NASA studies new booster (UPI)

Allen Thomson wrote:

Scout; IIRC they used to go for around 1 million apiece.



x10

The 1991 edition of Isakowitz' "International Reference
Guide to Space Launch Systems" gives the estimated launch
price in 1990 dollars as $10M to $12M for Scout, $15M for
Enhanced Scout. ($10M in 1990 bucks is ~ $14M in 2004 per
http://www.bls.gov/cpi/.)


When they were first built (1960) they went for around a million bucks
apiece; but as Scott pointed out, a million bucks doesn't go anywhere
near as far as it used to.

Pat

"Christopher M. Jones" wrote:

Scott Lowther wrote in message ...
Dick Morris wrote:
I saw two Saturn V launches from about 3 miles away, and God knows I'd
love to see another one, but I don't think we're going to be building
anything that big again this side of 2050.

I don't see why not. A shuttle-derived vehicle can easily be in the same
class as the Saturn V.

That's the hilarious thing about the Shuttle stack. It's
a Saturn V equivalent heavy lift launcher (it can throw 97%
of the S-V LEO payload into orbit, counting the orbiter
mass but not the SSMEs). And it's flown over a hundred
times. Nobody notices this because of the huge
inefficiency, and general banality, of the Shuttle system
and program. Just imagine what we could have done with
100 Saturn-V launches.

The Shuttle program got through Congress because NASA promised that it
would be cheap to operate. I doubt if very many would have voted for it
if they had known then what we know now. Production of the Saturn V was
shut down because of the high cost, so I don't think we could
realistically have expected it to continue even had there been no
Shuttle program.

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Scott Lowther wrote:

Dick Morris wrote:

Scott Lowther wrote:

Dick Morris wrote:

And how big do you think we need?

Saturn V class seems to be appropriate for minimal Moon missions, and
for major componants of Mars missions.

I saw two Saturn V launches from about 3 miles away, and God knows I'd
love to see another one, but I don't think we're going to be building
anything that big again this side of 2050.

I don't see why not. A shuttle-derived vehicle can easily be in the same
class as the Saturn V.

It certainly *could* be done, and the chances of doing it appear to be
higher now than I would have thought a few years ago, but I would still
consider it a long shot. LEO refueling allows us to do the same things
with a much smaller launch vehicle, which we could afford to make
reusable.

--
Scott Lowther, Engineer
Remove the obvious (capitalized) anti-spam
gibberish from the reply-to e-mail address

On Wed, 28 Apr 2004 15:41:31 GMT, h (Rand
Simberg) wrote:

On Wed, 28 Apr 2004 15:03:58 GMT, in a place far, far away, Scott

Indeed? When has *anyone* *ever* built a low-cost launch vehicle?

I don't know. When has anyone built a hypersonic hovercraft?

Forget hypersonic, when has anyone built a supersonic hovercraft?

Mary

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer

Rand Simberg wrote:

I don't know. When has anyone built a hypersonic hovercraft?

Forget hypersonic, when has anyone built a supersonic hovercraft?


My point was that Scott's question was a non sequitur in the context
of the discussion.

I sincerely hope that when the hypersonic hovercraft is built, it
will be full of eels.

Paul

"Edward Wright" wrote in message
om...
The RD-170 has been out of production since in 1988. The RD-180 is in
production, but it's considerably smaller than the F-1. It's the same
engine used on the Atlas first stage. Since you've said your Saturn VI
does't need to have more engines than an Atlas, it will need to have
much larger engines than an Atlas. Otherwise, it will never get off
the ground.

The RD-180 is one-half of an RD-170. The -180 has about 75% common parts, so
it wouldn't take much to put it back into production.

Mary Shafer wrote:


Forget hypersonic, when has anyone built a supersonic hovercraft?



I wonder how well a supersonic wing-in-ground-effect vehicle would work?
That could bring a whole new meaning to the term "Wave Rider", couldn't it?

Pat

Paul F. Dietz wrote:


I sincerely hope that when the hypersonic hovercraft is built, it
will be full of eels.

If I ever see one of those, my nipples will explode with delight!

Pat

On Thu, 29 Apr 2004 16:39:12 GMT, h (Rand
Simberg) wrote:

On Thu, 29 Apr 2004 12:27:43 -0400, in a place far, far away, Michael
Gallagher made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

That' not sustainable? They've been sustained
for almost 50 years.

Not for any serious exploration initiative.


So they need, what, another 25? 50? 100? How long do the Atlas and
Delta familites have to be sustained before they are considered
"sustainable"?


Not on the scale being proposed.....

As I noted in my previous post, what has also been considered are
heavy lifters combining Atlas and Delta EELV cores that can knock on
the doors of Saturn V class. You don't need anything new and sexy to
get there, and the same factories build the "smaller" rockets the rest
of the time


...... (or that many, including me, would
desire).

Sorry, but if you're arguing for space to be settled before it's
explored, that's stonewalling in my book.




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On Sat, 01 May 2004 11:41:58 -0400, in a place far, far away, Michael
Gallagher made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

On Thu, 29 Apr 2004 16:39:12 GMT, h (Rand
Simberg) wrote:

On Thu, 29 Apr 2004 12:27:43 -0400, in a place far, far away, Michael
Gallagher made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

That' not sustainable? They've been sustained
for almost 50 years.

Not for any serious exploration initiative.


So they need, what, another 25? 50? 100? How long do the Atlas and
Delta familites have to be sustained before they are considered
"sustainable"?

They've never been sustainable for a serious exploration
initiative--just for comsats and milsats and the occasional planetary
mission.


Not on the scale being proposed.....

As I noted in my previous post, what has also been considered are
heavy lifters combining Atlas and Delta EELV cores that can knock on
the doors of Saturn V class.

At horrendous costs per flight.

...... (or that many, including me, would
desire).

Sorry, but if you're arguing for space to be settled before it's
explored, that's stonewalling in my book.

No, I'm just arguing that it be "explored" sensibly.