NASA’s Next-Gen Spacelaunch System Could Launch Scramjets from a enormous Railgun [Space]

With the Space Shuttle program winding down, NASA and a number of other commercial ventures are developing technology so we can hurl the following iteration of space vehicles into the sky. But NASA acknowledges that rockets aren’t the only–or the best–way to get into space.

Engineers at the gap agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida are exploring future space launch schemes which could see spacecraft flung into the heavens by a large railgun or launched to the upper atmosphere aboard supersonic scramjets. Or, even cooler: both.

If space launches are anything, they’re expensive. As such, launch vehicles which are reusable (like the gap shuttles) are key to keeping costs under control. One such scheme for reusable launch craft involves ferrying payloads to the upper limits of the atmosphere aboard scramjets , those air-compressing, high-speed jets with theoretical top speeds more than four times faster than the fastest air-breathing jet engines.

In this type of scheme, a payload vehicle (holding, say, a satellite) would piggyback to high altitude aboard the scramjet, which in theory could reach near-orbital speeds. From the upper atmosphere, the payload vehicle would launch from the scramjet propelled by something comparable to the second stage of a booster rocket, putting the satellite or maybe a manned vehicle into orbital space without the incredible thrust needed to launch it from the ground.

But how does NASA plan to get the scramjet to the supersonic speeds necessary for sustained flight? Picture a big railgun rising from the ground at Kennedy Space Center. Using an electrified track stretching for miles, the track would use a magnetic field (or even gas propulsion, or perhaps magnetic levitation – these things is all still a great deal on the drawing board) to accelerate scramjets to otherworldly speeds without expending the large amounts of chemical energy needed to fireplace a rocket booster. Once a scramjet is moving fast enough, the jet engine would take over and propel it spaceward.

For now rockets are still NASA’s principle launch vehicles, so don’t expect any spacecraft-hurling railguns or regular hypersonic flights to the threshold of space within the immediate future. But these technologies already exist in some nascent form or another. Both NASA and DARPA were dabbling in scramjet technology for years, creating an enormous body of data and information for engineers to build upon. For their part, railguns were around for almost a century. The whole technologies involved need further refinement, but none are out of reach.

Put in a different way: NASA is dreaming up massive railguns to launch hypersonic space vehicles into the atmosphere at blinding speeds. What’s not to like?

[ NASA via Space.com ]

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This post is tagged: kennedy space center, launch vehicles, magnetic levitation, space engineers, space shuttle program, upper atmosphere