New Essay On Space Policy

h (Rand Simberg) wrote in message . ..
On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 15:54:16 -0500, in a place far, far away,
(quasarstrider) made the phosphor on my
monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

(Rand Simberg) wrote in message .. .

Sure, but my opinion is that we won't get costs low enough for
tourists if we throw the vehicle away. If we don't get them low
enough for tourists, we won't get them low enough to open up space (or
have an "affordable" and "sustainable" VSE).

IMHO the major advantage of reusability is reduced testing costs and
that is about it.

No, there's much more advantage than that. Like not having to build a
new vehicle for each flight...

The two are related, as you undoubtedly know. I think
the effect on development costs is less understood, however.
IMO, the Econ cost model that killed Phase A space shuttle
designs was flawed in not recognizing the benefits of
reusablility and the possibility of incremental flight
testing. Expending during development leads to hand-wringing,
crucial tests that tends to add greatly to development costs.
The impact on operational costs is more obvious.

Best regards,
Len (Cormier)
PanAero, Inc.
(change x to len)
http://www.tour2space.com

The greatest cost is the bloated wages of all the ceo's, managers,
scientists, engineers and laborers. Just as medical costs are sucked up by
bloated wages of the medical and medical administrative profession from the
ceo's of the insurance companies and HMO's to the doctors and drug companies
employees.
Material costs are cheap by comparason.

"Rand Simberg" wrote in message
...
I've have a long essay in this quarter's issue of The New Atlantis, in
which I discuss the myths of the old space age.

http://www.thenewatlantis.com/archive/6/simberg.htm



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