How did NASA get it so wrong

A clear majority on sci.space.policy seem to thing NASA's constellation
architecture is seriously flawed. I certainly do.

But NASA must have had a team of 100s working on this. Some of these
people are probably smarter than I am. Most will know a lot more about
rocketry and space flight than I do. So I have to ask, are they (and Ed
Kyle) right, and most of us wrong?

A couple of things make me think I'm right:
1. History is littered with brilliant individuals and teams making
amazing, and blindingly obvious mistakes. For example:
- At the height of the dot-com bubble, the management of Cable and
Wireless swapped a solid local telephone monopoly (Hong Kong) for an
Internet investment fund with no revenues.
- In the 1990s, Unilever launched Persil Power. A few months later they
pulled it after Proctor and Gamble demanded they do so, because it was
destroying clothes. The brilliant and arrogant team responsible had
completely ignored this fact.

2. NASA has form. Any critical appraisal of the Space Shuttle could
have pointed out it was a flawed concept. But they continued.

3. Looking through the commercial Constellation proposals, there was
nothing that close to the final architecture. These were also done by
bright teams, and more importantly, different teams. OK -so we expect
BoeLock to push their EELVs, but there were other serious proposals.
Some recommended a SDHLV, but I don't think any dreamt up the stick.

So what's the problem?

Perhaps "Group Think". This can happen with close teams, where an
idea gathers momentum, and no one wants to challenge it. But that's
why we have red teams where fresh critics are brought in to challenge
the design team. Doesn't NASA have red teams?

I've also noticed that Americans workers have a strong team ethic -
which is good - but challenges to the team norm are not welcome.
Challengers are considered poor team players, which might explain why
so much value in America is created by start-ups.

Did NASA take a different interpretation to Bush's plan? "Continue
Apollo and maximise hardware development" was not my take on Bush's
plan.

Perhaps they got too carried away with the Spirals concept. The NASA
plan sort of addresses Spirals 1 and 2. But these were only meant to be
stepping-stones to Spirals 3 and 4. Without these latter ones, I get
the impression that NASA is going to spend $100 billion to complete
the Apollo moon landing programs.

Can some one enlighten me, and explain how NASA came up with this
architecture?

Finally, is there an appeals process? Is there someone who can reject
NASA's plans as lacking imagination, over priced and delivering too
little?

Alex Terrell wrote:
A clear majority on sci.space.policy seem to thing NASA's constellation
architecture is seriously flawed. I certainly do.

But NASA must have had a team of 100s working on this. Some of these
people are probably smarter than I am. Most will know a lot more about
rocketry and space flight than I do. So I have to ask, are they (and Ed
Kyle) right, and most of us wrong?



You may want to consider that Griffin, unlike the typical Usenet
poster, is not working in a vacuum, utterly unfettered by political or
managerial constraints.

You may want to also consider that this newsgroup is pretty optimistic
about unproven technology getting built. I suspect if you looked back,
a clear majority of sci.space.policy were pretty optimistic that at
least one of Beal,Kistler or Roton would get to orbit.

A lot of people on this newsgroup seem to think that an orbital
cryogenic propellant depot should be fairly straightforward, or that
assembling a large moonship out of EELV sized payloads in LEO and
successfully hitting a launch window will be relatively easy. They may
be right, but they're not clearly right, since these things have never
been done. It's not surprising that Griffin and NASA have chosen not to
bet the program on them.

Will McLean

Will McLean wrote:


A lot of people on this newsgroup seem to think that an orbital
cryogenic propellant depot should be fairly straightforward, or that
assembling a large moonship out of EELV sized payloads in LEO and
successfully hitting a launch window will be relatively easy. They may
be right, but they're not clearly right, since these things have never
been done. It's not surprising that Griffin and NASA have chosen not to
bet the program on them.

Even NASA have identified that you could do this sort of thing with
medium launch capacities, say 20,000kgs to LEO. There were some
mid-90s reference studies done.

If you use off the peg Russian hardware you could do it for a fraction
of the current price tag.

The kit probably wouldn't be as pretty though.

Dave

Will McLean wrote:

Alex Terrell wrote:
A clear majority on sci.space.policy seem to thing NASA's constellation
architecture is seriously flawed. I certainly do.

But NASA must have had a team of 100s working on this. Some of these
people are probably smarter than I am. Most will know a lot more about
rocketry and space flight than I do. So I have to ask, are they (and Ed
Kyle) right, and most of us wrong?



You may want to consider that Griffin, unlike the typical Usenet
poster, is not working in a vacuum

Aha!
That's the solution!

Put the NASA top brass on ISS, and keep them there.
Motivate them to improve it.

Will McLean wrote:

You may want to consider that Griffin, unlike the typical Usenet
poster, is not working in a vacuum, utterly unfettered by political or
managerial constraints.

I'm not sure how the people above him constrain the architecture.
Perhaps the problem with Griffin, as a techie, is that he has his views
on the architecture. Perhaps the people beneath him let him - one
person - fix the architecture.

You may want to also consider that this newsgroup is pretty optimistic
about unproven technology getting built. I suspect if you looked back,
a clear majority of sci.space.policy were pretty optimistic that at
least one of Beal,Kistler or Roton would get to orbit.

Perhaps, and everyone hopes SpaceX succeed. Though Roton is an
intereting one - any good engineer could have pointed out the flaws,
developed by a team of smart people. But Beal, Kistler and Roton had to
live with a reality called a market. NASA doesn't.

A lot of people on this newsgroup seem to think that an orbital
cryogenic propellant depot should be fairly straightforward, or that
assembling a large moonship out of EELV sized payloads in LEO and
successfully hitting a launch window will be relatively easy. They may
be right, but they're not clearly right, since these things have never
been done. It's not surprising that Griffin and NASA have chosen not to
bet the program on them.

Well NASA has proposed orbital rendez-vous using two purpose built
vehicles. I thought a single ship, as with Apollo is a better idea.
Others prefer using 20 ton components launched on tried and tested, and
sometimes cheap ELVs. Which approach is riskiest?

But how they get there might suck, but what they plan to do (or not do)
when they get there sucks even more.

On 21 Sep 2005 12:20:09 -0700, in a place far, far away, "Alex
Terrell" made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

A clear majority on sci.space.policy seem to thing NASA's constellation
architecture is seriously flawed. I certainly do.

But NASA must have had a team of 100s working on this. Some of these
people are probably smarter than I am. Most will know a lot more about
rocketry and space flight than I do. So I have to ask, are they (and Ed
Kyle) right, and most of us wrong?

A couple of things make me think I'm right:
1. History is littered with brilliant individuals and teams making
amazing, and blindingly obvious mistakes. For example:
- At the height of the dot-com bubble, the management of Cable and
Wireless swapped a solid local telephone monopoly (Hong Kong) for an
Internet investment fund with no revenues.
- In the 1990s, Unilever launched Persil Power. A few months later they
pulled it after Proctor and Gamble demanded they do so, because it was
destroying clothes. The brilliant and arrogant team responsible had
completely ignored this fact.

2. NASA has form. Any critical appraisal of the Space Shuttle could
have pointed out it was a flawed concept. But they continued.

3. Looking through the commercial Constellation proposals, there was
nothing that close to the final architecture. These were also done by
bright teams, and more importantly, different teams. OK -so we expect
BoeLock to push their EELVs, but there were other serious proposals.
Some recommended a SDHLV, but I don't think any dreamt up the stick.

So what's the problem?

Emergent stupidity:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,58726,00.html

Finally, is there an appeals process? Is there someone who can reject
NASA's plans as lacking imagination, over priced and delivering too
little?

Either the President, or Congress, or both. But it's not obvious that
they will view it this way, even though it's the correct view.

On 21 Sep 2005 12:20:09 -0700, "Alex Terrell"
wrote:

A clear majority on sci.space.policy seem to thing NASA's constellation
architecture is seriously flawed. I certainly do.

But NASA must have had a team of 100s working on this. Some of these
people are probably smarter than I am. Most will know a lot more about
rocketry and space flight than I do. So I have to ask, are they (and Ed
Kyle) right, and most of us wrong?

You have to understand that the brilliant team of hundreds that came
up with this stinker did not have the same _goal_ that ssp posters
have. The goal was not to achieve important things in space safely
and at low cost, but to line certain well-connected pockets. The
chosen architecture should achieve the latter goal admirably. It may
even take more brains to do the latter while seeming to try to do the
former than to actually do the former.

1. History is littered with brilliant individuals and teams making
amazing, and blindingly obvious mistakes. For example:
- At the height of the dot-com bubble, the management of Cable and
Wireless swapped a solid local telephone monopoly (Hong Kong) for an
Internet investment fund with no revenues.
- In the 1990s, Unilever launched Persil Power. A few months later they
pulled it after Proctor and Gamble demanded they do so, because it was
destroying clothes. The brilliant and arrogant team responsible had
completely ignored this fact.

These "mistakes" lined certain pockets. Take it to the bank.

2. NASA has form. Any critical appraisal of the Space Shuttle could
have pointed out it was a flawed concept. But they continued.

Pockets were lined. Goal achieved.

3. Looking through the commercial Constellation proposals, there was
nothing that close to the final architecture. These were also done by
bright teams, and more importantly, different teams. OK -so we expect
BoeLock to push their EELVs, but there were other serious proposals.
Some recommended a SDHLV, but I don't think any dreamt up the stick.

"Whenever I see something that makes absolutely no sense whatever, I
know there must be a damn good reason for it." -- Peter de Vries

Perhaps "Group Think". This can happen with close teams, where an
idea gathers momentum, and no one wants to challenge it. But that's
why we have red teams where fresh critics are brought in to challenge
the design team. Doesn't NASA have red teams?

I've also noticed that Americans workers have a strong team ethic -
which is good - but challenges to the team norm are not welcome.
Challengers are considered poor team players, which might explain why
so much value in America is created by start-ups.

Hehe. If you think that's a problem in the USA, you haven't worked in
Japan, Germany, the UK, Canada, China, etc.

Did NASA take a different interpretation to Bush's plan? "Continue
Apollo and maximise hardware development" was not my take on Bush's
plan.

?? Bush's plan? Think "hungry pockets."

Finally, is there an appeals process?

Every four years...

Is there someone who can reject
NASA's plans as lacking imagination, over priced and delivering too
little?

Yes, but they just re-elected George W Bush.

-- Roy L

The problem, I think, lays less with the NASA plan than with the
attitude being expressed about it by certain internet rocketeers. The
NASA is likely the best that can happen in the physical universe we
occupy. Some people will not accept that, for idealogical or even
personal reasons. But it remains a fact.

First, NASA is constrained by how much money it is likely to be allowed
to spend. Even with the tiny price tag (and it is tiny) there are
complaints being expressed in political circles.

Second, people can jump up and down about how contracting things out to
Elon Musk or Burt Rutan will make things cheaper, but the fact of the
matter is that neither gentleman has launched as much as an ant into
low Earth orbit, not to speak of the Moon.

Now, if you're Mike Griffin, your first idea will not be to base the
entire success of the program you have been charged to execute on
unproven companies with nonexistant hardware. You may personally think
(as he said during the press conference) that some of the alt.space
companies will eventually succeed. But in the meantime, you have a back
to the Moon program to run.

That means, doing the tried and true contractor program. It is not
entrepeneurial nor is it cheap or efficient. But it is likely to get
the job done. Hate Boeing and Lockmart all you want, but they have
actually built things that have flown into space.

Nor are you going to rely on a lot of unproven technology, if you're
Griffin. Down that path layeth the disasters of the National Aerospace
Plane and the X 33. The idea is to build your back to the Moon hardware
using the tried and true and then, after it has proven its worth, start
incremintally upgrading it.

That's why the next people to walk on the Moon will be goverment
employees, working for a wasteful, bureaucratic agency. We might wish
it were not so, but there it is.

I'm also struck by the utter arrogance displayed by some of the
internet rocketeers. NASA has chosen a methodology for returning to the
Moon that works for them. There are arguments for it and against it,
but that is what the customer has chosen. Now, the idea that NASA needs
to change what it wants just to satisfy the wants and desires of
certain people who claim to support commercial space seems to me to be
a little odd. It's the commercial provider that offers the product or
service that the customer wants, not demand that the customer accept
what the provider is willing to offer. The former is capitalism. The
latter is something else entirely.

Rand, this involves both types of reality. The "political reality" is
an inmutable as the laws of physics.

Alex Terrell wrote:
Will McLean wrote:

You may want to consider that Griffin, unlike the typical Usenet
poster, is not working in a vacuum, utterly unfettered by political or
managerial constraints.

I'm not sure how the people above him constrain the architecture.

Then you are not thinking clearly about the issues. Imagine, for
example, an otherwise excellent architecture that involved terminating
5,000 people at KSC in 2010.

How do you think the congressmen from the relevant districts will
react? The president's brother, who is governor of Florida? The
president?

How do you think the KSC workforce will react between now and then?
Work with the same attention and loyalty as they would if they had a
future with the program? Or start looking for new jobs ASAP?

Will McLean