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b) Sealar *did* get off the drawing board, and was an attempt to prove Sea Dragon. It failed. Not due to lack of funding, but because of catastrophic failures of its main tank during testing led to little lack of enthusiasm for continuing the project.

Not that I don't believe you, but do you have any links to back this up? All I can find is that the SEALAR "got some funding from the Navy". And not very much at that.

Did you ignore what I wrote about the decline in market for heavy lift?

No, I didn't. I'm saying that manned space travel needs a paradigm of heavy lifters. We need A LOT of materials up there. "Smaller" doesn't do it. There's a decline in payload for the commercial satellite market, which is a different beast than we're discussing.

Because we want to *reuse it*?

Like you reuse a paper cup. The shuttle has to be rebuilt and certified after every flight. That's where the economics of it broke down. It's such a complex machine, that it's very expensive to "reuse". For the cargo the Shuttle is sending, It would be cheaper to use anything from a Proton to a Titan IV.

Besides, when you state "~29 metric tons of cargo, plus another 104 metric tons for its own orbiter weight", that is disingenous in that it makes it sound like it's dead weight. It's not. Most of that is things like the fuel tanks, engines, turbopumps, frame, and whatnot that would have had to be included in any upper stage rocket (the orbiter is, after all, the uppermost stage).

It gets to orbit, therefore it's payload. The fact that we're sending up 104 metric tons of orbital glider is irrelevant. The Russians were able to learn from us when they built the Buran. Instead of putting all the engine components inside the orbiter, they simply strapped a vehicle with no engines to a BDB, and lit her up. Total dry mass of the orbiter? 82-87 metric tons. The payload capacity was even slightly higher than the space shuttle!

Even then, there's no reason to fly a cargo ship like that, when there's no need for the cargo to come back. It would be cheaper to strap the cargo to a Proton rocket, then fly the crew in a five person orbiter launched on the back of another Proton booster.

Bullocks back at you - look at the numbers. Energia had an 88,000 kg payload to LEO. Launch cost was 774 million in 1985 dollars. That's 8.8k$/kg in 1985 dollars. Even many types of US rockets are cheaper than that, when you adjust for inflation, let alone other Russian rockets, Chinese rockets, and Indian rockets.

Do you have a link for those numbers? The only link I could find states the launch cost at $3000-$5000 per kg. Using these rocket cost figures and the maximum weight to LEO on Wikipedia, a "small" Delta II costs about $9000/kg to LEO. ($45m / 4971kg to LEO) A Proton is *cheap* with a cost somewhere in the $1750 - $3500 per kg to LEO range.

A very interesting thing, is that the above link lists Energia launches at arounf $110 m per launch. Since only the 4 booster configuration flew, we must assume that is what the cost figures are for. According to Wikipedia, the maximum mass to LEO in a standard configuration was 100 metric tons. 100 metric tons at 110 million per launch, leaves us with a cost of $1100 per kg to LEO. Consider that the entire ISS could have gone up on only two such launches, and almost the entire station to date would have fit in ONE Vulkan launch (175 metric tons according to Wikipedia).

Now a Long March 3 can lift 4.8 metric tons to LEO, and weighs in at a cost of 33 million per launch. That works out to ~$6800 per kg to LEO. Nowhere near as cheap as the Russian solutions. The Long March 3B was also the rocket that officially

Mod parent up, he's right. Here's the link

"In the early 1960's Aerojet studied project FIRST (Fabrication of Inflatable Re-entry Structures for Test) in order to evaluate the use of inflatable Rogallo wings for emergency return from orbit. ... The resulting trajectory was found to be practical under automatic or manual control. G loads during re-entry would not exceed 2.0 G."

I suggest you read about the Chinese rocket program before you comment on it. While they've been using some purchased Russian components, the Long March rockets which comprise their manned program have diverged from Soviet rockets since 1960 - if you'll recall, the relations of the two countries were highly strained. The Long March rockets are build on the technological based developed for the Dongfeng rockets.

You sound like those people who accuse the Soviets of getting all of their rocket technology out of defected German scientists, even though they got mostly line technicians while *we* got the designers.

I suggest you read about the Chinese rocket program before you comment on it. While they've been using some purchased Russian components, the Long March rockets which comprise their manned program have diverged from Soviet rockets since 1960 - if you'll recall, the relations of the two countries were highly strained. The Long March rockets are build on the technological based developed for the Dongfeng rockets.

You sound like those people who accuse the Soviets of getting all of their rocket technology out of defected German scientists, even though they got mostly line technicians while *we* got the designers.

Today's launch was the last of the Atlas IIAS line. There were earlier models, and there will be models yet to come. There was an Atlas IIA, an Atlas II, and, of course, the Atlas A, the first US ICBM.

Meet the Atlas Family, all 15 of them. First flight of a small prototype was in 1947. The first real Atlas flew in 1957. Alan Shepard flew into space on an Atlas D.

It's a big pressurized stainless steel can with engines. Still a good design after half a century.

Do not forget Pavel Klushantsev . No science fiction list is complete without Planeta Bur or Road to the Stars .

I had the pleasure of watching The Star Dreamer (documentary on Pavel, making science fiction films before in the soviet union) on australian sbs this year. If you can view this documentary or catch a copy of Planet of Storms or Planeta Bur you will be amazed at the Kubric like quality he acheives .... 15 years before Kubric!.

Do not forget Pavel Klushantsev . No science fiction list is complete without Planeta Bur or Road to the Stars .

I had the pleasure of watching The Star Dreamer (documentary on Pavel, making science fiction films before in the soviet union) on australian sbs this year. If you can view this documentary or catch a copy of Planet of Storms or Planeta Bur you will be amazed at the Kubric like quality he acheives .... 15 years before Kubric!.

This.

Sorry, but that is incorrect. There is a design from the late 60s for an Orion starship that could get to Alpha Centauri in 130 years, for the whopping cost of $1 trillion. Thats much faster than a solar sail could ever hope to do.

You're right about White, I screwed up there ( and already admitted to it elsewhere in this thread) - don't know where that came from.

But the modern MMU's certainly proved important in satellite repair during the shuttle flights - indeed, I'd say they were even essential - as in it'd be impossible to stop a spinning satellite and maneuver it into the shuttle bay while tethered. (sure, we could use remotes to accomplish the same thing - but that's as difficult a proposition as using remotes in SAR, wouldn't you say?)

Free-flight maneuvering is going to be *very important* during future construction & other missions. Assembling components while tethered could be fatal, and FF will be essential for anything involving journeys further away from the craft than just a few dozen feet.

Even during a simple spacewalk, tethers can represent a danger, as they can become fouled. Just like seat belts, they can be both useful and dangerous, as Collins found out during Gemini 10.

Cheers,
SB

The first race to the moon:

The Americans won the first race, but the Russians might beat them back to the moon.

The sentence is clearly referring particularly to the effort to send a manned mission to the moon, since it is predicated on the thing that the Americans did first.

It's interesting to note that the US also nearly lost the race to be the first to circle the moon, as revealed here. Evidence suggests that the Soviets tried to beat Apollo 8 by mere days by launching a mission profile similar to this current tourist scheme. Unfortunately for the Soviets, the new Proton booster required to launch the unmanned half of the mission was still problem-prone at that time:

A week later, the Soyuz booster is being removed from its pad, but now a Proton / L1 combination is on the Proton pad. This seems to clearly indicate that attempts were being made, right up to and beyond the day Apollo 8 was launched, to beat the Americans to the moon. The authors theorise that an attempt at a manned launch to the moon using the two-launch podsadka scenario was attempted, but that some serious spacecraft problem must have resulted in the Proton launch being scrubbed.

This is basically the whole story of the "space race". The Soviets were first with everything that they could achieve with their outstanding R-7 booster (which was used to launch Sputnik, and evolved into the Soyuz booster still in use today). However, they had problems scaling past that in either size or complexity, and the Americans were first to do most things outside of low earth orbit (with the exception of their moon probes and their way-cool Venus landers).

This is complete bullshit. Kamanin's diaries prove this is untrue.

The Soviet Union had two huge secret projects designed to win the moon race. The L1 project would send a Soviet crew around the moon before the Americans, using a stripped-down Soyuz spacecraft launched by a Proton rocket. The L3 project would beat the American Apollo program to the lunar surface. The Soviets lost both races. In the case of being the first to send a man around the moon, that loss was measured in days or weeks.

• The nuclear-powered car. The Ford Nucleon concept car made it to the concept stage.
• The nuclear-powered locomotive. The Baldwin Locomotive Company did some design sketches, but never got very far.
• The nuclear-powered railroad switch lamp. The New York Central actually built some prototypes.
• The nuclear-powered airplane. This got quite far along. A working nuclear reactor was actually flown in an B-36 aircraft, although it wasn't powering the aircraft. Huge nuclear aircraft engines were designed and prototyped by Pratt and Whitney. Although that project was cancelled, the fan for the Boeing 747 engine was borrowed from the nuclear aircraft project. Nothing else was big enough.
• The nuclear rocket. Early Apollo plans called for a nuclear upper stage. The NERVA project produced a working nuclear rocket engine. But it was deemed too dangerous to fly.
• And, of course, Orion.

We don't need 10 years to develop new technology. The basic technology for cheap access to space was invented in the 1960s. Just ask Bob Truax. . . He did the cost and feasibility studies for a project he called "Sea Dragon", when he was working for Aerojet General.

Rather than retell the whole story here, let me just provide a URL --> http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/searagon.htm

If this idea were updated and developed today, it could both slash the cost of sending freight into orbit and allow launching much larger assemblies -- just think what that would have meant for space station construction!

Sea Dragon was not intended to be a manned vehicle. We would still need another vehicle to replace the shuttle. Developing one specifically for lifting people to orbit shouldn't be that hard -- that might even be something like a scaled-up version of Spaceship One. Part of the folly of the Shuttle is that it tries to be everything: freight lifter, passenger vehicle, miniature research station. Breaking out these functions into specialized vehicles would make everything easier.

What is really interesting is that back in the 1960's NASA had plans for an even bigger rocket than the Saturn V. I think it was called the Jupiter rocket or something like that. About 5x-10x the lift capacity of the Saturn V.

I think you're a bit confused. "Jupiter" was the name of some ICBMs of the time. As a fast track to building one of the biggest rockets of all time, the engines from these ICBMs were clustered together into a single shell known as "Juno V". Believe it or not "Juno V" eventually took us to the moon! You see, Von Braun had suggested a name change after the Juno V diverged enough from the original rocket platform. The new name? Saturn V. (See: http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/S/Saturn _rocket.html)

The experiments were so successful that clustered rockets are still a common way to launch payloads. From the small Deltas, to the large Energias, they all provide more power and greater mission flexibility by offering a larger number of rocket engines instead of a few very large engines.

Here's what I know about Von Braun's future plans for space travel: Von Braun wanted to launch an Orion on the back of a Saturn V. This would allow the Saturn V to continue as a practical launch solution, and allow the Orion to become a practical form of interplanetary travel. (Actually, the Orion they would have launched would have been the least efficient design, but it still would have been a significant improvement over chemical rockets.) About that time, the government told NASA to shut down the Saturn V program and Von Braun left in disgust.

Now the Sea Dragon was a super-simple rocket that could have carried a massive tonnage (~550 metric tons) for about 1/4th the cost of the Saturn V. It was conceived of in 1962 as a study on how to make rocket launches cheaper. Again, by the time the study was taken seriously, the US was already winding down its production of large rockets. (The concept was later proven as the "Excalibur" rocket, but was largely ignored.)

Following the rise of the Regean era of space travel, NASA began research into using the Shuttle's engines as a massive booster. (The Shuttle's engines are currently some of the most powerful rockets in use today.) The result was the Shuttle C program; a pure cargo Shuttle.

With Clinton's Presidency, plans for space stations, moon bases, and Mars missions were all scaled back or put on hold. It wasn't until Clinton's term was up that NASA again began looking at ways of getting to Mars. Their current design is the Magnum launch vehicle which looks suspiciously like everything the Energia program was trying to accomplish.

What is really interesting is that back in the 1960's NASA had plans for an even bigger rocket than the Saturn V. I think it was called the Jupiter rocket or something like that. About 5x-10x the lift capacity of the Saturn V.

I think you're a bit confused. "Jupiter" was the name of some ICBMs of the time. As a fast track to building one of the biggest rockets of all time, the engines from these ICBMs were clustered together into a single shell known as "Juno V". Believe it or not "Juno V" eventually took us to the moon! You see, Von Braun had suggested a name change after the Juno V diverged enough from the original rocket platform. The new name? Saturn V. (See: http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/S/Saturn _rocket.html)

The experiments were so successful that clustered rockets are still a common way to launch payloads. From the small Deltas, to the large Energias, they all provide more power and greater mission flexibility by offering a larger number of rocket engines instead of a few very large engines.

Here's what I know about Von Braun's future plans for space travel: Von Braun wanted to launch an Orion on the back of a Saturn V. This would allow the Saturn V to continue as a practical launch solution, and allow the Orion to become a practical form of interplanetary travel. (Actually, the Orion they would have launched would have been the least efficient design, but it still would have been a significant improvement over chemical rockets.) About that time, the government told NASA to shut down the Saturn V program and Von Braun left in disgust.

Now the Sea Dragon was a super-simple rocket that could have carried a massive tonnage (~550 metric tons) for about 1/4th the cost of the Saturn V. It was conceived of in 1962 as a study on how to make rocket launches cheaper. Again, by the time the study was taken seriously, the US was already winding down its production of large rockets. (The concept was later proven as the "Excalibur" rocket, but was largely ignored.)

Following the rise of the Regean era of space travel, NASA began research into using the Shuttle's engines as a massive booster. (The Shuttle's engines are currently some of the most powerful rockets in use today.) The result was the Shuttle C program; a pure cargo Shuttle.

With Clinton's Presidency, plans for space stations, moon bases, and Mars missions were all scaled back or put on hold. It wasn't until Clinton's term was up that NASA again began looking at ways of getting to Mars. Their current design is the Magnum launch vehicle which looks suspiciously like everything the Energia program was trying to accomplish.

What is really interesting is that back in the 1960's NASA had plans for an even bigger rocket than the Saturn V. I think it was called the Jupiter rocket or something like that. About 5x-10x the lift capacity of the Saturn V.

I think you're a bit confused. "Jupiter" was the name of some ICBMs of the time. As a fast track to building one of the biggest rockets of all time, the engines from these ICBMs were clustered together into a single shell known as "Juno V". Believe it or not "Juno V" eventually took us to the moon! You see, Von Braun had suggested a name change after the Juno V diverged enough from the original rocket platform. The new name? Saturn V. (See: http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/S/Saturn _rocket.html)

The experiments were so successful that clustered rockets are still a common way to launch payloads. From the small Deltas, to the large Energias, they all provide more power and greater mission flexibility by offering a larger number of rocket engines instead of a few very large engines.

Here's what I know about Von Braun's future plans for space travel: Von Braun wanted to launch an Orion on the back of a Saturn V. This would allow the Saturn V to continue as a practical launch solution, and allow the Orion to become a practical form of interplanetary travel. (Actually, the Orion they would have launched would have been the least efficient design, but it still would have been a significant improvement over chemical rockets.) About that time, the government told NASA to shut down the Saturn V program and Von Braun left in disgust.

Now the Sea Dragon was a super-simple rocket that could have carried a massive tonnage (~550 metric tons) for about 1/4th the cost of the Saturn V. It was conceived of in 1962 as a study on how to make rocket launches cheaper. Again, by the time the study was taken seriously, the US was already winding down its production of large rockets. (The concept was later proven as the "Excalibur" rocket, but was largely ignored.)

Following the rise of the Regean era of space travel, NASA began research into using the Shuttle's engines as a massive booster. (The Shuttle's engines are currently some of the most powerful rockets in use today.) The result was the Shuttle C program; a pure cargo Shuttle.

With Clinton's Presidency, plans for space stations, moon bases, and Mars missions were all scaled back or put on hold. It wasn't until Clinton's term was up that NASA again began looking at ways of getting to Mars. Their current design is the Magnum launch vehicle which looks suspiciously like everything the Energia program was trying to accomplish.

You're thinking of von Braun's design for the Nova. Although ostensibly for the Moon program, von Braun wanted a rocket that would eventually be able to put astronauts on Mars. There's a ton of good information here; I've summarized the most important bits below.

Kennedy's 1961 challenge to NASA ruled out the construction of a Nova-class Moon rocket--NASA felt that there wouldn't be time to construct the specialized facilities required to build such a rocket. The size of the Saturn V was limited by the size of the existing construction facilities in Michaud, Louisiana.

The name Nova was, however, assigned to the class of rockets that were to succeed the Saturn V; unfortunately none of these rockets ever made it off the drawing board.

See this description of Hermes B-1.

The guy was Gerald Bull.

As you say, he was obsessed with the develpment of extreme long range cannon to launch packages into space/orbit, notably in the HARP Project.

When his research grants were cut he continued working, basically, for anyone who would fund him. South Africa, China and ultimately Iraq, where he developed the Iraqui Supergun, and more worryingly for Israel, a scud derivative with increased range and accuracy.

He was shot not once, but five times in the back of the head. No-one saw the killing, and no-one has been caught, but it's dollars to donuts that Israel/Mossad decided that if no-one else was going to do anything about this brainy menace, then they would.

Thus ended the career of the 'city buster', the most awesome strategic weapon ever deployed.
R-36M:Encyclopedia Astronautica

The reason that missiles usually have a limited shelf life is that inside the warhead the tritium used in the secondary will slowly fuse on its own to form helium-3. Not enough to explode, but enough to cause problems. So the predicted shelf life for a (US) thermonuclear warhead is about 10 years. Currently, the average age of a nuclear warhead is 20 years. I'd assume the launchers still work.

IANARS (Rocket Scientist), but if a missile is maintained, then it should last for plenty long enough. And even though it is getting old, it's not like they're trying for the 250m CEP here.

I don't know the exact dimensions of W-88 warheads, but a Trident D-5 is 90cm thinner than an SS-18, and with a maximum of 14 payloads, it may also be suitable for this purpose.

I could be wrong though.

This is nothing new.
The russians have been launching small payloads on their submarine-launched Volna and Shtil for years.

More info on the R36 family of rockets is available here

There is a little about it (and the missile) here and here

The US MX (Peacekeeper) missile was also designed to be cold launched. You can read about that here

... the boches had one in 1918 - Lange Max

After a few years, and several millions of $$ in development, the big contracting hogs managed to get it all snuffed. Cost a lot of people their jobs, and led to a nearly useless space station at several factors the cost of the Industrial Space Facility.

Seems to me that companies would be very hesitant to get into this type of realtionship with NASA again.

Syntroxis

Yes WWII... actually, the germans (and probably us as well) had guns in World War One (namely, the Paris Gun Thanks google ;) with a range of up to 131 km (81.4 mi) (70.73 nautical miles) which, incidentally is farther than any of the guns you just mentioned.

But, on another note, I would conjecture that air support will probably not be doing the spotting. My guess is that satellites will do that job. Also, the projectiles are supposed to be guided by GPS.

The X-15 could do everything required to win the X-prize except carry three people. It reached 100km, and it was flown repeatedly, for a total of 199 X-15 flights of three aircraft.

Why bother? Build a Shuttle C and get similar throw weights, without having to tool up much of anything in terms of new hardware.

It's a Shuttle stack without all the expensive bits. Good engineering.

• Valentina Vladimirovna Tereshkova First woman in space.
• Guion Bluford First african american in space.
• Laika first of earths inhabitants in space (baring alien abductions, etc).
• Tito first tourist.... Shuttlesworth - first guy from his whole continent...

Wow, your nickname is even somewhat on topic.

I find this amazing

Then you'd love this: the DC-X.

The first site talks about launching a nuclear powered factory to mars to produce methane-based rocket fuel.

Methane is a LOUSY rocket fuel.

Does it say it can't be used as a rocket fuel? No, it's not ideal, but it's much easier to produce on Mars, and it has been used as a rocket propellant before. Have you ever heard the saying, the best is the enemy of the good? Sometimes you can use a merely good enough solution rather than wait for a technically superior one. Or do you think we should wait to develop anti-gravity first?

Well no. The NTP engine was NOT developed to near-flight status. It was never physically constructed, let alone tested. The operation of this device violates most nuclear test ban treaties, and operating one withing the Van Allen belt would eventually contaminate the Earth's surface with nuclear material.

The only nuclear propulsion system which of necessity would contaminate its surroundings is Orion. But NTP (eg Nerva) uses a nuclear reactor to expel any propellant you like (best with hydrogen though). The propellant in the basic design does get somewhat contaminated, but this can be eliminated using modfied designs. (BTW, that "almost humerous" site you mention is NASA's. Of course, you're smarter than they are ...) And FYI they did build and fire test rigs on the ground which showed that engineering-wise the principle is sound, but did not get a chance to test it in space before the program was cancelled.

Even with this wonderous (but never actually built) form of propulsion, you merely cut down the amount of fuel. It still takes 6 months to get there because any faster or slower and you are increasing the distance to be traversed. Indeed the one study still has the same travel times I was talking about EVEN WITH THE NUCLEAR ENGINE.

Um, and so? Is there some law of physics which says a trip has to be made within a certain number of days? Why are you so hung up on the length of the trip? (Yes, I've read your original post about putting the astronauts to sleep and whatnot. I'm not sure why you think these issues are showstoppers when nobody in the field seems to.) And why do you think cutting down on the amount of fuel is a trivial concern? The more fuel you carry, the more fuel you have to carry to push THAT around. The point is to make the spacecraft smaller, lighter and CHEAPER. That's why we haven't gone to Mars, because every proposed mission from von Braun onwards has come with a $500 billion price tag attached to build some massive spacecraft, not because its "damn near impossible". Zubrin's plan can get it done much cheaper.

BTW, your "because any faster or slower and you are increasing the distance to be traversed" is silly. The standard 260 day travel time is the Hohmann minimum energy transfer orbit. If you burn more energy and go faster, you can indeed get there a lot quicker (you'll just have to burn even more to match orbits when you get there).

I don't get people like you. We can't do something right now, therefore it's impossible or not worth the attempt. With an ounce of imagination and historical awareness, you'd see how ridiculous this is.

Total failure. Not even a ground-based prototype. Lots of studies and papers on components, but no real results. It's so NASA.

The project manager on that project is still on the NASA payroll. That, too, is so NASA.

I'm just afraid that the X Prize is making the same mistake the Shuttle made. Yes, suborbital flights may be commercially viable, but there's nowhere else to go. The shuttle was developed to go to a space station, and to facilitate its construction. But they scrapped their only heavy lift booster before the space station was built! So once the shuttle was operational, there was nowhere for it to go except up and down, at $1 billion a pop. I seem them making the same mistake; making something to go somewhere that doesn't exist yet.

Once you proven that, companies will start sinking real cash into it - perhaps taking the logical next step and build a 'space hotel' and a shuttle able to ferry more than three people up and down at a time.

And how will we build this "space hotel?" Using a heavy-lift vehicle. But from where? So we sink money into developing it and the hotel. Then the space shuttle gets decommissioned, and we have to spend MORE money developing a shuttle.

There is no logical progression here. Figure out how to create a destination for this craft before you develop something that just goes up and down.

Maybe I'm just too obsessed with getting off of this bug-infested mudball...

Yes. Usually Rokot or Dnepr launches (old refurbished Russian ICBMs) are bought for small and cheap payloads, but they aren't exactly reliable...

A search of "Babylon gun" will get you links. It was never finished--a certain neighbour of Iraq was not happy about the likely practical uses.

Small solid launch vehicles have been tried before. For example the athena and taurus rockets by lockheed. Even though they used old ICBM technology they are commercial failures.

Another problem with solid rockets is that they have a rather extreme launch environment (lots of vibration), so you have to beef up your payload to handle the vibrations.

Solid rockets for civilian applications are just a bad idea.

--

...are the actual space ships. I'm definitely looking forward to many of the X-Prize contenders, but so far they're only building simple rockets to go up and down. It's a great in-between stage, but I'm looking forward to the day when orbital rockets will be built.

The one caveat to that is that a manned orbital rocket would probably be launched from the ocean rather than land. The reason for that is that water makes a plentiful rocket fuel. Tote along a reactor (nuclear is preferable, but diesel will do), convert sea water to LHOx, and launch your rocket. (This was the premise behind the Sea Dragon craft.) While a nuclear generator would probably be out of the range of a private company, using a diesel and/or solar reactor to make the fuel could cut the costs of the launch considerably.

Oh, and it's environmentally friendly.

As for the article, why bother designing the suits now? I'm sure that in 20 years there will be materials that will be much more advanced that we'll want to use instead.

Why bother upgrading your PC now? In two years time there will be faster processors and larger harddisk avilable, and then you can just ask yourself the same question again...

A spacesuit is in essence a highly complex, articulate one man spaceship. As such, it takes time to develop and iron out the bugs. The A7L suit used on the Apollo missions took nine years to develop, and was, as far as I can understand, a simpler piece of enginering than a suit for Mars will be - for starters, the gravity on the moon are less, meaning that the suit could have more mass without beeing uncomfertable to wear for extended periods of time. Also the moon has no atmosphere, while if you're going to Mars you might want to make sure there is no way the atmosphere on Mars affects your suit in a negative manner.

The EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit) that was developed for use on the Shuttle faced a simpler problem - no gravity to worry about, no moondust that could get into the joints, no chance of the astronaut stumbling over a rock - yet it took as long as the shuttle to develop the first flightrated variants.

Why indeed start designing the suits ten to twenty years ahead of the mission? Because it takes about that time to get the best possible design worked out, all the bugs ironed out and enought suits manufactured - during the apollo program each astronaut had 3 suits; one for training, one for flights and one backup.

Useless fact; The A7L suit had a mass of 22 while the assosiated PLSS (Portable Life Support System) had a mass of 26 kg. The EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit) used on the US spaceshuttle had a mass of 50 kg and a PLLS weigthing 15 kg.

As for the article, why bother designing the suits now? I'm sure that in 20 years there will be materials that will be much more advanced that we'll want to use instead.

Why bother upgrading your PC now? In two years time there will be faster processors and larger harddisk avilable, and then you can just ask yourself the same question again...

A spacesuit is in essence a highly complex, articulate one man spaceship. As such, it takes time to develop and iron out the bugs. The A7L suit used on the Apollo missions took nine years to develop, and was, as far as I can understand, a simpler piece of enginering than a suit for Mars will be - for starters, the gravity on the moon are less, meaning that the suit could have more mass without beeing uncomfertable to wear for extended periods of time. Also the moon has no atmosphere, while if you're going to Mars you might want to make sure there is no way the atmosphere on Mars affects your suit in a negative manner.

The EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit) that was developed for use on the Shuttle faced a simpler problem - no gravity to worry about, no moondust that could get into the joints, no chance of the astronaut stumbling over a rock - yet it took as long as the shuttle to develop the first flightrated variants.

Why indeed start designing the suits ten to twenty years ahead of the mission? Because it takes about that time to get the best possible design worked out, all the bugs ironed out and enought suits manufactured - during the apollo program each astronaut had 3 suits; one for training, one for flights and one backup.

Useless fact; The A7L suit had a mass of 22 while the assosiated PLSS (Portable Life Support System) had a mass of 26 kg. The EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit) used on the US spaceshuttle had a mass of 50 kg and a PLLS weigthing 15 kg.

As for the article, why bother designing the suits now? I'm sure that in 20 years there will be materials that will be much more advanced that we'll want to use instead.

Why bother upgrading your PC now? In two years time there will be faster processors and larger harddisk avilable, and then you can just ask yourself the same question again...

A spacesuit is in essence a highly complex, articulate one man spaceship. As such, it takes time to develop and iron out the bugs. The A7L suit used on the Apollo missions took nine years to develop, and was, as far as I can understand, a simpler piece of enginering than a suit for Mars will be - for starters, the gravity on the moon are less, meaning that the suit could have more mass without beeing uncomfertable to wear for extended periods of time. Also the moon has no atmosphere, while if you're going to Mars you might want to make sure there is no way the atmosphere on Mars affects your suit in a negative manner.

The EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit) that was developed for use on the Shuttle faced a simpler problem - no gravity to worry about, no moondust that could get into the joints, no chance of the astronaut stumbling over a rock - yet it took as long as the shuttle to develop the first flightrated variants.

Why indeed start designing the suits ten to twenty years ahead of the mission? Because it takes about that time to get the best possible design worked out, all the bugs ironed out and enought suits manufactured - during the apollo program each astronaut had 3 suits; one for training, one for flights and one backup.

Useless fact; The A7L suit had a mass of 22 while the assosiated PLSS (Portable Life Support System) had a mass of 26 kg. The EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit) used on the US spaceshuttle had a mass of 50 kg and a PLLS weigthing 15 kg.

As for the article, why bother designing the suits now? I'm sure that in 20 years there will be materials that will be much more advanced that we'll want to use instead.

Why bother upgrading your PC now? In two years time there will be faster processors and larger harddisk avilable, and then you can just ask yourself the same question again...

A spacesuit is in essence a highly complex, articulate one man spaceship. As such, it takes time to develop and iron out the bugs. The A7L suit used on the Apollo missions took nine years to develop, and was, as far as I can understand, a simpler piece of enginering than a suit for Mars will be - for starters, the gravity on the moon are less, meaning that the suit could have more mass without beeing uncomfertable to wear for extended periods of time. Also the moon has no atmosphere, while if you're going to Mars you might want to make sure there is no way the atmosphere on Mars affects your suit in a negative manner.

The EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit) that was developed for use on the Shuttle faced a simpler problem - no gravity to worry about, no moondust that could get into the joints, no chance of the astronaut stumbling over a rock - yet it took as long as the shuttle to develop the first flightrated variants.

Why indeed start designing the suits ten to twenty years ahead of the mission? Because it takes about that time to get the best possible design worked out, all the bugs ironed out and enought suits manufactured - during the apollo program each astronaut had 3 suits; one for training, one for flights and one backup.

Useless fact; The A7L suit had a mass of 22 while the assosiated PLSS (Portable Life Support System) had a mass of 26 kg. The EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit) used on the US spaceshuttle had a mass of 50 kg and a PLLS weigthing 15 kg.

As for the article, why bother designing the suits now? I'm sure that in 20 years there will be materials that will be much more advanced that we'll want to use instead.

Why bother upgrading your PC now? In two years time there will be faster processors and larger harddisk avilable, and then you can just ask yourself the same question again...

A spacesuit is in essence a highly complex, articulate one man spaceship. As such, it takes time to develop and iron out the bugs. The A7L suit used on the Apollo missions took nine years to develop, and was, as far as I can understand, a simpler piece of enginering than a suit for Mars will be - for starters, the gravity on the moon are less, meaning that the suit could have more mass without beeing uncomfertable to wear for extended periods of time. Also the moon has no atmosphere, while if you're going to Mars you might want to make sure there is no way the atmosphere on Mars affects your suit in a negative manner.

The EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit) that was developed for use on the Shuttle faced a simpler problem - no gravity to worry about, no moondust that could get into the joints, no chance of the astronaut stumbling over a rock - yet it took as long as the shuttle to develop the first flightrated variants.

Why indeed start designing the suits ten to twenty years ahead of the mission? Because it takes about that time to get the best possible design worked out, all the bugs ironed out and enought suits manufactured - during the apollo program each astronaut had 3 suits; one for training, one for flights and one backup.

Useless fact; The A7L suit had a mass of 22 while the assosiated PLSS (Portable Life Support System) had a mass of 26 kg. The EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit) used on the US spaceshuttle had a mass of 50 kg and a PLLS weigthing 15 kg.

"You mean that's really a real rocket? Like you mean they fired it out at Cape Canaveral?

"Yep."

"Whoa. Totally cool."

Not sure if my son even still has it anymore or not. Been a while.

How about the german WW2 era Saenger-Bredt antipodal bomber, that where the inspiration for pretty much every winged spacecraft that has been developed, planned and / or built? While the Wikipedia don't have much on the Silverbird, it has an article on Saenger himself. And as allways, Google is your friend in finding more.

Interesting fact; Saenger seems to have been the first to suggest the use of a regeneratively cooled engine, in which the nozzle are cooled with eitehr fuel or oxidizer which are then introdused to the burner itself.

This isn't the first European spaceplane, back in the 70's/80's/90's we had a project called Hermes running, but there were a lot of re-designs and eventually the project was closed down due to bloat and ever changing requirements.

Check out the Hermes space plane at Astronautix

Concur.

They gave it their best shot, but they got it wrong.

But then again, so did many others. Clippy notwithstanding, a day will come when personalized interaction with computers will not only exceed what now obtains between humans and pets, but also what now obtains what now obtains between humans and other humans. When this finally happens, there's gonna be some seriously weird shit going down along the lines of the ancient curse about living in interesting times.

Of course, the N1 never successfully flew. Energia was a good rocket, but only launched twice, and much like Saturn V, it no longer exists; they've all been broken down. The Russian circumlunar program was plagued with problems - they had 8 failures prior to a successful circumlunar (which occurred post-Apollo 8).

Don't get me wrong, the Russians have made some great hardware - the Soyuz is an amazing capsule. And their liquid-fuel engines are generally much, much better than ours (note that the EELV Atlas uses a Russian-built engine). But their experience with launches headed out of Earth's gravity well is no better, and arguably worse, than that of the US.

Really, in the end, a joint effort is the only thing that would make any sense, but with Bush in office, that is (to say the least) unlikely.

Of course, the N1 never successfully flew. Energia was a good rocket, but only launched twice, and much like Saturn V, it no longer exists; they've all been broken down. The Russian circumlunar program was plagued with problems - they had 8 failures prior to a successful circumlunar (which occurred post-Apollo 8).

Don't get me wrong, the Russians have made some great hardware - the Soyuz is an amazing capsule. And their liquid-fuel engines are generally much, much better than ours (note that the EELV Atlas uses a Russian-built engine). But their experience with launches headed out of Earth's gravity well is no better, and arguably worse, than that of the US.

Really, in the end, a joint effort is the only thing that would make any sense, but with Bush in office, that is (to say the least) unlikely.