New Mars Forums

Hello RobertDyck,

RSC Energia set up a display at the Stanford conference?? Thanks for mentioning it, but it was actually ME who set up and hosted that display! The 1/85 scale Super Vulkan with TVA was actually scratchbuilt by myself and a fellow Toronto Chapter member. As much as I would love to be on the Energia payroll, my little show-and-tell at Stanford was a purely volunteer effort undertaken at my own expense.

I have already made several attempts to find out about the exact status of the RD-0120s. These efforts have included contacting the likes of Mark Wade, James Oberg, Vadim Lukashevich, and Anatoly Zak. They all replied that they themselves were uncertain. On a somewhat unrelated note, several of my past attempts to contact various American aerospace corporations about their own products have resulted in responses rangeing from silence to outright paranoia. So much for a free and open society.

I'm extremely lazy. My Russian language skills are pathetic. Perhaps you could save me the trouble, and try to get in touch with Kosberg on our behalf?  You might have as much luck with contacting them as you had with RSC Energia.

If the RD-170 is fitted with dual turbopumps (twin RD-180 equivilant), then the chances of both sets of turbo-machinery/gas generators failing in the same Zenit booster  on any given flight are incredibly remote. What I agree is very useful is the ability, if need be, to burn the full propellant load if one of the two sets should fail.

No production of tooling of any kind was destroyed by the collapse at MIK 112 because no such tooling was ever there. The building was used only for the final assembly of the completed stages, and the mounting of the entire launch stacks on the TVA transporters.

The charaterization of  Energia as "moribund" is misleading. In fact, the most important element of the system remains in production, and continues to be launched on a regular basis. I refer to Zenit; in particular it's Boeing Sea Launch incarnation. RD-180(half an RD-170 as used on Zenit) is in production for use on all current versions of Atlas.

Perhaps two dozen RD-0120s were aparently being stored somewhere at MIK 112 at the time of the high bay roof collapse. However, a former Energia RSC employee told me that as far as he knew, almost 100 of these motors had been produced (including test stands).  As for the safety certification having expired, it should not be difficult to service or refurbish the motors as required. The RD-0120 design centre/manufacturer Kosberg TKSB aparently still exsits, although I have no idea what they are doing at the moment. If adequate supplies of RD-0120 are not forthcoming, some combination of RS-68 and/or Vulkain 2 could be used for the core stage, with surplus SSME to power the upper/TMI stage on a modernized Vulkan configuration.

There has obviously been some deterioration of infrastructure; rusting launch pads etc.,  but many former Energia/Buran support facilities at Baikonur remain in relatively good condition, and new Energia launch facilites could be built by the ESA at Kourou. Although the original Energia/Buran teams have been largely broken up, these people can be tracked down. All detailed technical data and operating manuals have been preserved.

A modernized, internationally produced Energia derived system remains the best option to deliver Mars payloads equal to, or considerably greater than any SDV. Most major components of such a system can be drawn from current commercial production, or have commercial potential. Compared to SRB, the clean burning Zenit offers markedly superior specific impulse, true reusability, much lower relative dry mass, full range thrust control, and multiple start-stop capability. No contest.

Small world. I also know Janyce. I actually don't remember talking with the Project Pluto guy all that much about the ramjet, but we did talk about NTRs.

At any rate,  Just as you and John C. have indicated, the radioactive mess resulting from an NTR explosion in the atmosphere would be infinitely worse than the low level contamination of the exhaust plume from normal operations. I should have mentioned this in my earlier post. Soph was quite right to have questioned my remark on the exhaust issue.

The public will never tolerate nuclear HLVs spewing radioactive exhaust plumes into the atmosphere, let alone be willing to pay for their development

However, I would agree with you that once existing stocks of surplus SSMEs and RD-0120s are used up, a nuclear-thermal upper stage/TMI stage does make a great deal of sense. Once a Mars programme is well under way, money may also be found to develop a nuclear-electric inter orbital tug, which could also be quite cost effective.

In the future, space elevators will provide an excellent method of launching payoads from the surface of Mars and the Moon.

Soph,

You have misunderstood and misinterpreted almost everything I have said. Contractors bail out on subcontractors all the time. This is not a uniquely Russian phenomena. What Boeing and Lockheed, as well as Mitsubishi, Krunichev, Ford, Mary Kay Cosmetics and every other corporation is out to do is make as much money as possible. That's the way of the world. Do you deny this?

You have just made a couple rather stupid remarks.  I don't live under a rock. I know exactly how money flows through and between large and small businesses. I work for a bank. I never said that your Dad is out to screw Russia, NASA, or anyone else! Where do you get this stuff?

I don't know which United States you live in, but the one I'm familiar with features individuals, small companies and large corporations bringing lawsuits against government agencies all the time. They are sometimes awarded millions of dollars in payments. The newspapers are full of such stories.

Your figures on the ISS are completely wrong. Total programme cost contribution by the U.S. to date is less than 30 billion. You seem to forget there are other participants in the programme, like the ESA, JSA, CSA etc. Thats why they call it the ISS. The 15 to 20 percent figure I quote is not 15 to 20 percent of 30 billion, but a percentage of the COST OVERRUNS. The actual total "bailout" figure that actually ended up as a cash payments from NASA to "the Russians" over the last ten years amounts to less than two billion. Try getting to Mars on that.

Please don't take your Dad's experience out on me.

Rob D.,

Your points are well taken. Mark S. certainly does deserve respect, and some of my comments have been rather sarcastic. I'll blame this on cultural differences. I'm originally from the U.K., so sarcasm runs in my blood. I'll try to tone things down a little for the American audience.

I must respond to Soph. To date, less than 15 to 20 percent of the total NASA "cost overruns" bill on the ISS programme is in any way even remotely related to "bailing out" those "untrustworthy" Russians. Despite what Boeing and Lock-Mart would like you to think, it is U.S. based firms that have been sucking the lions share of the cost overrun gravy out of NASA. This should make clear exactly who is screwing who.

And now for some more sarcasm in the form of a rhetorical question for Soph (I can't help myself. Sorry):

If you were aboard the ISS and faced with a catastrophic systems failure, would you hop onboard the Soyuz built and paid for by those "untrustworthy" Russians, or hold your breath until a shuttle shows up a few months later?

I said I would tone it down a "little".

Cheers everyone.

Re. facilities available to support the new Energia M,

To clarify, I meant that no part of MIK-RN is needed. I am not suggesting that the low bays of this building should be used, as Starsem currently uses them for other purposes. Neither Energia M operations from Baikonur, nor Energia Mars International HLLV operations from Kourou require any part of MIK-RN at site 112 to be repaired.

http://www.starsem.com/index.html

Parts of the giant MIK-OK building on site 254 are currently used by RKK(RSC) Energia for Soyuz and Progess pre-launch processing. In another section of this building, they also process the Block D upper stage used on Proton. The Energia M upper stage can be processed in this section because Energia M replaces Proton. The new Energia M upper stage is identical to that already planned for the Angara heavies.

http://www.russianspaceweb.com/baikonur … a_254.html

Energia M payloads can be processed in building 92A-50, which currently processes Proton payloads.

http://www.russianspaceweb.com/baikonur_proton.html

MZK is available for main stage processing and final assembly of the entire launch vehicle.

http://www.russianspaceweb.com/baikonur_energia.html

Hello Robert D.,

I think I now understand the paranoia thing. If your suspicions are correct, you and I, and several folks at the Caltech chapter should be looking over our collective shoulders. Certainly, we should keep an open mind about the possibility of industrial sabotage/terrorism, but I doubt that even Lock-Mart would do such a thing, and be willing to kill several people in the process. More importantly, I do not see why they, or anyone else would want to. The International Humans To Mars Programme I advocate would greatly benefit the aerospace industries of all the ISS partners, as well as several new potential partners. Boeing, Lock-Mart, EADS, SNECMA, RSC Energia, Krunichev and many others all stand to gain from the Programme. NASA, the ESA, RKA, JSA, CSA etc. and the countries  they represent would have a spectacular example of peaceful, cost-effective international co-operation. Sending humans to Mars would be the greatest scientific-technical achievement in the history of space exploration. As no one government is willing to pay the cost of going it alone, the Programme must be truly international.

Perhaps there was an opportunity for sabotage, but I think the more mundane explanation is far more likely. MIK-RN was a gigantic old building with an enormous flat roof. Practically no maintenance had been done on the section that collapsed since the cancellation of the Buran programme. Back around 1995, when conditions at Baikonur were at their worst, bands of locals, mostly soldiers who had not been paid in months, would roam the base at night, stealing everything that they considered of value that could be loaded into a pickup truck. In order to prevent such theft, several tonnes of building supplies were moved onto the roof of MIK-RN! Worse yet, when the base was finally brought under control, these materials were never removed.  Many more tonnes of water accumulated as the centre of the roof sagged, which caused more water to accumulate. When a repair crew was finally sent up, they obviously botched the job and ended up getting themselves killed. At least this tragic accident has served as a deafening wake up call to the RKA and all Baikonur personnel, to make sure nothing like this ever happens again.

My Russian language reading skills have gone all to hell, but the newsru.com article, like many mainstream press releases, is misleading. Although the 167 million dollar figure is technically correct, almost the entire amount is covered by subtracting it from the interest on the almost one billion dollars Kazakstan still owes to Russia. In short, "renting" Baikonur costs the the Russian taxpayer practically nothing.

As far as I know, Lockheed has never put any money into Plesetsk. Plesetsk is still a military base. The State Department is not in the habit of allowing Lockheed, or any other American corporation to subsidize Russian military bases. It appears I must repeat myself. Angara 1.1, 1.2, and possibly Angara 3 are planned to launch from Plesetsk for polar orbital missions. These will be carried out mostly by the military. The RKA may also continue with science missions out of Plesetsk. A few military and RKA launches on Soyuz rockets out of Plesetsk have continued for years, just as in Soviet times. However,  the northerly latitude is totally unsuitable for launching any commercial payloads into anything remotely resembling an equatorial orbit, let alone geo-synch. There is one hare-brained Plesetsk launch scenario that proposes to loop payloads round the moon in order to partially redress this problem. While possible on paper, nothing like this has ever been done. More importantly, no comsat insurer would ever risk sending a multi million dollar payload on such a difficult trajectory. I suspect rumors circulated about the abandonment of Baikonur have more to do with scaring the locals into keeping the rent low. The ILS and Starsem sites feature high praise for their Baikonur facilities, and their investments in keeping them state of the art. Neither company has anything at Plesetsk. Although Starsem makes mention of successful Soyuz launches from Plesetsk because they sell launches on the same type of rocket, neither has stated any intention of ever doing any commercial launch business there. The current ILS plan is to replace Proton with Angara 5 and 5UOHB, should these vehicles ever come into existence, but they make no mention of abandoning Baikonur. It's simply much cheaper to convert the Proton assembly, payload processing, and launch support infrastructure at Baikonur to support commercial Angara 5 and Angara 5UOHB operations.

http://www.ilslaunch.com/
http://www.starsem.com/index.html

Clearly, there is no reason to believe that Baikonur will ever be abandoned at any time in the forseeable future. Far more important is the fact that even if the Cosmodrome were to suddenly cease to exist, this would have little effect on my International Mars HLLV proposal!

And now, the tricky part. Please have a closer look at the relevant Energia stats:

http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/energia.htm

I thik astronautix.com is the best website on the planet, but Mr. Wade appears to have screwed this one up a little. At first glance, it  does not appear that the performance stats  clearly refer to an Energia configuration made up of a two Zenit Strapon plus Energia Core plus Energia EUS. Nor do the stats seem to refer in any clear manner to an Energia configuration made up of four Zenit Strapon plus Energia Core plus Energia EUS. In fact, what is listed is 2 x Strapons plus  4 x Strapons plus 1 x Energia Core plus 1 x Energia RCS plus 1 x Energia EUS! This list could easily be misinterpreted as referring to one vehicle comprised of all these sets of stages. Every other launch vehicle entry on the site is arranged in just such a manner, always referring to a particular configuration comprised of all the stages listed. In this case, our host has failed to make clear that this is just a list of various stage combinations associated with the side mounted payload versions of the Energia HLLV modular system as opposed to an actual configuration, proposed or otherwise. For example, the Energias that were built could only mount two or four Zenits, not six. If the payload was to be a Buran, then no upper stage was used. Polyus used the Energia RCS. Other cylindrical payloads could be fitted with the EUS, but RCS and EUS would never be fitted at the same time on the same vehicle.

A fully loaded Buran weighed 105 tonnes. Buran's "main engines" were primarily for circularization, on orbit manouvres, and de-orbit burn. The Energia booster did almost all the work involved in pushing the Buran into orbit. Robert, I may be missing something here, but could you explain to me how an Energia with four Zenits and an EUS stage can place only 88 tonnes into a 200km orbit, while an Energia with four Zenits and no upper stage could place a 105 tonne space shuttle into the same orbit? Plese see the Buran entry:

http://www.astronautix.com/craft/buran.htm

Please bear with me. I'm no rocket scientist. and my calculations are rather crude, but lets compare an Energia with four Zenits plus EUS to Zubrin's Ares:

http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/ares.htm

The combined propellant mass of four Zenits is greater than that of two ASRBs, while having lower a combined dry mass. The Zenits generate more thrust, and their vastly superior Isp allows for a much longer burn time than the ASRBs. Although Ares Stage 2 has a greater propellant capacity than Energia EUS, the combined propellant load of  an Energia Main Core plus EUS is actually slightly greater than the combined propellant load of Ares Stages 1 and 2. The total launch vehicle dry mass of the Energia configuration is slightly less than Ares. Taking all these factors into consideration, the payload performance of the original Energia Core fitted wtih four Zenits and an Energia EUS should actually be GREATER than Ares!

As we know, Ares can carry one hell of a lot more than 88 tonnes to a 200km orbit. I realize that the latitude of the launch site vs. the orbital inclination can make a major difference, but not this big a difference. Again, I propose to launch the Mars HLLVs from Kourou as opposed to Baikonur.

Your figures for Vulkan refer to the original Soviet design, and as such are absolutely correct:

http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/vulkan.htm

My Vulkan ILV proposal is an evolution of this design. Core capacity would be increased to match Energia, and be built of lighter alloy. A much larger upper stage based on the Energia M core, and fitted with an SSME or RD-0120 would replace the Vulkan Block V and it's RD-57M. Four of the eight Zenits would mount RD-180 in place of RD-170. This new ultra heavy configuration should be able to  deliver about 190 tonnes to LEO. A single such "Vulkan ILV" could be used to replace each pair of Magnums in the NASA DRM version 3 (baseline). Personally, I favour a scaled down version of the DRM that would utilize an identical HLLV system, but with four Zenits(RD-170) instead of eight.

Thanks for your words of support. I will try to address the other issues you have brought up later on today.

Robert D.,

Your past support of Energia was well founded, and your current "paranoia" is misplaced. The collapse of MIK 112, while tragic, has no real bearing on the ease with which an Energia derived ultra HLLV can be brought into production. Such an HLLV is still by far the best, cheapest, and most practical near term solution to the Earth to the TMI transport requirement.

Primarily for political reasons, I favor expanding ESA vehicle assembly and launch facilities at Kourou for the International Humans to Mars Programme.  The Energia derived HLLVs would operate from this base. Much of the Ariane V  infrastructure, such as cryogenic propellant plants, can also be used to support Energia operations. NASA Houston should be responsible for post launch mission control.  The condition of the remaining Energia-Buran facilities at Baikonur ranges from excellent to repairable, but there is clearly no need for any new "Energias" built for our proposed Mars Programme to rely on in any way Baikonur.

The original Energia M was shelved primarily because the Zenit boosters were built in Ukraine. At the time, relations between Russia and Ukraine were at an all time low. Ukrainian firms were charging outrageous prices for components upon which the Russian space programme was totally Dependant. In order to avoid the risk of being blackmailed into paying astronomical sums, and desperate to support the struggling domestic Russian aerospace industry, the RKA was forced to choose Angara.  Relations between Russia and Kazakstan at this time were also extremely strained, and at one point the RKA did seriously consider abandoning Baikonur. Subsequently, the Kazak government has realized that the closure of the base would destroy the local economy. Kazakstan is now doing whatever it can to help the Cosmodrome remain operational, and have drastically decreased the "rent" from what it was eight years ago.

Plesetsk  is adequate for launching small military payloads to polar orbits, but it's northerly latitude makes it completely unsuitable for sending commercial payloads to geo-synch. Neither Soyuz nor Progress can reach the ISS from Plesetsk.  ILS, otherwise known as International Launch Services, is the partnership formed between Lockheed, Krunichev, and Energia RSC that markets commercial launches on Proton. ILS and the RKA currently plan to convert existing Proton processing and launch facilities at Baikonur to support Angara 5 and Angara 5 UOHB, assuming these vehicles ever actually come into existence. There are no facilities at Plesetsk capable of supporting anything larger than Zenit. Even once converted, the former Zenit pads will be incapable of launching Angara 5 and Angara 5 UOHB. No serious proposal has ever been made to expand Plesetsk to give it this capability. Nobody has any intention of funding such an expansion. Year after year, ILS and Starsem continue to be booked solid with orders to launch commercial payloads from Baikonur. There is no commercial launch company with any interest whatsoever in Plesetsk. For many years now, it has been clear that neither the RKA, Starsem, nor ILS have the slightest intention of ever abandoning Baikonur. The claim that "Economics and Russian politics dictate abandoning Baikonur, and that means Energia-M will never be" is now way out of date and totally false. Also the statement that RSC Energia "lost" to a "competing Russian company that produces Angara" is misleading. Although Krunichev is prime contractor for the Angara CCB, Energia produces all the various upper stages for all Angara variants.

Another reason the original Energia M was shelved was that it was simply too big, with much higher payload delivery performance than Proton. No adequate commercial demand for such a heavy payload capacity existed. My proposed new version of Energia M would be fitted with anywhere between two and four Angara CCBs in place of the two Zenits originally planned.  The Angara CCB is smaller and cheaper than Zenit. This "Evolved Energia M" family would take less time and money to develop, and would be cheaper to produce and operate than Angara 5 and Angara 5UOHB. MIK 112 is not needed to support Energia M operations from Baikonur, as much newer facilities built to support Energia-Buran are available. Refurbishing UKSS and perhaps one or two of the other Energia pads for Energia M will also be quicker and cheaper than converting Proton facilities to support the heavy Angaras. It clearly makes more sense for ILS and the RKA to invest in Energia M, rather than Angara 5 and 5UOHB to replace Proton. If Lock-Mart ever partners with Starcraft Boosters (and possibly Krunichev?) to produce the StarBooster 200, this near term flyback booster could also be fitted to the Energia M core.

Robert, there may be some confusion surrounding the performance stats you quote for the "Energia LV with the EUS". I think I know exactly where you got these figures, but they only make sense for the original side mounted payload version if fitted with two as opposed to four Zenits. The "Vulkan LV" stats you quote are accurate for the original Soviet Vulkan design. My proposed evolution of this design, which I have referred to in previous posts as "Vulkan ILV" would actually be larger than the original Vulkan. Vulkan ILV would use a core tank with capacity identical to Energia as actually flown, this capacity is larger than the original Vulkan core. Lighter, stronger alloy would be used. Much more importantly, Vulkan ILV would use an Energia-M core based upper stage fitted with a surplus RD-0120 or SSME instead of a Vulkan Block V fitted with an RD-57M. The original Vulkan design was capable of generating far more power than it needed on launch. For smoother stageing and a more efficient flight profile, four of the eight Zenits on Vulkan ILV would be fitted with RD-180 in place of RD-170. RD-180 is also lighter and cheaper than RD-170. Vulkan ILV launched from Kourou should be able to deliver almost 190 metric tonnes to a the 200km circularized orbit you quote for Vulkan. Of course this is far more than required to support Zubrin's Mars Direct. That's because Vulkan ILV has nothing to do with the Zubrin plan. The purpose of  the ultra heavy ILV was to accomplish the NASA DRM version 3 (baseline), while eliminating the need for nuclear thermal propulsion and on orbit assembly. In short, three Vulkan ILVs could replace the six Magnums per DRM cycle. Wether or not Energia RSC "wants" to build the entire Vulkan ILV is totally irrelevant. I have only suggested that they are best suited to build the upper stage, which the RKA can easily pay for, especially as the engine comes free!

Personally, I favor a cheaper, scaled down version of the DRM, with crew size and payload requirements reduced by almost one third. This would enable an Energia derived HLLV similar to Vulkan ILV, but fitted with only four Zenits(RD-170) to be used, while still eliminating orbital assembly and nuclear thermal propulsion requirements. The three launches per mission cycle would be maintained.

The 5.2 meter diameter exterior of Shuttle C is totally inadequate for any reasonably proportioned aeroshell type transhab with adequate mass to carry  more than two people at a time to Mars and support them for the surface stay. Just how you propose to fit Zubrin's 10m "tuna can" on Shuttle C is beyond me. Nothing smaller than Ares can support Zubrin's Mars Direct. Shuttle C's payload capacity is grossly inferior to Ares. While Shuttle C's performance comes close to the Energia core with two Zenits plus EUS, It is inferior to the four Zenit plus EUS configuration. Ares itself has markedly less capacity than the four Zenit Energia plus Energia M derived ILV proposal I have outlined.

Who can be convinced to pay for the ILV is what is relevant. No corporation needs to be "convinced" to build it. I shall repeat myself. EADS should build the main core stage.  If adequate supplies of surplus Russian RD-0120 are not available,  each core could be fitted with a cluster of six Vulkain 2s, or SNECMA could begin European based production of RD-0120. This would be paid for by the European Union via the ESA.

Energia RSC should produce the Energia M derived upper stage. Russia, via the RKA can easily afford to pay for these, as they don't have to buy new engines for them. The greatest monetary contribution required of Russia would be for the purchase RD-170s from Energomash to power the Zenits. Each RD-170 can be safely used at least 10 times. They have been proven to withstand 20 full duration burns. The strap-on boosters are recoverable for reuse via a parachute/airbag system. Zenit is currently in commercial production by Yuzhnoye. As Ukraine will probably be unable to pay for these by itself,  the more wealthy international Mars programme partners should be willing to make some contribution, unless they enjoy seeing the economies of small countries being ground into the dust. Remember that because of  the Sea Launch partnership, anything that benefits Yuzhnoye will benefit Boeing. Incidentally, anything that benefits Energomash and Energia RSC also benefits Lock-Mart, at least indirectly.

The European, Russian, and American commercial launch industries all stand to gain from the production of this International HLLV.

Quick References:

www.spaceandtech.com/spacedata/elvs/angara_sum.shtml

www.astronautix.com

www.mars.caltech.edu/chris_its/mars/cmsm2r.html

www.starbooster.com

http://exploration.jsc.nasa.gov/marsref/contents.html

At the beginning of the Shuttle C topic posted in the Human Missions stream , Mark S claims: "On this forum we have established that resurrecting the Saturn V or Energia is possible but not practical due to the presence of shuttle technologies that will help us build something bigger." Nothing could be further from the truth. Although the resurrection of Saturn V is both impractical and undesirable, it's payload capacity was markedly superior to Shuttle C. To lump Energia in with Saturn is classic "Big Lie" propaganda. Repeat it often enough, mix the lie with half true but misleading and totally irrelevant statements like "The Russians can't afford it" and "We won't buy Russian rockets", and most people who don't know any better will believe. Mark also says "If only NASA had the guts to commit to a manned Mars mission". Everyone should realize that any NASA administrator attempting to divert large sums of money to such a mission without explicit instructions from the Oval Office would be dismissed. Clearly, the only real coward in this case is George W. Bush.

Shuttle C is among the worst possible launch vehicle options yet proposed. Payload capacity is totally inadequate, even lower than Magnum. While Magnum is projected to be more cost effective than Shuttle C, Magnum's payload limit means that any reasonable manned Mars mission architecture using it would be forced to resort to Earth orbit assembly. The only practical way around this would be the use of nuclear-electric propulsion for TMI and possibly TEI. I support the eventual use of nuclear-thermal and nuclear-electric propulsion, but political resistance and development cost makes utilization of surplus SSMEs or RD-0120s the best near term solution.

Also, the Shuttle C payload fairing diameter is much too small. For the purpose of sending humans to Mars, Ares is the best of the STS derived proposals. Ares itself remains a markedly inferior option when compared to proposed Energia derived HLLV systems.

Some folks still don't seem to realize that there is a world outside the U.S. and the countries it likes to bomb. There is no chance that Congress will ever be willing to provide 100% of the total funds required to start sending people to Mars. The ESA, RKA, JSA, CSA etc., will never be willing to pour money into any exclusively American designed, built and launched programme. Dropping a giant subsidy in the laps of the U.S. aerospace industry is not something the rest of the world will be willing to do. NASA possibly allowing a few token "international" astronauts to tag along will not change this.

Boeing and Lock-Mart are best qualified to take on the most complex and expensive aspects of the project; serving as prime contractors for development and production of the actual spacecraft. The European Union could easily fund the development and production of an Energia derived main core stage and the construction of new final assembly and launch facilities at Kourou. EADS is well positioned to serve as prime contractor for construction of this core stage. If Russia is unable to supply adequate numbers of RD-0120s, SNECMA could begin European based RD-0120 production, or the original set of four RD-0120s per core stage could be replaced by a cluster of six Vulcain 2s. European production of an STS derived core makes little sense. The Energia main core has greater propellant capacity than the Shuttle ET. Horizontal processing and assembly makes far more sense than vertical assembly. Existing Energia stage handling equipment could be used. The current STS tank is not compatible with Zenit, and Zenit is vastly superior to the never tested ASRB. The proposed Ares upper stage would also have to be developed from scratch, and it's propellant capacity is less than two thirds that of the Energia M core. Energia was designed as a modular system from the outset. Ares and Shuttle C are all-up, fixed capacity all or nothing systems, whose stages cannot be individually flight tested.

The ISS will soon been completed. The European ATV is scheduled to enter service this year. Once a serious decision is taken by the U.S., European Union, and Japan in favour of a real international Humans to Mars programme, The RKA could then cease Progress re-supply missions to the ISS. This large portion of the meager Russian space budget could then be used to provide two or three major components to the Mars HLLV. These components would consist of the RD-170, refurbished surplus RD-0120s, and an Energia M core derived upper stage. Energia RSC and Krunichev could cancel the planned Angara 5 Proton replacement in favour of restarting Energia M production. This new commercial launch vehicle could be fitted with four Angara CCBs in place of the original pair of Zenits. Regardless of wether this happens, the Kosberg factory and it's tooling for RD-0120 production remains intact. I have no idea how many of the original Soviet built RD-0120s were destroyed in the collapse of MIK 112, or how many are stored elsewhere. This is not a serious problem. Surplus SSMEs could easily be fitted to the Energia M core. This could be done by Boeing at Kourou to avoid any State Department B.S. about "sensitive technology exports". Transport of all stages and spacecraft to Kourou for final vehicle assembly can be accomplished by ship or An-225.

Over the past year, my thinking as to the ideal configuration for such an Energia derived HLLV has changed. I now realize that I had been underestimating payload capacity; i.e. the throw-weight performance to TMI of the "Vulkan ILV". This performance turning out to be better than I had originally thought also applies to versions with a smaller number of Zenit boosters. In a latter post, I shall attempt to provide a brief synopsis of the mission architecture I have in mind. It is basically a scaled down NASA DRM version 3, but utilizing a single four Zenit Energia derived HLLV in place of each pair of Magnums. Propulsion is all off the shelf chemical combustion technology. No on orbit assembly required. Payload delivery to TMI from launch at Kourou approx. 50 to 55 metric tonnes. Crew of four or five.

I shall also attempt to provide greater detail behind the political and economic realities that make this the safest and most practical near term low cost plan, and describe which agencies and corporations are best positioned to carry it out.

Hello Again Mark,

Actually, your 22 tonne from LEO to TMI  throw weight for the cluster of seven Delta IV CCBs with a core mounted nuclear-thermal upper stage sounds perfectly reasonable. What I meant to say was that the lift to LEO capability of a Delta IV CCB based cluster would be markedly higher than an Atlas V CCB based cluster.

I am sorry that I did not make that clear.