In article ,
says...

On 2018-04-26 17:14, Fred J. McCall wrote:

Without a destination in LEO, I wouldn't expect a huge market for LEO
trips. Falcon Heavy/Dragon V2 could do a Moon flyby with free return,
but the bulk of that trip is going to be boring. You'll spend very
little time near the Moon and the system doesn't have the capability
to make that longer.

That means the 'work horse for manned space flight will by default
wind up being SLS/Orion, which massively sucks.


Considering SpaceX is much better at delivering stuff on time and on
budget, wouldn't it be able to deliver a Dragon service module with the
extra oumph! to permit Moon orbit/return before the "real" service
module is delivered for Orion?

Big problem. It simply won't work. You see, neither Dragon nor Dragon
V2 has a "service module". They have a "trunk" which is little more
than a hollow tube to which the solar arrays are attached. Everything
that's in Orion's service module is *inside* Dragon and Dragon V2.
That's because SpaceX reuses everything they can. Throwing away a
couple solar arrays and an empty tube is a lot cheaper than throwing
away an entire Orion service module.

Then again, is there any market to make a sightseeing triop to the moon
without landing?

SpaceX thought so, then scuttled the plan to fly tourists around the
moon using a Falcon Heavy and a Dragon V2, so who knows. Depends on the
price. They'd be the first tourists to orbit the moon, so it's
something no one else has done except for the Apollo astronauts.

Wouldn't it have greater market potential to orbit the Earth for a week,
which gives you much better scenery? (in terms of tourist potential).

LOL, depends on who's paying and how much.

How much would Dragon V2 need to be changed to rise above Van Alen belt
and get full brunt of radiation?

Nothing if you accept the same risk the Apollo astronauts did.

Jeff
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