OSP: Capsule v. Wings - if you had to choose right now

Tyr · 2003-11-19 18:27:14

Looks like the capsule is leading the winged OSP by 2 to 1 in the poll. I really don't care what they decide to do. I never was a big fan of the ISS. For the OSP pricetag of $17 billion, we could take a big step towards Mars. For the money we've spent on the ISS and the OSP we could go to Mars and the Moon to. The OSP is no good for anything but moving astronauts to the ISS. Let them use Soyuz capsules! I say we take the money and build a heavy lifter. After that-to Mars!

Ad Astra · 2003-11-19 21:01:20

We really need a capsule, one better than Soyuz, for the purpose of getting to the moon and Mars. The current Soyuz is great for bringing crews to ISS, and it's only down points are the limited amounts of crew and cargo it can return with (and the accelerations it exposes them to.) It might be fiscally wise to fund both the Boeing capsule (so long as they can develop it cheaply) and resume the X-38 to bring crew and cargo down.

Bill White · 2003-11-19 22:25:41

We really need a capsule, one better than Soyuz, for the purpose of getting to the moon and Mars. The current Soyuz is great for bringing crews to ISS, and it's only down points are the limited amounts of crew and cargo it can return with (and the accelerations it exposes them to.) It might be fiscally wise to fund both the Boeing capsule (so long as they can develop it cheaply) and resume the X-38 to bring crew and cargo down.

Query - - what is the current manufacturers suggested retail price for a Soyuz launch? Suppose someone asked Energia to build a new Soyuz TMA (#6, right?) and launch to LEO?

Query #2 - - How much more capacity would the Soyuz be able to carry to LEO if launched at Kouru? (Khouru?)

I just finished reading Soyuz: A Universal Spacecraft. Excellent book!

After reading this book I vote for purchasing as many Soyuz as the ISS needs but only =until= sufficient funding is obtained for something that truly is 1 or 2 generations ahead of the Shuttle.

GCNRevenger · 2003-11-19 22:37:42

I reallly still am not seeing the reason for a capsule has for Moon/Mars missions. When in a vacuum, shape really doesn't matter, and you can stick a service module/airlock on the back of a winged/lifting body ship just as easily as you could on a capsule. Further, OSP in any form will never be light enough to use on a direct flight to the Moon aboard Atlas/Delta, so some kind of transfer stage to push it will be needed anyway. Adding the 4th or 6th seat to and Apollo CM style OSP plus supplies needed for the extra trip plus a small service module for course corrections would not be much (if any) lighter than a modified lifting body HL-20 with bigger batteries and air tanks.

Plus, if Nasa is going to get serious about setting up some form of perminant base on the Moon they will need a transfer stage and/or lander able to push and/or lift substantial mass, which should be more than enough to afford to make any trajectory adjustments needed to accomodate a lifting body re-entry, especially since a the lander and/or transfer stage would hopefully be reuseable.

OR, Nasa could elect to build a "payload faring for people" to attach to this lander/transfer stage soley for carrying people from LEO to Lunar orbit or the Lunar surface, which OSP could simply be launched to rendevous with and land again without leaving LEO.

Lockheed's design looks... kinda scarry. *laughs* But you know what it does look like? Thats right, The DynaSoar is back. They just cut the wings short and stretched it a little... if it lands on wheels, has the 1800mi crossrange of HL-20, and seats six (and preferably not paint it black) I won't have a problem with it. Though I do think that HL-20/X-38 might be easier to build.

Ad Astra · 2003-11-20 06:33:36

The advantage of a capsule for deep space missions is mass. Apollo took its recovery capsule to lunar orbit. How much more fuel would Apollo need to burn to put a lifting body in lunar orbit? Some moon plans call for bringin the capsule all the way down to the surface. It would be more difficult, again, to land a lifting body on the lunar surface due to propellant requirements.

GCNRevenger · 2003-11-20 09:26:34

I still do not understand why everyone insists that a lifting body will be alot heavier or harder to fly; the Apollo CM capsule, which did not have enough power to make it to the Moon and would be a little too small for OSP duty weighed around 6,000kg, and I think a 15-20% mass penalty for larger batteries, room for four with Lunar suits, and other "not needed for ISS" stuff is reasonably putting it at ~7,000kg. The Apollo Service Module weighed in at around Twenty Five Thousand Kilograms without the CM at all!. And don't forget the extra mass of the escape tower you have to launch too...

A 75% scale version of HL-20, the ship I think that OSP should be, would weigh around 8,000kg using Shuttle-era technology. A few hundred more kilos for extra supplies seems reasonable and the pressurized interior would already be double that of Apollo CM from the get-go so Lunar suits would not be an issue, and with the OMS engines built in you have ALOT more maneuverability too, which should make up for any trajectory differences... also recall that in a vacuum, it doesn't matter what shape your vehicle is, only how heavy it is.

The supposed mass advantage of a capsule is a mere 1,000kg, and even if it were double that, I don't think it would be an advantage enough to abandon the clearly superior re-entry dynamics of a lifting body and/or building TWO seperate vehicles where one would suffice. Build a baby HL-20 with modern materials, add more batteries and air tanks, and skip the capsule entirely.

Why not land a lifting body on the Moon?

Futhermore...

Neither a capsule nor a baby HL-20 will be able to get to Lunar orbit, much less the surface, using the EELV launchers. It just isn't going to happen. If Nasa is going to be operating a serious Lunar base, they are also going to need a serious lander able to ferry substantial masses to the surface, none of this two-ton Progress style nonsense. Even if the crew vehicle is the heaviest payload it would have to handle, which I think a rediculus tradeoff of performance for mass, the cost of making a slightly larger decent/acent stage should be far lower then having Nasa spend the money to build TWO OSP's.

Further-futher, if Nasa builds an SDV or other more-than-medium launcher, putting a lifting body's extra ton or two up should simply not be a big deal compared to the cargo masses it would (or at least should) be launching.

Both vehicles will require some kind of a service module or generic transfer stage which will easily exceed the limits of either EELV combined with the mass of any version of OSP, so if EELVs are used for launching all crew transfer componets anyway, an extra ton or two should not be a serious problem.

"Smaller/lighter = cheaper" is just not always true... building one vehicle that does both Lunar and ISS duty instead of two with very similar capabilities simply makes terrible economic sense. I will not go deeply into the previous thread about how a capsule OSP will also not be nessesarrily any cheaper than a lifting body for ISS duty, but let me summerize that big issues are the ground support needed with a capsule's small cross-range with non-runway landing and the inherintly un-reuseable OMS service module. Also don't forget how a capsule will require subjecting returning crews to double or tripple the strain of a lifting body, no matter which way you lay it out.

RobS · 2003-11-20 14:06:59

I can't comment on capsule versus lifting body in detail, but I gather the additional mass of the wings makes a lifting body heavier than a capsule. It also makes launch vehicles less aerodynamic--it's like putting the feathers on the head of the arrow instead of the butt end--and tends to push a launch vehicle laterally during flight, so I suppose an EELV has slightly less launch capacity to orbit with a lifting body.

I have also read in several places that it is not possible for a lifting body to hit the atmosphere at 25,000 mph, as it would returning from the moon (though the published scenario below assumes a lifting body could do it). I suppose it would be more precise to say it hasn't been done yet. The Columbia disaster will certainly make people think twice about designing a winged system for the return flight from the moon.

I wanted to comment about the question of the use of EELVs for reaching the moon. This is discussed in provocative detail in Michael Duke's Lunar Reference Strategy which I have referred to here ad nauseam, because it strikes me as one of the simplest, maybe cheapest, most politically achievable plans for returning to the moon that I have ever seen. Astronauts would be launched toward the moon in a "Crew Return Vehicle" (CRV) derived from the X-38 lifting body proposed as the ISS lifeboat (at least it was in 1997, when Duke, who worked at Lunar and Planetary Institute, gave his presentation). The vehicle would mass about 8 tonnes, which is in the range discussed above. Duke assumed the shuttle would be used for all launches to LEO, but a 25-tonne to LEO EELV would accomplish the same thing. I don't know whether the CRV docks to a 25-tonne stage to push it to trans-lunar injection or is launched with a 17-tonne stage to accomplish the same thing. It heads straight to L2 (beyond the moon; L1 could be used instead). There it docks to a "lunar based vehicle," LBV, a man-rated vehicle, reusable (able to fly ten times). The LBV filled up with lunar hydrogen and oxygen on the moon that was manufactured robotically (the LBV landed the robotic unit there in the first place) and used up eight tonnes of the fuel to fly itself and eight more tonnes of fuel to L2. The CRV docks to the LBV and fires its engine; the eight tonnes of fuel on board is enough to land the CRV/LBV combination on the moon. The LBV is then refueled while the crew does their exploration and it launches the CRV on a trajectory back to Earth. The LBV then lands back on the moon to be refueled. The CRV could land on the earth or dock to a space shuttle (which I think Duke assumed, but that's probably out, now). Perhaps it could also manage to dock to the ISS, but that would be difficult, and Duke doesn't say anything about it.

Sunsequently, this reusable transportation system could be used in these ways:

1. Two LBVs could fly to L1 from the lunar surface. Both took off with sixteen tonnes of fuel and arrived at L1 with half of that (eight tonnes). IF the fuel can be transferred, we would then have an LBV with sixteen tonnes of a fuel. A solar electric vehicle with four tonnes of xenon could lower the LBV to low earth orbit in six months, or four tonnes of aerobrake could aerobrake it into LEO. Another crew would fly up from the Earth's surface in a CRV, dock to the LBV, and it would push them to L1. There, they'd meet another partially fueled LBV to land them on the moon. In other words, once the system is established, it can fuel itself and you only need one flight in the 25-tonne launch class (an EELV or the shuttle) to fly a crew to the moon.

2. An EELV or a shuttle could launch two eight-tonne payloads of lunar cargo with two four-tonne modules of ion engine propellant (xenon, if we can get that much). They would dock to two solar electric vehicles, which would push the cargos to L1, where two LBVs would be waiting to haul each eight-tonne unit to the lunar surface. Thus it would relatively easy to build up infrastructure on the moon, launch by launch.

3. This entire system could be expanded with larger versions of the vehicles. One could envision an LBV able to hold about forty-eight tonnes of fuel and able to land twenty-four tonnes on the moon at a time. A larger solar electric vehicle could push the payload to the moon. This larger system, by the way, is about the size need to use the transportation system to send things to Mars. Duke himself, referring to the design reference mission (DRM), said that the system had to be scaled up four times to fit the needs of a Mars mission. The DRM already includes a solar-electric version, too.

Can this be done with EELVs? A heavy lifter would certainly be MUCH better and would be cheaper. The big problem I see is the five-meter diameter of the payload fairing of the EELV. This is slightly bigger than the 4.5 meter diameter of the shuttle' s cargo bay. I suspect a 6-meter fairing could be made, though the additional air friction would reduce the launch mass (anyone know how much?). It would be cheaper upgrading an EELV to reach the thirty-tonne range than to build a heavy lifter, and 30 tonnes to LEO would be possible.

By the way, Duke even estimated the costs: $900 million for three shuttle launches, $500 million to develop the solar-electric vehicles, $500 to develop the 1-tonne 25 kilowatt nuclear reactor that would be needed on the lunar surface, and $600 million to develop the LBV, an 8-tonne inflatable hab, and surface exploration equipment. The total cost was $2.6 billion to return humans to the moon. Additional flights cost about 1 shuttle flight each ($300 million, he said in 1997). I am sure in today's dollars it would double or triple. Even so, this is pretty cheap!

-- RobS

RobertDyck · 2003-11-20 15:15:22

I agree that an HL-20 or X-38 based lifting body would produce a low-mass reusable OSP capable of serving as a crew taxi to ISS as well as transporting crew to an on-orbit assembled interplanetary spacecraft for whatever destination you have in mind. The big advantage of a reusable OSP vs. an expendable one is its low per-launch cost. However, a capsule does have one advantage for crews returning from another planet (or moon), that is the material used for the heat shield. A lifting body is designed to use a reusable heat shield, and the material used for Shuttle is sufficient to return from orbit but not a direct entry from interplanetary velocity. That leaves you the options of either using propellant to enter Earth orbit or replacing the heat shield material with something more robust. The Apollo command module was built with an ablative heat shield that could withstand direct entry. Soyuz was designed to be the Russian vehicle to the Moon, so the ablative heat shield of its descent module was just as robust. I think it still uses the same heat shield.

This gets to the bigger picture of the entire mission plan. If you want a reusable orbit-to-orbit transfer vehicle, it will have to aerocapture at Earth. That permits you to use a dedicated surface-to-orbit OSP to return crew and samples to Earth. If you want an emergency escape pod capable of returning crew to Earth via direct entry, then just use two Soyuz descent modules. Why reinvent the wheel?

RobS · 2003-11-20 17:00:57

Robert, can ablative heat shields be resurfaced and used again? I'm curious because in principle a capsule should be just as reusable as a lifting body. The structure and interior should certainly be reusable. I read somewhere that one of the Gemini capsules that carried men into orbit was later launched again unmanned as a test and was recovered safely.

Also, could an ablative heat shield be put on a lifting body?

-- RobS

Tyr · 2003-11-20 17:17:34

There is an old Gemini capsule at the St. Louis Science Center here. You can see the charred patterns on the heat shield from reentry. Last time I was up there the heat shield was removed and you could see all the hardware underneath. The capsule was surrounded by a fence and they seem to be retouching it. Anyhow, it looks like you can bolt on and remove heat shields to me. An ablative heat shield is just a big round piece of stuff; much simpler than a thousand heat shield tile puzzle pieces, thus it must be cheaper and more reliable. Whatever happens, it will probably be the system that makes the most money for the aerospace co.s and keeps the NASA bureacracy greased for another decade or two, not the most versatile, economical and reliable. Call me a cynic, but politics has ruled the space programs of the USA and USSR from the very beginning. Otherwise, we would have done something that looks like it came straight out of Von Braun or Disney!

GCNRevenger · 2003-11-20 18:34:11

Errr my post ought to read "building two ships makes bad sense"

It is true that a return from a Moon-to-Earth transfer would put more thermal stress on Shuttle-grade heat shielding then it could reliably handle, but that is for ballistic reentry remember. A lifting body need not come down all at once, and with its OMS engines and control surfaces, I wonder if it could perform a DynaSoar style "skip" areobraking into Earth orbit directly. Don't know if a capsule can do that, especially since it would have NO orbital maneuvering capacity once the service module is jettisoned.

The reuseable heat shield on a lifting body won't be the tile nightmare of Shuttle, mainly by virtue that there simply isn't as much surface area on the bottom where you would have a few hundred tiles, not several thousand. Secondly, more modern metal bolt-on tiles, a foot square, could possibly be used instead of regular silica tiles. Small metal tiles have already been tested on Shuttle in lower heating areas. The ablative heat shield for a capsule isn't very reuseable, and it would be safer to replace it between flights without a great deal of expense.

I like the idea of building a "big" LBV to haul 20-25 ton class payloads to Lunar orbit or a Lagrange unmanned fuel depot, or I suppose 8 tons at a time would be okay if it could ferry OSP to/from the surface and maintain a high flight rate. I am a little wary of the solar ion transfer vehicle though, months of bathing whatever cargo you have in the Van Allen belts, living or mechanical, would seem to me to be a bad idea. Also it would make shipping anything cryogenic a problem due to boil off.

RobertDyck · 2003-11-20 18:50:06

Robert, can ablative heat shields be resurfaced and used again? ... could an ablative heat shield be put on a lifting body?

Good point. In theory an ablative heat-shield could be replaced. Mercury had a floatation air bag between the heat-shield and capsule; the heat-shield would be ejected when the air bag inflated. That did cause a problem for John Glenn; the switch to detect that the air bag was deployed had indicated it was while still in orbit, which would mean the heat-shield was no longer firmly attached. It turned out the heat-shield was still attached, but it demonstrated a weakness in design. Gemini and Apollo used firm attachments to hold the heat-shield. It should be possible to attach the heat-shield to a backing that is firmly bolted onto the capsule, but can be removed to replace it for another flight. One concern with that is the capsule may not look pretty for the second flight. Streaks of ablative material will precipitate onto the capsule during re-entry giving the capsule a dirty look. Although that is primarily cosmetic (additional ablative material would just provide a touch more protection for the second flight), there is a practical concern. The black colour of ablative material will collect heat from sunlight while on orbit. The Apollo capsule was painted white or mirror finished to keep heat out. To control heat while on-orbit, those streaks would have to be scrubbed off before the second flight. As for metal fatigue accumulating from thermal stress, I don't know. Theoretically a capsule would hold up as well as a lifting body; it's just a matter of engineering.

Can you apply an ablative heat-shield to a lifting body? That is more difficult to answer. The shape of a lifting body is more complex, and an ablative heat-shield is usually made as a single piece. You have to worry about different parts of the lifting body producing different temperatures, so different rates of eroding the ablative material. The Shuttle uses reinforced carbon-carbon on the tip of its nose and leading edges of its wings, glazed silica foam tiles on the rest of its nose and belly, and fibreglass blankets on the upper surface. You would have to make the ablative material thicker on the tip of the nose and belly. How would you scrub ablative streaks from the blankets? Could you place a replaceable heat resistant top sheet on the blankets? The more parts that have to be replaced, the less reusable the vehicle becomes. You could use a metallic heat shield for the top, which would use sheet titanium or inconell for the skin and crumpled metal foil between the outer skin and aluminium hull. You have to be careful about weight of a metallic heat-shield. As I write this I looked up heat-shield material; it?s overwhelming just how many there are. Apollo used nylon reinforced with Teflon between fibreglass and cork layers. The point of an ablative material is to melt or sublimate so the phase change absorbs the heat, then the hot fluid is carried away in the high-speed air stream.

Bill White · 2003-11-20 19:28:21

This debate may all be moot in light of this view from the US Congress:

Comments from Congressman Sherwood Boehlert Republican chair of the Science Committee:

That?s why Mr. Hall (ranking Democrat) and I have called on NASA not to move ahead yet with a Request for Proposals for the Orbital Space Plane.
?We?re not, by the way, calling for a complete halt to the program or even for reducing the fiscal 2004 request, but we don?t want to start taking steps that seem irrevocable. It?s wrong to expect Congress to sign on to soliciting or awarding a contract for OSP when no one can tell us how the OSP fits into the future of NASA, or remotely how much the project will cost. You?d think Congress had learned that lesson by now.

Since this is bi-partisan, it sounds like they are saying, FIRST, tell us what you seek to accomplish. THEN we can discuss the best way to get there.

OSP v capsule? Depends on what your mission is. Form follows function.

Ad Astra · 2003-11-20 22:22:58

I totally agree. Up until now, NASA has given little coherent thought to activities after ISS, and even the future plan for ISS beyond core complete is murky. If we are fortunate, we will soon have a unified, focused goal in space. When the questions of ISS crew size and exploration beyond LEO are answered, OSP will be able to take shape.

RobertDyck · 2003-11-20 23:34:28

This debate may all be moot in light of this view from the US Congress

We could simply stand by, keep our mouths shut and do nothing. That would leave us continuing to go in circles in low Earth orbit, getting nowhere. Or we can get involved and a make a difference. Congress is starting to listen. Congress has realized the problem. Sean O'Keefe has stated his intent to do nothing but "develop hardware". Congress wants a coherent integrated plan. It is up to us to keep congress focused on this issue, and to inform congress of real issues like the OSP so they can make an informed, intelligent decision. I'm sure both congress and NASA read this message board. I'm also sure NASA would like the cost of OSP to be greatly reduced. Many within NASA would like to go to Mars as much as we do. Stopping development of OSP until there is an intelligent over-all plan is a very good decision. What is the function? What are we trying to achieve? Where are we going? What is the function that will dictate the form?

Now here's an intelligent suggestion. Put a stop to all work on the OSP primarily for the purpose of breaking-up the corporate alliances. Then get Orbital Sciences to submit a new bid to develop a scaled down, 4 astronaut version of HL-20 without involvement by Lockheed-Martin. Orbital Sciences is the company that developed HL-20 and built the full-size flight-test models of X-38. They are the star, not Lockmart. They were also able to keep costs down while they were working on X-38. I think these debates are trying to reduce cost; after all, the requested price of $11 to $13 billion is absurd, and Robert Zubrin's prediction of $17 billion is even more so.

::Correction:: Orbital Sciences built HL-20, but Scaled Composites built X-38.

The voters are the people that congress will listen to most. That is how democracy works. You have to be informed, and you have to bug your elected officials. If you give up and say that "they" will do what they want, then you're already screwed. I could brag about the successes I've had getting elected officials here in Canada to listen. I could go on about the current issue. The point is that we should research the issue, find a sane solution, then don't stop until the elected officials make it happen. To get elected officials to really listen we need a united front. Now, can we come to an agreement? Can we close this issue? That does mean coming to a real, informed, sensible decision.

My proposal is that a lifting body makes more sense than a capsule primarily because a lifting body is reusable while a capsule has always been expendable. A reusable vehicle will have a lower operational cost. I also argue that to make any crew transport cost effective it must be launched on an EELV with only a single common core module. To make it safe it must have no solid rockets boosters; solids can't be shut down and it's impossible to abort while solid rockets are firing. The cost per launch for Shuttle was $63 million in 1988, not counting the fixed overhead cost. The total cost per year based on 6 launches was $1.470 billion in 1998, in 2003 it is $3.208 billion so simply prorating I estimate the per launch cost at $137 million. The cost estimate for Delta IV Large alone, without any capsule or space plane, was $170 million in 1999. That means OSP will have a higher per launch cost unless we convince congress that the vehicle must be smaller. Atlas V 401 had a cost estimate of $77 million in 1998. I also point out that the cost to develop the Shuttle, including the orbiter, external tank, SRBs, main engines, and conversion of the launch facilities, and construction of the first 3 orbiters was $10.1 billion in 1977. The much smaller OSP should have a much smaller price. We need to push congress to push the contractors to reduce the price. If they refuse we shouldn't give the same contractors a multi-billion contract to build an expendable capsule; the alternative should be to use the Russian Soyuz or a European spacecraft. As for an over-all plan; build OSP to access ISS and transport crew to orbiting vehicles headed to planetary destinations. Use Progress and ATV to supply cargo to ISS, and EELV to lift ISS modules. Develop an on-orbit tug to pull those new modules within reach of the station's arm. Then focus on Mars. Build a permanent scientific base on Mars, starting the base at a single location with the first manned mission. The Moon is a great place for space telescopes and has abundant aluminium, titanium, and oxygen. So the hydrogen is scarce and expensive to extract, get water from asteroids. Asteroids also have platinum, gold, silver, and the other platinum group metals: palladium, osmium, rhodium, ruthenium, and iridium. Asteroids also have materials for steel. Develop an aluminium/LOX rocket engine that doesn't use any hydrogen or hydrocarbons at all. That would permit ISPP on the Moon. Lunar ISPP would be completely different that Mars, but so what, it's still needed to make the Moon viable. We should continue development of the X-43 A/B and C to develop SCRAM jet engines and hypersonic aircraft. Once it works we can use it for a new low cost shuttle. I would suggest two shuttles, one for people and another for cargo. There could be a third shuttle: a spaceliner to transport passengers to an orbiting space hotel. Screw VentureStar or any other second generation shuttle; let's first use EELV/OSP as the second generation then develop a SCRAM jet third generation system. We should also develop nuclear rockets for tooling around interplanetary space. We should build a safe, large scale test facility to develop nuclear rocket engines. We can deploy them only in space, be we need some place to develop them first. We also need a safe spacesuit for extended missions on Mars with a lot of rock climbing. The EMU used on Shuttle and ISS masses 275 pounds and has a rigid torso and rigid wedges with rotary joints for the shoulders and hips. You will never scale a cliff face in that. A prototype MCP suit was built in the 1960's as part of the Apollo program, and that was with synthetic rubber and cotton. Dr. Paul Webb had the hope of using a fancy new material called spandex; we can certainly build one now. We also need a closed-loop recycling life support system to keep astronauts alive for the entire mission to Mars and back. Looking for life on Mars is scientifically interesting, but we really need to develop technology to extract construction materials from Lunar, asteroid, and Martian ores.

What I really want to see is a Mars sample return mission in 2007, a manned mission to Mars in 2009 and land in 2010, and colonization begin in 2020. Is anybody here with me?

GCNRevenger · 2003-11-21 08:31:32

This would be the optimal end... and in a perfict world, would be what we would do, but unfortunatly things are not...

1: There are not enough Mars enthusiasts to make a loud enough noise in Congress to consider spending enough money to make a Mars mission viable.

2: ISS will continue to be a millstone around Nasa's neck... too much money and too many contracts to cut it loose, but it will not achieve its aims without either flying Shuttle longer than anybody would like unless Nasa starts work on OSP Right Now. Furthermore, ISS will do little else than stay in orbit manned without signifigant masses sent via another vehicle; ATV/Progress/Soyuz can only keep ISS up with a small crew, no science payload, and nothing more.

3: Flying Shuttle is a worse option than flying EELVs. This should be pretty obvious, since there is so much infrastructure that Nasa will have to pay for no matter how many Shuttles fly a year. I don't think it unfair or unrealistic that each flight from now on will cost almost One Billion Dollars each, none of this $137M nonsense. Even Delta-IV HLV is a giant improvement over this painful figure.

4: The OSP is too heavy to ride on the no-SRB EELV of any type. It just won't happen. Even if you could make a perfict copy of Apollo that would seat four, it would still be too heavy with the addition of escape and adapter equipment. The small SRBs are also no where near as volitile or hazardous as the ones on Shuttle or Titan IV since they are loads smaller; the little SRBs on Delta and Atlas are reliable enough, because unlike Shuttle, OSP can easily and quickly emergency seperate from the booster through the entire phase that the SRBs are firing. Safety means crew survival, not vehicle survival.

5: Unfortunatly, the major contractors are probobly the only ones with the reasources to get any of this stuff done: building high performance spacecraft is not an excercise for small companies. It would be nice if Orbital could build HL-20-Lite, but I question simply if they could by 2008, if at all, in their modern incarnation. Building a manned spaceship, a really reliable, operational, LEO and beyond ship is an expensive undertaking: no offense to the X-Prize people, but they are light years away from making any trips past sub-orbital much less ISS or the Moon. So, I think Nasa should set a cap of $10Bn, which is not unreasonable, to the big boys, and simply say, "you will finish our rocket for this price even if you need more money when you sign." No exceptions, no caveats, no "oops this bolt failed, we'll need another million to make a new one," $10Bn. I also wonder if Zubrin's Mars Lust made him quote the $17Bn from the high range of the possible, so that Nasa would scrub OSP and get to work on Mars Direct. ...$10Bn for three operational reuseable vehicles, and not a penny more.

Lastly and probobly most depressing, is that if Nasa is told to go anywhere by Bush or Congress, it will be the Moon. I simply doubt that the US is ready to commit the reasources for a Mars mission. And, since Nasa has to go somewhere, it will be the Moon. Since the modern Nasa is so fixated with baby steps (even ones that are forward at all), I don't think they have the courage and boldness anymore to seriously consider a manned Mars flight. This, combined with Bush/Congress "develop not explore space," will ensure that they spend most of their effort within Lunar orbit for the forseeable future.

Footnotes...:

-Mining the Moon for anything but rocket fuel or He3 is a terrible idea, since getting minerals back to Earth bulk is almost impossible

-Scramjet powerd Shuttle would be nice when it comes time to replace EELVs, but that will take a while. A worthwhile interim goal is to build a RS-84 kerosense flyback booster to mate three of with EELV cores to build a thirty-ton booster for the price of a single-CCB model.

-Suits will obviously be needed down the road, thats more of an accessory item ATM.

Bill White · 2003-11-21 08:58:52

Here is a longer quote from the prior link which ends with the ranking Republican and the ranking Democrat being in agreement that OSP funding is premature because America lacks a long range vision for space:

Chairman Boehlert gave this speech YESTERDAY - - 20 November 2003

Committee on Science
SHERWOOD BOEHLERT, CHAIRMAN
Ralph M. Hall, Texas, Ranking Democrat Press Contacts:
Heidi Mohlman Tringe
Jeff Donald
(202) 225-4275
BOEHERT ADDRESSES SPACE TRANSPORTATION ASSOCIATION
WASHINGTON, D.C., November 20, 2003 - Science Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert today delivered the following speech to the Space Transportation Association:
* * *
I?m also concerned that we don?t have all the information we need from NASA on what challenges the Space Station will face in the months ahead. We?ve been waiting for months, for example, for clear information on how NASA plans to keep the Station crewed and supplied after March (the original target for returning to flight), and especially on what problems may occur if the Shuttle can?t launch in September. Given past concerns about schedule pressure, the Committee plans to be very active in getting answers to these questions.
?But from a Congressional point of view, figuring out what to do with the Shuttle program -- and even with NASA in general -- in the short run is easy. NASA itself has the hard tasks.
?That?s not the case when it comes to the longer run, and the longer run starts in fiscal 2005. The status quo, as everyone realizes, is not sustainable. NASA needs a clear mission in human space flight and a program to go with it.
?And that mission can only be decided through a thorough, open and honest debate that involves the Administration, the entire Congress - not just a few folks interested in NASA - and the American people. That hasn?t happened in 40 years, and it ain?t easy.
?I don?t have a particular ?vision? I?m pushing at this point. I?m open to the idea of a Mars landing or of a lunar landing or a mission to an asteroid, which might be especially compelling, given that asteroids may present an eventual threat to our planet. But I do have some general principles that will guide my thinking as we all work to develop a new vision for NASA.
?First, I believe - as the Augustine Commission did - that space science and earth science programs should be the agency?s highest priority. They have more scientific benefit, expand our horizons further (literally and figuratively), and accomplish more at less risk and less cost than do human space flight programs.
?Second, any vision has to come with an affordable price tag. Witnesses at our most recent Science Committee hearing on the future of human space flight estimated that we could accomplish significant new missions with a NASA budget that ramped up to about $20 billion and remained at that level. That?s still a hefty increase - 33 percent - but it?s probably in the upper range of what might be considered affordable.
?Third, if we?re going to take on ambitious new human missions - as I think we should - then we can?t indefinitely perpetuate the existing elements of the human space flight program.
?We need a date certain to stop flying the Space Shuttle and to decommission the International Space Station. Obviously, both will remain in use until the end of this decade and probably beyond. But while they?re in use, we need to ensure that they are, to the greatest extent possible, contributing to our longer-range missions.
?Fourth, we shouldn?t be committing to any new projects in human space flight until we have a better sense of what we?re trying to accomplish, of how long the Shuttle and Station will be in use, and of how much we?re willing to spend over the long haul. That?s why Mr. Hall and I have called on NASA not to move ahead yet with a Request for Proposals for the Orbital Space Plane.

On space issues, this guy is the highest ranking Republican in the House of Representatives. And, IMHO, this is the KEY sentence from the speech:

?And that mission can only be decided through a thorough, open and honest debate that involves the Administration, the entire Congress - not just a few folks interested in NASA - and the American people. That hasn?t happened in 40 years, and it ain?t easy.

Bill White · 2003-11-21 09:03:46

What I really want to see is a Mars sample return mission in 2007, a manned mission to Mars in 2009 and land in 2010, and colonization begin in 2020. Is anybody here with me?

Of course we are! The question is how?

Boehlert gives us the answer. Persuade a sufficiently large number of people that they benefit from humans in space.

?And that mission can only be decided through a thorough, open and honest debate that involves the Administration, the entire Congress - not just a few folks interested in NASA - and the American people. That hasn?t happened in 40 years, and it ain?t easy.

clark · 2003-11-21 09:09:27

Gee, kind of sets the stage nicely for the current Executive Administration to have all the answers to his points...

Now why would a Republican member of the House do such a thing for the Republican President? :laugh:

Why would they he do that prior to an unveiling of a new space policy, which is slated to come forth from the current administration in a few weeks?

Questions and more questions... :laugh:

dickbill · 2003-11-21 09:11:02

?We need a date certain to stop flying the Space Shuttle and to decommission the International Space Station.

first time I heard about decommissioning the ISS before we ever heard about its mission.

Given the price of the ISS, its lifespan should be long enough that "decommissioning" it is an irrelevant issue.

RobertDyck · 2003-11-21 11:27:10

3: Flying Shuttle is a worse option than flying EELVs. This should be pretty obvious, since there is so much infrastructure that Nasa will have to pay for no matter how many Shuttles fly a year. I don't think it unfair or unrealistic that each flight from now on will cost almost One Billion Dollars each, none of this $137M nonsense. Even Delta-IV HLV is a giant improvement over this painful figure.

If you really want to eliminate the overhead cost of maintaining the Shuttle by replacing it with something cheaper, you would have to decommission all operations at KSC on Merritt Island. The Shuttle is the only use at all for Merritt Island now, Delta IV and Atlas V will launch from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on the mainland. You would also have to decommission the Michoud Assembly Facility in Louisiana where Saturn V first stages were built and Shuttle external tanks are made now. You would have to end the SSME and SRB support programs at Marshall in California and Stennis in Mississippi, and Thiokol?s SRB facility in Utah. You would also have to end funds to Dryden to maintain an alternate landing site for Shuttle. That would take away (using 2003 budget figures) $167.3 million from KSC, $887.1 million from Marshall (including Michoud and Thiokol?s facility), $43.4 million from Stennis, and $4.9 million from Dryden. The $1,778.2 million to Johnson is going to continue as long as there is a manned space program. The Dryden Flight Research Center has other things to work on, and will probably be involved with OSP. Thiokol will produce the solid rockets for Delta IV. The dramatic things would be completely closing Merritt and Michoud. Do you think the politicians would go for that? I doubt it. OSP would not result in elimination of these fixed overhead costs, so it would only replace the $137 million per-launch cost of Shuttle. That would result in a net increase that the American tax payer must pay. Rather than arguing for decommissioning Merritt Island and Michoud, I am proposing redirecting them to produce a SDV for Mars. Then reducing access to space will require reducing the operational cost of OSP below the $137 million mark.

Bill White · 2003-11-21 11:51:04

3: Flying Shuttle is a worse option than flying EELVs. This should be pretty obvious, since there is so much infrastructure that Nasa will have to pay for no matter how many Shuttles fly a year. I don't think it unfair or unrealistic that each flight from now on will cost almost One Billion Dollars each, none of this $137M nonsense. Even Delta-IV HLV is a giant improvement over this painful figure.
If you really want to eliminate the overhead cost of maintaining the Shuttle by replacing it with something cheaper, you would have to decommission all operations at KSC on Merritt Island. The Shuttle is the only use at all for Merritt Island now, Delta IV and Atlas V will launch from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on the mainland. You would also have to decommission the Michoud Assembly Facility in Louisiana where Saturn V first stages were built and Shuttle external tanks are made now. You would have to end the SSME and SRB support programs at Marshall in California and Stennis in Mississippi, and Thiokol?s SRB facility in Utah. You would also have to end funds to Dryden to maintain an alternate landing site for Shuttle. That would take away (using 2003 budget figures) $167.3 million from KSC, $887.1 from Marshall (including Michoud and Thiokol?s facility), $43.4 million from Stennis, and $4.9 million from Dryden. The $1.7782 million to Johnson is going to continue as long as there is a manned space program. The Dryden Flight Research Center has other things to work on, and will probably be involved with OSP. Thiokol will produce the solid rockets for Delta IV. The dramatic things would be completely closing Merritt and Michoud. Do you think the politicians would go for that? I doubt it. OSP would not result in elimination of these fixed overhead costs, so it would only replace the $137 million per-launch cost of Shuttle. That would result in a net increase that the American tax payer must pay. Rather than arguing for decommissioning Merritt Island and Michoud, I am proposing redirecting them to produce a SDV for Mars. Then reducing access to space will require reducing the operational cost of OSP below the $137 million mark.

This suggests to me Ares is the only politically viable choice for a Mars launch system since Ares is based on the
shuttle stack. Anything else combines development costs with the political costs of shutting down all these facilities.

Wouldn't all these guys make logical allies for humans to Mars, if only to save their jobs after the shuttle stops flying?

clark · 2003-11-21 11:54:14

A reason and a politcally expedient solution, all in one package! The stars themselves very rarely align so precisely.

Tyr · 2003-11-21 12:22:04

here are some ideas you can't miss: http://www.spaceislandgroup.com/dual-launch.html
They want to stick a modified DC-X on a SDV. Cool idea.

Shaun Barrett · 2003-11-24 06:55:55

I agree with Robert's timetable (who wouldn't?) - 2010 landing and 2020 commencement of colonisation.

But I've never been convinced that a sample return mission is necessary. Send more capable automated laboratories to Mars if you're concerned about man-eating bacteria or lung-rotting superoxide fines. It'll be quicker, cheaper, and technologically simpler.
The first astronauts on Mars will learn more about Martian regolith and geology in the first day or two than a dozen SRMs could tell us in the next decade or two.

Other than that, I'm with you all the way!!

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