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15.06.2014

Angara rocket family (Credit: Roscosmos)

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On June 25, 2014, the first scheduled test launch of the new booster “Angara will occur from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome.

Angara is a new generation of modular carrier rockets with oxygen-kerosene engines. The Angara launch vehicle family includes light, medium and heavy classes capable of launching payloads weighing from 3.8 to 35 metric tons.

Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center is the lead developer and manufacturer of the booster.

The first launches of Angara rockets of various classes will be carried out using a single launch complex.

A distinctive feature of “Angara” launch vehicle is the use environmentally friendly and inexpensive oxygen and kerosene.

Quellle: Roscosmos

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Update: 19.06.2014

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Russia has begun testing its new Angara rocket carrier at the northern Plesetsk Cosmodrome, Arkhangelsk Region.

The cosmodrome’s crew has finished testing the rocket’s components and systems and has begun comprehensive rocket tests. “Based on the results of the comprehensive tests, the state commission will make the final decision on Angara’s readiness for the first launch,” Colonel Alexei Zolotukhin, the Defense Ministry’s spokesperson for the Aerospace Defense Troops, told ITAR-TASS on Thursday, June 26.

The first launch of the light-weight version of the rocket is scheduled for June 27.

Russia has stepped up preparations for the first launch of its new Angara rocket carrier, Deputy Defense Minister Yuri Borisov said earlier.

“We have done a tremendous amount of work to step up preparations for the Angara launch and to catch up with the schedule,” he said.

Russia will launch its new Angara rocket carrier this year, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said.

“Angara has such characteristics that I hope it will be able to compete with the world’s best analogues in the future. The rocket was fully designed and made in Russia, using environmentally friendly fuel components - oxygen and kerosene,” the prime minister said.

“What is important is that we have laid the solid scientific and technical groundwork for improving our space systems and infrastructure,” he said.

The new rocket carrier will be used to launch both civilian and military spacecraft and for international space cooperation projects.

The Angara project

Angara is one of the priorities in the development of the Plesetsk spaceport. In November 2013, a full-scale mock-up of the rocket was for the first time put up on the launch pad. It was a fully operational rocket but intended for ground testing only, not for launching.

Work to create the ground infrastructure for the new rocket and prepare an Angara launch is part of the federal program for the development of Russia’s cosmodromes in 2006-2015.

Zolotukhin said that there had been a lag of up to six months in the work on some elements of the ground infrastructure. Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu had to take the situation under his personal control and ordered video cameras to be installed at the construction site to monitor the work round the clock.

Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) Chief Oleg Ostapenko said that work on the Angara rocket carrier was now proceeding as scheduled.

“We stick to the schedule. Work is now in progress to create a medium lift launch vehicle and in parallel with that we will move over to the heavy version Angara-5. Work is also underway to create the Soyuz-2 rocket and space system, and we plan to use the builders’ capacities for constructing the launch pad for Angara,” Ostapenko said.

A super-heavy lift launch vehicle will be able to carry a payload of 80 tonnes to low-earth orbits. In the future, its capacity can be increased to 160 tonnes and more.

The launch site for super-heavy lift vehicles will be built at Russia’s new Vostochny Cosmodrome now under construction in the Far Eastern Amur Region.

Khrunichev Space Centre Director-General Alexander Seliverstov said that the Angara development had reached the flight test stage and the focus was on finalizing the launch site in Plesetsk.

The Angara 1.2 vehicle was shipped to Plesetsk in late May 2013 to allow adequate time for extensive testing and interface verification efforts being performed prior to the planned launch in the first half of 2014. The Angara 5 vehicle is expected to launch later in 2014, he said.

Seliverstov said that light and heavy versions of Angara rockets would be launched in 2014 and work was proceeding as scheduled.

“The first rocket is to be launched in 2014,” Seliverstov said.

A heavy version of the rocket is being assembled. “Work is proceeding as scheduled. We have to make the heavy version before the end of the year as its launch is scheduled for the end of 2014,” he said last year.

Angara will allow Russia to launch all kinds of spacecraft to any orbit. Now Russia can launch heavy satellites only aboard Proton rockets from Baikonur, which it leases from Kazakhstan for about $115 million annually.

According to Khrunichev, a big advantage of the new rocket carrier is that “it is a universal space rocket system” capable of taking three types of rockets into space: light with a payload of up to 3.5 tonnes, medium with a payload of up to 14.6 tonnes, and heavy with a payload of up to 24.5 tonnes.

Medium lift and heavy lift launch vehicles can take payloads to the geostationary orbit as well.

The vehicle uses a unique engineering solution: the carrier can be assembled of the same modules. Their maximum number is five in a heavy version, three in a medium version, and one in a light version. They can all be launched form the same pad, not like now at Baikonur where each carrier requires its own launching pad.

The Angara class of rockets comprises four types of vehicles, with payload capacities ranging between 3.7 tones (light class, intended for low orbits) and 28.5 tonnes.

The rockets are based on a universal rocket module powered by the RD-191 engine using kerosene and liquid oxygen. One such module makes up the first stage of the light class Angara 1.1 and Angara 1.2 boosters. Their second stages are different. The medium and heavy class boosters Angara-3 and Angara 4 are an extension of the light class types with additional three or four universal modules. Depending on the specific tasks, the booster can be equipped with the Briz-M or KVRB accelerator units.

Angara rockets will not use aggressive and toxic heptyl-based fuel, which will make them much more environmentally friendly.

Quelle: ITARTASS

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Update: 28.06.2014

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Launch of Russia's Angara Rocket Postponed Moments Before Liftoff

The maiden voyage of Russia's first rocket of post-Soviet design, Angara, was scrubbed at the last moment Friday for reasons that are not yet known, Interfax reported. 

Lieutenant General Alexander Golovko told Interfax that the rocket's flight computer triggered an automatic launch abort moments before liftoff, and that the launch has been bumped to Saturday.

President Vladimir Putin, who was watching the launch alone in a large Kremlin conference room, told Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu — who was at the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia to preside over the launch – that he had one hour to analyze the situation and report back. 

Angara is an important project for the Russian space program, which has managed to stay afloat for 20 years by maintaining and upgrading proven Soviet-era technology. Angara is the first rocket the space industry has designed since the collapse of the Soviet union in 1991, and is intended to prove that Russia has a future in space.

Quelle: The Moscow Times

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Update: 1.07.2014

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Angara rocket to be removed from launch pad for additional checks

The rocket was scheduled to lift off from Plesetsk on June 27 but its launch was automatically cancelled and postponed for one day

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Russia’s new Angara-1.2PP carrier rocket will be removed from the launch pad at the northern Plesetsk Cosmodrome, Arkhangelsk Region, for additional checks after its flight scheduled for June 27 was cancelled.

“On the recommendation of the chief designer and the Military Space Defesce Troops, the Angara-1.2PP rocket will be removed from the launch table and sent to the assembly and test facility for additional checks,” the Khrunichev Space Centre, which made the vehicle, told ITAR-TASS on Monday, June 30.

The rocket was scheduled to lift off from Plesetsk on June 27 but its launch was automatically cancelled and postponed for one day but never took place. The rocket was not supposed to carry any payload. Its second stage with a test weight was to land at the Kura range in Kamchatka, 5,700 kilometres from the cosmodrome.

Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said earlier that Russia would launch the new Angara carrier rocket this year. “Angara has such characteristics that I hope it will be able to compete with the world’s best analogues in the future. The rocket was fully designed and made in Russia, using environmentally friendly fuel components - oxygen and kerosene,” he said.

“What is important is that we have laid the solid scientific and technical groundwork for improving our space systems and infrastructure,” the prime ministers added.

The new carrier rocket will be used to launch both civilian and military spacecraft and for international space cooperation projects.

Angara is one of the priorities in the development of the Plesetsk spaceport. In November 2013, a full-scale mock-up of the rocket was for the first time put up on the launch pad. It was a fully operational rocket but intended for ground testing only, not for launching.

Work to create the ground infrastructure for the new rocket and prepare an Angara launch is part of the federal program for the development of Russia’s cosmodromes in 2006-2015.

A super-heavy lift launch vehicle will be able to carry a payload of 80 tonnes to low-earth orbits. In the future, its capacity can be increased to 160 tonnes and more.

The launch site for super-heavy lift vehicles will be built at Russia’s new Vostochny Cosmodrome now under construction in the Far Eastern Amur Region.

 

Angara rocket

The Angara 1.2 vehicle was shipped to Plesetsk in late May 2013 to allow adequate time for extensive testing and interface verification efforts being performed prior to the planned launch in the first half of 2014. The Angara 5 vehicle is expected to be launched later in 2014. A heavy version of the rocket is being assembled.

Angara will allow Russia to launch all kinds of spacecraft to any orbit. Now Russia can launch heavy satellites only aboard Proton rockets from Baikonur, which it leases from Kazakhstan for about $115 million a year.

 

 

 

According to Khrunichev, a big advantage of the new rocket carrier is that “it is a universal space rocket system” capable of taking three types of rockets into space: light with a payload of up to 3.5 tonnes, medium with a payload of up to 14.6 tonnes, and heavy with a payload of up to 24.5 tonnes.

Medium lift and heavy lift launch vehicles can take payloads to the geostationary orbit as well.

The vehicle uses a unique engineering solution: the carrier can be assembled of the same modules. Their maximum number is five in a heavy version, three in a medium version, and one in a light version. They can all be launched form the same pad, not like now at Baikonur where each carrier requires its own launching pad.

The Angara class of rockets comprises four types of vehicles, with payload capacities ranging between 3.7 tones /light class, intended for low orbits/ and 28.5 tonnes.

The rockets are based on a universal rocket module powered by the RD-191 engine using kerosene and liquid oxygen. One such module makes up the first stage of the light class Angara 1.1 and Angara 1.2 boosters. Their second stages are different. The medium and heavy class boosters Angara-3 and Angara 4 are an extension of the light class types with additional three or four universal modules. Depending on the specific tasks, the booster can be equipped with the Briz-M or KVRB accelerator units.

Angara rockets will not use aggressive and toxic heptyl-based fuel, which will make them much more environmentally friendly.

 

 

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Quelle: ITARTASS

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Update: 2.07.2014

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Next Angara Launch Attempt Weeks Away

Russia's new Angara rocket will not fly any time soon, as engineers continue to work on making sure the vehicle is in full working order following Friday's aborted launch, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said Tuesday.

"The next launch will not, of course, be in the coming days. I think that it will take weeks before the Angara booster will be returned to the launch complex," Rogozin told journalists touring the construction site of Russia's Vostochny Cosmodrome, which will be the rocket's main launch site once it is finished in 2017.

Russia's reputation as a big-hitter in the sphere of technology rests on the fate of Angara — the first new rocket designed by the Russian space industry in more than 20 years.

To highlight the rocket's importance, the media was gathered en masse for Friday's attempt — breaking a decades-long tradition of testing new rockets out of the public eye.

A few minutes before Angara was schedule to take off, the state-run Rossia 24 television channel cut to a command center located somewhere in the Kremlin. The room was occupied by a single man who was watching the launch from afar — President Vladimir Putin.

When Angara's computer's detected a drop in oxidizer pressure — forcing the launch to be aborted just 19 seconds before liftoff — Putin consoled Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and gave permission and ordered space officials to take their time to ensure the vehicle is truly ready for launch.

However, in the wake of Friday's failure, official statements from Russian space and government officials concerning its causes have been scant, and Saturday passed without a second launch attempt being made.

Unidentified industry sources have said that a valve used to vent excess pressure from the liquid oxygen tank was "poorly sealed," hence the botched launch.

NPO Energomash, the maker of the Angara's RD-191 engine, passed the buck on Tuesday, saying in a statement that the liquid oxygen tank, which feeds oxidizer into the engine, is not part of their design.

Rogozin, who oversees the Russian space and defense industries, broke the official silence on Tuesday, telling the Angara project's detractors that they need to gain some perspective: "It has new engines, a new control system, and therefore it needs testing to polish it all off. It is necessary not to rush the work. It is not worth the risk. This rocket has been a long time in the making. She will fly, of course, but [we must] allow testing to be carried out. The launch was delayed as a failure was detected. The failure was detected by the system itself."

An unidentified space industry official said Tuesday that not even the chief designer knows when the new launch date will be, Interfax reported. The official went on to lambast the "technically illiterate" Russian media for using the incident as an excuse to once again decry the death of Russian space exploration — a favorite pastime of Russian space industry commentators since 1991.

Yury Karash, a space policy expert at the Russian Academy of Cosmonautics, told The Moscow Times on Tuesday that Angara's launch delays should not be overly dramatized, since everything about Angara is new and that "too much is at stake with this launch" to rush the process.

"[Angara] is supposed to replace the venerable, quite robust, but also quite poisonous Proton launch vehicle. Fifty years ago, when it was designed and put into service … people didn't really care about the environment. Now they do," Karash said.

The Federal Space Agency, or Roscosmos, launches the Proton rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The poisonous fuel used by the rocket has been a source of tension between Moscow and Almaty, as a recent string of Proton launch failures since 2010 has polluted the Kazakh countryside.

But environmentally conscious rocketry is not the only reason that Angara is an important project for Russia.

Make or Break

The history of the Angara rocket, which has spent nearly 20 years in development, in many ways reflects the troubles of the Russian space industry since 1991. Unsteady funding, industrial decay and a brain drain have forced the industry to temper its ambitions instead of acting as the driving force of innovation in the field.

Angara hit the drawing boards in 1995 as an ambitious, partially reusable family of rockets that can take light, medium and heavy payloads into orbit. The plan envisioned giving the Angara wings that would allow it to fly back to the cosmodrome like an airplane once it had used up most of its fuel. It would then be serviced and reused for later flights.

Reusability is the holy grail for a space industry that has only survived by learning to be frugal. Even so, it was clear by 2000 that the "flyback booster" idea was simply untenable, and the Khrunichev Space Center, which builds the Angara and Proton rockets, opted to roll back to a classic booster design — a missile.

Even in its more modest form, Angara quickly became a vital project for the Russian space industry.

"With the successful launch of Angara, Russia will prove that it may not just endlessly operate old Soviet technology, but can design and develop its own technology — Russian technology — and successfully put it in service," said Karash.

Furthermore, the heavy version of Angara, which one space industry source recently said would be tested by the end of December, is Russia's only hope of keeping up with the U.S. and Chinese space programs, as both nations are developing heavy boosters.

"I think that Russia has no choice [but to develop the Angara heavy] if it really wants to go beyond low Earth orbit or into deep space. And I am talking not only about launching automatic spacecraft beyond the Moon's orbit, but about human space exploration. If Russia is serious about this, it has no choice but to develop the Angara heavy rocket," Karash said.

Commercial Competition

Proton rockets generated huge sums of money in the 1990s, when Russia flooded the market with launch services for commercial satellites.

Today, Proton launches are sold by International Launch Services, a Virginia-based subsidiary of the Khrunichev Space Center.

Rachel Villain, a space industry analyst with Euroconsult, said in an e-mail that International Launch Services has sold 30 percent of the global satellite launches over the past decade. In total, companies selling launches of Russian rockets bring in $800 million to $1 billion annually, making commercial applications an important revenue source for Russian space companies.

The version of Angara that was set to fly on Friday, the Angara 1.2PP, is a medium class booster that will replace the Soyuz and Proton rockets for commercial and government satellite launches, said Pavel Luzin, a space policy expert at the Institute of World Economics and International Relations.

"There are now serious questions about how Angara can be commercially viable," Luzin said, as production of the Proton rocket is set to be phased out.

"When Proton was commercialized in the early 1990s, no one thought about the cost of its development — this was not possible with technology created in the U.S.S.R.," said Luzin. Instead, the only concern was the cost of producing each vehicle — the development work had been done long ago.

It is not clear how much has been spent on the research and development work for Angara. "I tried some time ago to calculate how much the development has cost over the past 30 years, but I couldn't do it — there isn't enough public information," Luzin said.

According to Luzin, it is clear that even if Angara rockets are produced at the same rate as Proton rockets, regardless of development costs, they will be more expensive than Proton. This raises questions about the viability of its commercial role, as the past few years have seen the emergence of new commercial launch providers such as the California-based SpaceX, a development that has driven down launch costs.  

Quelle: The Moscow Times

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Update: 5.07.2014

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Second attempt to launch Angara rocket may be made July 9 - daily

The first test launch of the light class rocket Angara-1.2PP was originally expected to take place on June 27

A second attempt to launch the Angara rocket from the northern Plesetsk space site may be made on Wednesday, July 9, the daily Kommersant said with reference to a source at the Russian Defence Ministry.

“On July 5 a government commission is to meet in session to make a decision whether the rocket is ready for launch,” the daily quotes the ministry’s official as saying. According to the source, there are no objective reasons to postpone further tests till a later date.

Kommersant’s sources in the space rocket industry share this view. After the rocket was removed from the launch pad and brought to the test and assembly hangar specialists briefly identified the glitch. The source said the launch had to be cancelled due to a faulty valve of the liquid oxygen tank. The valve’s malfunctioning was a result of sloppy assembly.

Specialists will be able to eliminate the problem on site, without transporting the rocket to the manufacturer - the Khrunichev space research and industrial centre. Otherwise, says Kommersant, the launch would have to be put off for much longer, up to several months.

The first test launch of the light class rocket Angara-1.2PP was originally expected to take place on June 27. The automatic control system stopped the countdown. The launch attempt was delayed for one day only to be cancelled again.

The designer of the first stage engine RD-191 blamed the failure on a fall in the pressure of the oxidizer tank.

There were no plans for putting payloads in space. Under the test’s program the inseparable payload dummy and the second stage were to reach the designated site at the Kura proving ground in the Kamchatka peninsula 5,700 kilometres away from the launch site.

Quelle: ITARTASS

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Update: 8.07.2014

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Russia’s Eco-Friendly ‘Angara’ Rocket Installed On Plesetsk Launch Pad - Source

Russia’s new eco-friendly light class Angara-1. 2PP rocket has been installed on the launch pad of Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia’s Arkhangelsk Region, a source in the space industry told RIA Novosti Monday.

““Angara” has been rolled out from the testing facility to a launch pad. The erection of the rocket is expected to take place in the middle of a day,” the source said.

The first launch of the light-class Angara-1.2PP rocket was originally scheduled for June 25, but was postponed until June 27 due to the need to carry out additional tests. However, the maiden launch was automatically cancelled by the onboard control system. Later, a source in the space industry told RIA Novosti, that the State Commission decided to install a rocket on a launch pad on July 7. The preliminary launch date is July 9.

“Angara” rockets are powered by engines using so-called green fuels that provide ecological safety near the spaceport, as well as in the areas where separating parts of the rocket fall.

The Angara family of rockets is built in light, semi-heavy and heavy versions to lift a variety of payloads between 1.5 and 35 tons. The launch of the heavy class “Angara” rocket is scheduled for the end of 2014 and the first manned mission is expected to take place in 2018.

Quelle: RIANOVOSTI

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Update: 9.07.2014

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Erfolgreicher Start von Angara mit Mockup-Trägerlast

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Russia's Angara rocket 'makes debut'

Russia has launched its all new Angara rocket on its maiden flight from the northern Plesetsk cosmodrome.

There was no live TV coverage, but later video showed the vehicle leaving the pad at about 12:00 GMT.

The test flight carried a dummy payload and was not intended to reach an orbital altitude.

Angara is designed to give Russia full control over its space activities, reducing its reliance on technologies and facilities of former Soviet states.

These include the rocket components currently sourced from the Ukraine, and use of the famous Baikonur spaceport sited in Kazakhstan.

The maiden flight had been repeatedly delayed. In June, national TV had given the previous attempt extensive live coverage only then to see a technical glitch force yet another postponement.

Reporting of Wednesday's attempt was more muted, therefore.

Confirmation of a successful first flight came through the Russian military news agency Interfax-AVN.

It said that Defence Minister, Army General Sergey Shoygu, had reported the positive outcome to the supreme commander of the Russian Armed Forces, President Vladimir Putin.

And later in the day, it added that parts of the rocket had come back to Earth as expected: "An inseparable dimension and mass mock-up of the payload, together with the second-stage, has fallen in the designated area of the Kura range in Kamchatka peninsula at a distance of 5,700km from the launch site."

Russia's Deputy Prime Minister, Dmitry Rogozin, tweeted that the launch was a "winning start".

Replacement plan

Like a number of the world's launchers, Angara is modular in concept.

It has a main core that burns kerosene and liquid oxygen. This "universal rocket module" can then be supplemented with additional boosters for extra power, and different designs of upper-stage to place satellites at their correct altitudes.

Wednesday's test version used the simplest configuration - the Angara-1. When this is in service, this will be expected to put up to four tonnes of payload into a low-Earth orbit - the kind of orbit used by Earth-imaging satellites.

Other variants are planned, including a heavy-lift version designated Angara-5.

This should be capable of putting up to 7.5 tonnes into the geostationary transfer orbits used by telecommunications spacecraft as they make their way up to 36,000km above the equator.

Russia wants to launch the Angara family both from Plesetsk and the Vostochny Cosmodrome, which is currently being constructed in the Amur Oblast, in the Russian far east.

The new rockets would allow the country to phase out a suite of older vehicles, including the heavy-lift Proton launcher. This has had a torrid reliability record of late.

The immediate plans are to use the Angara family for unmanned launches only, but manufacturer Khrunichev is developing a human-rated Angara-5 for launch from the Vostochny Cosmodrome.

Russia currently operates Soyuz rockets for manned flights from Baikonur.

Quelle: BBC

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Russia Shakes Off Glitches to Successfully Launch Angara Rocket

Russia launched its first post-Soviet rocket on Wednesday, signaling that the country may still have a horse in the space race after decades of disappointment. 

The Angara rocket lifted off from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome near Arkhangelsk in Russia's far north and flew for 25 minutes on a sub-orbital ballistic trajectory before landing at the Kura test-range in the far eastern Kamchatka Peninsula. 

Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, who oversees the Russian space and defense industries, celebrated the successful launch of Angara on his Twitter account.

The successful launch shows that Russia's space industry, which has fallen on hard times in recent years, can design brand new vehicles exclusively using domestically-made components. 

The industry has managed to stay afloat since the fall of the Soviet Union by modernizing tried-and-true Soviet designs. 

The launch was originally scheduled for June 27, but the rocket's flight computer automatically aborted the attempt seconds before liftoff. A drop in oxidizer pressure caused by a leaky valve was responsible for the shutdown. 

Breaking a decades-old tradition of conducting new rocket tests away from the public gaze, the Russian media televised the first attempt. A few minutes before the launch was meant to go ahead, state media outlets cut to President Vladimir Putin watching the proceedings, or lack of them, from the Kremlin. 

However, reverting to Soviet form, Wednesday's launch was not televised live. 

Zvezda, a television station with close ties to the Defense Ministry, showed a clip of the launch after it had been confirmed a success.

Angara was commissioned in the early 1990s, when Russian space officials were concerned that an independent Ukraine might withhold deliveries of vital components used in Russian rockets such as Proton. 

The version of Angara that Russia tested on Wednesday is the Angara 1.2PP light. It is the first in a series of Angara rockets that will be capable of lifting light, medium and heavy payloads into space. 

Russia is currently building a new cosmodrome in the Far East called Vostochny, which will become the primary launch site for Angara rockets after its completion in 2017. 

Although Angara is intended to replace Russia's commercial workhorse, the Proton rocket, there are doubts that the program will become commercially viable. The rocket faces stiff competition from foreign launch firms such as the California-based SpaceX.

Quelle: The Moscow Times 

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Launch-Video-Frams: 

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