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OK-GLI
The OK-GLI (Russian: Орбитальный корабль для горизонтальных лётных испытаний, ОК-ГЛИ, romanized: Orbital'nyy korabl' dlya gorizontal'nykh lotnykh ispytaniy, lit. 'Orbital ship for horizontal flight tests'), also known as Buran Analog BTS-02 (Russian: БТС-02, Большой транспортный самолёт второй, romanized: bolshoi transportny samolyot vtoroi, lit. 'big transport aircraft, the second'), was a Soviet atmospheric test vehicle ("Buran aerodynamic analogue") of the orbital Buran spacecraft. It was constructed for the Buran programme in 1984, and was used for 25 test flights between 1985 and 1988 before being retired.
The aircraft was subsequently put on exhibit in Australia (2000), Bahrain (2002) and since 2008 has been on exhibit at the Technik Museum Speyer in Germany.
The development of the Buran vehicles by the Soviet Union began in the late 1970s as a response to the Space Shuttle program of the United States. The construction of the orbiters began in 1980, and by 1984 the first full-scale Buran was rolled out. The first suborbital test flight of a scale-model took place as early as July 1983. As the project progressed, five additional scale-model flights were performed.
The OK-GLI (Buran Analog BST-02) test vehicle ("Buran aerodynamic analogue") was constructed in 1984. It was fitted with four AL-31 jet engines mounted at the rear (the fuel tank for the engines occupied a quarter of the cargo bay). This Buran could take off under its own power for flight tests, in contrast to the American Enterprise test vehicle, which was entirely unpowered and relied on an air launch.
The jet engines were used to take off from a normal landing strip, and once it reached a designated point, the engines were shut down and the OK-GLI glided back to land. This provided valuable test data about the handling characteristics of the Buran design. The powered-engine approach significantly differed from the carrier plane/air drop method used by the US and the Enterprise test craft.
Until the end of the Soviet Union in 1991, seven cosmonauts were allocated to the Buran programme. All had experience as test pilots and flew on the OK-GLI test vehicle. They were: Ivan Bachurin, Alexei Borodai, Anatoli Levchenko, Aleksandr Shchukin, Rimantas Stankevičius, Igor Volk and Viktor Zabolotsky.[citation needed]
In total, nine taxi tests and twenty-five test flights of the OK-GLI were performed, after which the vehicle was "worn out". All tests and flights were carried out at the Zhukovsky Air Base, outside Moscow.
After the program was cancelled, the OK-GLI was stored at Gromov Flight Research Institute, near Moscow, where it was displayed during the annual MAKS air show.
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OK-GLI
The OK-GLI (Russian: Орбитальный корабль для горизонтальных лётных испытаний, ОК-ГЛИ, romanized: Orbital'nyy korabl' dlya gorizontal'nykh lotnykh ispytaniy, lit. 'Orbital ship for horizontal flight tests'), also known as Buran Analog BTS-02 (Russian: БТС-02, Большой транспортный самолёт второй, romanized: bolshoi transportny samolyot vtoroi, lit. 'big transport aircraft, the second'), was a Soviet atmospheric test vehicle ("Buran aerodynamic analogue") of the orbital Buran spacecraft. It was constructed for the Buran programme in 1984, and was used for 25 test flights between 1985 and 1988 before being retired.
The aircraft was subsequently put on exhibit in Australia (2000), Bahrain (2002) and since 2008 has been on exhibit at the Technik Museum Speyer in Germany.
The development of the Buran vehicles by the Soviet Union began in the late 1970s as a response to the Space Shuttle program of the United States. The construction of the orbiters began in 1980, and by 1984 the first full-scale Buran was rolled out. The first suborbital test flight of a scale-model took place as early as July 1983. As the project progressed, five additional scale-model flights were performed.
The OK-GLI (Buran Analog BST-02) test vehicle ("Buran aerodynamic analogue") was constructed in 1984. It was fitted with four AL-31 jet engines mounted at the rear (the fuel tank for the engines occupied a quarter of the cargo bay). This Buran could take off under its own power for flight tests, in contrast to the American Enterprise test vehicle, which was entirely unpowered and relied on an air launch.
The jet engines were used to take off from a normal landing strip, and once it reached a designated point, the engines were shut down and the OK-GLI glided back to land. This provided valuable test data about the handling characteristics of the Buran design. The powered-engine approach significantly differed from the carrier plane/air drop method used by the US and the Enterprise test craft.
Until the end of the Soviet Union in 1991, seven cosmonauts were allocated to the Buran programme. All had experience as test pilots and flew on the OK-GLI test vehicle. They were: Ivan Bachurin, Alexei Borodai, Anatoli Levchenko, Aleksandr Shchukin, Rimantas Stankevičius, Igor Volk and Viktor Zabolotsky.[citation needed]
In total, nine taxi tests and twenty-five test flights of the OK-GLI were performed, after which the vehicle was "worn out". All tests and flights were carried out at the Zhukovsky Air Base, outside Moscow.
After the program was cancelled, the OK-GLI was stored at Gromov Flight Research Institute, near Moscow, where it was displayed during the annual MAKS air show.