Abandon the space station?

On 22 Mar 2004 12:15:30 GMT, (Hallerb) wrote:


Which is why a manned mission to mars shouldn't even be at the
discussion stage. It seems to me, if we kept our focus on building a
proper, working station/stations, the tech necessary to build reliable
interplanetary craft would come.

Botch

Well we need a GOAL, stations have been around forever.

A goal, definately......but the US has had only one station and this
half built mutant that we have now The ISS has been in the planning
and construction phase since the 80's, we can't even finish building
the test bed toTEST tech for a Mars mission.

Specifically we need a LOW COST TO ORBIT SYSTEM! After that everything else
gets easier!

Agreed, we need a better, cheaper launch system, but we also need a
station to develop the Mars tech where the very survival of the
station doesnt' compete with the experiments that are being done.

Botch

On Sun, 21 Mar 2004 16:52:13 -0400, John Doe wrote:

JimO wrote:
I suggest that the UN would have to pay for it.

Good idea -- they could use some of the money they skimmed off the
oil-for-palaces
program with Saddam. Considering how Saddam had bought and paid for the
obedience of some UN officials and West European leaders,

Before you start believing the propaganda that was heard in the USA, I suggest
you head to the UN web site and start reading about the oil-for-food
programme. They have an extensive section that describes all the mechanics, as
well as problems that had been encountered. And once you've read it, you will
realise that the accusations made by the USA are just electioneering
propaganda. I am disapointed that people with education would continue to
believe the lies that continue to be spewed by your government.

One more outburst like this, young man, and Jim will cease to seek you
out as a source of inside information

Dale

FWIW, The UN Secretary General has called for an independent investigation
into this matter.

On Mon, 22 Mar 2004 15:20:28 GMT, "Greg D. Moore \(Strider\)"
wrote:


"Botch" wrote in message
.. .
On 22 Mar 2004 12:15:30 GMT, (Hallerb) wrote:


Which is why a manned mission to mars shouldn't even be at the
discussion stage. It seems to me, if we kept our focus on building a
proper, working station/stations, the tech necessary to build reliable
interplanetary craft would come.

Botch

Well we need a GOAL, stations have been around forever.

A goal, definately......but the US has had only one station and this
half built mutant that we have now The ISS has been in the planning
and construction phase since the 80's, we can't even finish building
the test bed toTEST tech for a Mars mission.

ISSS has been in the planning and construction phases since 1992. Before
that we were planning Freedom for many years, but never got much done.

Freedom was the genisis of what we currently have, it's taken a couple
decades just to get a station up there, regardless of the name, makeup
of the program.

And it is not a test bed to test tech for Mars. In fact, Congress in the
past few years made it clear that NASA could NOT test Mars bound tech on the
station (witness the fate of transhab.)

If the very construction of, and support of the station wasn't an
issue it would make researching Mars or Moon tech practical. I just
think we need to learn how to do what we're doing first, before taking
on other challenges.

Botch

Which is why a manned mission to mars shouldn't even be at the
discussion stage. It seems to me, if we kept our focus on building a
proper, working station/stations, the tech necessary to build reliable
interplanetary craft would come.

Botch

Well we need a GOAL, stations have been around forever.

Specifically we need a LOW COST TO ORBIT SYSTEM! After that everything else
gets easier!

"John Doe", I'm writing an in-depth essay along exactly these lines. If at
some point,
you could get me a direct email address (even an anon one at yahoo) for you,
I'd be happy to share pre-pub for your comments.

Email me:
joberg at houston dot rr dot com




"John Doe" wrote in message ...
Hallerb wrote:
If you freed up the $ being spent on ISS ^ shuttle they would quickly
fund a
replacement manned orbiter and enough left over to get out of LEO./

This is political goobledygook meant to sway the media coverage.

Look at Hubble. The money for its upgrade has already been spent. You're
not
going to save much.

Look at the Station: Except for the USA habitation capability
(HAB/NODE3/whatever), the USA segment has already been paid for. All that
is
left is to launch the items waiting in storage at KSC.

And right now, the USA has committed to launching and supporting the
European
and Japanese labs. This requres that the truss be completed (so that there
is
enough power generation capability) and node 2 launched.

Also, consider that if you're going to be building a mars ship, it will be
at
least as big if not bigger than the station. (since it will require a
whole
bunch of storage space for supplies).

One needs to validate the station's design for stuff like attitude
control.
Once the station is "assembly complete", will the CMGs work reliably ? Or
will
there be too much torque required and they have a bigger than expected
failure
rate ?

How will the truss react to reboost operations from Progress and ATV ?
(different direction that very slow reboosts by shuttle). Will CBMs be
able to
handle the "wear and tear" from not only reboosts, but more especially
attitude changes done by CMGs ? (Think of the CBM between Unity and
Destiny
which will bear all the brunt of the force of moving Unity, truss, Node2,
Columbus, Kibo and postentionally a shuttle attached at the very end.

Yes, it is almost sure that the engineers got it right on paper. But one
still
needs to test this in reality and over time to validate the designs.

Look at Elektron. It hasn't exactly been very reliable as of late. And
you'd
think that Russia would have gotten it right after all the experience in
Mir
(did Mir have an elektron or did it rely only on candles and O2 supply
from
Progress ?)

Look at CDRA on the USA side ? Have they gotten it to work reliably to a
level
where they can bet their lives on it, or is it still working
intermittently to
prevent problems from arising ?

If you're planning on long duration space flights, you first have to get
such
basic systems to work reliably and that means doing a proper shakedown of
all
those technologies on the space station.

Yes, there have been problems on the station, and there will be more
problems
to come. But that is exactly why the station is so valuable. It is only by
discovering what works and what doesn't work (and how to fix it) that
humankind will be able to build some ship that can go to mars and back.

And if they can't get Elektron to work reliably, but they know that for
the
first 6 months, it works well, then they'll just have to load multiple
Elektrons on a ship to mars, so that they can have reliable O2 generation
for
the duration of the flight.

Thanks -- it now makes sense, considering the lower payload mass and higher
target orbit. So the ATO mode is available earlier, even though unlike with
Spacelab-2, we'd have no mission success. We get the vehicle, crew, and
payload back safe, however.

I recall that the higher HST orbit does introduce some vulnerability to prop
failures/leaks that lose you de-orbit sooner than you'd lose it from the ISS
altitude, right?





"Jorge R. Frank" wrote in message
...
"JimO" wrote in
:

Bill Barto wrote:
"easier" isn't quite the word. A lower inclination gives launchers
from KSC greater cargo capacity to such an orbit, as well as
longer launch windows.
THEN "Jorge R. Frank" wrote
And better abort options for single-engine-failure cases (though
worse for multiple-engine-failure cases).

Jorge, please elaborate. I recall that ISS launches have East Coast
sites for multiple engine outs (HST wouldn't), but how is a
single-engine-out abort easier for 28 than 51.6, with the closing of
most (or all) TAL sites in West Africa?

The Press-to-ATO boundary for HST flights is between 75-95 seconds earlier
than for ISS flights, depending on how heavily loaded the ISS flight is.
So
HST flights have much better odds of the engine failure falling within ATO
capability. In fact, some ISS flights have the two-engine TAL boundary
barely 30 seconds before the HST Press-to-ATO.

As for the TAL site closing, I consider that a bit of chicken-and-the-egg
(and possibly one of many non-publicized reasons why O'Keefe *really*
cancelled SM-4). But on STS-103 at least, Press-to-ATO occurred *before*
Negative Return, so it's arguable that HST flights don't need TAL for
single-engine failures, only for multiple-engine failures and systems
failures.


--
JRF

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

Reasonable response -- thanks.

I note you're back to mimicking Brit spelling again? grin




"John Doe" wrote in message ...
JimO wrote:
I suggest that the UN would have to pay for it.

Good idea -- they could use some of the money they skimmed off the
oil-for-palaces
program with Saddam. Considering how Saddam had bought and paid for the
obedience of some UN officials and West European leaders,

Before you start believing the propaganda that was heard in the USA, I
suggest
you head to the UN web site and start reading about the oil-for-food
programme. They have an extensive section that describes all the
mechanics, as
well as problems that had been encountered. And once you've read it, you
will
realise that the accusations made by the USA are just electioneering
propaganda. I am disapointed that people with education would continue to
believe the lies that continue to be spewed by your government.

The USA isn't exactly in a position where it can criticise the UN right
now.
It is on no position to criticise the Russian space programme. And if ATV
flies before Shuttle, it will be in no position to criticise "old Europe"
as
your regime likes to call the countries that fund ESA.

What if the USA donates its segment to the UN and then Russia and ESA can
operate the station at a fraction of the cost of NASA ? Raise occupants to
6
by having ESA pay for 2 Soyuz and using ATV to bring enough supplies ?
That
would be a huge slap on the face for the USA whole politics and management
have prevented this from happening.

"JimO" wrote in
:

I recall that the higher HST orbit does introduce some vulnerability
to prop failures/leaks that lose you de-orbit sooner than you'd lose
it from the ISS altitude, right?

I believe so, but I'm not sure (in particular, I'd heard RCS deorbit was
not available as a downmode).


--
JRF

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

Dale wrote:
FWIW, The UN Secretary General has called for an independent investigation
into this matter.

A UN member in the midst of an election campaign has made a public accusation.
The UN has no choice but to call for an investigation. It is the only
diplomatic response it can make and cannot be seen getting involved in the USA
election campaign.

Mature diplomats don't start calling foreign leaders by their first names
during media scrums, and they don't start making all sorts of wild accusations
without providing verifyiable proof.

Again, go to the UN web site and read up on the OFF programme. Read the status
reports as well from the folks on the ground.

Before believeing those wild electoral accusations, you should read the other
side of the coin.

"Botch" wrote in message
...
On 22 Mar 2004 12:15:30 GMT, (Hallerb) wrote:


Which is why a manned mission to mars shouldn't even be at the
discussion stage. It seems to me, if we kept our focus on building a
proper, working station/stations, the tech necessary to build reliable
interplanetary craft would come.

Botch

Well we need a GOAL, stations have been around forever.

A goal, definately......but the US has had only one station and this
half built mutant that we have now The ISS has been in the planning
and construction phase since the 80's, we can't even finish building
the test bed toTEST tech for a Mars mission.

ISSS has been in the planning and construction phases since 1992. Before
that we were planning Freedom for many years, but never got much done.

And it is not a test bed to test tech for Mars. In fact, Congress in the
past few years made it clear that NASA could NOT test Mars bound tech on the
station (witness the fate of transhab.)



Specifically we need a LOW COST TO ORBIT SYSTEM! After that everything
else
gets easier!

Agreed, we need a better, cheaper launch system, but we also need a
station to develop the Mars tech where the very survival of the
station doesnt' compete with the experiments that are being done.

Probably.



Botch