Am I the only one that thinks NASA has lost it?

And I'm not referring specifically to the loss of Columbia. The
"shuttle" program from the start was basically a collection of the
cheapest ideas that could be slapped together into one vehicle and
still be called a "shuttle". No, I'm talking about the crippling
fear of risk that plagues NASA these days. I think the thing that
pushed me over the edge was the latest AvWeek in which they outlined
the testing of a CAPSULE. A friggin' CAPSULE?? And they'll make
everything in it quintiple redundant and test the thing for twenty
years to make sure even a chimp couldn't **** it up and then gold
plate the thing so they'll cost a billion a piece. NASA should be
THROWN out of the launch business with their asses bouncing down the
stairs and left with R&D and space exploration ONLY. Either that or
put someone in charge who has the cojones to take some risk and do
things smart. You wanna make an ity bitty spaceplane to ferry
astronauts? Fine. Accept that it will ONLY be used to ferry people
and make it fully resusable. Hell hire DARPA to figure it out if NASA
is too stupid to do the job. Want to launch payload? Fine, get rid
of the swiss watch mentality and figure out what you REALLY want to
do. Okay, end of rant.

Scott Ferrin wrote:

And I'm not referring specifically to the loss of Columbia. The
"shuttle" program from the start was basically a collection of the
cheapest ideas that could be slapped together into one vehicle and
still be called a "shuttle". No, I'm talking about the crippling
fear of risk that plagues NASA these days.

You can replace crews; but with so few Shuttles in existence, and the
extremely high cost of orbiters- not to mention the lead time to get a
replacement one- NASA can't afford to lose them in a fiscal as well as
publicity sense; we tried to do something very challenging on too low of
a budget, and ended up with a badly compromised vehicle in both the
safety and launch economy departments as a result. Frankly, the Shuttle
in its present form never should have been built.

I think the thing that
pushed me over the edge was the latest AvWeek in which they outlined
the testing of a CAPSULE. A friggin' CAPSULE??


Don't knock it if it works- the Russian Soyuz capsules haven't had a
fatality in 32 years despite two aborts, and several less-than-optimal
reentrys; including one with damaged parachutes, and another that pulled
21.3 G's as it descended into China after an in-flight abort. (some of
that was plain dumb luck; but some of that record was due to it being a
simple and straight forward design.) This shows a robust system; far
more robust than the Shuttle ever was. But going with the capsule
approach would mean that NASA would be pretty much admitting that the
Shuttle was a big mistake, and that would take real cojones on their
part, I'll bet it ends up having wings- whether that's a good idea in
the long run is a very open question- but it will almost certainly add
to both the cost and development time that the system will need to enter
service in relation to the capsule approach.

And they'll make
everything in it quintiple redundant and test the thing for twenty
years to make sure even a chimp couldn't **** it up and then gold
plate the thing so they'll cost a billion a piece.


Well...yeah, but you're dealing with a government project here;
remember- the V-22 Osprey is actually starting to enter service a mere
14 years after its first flight. If its a reusable spaceplane, don't be
surprised if it costs _over_ a billion a piece.

NASA should be
THROWN out of the launch business with their asses bouncing down the
stairs and left with R&D and space exploration ONLY. Either that or
put someone in charge who has the cojones to take some risk and do
things smart. You wanna make an ity bitty spaceplane to ferry
astronauts? Fine. Accept that it will ONLY be used to ferry people
and make it fully resusable. Hell hire DARPA to figure it out if NASA
is too stupid to do the job. Want to launch payload? Fine, get rid
of the swiss watch mentality and figure out what you REALLY want to
do. Okay, end of rant.

There was this thing called a Saturn V once.....

Pat

On Sat, 04 Oct 2003 14:55:11 -0600, Scott Ferrin
wrote:


And I'm not referring specifically to the loss of Columbia. The
"shuttle" program from the start was basically a collection of the
cheapest ideas that could be slapped together into one vehicle and
still be called a "shuttle". No, I'm talking about the crippling
fear of risk that plagues NASA these days. I think the thing that
pushed me over the edge was the latest AvWeek in which they outlined
the testing of a CAPSULE. A friggin' CAPSULE?? And they'll make
everything in it quintiple redundant and test the thing for twenty
years to make sure even a chimp couldn't **** it up and then gold
plate the thing so they'll cost a billion a piece. NASA should be
THROWN out of the launch business with their asses bouncing down the
stairs and left with R&D and space exploration ONLY. Either that or
put someone in charge who has the cojones to take some risk and do
things smart. You wanna make an ity bitty spaceplane to ferry
astronauts? Fine. Accept that it will ONLY be used to ferry people
and make it fully resusable. Hell hire DARPA to figure it out if NASA
is too stupid to do the job. Want to launch payload? Fine, get rid
of the swiss watch mentality and figure out what you REALLY want to
do. Okay, end of rant.


I dunno, I kind of hope that a combination of the Chinese efforts and
the private efforts for the X Prize will rekindle things.

I mean if the Chinese start pulling ahead of the US in space (a long
way away, and who knows what they plan, really?), then the US will
hopefully get someone with a vision, and the will to pull it off.


--

Find out about Australia's most dangerous Doomsday Cult:
http://users.bigpond.net.au/wanglese/pebble.htm

"You can't fool me, it's turtles all the way down."

You can replace crews; but with so few Shuttles in existence, and the
extremely high cost of orbiters- not to mention the lead time to get a
replacement one- NASA can't afford to lose them in a fiscal as well as
publicity sense; we tried to do something very challenging on too low of
a budget, and ended up with a badly compromised vehicle in both the
safety and launch economy departments as a result. Frankly, the Shuttle
in its present form never should have been built.


That pretty much sums up everything that's wrong with NASA.





I think the thing that
pushed me over the edge was the latest AvWeek in which they outlined
the testing of a CAPSULE. A friggin' CAPSULE??


Don't knock it if it works- the Russian Soyuz capsules haven't had a
fatality in 32 years despite two aborts, and several less-than-optimal
reentrys; including one with damaged parachutes, and another that pulled
21.3 G's as it descended into China after an in-flight abort. (some of
that was plain dumb luck; but some of that record was due to it being a
simple and straight forward design.) This shows a robust system; far
more robust than the Shuttle ever was. But going with the capsule
approach would mean that NASA would be pretty much admitting that the
Shuttle was a big mistake, and that would take real cojones on their
part, I'll bet it ends up having wings- whether that's a good idea in
the long run is a very open question- but it will almost certainly add
to both the cost and development time that the system will need to enter
service in relation to the capsule approach.


My bone of contention is more that we have the ability to do better.
A capsule has pretty much zero options once it's started reentry, it
gets thrown away after every use along with the booster that lofted
it. That's a lot of man hours and material to stick a few people in
orbit. Not to mention it's MAN-RATED $$$$$ stuff that's getting
thrown away. If they are going to go through the money, time, and
effort to man rate something it should be fully reusable. The thing
is they've got this mentality that people and payload need to go on
the same platform and you end up with a seven million pound rocket
that has to be man-rated. A single stage to orbit craft that only has
to carry 1200 pounds of people and their life support system would be
MUCH smaller (cheaper) and easier to do than trying to haul a
sixty-five thousand (or is it down to 50 these days) pound payload
with it. Then for the payload do something along the lines of the
big dumb booster. Right now NASA is so far down the diminishing
returns curve when it comes to precision, complexity and trying shave
off every extra gram and squeeze out every ISP they can that costs are
in the ionosphere. Bring down the costs of putting pounds into orbit
then the satellite builders can make their products a little more
durable than mayfly wings and you don't blow $240 MILLION dollars when
it tips over. Not to mention that then they could use less expensive
materials, a stronger structure etc. etc etc.



And they'll make
everything in it quintiple redundant and test the thing for twenty
years to make sure even a chimp couldn't **** it up and then gold
plate the thing so they'll cost a billion a piece.


Well...yeah, but you're dealing with a government project here;
remember- the V-22 Osprey is actually starting to enter service a mere
14 years after its first flight. If its a reusable spaceplane, don't be
surprised if it costs _over_ a billion a piece.


Let's put that in perspective. A Burke destroyer Flight IIA is in
the neighborhood of a billion dollars. Would a little space boat like
they are proposing to stick on the nose of a Delta IV Heavy need more
sophisticated electronics than an Aegis system? Hardly. 90+ assorted
missiles? Nope. Thousands of tons of steel? Hell it doesn't even
have a propulsion system (RCS isn't a propulsion system IMO) and a
Burke has four big gas turbines. In comparison to an F-22 even if you
went by the MOST it has been quoted at (250 million) it's far less
than a billion and when you get right down to it the only thing
*special* about the space raft should be the heat protection system.
Other than that it's basically an airplane and not a very good one at
that.





NASA should be
THROWN out of the launch business with their asses bouncing down the
stairs and left with R&D and space exploration ONLY. Either that or
put someone in charge who has the cojones to take some risk and do
things smart. You wanna make an ity bitty spaceplane to ferry
astronauts? Fine. Accept that it will ONLY be used to ferry people
and make it fully resusable. Hell hire DARPA to figure it out if NASA
is too stupid to do the job. Want to launch payload? Fine, get rid
of the swiss watch mentality and figure out what you REALLY want to
do. Okay, end of rant.

There was this thing called a Saturn V once.....

Pat



Even it was thrown in the ocean for the fish. For heavy lift they
need to ditch the shuttle and move to something with more payload that
is cheaper to build and is reusable. As long as they stick with the
"it's NASA no failure is tolerated and everything must be built like a
swiss watch and not allowed to get a spec of dust on it" they will
never go anywhere. Don't even get me started on that joke of a space
staion.

Scott Ferrin wrote:


My bone of contention is more that we have the ability to do better.
A capsule has pretty much zero options once it's started reentry, it
gets thrown away after every use along with the booster that lofted
it.

There's no reason you can't make a reusable capsule- the Soviets were
working on one called Zarya:
http://www.astronautix.com/graphics/z/zaryagr.jpg
If an ablative type heat shield is used, it can be replaced after each
flight. The big decision would be whether to land it in water or on
land; and if some sort of para-wing should be used, as was tested for
the Gemini spacecraft.



Well...yeah, but you're dealing with a government project here;
remember- the V-22 Osprey is actually starting to enter service a mere
14 years after its first flight. If its a reusable spaceplane, don't be
surprised if it costs _over_ a billion a piece.




Let's put that in perspective. A Burke destroyer Flight IIA is in
the neighborhood of a billion dollars. Would a little space boat like
they are proposing to stick on the nose of a Delta IV Heavy need more
sophisticated electronics than an Aegis system? Hardly. 90+ assorted
missiles? Nope. Thousands of tons of steel? Hell it doesn't even
have a propulsion system (RCS isn't a propulsion system IMO) and a
Burke has four big gas turbines. In comparison to an F-22 even if you
went by the MOST it has been quoted at (250 million) it's far less
than a billion and when you get right down to it the only thing
*special* about the space raft should be the heat protection system.
Other than that it's basically an airplane and not a very good one at
that.


Big R&D costs plus lots of short production run parts...a spaceplane
won't be cheap.






There was this thing called a Saturn V once.....

Pat





Even it was thrown in the ocean for the fish. For heavy lift they
need to ditch the shuttle and move to something with more payload that
is cheaper to build and is reusable. As long as they stick with the
"it's NASA no failure is tolerated and everything must be built like a
swiss watch and not allowed to get a spec of dust on it" they will
never go anywhere. Don't even get me started on that joke of a space
staion.

I think the ISS could perform a valuable service for the world- as an
artificial reef somewhere in the South Pacific.

Pat

Big R&D costs plus lots of short production run parts...a spaceplane
won't be cheap.

Why big R&D? How much did Burt Rutan sink into his and it's got a jet
mother ship to go with it? Much of the necessary R&D has been done on
the X-38 (which is basically the kind of thing they're looking at
ironically- it was cancelled) not to mention the plethora of lifting
bodies they've tinkered with all the way back to the X-20 in the
sixties. How much did Have Blue cost and it was pushing technology of
the time far more than this space raft is (or even SHOULD be)?
Essentially you're just building a shell whose aerodynamics have been
studied for going on forty years now. An RCS, flight control system,
life support, and heat protection (no ablation thank you, it's more
turn around cost) and you're there. There's absolutely no reason it
should cost anything like a billion dollars. Of course that's
assuming someone other than NASA was in charge. With NASA in charge I
don't even want to think about it, it's just too damn depressing.

Scott Ferrin wrote in message . ..
And I'm not referring specifically to the loss of Columbia. The
"shuttle" program from the start was basically a collection of the
cheapest ideas that could be slapped together into one vehicle and
still be called a "shuttle". No, I'm talking about the crippling
fear of risk that plagues NASA these days. I think the thing that
pushed me over the edge was the latest AvWeek in which they outlined
the testing of a CAPSULE. A friggin' CAPSULE?? And they'll make
everything in it quintiple redundant and test the thing for twenty
years to make sure even a chimp couldn't **** it up and then gold
plate the thing so they'll cost a billion a piece. NASA should be
THROWN out of the launch business with their asses bouncing down the
stairs and left with R&D and space exploration ONLY. Either that or
put someone in charge who has the cojones to take some risk and do
things smart. You wanna make an ity bitty spaceplane to ferry
astronauts? Fine. Accept that it will ONLY be used to ferry people
and make it fully resusable. Hell hire DARPA to figure it out if NASA
is too stupid to do the job. Want to launch payload? Fine, get rid
of the swiss watch mentality and figure out what you REALLY want to
do. Okay, end of rant.


I'm not realy sure that NASA has "lost it" as much as I think the
American public (and by turn, Congress) has lost its zeal. Let's face
it, the public's interest in space exploration is not the same
interest it had in the early 60's. Yes there have been little spikes,
particularly in the early 80's, late 80's and mid 90's but when asked
to put their money where their mouth is, John and Mary Doe have been
reluctant to pony up. This is especially true if it is PERCIEVED as
interfering with ANY entitlement program.

Most of us here on this NG are space enthusiasts, perhaps even
zealots. I think the people at NASA have the same enthusiasm too, I
bet there are even zealots there too. However us enthusiasts are too
small in number to make much of a difference. Sadly, we are going to
have live with incremental exploration. NASA's problem is that they
were never given the resources to design the Shuttle right, they were
never given the resources to fly the Shuttle right. To paraphrase a
movie line: "no bucks- no Buck Rogers".

My personal opinion is that NASA had spent an awful lot of taxpayer
money designing and building the Apollo/Saturn system. Gradual
refinements of the Apollo/Saturn system would have saved NASA more
money than flying a semi-reusable Shuttle designed from scratch. Think
Porsche 911 and think where the Apollo/ Saturn system would be today.

Gene