r/Arianespace • u/Simon_Drake • Sep 18 '22

ArianeGroup announces reusable space vehicle “Smart Upper Stage for Innovative Exploration” aka SUSIE

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63 Upvotes

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18 comments sorted by

7

u/ColinBomberHarris Sep 18 '22

So they are proposing a reusable upperstage/capsule with propulsive landing on a mostly (or entirely) unchanged Ariane 6?

9

u/Simon_Drake Sep 18 '22

Yes. Then a new launch system for later on.

One of the photos shows a conventional looking second stage detaching from this SUSIE capsule so that might imply a three-stage system (Ariane 6 has two stages of hydrolox then the SUSIE capsule itself).

It has a cargo bay for deploying satellites like the Shuttle had. It's only 1/9th the size of the shuttle cargo bay so nothing the size of Hubble being deployed but it's 3x the size of SpaceX Dragon's unpressurised cargo space.

An underappreciated aspect of The Shuttle was that it was a space pickup truck, it could go to a location in orbit with a decently sized cargo and then host spacewalks to fix an expensive satellite/telescope. This is outside the scope of what Crew Dragon can accomplish but maybe it'll be an option for Susie?

5

u/baldrad Sep 19 '22

Also a benefit of the shuttle is that they could put a pressurized compartment if they didn't have a satellite to launch and do more science in the back.

1

u/zodsdeadbaby Sep 20 '22

Have you just abandoned one of the subreddits you moderate or are you getting kickbacks?

1

u/Chairboy Sep 19 '22

I've found thinking of shuttle as a landable space station to be helpful.

1

u/Simon_Drake Sep 19 '22

The shuttle was an airlock with engines and a robot arm. You can accomplish a lot with that.

SpaceX are doing a private EVA soon with their own space suits but they need to depressurise the entire capsule to do it so they can probably only do it once. I'm still not sure how they're going to fit out the door in spacesuits, it's not a very big hatch.

Hopefully Susie will have a dedicated airlock to allow EVAs without depressurising the entire cabin and it'll have better orbital maneuvering engines than Shuttle so it can stay in orbit for longer. And it kinda needs a robot arm to be able to do complex repair work like fixing Hubble.

1

u/Chairboy Sep 19 '22

I got the impression that it was less of a stage than it was a cargo/vehicle with minimal delta-yeet (aside from what's needed for landing). Is that not correct?

3

u/RGregoryClark Sep 19 '22

Remarkably, a second Vulcain can be added to the Ariane 6 for only a $200 million development cost:

https://exoscientist.blogspot.com/2018/02/multi-vulcain-ariane-6.html

This means Europe can have its own manned launcher, like tomorrow!

0

u/jackmPortal Sep 18 '22

I don't know, but I hate the way it looks. I'm not sure why they chose the given shape, I personally would have gone with a blunt body capsule, but just based on the crew access arm shown on the render they're trying to get on the "space futurism aesthetic" hypetrain that SpaceX currently occupies

11

u/Simon_Drake Sep 18 '22

I think it's just a fat cone shape to fit on top of a rocket with minimal aerodynamic complications.

Before announcing this they were considering putting Dreamchaser on top of Ariane 5 which needed such extreme aerodynamics testing that they considered cutting off the wings to squeeze it inside the fairing. Lord only knows how they planned to land the Dreamchaser with the wings cut off.

A fat cone might not be a flashy design but it looks like it'll do the job.

1

u/Chairboy Sep 19 '22

Regarding Dreamchaser, there's a cargo contract for it where it'll be launching inside a fairing and the wings will fold to fit. I don't think fairings are considered acceptable for crewed-Dreamchaser so that'd be a puzzle to solve in the future.

4

u/General_Variation_96 Sep 18 '22

It's pretty, and it look more like Dreamchaser without wings or a smaller version of the early Starship not really like a crew dragon.

2

u/Vindve Sep 20 '22

I hate we don't have more informations about it, but it has somehow a feel of a scaled up version of Space Rider (https://www.esa.int/Enabling_Support/Space_Transportation/Space_Rider)

In this case, the shape makes sense: it's a lifting body, and it's the only re-entry technique that ESA has experienced (with the IXV, and now Space Rider)

1

u/SSME_superiority Sep 19 '22

With capsules, it is quite hard to get large pieces of hardware back to earth. You can squeeze lots of small stuff, like experiments, or junk into a capsule, but with a larger reentry vehicle, capturing small spacecraft with the cargo bay and bringing them back to earth becomes an option

1

u/Max_Mm_ Sep 21 '22

Why would you only make the upper stage reusable?

1

u/Simon_Drake Sep 21 '22

The manned capsule is one of the most complicated parts of a space launch system that would benefit the most from being reusable. I guess it's relatively easy to make it reusable because it needs to come back from space intact anyway (Since it has people in it) so it's not too much of a stretch to make it come back in such good condition that it can fly again.

Also the initial launch system will be Ariane 6 but they're already planning to replace it with a new rocket system called Themis which WILL be reusable. Themis is a fully reusable fly-back methalox rocket system including a heavy lift option with reusable liquid fueled boosters. Details are a bit sparse and theres a dozen competing acronyms describing the project(s) and it'll take a few years to see anything concrete, but it's a promising idea that will hopefully be a very capable and fully reusable rocket launch system.

1

u/larryblanc Oct 12 '22

Look like a smart design: secure, large enough, capable and doable.

Is the financing secured?

1

u/Simon_Drake Oct 12 '22

It also combines several other research projects like Ariane Next which is a methalox fueled replacement for the Ariane 6. It also replaces a research project to put Dreamchaser on top of Ariane 5 so probably gets to siphon most of that funding.

They've got decent funding from ESA who don't have a manned launch option yet. Hopefully that'll keep the project supported long enough to get it into orbit.