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Future Robotic Shuttles?



 
 
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  #61  
Old October 23rd 10, 04:59 AM posted to sci.space.station,sci.space.shuttle
bob haller safety advocate
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Posts: 615
Default Future Robotic Shuttles?

On Oct 22, 8:55*am, Jeff Findley wrote:
In article 96dd767b-f54d-41e2-ba37-2a55cd6d8d89
@j18g2000yqd.googlegroups.com, says...



well the shuttle is worse than flying in combat and most military
airplanes have ejection seats.


Worse than flying in combat? *No Bob, that's NOT true. *Shuttle has only
had two failures in 132 flights, which is a 1 in 66 loss of crew rate. *
That's a heck of a lot better than what our boys were facing during WW-
II. *

My grandfather was an engineer on a B-24 during WW-II and the life
expectancy of one of an air crew was extremely dismal and they had no
ejection seats (they did have parachutes though). *I know you can't
always trust the Internet for facts like this, but here it is anyway:

* * Bomber crews' tour of duty was 25 missions (later raised to 35)
* * But, the life expectancy of the average crew was just 14 missions..

Most NASA astronauts only fly one or five missions. *There is a *very*
small minority who have flown six or more missions. *No NASA astronaut
has flown anywhere near the 25 or 35 missions required to complete a WW-
II bomber crew's tour. *

Obviously, the actual risk to a single shuttle astronaut is *far* lower
than that of a WW-II bomber crew, who flew together on every one of
those missions until one of two things stopped them: *1. They were shot
down (most likely all killed) or 2. They completed their tour of duty
and went home. *

If you're going to make wild assertions that may offend combat veterans
and their families, please back up that assertion with facts and
verifiable statistical analyses.

theres no escape system on commercial airliners since most accidents
occur during takeoff or landing, and theres no way to get out during
those times


Most launch vehicle accidents occur during launch or reentry/landing
too. *You take your chances during launch and landing, and every
astronaut knows those odds and chooses to fly anyway. *Just because some
whiners like you don't like the odds is no reason to stop flying.

Jeff
--
42


jeff the less safe than combat was widely accepted and discussed right
after columbia loss.

i suppose it should of said current combat aircraft are safer than
flying in a shuttle

I feel bad for the workers that the shuttle is ending without a
replacement.

Although this was clearly a nasa management failure

if they would of choosen to fly on deltas we would be flying today
  #62  
Old August 7th 11, 06:19 AM posted to sci.space.station,sci.space.shuttle
Bootstrap Bill
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Posts: 9
Default Future Robotic Shuttles?



"greenaum" wrote in message
...

On Sat, 18 Sep 2010 01:36:04 -0400, JF Mezei
sprachen:

Perhaps NASA might be able to develop a cost effective way to
manufacture large carbon-carbon parts and make a shuttle belly out of a
dozen carbon-carbon panels instead of thousands of tiles.


I realise this is nearly a year old, but Usenet's not what it used to
be...

The latest New Scientist is a bit of a special on 3D printing /
"additive manufacturing". At the moment, it's based round spreading a
layer of powder, and using lasers / electron beams to melt the powder
together, sintering it into solid parts. You do one layer, then spread
some more powder for the second layer. After a while, you end up with
a big pile of powder with a 3D object hidden in it.

-----------------------------------------------------------

There was an article in a magazine (Wired?) about eight years or so ago. It
mentioned the possibility of using 3D printers to build laptop computers. It
said the first one might cost $1 billion, but after that it would drop to
$15.

Has their been any progress in this recently? Are we close to being able to
print modern computers with 3D printers?

Rep Rap looks neat, but the printers are limited to making simple plastic
toys, nothing even remotely close to a laptop computer.



  #63  
Old August 7th 11, 11:05 AM posted to sci.space.station,sci.space.shuttle
Brian Gaff
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Posts: 2,312
Default Future Robotic Shuttles?

Its all the systems in the Shuttle that need to be kept going.
I doubt the technology will be there to get rid of those very soon, make
the bits certainly but its still going to need a lot of looking after.
Brian

--
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Blind user, so no pictures please!
"greenaum" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 18 Sep 2010 01:36:04 -0400, JF Mezei
sprachen:

Perhaps NASA might be able to develop a cost effective way to
manufacture large carbon-carbon parts and make a shuttle belly out of a
dozen carbon-carbon panels instead of thousands of tiles.


I realise this is nearly a year old, but Usenet's not what it used to
be...

The latest New Scientist is a bit of a special on 3D printing /
"additive manufacturing". At the moment, it's based round spreading a
layer of powder, and using lasers / electron beams to melt the powder
together, sintering it into solid parts. You do one layer, then spread
some more powder for the second layer. After a while, you end up with
a big pile of powder with a 3D object hidden in it.

Current materials for the powder include titanium and nylon. Parts can
be made much lighter, since the method allows literally any shape to
be made. Shapes that are impossible to cast or cut using tools. You
can save a huge amount of weight, and CAD's being able to do the
modelling to design strength and stress-resistance for decades now.

Anyway, the next medium-sized step is composites. Use different
materials in the layers, allowing complex compounds that behave very
differently to anything possible now. Things can be made at the
microscopic level, the idea is we'll soon be able to make materials
with any property you like, not just any shape. Things like a material
that gets thicker as you stretch it.

Give this a few more years, (and not that many!). Everything will be
changed, almost anything will be possible. What if a shuttle weighed
half as much? In the not-too-far future, perhaps one could make a
whole shuttle on a 3D printer. Give the print-heads the right
materials, and you could maybe even have the thing pop out complete
and almost entirely in one piece! Certainly a 1-piece or few-piece
heat shield is likely possible.

If you can ensure things are safer, and ideally simpler, that makes it
cheaper to ensure you probably won't kill too many crew members. Which
is a big expense.

Still, what's the most expensive part of running the shuttle? I'd
imagine it's the well-qualified staff that run everything on the
ground, and work for the contractors. And lots of investment in tools
and equipment. At least the latter can be replaced by this.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"There's nothing like eating hay when you're faint," the White King
remarked to Alice, as he munched away.
"I should think throwing cold water over you would be better," Alice
suggested: "--or some sal-volatile."
"I didn't say there was nothing better," the King replied. "I said there
was nothing like it."
Which Alice did not venture to deny.




 




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