NASA formally unveils lunar exploration architecture

"Jeff Findley" wrote in message
...

wrote in message
oups.com...

As far as CEV, Stick, and Big Rocket goes, we have come full circle
back to an Apollo CSM, Saturn 1b and Saturn V. These were vehicles we
should have never discarded and abandoned in the first place.

They were discarded because of the high cost. What makes you think the
same
won't happen again? We are, after all, presented with a plan to spend
more
time and money than Apollo, but end up with only a small improvement in
capability.

Jeff
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Not true, we have more capability. The shuttle was limited to earth
orbit. The CEV is capable of going to space station, any orbit around the
earth, orbit the moon, mars and beyond and it costs half as much as Apollo.
I think we could have developed the CEV with shuttle derived hardware after
apollo and it would have cut moon costs then in half and we could have
continued to goto the moon and colonize it then.
Ray

"Herb Schaltegger" wrote in
message .com...
On Tue, 20 Sep 2005 07:21:41 -0500, Ray wrote
(in article p9TXe.8506$i86.1501@trndny01):

That makes no sense. You have a spacecraft designed to operate
outside of earth orbit, you make a few flights to the moon and then
cancel
the program? No. And do what with the CEV? Operate it in orbit only? No.
It
was not designed for that.

It's not designed at all. So far, all you or anyone else has seen are
a bunch of pretty pictures. NASA and its contractors are very fond of
pretty pictures. Do you really believe these are the only pretty
pictures NASA has produced to drum up support for a project? Do you
not realize how few actually come to fruition?
The US government has no choice. It will replace the space shuttle
with CEV. Their is even talk of retireing the shuttle early, like 2007.


I dont think any future American President,
Senate or Congress will be that stupid enough to cancel the program with
one
exception.

Flash back to the late 1960's/early 1970's and consider what was done
with Apollo, then consider what you just wrote.
Apollo was canceled after 8 missions to the moon, and because NASA
had a idea about making a spacecraft with wings that could land at an
airport, but now that we found out this is the wrong way to fly into space,
we will not make that mistake again. Going to the moon today and in the
future will be a lot cheaper than in the 60s because shuttle hardware is
cheaper.


The moon program might be cancled eventually for Mars, but to
cancel it and do nothing outside of earth orbit is just stupid. I think
the
congress and the senate are dedicated to this program.

Based on what? Why do you believe that Congress cares one whit about
this program aside from jobs at the NASA centers and contractors?

because something like 96 people in the congress pleaged to support
it in the NASA authorization act that was passed this past July, I believe.
I also belive that US government is TIRED of endlessly circleing the earth
forever.


--
"Fame may be fleeting but obscurity is forever." ~Anonymous
"I believe as little as possible and know as much as I can."
~Todd Stuart Phillips
www.angryherb.net

"Jeff Findley" wrote in message
...

"Ray" wrote in message
news9TXe.8506$i86.1501@trndny01...
That makes no sense. You have a spacecraft designed to operate
outside of earth orbit, you make a few flights to the moon and then
cancel
the program? No. And do what with the CEV? Operate it in orbit only? No.
It
was not designed for that. I dont think any future American President,
Senate or Congress will be that stupid enough to cancel the program with
one
exception. The moon program might be cancled eventually for Mars, but to
cancel it and do nothing outside of earth orbit is just stupid. I think
the
congress and the senate are dedicated to this program.

Yet that's exactly what's happening to ISS. NASA needs to severely cut
back
on the number of planned shuttle flights to ISS in order to end the
shuttle
program by 2010. Furthermore, NASA has yet to develop the crew return
vehicle that it agreed to develop and deploy in order to increase the ISS
crew size beyond three. Maybe we'll see CEV flying to ISS by 2012, but
that's many years beyond the initial plan and many years beyond the date
that Russia agreed to fly US astronauts to and from ISS on Soyuz.

What makes you think that this next program will be any different than how
NASA has run ISS? What will they cut from the lunar exploration program
when they run into cost overruns like they did on ISS and congress and the
administration tell them to redesign the program? Have you learned
nothing
from the shuttle/ISS programs?

Jeff
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I think the congress and the senate have learned a lesson with the
shuttle and will continue to have more of an eye on NASA and how they spend
money in the future. According to Mike Griffen, moon, mars and beyond is a
pay-as-you go program, if we don't have the money, we dont go, but I think
NASA will have all the money it needs in the future. I think NASA and the
US government have learned a lot from the shuttle and ISS program.
Ray

"Joe Strout" wrote in message
...
In article p9TXe.8506$i86.1501@trndny01, "Ray"
wrote:

That makes no sense. You have a spacecraft designed to operate
outside of earth orbit, you make a few flights to the moon and then
cancel
the program? No.

If you can't be bothered to read history, at least watch it on the
History Channel. You're embarrassing yourself.

,------------------------------------------------------------------.
| Joseph J. Strout Check out the Mac Web Directory: |
| http://www.macwebdir.com |
`------------------------------------------------------------------'

Its different now. The democrats are not in control of the congress
like they were during apollo and in the 70's

Ray

in article , Joe Strout at
wrote on 9/19/05 9:06 PM:

In article . com,
"dasun" wrote:

snip

As for commercial exploration beyond LEO, give me a reasonable business
plan that justifies that sort of expenditure

Su

1. NASA develops standard payload interfaces, at a reasonable size that
can be reached by at least 2 commercial launchers (and preferably more).

2. NASA announces a plan to purchase such launches for a robust program
of exploration, from the lowest reliable provider available at each
launch. (Yes, I know determining "reliable" could be a rat's nest if
done poorly, but suppose it's done sensibly.)

3. Launch providers compete to lower their own launch costs, in order to
get those launches and make a tidy profit. New companies arise to get a
piece of the action; launch costs go down, reliability and capability go
up.

Two of the three points in your business plan are not about your business.
You need to cut the apron strings with NASA. If NASA is as bloated as you
say it is, you should be able to "Fedex" them out of the way in LEO
deliveries.

snip

George Evans

in article , Jorge R. Frank at
wrote on 9/19/05 9:43 PM:

Reed Snellenberger wrote in
.119:

snip

and ultimately be more versatile than the orbiter.

In the sense that it can go to the moon, yes. For LEO missions, it's way
less versatile than the orbiter. In particular, "ISS assembly complete" is
about to be redefined as "whatever state the station happens to be in
whenever the shuttle stops flying, since there ain't no way CEV is going to
do any meaningful assembly."

Isn't it possible for ISS to do some unassisted assembly now that it has its
own remote manipulator?

snip

George Evans

"Derek Lyons" wrote in message
...
John Doe wrote:

Didn't they say that for Shuttle, and promise the shuttle would be fully
reusable with little/no maintenance required between flights and fly at
very low costs many times per month ?

They also promised great things for Apollo - but they get a pass for
failing there. (Failing for much the same reasons as Shuttle failed.)

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

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

Maybe NASA could be cut some slack here. Apollo was the first
spacecraft of its kind to goto the moon and shuttle was the first hybrid
spacecraft of its kind to fly through the atmosphere and land on a runway,
both experiments. NASA can learn from these other spacecraft and design a
better spacecraft. I think you are all too hard on NASA.

Ray

I have question about all this. Many you seem to be anti-NASA and
anti moon, mars and beyond because you suspect its all bull ****. NASA did
a study on moon, mars and beyond before they presented it to the President
and Congress. If moon, mars and beyond was not workable with the budget
they receive, I don't think they would have presented to the President and
Congress, and I don't think the government would have agreed to it. What
makes you right about all this and them wrong?
Ray

"Paul F. Dietz" wrote in message
...
Ray wrote:

If moon, mars and beyond cannot be justified and its too
expensive then why did the Congress (94%), Senate and President
overwhelmingly approve it?

Because it buys votes?

I do hope you are not proposing that if the government approves something,
that implies the thing is a good idea.

Why couldn't they just stay with the shuttle or developed an orbital
space plane to get to orbit only when we need to or just cancel manned
space exploration? I think we got moon, mars and beyond because the US
government overwhelmingly supports it and a lot of major aerospace
corporations support it.

Well, *of course* the pigs feeding at this trough support it.
They support things that send money their way.

They couldn't stay with the shuttle because it's become an embarrassment,
and because the day when they can't fly any more of them is closer
than they thought (at which point the pork stops flowing).

Paul

"Jeff Findley" wrote in message
...

"Ray" wrote in message
news:J6KXe.15619$Zg5.1847@trndny05...

I am extremely excited about this plan! I have a question for
you.
What else should NASA do? Personally, I rather get rid of NASA instead
of
letting it orbit humans around the earth forever wasting our tax money.
If
we are going to have manned spaceflight we need to be serious about it
and
explore space, moon, mars and beyond, with people not just some dam
robots.
Somebody mentioned something on these newsgroups once about NASA working
with energy. That's bull****. We have a dept or energy for that. NASA
exists to do flight in space mostly.

NASA could focus on the real problem, which is high launch costs. For the
$7 billion a year this program is going to cost, they could fund dozens of
X-vehicle programs, each aimed at one aspect of lowering launch costs.
The
results of these programs would be public knowledge, useable by both the
established launch companies, and the startups.

Certainly this would delay our return to the moon, but it would make the
return to the moon far more affordable and sustainable. Apollo wasn't
sustainable due to high costs. Shuttle wasn't sustainable in part due to
high costs. What makes anyone think that the Stick and the SDHLV will be
sustainable?

Jeff
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I really don't think its NASA's job to concentrate on lowering
launch costs really. That's private industries job. NASA's job is to goto
the moon and beyond

Ray

"Jeff Findley" wrote in message
...

"Ray" wrote in message
news:22LXe.7296$i86.3182@trndny01...

I like what you said below, but I actually like a big CEV in orbit.
The
astronauts deserve a roomy CEV. By the way, do you know the dimensions
of
the CEV or where I could find that information? Will the CEV be as big
as
the shuttle crew cabin or smaller?

The astronauts deserve it? That's hardly justification to spend about $10
billion to develop the CEV and the stick.

Jeff
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For space exploration, its worth it.
Ray