Modest Proposal - Common Interplanetary Booster

On 3 Sep, 14:37, BradGuth wrote:
On Sep 3, 4:31 am, Ian Parker wrote:





I feel that we should concentrate on low cost to LEO for the following
reason. Once you are in space you can use the highly efficient ion
propusion motor.

No, I will correct myself LEO and high energy weight solar systems. If
an objective is SSP what will be needed is just that. Let us think in
terms of a squae kilometer of aluminium 1 micron thick. Weight 2.7T.
This can be used for reflectors. Potentially 2GW is falling on that
sqare kililometer. OK you will need silicon cells struts to give some
degree of mechanical stability. You will only get a limited efficiency
too.

If you could get 500MW for 10 tons you would be well placed not only
to have a good ion drive system, but also a stepping stone to SSP.

To get to LEO only rockets are really feasible. From LEO to wherever
there are a lot of other concepts that should be explored.

* - Ian Parker

You do realize that you're speaking to our resident God, don't you?

Our resident lord Mook and substitute wizard of Oz is more than a wee
bit bipolar, and doesn't take kindly to folks that do not 100% accept
his proposal as is.

Imagine what a fully complex and maximum kind of proposal from lord
Mook is like. *Just ask and you will receive tens of thousands of his
pirated words and plagiarized science as based almost entirely upon
the hard works of others that don't always get credit.

Technically most anything William Mook has to suggest is doable as
long as you believe everything published by those of of his DARPA/NASA
Old Testament, and that it's either 100% public funded as open-ended
to boot, and/or reverse tax funded is even better, and never mind the
next round of global inflation that'll be created.

Your basic 400~500 km LEO stuff that can manage to always avoid the
SAA contour while being assembled and/or maintained by us humans is
worth doing, although from the tether dipole element of my LSE-CM/ISS
should be a whole lot better.

If I am I am surprised. I would have expected him to have made the
remarks I have made. He is the great fan of SSP. How can you want to
develop SSP and no apply the technology to space propulsion? I would
in fact have expected him to come back and say that what I had posted
was unduly pessimistic.


- Ian Parker

Ian Parker wrote:
On 3 Sep, 14:37, BradGuth wrote:
On Sep 3, 4:31 am, Ian Parker wrote:





I feel that we should concentrate on low cost to LEO for the following
reason. Once you are in space you can use the highly efficient ion
propusion motor.

No, I will correct myself LEO and high energy weight solar systems. If
an objective is SSP what will be needed is just that. Let us think in
terms of a squae kilometer of aluminium 1 micron thick. Weight 2.7T.
This can be used for reflectors. Potentially 2GW is falling on that
sqare kililometer. OK you will need silicon cells struts to give some
degree of mechanical stability. You will only get a limited efficiency
too.

If you could get 500MW for 10 tons you would be well placed not only
to have a good ion drive system, but also a stepping stone to SSP.

To get to LEO only rockets are really feasible. From LEO to wherever
there are a lot of other concepts that should be explored.

� - Ian Parker

You do realize that you're speaking to our resident God, don't you?

Our resident lord Mook and substitute wizard of Oz is more than a wee
bit bipolar, and doesn't take kindly to folks that do not 100% accept
his proposal as is.

Imagine what a fully complex and maximum kind of proposal from lord
Mook is like. �Just ask and you will receive tens of thousands of his
pirated words and plagiarized science as based almost entirely upon
the hard works of others that don't always get credit.

Technically most anything William Mook has to suggest is doable as
long as you believe everything published by those of of his DARPA/NASA
Old Testament, and that it's either 100% public funded as open-ended
to boot, and/or reverse tax funded is even better, and never mind the
next round of global inflation that'll be created.

Your basic 400~500 km LEO stuff that can manage to always avoid the
SAA contour while being assembled and/or maintained by us humans is
worth doing, although from the tether dipole element of my LSE-CM/ISS
should be a whole lot better.

If I am I am surprised. I would have expected him to have made the
remarks I have made. He is the great fan of SSP. How can you want to
develop SSP and no apply the technology to space propulsion? I would
in fact have expected him to come back and say that what I had posted
was unduly pessimistic.


- Ian Parker

Usually he doesn't respond well to those he thinks are beneath his
Godly all-knowing expertise in everything under the sun.

It's not that many of Mook's notions are not without technological
merit, as long as the time required for their R&D plus public funding
is open-ended and without chance of remorse slipping in.

Mook only believes in the future, because the past as having been
scripted as history is forever unchangeable, no matter how skewed,
corrupted or dead wrong that history is. Therefore everything
officially recorded of our DARPA and NASA is absolute matter of fact,
or better than the word of God. This is what drives folks like
William Mook to believe that frail human DNA can easily cope with
whatever's within or outside of our protective magnetosphere, as well
as for easily surviving upon asteroids or that of our gamma and
secondary/recoil X-ray environment of our Selene/moon.

Mook is not a big supporter of rad-hard robotics, or in doing things
in the smallest and most efficient way possible. In the bipolar good
book of Mook, bigger is always better, and yet oddly he doesn't like
my 256e6 tonne LSE-CM/ISS, or forbid anything having to do with Venus.

~ Brad Guth Brad_Guth Brad.Guth BradGuth

Ian Parker wrote:

I feel that we should concentrate on low cost to LEO for the following
reason. Once you are in space you can use the highly efficient ion
propusion motor.

So long as you don't intend to actually go anywhere or do anything, an
ion motor suffices.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

http://derekl1963.livejournal.com/

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL

On 3 Sep, 16:31, (Derek Lyons) wrote:
Ian Parker wrote:
I feel that we should concentrate on low cost to LEO for the following
reason. Once you are in space you can use the highly efficient ion
propusion motor.

So long as you don't intend to actually go anywhere or do anything, an
ion motor suffices.

I think this is a little bit unfair. The concept needs development.
William Mook has made a big point about SSP and the amount of solar
power generated per ton of photovoltaics and mirrors. Ion drives
should be viewed in this context. Let us suppose tou have 10MW per
ton. This is in fact a very conservative estimate in terms of what we
are talking about for SSP. If our exhaust velocity is 50km/s we have a
thrust of 400N per ton of cells. This is going to take you quite a
way.

If you want the ultra high performance systems being talked about you
need to start somewhere. To me an ion system with this sort of level
of performance is the place to start. There seems to be little point
in carrying SSP to GEO in a rocket. You take it to LEO in a rocket and
use an ion drive to take it to GEO. What would we be talking about in
a high performance system? 4,000N/T (4N/kg) ? Something of that sort.


- Ian Parker

Derek Lyons wrote:
I feel that we should concentrate on low cost to LEO for the following
reason. Once you are in space you can use the highly efficient ion
propusion motor.


So long as you don't intend to actually go anywhere or do anything, an
ion motor suffices.


Assuming you have the time to wait while it accelerates you, you can get
out of LEO with a ion engine.
You'd have to weigh (literally) the savings in conventional propellants
versus the food and water you'd have to add for the crew as they take
several weeks or months to get on their way to their destination.
Certainly this is something that favors a very small crew, or a unmanned
spacecraft.
At lower orbital altitudes air drag versus the ion engine's anemic
thrust could also be a real problem.

Pat

"Pat Flannery" wrote in message
...
Assuming you have the time to wait while it accelerates you, you can get
out of LEO with a ion engine.
You'd have to weigh (literally) the savings in conventional propellants
versus the food and water you'd have to add for the crew as they take
several weeks or months to get on their way to their destination.
Certainly this is something that favors a very small crew, or a unmanned
spacecraft.
At lower orbital altitudes air drag versus the ion engine's anemic thrust
could also be a real problem.

You also have to look at the damage caused by moving slowly through the
van-Allen radiation belts. The radiation in those belts has a nasty
tendency to damage electronics, especially solar arrays.

You really want to start your ion engine journey *above* the van-Allen
belts. Say one of the earth-moon Lagrange points?

Jeff
--
A clever person solves a problem.
A wise person avoids it. -- Einstein

Isp improvements on orbit translate to larger launcher sizes. That
is, the money you spend on building ion rockets, is really a
substitute for larger launcher sizes. Since launchers are too small
anyway, for powersat and factorysat and asteroidal capture, the first
step is clear. And once you have a lever, you use it - without
waiting around for efficiency improvements, though you do those too.

To go from LEO to GEO we can figure out from the vis-viva equation;

v^2 = mu*(2/a - 1/r)

To kick a payload from LEO to GEO requires adding 2.47 km/sec to the
payload. Then, when you're at altitude, you have to add another 1.47
km/sec. Then, to recover the booster, you have to subtract 1.5 km/sec
- to re-enter. Total delta vee is 5.44 km/sec.

Most of the payload is deposited at GEO.

Start with 2 million pounds at GEO and look at two different
conditions;

1) chemical kick stage with 4.5 km/sec exhaust speed
2) ion kick stage with 45 km/sec exhaust speed.

The structural fraction of the chemical kick stage is 12.5%. The
structural fraction of the ion kick stage is 37.5% - only 3x the
figure of the chemical rocket.

So, the chemical rocket needs;58.3% propellant fraction to accelerate
its payload to 3.94 km/sec. This leaves 29.2% for payload. Around
584,000 pounds the 600,000 pounds I mentioned.

Now you've got to recover the 250,000 lb stage - there's actually
two in this scenario, and one falls back immediately, while the other
has to be deorbited. Still, we have to subtract 1.5 km/sec - and with
a 4.5 km/sec rocket We need 28.4% the empty mass - which is 70,800
lbs for the larger mass,and 35,400 lbs for the smaller mass - this
reduces the payload at GEO from 584,000 pounds to 429,200 pounds in
the first instance, and 550,000 pounds in the second instance.

So, we have a 29 million pound launcher putting up 550,000 pounds into
GEO - with an all chemical booster -

Now, we have a 45 km/sec ion rocket achieving the same thing - with a
37.5% structural fraction. That's 650,000 pounds of structure.

We have the same 2 milion lbs on LEO. The same delta vees to carry
out. 3.94 km/sec - requires

u = 1 - 1/exp(3.94/45) = 8.4% propellant on the boost up.

This is 167,700 pounds of propellant on a 2 million pound starting
mass. Adding this to the structural fraction, we have 817,700 pounds
of stage and propellant, leaving 1,183,000 pounds of payload. About
double the payload. We have to figure out the deorbit propellant now.

The 650,000 pound stage has to deorbit so, it must go through a delta
vee of 1.5 km/sec. That means 22,000 pounds of propellant are
needed. This reduces the payload on GEO to 1,161,000 pounds.


CHEMICAL ION
4.5 km/sec 45.0 km/sec
459 sec Isp 4590 sec Is
2,000,000 stage 2,000,000 stage
250,000 structure 650,000 structure
1,150,000 propellant 189,700 propellant
550,000 payload 1,161,000 payload

We've more than doubled the payload FOR THIS LAUNCHER by adding a
higher performing upper stage. The question we mst always ask, is the
complexity and cost of adding this sort of technology to the upper
stage worth the improved performance? That is, if we take the dollars
and time to build a larger launcher, would we be ahead?

The answer I get is yes - using money at this juncture to build larger
launchers and launch them from adequately maintained launch centers at
appropriate locations at cost effective launch rates - is the quickest
easiest way to imrprove our capabilities in space. Once we've maxed
that out, we can start talking about improved propulsion - on existing
airframes and so forth.

I have already mentioned elsewhere, on the very large launcher posts I
made a few weeks ago, that laser powered propulsion units are logical
next steps once the laser powersats are installed and excess power is
available at reasonable costs.

This is not the case today since we're suffering from high energy
prices a shortage of supply and increasing demand. Once this is
usefully addressed with the program described here, then it makes
sense to invest in some form of laser/ion propulsion - done at a power
level and at a structural fraction that beats the pants off of
conventional ion propulsion touted here.

Obviously, I'm looking at this as a business proposition.

Step 1: Create ultra-low-cost terrestrial solar panels.

I've done this.

http://www.usoal.com

and here's how you use them

http://www.ohiochamber.com/governmen...ook_021308.pdf

Make hydrogen from solar DC and burn hydrogen in coal fired plants to
make AC on demand. Then take the coal not burned combine it with more
hydrogen to make liquid fuel products.

This supplies all our oil needs worldwide, and cuts our carbon use
more than half. This is sufficient to reverse the trend in carbon
build up since nature does have some capacity to absorb carbon in the
carbon cycle.

Step 2: Buy space launch assets from major aerospace firms.

Once this is in place, use the revenues to buy the space launch assets
of the major aerospace companies throughout the world. Those are
reorganize to build up space launch abilities. With this kind of
money I joint venture with other publicly owned business-like
entitites.

Step 3: Build subscale fully reusable commercial launcher.
Basically, I propose the Comon Interplanetary Booster and offer
contracts to help build and operate it - while reserving use for
powersat experimentatoin.

Take a small portion of the nearly $4 trillion earned in fuel and
electricity sales, and invest it in a large heavy lift launcher -
first a 500 ton to orbit. This is described here - and later, when
SSP technology is proven out - a larger 10,000 ton to orbit heavy lift
vehicle. Translating of course the ability to loft 10,000 tons into
25 million pounds of payload on Mars.

Step 4: Deploy a global wireless internet satellite constellation.

Orbiting 660 satellites in 33 sun-synch oribts of 20 satellites each -
each satellite massing 20 tons - provide 50 billion channels of
wireless broadband throughout the world, and capture $300 billion in
communications revenue and trillions of dollars per year in online
banking, financial services, and insurance revenues.

Step 5. Develop and deploy new powersat technology

Using revenues from space based assets, invest in developing new space
based assets, principally powersats. Do this in conjunction with
privately funded exploration along the lines described here, using the
same launcher set, with custom built flight elements to carry out Mars
expeditions, lunar development, and exploration, and asteroidal
exploration and development.

Step 6. Once powersat technology is proven, build larger launchers.

Using a portion of synfuels revenue, build larger launchers along the
lines described elsewhere, capable of putting up 10,000 tons (200
million pounds) into LEO with 12 million pounds (6,000 tons) into GEO
and 5,000,000 pounds (2,500 tons) to the surface of the moon and mars
and the Near Earth Asteroids.

Step 7. Once large powersats are operating on orbit, upgrade upper
stages to use high specific impulse laser propulsion and laser light
sail technology. Use this to harvest asteroids - and double payloads
from Earth to high orbit - and triple payloads to Mars and the Moon
and the asteroids from Earth.

Terrestrial solar power systems that are providing hydrogen for
massive synfuel production have their output increased 16x with the
addition of bandgap matched lasers on orbit - increased energy
translates directly to 16x the energy from hydrogen. As the
hydrocarbon fuels max out - additional demand is fulfilled with
hydrogen fuels.

Step 8. Develop MEMs based laser powered propulsive skin spacecraft
to implement personal ballistic transport on Earth and beyond Earth.

As the ability to absorb increasing amounts of power become bound by
our ability to ship and handle increasing amounts of hydrogen, direct
beaming of laser energy to end users begins. One of the central
consuming sectors is personal ballistic transport. Moving from a
pedestriatn socieety to an automotive society increases energy use
rate by 11x. Increasing from an automotible society to a personal jet
increases use rate by another factor of 9 - 100x more than
pedestrian. Increasing from aircraft to ballistic spacecraft
increases demand for energy another factor 30 - 3,000x pedestrian.
We have sufficient power on orbit if we beam energy directly to users
on demand.

As the cost of power and energy decreases, the cost of handling fuels
comes to dominate the cost - particularly if the fuels are high
pressure gases, or cryogenic fuels. So, when the handling costs
dominate, direct beaming will be preferred.

Instituting a Moore type curve in reucing the cost of energy and power
- from space - we can even predict when these sea changes come about.
When everyone can afford cars, airplanes, and spaceships - and when
they move from hydrocarbon,to hydrogen, to direct beaming.

You basically double the size of the payloads on high orbit with very
high specific impulses. That's the plus side.

What you have to ask yourself is does the increased cost, complexity
and so forth, pay sufficient dividends to be worth this? Why not
just double the size of the launcher? Would that be prefereable?

That is, I've proposed a 30 million pound vehicle here that puts
550,000 pounds on GEO. Putting some sort of nuclear electric system
together in operate nearly 5,000 sec Isp - doubles your payload to GEO
to 1,100,000 pounds. A large ion rocket that size is an expensive and
complex thing. What about going from a 3 element launcher to a 7
element launcher? That is, add 4 more booster elements to teh first
stage and have a 70 million pound vehicle at lift off. How does that
compare in complexity and cost to building a 650,000 pound ion rocket
engine?

I'm not saying we shouldn't do both. But every battle has a most
effective order to it. The question we have to ask, what's the best
way to proceed today?

I think we need to build heavier launchers and bigger payloads up
there.

This vehicle described here is bigger than anything ever seriously
contemplated before. It also has zero technical complexity (the three
element one) and it puts a crew of 60 on the moon for a year or two -
haha - and a similar crew on Mars for the same period - but only 90
days or so on mars - 2 years in transit.

This is HUGE - compared to what we've got so far.

This system could over a three year period launch a global wireless
hotspot with 50 billion channels - it could land hotels and labs and
big stuff on the moon and mars - launch serious power satellites to
test systems designs and make money doing it - before launching into
really big stuff - put people across the entire inner solar system out
to Ceres.

Once a few power satellites are up, I think beamed propulsion stages,
built around the existing stages would make sense. Laser thermal -
with 10 km/sec Ve (1,000 sec Isp) - laser sustained detonation - with
20 km/sec Ve (2,000 sec Isp) - laser photovoltaic ion rockets - with
50 km/sec Ve (5,000 sec Isp) - laser light sails (infinity Isp no
propellants at all) - These are natural research projects, and ion is
included. When you are power limited, lower isp like low gears give
you more force - at reduced speed.

But, there's a lot that can be done with plain vanilla stuff,and when
you're making money from royalties on the wireless web,and beamed
power sales, then you will increase the efficiency of already
operating upper stages -

Model: Saturn II.
Gross Mass: 490,778 kg (1,081,980 lb).
Empty Mass: 39,048 kg (86,086 lb).
Thrust (vac): 5,165.790 kN (1,161,316 lbf).
Isp: 421 sec.
Burn time: 390 sec.
Propellants: Lox/LH2.
Diameter: 10.06 m (33.00 ft).
Span: 10.06 m (33.00 ft).
Length: 24.84 m (81.49 ft).
Country: USA.
No Engines: 5.
Motor: J-2.
Cost $ : 290.000 million.
First Flight: 1967.
Last Flight: 1973.
No Launched: 24.

I'm proposing a reusable configuration, with thermal protection, and a
zero height annular aerospike engine configured for re-entry base
first and vertial powered touchdown. Landing on the moon and mars also
possible. Two of these guys stacked inline atop the central of three
flight elemets. TPS landing gear and so forth - increases mass to
125,000 pounds - using modern techniques.

The bottom S-II stage carries another S-II stage, that has a 63 ft
tall cone with a 33 ft base - atop the 82 ft tall cylinder - this is
a total length of 125 ft. Its a narrower taller version of this core
stage.

http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/rombus.htm

1/5th the structural mass and 1/10th the mass - though the size of
rombus is the same size as the three flight elements described
elsewhere.

A 45 ft diameter element - and 125 ft tall - and masses 10 million
pounds - is midway between an ET and rombus core booster.- ET is 28 ft
x 158 ft length and masses 1.68 million pounds.

On Sep 3, 12:30 pm, "Jeff Findley"
wrote:
"Pat Flannery" wrote in message

...

Assuming you have the time to wait while it accelerates you, you can get
out of LEO with a ion engine.
You'd have to weigh (literally) the savings in conventional propellants
versus the food and water you'd have to add for the crew as they take
several weeks or months to get on their way to their destination.
Certainly this is something that favors a very small crew, or a unmanned
spacecraft.
At lower orbital altitudes air drag versus the ion engine's anemic thrust
could also be a real problem.

You also have to look at the damage caused by moving slowly through the
van-Allen radiation belts. The radiation in those belts has a nasty
tendency to damage electronics, especially solar arrays.

You really want to start your ion engine journey *above* the van-Allen
belts. Say one of the earth-moon Lagrange points?

Jeff

I would tend to agree. However, the Selene/moon L1 is taboo/
nondisclosure rated, as I'd bet all other such Ls are either off-
limits or useless according to our resident wizard of Oz.

~ Brad Guth Brad_Guth Brad.Guth BradGuth

On Sep 3, 5:54 pm, wrote:
You basically double the size of the payloads on high orbit with very
high specific impulses. That's the plus side.

What you have to ask yourself is does the increased cost, complexity
and so forth, pay sufficient dividends to be worth this? Why not
just double the size of the launcher? Would that be prefereable?

That is, I've proposed a 30 million pound vehicle here that puts
550,000 pounds on GEO. Putting some sort of nuclear electric system
together in operate nearly 5,000 sec Isp - doubles your payload to GEO
to 1,100,000 pounds. A large ion rocket that size is an expensive and
complex thing. What about going from a 3 element launcher to a 7
element launcher? That is, add 4 more booster elements to teh first
stage and have a 70 million pound vehicle at lift off. How does that
compare in complexity and cost to building a 650,000 pound ion rocket
engine?

I'm not saying we shouldn't do both. But every battle has a most
effective order to it. The question we have to ask, what's the best
way to proceed today?

I think we need to build heavier launchers and bigger payloads up
there.

This vehicle described here is bigger than anything ever seriously
contemplated before. It also has zero technical complexity (the three
element one) and it puts a crew of 60 on the moon for a year or two -
haha - and a similar crew on Mars for the same period - but only 90
days or so on mars - 2 years in transit.

This is HUGE - compared to what we've got so far.

This system could over a three year period launch a global wireless
hotspot with 50 billion channels - it could land hotels and labs and
big stuff on the moon and mars - launch serious power satellites to
test systems designs and make money doing it - before launching into
really big stuff - put people across the entire inner solar system out
to Ceres.

Once a few power satellites are up, I think beamed propulsion stages,
built around the existing stages would make sense. Laser thermal -
with 10 km/sec Ve (1,000 sec Isp) - laser sustained detonation - with
20 km/sec Ve (2,000 sec Isp) - laser photovoltaic ion rockets - with
50 km/sec Ve (5,000 sec Isp) - laser light sails (infinity Isp no
propellants at all) - These are natural research projects, and ion is
included. When you are power limited, lower isp like low gears give
you more force - at reduced speed.

But, there's a lot that can be done with plain vanilla stuff,and when
you're making money from royalties on the wireless web,and beamed
power sales, then you will increase the efficiency of already
operating upper stages -

Model: Saturn II.
Gross Mass: 490,778 kg (1,081,980 lb).
Empty Mass: 39,048 kg (86,086 lb).
Thrust (vac): 5,165.790 kN (1,161,316 lbf).
Isp: 421 sec.
Burn time: 390 sec.
Propellants: Lox/LH2.
Diameter: 10.06 m (33.00 ft).
Span: 10.06 m (33.00 ft).
Length: 24.84 m (81.49 ft).
Country: USA.
No Engines: 5.
Motor: J-2.
Cost $ : 290.000 million.
First Flight: 1967.
Last Flight: 1973.
No Launched: 24.

I'm proposing a reusable configuration, with thermal protection, and a
zero height annular aerospike engine configured for re-entry base
first and vertial powered touchdown. Landing on the moon and mars also
possible. Two of these guys stacked inline atop the central of three
flight elemets. TPS landing gear and so forth - increases mass to
125,000 pounds - using modern techniques.

The bottom S-II stage carries another S-II stage, that has a 63 ft
tall cone with a 33 ft base - atop the 82 ft tall cylinder - this is
a total length of 125 ft. Its a narrower taller version of this core
stage.

http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/rombus.htm

1/5th the structural mass and 1/10th the mass - though the size of
rombus is the same size as the three flight elements described
elsewhere.

A 45 ft diameter element - and 125 ft tall - and masses 10 million
pounds - is midway between an ET and rombus core booster.- ET is 28 ft
x 158 ft length and masses 1.68 million pounds.

And that's supposedly modest?

Do you know of the all-inclusive and thus birth-to-grave accounting?
(apparently not)

~ BG