4 ms·
There has been a request from the soviet government to make it as similar as possible to the Space Shuttle programme. There were some compromises made due to di
by marvin_yorke 8y ago
There has been a request from the soviet government to make it as similar as possible to the Space Shuttle programme. There were some compromises made due to different reasons, like available engine types and location of the launchpad, but mostly it's an exact copy. There's a nice article in Russian that explains the history of this project https://habr.com/post/412271/ https://habr.com/post/412271/
- avmich 8y agoNot only Buran was riding atop of self-capable Energiya and therefore didn't carry big engines. Buran was unmanned-first, which required quite a bit of ingenuity back in 1980-s. It had bigger payload than the Shuttle. One of better features of Buran was nontoxic propellants onboard. Buran's RCS were oxygen-kerosene, and LOX was stored onboard - liquid - for a month-long flight duration. That's something which Shuttle and today's SpaceX designs still lack; after Shuttle landing first order of importance is to get rid of remains of very toxic onboard propellants. Same for Dragon.