Space Shuttle max velocity question

[Anthony Sabre]

I've read that the max attainable speed for the Space Shuttle is Mach 25 or 21,000 MPH. But is that the max speed the Shuttle can achieve, while maintaining structural integrity, when traveling through space? If not what is the max speed it could maintain while maintaining intergrity? And how long would it take to clear the Sol system at that speed?

If there is anywhere you can refer me to online that answers the question that would also be helpful.

 

[FredH]

In space, wouldn't it rather be a matter of maximum acceleration? (And limited by the Orbiter's onboard fuel supply?)

 

[msbae]

Hope this helps...

To achieve orbit, the shuttle must accelerate from zero to a speed of almost 28,968 kilometers per hour (18,000 miles per hour), a speed nine times as fast as the average rifle bullet.

http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/reference/basics/launch.html

 

[Anthony Sabre]

In space, wouldn't it rather be a matter of maximum acceleration? (And limited by the Orbiter's onboard fuel supply?)

Let's say that fuel supply isn't a concern because it's not being propelled by normal means.

 

[Dayton3]

As long as acceleration is low, there is no practical upper limit for a spacecraft like the space shuttle to be propelled at.

Say that once in orbit a series of low thrust, low acceleration rockets were attached to the shuttle, it could be accelerated out of orbit to a very high speed indeed.

In fact there were some proposals to use a couple of shuttles, after docking with additional rocket boosters in orbit to be boosted to lunar orbit and act as the mission module for manned lunar missions.

 

[FordSVT]

To leave Earth's gravity well and head out into the solar system, it would have to reach 25,000 mph (40,000 kph).

The problem isn't necessarily the shuttles "structural integrity", that's more affected by acceleration, and in a vacuum there's no atmospheric friction to worry about as you attain higher velocities. The problem is fuel, and the shuttle system is designed to carry just enough fuel to put it into orbit as far as I now. You'd need to strap it to something a lot bigger to push it beyond orbit and into the solar system. And remember, as soon as those engines quit, it's going to start slowing down a little and arcing through space. Even if it has broken free of the Earth, it has not broken free of the sun's influence. You need continual acceleration, and that's beyond the shuttle's technological capability. You can't just stick a big ion rocket onto it.

Assuming it maintained 25,000 mph, it would take 60 days to reach Mars at it's closest approach of 36 million miles (assuming a straight line, which a ship or probe would never travel in real life). It would take about 20 years to reach Pluto at that speed, which is about 4 billion miles away. The Kuiper belt lies far beyond even that.

To actually leave the solar system and the sun's gravity well, you could go slower with the right trajectory (about 16,000 mph), but you wouldn't want to. Even at 25,000 mph, it would take about 27,000 years to reach the next solar system.

By comparison, Voyager 1 is travelling at about 38,000 mph, and is currently 10 billion miles away. The only objects farther away from the sun are deep-space comets.

 

[Anthony Sabre]

The problem isn't necessarily the shuttles "structural integrity", that's more affected by acceleration, and in a vacuum there's no atmospheric friction to worry about as you attain higher velocities. The problem is fuel, and the shuttle system is designed to carry just enough fuel to put it into orbit as far as I now. You'd need to strap it to something a lot bigger to push it beyond orbit and into the solar system. And remember, as soon as those engines quit, it's going to start slowing down a little and arcing through space. Even if it has broken free of the Earth, it has not broken free of the sun's influence. You need continual acceleration, and that's beyond the shuttle's technological capability. You can't just stick a big ion rocket onto it.

Assuming it maintained 25,000 mph, it would take 60 days to reach Mars at it's closest approach of 36 million miles (assuming a straight line, which a ship or probe would never travel in real life). It would take about 20 years to reach Pluto at that speed, which is about 4 billion miles away. The Kuiper belt lies far beyond even that.

Perfect. This is what I was looking for, thanks. Doing some research for a story I'm writing.

 

[RobertVA]

Once beyond the atmosphere it's not so much the size or thrust but the product of the propellant mass, velocity and duration. Put an ion engine in the cargo bay and aim it in the direction opposite the cargo bay floor and you could propel the shuttle anywhere you want it to go. There wouldn't be much point to pushing the mass of the thermal protection system out of relatively low Earth orbit though. You would have to slow the whole vehicle back down for relatively safe reentry (more propellants and another long period of thrust). The need to store oxygen and hydrogen at cryogenic temperatures for the shuttle's electricity generating fuel cells limits the shuttle's maximum time aloft too (warmer storage requires heavy high pressure tanks).

 

[JustAFriend]

Put an ion engine in the cargo bay and aim it in the direction opposite the cargo bay floor and you could propel the shuttle anywhere you want it to go.

...although most anywhere you'd send them the crew would be dead on arrival.

The Shuttle only carries enough supplies (oxygen, water) for a couple of weeks.

 

[Dayton3]

Anyone remember Stephen Baxters novel "Titan" where NASA (ordered to get rid of all remaining shuttle hardware) propels the space shuttle Discovery to Saturn?

Good novel if you ignore all the conservative Christian bashing he does.

 

[RobertVA]

Put an ion engine in the cargo bay and aim it in the direction opposite the cargo bay floor and you could propel the shuttle anywhere you want it to go.

...although most anywhere you'd send them the crew would be dead on arrival.

The Shuttle only carries enough supplies (oxygen, water) for a couple of weeks.

Actualy the shuttle doesn't launch with much water aboard because pure water is a byproduct of producing electricity with those fuel cells.

 

[Dale]

The shuttle is very, very fast!

 

[Roshi]

WOW! Warp 18!

 

[Squiggy]

Which begat this:

and this...

 

[Meredith]

Which begat this:

and this...

I dunno if that is a tragedy of the education system or a Tragedy because Causality would be broken if it were true and the universe would go boom, or Tragedy because Colombia would be traveling backwards in time and in the next Galaxy by now.

 

[Anthony Sabre]

Not to make light of that tragedy but the tagline there is a riot!!!

 

[Dayton3]

Anyone remember one of the early shuttle landings where a network newsperson observed some vapor rising from the rear of the shuttle and remarked that

"it must be from the shuttles afterburners"

 

[Rii]

Anyone remember Stephen Baxters novel "Titan" where NASA (ordered to get rid of all remaining shuttle hardware) propels the space shuttle Discovery to Saturn?

Good novel if you ignore all the conservative Christian bashing he does.

The only "bashing" of Christianity that I recall in the novel was against those elements attempting to turn the United States into a theocracy.

Didn't Titan open with a Shuttle disaster on re-entry that grounded the fleet? Prophetic.

 

[diankra]

Anyone remember Stephen Baxters novel "Titan" where NASA (ordered to get rid of all remaining shuttle hardware) propels the space shuttle Discovery to Saturn?

Good novel if you ignore all the conservative Christian bashing he does.

The only "bashing" of Christianity that I recall in the novel was against those elements attempting to turn the United States into a theocracy.

Didn't Titan open with a Shuttle disaster on re-entry that grounded the fleet? Prophetic.

Yep. Columbia is lost during re-entry and landing, though under slightly different circumstances (the APUS go out, so the crew are able to evacuate by the slide-pole, while the commander disobeys mission control and tries to bring the orbiter into a landing without power, but dies in the process), at very nearly the date that the actual orbiter was lost in reality (it's late 2003 in the book, as far as I remember).
Though SB rather over-estimates the number of shuttle flights there'd been by that date, so it's something like STS-127 (ie, even in the mid-1997s, he still believed the NASA manifests and assumed they'd be fulfilled).
Another 'overtaken by events' aspect of Titan is that Baxter had Carl Sagan make a cameo appearance on a news discussion programme. By the time the book had been published, this was, sadly, already alternate history.

 

[Dayton3]

Anyone remember Stephen Baxters novel "Titan" where NASA (ordered to get rid of all remaining shuttle hardware) propels the space shuttle Discovery to Saturn?

Good novel if you ignore all the conservative Christian bashing he does.

The only "bashing" of Christianity that I recall in the novel was against those elements attempting to turn the United States into a theocracy.

Didn't Titan open with a Shuttle disaster on re-entry that grounded the fleet? Prophetic.

The novel has the U.S. president banning abortion his first day in office.

Something categorically impossible. Especially given that the president barely wins election.

Baxter makes the wrong assumption that Christians are against science and technology and especially the space program. Something that is wrong on virtually all counts.

Finally, Baxter has the supposed "Christian" leadership of the United States developing a genocidal biological weapon (a superflu that targets only Chinese) and using it against the Chinese

Baxters books by and large tend to be very fatalistic and end on a down note.