h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: HOTOL - The British Space Plane - A46072370
Author: Ictoan S.H.A.D.O.W. Secretary - AWE - WAWi - U173821

been a while since I've done an entry so be nice

Not sure if the Space Shuttle link meets the guidelines?

Info on HOTOL is a bit patchy so any extra input more than welcome.

Looks good to me. You shouldnt have a Header (What is HOTOL?' right at the start though.

Also it would be worth giving some brief biographical/orientation info about Alan Bond, perhaps in a footnote.

I may have more to contribute later as I could well have some extra info in one of my scrapbooks.

A

good points. not sure about the bio stuff though - if it is important enough we should really give the fella his own entry, no?

"as I could well have some extra info in one of my scrapbooks"
Oooh, please if you do!

I am thinking of branching a couple of extra entries off this one - one on the RB545 engine cos it was quite a departure and perhaps include that as part of a general one of LACE engines. But we'll see.

Well, when I said 'brief' biographical details I meant just that. Perhaps just one sentence to orientate people as to who he is/what else he's done. At the moment we're just left baldly with a name.

It should be in the first line (capital S)

<>
This would correspond to *switching while* travelling at around *Mach* 6

<>
Instead, BAe approached Russia

Ta, done

Both of them - agree on the Alan Bond thing. And yes, Project Daedalus is on my todo list!

I have a booklet prepared by British National Space Centre in 1986. There is a whole page dedicated to HOTOL:

"At a take off speed of some 340mph (550kph) it will leave the trolley, and, climbing at an angle of about 24 degrees, reach a height of 40,000ft (12,000m), clear of all commercial airlainers, some 4.5 to 5 minutes later. In less than 10 minutes, it will be some 26km above the earth and travelling at a speed approaching Mach 4."

It goes on

"Orbital velocity will be achieved at a height of 90km, and then the main propulsion system will be cut, allowing the craft to coast on up and stabilise in orbit at an operational height of about 300km".

I could scan and email it to you if you like?

Poignantly:
(a) ensure you include the metric conversions. The units are somewhat mixed presently
(b) Make reference to BNSC. "BNSC is now jointly supporting full-scale proof-of-concept studies by British Aerospace and Rolls Royce".

Oooh yes please!

Either email me using ictoan with the address at lycos dot co dot uk
(although make it quick as lycos are ceasing their email ops in feb) or give me your address and I'll come round in the dead of night and nick the original article

So presumably the £2mill from the govt. was via the BNSC then?

(It took so much to not add a note saying 'another fine opportunity thrown away by the Thatcher govt.')

Done

got it -

You might do worse than to do a bit further research into post war Barnes Wallis.

I suspect, though I can’t prove it, that HOTOL had its origins with Wallis who was doing research in the 1960’s with almost exactly that idea in the shape of a very high flying SST. The STOL hypersonic airliner.

http://www.barneswallistrust.org/otherprojects.htm

He did I believe, once say that the Concorde design was all wrong, and that what they should have been designing was a transport aircraft that launched into space and let the destination come round to it. With hindsight we can see that he wasn’t altogether wrong.

He also had a model of an experimental SST flying in the form of the ‘Swallow’

Which only goes to show just how far sighted the man was. If only the governments of the time had had enough trust, what might have been…

Deke

Agreed: I have some artist impression stuff from NASA in the early 70s showing the shuttle piggy-backing into space on the back of a 747. I expect it's on the net somewhere, but I can scan and send what I have again.

I've added a note stating that the figures are not precise as the craft never actually existed.
The reason for this is that different sources quote slightly different figures.

For example, Mantague's flyer states take off at 340mph.
Whereas http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1986/1986%20-%200488.html states 290kt which is 333mph. Hence also the variation in payload figures.

From what I've read the HOTOL origins were really with the Bond engine in that it was that which allowed the whole concept to go ahead. Not to diss Barnes Wallis though - just been looking through the link at the bit where is arguing against a third airport in London - interesting overtones for today!

made a couple of other minor changes

Looks like you were bang on the money Deke:

http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1985/1985%20-%202122.html

Hmmm - hey Deke - fancy doing a Barnes Wallis entry? There's only 1 unedited article so far and to have only a footnote in this article seems almost insulting to his memory.

As HOTOL was never built, you need to put all of the design section in the conditional tense, ie using 'coulds' and 'woulds':

Once at this height the main engine cuts out and the craft then continues on to its orbital height of 300km.
-->
Once at this height the main engine would cut out and the craft would then continue on to its orbital height of 300km.

Alex

done (I think, let me know if you spot any).
Also tidied up some unwieldy sentences and phrasings. Still seems a bit stilted to me.

I'm sorry; although I think that the entry is fine, I have to ask.

Is there any history to the 'why' they named it HOTOL (HOrizontal Take Off and Landing)?

If it were just to differentiate it for VTOL (Vertical Take Off and Landing), it seems unnecessary that they would use a name to mentally separate it from a non-space plane.

Aren't virtually ALL planes (sea, air, or space), HOrizontal Take Off and Landing in design?

What's the real reason that the name was chosen? Would it be as comfortable as a hotel?

Inquiring minds want to know.

because it conventional space launch at the time was a space rocket.
The shuttle was new but was also a vertical take off although horizontal landing. Ariane series was the main contender in europe and that was a conventional rocket.

So, in true engineering geek style they named it after what it did
Which was (and indeed 20 something years later still would be) unique.

Perhaps it is my use of 'space plane' that lead to the confusion - it isn't really a plane as in a passenger vehicle more an automated satelite (or other payload) delivery system.

But I thought that 'HOTOL' as a title on its own would be a little stark and meaningless to those not already aware of it.

What do people think, change the title?