Privatized Human Missions

Ben Barrett · 2005-07-28 05:53:18

After reading the post by calm guy about being fed up with NASA I got to thinking. I would like to see our government, or any government for that matter, decide to make a human Mars mission possible, as to me it would represent an investment in the future of humankind. I try to remain optomistic that NASA, the Russians or maybe even the ESA will get this done. That being said there is a distinct and frightening possibility that this won't happen, if NASA continues to be mired in the LEO paradigm that has prevented us from getting anywhere. Should there be a policy change by the next administration or, even worse, another disaster, we could see the Moon-Mars mandate disappear in a hurry. Therefore there is a chance that if we really want to get to Mars we have to come to the realization that we might have to do it ourselves. Privatization, in my opinion, would also be a stronger statement, as it would trancend nationality in our resolve to settle Mars. The best way to do this would be come up with a good detailed plan for executing the mission and then start selling it like crazy. Granted, it's not that simple, (I won't even get into my ideas or this post would be way to long.) it would be VERY difficult to do, but sometimes people have to forage ahead despite great adversity in order to make their ideas happen. We have here bright people from all parts of this planet who undoubtably look at Mars and dream about it. Maybe it's high time we focus less on pleading with NASA and focus more on making our dream a reality for ourselves. Would it be dangerous? Hell yes. Would it be risky? Absolutely, but sometime the greatest risk in life is not taking one. [/quote]

Palomar · 2005-07-28 06:12:32

if NASA continues to be mired in the LEO paradigm that has prevented us from getting anywhere.

*Frankly I don't know where it's all going (other than nowhere fast). I'm getting fed up with the overall situation, period.

It's a good thing I love astronomy, because my interest in space exploration (not entertainment) sure is taking a beating.

I've never been a fan of the shuttle, for instance; as I mentioned yesterday in a different thread, even in 1976 critics warned the shuttle was really our wings clipped; we'd be stuck in LEO for decades. Well, that's nearly 3 decades ago now. And the shuttles are essentially pieces of junk.

And if near-future (some even current now) trends are any indication, it seems even privately we're looking at being stuck in LEO for decades to come.

I thought more people were interested in a manned mission to Mars, but apparently not. Sheep. :evil:

--Cindy

Fledi · 2005-07-28 19:55:48

Hi Cindy,

Don't give up yet, it might take one or more realistically to decades to build out a private launching infrastructure, but once it is done this whole issue of manned spaceflight will rapidly become something even middle class citizens will be able to afford.

Ben Barrett · 2005-07-29 03:16:27

I agree, what I'm thinking is that the Mars Society and other pro-space organizations should come up with a comprehensive plan for exploring Mars and begin to look for possible investors. It might be the only way we make it off this rock.

Stormrage · 2005-07-29 04:32:59

There is just one hurdle. Money and technology. We don't have billions of dollars. Starting our own space program costs money. Also the level of technology hasn't grown for a private exploration.

Maybe some day though.

srmeaney · 2005-07-29 04:41:09

True,

Even starting up your own Space Commonwealth with its own currency and inate economic value, and territory will get you a kicking from the wannabe superpower with dreams of Galactic imperium. Unless you can get the economic support of the corporations of this planet and the people in general, you havnt got a hope in hell.

When others even look at the idea of Space Commonwealth they see a wall of Government separating a Space Paradise from PrisonColony: Earth.

They dont want Government unless it is their own. And they dont want to be subject to any limits that restrict them to an equal share.

Sean

Fledi · 2005-07-30 16:02:14

Maybe we should look at it not just from a money perspective, but what resources we can gather, both the time invested into a project by individuals and the cost of the materials.
For example the approach of the Canadian Da Vinci project impressed me, the numbers were some 350,000 $ invested for building their rocket plus 200,000 man hours.
Sure their rocked hasn't flown yet, but if it will succeed it would mean lower cost by another magnitude compared to SS1.

These guys have still a long way to go before they will build anything that even just comes close to orbital, but hey, the whole rocketry branch wasn't taken seriously by most of the aeronautic community before they started sending up people to space and then to the Moon.

In the end, I think what we need is to combine these suborbital efforts with some sort of launch assist like a maglev or that rotating space tether to make spaceflight affordable.

John Creighton · 2005-07-30 18:40:45

I think we need to start with small projects and build up from there. Perhaps invest 10% of the revenue into future projects and build up bigger and bigger. I believe the planetary society had a project to launch a solar sail and the Mars society planed to put mice up in space in a centrifuge. As these society start accomplishing more hopefully more money can be raised in the future.

C M Edwards · 2005-07-31 12:23:45

... there is a chance that if we really want to get to Mars we have to come to the realization that we might have to do it ourselves. Privatization, in my opinion, would also be a stronger statement, as it would trancend nationality in our resolve to settle Mars.

You mean something like what was discussed in http://www.newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=2258]this thread? Or http://www.newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=37]this thread? Or http://www.newmars.com/forums/viewtopic … ight=]this one?

Or perhaps you're discussing the startup of private companies. Either way, I'm with you, Ben.

GCNRevenger · 2005-07-31 12:30:40

Maybe we should look at it not just from a money perspective, but what resources we can gather, both the time invested into a project by individuals and the cost of the materials.
For example the approach of the Canadian Da Vinci project impressed me, the numbers were some 350,000 $ invested for building their rocket plus 200,000 man hours.
Sure their rocked hasn't flown yet, but if it will succeed it would mean lower cost by another magnitude compared to SS1.
These guys have still a long way to go before they will build anything that even just comes close to orbital, but hey, the whole rocketry branch wasn't taken seriously by most of the aeronautic community before they started sending up people to space and then to the Moon.
In the end, I think what we need is to combine these suborbital efforts with some sort of launch assist like a maglev or that rotating space tether to make spaceflight affordable.

I don't think that you realize just how far these people are away from orbit. In fact, its so far away, that its difficult to express in common words an analogies... SpaceShipOne or any of the X-Prizers' vehicles would need two orders of magnetude - several hundred times - the energy needed to reach orbit with a practical vehicle.

I still maintain that rotatethers are not technologically feasable because of the difficulty of redezvous, and are not economically practical because of their low flight flight rate and extreme initial costs.

A maglev sled would help, but they only contribute about 20% of the energy needed to reach orbit and really doesn't make orbital launches any simpler due to the increased complexity of the spaceplane. Extremely high initial costs too.

Fledi · 2005-08-01 13:31:39

I don't think that you realize just how far these people are away from orbit. In fact, its so far away, that its difficult to express in common words an analogies... SpaceShipOne or any of the X-Prizers' vehicles would need two orders of magnetude - several hundred times - the energy needed to reach orbit with a practical vehicle.

Oh, I'm aware of that. And yet these people have already built a passenger carrying, reusable suborbital vehicle for a, by aerospace standards, minuscule sum. I know X15 already accomplished nearly that in 1958, but it was not reusable and needed a B52 to launch. (I have no idea about the development cost of X15 but would bet it was higher than that of SS1)
It is probably not that difficult to design something like SS1 compared to an orbital rocket, but why hasn't anyone thought about doing it earlier then?

I still maintain that rotatethers are not technologically feasable because of the difficulty of redezvous, and are not economically practical because of their low flight flight rate and extreme initial costs.

Rendevouz is a problem, but I think that one can be solved.
The low flight rate only goes for parts that stay up. 0g or vacuum manufactured goods will obviously go back down, as will crews or tourists.
In the end the tether will be needed for spaceship construction, translunar sling shots and cargo transfer to Mars. As these tasks increase it will pay off to either have large solar cell or these interesting solar thermal (with mirrors) surfaces. Especially the mirrors could also be in a higher orbit and direct the power to the station from there.
OK you would still need radiators to dissipate the excess heat if you convert the power to electric instead of heating a thruster.
The other possibility is to have maglev assisted orbital spacecraft dock at the station and deorbit from there using the tether to boost its orbit.
Maybe there is another interesting option with a ground based tether system instead of the maglev, but I haven't looked into that one yet.

I have lots of ideas about this one, but can't guarantee yet it will work as smoothly as I imagine, so the only thing I can do is work on this project and that's what I'm doing when I have the time.
The simulation is making some progress, it looks better every day, maybe a few more months and it's ready to be placed on the web. Of course this is only a very small step towards what will be needed to have it in orbit one day.

How much a maglev can help depends on the achieveable max speed of it which is a length and atmospheric friction limited thing.
Nonetheless, I see no better way of reducing to orbit costs as to use some sort of large reusable structure to boost rockets which only need to be much smaller and thus easier to make reusable themselves.

Some time ago Griffin said something about that NASA should be at the frontier not stuck in LEO, but the truth is the frontier won't be pushed back a lot unless we can make LEO affordable.
There can be some flag and footprint missions or a small moonbase that will be a nightmare to keep alive like the ISS with these launch costs, but nothing more.
Now I don't expect to see it happen tomorrow morning, but it will only happen if we do our part to make it so.
What I think we are seeing now is NASA going beyond LEO, big companies like Boeing and Lockheed taking over LEO transportation for the time being and a new kind of player, namely the altspacers, getting into the game at the point where NASA was 50 years ago.
And sooner or later the day will come when these guys go from sub-orbital to orbital, the corporations from LEO to Lunar/Martian spaceship construction/infrastructure and NASA to who knows where (Yovian Moons??) (that is if they survive now and succeed with VSE).

Of course things can also go worse but I like to ignore this possibility.

GCNRevenger · 2005-08-01 16:37:12

No, I don't really think you do really understand how far away the X-Prize types are from an orbital vehicle. You know they are really far, but you don't understand; if you did, then you wouldn't make statements like this, because they are so obviously silly. In aerospace engineering imparticularly, if you want to increase the performance of a particular vehicle - say, double it - it doesn't cost double, it costs more. In fact, it is safe to aproximate that the cost increases exponentially with performance and complexity. If SSO cost $30M or whatnot then an orbital vehicle using the same level of technology could cost billions.

The X-Prize people really don't have that much of an edge cost wise over Big Aerospace with on-par performance... Its silly to talk about X-Prize companies going orbital, because they're not. The AltSpace community in general is basically tied to three plans/companies too:

-Elon Musk's Space-X and their Falcon-V, which doesn't exsist, and his puny baby Falcon-I doesn't even have an upper stage engine yet.

-Kistler Aerospace's KH-1 reuseable vehicle, which is only half done and their company is utterly bankrupt. Even if they did finish it, the chance the thing will fly with sufficent reliability is low.

-T/Space with Burt Rurtan, who want to build a minimum complexity Methane powerd rocket and drop it from a custom made jumbo jet. The price tag of $400-500M is way too high for sane investors, and NASA won't pay it.

None of them could carry more then about 10MT of payload to LEO either... I have little faith in either of them, particularly Kistler.

Rendezvous: This is another type of thing that becomes exponentially more difficult and expensive: when you start stacking together things that are hard to do, that is when you have lots of hard things that have to happen for it to work, the cost and difficulty of making that system work reliably increases exponentially.

Past a certain point, it is too difficult to make it sufficently reliable for commertial use. Think of a modern aircraft carrier and its arrestor hook system, except that it is flying at high altitude at supersonic velocity and moving around much faster then a boat does, and you have to be at exactly that place in the sky in that exact few-second window... Its never going to be reliable enough.

Then there is the issue of flight rate, that the thing will not be able to lift enough vehicles in a short enough amount of time to be worthwhile. You only get one shot at it per orbital allignment most likly to minimize spaceplane delta, which is going to be some days probobly. Its not practical.

Fledi · 2005-08-01 17:48:13

In aerospace engineering imparticularly, if you want to increase the performance of a particular vehicle - say, double it - it doesn't cost double, it costs more. In fact, it is safe to aproximate that the cost increases exponentially with performance and complexity. If SSO cost $30M or whatnot then an orbital vehicle using the same level of technology could cost billions.

You think I don't know this? That's exactly what I was trying to tell you for the last three posts or so.
So I will repeat it once more.
The whole idea is to use suborbital vehicles and combine them with a big structure like the tether or a maglev.
All vehicles you were addressing were full orbital ones and it's quite clear that's out of reach for altspace for the near future.
What has a chance to develop now is the suborbital market for space tourists as proven by SSO on which I'm basing these thoughts about the boosting structures. Of course theese suborbital rockets will have to be improved even for this but not nearly by as much as if you wanted them orbital out of their own power.

Think of a modern aircraft carrier and its arrestor hook system, except that it is flying at high altitude at supersonic velocity and moving around much faster then a boat does, and you have to be at exactly that place in the sky in that exact few-second window... Its never going to be reliable enough.

There is air friction with an aircraft carrier, the tethers end will be no lower than about 100km plus you won't have to hit a landing strip only a few meters wide but a box of 1km x 1km x several km.
Now I've heard something that ICBMs could strike their target within a few dozens of meters, so at least 10 times more precisely than the dimensions of this imaginery box in space.
Timing the rendevouz is critical but will be within that few seconds window as long as you launch at the exact time.
By the way it's not so much of a problem if you miss it every other time, then you simply land the vehicle, try again and are still much cheaper than a full orbital rocket.

For the maglev part I might add that 20% energy figure of yours goes only if the maglev acceleration goes only for a few 100 meters/second, not kilometers as what I was thinking about. Same goes for the tether.

Then there is the issue of flight rate, that the thing will not be able to lift enough vehicles in a short enough amount of time to be worthwhile. You only get one shot at it per orbital allignment most likly to minimize spaceplane delta, which is going to be some days probobly. Its not practical.

If you're equatorial it is possible to launch multiple times a day from the same location (you only have to be near the perigee of the tether orbit, not exactly at it, since the altitude increase isn't that much for something like a 10 or 20 degrees degression from the perigee).
The suborbital vehicle would be launched from a seaborne platform or a carrier plane anyways allowing for minor adjustments along the way.

But a few days per launch wouldn't be that tragic after all, that's still 100 launches per year, but it can go up to something like 1000 if neccesary (you also need some time to retrieve the vehicle from the end of the tether or winch in the complete thing (and temporarily store the rotational
energy in a flying wheel made of tether material).

clark · 2005-08-01 17:57:19

I thought some here may enjoy the eye-candy.

Bigelow. What a nut.

If you look closely, you will see a moon lander partially concealed by the solar panels (little itty bitty legs sticking out are a dead give away).

Directly above the moon lander looks to be a capsule style docking bay for earth-return/moon crusier rendeavou.

If you can fly that to the Moon, where else might you fly it to...

Hey, hey Paula, no one else will ever do...

RobertDyck · 2005-08-01 18:20:05

I saw a TV interview with another astronaut. (There have been a number due to return-to-flight.) This guy pointed out the entire cost of the Gemini program was $6 billion, and that's in today's dollars. He asked how many months of today's budget that represents.

Let's see, NASA's 2005 budget is $16.244 billion so that's less than 3 months. To be fair, though, that includes robotic exploration, astronomy, Earth science, biological & physical research, aeronautics technology, education, human & robotic technology, transportation systems, as well as station, shuttle, and space flight support. "Transportation systems" are separate from the shuttle. The space shuttle alone cost $4.319 billion and space flight support cost $492 million. So Gemini's budget represents 15 months of the Shuttle/flight support.

Still think CEV could reasonably cost double-digit billions?

RobertDyck · 2005-08-01 18:33:32

I thought some here may enjoy the eye-candy.
Bigelow. What a nut.

Please tell me he's kidding. You don't need all that. Apollo astronauts stayed in a capsule with lander attached for the entire trip to the Moon. (My orbit trajectory calculator says it's 4 1/2 days.) They can do the same this time. You need more room for a 6 month journey to Mars, but muscle atrophy and bone decalcification for 4 1/2 days are negligible. Let's reduce that vehicle to the Soyuz-style return vehicle and lunar lander, with a simple TLI stage. All the other stuff including Bigelow's inflatable habitat are unnecessary. The Russian Soyuz developed for the Moon race had a slightly stretched service module for return to Earth. That's it, all you need. Any extra room is only needed for a lunar surface habitat. That would be one-way and would require some sort of landing system (read: where are the legs.)

Of course Robert Zubrin made a good point at last years convention about mission architecture. Rather than lunar orbit rendezvous, build a single vehicle that goes from Earth directly to the lunar surface and back. I could harp about maximizing reusable equipment, but no one wants to read about that again. Bottom line: this is way overkill.

augmento · 2005-08-01 21:53:09

and i was hoping that i could just put one of these together.

http://www.cylon.org/tv/Salvage/s1-03.html

Commodore · 2005-08-01 22:22:50

I thought some here may enjoy the eye-candy.
Bigelow. What a nut.
Please tell me he's kidding. You don't need all that. Apollo astronauts stayed in a capsule with lander attached for the entire trip to the Moon. (My orbit trajectory calculator says it's 4 1/2 days.) They can do the same this time. You need more room for a 6 month journey to Mars, but muscle atrophy and bone decalcification for 4 1/2 days are negligible. Let's reduce that vehicle to the Soyuz-style return vehicle and lunar lander, with a simple TLI stage. All the other stuff including Bigelow's inflatable habitat are unnecessary. The Russian Soyuz developed for the Moon race had a slightly stretched service module for return to Earth. That's it, all you need. Any extra room is only needed for a lunar surface habitat. That would be one-way and would require some sort of landing system (read: where are the legs.)

I think everything aft of the docking node is service module.

Later on once we have an actual permenent base on the moon, we're going to want to pack the CEV with as many seats and supplies as possible. At that point expecting 6+ people to live in a now quite cramped capsule is a little too much to ask.

Thats actually a great platform to potentally do a near earth asteroid mission. Which I think will take place before a Mars mission.

Martin_Tristar · 2005-08-01 22:25:41

What a Topic : Privatize space exploration !!!!!!!!!

The main difference must be the development of newer and low cost processes for space development that could bring forth human society into space.

Firstly we need to build a business plan approach around the development aspects and the revenue aspects of the space project. Because funding the projects must be a nil cost or profitable a basis. ( with nil cost you need to provide other advantages including strategic or future relating goals )

Second, a venture capital broker to find the money for the venture and secure the funding. The funding will come from many sources - individuals, private companies, public companies and government.

Thirdly , build the project on time and within budget, because that provides you with the demonstrated skills for the future of other projects for funding and expanding into space.

RobertDyck · 2005-08-01 23:18:50

Salvage-1, I haven't thought of that show in years. It was supposed to be fuelled by mono-hydrazine. The prefix "mono" implies it's singular, not combined into a larger molecule. In real life that would simply be called hydrazine. http://www.astronautix.com/props/hydazine.htm]This is real hydrazine. The MR-508 engine actually managed to get specific impulse of 502 seconds. Of course it's an arcjet, which is a form of electric propulsion. Like all electrics, it takes significant power and produces low thrust; in this case 0.0235 kgf thrust. Engine mass is 1kg so it couldn't lift itself much less a fuel tank. Useful on satellites for station keeping, but not a main engine.

Or did the writers mean http://www.astronautix.com/props/monazi … /Hydrazine, Mixed Oxides of Nitrogen with Hydrazine. That engine has Isp 343 seconds in vacuum, oxidizer/fuel ratio 1.4, density 1.19 g/cc. Dense fuel but poor performance. http://www.astronautix.com/props/monmmh.htm]MON/MMH is a little lower performance but Isp at sea level is listed: 292 seconds. Isp in vacuum 340 seconds, density 1.17 g/cc.

The closest thing to a magical fuel is http://www.astronautix.com/props/lf2lh2.htm]LF2/LH2 (liquid fluorine and liquid hydrogen) which had Isp of 464 seconds for an engine optimized for upper stages (use in vacuum only). It was abandoned because fluorine is so toxic. Besides, several LOX/LH2 engines designed for upper stages achieved comparable Isp. LF2/LH2 does have higher fuel density.
LOX/LH2, oxidizer/fuel ratio 6, density 0.28 g/cc
LOX/Slush LH2, oxidizer/fuel ratio 4, density 0.33 g/cc
LF2/LH2, oxidizer/fuel ratio 8, density 0.46 g/cc

GCNRevenger · 2005-08-02 14:24:24

Or maybe he means Monomethyl Hydrazine, CH3-NH-NH2, also called MMH?

Anyway, no such fuel exsists that could quickly take you from Earth to the Moon one way with a single stage without getting really big, unless it was powerd by a very high energy density nuclear engine, like a GCNR or NSWR.

The best chemical fuels in the world aren't likly to get alot better any time soon. Slushed Hydrogen and LOX seem to be about as good as it gets for practical rocket engines.

On the horizon, there are some crazy N5+ cation salts that are somewhat stable that might give you Hydrogen-like performance in densities close to that of water, but there is the little problem that they are solids and very hard to produce. If you didn't mind using a solid rocket engine, that would make getting into LEO a bit easier, but not all the way to the Moon. Toxticity issues too.

Fledi · 2005-08-02 16:37:58

Then there is also this one http://www.plichta.de/english/english.php?patents

TwinBeam · 2005-08-02 17:05:49

*IF* you could stabilize it, mon-atomic hydrogen should give quite a kick.

How could you even begin to stabilize it? Maybe super cool it, mixed in with ordinary H2 at a ratio such that a few H1 randomly combining won't trigger explosive recombination?

Of course, it was just a TV show...

GCNRevenger · 2005-08-02 17:44:31

Mono-atomic Hydrogen? Uhhh... no

If you carried it in such a small concentration to minimize unwanted recombination, then you could carry so little of it that it would be pretty useless.

Spin-stabilized Helium is out of the question too.

Spiking slushed hydrogen might give you a little extra kick, like with nanoscale aluminum particles, but it wouldn't make a huge difference.

TwinBeam · 2005-08-02 20:29:55

Hey, I'm not disputing that it's not likely to work.

But if I've read correctly, the energy of combining 2 H to H2 is about 435 kJ/mole of H2 formed, vs about 732 J/mole of H2O created by burning H2 and O2. If that's correct, you could dilute H a LOT and still get value from it - e.g dilute it 290:1 (H2 to H) and you'd still get about 2x the net energy after combining it with O2.

Better yet, forget the O2 - just use the energy of recombination - diluted 290:1 you'd get the about same energy as from the same mass of H2 burnt with O2, with 1/9th the mass of fuel, or roughly 3x the delta-V for a given mass ratio.

My googled sources were:

http://library.thinkquest.org/03oct/015 … ology.html

and

http://www.science.uwaterloo.ca/~cchieh … 20/mo.html

Also this one has an interesting tid-bit about embedding H in frozen neon:

http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/oc … .Ch.r.html

Again - I'm not saying this "dilution" idea actually works - just that monoatomic H is interesting as a potential fuel - perhaps worth considering further.

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