Orbital is building two additional X-34 vehicles that will be used as technology demonstrators for Reusable Launch Vehicles later this year. This years field tests will encompass the first approach and landing tests followed by 26 unpowered and powered flights for which NASA has contracted with Orbital.

"The shipment of the first X-34 vehicle marks the transition from the development phase of the program to the field test phase," said Dr. Robert E. Lindberg, Orbital's Vice President and X-34 Program Manager. "When fully operational, the X-34 will validate and expand the high-speed and high- altitude flight research last carried out by NASA's X-15 spaceplane more than 30 years ago," Lindberg concluded.

At Dryden, the X-34 will be subjected to a series of ground and in-flight tests using Orbital's L-1011 carrier aircraft. A team of 15 Orbital engineers and technicians will operate and maintain the spaceplane during these tests. An objective of the X-34 program is to demonstrate that a reusable launch vehicle can be economically flown using a small ground support team.

The X-34 is a fully reusable test-bed vehicle that is 58 feet long with a wing span of almost 28 feet. It will be air-launched from beneath Orbital's L-1011 carrier aircraft in similar fashion to Orbital's well-known Pegasus rocket.

The X-34 program will demonstrate new technologies that are key to developing and operating RLVs designed to significantly reduce the cost of launching satellites into orbit.

Among the technologies that X-34 will demonstrate are an all-composite airframe structure, composite fuel tanks, state-of-the-art thermal protection materials, and autonomous control and landing systems, as well as the ability to conduct flight operations through inclement weather and to safely abort space missions.

In addition to its role as a demonstration vehicle for RLV technology, the X-34 has also been designed as a versatile platform with the ability to host a wide variety of high-speed aerospace research projects or micro-gravity experiments, among others.

Motorola Satellites Key to RLVs
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Satellite Launch To Boost DTH In India
Calcutta, India (SPX) Dec 28, 2005
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