wrote:

The astronaut corp apparently desperately hopes not. The hydrogen fire
on Delta IV scared the bejeesus out of everyone who saw it; DIV cannot
fulfill the CEV mission without solid-rocket strapons (up to 7, if
memory serves), thus negating the already dubious safety superiority to
solids; and the DIV has to fly an odd trajectory (due to structural
concerns) that means that there are points in the ascent when abort is
*not* survivable. Atlas V heavy is a bit of an unknown, but apprently
has a number of the same performance issues.


Looking at the LockMart CEV design with add-on living/docking area at
the back reminds me of the way Hermes slowly grew into a reusable
spaceplane with the nonreusable section hanging on the back, ruining the
economics of the system- but at least in that case they had it going up
on one Ariane booster; in this case it takes two launches to get to the
same sort of configuration.
Question of the week- where are the radiators located on CEV in its
stand-alone orbital configuration? On the bottom of the extensible solar
arrays? Or are the "solar arrays" shown in the drawings really
radiators, and the electrical power derived from onboard fuel cells? You
can see the radiator hanging off of the back module, but no obvious one
on the CEV; and it will need one given it TPS covering.
The lifting body design gives the vehicle great cross range, which is
said to be in the interests of safety, and to avoid water landings.
Given the present administration's desire for military space control,
one can wonder if the great cross range requirement had a similar origin
to that of the Shuttle's, with its delta wings- something the military
wants for a military derivative of the CEV.
Hopefully, we aren't walking down the "one-size-fits-all" path of
spacecraft design again.

Pat