NASA studies new booster (UPI)

Scott Lowther wrote in message ...

Behold what I ACTUALLY wrote: " the aprts count for a motor one foot in
diameter is about the same as for one six feet in diameter. The aprts
are smaller...

That's not the *only* thing you wrote, and I thought you had the guts
to stand behind all your words. My apologies for that.

Your original claims went far beyond this trivial single data point.
You made sweeping claims about rockets in general.

If the only point you're , willing to stand behind now is this single
example, fine. This data point shows that one engineer could not
design a one-foot motor with a smaller parts count than a six-foot
motor. It doesn't prove other engineers couldn't do it, and it
certainly doesn't prove your original sweeping claim that the only way
to reduce launch costs is with "big ass boosters."

Scott Lowther wrote in message ...

I'm curious: what infrastructure was built on orbit or on the moon by
Apollo?

Almost none, because it was too expense.

If none... then what relevance is the suggestion? Oh, I know... none.

No, you don't know at all. It's relevant because your ideas repeat the
same mistakes NASA has made for 40 years.

Infrastructure that no one can afford to use. What's the point? How
many International Space Stations do you need?

Hundreds, by Scott's thinking.

ISS? One is too many. But that is, of course, a standard Ed Wrightism...
an idiot strawman arguement.

Nonsense. NASA is proposing to build a second ISS on the Moon, another
on Mars, and who knows beyond that. The only strawman is yours.

If we are to have airliner-like flightrates, these spaceliners have to
go *somewhere*. While an orbital shuttle for hauling people up for a
zero-g daytrip might be nice for a while, in the end there will need to
be orbital destinations... large tourist/science/industrial/etc. space
stations and the like.

And your "space program" will lead to none of those.

Building factories on orbit from small aprts is
excessively difficult and expensive; launch it in large chunks.

That's the NASA Religion, but there's no evidence that it's true. You
guys have been launching large chunks of very expensive hardware since
the 60's. Where are the airline-like flightrates? Where are the large
tourist/science/industrial space stations???

Scott Lowther wrote in message ...

What parts of "affordable" and "sustainable" do you not understand?

But so far, it is very unclear just how these will apply to the Moon base.

There are different, valid definitions of what these mean. There's a
government/military definition, an industrial definition and a
civilian/tourist definition.

No, there aren't. The numbers may be different, but the calculations
and definitions are the same.

Just because it doesn;t turn Disneyland
tourist dollar profits doesn't mean it's not affordable and
sustainable... jsut look at your nearest army base.

Many of which have been closed down because they weren't affordable or
sustainable.

The government and military may be willing to spend more money for
some purposes than the private sector, but that doesn't mean they are
willing to spend unlimited sums of money. Too many space cadets think
they don't need to worry about how much their dreams cost because the
government will pay for them. As long as they continue to think that,
they will continue to watch their dreams closed down, like Hanscom AFB
and Project Apollo.

(Edward Wright) writes:

jeff findley wrote in message ...

Scott Lowther writes:
Hardly. I do not believe that *anything* will replace Shuttle. in fact,
I *hope* nothing replaces Shuttle. Shuttle is a goofy concept...

You are arguing for a "big ass booster" to replace the Space Shuttle.
It may look different, but the mission is the same (spending billions
of dollars a year to send an insignificant number of NASA employees
into space).

a vehicle designed specifically to haul cargo AND people at the same time,
all the time, si jsut plain wrong.

At least we agree about something.

So, all airliners, delivery vans, and railroads are "goofy
concepts"?

Airliners with passengers carry a modest amount of cargo (mostly
luggage). Air cargo is generally handled by cargo transports that are
similar to airliners, but who's passenger seating areas have been
converted to handle standardized cargo containers.

Delivery vans carry cargo, with the exception of a driver, and perhaps
a few other people in the cab. Rarely would you find paying
passengers in such a vehicle. Paying passengers generally travel in a
similar vehicle called a bus.

Railroads generally sort trains into two categories, passenger and
cargo. Rarely do you see paying passengers share the same train with
a slew of cargo carrying cars.

The same can be said for ocean going vessels (the "heavy lifters" in
terms of transportation of large masses). Passenger vessels rarely
carry large amounts of cargo, and cargo vessels rarely carry large
numbers of paying passengers.

What's "just plain wrong" is the idea that there's something wrong
with having humans and cargo on the same vehicle. No *successful*
transportation industry functions without humans aboard its vehicles.
Yet, this is part of the "received wisdom" among NASA and its
contractors.

The devil is in the details. With the way NASA is going with CEV, I
doubt they'll be sticking LOX or LH2 inside the crew compartment of
the CEV. At most, cargo and a crew module could go up on the same
launch vehicle, but I'm guessing the crew module will be treated by
the launch vehicle largely as another cargo container. This is very
similar to attaching either passenger or cargo cars to a train engine.
The engine may be the same, but passenger cars are essentially treated
as cargo cars with people in them.

This is far different than the shuttle which is a crewed vehicle with
a huge cargo bay. That is a design that's horribly flawed, because
down-mass is one of the most dubious features of the shuttle. All you
really *need* to bring back is the crew and scientific samples. That
requirement can be met with a very modestly sized (in terms of
down-mass) re-entry vehicle.

On the earth, that would be like Greyhound passenger busses pulling
semi-trailers, or cruise ships where half the ship is bulk oil or
shipping containers. There are good reasons you don't commonly see
beasts like these. There are exceptions to this, but they seem to be
very few (like the converted school bus I've seen around here that has
a short passenger section to carry construction workers and the rear
section of the bus has shelves to carry concrete forms).

Once the shuttle is retired, NASA will have to have something to
launch the CEV and begin testing hardware for the Moon missions.

That's like saying NACA will have to have something to replace the
Spruce Goose so it can begin testing dirigible parts for European
missions.

Why does NASA "need" to do that?

How do you propose the CEV get into LEO? They need to buy something
to do this, whether it is flights on existing vehicles or whether it
is some new vehicle that they wish to develop.

What about a modular design for your HLV? Start with a core booster
design that can place shuttle class payloads into LEO,

An excellent start, if your goal is to ensure transportation costs
remain high and NASA is unable to do anything useful in space for
decades to come.

This is something that I think would be very cool,

That's the whole problem. You're thinking like technoweenies and what
NASA to spend billions of dollars just because you think a design is
cool. The problems that need to be addressed are marketing and
economic problems. There's no technological magic bullet. No matter
how "very cool" your superbooster might be, it will be an economic
failure like the Shuttle and Saturn before it. You cannot repeal the
laws of economics any more than you can repeal the laws of gravity.

You cut out this part:

but I still worry
about NASA developing a new booster when they could start the CEV
program using Delta IV and Atlas V.

I'd prefer NASA use commercially available launch vehicles. I'm
uncertain how we get from there to far cheaper vehicles, other than
let the market take care of it itself. Letting NASA develop its own
vehicle would be "cool", but it's a recipe for another Saturn V or
Shuttle financial disaster (there was never really any commercial
market for either).

At the very least, NASA should only be setting requirements, not
developing the booster or running the launch facilities. It should be
run in such a way that the launch providers can sell these launches
commercially as well.

The thing I worry about is NASA specifying a new HLV that is so big,
it won't be sold commercially, even if the contractor is allowed to do
so.

Jeff
--
Remove "no" and "spam" from email address to reply.
If it says "This is not spam!", it's surely a lie.

jeff findley wrote:
On the earth, that would be like Greyhound passenger busses pulling
semi-trailers, or cruise ships where half the ship is bulk oil or
shipping containers. There are good reasons you don't commonly see
beasts like these.

Because the individual markets are now big enough that serving them
via separate specialized transports is economically viable.

Greyhound is a particularly *bad* example for what you are trying to
prove. As late as the early 90's they carried significant freight as
well as passengers on those buses. That didn't change until Fed/UPS
finally got serious about competition and growth.

We the same thing back when passenger liners were big business.
(Passenger liners weren't cruise ships, not by a long stretch.) On
each and every trip across the Atlantic they carried significant
amounts of cargo.

There are exceptions to this, but they seem to be
very few (like the converted school bus I've seen around here that has
a short passenger section to carry construction workers and the rear
section of the bus has shelves to carry concrete forms).

The shift from mixed mode transport to dedicated mode transport is a
fairly recent one.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

jeff findley wrote:

Railroads generally sort trains into two categories, passenger and
cargo. Rarely do you see paying passengers share the same train with
a slew of cargo carrying cars.

And almost never do you see passengers in cargo cars on trains.

Division of cargo and passengers happens quite early in most methods of
travel. There is some economic advantage in having some passengers ina
cargo craft,a dn some cargo in a passenger craft... but both at once to
a large degree... just goofy.

What's "just plain wrong" is the idea that there's something wrong
with having humans and cargo on the same vehicle. No *successful*
transportation industry functions without humans aboard its vehicles.

The driver of a semi can hardly be called a "passenger." Neither can the
crew of a 747 cargo conversion, a Spanish treasure galleon, a Viking
longboat, the crew of a supertanker or the driver of a UPS truck.


The devil is in the details. With the way NASA is going with CEV, I
doubt they'll be sticking LOX or LH2 inside the crew compartment of
the CEV. At most, cargo and a crew module could go up on the same
launch vehicle, but I'm guessing the crew module will be treated by
the launch vehicle largely as another cargo container. This is very
similar to attaching either passenger or cargo cars to a train engine.
The engine may be the same, but passenger cars are essentially treated
as cargo cars with people in them.

Agreed wholeheartedly. A Shuttle is a vehicle design to Bring Stuff
Back. So far, it's beena largely un-needed capability. Shuttle would
have been better ahd it been a Shuttle-C with an enlarged Apollo capsule
on top.... when needed.

The thing I worry about is NASA specifying a new HLV that is so big,
it won't be sold commercially, even if the contractor is allowed to do
so.

If the launch cost per pound of payload is sufficiently low, then the
market will find a use for the capability. If the market can find a use
for hourly flights of a small launcher, then it can find a market for
daily or weekly launches of a much bigger one. In fact.... *more*
markets. The big launcher can obviously carry anythign the small one
can, but it can also cary things that would be insanely impractical to
carry up in small chunks on the smaller launcher.

--
Scott Lowther, Engineer
Remove the obvious (capitalized) anti-spam
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On Tue, 27 Apr 2004 01:50:51 GMT, in a place far, far away, Scott
Lowther made the phosphor on
my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

A Shuttle is a vehicle design to Bring Stuff
Back. So far, it's beena largely un-needed capability. Shuttle would
have been better ahd it been a Shuttle-C with an enlarged Apollo capsule
on top.... when needed.

That would have reduced costs very little.

If the launch cost per pound of payload is sufficiently low, then the
market will find a use for the capability.

It won't be with a heavy lifter, whether Shuttle derived or not.

Rand Simberg wrote:

On Tue, 27 Apr 2004 01:50:51 GMT, in a place far, far away, Scott
Lowther made the phosphor on
my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

A Shuttle is a vehicle design to Bring Stuff
Back. So far, it's beena largely un-needed capability. Shuttle would
have been better ahd it been a Shuttle-C with an enlarged Apollo capsule
on top.... when needed.

That would have reduced costs very little.

Didn;t mention cost... said "it would ahve been better."

If the launch cost per pound of payload is sufficiently low, then the
market will find a use for the capability.

It won't be with a heavy lifter, whether Shuttle derived or not.

So certain are you. Well, ce la vie.


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

On Tue, 27 Apr 2004 05:20:11 GMT, in a place far, far away, Scott
Lowther made the phosphor on
my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

A Shuttle is a vehicle design to Bring Stuff
Back. So far, it's beena largely un-needed capability. Shuttle would
have been better ahd it been a Shuttle-C with an enlarged Apollo capsule
on top.... when needed.

That would have reduced costs very little.

Didn;t mention cost... said "it would ahve been better."

Only if your criteria for "better" don't include cost (and probably
not even then). When you're Bill Gates, you can make such an
assessment, but when it's the taxpayers' money, well...

If the launch cost per pound of payload is sufficiently low, then the
market will find a use for the capability.

It won't be with a heavy lifter, whether Shuttle derived or not.

So certain are you.

I've analyzed the problem extensively, for many years, both with
government funds and without. What's your basis?

jeff findley wrote in message ...

a vehicle designed specifically to haul cargo AND people at the
same time,
all the time, si jsut plain wrong.

So, all airliners, delivery vans, and railroads are "goofy
concepts"?

Airliners with passengers carry a modest amount of cargo (mostly
luggage). Air cargo is generally handled by cargo transports that are
similar to airliners, but who's passenger seating areas have been
converted to handle standardized cargo containers.

Every cargo airliner carries a crew (i.e., people).

This is far different than the shuttle which is a crewed vehicle with
a huge cargo bay. That is a design that's horribly flawed, because
down-mass is one of the most dubious features of the shuttle. All you
really *need* to bring back is the crew and scientific samples.

You don't "need" to bring anything back from space -- or send anything
up, either -- but there are many reasons why you might want to.

That requirement can be met with a very modestly sized (in terms of
down-mass) re-entry vehicle.

Yes, it could. Why does that mean "a vehicle designed to haul cargo
and people is just plain wrong"?

On the earth, that would be like Greyhound passenger busses pulling
semi-trailers,

They don't need to. They have baggage compartments.

or cruise ships where half the ship is bulk oil or shipping
containers.

Those are called "tramp steamers." They used to be considered quite
romantic.

I note you haven't named a single cargo vehicle that doesn't carry
people.

Once the shuttle is retired, NASA will have to have something to
launch the CEV and begin testing hardware for the Moon missions.

That's like saying NACA will have to have something to replace the
Spruce Goose so it can begin testing dirigible parts for European
missions.

Why does NASA "need" to do that?

How do you propose the CEV get into LEO?

I didn't propose CEV at all. You're mistaking me for Sean O'Keefe. I
repeat, why does NASA "need" to do that?

They need to buy something to do this,

Why? What horrible thing would happen if they didn't?

I'd prefer NASA use commercially available launch vehicles. I'm
uncertain how we get from there to far cheaper vehicles, other than
let the market take care of it itself.

There is no other way.

At the very least, NASA should only be setting requirements, not
developing the booster or running the launch facilities. It should be
run in such a way that the launch providers can sell these launches
commercially as well.

The thing I worry about is NASA specifying a new HLV that is so big,
it won't be sold commercially, even if the contractor is allowed to do
so.

Why does NASA need to specify any vehicle?