H-2 Has the Potential for ‘World-Class Competition’ : Japan Takes Off With Its Own Rocketry Designs for Commercial Use

TOKYO —  Against great clouds of white smoke, a slender 130-foot rocket lifted off from Japan’s Tanega Island space center on Aug. 13, offering new evidence that Japan could become a major world player in the commercial launching of satellites in the 1990s.

Japanese engineers drank sake toasts. Newspapers gave major display to photos of the rocket, the first in a new series called the H-1. Celebration was in order because key components in the rocket were designed and produced in Japan, replacing U.S.-model parts in previous rockets.

Few people expect the H-1, a comparatively small rocket, to figure in commercial launches. But its success has brought Japan closer to development of the next generation rocket, the much larger, all-Japanese H-2, scheduled for test launch in the spring of 1992.

Big Step Forward

If it performs as intended, said Merl Peters, a senior representative in Tokyo of the U.S. aerospace giant McDonnell Douglas Corp., the H-2 could be “world-class competition.”

The H-2 is still on the drawing boards, and the Japanese have made no formal decision to open their space program to the world. Their program, in any case, remains tiny compared to that of the United States. Research and development spending last fiscal year equaled only about 0.9% of that by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

Still, the technological disarray in the United States and Western Europe caused by the Challenger disaster and a string of failures in unmanned rockets has put a new cast on Japan’s efforts in this field. So has President Reagan’s decision to get the shuttle program out of the commercial launch business.

Designing a Space Shuttle

In industry and government here, there is a feeling that the H-1’s initial success has put Japan well on the road to ending years-old dependency on U.S. rocket technology. Although Japan can never hope to compete with the United States and Europe across the board, officials suggest, it might do so in selected niches.

“In some parts of launch technology . . . we may reach a similar level to that of Europe and the United States,” said Masahiro Kawasaki, a deputy director of the government’s Science and Technology Agency.

For the present, Japan is also working to hone skills in building satellites. It has agreed to contribute a module of the U.S. space station that is scheduled for assembly in orbit in the 1990s. Japanese engineers are designing their own version of a space shuttle. They have gotten as far as test-gliding a scale model but there is no sign of when, if ever, it will be built.

No Launch-Pad Explosions

Japan’s program in rockets dates to the 1955 launch of a pencil-sized model as an experiment. Since then, Japan has followed a development strategy that it has used successfully in countless other fields: importing licensed technology to learn the basics in difficult areas, then branching out on its own.

Japanese rockets have launched 17 satellites since 1976. There have been no launch-pad explosions. Only two launches were officially declared failures, both due to rockets misfiring high above the earth.

In the 1960s, Japan developed the comparatively simple solid-fuel M series of rockets, capable of lifting light payloads into low orbits. In the 1970s, under license from McDonnell Douglas, it manufactured an N series based on liquid fuel, essentially a Japanese version of the American company’s Delta booster.

Impressive New Engine

The H-1 goes an important step further. The first stage is standard Delta, but the second is Japanese-designed and -produced, containing a liquid-fueled engine with a thrust of 10 tons. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Ishikawajima-Harima Heavy Industries were the main contractors.

Engines of this type, powered by liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen, are hard to build, in part because the two fuels are stored at different super-cold temperatures. But their development is crucial to serious rocketry, because they can be throttled on and off during flight. Solid-fuel rockets burn only once.

McDonnell Douglas is sufficiently impressed with the new engine to have suggested informally to the Japanese that it might want to use the engine or parts of the engine in a line of booster rockets it is considering producing now that the shuttle program has ceased commercial launching. There appears to have been no positive response from the Japanese, however.

For on-board course monitoring, previous Japanese rockets used inertial guidance systems provided on a “black box” basis by the American aerospace company General Dynamics. That meant Japanese engineers were not allowed to open and examine the secret devices, which are used in U.S. military rockets. The H-1, however, has a Japanese inertial system.

Little Interest in Joint Venture

With the exception of a hold on the pad of 14 minutes, the Aug. 13 launch is reported to have gone exactly as planned. The second-stage engine fired twice on command high over the Pacific. The inertial-guidance system functioned correctly, helping place two satellites aboard in low-level orbits.

The launch was experimental. Two more experimental launches are planned, to be followed by four regular launches before 1990. All the room on the rockets is already booked for Japanese satellites. The Japanese have shown little interest in murmurings from McDonnell Douglas of a joint-venture expansion of the H-1 program to commercial use.

The H-2 is to be based entirely on Japan’s efforts. “In terms of technology, we will use the same as we did in the H-1,” said Etsuo Matsumoto of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. “Only, we will enlarge everything.”

May Enter Commercial Business

As envisioned, the rocket would be able to lift 4,400 pounds into the geosynchronous orbit useful for satellites involved in telecommunications.

Some analysts here say the Japanese are planning to enter the commercial business. Others say they have not made up their minds. With the United States, Western Europe and China already vying for launch business, there is no certainty of room for one more in the field, suggested a diplomat who follows the Japanese space program.

Various agreements on technology ban use of the H-1 by third countries and Japanese law on space development imposes limitations. “If we move to launching services for foreign customers, we will need some institutional changes,” said Kawasaki of the Science and Technology Agency. No one doubts such changes could be made.