Launch Condition Deviations of Reusable Launch Vehicle Simulations in Exo-Atmospheric Zoom Climbs

By: Nasa, National Aeronautics and Space Adm

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has proposed a two-stage system to deliver a small payload to orbit. The proposal calls for an airplane to perform an exo-atmospheric zoom climb maneuver, from which a second-stage rocket is launched carrying the payload into orbit. The NASA Dryden Flight Research Center has conducted an in-house generic simulation study to determine how accurately a human-piloted airplane can deliver a second-stage rocket to a desired exo-atmospheric launch condition. A high-performance, fighter-type, fixed-base, real-time, pilot-in-the-loop airplane simulation has been modified to perform exo-atmospheric zoom climb maneuvers. Four research pilots tracked a reference trajectory in the presence of winds, initial offsets, and degraded engine thrust to a second-stage launch condition. These launch conditions have been compared to the reference launch condition to characterize the expected deviation. At each launch condition, a speed change was applied to the second-stage rocket to insert the payload onto a transfer orbit to the desired operational orbit. The most sensitive of the test cases was the degraded thrust case, yielding second-stage launch energies that were too low to achieve the radius of the desired operational orbit. The handling qualities of the airplane, as a first-stage vehicle, have also been investigated.Urschel, Peter H. and Cox, Timothy H.Armstrong Flight Research CenterAEROMANEUVERING; CLIMBING FLIGHT; REUSABLE LAUNCH VEHICLES; TRANSFER ORBITS; PAYLOAD TRANSFER; SIMULATION; TRAJECTORIES; CONTROLLABILITY

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1723735639
• ISBN13: 9781723735639
• Release Date: January 1
• Publisher: Independently Published
• Length: 40 Pages
• Weight: 0.26 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.1" x 8.5" x 11.0"