Declassified spacecrafts and orbital weapons of the USSR – Russia

Fighting orbital laser station “Polyus” / “Skif”

(THE USSR)

Specifications

Length: 37.00 m (121.39 ft)

Maximum Diameter: 4.10 m (13.5 ft)

Mass: 80,000 kg (180,000 lb)

Associated Launch Vehicle: Energia.

Intended orbit: altitude 280 km (170 mi), inclination 64°

Targeting system: optical, radar, with low-yield laser for final targeting

Armament: 1-megawatt carbon-dioxide laser

The Polyus spacecraft (Russian: Полюс, pole), also known as Polus, Skif-DM, GRAU index 17F19DM, was a prototypeorbital weapons platform designed to destroy SDI satellites with a megawatt carbon-dioxide laser.[1] It had a Functional Cargo Block derived from a TKS spacecraft to control its orbit and it could fire test targets to demonstrate the fire control system.

The Polyus spacecraft was launched 15 May 1987 from Baikonur Cosmodrome Site 250 as part of the first flight of the Energiasystem,[2] but failed to reach orbit.

According to Yuri Kornilov, Chief Designer of the Salyut Design Bureau, shortly before Polyus’ launch, Mikhail Gorbachev visited the Baikonur Cosmodrome and expressly forbade the in-orbit testing of its capabilities. Kornilov claims that Gorbachev was worried that it would be possible for Western governments to view this activity as an attempt to create a weapon in space and that such an attempt would contradict the country’s previous statements on the USSR’s peaceful intent.[3]

For technical reasons, the payload was launched upside down. It was designed to separate from the Energia, rotate 180 degrees in yaw, then 90 degrees in roll and then fire its engine to complete its boost to orbit. The Energia functioned perfectly. However, after disconnecting from Energia, the Polyus spun a full 360 degrees instead of the planned 180 degrees. When the rocket fired, it slowed and burned up in the atmosphere over the south Pacific ocean. This failure was attributed to a faultyinertial guidance system that had not been rigorously tested due to the rushed production schedule.[4]

Parts of the Polyus project’s hardware were re-used in Kvant-2, Kristall, Spektr and Priroda Mir modules, as well as in the ISSmodule Zarya.

NPO Energia received orders from the Soviet government to begin research on space-based strike weapons in the mid-70s. Even before, the USSR had been developing maneuverable satellites for the purpose of satellite interception. By the beginning of the 1980s, Energia had proposed two programs: laser-equipped Skif and guided missiles platform Kaskad (where Skif would cover the low-orbit targets, Kaskad engaged targets in high and geosynchronous orbits). Together with NPO Astrofizika and KBSalyut, they began developing their orbital weapons platform based on the Salyut DOS-17K frame.

Later, when the objective of ICBM interception proved too difficult, the aims of the project were shifted towards anti-satellite weapons. The 1983 announcement by the US of their SDI program prompted further political and financial support for the satellite interceptor program. In the nuclear exchange scenario, the interceptors would destroy the SDI satellites, followed by a so-called “pre-emptive retaliation” large-scale Soviet ICBM launch.

The laser chosen for the Skif spacecraft was the 1-megawatt carbon-dioxide laser, developed for the Beriev A-60 aircraft (an Il-76 flying laboratory with a combat laser). The introduction of the Energia, capable of launching about 95 tonnes into orbit, finally allowed the spacecraft to accommodate the massive laser. The massive exhaust of the carbon-dioxide laser precipitated the objective of making the laser “recoil-less”. The zero-torque exhaust system (SBM) was developed to that end. Its testing in orbit meant the release of a large cloud of carbon dioxide, which would hint at the satellite’s purpose. Instead, the xenon-krypton mix would be used to simultaneously test the SBM and perform an innocent experiment on Earth’s ionosphere.

In 1985, the decision was made to test-launch the new Energia launch vehicle, which was still in the testbed phase. A 100-ton dummy payload was initially considered for the launch, but in a series of last-minute changes, it was decided that the almost-completed Skif spacecraft would be launched instead for a 30-day mission.

The launch May 15, 1987, shot by 24 cameras from different angles.

Prelaunch installation 04.02.1987

The development of the real Skif was completed in just one year, from September 1985 to September 1986. Testing and tweaking the Energia launch vehicle, the launch pad and the Skif itself moved the launch to February, and later to May 1987. According to Boris Gubanov, the head designer of the Energia launch vehicle, the work schedule of the preceding years was exhausting, and at the point of Mikhail Gorbachev’s visit on 11 May, he asked the Soviet premier to clear the launch now, because “there will be heart attacks”.

The catastrophic malfunction that led to Skif entering the atmosphere in the same area as Energia’s second stage was successfully investigated. It was found that 568 seconds after launch, the timing control device gave the logical block a command to discard the side modules’ covers and laser exhaust covers. Unknowingly, the same command was earlier used to open the solar panels and disengage the maneuvering thrusters. This wasn’t discovered because of the logistics of the testing process and overall haste. Main thrusters engaged while the Skif kept turning, overshooting the intended 180-degree turn. The spacecraft lost speed and reverted to the ballistic trajectory.

Air-orbital plane “Spiral”

Aerospace System “Spiral” – space application system consisting of the orbital plane, which is the start of the air technology was displayed in hypersonic space plane, overclockers, and then stage rocket into orbit.

Source of image WIKIPEDIA

The “Spiral”, launched in 1960, was a response to the creation of the US space program interceptor reconnaissance-bomber, the X-20, “the Dyna Soar”

Plane-overclockers

Powerful airship overclockers (weight 52 tons, length 38 meters, wingspan of 16.5 m) was dispersed to six times the speed of sound (6M), then with his “back” at an altitude of 28-30 km was supposed to start a 10-ton manned orbital plane 8 m long and 7.4 m span.

“The plane-overclockers to 6 Mach suggests the possibility of use as a passenger plane, airliner, which, of course, was rational: its high speed characteristics would allow to raise the rate of civil aviation.”

Plane-overclockers was the first technologically revolutionary detailed design of hypersonic aircraft with jet engines. At the 40th Congress of the International Aeronautical Federation (the FAI), which took place in 1989 in Malaga (Spain), representatives of the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA’s) gave the plane-overclockers high praise, noting that he “was designed in accordance with the modern requirements. “

In view of the requirements of a lot of money for brand new motor, aerodynamic and material science technologies for the creation of such a hypersonic-overclockers aircraft in the latest versions of the project was considered less costly and more quickly achievable possibility of creating not a hypersonic and supersonic overclockers, as is considered modified shock-reconnaissance aircraft T-4 ( “100”), however it was not realized.

BOR space drone

The BOR-4 (Bespilotnyi Orbital’nyi Raketoplan 4, “Unpiloted Orbital Rocketplane 4”) flight vehicle is a scaled (1:2) prototype of the Soviet Spiral VTHL (vertical takeoff, horizontal landing)spaceplane. An unmanned, subscale spacecraft, its purpose was to test the heatshield tiles and reinforced carbon-carbon for the Buran space shuttle, then under development.[1]

Several of them were built and flown between 1982 and 1984 from the Kapustin Yar launch site at speeds of up to Mach 25. After reentry, they were designed to parachute to an ocean splashdown for recovery by the Soviet Navy. The testing was nearly identical to that carried out by the US Air Force ASSET program in the 1960s, which tested the heatshield design for the X-20 Dyna-Soar. On June 3, 1982 a Royal Australian Air Force P-3 Orion reconnaissance aircraft captured the first Western images of the craft as it was recovered by a Soviet ship near the Cocos Islands.[2]

Source

BOR Images source

Source 2

Russian Aerospace Plane

Possible Features

   Length 7900 mm

   Wingspan mm 3600

   Starting weight, kg 2200

   The stock of liquid oxygen, 18 kg

   Speed range, Max 6 … 14

Russian Aerospace Plane (RAKS) is created as part of the research work “Eagle” by order of the Russian Aerospace Agency in 1993.

Main targets:

– The integration of scramjet and airframe;

– Study questions work ramjet engine in real hypersonic flight at cruising speed up to M = 14;

– The study of the thermal problems associated with operating ramjet engine and aerodynamic heating of the airframe;

– Dynamic throttling in a hypersonic scramjet flight;

– Check ground flight test experiments

Kliper

Kliper was a proposed partly reusable manned spacecraft by RSC Energia. Due to lack of funding from the ESA and RSA, the project has been indefinitely postponed as of 2006. Source

Designed primarily to replace the Soyuz spacecraft, Kliper was proposed in two versions: as a pure lifting body design and asspaceplane with small wings. In either case, the craft would have been able to glide into the atmosphere at an angle that produces much less stress on the human occupants than the current Soyuz. Kliper was intended to be designed to be able to carry up to six people and to perform ferry services between Earth and the International Space Station.