NASA formally unveils lunar exploration architecture

John Doe wrote:
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.

Hint: what did they do with Apollo ?

And do what with the CEV? Operate it in orbit only? No.

Where else do you want it to go ? Jupiter ? The CEV is just a glorified
Apollo with more people in it. Nothing more. It is unsuitable to go to
Mars. In fact, if there isn't room for proper exercise equipment, I
wonder if it is suitable for 2 weeks trips. They put the exercise
equipment in the shuttle for a good reason.

If the program is "Apollo on steroids", then the Low Earth Orbit
version of the CEV is just "Soyuz on Viagra" - delivers a bit more and
can reenter a few times.

Reed Snellenberger wrote in
.121:

"Jorge R. Frank" wrote in
:

Reed Snellenberger wrote in
.119:

We get something that will initially be (at least) safer than
Shuttle

CEV claims to cut the risk of crew loss *during the ascent phase* by
a factor of ten compared to the shuttle, but ascent risk is only
about half the overall risk. And the remaining mission risks for CEV
don't automatically drop just because the ascent risk dropped. So *at
best* you're talking about a 50% risk reduction - and that's only
after the spacecraft has flown enough times to demonstrate the level
of design maturity the shuttle has *now*.


Risk at re-entry should also be reduced quite a bit, since a capsule
doesn't have the requirement to perform aerodynamic maneuvers during
entry and should be inherently stable as well.

Offset by the design vulnerability of jettisoning critical components
during dynamic flight (in the case of the CEV, the service module and the
heat shield).

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."

That's perfectly alright as long as you don't pretend to have goals
in LEO like ISS and keep the program focused on exploration beyond
LEO. But those who pretend otherwise are going to be disappointed.

I'll grant that it won't be versatile enough to carry up ISS modules
that were specifically designed to be launched in the back of the
shuttle. However, we've already made the decision to end the Shuttle
by 2010, so saying that CEV is less versatile than shuttle because it
can't install modules that were specifically designed for the shuttle
is a lot like saying that Shuttle isn't as versatile as Apollo since
it can't make it to the moon. Different missions, different
capabilities.

Again, that's fine as long as people don't pretend otherwise.

--
JRF

Reply-to address spam-proofed - to reply by E-mail,
check "Organization" (I am not assimilated) and
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On 20 Sep 2005 11:33:52 -0700, in a place far, far away, "Will"
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a
way as to indicate that:

It is a plan that produces
something useful in the near-term - the CEV and CLV tools
that will replace shuttle and could by themselves, in
concert with commercial launch services and international
space station partners, serve as the framework for a long-
term human space program.

For exactly the same (or more) cost as the Shuttle program.

http://www.transterrestrial.com/arch...29.html#005729

I don't see how that follows from your figures. Two manned CEV launches
can handle ISS crew rotation, and four unmanned, with payload instead
of the capsule, can deliver more payload to ISS than the same number of
shuttle launches. If your figure of $3 billion is for annual program
cost, that's more than a billion less than what the shuttle costs to do
the same job.

If crews are rotated twice a year--I thought there was a desire for
ninety days. But it comes down to a) if the $3B number is correct and
b) it represents total costs for the flights, rather than simply fixed
annual costs. If the latter, then one has to add the marginal costs
as well. Also factor in whatever costs are associated with the lack
of ability to return large payloads.

We can't really compare the program costs, though, until we see more
detailed estimates. My point is that it doesn't look like a bargain,
compared to Shuttle.

"Jeff Findley" wrote in
:

"Reed Snellenberger" wrote in
message .121...
"Jorge R. Frank" wrote in

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."

That's perfectly alright as long as you don't pretend to have goals
in LEO like ISS and keep the program focused on exploration beyond
LEO. But those who pretend otherwise are going to be disappointed.

I'll grant that it won't be versatile enough to carry up ISS modules
that were specifically designed to be launched in the back of the
shuttle. However, we've already made the decision to end the Shuttle
by 2010, so saying that CEV is less versatile than shuttle because it
can't install modules that were specifically designed for the shuttle
is a lot like saying that Shuttle isn't as versatile as Apollo since
it can't make it to the moon. Different missions, different
capabilities.

If a need arises to extend the station after Shuttle is retired,
that will be another mission. If someone wants to do that, they will
just have to develop (and fund) the tools to get the piece delivered
and installed.

Griffin mentioned this in his talk. While he's personally against
launching ISS modules on "the stick", he did say it would be possible,
but it would take time and money. You'd have to develop a strongback
to mimic the shuttle's payload bay attach points, and would likely
have to requalify the module being launched for launch on "the stick".
That only gets the payload to LEO.

That requalification will, for most of the modules, involve power and
thermal issues as well. Won't be cheap.

I'm guessing here, but the two ways you could get from your initial
orbit to ISS would be the way Pirs was delivered (take a CEV service
module and use that to maneuver and dock or grapple the module to ISS
or the SSRMS) or you launch a CEV on a separate launch and have it
dock with and deliver the strong back/ISS module to ISS.

Again, that would take funds and additional development beyond the CEV
requirements, so naturally it's going to cost you more money to do
such a thing.

I'm guessing it will be expensive enough that it won't even be attempted.
CEV development may not break the bank at NASA, but it will be expensive
enough that any semblance of requirements creep will have to be
vigorously stamped out.

--
JRF

Reply-to address spam-proofed - to reply by E-mail,
check "Organization" (I am not assimilated) and
think one step ahead of IBM.

On Tue, 20 Sep 2005 19:40:06 GMT, in a place far, far away,
(Derek Lyons) made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

Joe Strout wrote:

Then you've already lost (or else you have a uselessly loose definition
of "expensive"). Rocket launch could be substantially cheaper than it
is now, but it needs a healthy capitalist market, not a massive
socialist space program --

We have a healthy capitalist market, (far more launches are commercial
than NASA). Prices haven't come down much.

Because the market is not, in fact, healthy. It is trivially small.

On Tue, 20 Sep 2005 20:20:06 GMT, in a place far, far away, George
Evans made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
such a way as to indicate that:


What *real* evidence do you have for this claim that commercial providers
could do the same for less? What commercial provider has produced a man
rated launcher?

What government provider has, recently? Do you even know what the
phrase "man rating" means?

Dear Joe Strout, other mainstream rusemasters and otherwise on behalf
of so many damn fools on the money grubbing hill,
You folks need to get a grip upon another life that doesn't suck and
blow so much intellectual crapolla that we stand a darn good chance of
imploding ourselves from all of your artificial 2H2O2.

This topic was recently offered by "bryan"; PING: brad guth
what do reckon to this, brad?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4261522.stm

I reckon the terrific graphics that were quite spendy and of the
authorised infomercial script that was published where-is as-is so as
to continually snooker thy humanity is exactly what it is. Another
smoke and mirror MI6/NSA~NASA effort as to keeping their brown-nosed
media as happy campers that otherwise couldn't manage to tie their own
shoe laces.

All of the sudden there's an actual honest to God need for that of an
actual working fly-by-rocket lander, and above all a lander capable of
shielding those astronauts from otherwise getting summarily nailed
(physically as well as TBI) to a fairlywell. I've calculated that
roughly a 30 tonne lander should do the trick. Screw whatever hundreds
of billions it'll cost by then, I'm wondering how much fuel it'll
require as to de-orbit and safely down-range such a substantial lander
along with all of the crew and of their applied technology as having a
viable return ticket to ride is going to take?

BTW; why are they having to utilize such spendy artistic
representations when supposedly we have the real thing to look at?
Although, at least mother Earth looks about right for it's size and
albedo in a somewhat correct relationship to the relatively dark
(nearly coal/basalt like) albedo of the moon, neither of which showed
up within any such proper perspectives as within any of their previous
Apollo missions.

Need-to-know and/or taboo/nondisclosure of the ruse/sting of the
century continues until them Apollo cows come home. Thus all other
related and/or of independent research and of whatever's derived as
objectively hard-science or even of sufficiently subjective notions as
having been honestly interpreted is sequestered indefinitely regardless
of the consequences. Mention God, morals, remorse or anything that's
the least bit anti-mainstream (such as the perpetrated cold-war) and
you're worse off than DOA, and that's even if you've located the holy
grail. Dare to question authority or religion and it open season of
your getting summarily pulverised by as much topic/author stalking,
bashing and/or banishment as they (the mainstream status quo bad guys)
can muster.

Radiation physics as based upon the square of the distance being
representative of what being sufficiently near to the moon has to offer
is certainly bad enough if the terrestrial satellite that's roughly 400
km above Earth takes in sample readings that are worthy of one microrem
per day because, that'll get you into an environment of an average 35
rem/day while cruising at 94 km above the moon. However, make that a
terrestrial millirem/day and you've got 35,000 rem/day or 1458 rem/hr
to deal with.

Of course, if the sun wasn't providing any nasty amount of influx to
start off with, as must have been the case with those supposedly manned
Apollo missions, as then you've got next to nothing to defend your self
from (especially if you don't bother with going down onto the otherwise
sufficiently radioactive as well as reactive surface that has
insufficient atmosphere as to moderated not only the incoming flux of
whatever has reacted itself into being hard-X-rays as well as per
secondary/recoil rays coming from all the surrounding lunar terrain
that you can see, from such having easily nailed your naked moonsuit
butt, which also would have to somehow coincide with the extremely
slight (inconceivably scant) amount of TBI dosage as having been
officially recorded and published as being the case.

The reported 12~76 mr/day while having a shield density of not much
better off than 5 g/cm2 within their Apollo CM (roughly twice that much
density available in the direction of their forward and aft ends) and
otherwise next to nothing while situated upon the surface is absurdly
physics-101 impossible for even an earthshine/nighttime lunar
environment.

I believe that the Apollo record of 12~76 mr/day is only off by a good
factor of 100:1 for that their surviving an extremely mild solar day
while cruising external to the Van Allen expanse and so close to such a
nicely reactive moon, and perhaps a thousand fold under the mark of
what a somewhat nasty solar day has to provide. However, a truly bad
solar event day would have been a matter of terminating all crew
regardless of their 5~10 g/cm2 worth of shielding, and certainly
getting nearly 100% through the aluminum foil utilized while upon the
lunar surface that should have been perfectly good for defending from
the sorts of deep-UV (down to 10 nm) but otherwise invisible to the
likes of the available hard-X-rays plus the unfiltered naked incomings
of solar and cosmic whatever, not to mention of whatever's of micro
meteorites or just incoming dust at 30+km/s and/or of the solar
submicron flak arriving at 300+km/s. A truly bad solar day upon the
moon might incorporate a solar wind that packing 10 picogram/m3 as
arriving at 2400 km/s and of a TBI dosage factor that's so far off the
charts that we haven't even developed the sorts of instruments capable
of going that high.

Realistically, 100 fold greater than the NASA/Apollo reported TBI
dosage would have been survivable without involving banked bone marrow,
although obviously their Kodak moment's wouldn't have gone unscaved and
there should have been more than a few white hairs to boot, however
1000 fold would have required the usage of banked bone marrow being
that so much short-term TBI dosage would have far exceeded our
biological ability of surviving so much DNA/RNA damage. The amounts of
radiation dosage as having been managed on our side of the Van Allen
expanse is at least 100 fold lesser than being external, with many
having suggested as great as a 1000 fold lesser dosage depending upon a
given spectrum of the sorts of TBI dosage made available, however the
aspects getting yourself closer to the reactive moon is exactly like
getting yourself closer to a pile of radioactive substances, whereas
the closer you manage to get by the square of the distance is where
things sort of go to hell very quickly. It's also well established that
in order to diminish one's own TBI dosage by a factor of 50% or 2:1
requires a density that's worth .7" of lead. Thereby it'll require
roughly 0.7" of lead or of whatever greater thickness of other
substance as situated between yourself and the source(s) of those
hard-X-rays in order to cut whatever raw dosage in half. Thus 2.8" or
71 mm of solid lead (80+g/cm2) will get you a 16:1 reduction, or 4.9"
(124.5 mm) that'll amount to 141 g/cm2 will get you a fairly
respectable 128:1 shield (somewhat equal to what the Van Allen expanse
provides) from the vast bulk of what's otherwise DNA/RNA nasty.
Unfortunately, there's still no viable way of launching a habitat of 80
g/cm2, much less of 141 g/cm2, thus cutting your time of exposure is
about all that's humanly doable and, even then having that cryogenic
cash of your banked bone marrow just in case would be the sort of
insurance/plan-B that you'd want at your disposal.

Actually lead is not as good as UHMW or water, since the atomic number
of lead is so much greater than water is why lead produces
substantially more of it's own secondary/recoil dosage of those TBI
worthy hard-X-rays, which is clearly counter productive. However, the
draw back to utilizing UHMW and/or water is that it'll require a great
deal more depth or thickness in order to achieve the desired benefit.
Thus you're somewhat damned if you do and damned if you don't.

BTW; none of this is of my science or that of my physics, as it's
entirely based upon the regular laws of physics and of the hard-science
that's been quite well documented and even indirectly if not directly
NASA certified. Go figure. Even the 32~64 w/m2 of what's UV spectrum
worthy is insurmountable if honestly respecting the unfiltered Kodak
physics of photographic standards and accountability that you and I can
take to the bank.
~

Life upon Venus, a township w/Bridge & ET/UFO Park-n-Ride Tarmac:
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-town.htm
The Russian/China LSE-CM/ISS (Lunar Space Elevator)
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/lunar-space-elevator.htm
Venus ETs, plus the updated sub-topics; Brad Guth / GASA-IEIS
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-topics.htm
War is war, thus "in war there are no rules" - In fact, war has been
the very reason of having to deal with the likes of others that haven't
been playing by whatever rules, such as GW Bush.

in article , Joe Strout at
wrote on 9/19/05 8:49 PM:

In article ,
"S. Wand" wrote:

Yes, there is a lot to like about this plan.

1) We're finally getting around to developing a Saturn V-class heavy lifter.

Again...

This is essential if we're ever to go beyond low earth orbit.

No, it's not. There are many mission architectures that would work just
fine with smaller launchers -- launchers of the sort, in fact, that are
already commercially available, and which will have even more
cost-reducing competition in the near future.

Could you provide examples of these alternatives?=

snip

I think until we get a space elevator, getting to LEO will be an expensive
proposition.

Then you've already lost (or else you have a uselessly loose definition
of "expensive"). Rocket launch could be substantially cheaper than it
is now, but it needs a healthy capitalist market, not a massive
socialist space program -- one thing history has shown is clearly is
that socialism is enormously inefficient. (Ironic that Russia now has a
far more capitalist -- and cost-effective -- space program than we do.)

Then make LEO cheaper. What's stopping private industry from developing
this. As soon as it's ready there's no reason NASA and others wouldn't use
it, like they use other commercial vehicles to move astronauts around.

snip

But it would be nice to see private industry step up for operations
less than 250 miles high.

Now you've hit it. But private industry needs to be given the
opportunity -- nay, the market *demand* -- to step up. This plan does
the opposite.

Needs to be "given" the market demand? I would have thought you understood
free markets better.

snip

George Evans

"Jeff Findley" wrote in message
...

wrote in message
ups.com...
The bottom line is : let s give back to NASA in 2018 the capabilities
it had in 1972.

And cost more money and time to do it. :-(

Jeff
--
Remove icky phrase from email address to get a valid address.


It doesn't cost more money than Apollo. This will cost 55% of
Apollo, and well worth it.
Ray

Cardman,
Before we or them dirty rotten Russians ever manage to accomplish the
moon, we'd best have our LSE-CM/ISS established before it's a Chinese
LSE that we'll have to pay a hefty toll to utilize, or else.
~

Life upon Venus, a township w/Bridge & ET/UFO Park-n-Ride Tarmac:
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-town.htm
The Russian/China LSE-CM/ISS (Lunar Space Elevator)
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/lunar-space-elevator.htm
Venus ETs, plus the updated sub-topics; Brad Guth / GASA-IEIS
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-topics.htm
War is war, thus "in war there are no rules" - In fact, war has been
the very reason of having to deal with the likes of others that haven't
been playing by whatever rules, such as GW Bush.