Habitability of station to 2005 ?

(Hallerb) writes:


Considering that the only missions (beyond possible Hubble repair
missions) that the shuttle will fly in the future are to ISS, loss of
ISS essentially means loss of the shuttle program.

Jeff

Perhaps that isnt such a bad thing? As long as the money were
redirected to help fund a new capsule manned launch system?

For what do you need a *manned* launch system at all without ISS?


Jochem

--
"A designer knows he has arrived at perfection not when there is no
longer anything to add, but when there is no longer anything to take
away." - Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Jochem Huhmann writes:

For what do you need a *manned* launch system at all without ISS?

Absolutely nothing, unless NASA goes back to the pre-ISS days of
flying one to two week science missions on the shuttle. :-P

Jeff
--
Remove "no" and "spam" from email address to reply.
If it says "This is not spam!", it's surely a lie.

Dr John Stockton wrote:
No. Spare consumables will be consumed, preferably after more spares
have arrived, but before their expiry dates.

There are many spares which exist only as a backup. Consider oxygen candles
and medical supplies. Close to their expiry, you might as well use the oxygen
candles, which will save you some electricity (allows you to turn off
elektron). But you still need to ship new candles up to replace those.

Also, if during a period, the crew has had to use up some of the spare
inventory, does Progress have sufficient capacity to replenish the spare
inventory back to the baseline levels ?

James Novell wrote in
1- Spare CMGs cannot be placed inside Progress.

2- What happens when you have to decide between providing sufficient
consumables for a 2 man crew and between placing spare parts ?

Just to make it clear, we all want all options available. ATV for large
cargo capacity, Progress for more frequent trips when required and STS to
finish building the station. Plus, closing the loop will reduce the
water requirement (basically purifying astronaut's **** is what it is).
The more flexibility the better.

Well, somehow all of this needs to be financed. NASA supplies the heavy
lift capability, somewhat expensive but they can afford it. RSA has little
money but has reliable technology for frequent flights to the station.
Finally, ESA does not have the R&D of the former two but spends some money
to leverage all available technology to provide a decent cargo capability.
This is good cooperation, overall.

And if another CMG fails, won't that result in significant increase of
fuel needs for the russian Segment ?

Well, the increase is not that significant but it is better to have the
CMGs. Is it tremendously difficult to repair the CMG in orbit? I assume
that some small part like a bearing or something has failed. May be they
can just replace that (or at least design the replacement CMG to be
serviceable in orbit. The other major component that is big and heavy are
the batteries... those are failing too. It should not be that hard to make
these modular?

Vassil

Vassil wrote:
Just to make it clear, we all want all options available. ATV for large
cargo capacity, Progress for more frequent trips when required and STS to
finish building the station.

Yes this is what we WANT. But right now, we only have Progress. If the shuttle
can't fly until 2005, how many Progress launches can we count on ? Can we
count on one ATV launch or is that still wishful thinking ?

CMGs. Is it tremendously difficult to repair the CMG in orbit? I assume
that some small part like a bearing or something has failed.

From what I heard, a single CMG cannot fit through Quest airlock hatches. So
the fix would have to be done as EVA. And the innards are probably extremely
delicate parts that are not designed to be maintained with large EVA gloves.

If Shuttle is to remain grounded long enough, would it be worth it to consider
sending one or two spare CMGs up on a soyuz rocket with a tug similar to that
which brought Piers to the station ? Or would that take too long to develop
and build ?

Can 1 or more CMGs fit on the unpressurised section of the HTV?
If so, then once HTV is operational and the CanadaHand is installed,
it should mean that such major component replacements would no
longer require the STS.