Parking Orbit

On Sat, 18 Feb 2006 18:31:41 GMT, h (Rand
Simberg) wrote:

I suspect that the politically incorrect answer is to remove the
constraint that it be operable out of KSC. A lower inclination would
be better, with equatorial being the best.

Why bother selecting 'optimal' inclinations anyway? After all...
if this is going to be an orbiting fuel depot for a lunar shuttle,
just make your moonship a little bigger - add more fuel, and adjust
the inclination enroute. :-)

A parking orbit (aka station-keeping platform/tank-farm) of a massive
fuel depot in the sky, of LL-1 accommodating those sorts of volumes and
of whatever mass as offering an unlimited solution isn't or at least it
shouldn't hardly be rocket science. At least not by now, especially in
that so many satellite deployments (including those of our Apollo
fiasco) have more than proven their translunar capability.

LL-1 is not technically of what's nearly as taboo/nondisclosure as
you'd think. It's not even all that far away nor without benefit of
the lunar gravity itself. Actually taking advantage of the moon/sun
alignment is one better yet, and of those deployments taking the full
lunar cycle of 29.5 days of getting whatever tonnage transferred away
from Earth and efficiently arriving into the LL-1 sweet-spot isn't a
robotic DNA problem that I know of.

Since retrothrust reserves of rocket fuel isn't a significant
requirement for getting substantial tonnage into that zone (merely
reaction thruster should more than do the trick), and the interactive
gravity-well and of tidal forces should work in our favor. Therefore,
where exactly is the supposed insurmountable or dumbfounded problem?

As long as we don't have to deal with banking the likes of robotic bone
marrow, and since the LL-1 zone is supposedly a good 60,000 km away
from our reactive and therefore extremely nasty moon by day (by
earthshine being as little as 0.1% as nasty), is why the LL-1 zone is
so space-depot accommodating. There's also the very least amount of
local plus solar wind medium to deal with, and it's even somewhat
shielded by the extended magnetosphere of mother Earth.

As for Earth-science and moon-science and just plain old
astronomy/astrophysics science on steroids, there's none better than
LL-1. I think it's even humanly safer and most certainly it's far more
accessible and thereby end-user friendly than being entirely exposed
and out-of sight via LL-2.

Short duration transits of getting crew from Earth to LL-1 should be
doable within 24 hours, although requiring a fair amount of SRM or LRB
retrothrust. A gravity free fall back to mother Earth seems rather
energy efficient, as well as deploying whatever into lunar orbit should
no longer be nearly as complicated as it is. Even the notions of
deploying nukes from LL-1 isn't insurmountable, although from a
tethered deployed platform that can be efficiently sustained at 50,000
km away from Earth (25,000 km if you'd dare) might seriously improve
the odds of our nukes taking out whatever cash of their nukes before
they ever get launched in the first place.
-
Brad Guth

Life upon Venus, a township w/Bridge & ET/UFO Park-n-Ride Tarmac:
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-town.htm
The Russian/China LSE-CM/ISS (Lunar Space Elevator)
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/lunar-space-elevator.htm
Venus ETs, plus the updated sub-topics; Brad Guth / GASA-IEIS
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-topics.htm

If nothing else, the most rational of folks would have to agree that we
should at least go back to LL-1.

A viable parking orbit (aka station-keeping platform/tank-farm) of a
massive fuel depot in the sky, of which LL-1 could easily be
accommodating those sorts of volumes and of whatever mass as offering
an unlimited solution isn't or at least it shouldn't hardly be rocket
science. At least not by now, especially in that so many satellite
deployments (including those of our Apollo fiasco) have more than
proven their translunar capability.

LL-1 is not technically of what's nearly as taboo/nondisclosure as
you'd think, although the naysay likes of William Mook should
continually disagree just out of spite. However, in spite of all the
Usenet and/or other naysay flak, it's not even all that far away nor
without benefit of the lunar gravity itself. Actually taking advantage
of the moon/sun alignment is one better yet, and of those deployments
taking the full lunar cycle of 29.5 days of getting whatever tonnage
transferred away from Earth and efficiently arriving into the LL-1
sweet-spot isn't a robotic DNA problem that I know of.

Since retrothrust reserves of rocket fuel isn't a significant
requirement for getting the vast bulk of substantial components and
fuel tonnage into that zone (merely reaction thrusters should more than
do the trick), and the interactive gravity-well and of tidal forces
should otherwise work in our favor. Therefore, where exactly is the
supposed insurmountable or dumbfounded problem?

As long as we don't have to deal with banking the likes of robotic bone
marrow, and since the LL-1 zone is supposedly a good 60,000 km away
from our reactive and therefore extremely nasty moon by day (by way of
earthshine being as little as 0.1% as nasty and therefore humanly
survivable), is why the LL-1 zone is so nicely space-depot
accommodating. There's also the very least amount of local plus solar
wind medium to deal with, and it's even somewhat shielded by way of the
lunar gravity extended magnetosphere of mother Earth.

As for Earth-science and moon-science and just plain old
astronomy/astrophysics science on steroids, there's none better than
LL-1. I think it's even humanly safer and most certainly it's far more
accessible and thereby end-user friendly than being entirely exposed
and out-of sight via LL-2.

Even the likes of Walter Cronkite should help to fully promote upon the
notions that short duration transits of getting whatever crew and/or
paying passengers safely from Earth to LL-1 should be doable within 24
hours, although requiring a fair amount of SRM or LRB retrothrust. A
gravity free fall back to mother Earth seems rather energy efficient,
as well as deploying whatever into lunar orbit should no longer be
nearly as complicated as it is. Even the notions of deploying nukes
from LL-1 isn't the least bit insurmountable, although from a tethered
deployed platform that's hosting a substantial cash of such nukes
and/or of nuke packing robotic shuttles that can be efficiently
sustained at 50,000 km away from Earth (25,000 km if you'd dare) might
seriously improve the odds of our nukes taking out whatever cash of
their nukes before they ever get launched in the first place.

My previous notions of having that platform as hosting a good dozen of
those 100 GW laser cannons should otherwise remove most all of the
pesky physical time delay factors of whatever our star-wars of nuking
humanity resolve should be capable of delivering upon any km2 zone upon
Earth.
-
Brad Guth

Life upon Venus, a township w/Bridge & ET/UFO Park-n-Ride Tarmac:
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-town.htm
The Russian/China LSE-CM/ISS (Lunar Space Elevator)
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/lunar-space-elevator.htm
Venus ETs, plus the updated sub-topics; Brad Guth / GASA-IEIS
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-topics.htm