Astronauts like capsules

I am recently retired from NASA and was right in the middle of the move to
go back to capsules vs. winged vehicles landing on runways.

What surprised me the most was even the pilot astronauts liked capsules
better. Keep in mind the USA astronaut corps flies both at this time --
Soyuz, capsule -- Shuttle, wings. I thought the pilot in them would want to
land on a runway vs. the "brainless" feat of opening up chutes. I was
wrong. I have not talked to a single astronaut that wanted the next vehicle
to have wings. They really like that the capsule heat shield is strong and
protected and the capsule can bring you home alive with a complete flight
control failure. Winged vehicles have fragile, exposed heat shields and have
no chance of bringing you home if the flight control system fails. Ascent
aborts with a winged vehicle are also much harder.

Any inputs from others on what the astronauts like?

Danny Dot
www.mobbinggonemad.org

Well, you just had to say that!

I guess, until we can devise a true space plane there is a problem, as on
the way up there is not much you can do but ride the beast. However, I
imagine the manoeuvrability of the traditional spacecraft is more
predictable and maybe this is what is required now. Its interesting to note
that you can automate a docking with quite old designs, but the shuttle has
to be docked manually.

Brian

--
Brian Gaff....Note, this account does not accept Bcc: email.
graphics are great, but the blind can't hear them
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"Neon Knight" wrote in message
36...
"Danny Dot" wrote in
:

Any inputs from others on what the astronauts like?

I heard that some of them like pizza with pepperoni and mushrooms.

"Brian Gaff" wrote:

I guess, until we can devise a true space plane there is
a problem, as on the way up there is not much you can do but
ride the beast.

And that's a key problem - everyone thinks "well, retire the Shuttle
until we can develop a working and reasonable winged shuttle"... How
are we supposed to develop one *if we aren't flying them*?

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

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

Derek Lyons wrote:
And that's a key problem - everyone thinks "well, retire the Shuttle
until we can develop a working and reasonable winged shuttle"... How
are we supposed to develop one *if we aren't flying them*?

What if a 'winged shuttle' was just a stupid idea to begin with?

Mark

"Derek Lyons" wrote in message
...
"Brian Gaff" wrote:

I guess, until we can devise a true space plane there is
a problem, as on the way up there is not much you can do but
ride the beast.

And that's a key problem - everyone thinks "well, retire the Shuttle
until we can develop a working and reasonable winged shuttle"... How
are we supposed to develop one *if we aren't flying them*?

Meaningful X vehicle programs to work towards the goal of reasonable winged
shuttles?

We've learned just about all the lessons we're going to learn from the
shuttle. There are two problems with the shuttle that make it hard to learn
these lessons. The first is that it flies infrequently. For a vehicle that
you want to learn something from, you ought to be flying it far more often
than about six times a year.

The second problem with the shuttle is that it's hard to change the design.
It's just not built to be torn apart, reconfigured, and put back together
again. In fact, it's not even designed for good maintainability between
flights. More or less routine maintenance takes quite a bit of time on the
shuttle.

And finally, it's just too expensive. Too expensive to fly, too expensive
to maintain, and far too expensive to change or evolve the design.

Jeff
--
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a
little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor
safety"
- B. Franklin, Bartlett's Familiar Quotations (1919)

"Danny Dot" wrote in message
...
I am recently retired from NASA and was right in the middle of the move to
go back to capsules vs. winged vehicles landing on runways.

What surprised me the most was even the pilot astronauts liked capsules
better. Keep in mind the USA astronaut corps flies both at this time --
Soyuz, capsule -- Shuttle, wings. I thought the pilot in them would want
to land on a runway vs. the "brainless" feat of opening up chutes. I was
wrong. I have not talked to a single astronaut that wanted the next
vehicle to have wings. They really like that the capsule heat shield is
strong and protected and the capsule can bring you home alive with a
complete flight control failure. Winged vehicles have fragile, exposed
heat shields and have no chance of bringing you home if the flight control
system fails. Ascent aborts with a winged vehicle are also much harder.

Any inputs from others on what the astronauts like?

I forgot an important part of what the astronauts "like". They like orbit
operations. They LOVE space walks (EVAs). They don't like ascent and
entry. The risk of loss of life is very high during ascent and entry and
they obviously know this. Landing is a no win proposition. A shuttle
landing is looked at my many, many people. Any error in the landing can
ruin a career.

They see ascent and entry as "necessary evils" to get to do the the orbit
stuff.

Danny Dot


Danny Dot
www.mobbinggonemad.org

" wrote:

Derek Lyons wrote:
And that's a key problem - everyone thinks "well, retire the Shuttle
until we can develop a working and reasonable winged shuttle"... How
are we supposed to develop one *if we aren't flying them*?

What if a 'winged shuttle' was just a stupid idea to begin with?

What if a 'capsule' is a stupid idea?

The plain fact of the matter is - we don't clearly know.

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

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

Derek Lyons wrote:
The plain fact of the matter is - we don't clearly know.

As far as I can see, the only reason people have any real interest in
'winged shuttles' is because Von Braun wanted one in the 50s. They seem
to provide few real benefits and lots of costs: one of the most obvious
being that if you lose a wing you're dead.

Mark

" ) writes:
Derek Lyons wrote:
The plain fact of the matter is - we don't clearly know.

As far as I can see, the only reason people have any real interest in
'winged shuttles' is because Von Braun wanted one in the 50s. They seem
to provide few real benefits and lots of costs: one of the most obvious
being that if you lose a wing you're dead.

You do understand that that is an argument for the immediate grounding
of ALL airplanes right now.

Andre

Andre Lieven wrote:
You do understand that that is an argument for the immediate grounding
of ALL airplanes right now.

If the average airplane lost a wing one flight in fifty like the
shuttle, then yes, it would be a very good argument for grounding all
planes now.

Otherwise it's just another bogus attempt to compare the shuttle to an
airliner that's many, many, many, many orders of magnitude safer. It
will be a long time before you can build a 'winged shuttle' anywhere
near as safe as a 747.

Mark