CEV to be made commercially available

Pete Lynn wrote:

" wrote in
message oups.com...


Jim Davis wrote:


And you know and I know and everyone knows
there will be no such products from an SDHLV.

But you could not care less about that, I suspect.


No, I don't, because that's *ENTIRELY*
*IRRELEVANT.* The question is whether ESAS
can work, not whether it will be profitable.



Usually your statements can at least be justified in one dubious context
or another, but for this one, it is hard to go past stupid. Just because
the returns of some projects can be very long term and very distributed
does not mean that they do not have to be profitable.


Yeah? Let us all know when the US Air Force turns a profit.


What I find particularly offensive is that the $100 billion wasted by
this government affiliated monopolistic power group


Not much point in trying to make sense of anything past this point. NASA
is not a monopoly on space power.



--
"The only thing that galls me about someone burning the American flag is how unoriginal it is. I mean if you're going to pull the Freedom-of-speech card, don't be a hack, come up with something interesting. Fashion Old Glory into a wisecracking puppet and blister the system with a scathing ventriloquism act, or better yet, drape the flag over your head and desecrate it with a large caliber bullet hole." Dennis Miller

Jim Davis wrote:

wrote:



No, I don't, because that's *ENTIRELY* *IRRELEVANT.* The
question is whether ESAS can work, not whether it will be
profitable.



Scott, this is an incredible statement, indeed it is an admission of
sorts. It's hard to escape the conclusion that you do not care if
ESAS enriches or impoverishes the nation; you just want to see
Americans on the moon, consequences be damned.



Utter rubbish.Again, point to a government agency or project that *is*
profitable. ESAS plans to spend about what Shuttle does annually.
Shuttle has not impoverished the nation.

--
"The only thing that galls me about someone burning the American flag is how unoriginal it is. I mean if you're going to pull the Freedom-of-speech card, don't be a hack, come up with something interesting. Fashion Old Glory into a wisecracking puppet and blister the system with a scathing ventriloquism act, or better yet, drape the flag over your head and desecrate it with a large caliber bullet hole." Dennis Miller

"Scott Lowther" wrote in message
...
Pete Lynn wrote:

Just because the returns of some projects can be
very long term and very distributed does not mean
that they do not have to be profitable.

Yeah? Let us all know when the US Air Force turns a
profit.

Are you suggesting that the US economy would be more profitable over the
long term without the US Air Force?

What I find particularly offensive is that the $100
billion wasted by this government affiliated
monopolistic power group

Not much point in trying to make sense of anything
past this point. NASA is not a monopoly on space
power.

No, on space funding.

I would suggest that NASA currently gets a monopolistic proportion of
total space frontier commercialisation funding, public and private. NASA
launch vehicle development funding swamps that of the start ups.

NASA has a critical supporting role to play in opening up the space
frontier, but it should not, and obviously can not, do
commercialisation, and commercialisation is the necessary next step.

Not only is NASA picking winners, but it is again picking itself as a
winner. In spite of the conflict of interest and considerable evidence
to the contrary.

Pete.

" wrote in
message oups.com...

Jeff Findley wrote:
Really? I wasn't aware that the Congress/President specified that NASA
launch missions to the moon with as few launch vehicles as possible.

Non sequitur. The Pres has said "get to the moon." That's the "need."
They cannot buy a launch to the moon, as there's no such product
available. So, they have to pay to have such a product developed.

You're a smart guy Scott. NASA can buy launches to LEO and do earth orbit
assembly (likely mostly docking to avoid EVA's, since NASA still doesn't
consider them routine).


If you go back far enough, LOR wasn't the only option being
considered. It was seen as the fastest way to get to the moon, but
EOR
might have been a more sustainable approach in the long term.

No good reason to assume that. EOR would have cost as much or more to
develop than LOR, and would have potentially cost more to operate.

Or EOR could have cost more time and money to develop, but less to
operate
due to economies of scale.

Well, Apollo cost a bucket of money as it was, and the bulk of that was
spent prior to going to the moon, and the program was killed prior to
going to the moon. So if EOR cost *more* to develop up front, it would
have been an even *bigger* target for the budget axe.

Possibly, but there would have been broader applications for the technology
developed. For example, launching comsats into LEO separately from their
geosynch kick stage, eventually using a reusable LEO to GEO space tug to do
the work. This, in conjunction with better development of EVA equipment and
procedures, could have lead to cheaper, servicable GEO comsats, rather than
the expensive, one use only comsats we have today.

If you developed the R&D and manufacturing infrastructure and only
build a few things and then kill the program, the unit cost is
astonishing.

Exactly. That's one reason why Saturn V was killed. Another reason it was
killed was because it was a NASA specific launch vehiclt that was too big to
be of use by anyone else.

EOR would have been no better off here. Perhaps one or two
moon flights that cost *more* than Apollo.

This is where we disagree. I happen to think that the technologies (LEO
EVA, automated rendezvous and docking, orbital storage of cryogenic
propellants, and etc.) and smaller launch vehicles intended for EOR would
have had broader applications than just going to the moon. Because of this,
canceling the lunar program (after a landing or two), need not have resulted
in the cancellation of the launch vehicle(s) too. The fact is that Saturn V
was just too damn big and expensive for *anything* reasonably affordable and
sustainable program. And no, I don't consider the shuttle program
reasonable and sustainable in terms of costs, otherwise, the Shuttle II
proposals would have gotten funding, but instead, NASA is looking at smaller
capsules again.

I believe the same to be true of the proposed SDHLV. It's just too big and
expensive to be used for anything but going to the moon and Mars, making it
more vulnerable to cancellation than existing (smaller) US launch vehicles.

Jeff
--
Remove icky phrase from email address to get a valid address.

Fred J. McCall wrote:

:The general populace's apathy is a rational response to the situation.
:What, exactly, is the manned space program doing for them or their
:descendants?

It wasn't doing anything before and lots of people were excited about
it, Paul.

Ah, and because people were doing that, it couldn't be irrational.
As we all know, people are never irrational.

Or maybe that's the way people are on your planet.


:The only complaint I have about the apathy is that it's allowing
:the charade to continue.

As opposed to killing human access to space (and any interest in same
by most folks) outright?

I object to massively expensive government entertainment programs
for space fans. I reject that notion that 'getting people interested
in space' is a worthwhile goal. A manned space program, IMO, must
be justified by the objective good it does for the country, and
by its cost. IMO, ESAS fails to measure up.

Except that's not going to happen because you'll never get over the
'hump'. You're basically stuck at COMSAT sorts of applications. No
need for people there.

Well, at least you're off the 'getting people interested' thing here.
The problem is, ESAS doesn't 'get over the hump' either. What it does
is, at enormous cost and over an extended period, do nothing much
on which anything further can be built.

:Since ESAS won't do anything significant to advance that goal,
:killing NASA would be no worse, and would save money.

No, it would be worse because even fewer people would be interested in
the future. The money saved would go where, do you think, Paul?

Lots of people would remain interested in the future. They would
be less interested in your particular flawed view of the future.
Don't be so self centered.

As for where the money could go... gosh, maybe the government
could just NOT SPEND IT? If you claim that's impossible, that the
government will continue to spend far beyond its means, then
the country is doomed anyway, ESAS or not.

:Avoiding the shuttle fiasco would have been a huge benefit,

To who? Terminating space, remember? Contrary to what your sort
generally think, cutting manned space does NOT lead to more money for
non-manned space. It leads to a cut in ALL space.

But in this case, remember that US expendable launcher programs
were explicitly targeted for termination so shuttle would have
more customers. Had shuttle not been developed, this wouldn't
have happened. As it stands, the expendable programs were restarted,
at considerable cost, when it became clear how disastrous the
shuttle program would be. But by that time a decade or more
had been wasted.

Expenables in the US would be far ahead of where they were had
shuttle not been built. We might have had the equivalent of
the Atlas 5 a decade earlier, or perhaps even sooner. We might
even have started designing the first stages of these vehicles
for recovery and reuse.

:and US expendable launchers would be much better than they now are.

I can't find a single reason to believe that.

Sucks to be you, I guess.

Paul

" wrote in
message oups.com...

Jim Davis wrote:
And you know and I know and everyone knows there will be
no such products from an SDHLV.

But you could not care less about that, I suspect.

No, I don't, because that's *ENTIRELY* *IRRELEVANT.* The question is
whether ESAS can work, not whether it will be profitable.

The question is whether ESAS will provide a sustainable, affordable
architecture that has potential uses other than ESAS. In my opinion, it
won't be better in this area than either Saturn V or the shuttle.

Jeff
--
Remove icky phrase from email address to get a valid address.

"Scott Lowther" wrote in message
...
Pete Lynn wrote:
Usually your statements can at least be justified in one dubious context
or another, but for this one, it is hard to go past stupid. Just because
the returns of some projects can be very long term and very distributed
does not mean that they do not have to be profitable.


Yeah? Let us all know when the US Air Force turns a profit.

No profit, but there are tangible benefits to maintaining a viable US Air
Force.

What I find particularly offensive is that the $100 billion wasted by
this government affiliated monopolistic power group

Not much point in trying to make sense of anything past this point. NASA
is not a monopoly on space power.

It sure acts like it is. Building and maintaining their own launch vehicles
and launch facilities when they could buy commercial launches strikes me as
the pinnacle of NIH syndrome.

Jeff
--
Remove icky phrase from email address to get a valid address.

"Scott Lowther" wrote in message
...
Jim Davis wrote:
Scott, this is an incredible statement, indeed it is an admission of
sorts. It's hard to escape the conclusion that you do not care if
ESAS enriches or impoverishes the nation; you just want to see
Americans on the moon, consequences be damned.


Utter rubbish.Again, point to a government agency or project that *is*
profitable. ESAS plans to spend about what Shuttle does annually.
Shuttle has not impoverished the nation.

Again, government agencies and projects all have cost/benefit ratios, even
if they are never allowed to turn a profit. You like to bring up DOD as a
government agency that doesn't produce a profit. It's actually a great
example, because US citizens benefit greatly from a strong defense
department. When was the last time another nation tried to mount an attack
on the US mainland?

It seems entirely appropriate that we remember this on Veteran's Day.

Jeff
--
Remove icky phrase from email address to get a valid address.

Jeff Findley wrote:


Well, Apollo cost a bucket of money as it was, and the bulk of that was
spent prior to going to the moon, and the program was killed prior to
going to the moon. So if EOR cost *more* to develop up front, it would
have been an even *bigger* target for the budget axe.



Possibly, but there would have been broader applications for the technology
developed. For example, launching comsats into LEO separately from their
geosynch kick stage, eventually using a reusable LEO to GEO space tug to do
the work. This, in conjunction with better development of EVA equipment and
procedures, could have lead to cheaper, servicable GEO comsats, rather than
the expensive, one use only comsats we have today.



Problem: the EOR system was to use a series of unmanned and unreusable
tankers to top up the lunar vehicle in Earth orbit. EVAs were not to be
a big part of the mix, and the tanekrs were not "tugs" as such. Some
fairly detailed design work had been completed on these systems.



If you developed the R&D and manufacturing infrastructure and only
build a few things and then kill the program, the unit cost is
astonishing.



Exactly. That's one reason why Saturn V was killed.


Take the low-cost launch vehicle of your choice, from Falcon to T-Space
to whatever. Build one or two, then cancel it. Per-unit cost is
astonishingly high as a result.



EOR would have been no better off here. Perhaps one or two
moon flights that cost *more* than Apollo.



This is where we disagree. I happen to think that the technologies (LEO
EVA, automated rendezvous and docking, orbital storage of cryogenic
propellants, and etc.) and smaller launch vehicles intended for EOR would
have had broader applications than just going to the moon. Because of this,
canceling the lunar program (after a landing or two), need not have resulted
in the cancellation of the launch vehicle(s) too. The fact is that Saturn V
was just too damn big and expensive for *anything* reasonably affordable and
sustainable program.


But EOR was to use the Saturn I (derivative thereof, actually). Saturn I
got canned with V.





--
"The only thing that galls me about someone burning the American flag is how unoriginal it is. I mean if you're going to pull the Freedom-of-speech card, don't be a hack, come up with something interesting. Fashion Old Glory into a wisecracking puppet and blister the system with a scathing ventriloquism act, or better yet, drape the flag over your head and desecrate it with a large caliber bullet hole." Dennis Miller

Jeff Findley wrote:

"Scott Lowther" wrote in message
...


Pete Lynn wrote:


Usually your statements can at least be justified in one dubious context
or another, but for this one, it is hard to go past stupid. Just because
the returns of some projects can be very long term and very distributed
does not mean that they do not have to be profitable.



Yeah? Let us all know when the US Air Force turns a profit.



No profit, but there are tangible benefits to maintaining a viable US Air
Force.


And you think there woudl be no benefits to maintaining a permanent
lunar presence or manned missiosn to Mars?



What I find particularly offensive is that the $100 billion wasted by
this government affiliated monopolistic power group


Not much point in trying to make sense of anything past this point. NASA
is not a monopoly on space power.



It sure acts like it is. Building and maintaining their own launch vehicles
and launch facilities when they could buy commercial launches strikes me as
the pinnacle of NIH syndrome.


That may be, but it does not make them a monopoly. Again, the Russians
and the Chinese can help you oput. Space-X, T/space and others are also
doign their bit. Now, if these companies cannot make a go of it without
NASA funding... then they are not an improvement.


--
"The only thing that galls me about someone burning the American flag is how unoriginal it is. I mean if you're going to pull the Freedom-of-speech card, don't be a hack, come up with something interesting. Fashion Old Glory into a wisecracking puppet and blister the system with a scathing ventriloquism act, or better yet, drape the flag over your head and desecrate it with a large caliber bullet hole." Dennis Miller