Certainly this latter reason was what I recall being said when they were
originally planning more frequent launches in the early days. I think its a
legacy from those days and if it works, why change it?

Brian

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Brian Gaff....Note, this account does not accept Bcc: email.
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"John Doe" wrote in message
...
Lee Jay wrote:
I've wondered why the payload isn't installed in the payload bay either
at the OPF or the VAB. Why is it often (always?) done at the pad?

When you consider how long it takes between the shuttle bay doors closed
at OPF and the actual launch, your cargo wouldn't be able to carry any
perishable experiments.

If the whole flow of work had been done so that they could be like a
Soyuz: move to the pad and launch the next day, then perhaps they could
have done payload loading in the VAB.

The one advantage of the current process is that it frees the VAB quickly.
This way, they can pipeline the work with an orbiter in OPF, one in VAB
and one at the pad, and thus theoretically have more frequent launches.