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Angara-5V

First test launch of Angara-5

First flight of Angara-1.2PP

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Angara-5 to replace Proton

Not counting unapproved "paper" designs, the Angara-5 rocket, a.k.a. Angara-A5 or 14A127, will become the most powerful version within its family. For the first time since the dissolution of the USSR, Russia will acquire a space launcher which could deliver more payload than the nation's current workhorse Proton rocket. In many respects, Angara-5 was the reason the entire family was developed.

Previous chapter: Angara family home page

Above: The Angara-A5 rocket configured for the first launch. (CLICKABLE)

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The Proton replacement

Incorporating all the latest achievements of the Russian rocketry, Angara-5 was designed as the main carrier of satellites for the Russian Ministry of Defense, for the Russian civilian space agency and for its commercial customers around the world. When launched from Plesetsk, Angara could deliver 24.5 tons of payload to the low Earth orbit, comparing to up to 22 tons carried by Proton to a similar altitude.

Unlike Proton, whose launches are only possible from Baikonur, thus holding Russia a hostage of its agreements with Kazakhstan, Angara would be based in Plesetsk, located few hundred kilometers north of Moscow. Unfortunately, due to the geographical location of Plesetsk, Angara-5 lost much of its payload advantage over the Proton. The Plesetsk-based Angara would be taxed particularly hard when carrying satellites to the equatorial (geostationary) orbit -- its main destination. While the Russian government could tolerate this situation for the sake of its strategic independence, the Angara would face an uphill battle on the international market for the most economical way of delivering commercial satellites. To resolve the problem, the Russian space agency, Roskosmos, considered building an entirely new launch site in the nation's Far East. However these plans had to be postponed after the priority had been given to the construction of a launch pad for a less powerful Soyuz-2 rocket.

Moreover, during a major strategy meeting in October 2013, the new head of Roskosmos Oleg Ostapenko called the Angara family a "dead-end project" and urged against huge spending required to bring Angara to Vostochny. It was unclear what Ostapenko hoped to replace Angara with, given the fact that the prospective Russian super-heavy booster was still on a drawing board. Such a rocket could hardly be practical for a commercial role, but its components could serve as a replacement for Angara, the same way booster stages of the super-heavy Energia rocket became a basis for the medium-class Zenit in the USSR. However the development of such a launcher would likely take years longer than the "duplication" of the Angara's launch pad in Vostochny. Still, Ostapenko was apparently willing to accept that. As of 2014, it was still unclear what route Roskosmos would ultimately take.

Russian officials and media liked to proclaim Angara-5 to be an all-Russian rocket, whose components would be produced entirely inside the Russian Federation, without any reliance on the former republics of the USSR, first of all Ukraine. However the real extent of such "non-reliance" is open to interpretation. In August 2014, at the height of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, there were reports that the Russian government allocated more than a billion rubles for the Voronezh mechanical plant to build a production line by 2016 for manufacturing pressurized titanium tanks. They are installed onboard launch vehicles to supply high-pressure helium gas for pneumatic systems of rocket engines. As it turned out, until that time such tanks had been manufactured at KB Yuzhnoe's production plant in Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine. Russia's Proton and Angara rockets as well as Briz-M upper stage (which would be part of Angara-5) were listed among the recipients of the Ukrainian gas tanks.

In 2015, a total cost of the Angara-5 development was estimated at 150 billion rubles. (744)

Technical description

Angara-5 (industrial designation 14A127) would use four standard URM-1 boosters as the first stage and a single URM-1 booster as its second stage. A prototype of the URM-1 made three flights as a part of the South-Korean KSLV rocket and also propelled the Angara-1.2PP rocket in July 2014. The URM-2 booster would serve as the third stage. It also performed successfully during the flight of Angara-1.2PP. The additional upper stages on Angara-5 would be used to send satellites from their initial parking orbits to the geostationary orbit or into deep space. Initially, the Briz-M upper stage using toxic storable propellants would be employed, only to be replaced with a more powerful KVTK space tug, burning liquid hydrogen. Additionally, Roskosmos considered equipping Angara-5 with Block-DM upper stage for missions from Vostochny. When launched with Block-DM upper stage the rocket would be topped with a 14S75 payload fairing, while a version equipped with the KVTK upper stage would be using the 14S735 fairing.

Finally, after the cancellation of the Rus-M project in 2011, the Russian government promised to fund a manned version of the Angara-5 rocket known as Angara-5P.

By the time flight testing of the Angara-5 rocket started at the end of 2014, the launch vehicle was expected to have a capability of delivering around seven tons of cargo to the geostationary transfer orbit. Since some of the military satellites had already been too heavy for the launcher, GKNPTs Khrunichev proposed an upgraded version of the vehicle, known as Angara-5V. (744)

Flight profile

Angara-5 lifts off with four boosters of the first stage and a central booster of the second stage all igniting their RD-191 engines on the launch pad. After 47 seconds of ascent at full thrust, the RD-191 engine on the central booster throttles down to 30 percent of its capability. It enables the booster to conserve propellant and burn longer than its strap-on siblings. After the separation of four boosters 213 seconds into the flight, the core stage returns to full thrust and fire for a total of 325 or 329 seconds. It then separates with the help of small solid motors installed "backwards" at the very top of the rocket's transfer compartment. The URM-2 then ignites its RD-0124 engine to accelerate the payload section to a nearly orbital speed. In a typical mission, the URM-2 fires until T+750 seconds in flight and the upper (fourth) stage then completes the job with a short firing of its engine to enter an initial parking orbit with an altitude ranging from 180 to 250 kilometers. The same stage later restarts its engine to reach a variety of higher orbits, depending on a particular mission.

When launched from Plesetsk, Angara-5 was to be able to enter orbits with an inclination of 63, 76, 82.5 and 93.4 degrees toward the Equator. In case of missions to the geostationary orbit, the upper stages would have to conduct propellant-hungry maneuvers to tilt the orbital inclination from the initial 63 degrees to a near-equatorial plane.

Flight testing

As of July 2014, the first test launch of the Angara-5 rocket from Site 35 in Plesetsk was officially planned for December of the same year. The rocket lifted off on Dec. 23, 2014, and largely completed its flight program.

In mid-2014, the first deputy to Roskosmos head Aleksandr Ivanov told the Ekho Moskvy radio station that Angara-5 vehicles had already been ordered for launches of operational satellites scheduled in 2016 or 2017. In an interview with the ITAR-TASS news agency in August 2014, the head of GKNPTs Khrunichev Vladimir Nesterov said that during its second mission, Angara-5 would be carrying an operational payload, however the launch vehicle would officially remain in flight testing until 2020. As of beginning of 2015, the second rocket was expected to leave the assembly line by November of that year. (725)

The Russian Ministry of Defense was expected to be the first agency to formally adopt the Angara rocket, Nesterov said.

Nesterov admitted that at the beginning of flight testing, each Angara-5 had been twice as expensive when compared to the operational Proton rocket, however he expressed confidence that the price per launch would come down significantly as the launch vehicle enters mass production. However Angara-5 was not expected to fully replace Proton until the new rocket had completed its flight test program, logged enough successful missions and received its hydrogen-powered upper stage, Nesterov said. Moreover, its entrance into the commercial launch market would depend on the availability of the new launch pad in Vostochny. Industry officials confirmed that in order to become economical, the Angara-A5 would have to launch all federal and all commercial payloads that Russia could win around the world.

In September 2014, officials at GKNPTs Khrunichev announced that by 2021 Angara-A5 would take over launches of all Russian government payloads, leaving Proton to deliver commercial missions. During its early operational life, Angara-A5 was expected to fly around five missions a year, reaching seven launches per year between 2023 and 2025. As the production of the Angara rocket grows, the manufacturing of Proton would decline:

In December 2014, Interfax quoted Nesterov as saying that five Angara-1 and five Angara-5 rockets would be launched until 2020, before the launch vehicle family would be formally accepted into armaments of the Russian Ministry of Defense (and declared operational by the civilian space agency).

Read (and see) much more about Angara rockets and many other space projects in Russia
in a richly illustrated, large-format glossy edition:

Next chapter: The first mission of the Angara-5 rocket

APPENDIX

Evolution of the Angara-5 capabilities:

*All launches from Plesetsk

**Geostationary transfer orbit: perigee -- 5,500 kilometers; inclination -- 25 degrees toward the Equator;

Payload capabilities of the Angara-5 rocket launching from Vostochny:

*will require an additional maneuver with a delta V of 1,500 meters per second to enter the geostationary orbit

Angara-5 missions:

Page author: Anatoly Zak; Last update: June 11, 2015

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The very first Angara-5 lifts off on Dec. 23, 2014. Click to enlarge. Credit: Russian Ministry of Defense

Angara-5 sheds its four first-stage boosters during a ride to orbit. Click to enlarge. Copyright © 2014 Anatoly Zak

A scale model of the Angara-5 rocket with a hydrogen-powered upper stage unveiled in 2001. Copyright © 2001 Anatoly Zak

A scale model of the Angara-5 rocket with Briz-M upper stage unveiled in 2009. Click to enlarge. Copyright © 2011 Anatoly Zak

Angara-5 (left) and Angara-5P rockets as of 2013. Copyright © 2013 Anatoly Zak

A possible configuration of the Angara-5 rocket with a KVTK upper stage circa 2013. Credit: Roskosmos