Post by Blackbird on Aug 10, 2004 16:12:29 GMT -5
NASA is considering asking for funding for an X-37 flight test vehicle. This will provide the agency has a sustainable research and technology program in space transportation. There will be a need for a research vehicle after X-33. And one of the facts of the hypersonic or the very high speed vehicle business is that the place to validate systems and components is in-flight. So the team at Marshall and other centers, is working to put together a sustainable research and technology program with flight demonstration, where appropriate, in the investment strategy, that is called X-37 by some. The intended objective of the program is to demonstrate the next generation of technologies. The technologies in X-33 are frozen at 1994. Assuming success at this level of technology, the future requirements of NASA and the commercial industry are going to require a next generation of technologies, and NASA would be ready to develop those and to validate them in the X-37 experimental flight program. While the X-33 is a demonstrator for Earth-to-orbit technologies, Future X demonstrators will flight test technologies for multiple applications including orbital and commercial transport, military spaceplane, human exploration, multi-stage and hypersonics research.
In December 1998 NASA selected the Boeing Company, Downey, Calif., for negotiations leading to possible award of a four-year cooperative agreement to develop the first in a continuous series of advanced technology flight demonstrators called Future-X. The total value of the cooperative agreement, including NASA and Boeing contributions, is estimated at $150 million, with an approximate 50/50 sharing agreement.
Work conducted under this initiative may include:
Development of core technologies for low-cost space transportation.
Pathfinder vehicle flight tests to prove focused technologies that require a flight environment validation.
Trailblazer vehicles integrated flight demonstrations that validate a vareity of technologies and operations, along with performance and economic feasibility. Possible concepts include all-rocket and air-breathing systems, single and two-stage systems.
Work under this cooperative agreement will begin immediately after successful negotiations. In addition, three companies and three NASA Centers were selected for seven Future-X flight experiments with an estimated value of $24 million. The Future-X effort is managed by the Space Transportation Programs Office at NASA's Marshall Space Fight Center, Huntsville, Ala.
Future-X vehicles and flight experiments will demonstrate technologies that improve performance and reduce development, production and operating costs of future Earth-to-orbit and in-space transportation systems. Under the cooperative agreement Boeing and NASA will advance 29 separate space transportation technologies through development and flight demonstrations of a modular orbital flight testbed called the Advanced Technology Vehicle (ATV). The ATV is first-ever experimental vehicle that will be flown in both orbital and reentry environments.
In December 1998 NASA selected the Boeing Company, Downey, Calif., for negotiations leading to possible award of a four-year cooperative agreement to develop the first in a continuous series of advanced technology flight demonstrators called Future-X. The total value of the cooperative agreement, including NASA and Boeing contributions, is estimated at $150 million, with an approximate 50/50 sharing agreement.
Work conducted under this initiative may include:
Development of core technologies for low-cost space transportation.
Pathfinder vehicle flight tests to prove focused technologies that require a flight environment validation.
Trailblazer vehicles integrated flight demonstrations that validate a vareity of technologies and operations, along with performance and economic feasibility. Possible concepts include all-rocket and air-breathing systems, single and two-stage systems.
Work under this cooperative agreement will begin immediately after successful negotiations. In addition, three companies and three NASA Centers were selected for seven Future-X flight experiments with an estimated value of $24 million. The Future-X effort is managed by the Space Transportation Programs Office at NASA's Marshall Space Fight Center, Huntsville, Ala.
Future-X vehicles and flight experiments will demonstrate technologies that improve performance and reduce development, production and operating costs of future Earth-to-orbit and in-space transportation systems. Under the cooperative agreement Boeing and NASA will advance 29 separate space transportation technologies through development and flight demonstrations of a modular orbital flight testbed called the Advanced Technology Vehicle (ATV). The ATV is first-ever experimental vehicle that will be flown in both orbital and reentry environments.