NASA studies new booster (UPI)

Michael Gallagher wrote in message . ..

..... Falcon V can deliver much more than 700 kg, and it's not too
small if
it's the cheapest way to do it.

It can do about 4,000 kg to LEO, but that would mean 10 flights just
to get the Apollo spacecraft into orbit, and we would want to do more
than Apollo. And no matter how cheap Falcon V is, the cost of
multiple laucnhes, plus the EVAs, adds up

Any series of numbers "adds up." That does not mean it adds up to more
than the cost of Shuttle-C. Please tell us how many Falcon V flights
will add up to the cost of one Shuttle-C flight and what the total
payload will be for each.

One look at an opinion poll will show "the whole damn country" does
not agree with you.

How much of that is from the fact that they don't want to see a Mars
flight at all and how much of that is from a rigged poll question
("Would you support letting your granny die in the street to send a
redneck to Mars for half an hour?" something like that) is an open
question.

Then take your own poll, which isn't rigged. Stop people on the street
and ask how many are "waiting to go to Mars... right now." I doubt if
one person in a hundred will say yes.

It's obligated to wait because the majority of voters and their
elected representatives have
said so .....

And we have an elected president who initiated the progam.

What program is that? The President has called for a NASA program
working toward an eventual goal of going to Mars sometime in the
unspecified future. That's not the same as saying "we" must go to Mars
"right now."

..... That's what I've been trying to tell you, Mike. Reducing the
cost of
space transportation not only builds toward Moon and Mars landings,
it's the *only* way there will ever be a significant number of Moon
and Mars landings.

But this begs the question of how long it takes to get to that point.
Yes, it is selfish of me, but I want to see SOMEONE from this country
land on Mars in my lifetime; waiting, say, 100 years for reduced costs
doesn't cut it for me.

Who said you should wait 100 years? We can start reducing costs right
now.

If you merely want to "see someone land on Mars" on television, you
can rent that movie Disney did a few years back. If you want to see it
in person, the cost will have to come down to where you can afford a
ticket.

I will be perfectly happy if a dozen people can go.

I won't. A dozen people isn't a space program, it's a rounding
error.
The difference between your program and Bob Park's is an
insignificant
number of people and many hundreds of billions of dollars. I'm not
interested in robots. I want to see humans in space, and not just
token numbers.

I want to see humans in space, too. But I don't see you how you get a
significant number of humans going someplace without first having a
small group of trail blazers. Lewis and Clark's expidition did not
involve a lot of people

Probably a lot more than you realize. More importantly, when Lewis and
Clark undertook their expedition, it was already possible for ordinary
people to follow them at not-unreasonable cost. That's something the
people who love the "Lewis and Clark" analogy always seem to overlook.
If the only way for settlers to follow them was on a $200 million
EELV, Lewis and Clark would have been no more than a footnote in
history.

"Edward Wright" wrote in message
m...
Michael Gallagher wrote in message
. ..

I want to see humans in space, too. But I don't see you how you get a
significant number of humans going someplace without first having a
small group of trail blazers. Lewis and Clark's expidition did not
involve a lot of people

Probably a lot more than you realize. More importantly, when Lewis and
Clark undertook their expedition, it was already possible for ordinary
people to follow them at not-unreasonable cost. That's something the
people who love the "Lewis and Clark" analogy always seem to overlook.
If the only way for settlers to follow them was on a $200 million
EELV, Lewis and Clark would have been no more than a footnote in
history.

As a percentage of the population, more Americans were on the Lewis
an Clark expedition than have been in space to date. I don't remember
who pointed this out first here.

Dick Morris wrote in message ...
ed kyle wrote:

My problem with EOR is that it doesn't pass the simplicity
test. Albert Einstein said, "Everything should be made as
simple as possible, but not simpler." EOR is not "as simple
as possible".

Operating cost is not simply proportional to complexity. EOR is more
complex than a single launch, but it can be a lot cheaper if the
launcher is reusable.

If this were true, reusable launch vehicles would be flying
today to fulfill commercial market demand. But they aren't.
Instead, the participants in the winner-take-all comsat
business use expendables because they provide the lowest cost
(simple) ride to orbit. So do NASA, the U.S. Air Force, the
Russian Space Forces, the European Space Agency, China's space
agency, and all the rest.

... Apollo died because it cost too much to keep it going with
expendable launchers ...

This is simply not true. Vietnam and social unrest killed
Apollo, partially because the public *perceived* it wasteful
during troubled times and, more importantly, because NASA's
budget was decimated by the billions diverted to the
military's loosing fight in Vietnam. The truth was that
after 1969 the Saturn V Apollo missions cost less than NASA's
current Space Shuttle ISS programs in current dollars (about
$3.9 billion/year then versus about $7 billion now).

- Ed Kyle

(Edward Wright) wrote in message . com...
(ed kyle) wrote in message . com...

... EOR is a more complex mission than single-launch.

The Internet is more complex than a pocket calculator. The US air
transportation system is more complex than a single giant blimp.

Do you use the Internet to balance your checkbook? Could
you use a blimp to route passenger aircraft?

Complexity is not something to be avoided at any cost.

Should we call this Ed Wright's axiom?

Redundant systems are required for any non-trivial transportation
system. Airlines, trucking companies, bus services, taxi companies,
even racing teams have spare vehicles. Why should space transportation
be any different?

Have you flown lately? I can tell you with certainty
that most airlines barely keep enough aircraft certified
to handle their daily schedules, let alone to provide
redundant aircraft on standby.

- Ed Kyle

On 18 Mar 2004 06:45:12 -0800, in a place far, far away,
(ed kyle) made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
such a way as to indicate that:

Operating cost is not simply proportional to complexity. EOR is more
complex than a single launch, but it can be a lot cheaper if the
launcher is reusable.

If this were true, reusable launch vehicles would be flying
today to fulfill commercial market demand.

There are many reasons that reusable launch vehicles aren't flying
today, but not because that statement isn't true.

... Apollo died because it cost too much to keep it going with
expendable launchers ...

This is simply not true. Vietnam and social unrest killed
Apollo, partially because the public *perceived* it wasteful
during troubled times and, more importantly, because NASA's
budget was decimated by the billions diverted to the
military's loosing fight in Vietnam. The truth was that
after 1969 the Saturn V Apollo missions cost less than NASA's
current Space Shuttle ISS programs in current dollars

i.e., still far too much.

(ed kyle) wrote in message . com...

... EOR is a more complex mission than single-launch.

The Internet is more complex than a pocket calculator. The US air
transportation system is more complex than a single giant blimp.

Do you use the Internet to balance your checkbook?

Yes.

Could you use a blimp to route passenger aircraft?

Yes, but airplanes are a more economic solution, even though they are
more complex.

Complexity is not something to be avoided at any cost.

Should we call this Ed Wright's axiom?

Most people would call it "common sense."

Redundant systems are required for any non-trivial transportation
system. Airlines, trucking companies, bus services, taxi companies,
even racing teams have spare vehicles. Why should space transportation
be any different?

Have you flown lately? I can tell you with certainty
that most airlines barely keep enough aircraft certified
to handle their daily schedules, let alone to provide
redundant aircraft on standby.

I have not only flown, I've also worked on airline scheduling
software.

Any major airline is bound to have some number of planes in the shop
at any given time. If they didn't have spare planes, they would never
be able to meet their flight schedules. Do you think airplanes never
break down?

ed kyle wrote:

Dick Morris wrote in message ...
ed kyle wrote:

My problem with EOR is that it doesn't pass the simplicity
test. Albert Einstein said, "Everything should be made as
simple as possible, but not simpler." EOR is not "as simple
as possible".

Operating cost is not simply proportional to complexity. EOR is more
complex than a single launch, but it can be a lot cheaper if the
launcher is reusable.

If this were true, reusable launch vehicles would be flying
today to fulfill commercial market demand. But they aren't.
Instead, the participants in the winner-take-all comsat
business use expendables because they provide the lowest cost
(simple) ride to orbit. So do NASA, the U.S. Air Force, the
Russian Space Forces, the European Space Agency, China's space
agency, and all the rest.

Fully-reusable launchers are not flying today because the markets are so
miniscule. (And the markets are miniscule because expendable launchers
cost so much.) At a handful of flights a year you cannot amortize the
development cost of a new launcher, especially the substantially higher
development cost for a fully-reusable design.

None of which, of course, has anything to do with the ability of a
fully-reusable launcher to deliver dramatically lower recurring costs.
That is a matter of eliminating the cost of expended hardware, and
designing for reliability, maintainability, and durability - rather than
absolute maximum performance as has been done with all existing
launchers. Get the recurring costs down and we get out of the vicious
cycle of high cost leading to low demand leading to still higher costs,
etc. The problem is a lack of vision, not the inability of a
fully-reusable design to deliver low costs.

... Apollo died because it cost too much to keep it going with
expendable launchers ...

This is simply not true. Vietnam and social unrest killed
Apollo, partially because the public *perceived* it wasteful
during troubled times and, more importantly, because NASA's
budget was decimated by the billions diverted to the
military's loosing fight in Vietnam. The truth was that
after 1969 the Saturn V Apollo missions cost less than NASA's
current Space Shuttle ISS programs in current dollars (about
$3.9 billion/year then versus about $7 billion now).

It was perceived as wasteful because it cost so much. I recall reading
that each Apollo mission cost about $2 billion, and I believe that was
in then-year dollars. Apollo had reached the point of diminishing
returns, and it was decided that it simply wasn't worth spending more
billions of dollars for "more boxes of rocks". If each flight had cost,
say, 5% of that amount, the opposition would have been far less, and
NASA could have afforded to continue the program even with a much lower
budget. (Yes, we can get the cost of a lunar flight down to 5% of an
Apollo flight, even with existing technology.)

- Ed Kyle

ed kyle wrote:

(Edward Wright) wrote in message . com...
(ed kyle) wrote in message . com...

... EOR is a more complex mission than single-launch.

The Internet is more complex than a pocket calculator. The US air
transportation system is more complex than a single giant blimp.

Do you use the Internet to balance your checkbook? Could
you use a blimp to route passenger aircraft?

Complexity is not something to be avoided at any cost.

Should we call this Ed Wright's axiom?

Except for the TPS, a 747 is more complex than a Shuttle Orbiter. Yet
it costs several orders-of-magnitude less to fly, because it is designed
to be highly reusable and highly reliable. No operational launch
vehicle has ever been designed to those criteria. Complexity is not the
problem.

Redundant systems are required for any non-trivial transportation
system. Airlines, trucking companies, bus services, taxi companies,
even racing teams have spare vehicles. Why should space transportation
be any different?

Have you flown lately? I can tell you with certainty
that most airlines barely keep enough aircraft certified
to handle their daily schedules, let alone to provide
redundant aircraft on standby.

I was on a flight once that had to do an "RTLS" abort due to engine
trouble. There was another airplane waiting for us at the gate when we
got back. A small sample size to be sure, but I suspect that happens
much more often than not. For one thing, a certain percentage of an
airline's fleet is always going to be in the shop for routine, scheduled
maintenance and can be pressed back into service in a pinch. Over it's
lifetime, an airplane will spend a bit under half the time in the air,
so, on the average, half of an airline's fleet will be on the ground at
any given time. There is enough slack in the system to accomodate minor
disruptions.

- Ed Kyle

Michael Gallagher wrote in message . ..

You keep saying that as if the current approach is working. It's
not,
Michael. After 40 years, there are still no people on Mars ....

I am well aware of that, Ed, and the reason it is "not working" is
because for forty years, we have not had political leaders in the
White House and Congress willing to pay for it,

Again, that is not true. The US government has spent approximately a
trillion dollars on space programs, all of it approved by the White
House and Congress. More than enough to have gone to Mars, if the
money had been spent properly.

If you don't think one trillion dollars was enough, how much would be?
What makes you sure the solution is more money, rather than spending
the existing amount of money more wisely?

Of course, the White House and Congress would also have to approve the
expenditure to for NASA to purchase commercial manned vehicles;

I never proposed that NASA purchase commercial manned vehicles. NASA
doesn't purchase commercial airliners; they buy airline tickets. NASA
employees still seem to get around nicely.

IIRC, the cost has to be very small for NASA (or anyone) to do soemthing
like that without Congressional oversight. Even then, there probably
would have to be something in the budget earmarked for it. So from
that respect, back to square one, getting people at the top to go
along with it.

Which has never been the problem. The Launch Services Purchase Act
already requires NASA to buy rides on commercial vehicles to meet its
space transportation needs. The only problem is getting NASA to follow
the law.

.....the fact is that *none* of us have the ability to go to Mars
right now.

Well, let me try and clear this up:

When I talked about being able to go to Mars, I meant we don't need a
lot of new technology; if anything, just rebuild some old ones, like
the NERVA nuclear thermal rocket engines tested in the '60s to cut the
travel time down a bit.

Rebuilding a NERVA engine is not as trivial as you imply. NERVA was
built a long time ago. It would almost certainly be easier to finish
work on the Timberwind reactor than trying to ressurect NERVA. Either
one would take time, however. Neither enables us to go to Mars "right
now."

..... as wrong as you
were when you said "all of us" have the ability to "go to Mars
right
now" -- but I never said that.

I think I've got it:

When I referred to "we" being able to go to Mars, I did not mean that
"every individual American has the ability to go to Mars," I meant
"The United States government (or an agency thereof) is has been aware
of the technological and logistical reuqirments of a trip to Mars for
sometime, and from that perspective, it is well within the possibility
to send a crew to Mars." That "we." Like you say "We will go all the
way to the Super Bowl!" when you are talking about a football team you
will never be a member of.

You're mistaking me for Buffy the Cheerleader. I never say that.

Why should I identify with a government agency that I'm not part of? I
don't exclaim "We're going to Disneyland!" just because the US
Department of Labor is sending some employees to Disneyland. Why
should I be excited because some government employees I don't even
know get to go on a fun trip?

"Jake McGuire" wrote in message
om...
Looking in the payload planners guide reveals that the Delta IV Heavy
requires about fifteen shifts in the HIF and twenty shifts on the pad.
That breaks down to a little over four weeks at five days a week, one
shift per day in the HIF and two shifts per day on the pad. Using
existing facilities at seven days a week and two shifts a day, you
could easily do three Delta-IV Heavy launches a month, and that's
without new test stands.

Reality has caught up with Boeing. The PPG is hopelessly out of date when it
comes to work predictions. There is absolutely no way that three D IV
Heavies could be salvoed in a month using existing facilities.

-Kim-