Japans Moon Ambitions - They're KIDDING, Right ?

On Wed, 02 Mar 2005 18:26:08 GMT, h (Rand
Simberg) wrote:

On 2 Mar 2005 07:19:11 -0800, in a place far, far away,
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a
way as to indicate that:

Space launch reliability in excess of "three-nines"
isn't going to happen with current technology. The
current state of the art in space launch vehicles are
the EELV launchers built by Lockheed Martin and Boeing.
These vehicles were designed to have hardware-related
vehicle failure rates of less than 1%, but non-hardware
failure modes like bad software loads or bad ground
processing steps (e.g. forgetting to remove a piece
of tape from a connector pair that is supposed to
separate - something that really happened) now account
for more failure modes than the hardware - resulting
in the total predicted failure rate for these newest
of rockets being roughly 2%.

That's not a technology issue, per se. It's a design problem.

At one time, NASA convinced itself that shuttle was
0.999 reliable, but 2 failures in 113 flights proved
otherwise. Given this reality, it is clear that human
launch systems must have crew escape systems to improve
survivability.

That's not reality. Well, the Shuttle reliability is reality, but
that doesn't mean that space transports have to be intrinsically
unreliable, even with current technology. It just means that they
have to be better designed and tested.

Look how Japan refined the car, and motorbike. What's to say they
can't do the same for rockets able to reach the moon.





Christopher
++++++++++++
"The best way to keep one's word
is never to give it."

Napoleon Bonaparte

wrote in message
oups.com...

Then the best way to do a manned Moon base probably is to dig deep
underground and build a base there.

3m of regolith is enough protection against radiation, temperature,
and micrometeorites.

So I suggest sending a couple of unmanned diggers.

Nah, a couple of astronauts could shovel that on top. Digging deep
isn't all that easy because beneath the dusty surface, crumbled by
millions of meteorite hits, the bedrock is quite hard...



--
__ "A good leader knows when it's best to ignore the __
('__` screams for help and focus on the bigger picture." '__`)
//6(6; ©OOL mmv :^)^\\
`\_-/ http://home.t-online.de/home/ulrich....lmann/redbaron \-_/'

BlackWater wrote:
On 2 Mar 2005 06:29:18 -0800, "kert" wrote:

BlackWater wrote:
On 1 Mar 2005 18:41:03 -0800, "Ed Kyle"
wrote:
Sorry, but for this endeavour to be viable we need
an EXTREMELY low failure rate ... one in five
thousand perhaps, or better. It CAN be done ... but
it means not using bleeding-edge technology or
engineering and it means a major effort to simplify
and standardize too.

It means just one thing : high flight rate. You cant have one in
five
thousand failure rate without flying five thousand times.
Everything else derives from high flight rate, i.e. low cost per
flight
will be inevitable to avoid instant bankrupt, technologies that
actually can withstand high flight rates etc.

I think that once we commit to the permanent moon base,
there will be a great many flights at a fairly high rate.

Not so if they manage to sell the idea of a new HLV.

-kert

On 2 Mar 2005 18:41:30 GMT, in a place far, far away, Jim Davis
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such
a way as to indicate that:

Atlas II?

What are the relative stats over the last hundred flights or so?

Atlas II has a perfect record. 58 for 58, I think.

Then I guess that would be the winner (though the Proton may have a
longer streak--I'm not sure).

It doesn't really have any influence on my main point, though.

On Wed, 02 Mar 2005 20:02:41 GMT, in a place far, far away, Bama Brian
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
such a way as to indicate that:

Soon there will be both Japanese and Chinese lunar bases.

Don't hold your breath.

rest of bad SF fantasy stuff snipped

On Wed, 02 Mar 2005 21:08:18 GMT, in a place far, far away,
Christopher made the phosphor on my
monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:


That's not reality. Well, the Shuttle reliability is reality, but
that doesn't mean that space transports have to be intrinsically
unreliable, even with current technology. It just means that they
have to be better designed and tested.

Look how Japan refined the car, and motorbike. What's to say they
can't do the same for rockets able to reach the moon.

Nothing. But they show no signs of even attempting to do so
currently.

Rand Simberg wrote:
On 2 Mar 2005 09:30:31 -0800, in a place far, far away, "Will"
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a

Proton the most reliable proven launch system? I don't think so.

If you look at its recent record, I'd bet it is. What do you think
is
better?

With the retirement of Ariane 4 and Atlas 2,
Proton is currently the most successful active
large comsat launcher on the market, in terms
of mission reliability, but a few other
mostly non-commercial space launch vehicles have
better records.

================================================== ==============
Vehicle Successes/Tries Realzd Pred Consc. Last Dates
Rate Rate* Succes Fail
================================================== ==============
Tsyklon 2 103 104 .99 .98 91 4/25/73 1967-
Delta 2 116 118 .98 .98 63 1/17/97 1989-
STS 111 113 .98 .97 0 2/1/03 1981-
Soyuz-U 697 717 .97 .97 14 10/15/02 1973-
Kosmos 3M 412 435 .95 .95 11 11/20/00 1964-
Molniya M 273 291 .94 .94 52 6/21/90 1963-
CZ-2(C)(/SD/SM) 26 27 .96 .93 26 11/5/74 1974-
Proton-K/DM-2M 37 39 .95 .93 4 11/25/02 1994-
Tsyklon 3 113 121 .93 .93 0 12/24/04 1977-
CZ-4(A/B) 10 10 1.00 .92 10 None 1989-
Proton-K/DM-2 94 102 .92 .91 8 10/27/99 1982-
Soyuz-FG 8 8 1.00 .90 8 None 2001-
Proton-K/17S40 6 6 1.00 .88 6 None 1997-
Rokot/Briz/K(M) 6 6 1.00 .88 6 None 1994-
Proton-K 26 29 .90 .87 9 11/29/86 1968-
CZ-2F 5 5 1.00 .86 5 None 1999-
Proton/Briz-M 10 11 .90 .85 10 7/5/99 1999-
Pegasus (H/XL) 30 35 .86 .84 21 11/4/96 1991-
CZ-3/3A 19 22 .86 .83 9 8/18/96 1984-
Titan 4B 13 15 .87 .82 10 4/30/99 1997-
Zenit 3SL/DMSL 13 15 .87 .82 1 6/29/04 1999-
Ariane 5G 16 19 .84 .81 9 7/12/01 1996-
H-IIA 6 7 .86 .78 1 11/29/03 2001-
Taurus (XL) 6 7 .86 .78 1 9/21/01 1994-
Zenit 2 28 36 .78 .76 5 9/9/98 1985-
START(-1) 5 6 .83 .75 4 3/28/95 1993-
PSLV 6 8 .75 .70 4 9/29/97 1993-
Shavit 4 7 .57 .56 0 9/6/04 1988-
================================================== ==============
* First level Bayesian estimate of mean predicted probability
of success for next launch attempt (k+1)/(n+2) where k is the
number of successful events and n is the number of trials.

- Ed Kyle

kert wrote:

BlackWater wrote:
On 1 Mar 2005 18:41:03 -0800, "Ed Kyle" wrote:
Sorry, but for this endeavour to be viable we need
an EXTREMELY low failure rate ... one in five
thousand perhaps, or better. It CAN be done ... but
it means not using bleeding-edge technology or
engineering and it means a major effort to simplify
and standardize too.

It means just one thing : high flight rate. You cant have one in five
thousand failure rate without flying five thousand times.

Why? The first failure might happen on flight number three. We might
then expect to fly an *average* of 5000 *more* times before another one.

Remember, I can drive at 30 mi/hr without necessairily traveling a
full 30 miles...

Everything else derives from high flight rate, i.e. low cost per flight
will be inevitable to avoid instant bankrupt, technologies that
actually can withstand high flight rates etc.


--

You know what to remove, to reply....

BlackWater wrote:

On 2 Mar 2005 06:29:18 -0800, "kert" wrote:

BlackWater wrote:
On 1 Mar 2005 18:41:03 -0800, "Ed Kyle" wrote:
Sorry, but for this endeavour to be viable we need
an EXTREMELY low failure rate ... one in five
thousand perhaps, or better. It CAN be done ... but
it means not using bleeding-edge technology or
engineering and it means a major effort to simplify
and standardize too.

It means just one thing : high flight rate. You cant have one in five
thousand failure rate without flying five thousand times.
Everything else derives from high flight rate, i.e. low cost per flight
will be inevitable to avoid instant bankrupt, technologies that
actually can withstand high flight rates etc.

I think that once we commit to the permanent moon base,
there will be a great many flights at a fairly high rate.
It's going to take a lot of materials to build a decent
colony - even if we make heavy use of indigenous materials
(structural modules of sintered mood dust for example).
For awhile, it's going to be almost as expensive as
waging a war.

As we've seen for so many technologies, high production
rapidly leads not only to lower costs, but also to
simplification and vastly increased reliability. This
will apply to rocket components as well. Right now, so
few are made that each is almost a custom one-off
device. Imagine if every computer hard disk were hand
built to order, every platter, every head, every motor
created as-needed by individual craftsmen. They'd still
be 'full-size' 10 megabyte jobs - and break after a year
(if you were lucky). Thanks to demand, you can now fit
four or more gigabytes into something the size of a
compact-flash card.

Restricting the moon program to just four or five basic
vehicle designs, each sharing almost all of their
components - varying mostly in, say, NUMBER of engines
or SRBs - this will do a lot to improve reliability
and keep down costs. We can part-out the jobs, each
manufacturer building the widgets to the exact same
specs. Ways to do it faster, cheaper and better will
pop up constantly.

I don't expect the kind of safety record we see with
jetliners ...

But the closer you approach that, the larger your possible markets
are, and the greater the potential of getting this high flight rate, and
economies of scale in manufacturing.

no matter what, rocket launches and space
travel are just gonna be higher-stress, higher-risk ...


'Higher-stress,' compared to airliners, perhaps. But not necessairily
so high in an absolute sense, that a similar reliability standard can't
be met. It just may cost somewhat more to do it.


but given the number of launches this effort is going
to REQUIRE there had better be an almost zero failure
rate.


So what's the problem? That's what we ask of commercial airliners,
too.


So, reliability is gonna be even more important
than achieving the greatest possible efficiency. Better
to sacrifice a few pounds of lift capability rather
than shave combustion chambers or structural components
too thin and crash the whole rocket.

Basically agreed here, though.

--

You know what to remove, to reply....

Bama Brian wrote:

BlackWater wrote:
On 2 Mar 2005 06:29:18 -0800, "kert" wrote:


BlackWater wrote:

On 1 Mar 2005 18:41:03 -0800, "Ed Kyle" wrote:
Sorry, but for this endeavour to be viable we need
an EXTREMELY low failure rate ... one in five
thousand perhaps, or better. It CAN be done ... but
it means not using bleeding-edge technology or
engineering and it means a major effort to simplify
and standardize too.

It means just one thing : high flight rate. You cant have one in five
thousand failure rate without flying five thousand times.
Everything else derives from high flight rate, i.e. low cost per flight
will be inevitable to avoid instant bankrupt, technologies that
actually can withstand high flight rates etc.


I think that once we commit to the permanent moon base,
there will be a great many flights at a fairly high rate.
It's going to take a lot of materials to build a decent
colony - even if we make heavy use of indigenous materials
(structural modules of sintered mood dust for example).
For awhile, it's going to be almost as expensive as
waging a war.

As we've seen for so many technologies, high production
rapidly leads not only to lower costs, but also to
simplification and vastly increased reliability. This
will apply to rocket components as well. Right now, so
few are made that each is almost a custom one-off
device. Imagine if every computer hard disk were hand
built to order, every platter, every head, every motor
created as-needed by individual craftsmen. They'd still
be 'full-size' 10 megabyte jobs - and break after a year
(if you were lucky). Thanks to demand, you can now fit
four or more gigabytes into something the size of a
compact-flash card.

Restricting the moon program to just four or five basic
vehicle designs, each sharing almost all of their
components - varying mostly in, say, NUMBER of engines
or SRBs - this will do a lot to improve reliability
and keep down costs. We can part-out the jobs, each
manufacturer building the widgets to the exact same
specs. Ways to do it faster, cheaper and better will
pop up constantly.

I don't expect the kind of safety record we see with
jetliners ... no matter what, rocket launches and space
travel are just gonna be higher-stress, higher-risk ...
but given the number of launches this effort is going
to REQUIRE there had better be an almost zero failure
rate. So, reliability is gonna be even more important
than achieving the greatest possible efficiency. Better
to sacrifice a few pounds of lift capability rather
than shave combustion chambers or structural components
too thin and crash the whole rocket.

If the U.S. gummint hadn't signed the "no nukes in space" treaty, we'd
have men exploring Titan on foot rather than depending on an
instrumented, soon dead, package.

The Nerva (nuclear rocket) program showed the promise of unbelieveable
thrust ratios as compared to our current chemical rockets, around three
orders of magnitude greater. Even back in 1959, they were getting ISP's
in the order of 2x our current shuttle engine design.

The so-called ion drive approach can't get us to orbit, and even once
there it is only better than the nothing which we now have for
interplanetary travel.

My opinion, however, is that the U.S. space program died back in the
'70's, killed off by those who were afraid of taking any risks at all.

Soon there will be both Japanese and Chinese lunar bases.

With a loose definition of soon...

I don't doubt they have long-range goals that they may well meet at
some point, but remember, one of these countries has no current manned
space capability (but if they're smart, they'll follow up RVT with
something better, as we failed to do with DC-X), and the other has had
only *one* manned flight to date, and following the west's
standing-army, capsule-on-ELV model.

I'm not worried quite yet...


Once they're
up there controlling the moon, as well as earth orbit, we had all better
start learning Japanese and Mandarin because they will become the true
world powers - and we won't be able to stop them.

And what will the US be doing in the decades it will take to get to
that point? We're lousy at being pro-active, but as the Russians know,
once we see a threat, we can be *re*active very quickly....

And that's referring to government programs. If we merely encourage
our own private companies, we may have the consession stands on the Moon
when Japan or China gets there.


They wouldn't even
need nukes. They could throw big rocks at our cities and destroy the
U.S. in a single day.


And risk Earth-based reliation within a single hour...

Japan is already quite aware of what we can do, thanks.


Or they could just destroy all of our satellites
and so destroy all of our communications, GPS abilities, financial
transfers, and so on.

To acheive...what?

And who is 'our?' Merely because a large number of geostationary
satcoms are property of US companies, plenty of international traffic
goes through them. Such an action would indirectly cut their own throats
as well.

And again, the risk of retaliation. Taking out satcoms doesn't
cripple that, one bit. ICBMs don't require GPS.


--

You know what to remove, to reply....