British company in 'space first'

Citation

(1999), "British company in 'space first'", Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, Vol. 71 No. 4. https://doi.org/10.1108/aeat.1999.12771daf.004

British company in 'space first'

British company in "space first"

Keywords: Marshall, Flight, Aerospace, Launching

British company, Marshall Aerospace, has played a major role in the design of the groundbreaking re-usable launch vehicle X-34, for NASA. The X-34 will be launched into space from a TriStar modified by Marshall's for the purpose, up to 25 times over the period of a year, with the objective of demonstrating the possibilities of hypersonic flight at altitudes of up to 250,000ft (47 miles).

Marshall, which has a 70 year track record in aircraft design, modification, maintenance and repair, originally customised the Lockheed L10-11 "Stargazer" aircraft in 1994. This modification involved major alterations to the aircraft structure as well as complex changes to its interior in order to launch Pegasus satellite launch rockets for orbital Space Sciences Corporation of America. The aircraft takes the Pegasus rocket launch vehicle to 39,000ft, at which point the rocket is released, blasting off into space to place satellites into low earth orbit at approximately 235 miles. These satellite launches are achieved at a fraction of the cost of a conventional ground launch and are only made possible by complex and very close tolerance modifications to the TriStar wide-bodied aeroplane. There have, to date, been 12 successful satellite launches, with the most recent one this year (Plate 3).

Marshall is currently further modifying Stargazer to carry X-34, a NASA hypersonic space research vehicle which is being used to develop opportunities for space travel into the next century. All design, modification and testing of the aircraft systems have been undertaken at Marshall's Cambridge facility and, during the next few months, exhaustive flight testing of the TriStar and the X-34 will be undertaken.

Plate 3 The complex umbilical cords which provide vital services from the Stargazer aeroplane to the X-34 rocket; for safety reasons, it is essential that each umbilical cord is disconnected in the correct order

A major milestone was achieved recently at NASA's Dryden facility in California when an X-34 rocket was "mated" for the first time to the TriStar aircraft. X-34, weighing in at some 50,000lbs or 25 tons, will be the heaviest object ever dropped from an aircraft in flight and its size would dwarf a number of light aircraft. Integration of the X-34 vehicle with the TriStar is an exceedingly challenging engineering feat with few organisations world-wide having the breadth of engineering required.

Marshall Aerospace is also tendering, as part of the Lockheed Consortium, for the ASTOR long-range stand-off surface surveillance system for the three armed forces, providing enemy territory and closer-range intelligence.

Details from Group Support Executive, Marshall Aerospace. Tel: +44 (0)1223 373737; Fax: +44 (0)1223 321032; E-mail: terry.holloway@marshallaerospace.com