Euro version of Mars Direct - Thoughts?

Bill White · 2004-06-25 17:20:11

Found this http://www.marssociety.de/emc/proceedin … a.pdf]link and posted it in "The Myth of Heavy Lift" but then decided it deserves its own thread.

Check out the cost estimates for the 1st mission and follow on missions.

Grypd · 2004-06-25 17:36:32

It seems that it can be done but it needs the conjunction of something else, A reuseable space plane servicing the heavy launcher maybe?

JimM · 2004-06-26 08:04:01

Found this link and posted it in "The Myth of Heavy Lift" but then decided it deserves its own thread.

I agree. Here's what I posted to Myth of Heavy Lift on this earlier:

The Shuttle or anything derived from it is cursed. The design and execution is fundamentally flawed. And it's not just Shuttle that's cursed, any project built and run by the iron triangle of NASA and its cost-plus pals Boeing and Lockheed Martin is going to cost the earth by the time it gets finished--if it ever gets finished. Why? Because they have zero interest in doing things the cheap way. Why should they? If you get paid on a cost-plus basis, the more it ends up costing the more profit you make--and with public and politicians trained to believe and accept that space is extremely, extortionately expensive, why dissolution them?

What's to be done to overcome this monopoly (and it is an effective monopoly in the US) that amounts to a total roadblock on real progress in space? The answer--the only answer I can see-- is have space move forward somewhere else, enough to frighten the US out of its complacent slumber withe the iron triangle. Today there is only one organisation that has both the knowledge and the money to do this, and that's ESA. (Especially if it can bring in the Russians as 'honorary members', which takes care of getting people up and down from orbit.)

Therefore yes, I'm extremely interested in Mars Society Deutschland's plan to use a European Very Heavy Launcher (which could lift more to LEO than Shuttle C, BTW) derived from Adriane 5 as the basis of a Zubrin-style expedition to Mars. It does not seem to depend on American technology for any of its major components, so if it happened it would break the Iron Triangle's monopolist grip on space by providing serious competition from a non-American yet western organization. (Rather like Boeing and Airbus, if you like.) To get the best results, competition is a necessity. If you don't believe that, you were probably on the wrong side during the Cold War.

flashgordon · 2004-06-26 12:59:27

Zubrins legacy may not be in achieving mars direct himself but in spreading the ideas; political and economic pressure will drive the rest.

Grypd · 2004-06-26 13:36:13

The shuttle is not cursed, Its designed wrong, and is very very inefficient and been the subject of make work programs. The ISS being prime example.

But i dont want to throw the baby out with the bath water, The shuttle can be made better. A brand new heavy lift like the Ariane 5M would be perfect we just are not going to get it any time soon.

There is not the political pressure in Europe for a manned space program. Many countries have little or no interest in the future space program, they may well launch satelites and develop them but it would take a major shift in public pressure for there to be that drastic a change.

Timeslicer · 2004-06-26 14:07:31

The document has good examples of mission costs. One observation - development costs are obviously about an order of magnitude higher than procurement costs.

Anything that reduces the R&D costs will contribute greatly to making Mars missions more feasible.

The Mars Society's efforts on that score are noteworthy.

JimM · 2004-06-26 16:41:01

The shuttle is not cursed, Its designed wrong, and is very very inefficient and been the subject of make work programs.

If it's designed wrong, is very very inefficient, and has been the subject of make-work programs, then it's cursed.

If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, then it's a duck.

Grypd · 2004-06-26 16:43:04

The premise behind the shuttle is wrong it is not the Orbiter we need to reuse but the launch systems. But that can be fixed.

smurf975 · 2004-06-26 16:58:50

I just found out that there is already an euro version of a Mars human mission. Look for the Aurora programme on esa's website.

JimM · 2004-06-26 17:23:17

The premise behind the shuttle is wrong it is not the Orbiter we need to reuse but the launch systems. But that can be fixed.

The most useful service Shuttle can do now for the space program is to serve as an Awful Warning.

I just found out that there is already an euro version of a Mars human mission. Look for the Aurora programme on esa's website.

Yes, information on Aurora is available http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Aurora/SEMX … .html]here

PurduesUSAFguy · 2004-06-26 17:35:15

I think the best thing that could happen for humans to mars, be it NASA, ESA, or Whereveristan, is for someone to put up the money for RCS Energya to revive the Energia.

GCNRevenger · 2004-06-27 01:25:08

The Energia is not going to come back, too much of the original program... the parts manufacturers, the launch & assembly facilities, and the people/admin/experience are too far gone. The RD-0120s, the VAB, etc all gone. The biggest "MarsDirect sized" version of Energia was never even built either if memory serves.

My big worries/issues/things about a "European DRM" mission is the launch vehicle... the Ariane-VM superheavy would have tripple the engines, tripple the failures of the already shakey system. And, do the Europeans have the money to do the huge amount of enegineering involved? The little ISS ATV program seems to have been a hurdle financially and buracraticly.

Jim, your blanket condemnation of anything to do with Shuttle but not over the Saturn rockets is somewhat contradictory... Yes the orbiter itself needs to go, no question there, and yes there is little point in making a reuseable launcher, no argument there, but the problem is with Nasa... not Shuttle itself so much.

Shuttle uses all the same facilities as the Saturn rockets, the shuttle tank is not far removed from Saturn's, the SRBs are reliable nor excessivly expensive, and there is nothing wrong with these facilites or systems save a little update here and there. The problems come trying to make the fantasticly complex and poorly concieved Golden Goose contraption fly on it, the traditional NASA status-quo administration, and open-ended orders for the agency to go in circles (build space station).

So we build Shuttle-C with EELV hardware, ditch as much of the orbiter related stuff as possible, maybe make the 5-segment boosters in an expendable version. Large SRBs + Large Cryogenic Core, just like the NOVA concepts to suceed and replace Saturn...

And what would you see built? Dig up the plans for the F-1A and J-2 engines to redo Saturn when we could build Shuttle-C for less twice as fast? Trust Elon Musk to make an HLLV when he can't even launch 2,000lbs? Have Armadillo Aerospace make a Mars lander? ...The "evil capitalist contractors" are about the only organizations on Earth with the engineering skills and reasources to build Mars spacecraft or large rockets. Its expensive to live with them, but we can't live without them.

Ultimatly the problem with Shuttle is political, that the Shuttle Orbiter design and program (what it was built for)were born of bad politics, not that the other hardware is inherintly flawed.

JimM · 2004-06-27 03:39:54

...but the problem is with Nasa... not Shuttle itself so much.

Well yes, but it is the NASA problem, which has been with us for a while, that delivered the Shuttle, "USS Kludge"

NASA, I suggest, has been living off its Apollo reputation ever since Apollo 17 returned from the moon.

I have nothing but praise for the NASA that delivered on Kennedy's promised and landed men on the moon before the decade of the 60s was out. But the NASA of today is quite different. It has become fat and complacent and a serious drag on the whole manned space program. It is comfortably embedded with its iron triangle pals, and reverted to the traditional role of any public bureaucracy, which is to continue its own existence for its own sake. Meanwhile its iron triangle pals do what any private company is supposed to do, make money--and what a milch cow they have here; their pal NASA extracts billions every year from the government for them and awards cost-plus contracts that cannot fail to make nice juicy profits for acheiving very little.

Indeed, to call what we have today a 'space program' is a travesty.

The reason I believe NASA is probably beyond redemption as a driving force for a space program suited to the 21st Century is that it is stuffed full of people who were young and effective and enthusiastic back in the 1960, but now... well, let's just say, now they are not.

I'd be tempted to suggest shutting down NASA and starting again, but as a second best, I'd let JPL go away to be on their own, and take from NASA all responsibility for developing and running any sort of space transport system--meaning that any successor or successors to Shuttle are not specified or build or run by NASA but a private space transport company that is ultimately intended to operate at a profit.

Then if the US wants to mount a mission to Mars, say, it should ask for bids, not just to design and build the ships, but also to operate the mission, with the big profits coming in after going there and returning successfully. In other words, there is a real prospect of the bidding process helping drive down the cost... indeed if they could find the capital, the Mars Society (for instance) could form a company and make a bid themselves.

The Energia is not going to come back...

Yes, I came to that view myself a year or so ago after checking out all I could find out about Energia from Russian and other sources. I reluctantly came to the conclusion that you could say Energia almost didn't exist. Apart from one or two cobbled together to lauch a test payload and then an unmanned Buran, no Energia was ever brought near completion; it was always more of a paper study than a real live rocket. This vehicle, which has acquired near-mythical status among some is indeed just that today-- a myth. That's why I came to the conclusion that it would be much easier and better to revive Saturn. At least we know how to build one and we know it works, and as you say, all the facilities needed for Saturn are there at Cape Canaveral, 'borrowed' for now by Shuttle.

(BTW, the Russians did not have a VAB for asssembling Energia. Like all their other stacks they assembled it horizontally and rotated to vertical at the launch pad. Of course it was not fuelled until vertical, but still...)

...do the Europeans have the money to do the huge amount of enegineering involved?

Yes, the EU has the money. It has a GDP roughly equal to the US. The problem is persuading them to part with enough of it, but I think there is the same problem in the US regarding PlanBush, no?

smurf975 · 2004-06-27 06:04:16

My big worries/issues/things about a "European DRM" mission is the launch vehicle... the Ariane-VM superheavy would have tripple the engines, tripple the failures of the already shakey system. And, do the Europeans have the money to do the huge amount of enegineering involved?

Technically the Europeans are richer then the USA.

Grypd · 2004-06-27 09:38:33

It has never been about Financial concerns in the case of europes space plans.

It has to do with political will. Europe will not give Esa the amount of money needed at the moment to allow the construction of SuperHeavy Arianes.

Europe may do it if it was in competition with another "country" but at the moment this seems unlikely as there is reasonable cooperation at the moment.

Esa is a satellite and robotic mission launcher and at this it is brilliant but it will need a major change in goals for Esa to become a major human exploration force. Im sorry to say it will be a while for this to occur.

smurf975 · 2004-06-27 11:19:39

Esa is a satellite and robotic mission launcher and at this it is brilliant but it will need a major change in goals for Esa to become a major human exploration force. Im sorry to say it will be a while for this to occur.

It doesn't matter much at this point anyway as you need to explore and test your machines before you can send a human mission. The satellite and robotic missions seem to fulfill this first priority.

In the time during the ESA must have successful missions, such as NASA's rovers, which will attract a lot of press and then they can start lobbying for more funds.

Rxke · 2004-06-27 11:22:54

Europe is slowly getting more 'space-loving' for instance look at the appointment of Claudie Haigneré, the ESA astronaut, of Minister for Research and New Technologies in the French government in 2002.

Europe is getting a lot of money back from its investment in the commercial launching industry, and while it probably *is* a red tape nightmare, there is a lot of competition AND cooperation to get contracts, between companies...
Quite a lot of small-scale stuff is being done, on the development of new tech, ESA slowly building up its knowledgebase, with some impressive results. Look at the 'express' missions, cheap because using a lot of interchanegeable hardware, so lowering development-costs etc.
I'm still amazed they put their long-term Mars plans on the net, and didn't pull them off after some months, they must be serious.
But not in a hurry.

Timeslicer · 2004-06-27 11:25:25

Look at that paper again. The real costs are in the development of the stuff you'd take into space or to the moon or Mars. That's the real reason why you prefer one launch - to cut out the massive added costs entailed in designing ten things that launch separately and have to be put together in space.

But why not take that logic further? The important question isn't "how do we get stuff into space cheaper?" (if it's worth sending something into space, the launch costs aren't an impossible obstacle). The important question is "how do we get development costs down?"

It is true that if we did have a really cheap way into space, development costs would fall radically. But why? Because we could build something, take it into space, test it, see how it fails, fix it, and launch again. That's the approach being used by Armadillo Aerospace, BTW.

Since we do NOT have a cheap way into space, the next best alternative plan would be to get into space and stay there building and testing things.

Oh hey - like a space station! We have woefully failed to make proper use of the space station - frittering away that massive investment on "science experiments". (Heard of any big breakthroughs as a result of all that 'valuable' science? I haven't. Heck, NASA scientists are even still complaining that they don't know enough about the effects of long-term zero-G on astronauts for a trip to Mars. You'd think they'd have THAT figured out by now, if anything.)

The ISS should have been a machine shop for assembling and building and testing experimental space systems. I say we give John Carmack NASA (with budget), the ISS and shuttles, and see if he can get to the Moon or Mars.

The same logic applies to a Mars mission. Instead of trying to research all the factors that will affect a Mars exploration rover and design a rover that will not fail, design a plausible first cut at it that can be easily modified, send it to Mars, and send along skilled engineer/machinists who can "fix it til it works", with the support of scientists and engineers back on earth as needed. Let the planetary exploration scientists follow a few years later, after some infrastructure has been built for them.

Grypd · 2004-06-27 15:38:04

At the moment the two main countries in ESA, France and Germany are in an economic doldrum.

Also with the fallout with the European constitution there is little or no time left for politicians to consider advancing space technology or to put money into it. I really wish there was.

Britain has NO space policy though there has been an increase in pressure to change this. Britain has more or less ignored Esa since its creation.

Rxke · 2004-06-27 16:22:11

Don't forget Italy, The pressurised ATV's are mainly being built there... (Of course, with populist Berlusconi at the helm, sigh... Who knows what future will bring. Being a media magnate, at least he has *some* vested interest in the space-industry (TV-sats, anone?))

Grypd · 2004-06-27 16:47:14

I did not forget Italy, but ESA is a space organisation of different states and if two of the three main partners are not willing to invest Italy cannot go on its own.

But saying that it may be with the other problems Europe has at the moment it will go looking for prestige and a means to improve European feeling in its member states. This could be accomplished by a Mars/Moon programme. It will be seen as a way for all member states to contribute and a way to advance european science. Will there be cooperation with NASA this I cannot be sure of with the recent cooling of Europe/Usa relations.

RobertDyck · 2004-06-28 11:18:46

The Energia is not going to come back, too much of the original program... the parts manufacturers, the launch & assembly facilities, and the people/admin/experience are too far gone. The RD-0120s, the VAB, etc all gone. The biggest "MarsDirect sized" version of Energia was never even built either if memory serves.

Oh, the political spin happens again. Energia could be reactivated. I argue that reactivating Energia is easier than developing Magnum. Shuttle-C would be easiest, if managed properly. I already posted the letter from KBKhA regarding reactivating manufacture of the RD-0120 engines; it's easier than you imply here. The transporter and its rails are in prestine condition. The launch gantry needs a scrub with a wire brush and a fresh coat of paint. I had an arguement with a salesman at Orbital Science about Energia in the spring of 2002. He argued that the VAB was rusted and about to fall down. I pointed out that I have pictures from a tour group that went through in April, 1997. Russia not only stored the 3 remaining Energia launch vehicles there, they also used the low bays to stage modules for ISS. It was clean, bright, well maintained, in perfect operating condition. Less than a month after that conversation the accident occured; the roof collapsed. A Russian investigation found it was an accident, but the coincidence still makes me paranoid.

Bottom line: Energia could be reactivated. The strap-on boosters are the first stage of Zenit; it's still in production. The manufacturer of the RD-0120 engines is willing to bring them back into production at their cost, but only if they get a customer willing to pay for engines. The VAB needs a new roof, and after 2 winters of exposing the high bays to the elements it will need a thorough cleaning. Kazahkstan wants Russia to pay for it, Russia says Kazahkstan caused the damage so they should pay. The only major hurdle is external tanks. The tanks of the core module are no longer in production and the factories are gone; I think they were retooled for consumer goods. One engineer at Michoud pointed out that if that's the only hurdle to going to Mars, then Michoud could make the tanks. Hmmm, Russia dependant on the U.S. to build the big Russian rocket. Would that resolve the political resistance to rebuilding Russian infrastructure?

The Vulkan version of Energia was never built, but it has never been needed for Mars Direct. Energia as flown can lift 88 tonnes to LEO, or over 100 tonnes with the upper stage. You don't need the 170 tonne lift capacity of Vulkan. According to Robert Zubrin's book "The Case for Mars", Mars Direct could be launched with 2 Ares rockets or 3 Energia rockets. By the way, there were 3 Energia rockets in the VAB when the roof collapsed on them.

My big worries/issues/things about a "European DRM" mission is the launch vehicle... the Ariane-VM superheavy would have tripple the engines, tripple the failures of the already shakey system.

Ariane 4 is one of the most reliable launch vehicles in operation today. Ariane 5 failed its first launch due to a stupid mistake, not anything with the engineering. It has never failed since. Your categorization as "shakey" can only be described as more spin, to put it politely.

We could do Mars Direct with Energia, Ariane-VM, or Shuttle-C. Let's just pick one and DO IT! NOW!

smurf975 · 2004-06-28 11:26:20

The problem as some people already stated here and other places is the "not invented here" that many space agencies policies suffer from which are dictated by local businesses and politics.

JimM · 2004-06-28 15:41:19

Oh, the political spin happens again. Energia could be reactivated. I argue that reactivating Energia is easier than developing Magnum. Shuttle-C would be easiest, if managed properly.

Energia could be reactivated. The V-2 could be reactivated. The Hindenburg could be rebuilt.
Shuttle-C will take much longer, cost lots more, lift much less, and be unreliable. Like everything else to do with Shuttle, it is cursed.

Saturn would be easier to revive than Energia, as I said earlier. And we know Saturn works.

smurf975 · 2004-06-28 15:43:51

Saturn would be easier to revive than Energia, as I said earlier. And we know Saturn works.

Energia works also and is cheaper!

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Re: Euro version of Mars Direct - Thoughts?

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