NASA Considering Early Retirement of Shuttle Program

Rei writes "While publicly assuring the public that it has no plans to do so, leaks have indicated that NASA has been quietly investigating plans to get rid of the Space Shuttle as soon as possible, and finish the International Space Station with disposable rockets, even as NASA works on achieving Return to Flight in 2005."

Comments

Finally!

[Badboy Recovered]

And i do mean finally!

Good!

[cmburns69]

.. But are the reusable rockets rated for manned space-flight?

Re:Good!

[Big Mark]

Ever heard of the Apollo program? Saturn-V?

Re:Good!

[Anonymous Coward]

Which part of the Apollo program was reusable, exactly? The astronauts? That doesn't count.

Re:Good!

[julesh]

But are the reusable rockets rated for manned space-flight?

a) The story says disposable, not reusable
b) Doesn't look like it -- the article mentions relying on Soyuz (and potentially Shenzhou) for manned flights in future.

Re:Good!

[Waffle Iron]

If you think about it, probably the only parts of the entire Saturn V setup that actually made the full round trip from the earth to the lunar surface and back were some photographic film, space suits and the astronauts themselves. Kinda strange.

Re:Good!

[vsprintf]

a) The story says disposable, not reusable
b) Doesn't look like it -- the article mentions relying on Soyuz (and potentially Shenzhou) for manned flights in future.

Of course. Outsourcing the space program was the next logical step.

Re:Good!

[cmburns69]

I know it can be bad karma to reply to my own post, but I have to clear this up.. I meant to type disposable, when I typed "reusable"..

Of course it completely changes the meaning of the post, but.. well.. maybe slashdot should implement an edit feature.

Re:Good!

[torpor]

Not quite. All the data they recorded and sent back as part of their mission, also made the round trip. The radio transmissions, the uploads, etc.

Re:Good!

[CaptainAvatar]

Heh, good point. There would have been a few other miscellaneous things though, like the containers for the soil samples.

Saturn Vs, Please?

[Simon G Best]

Aren't Saturn Vs just magnificent? They're magnificent! I reckon it's time for them to make a come-back. Please?

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[Anonymous Coward]

Even as magnificent as they are, it would take a Saturn V 30 years to go to Neptune with a Holmann Transfer. Considering that the planets won't align for a Voyager-esque event for another 150 years, we need to work on something similar to NERVA. Its probably not feasable to make rockets too much larger than the giant Saturn V's (360 feet tall).

Oops, I mentioned nu-cu-lur. Mod down -5: Evil.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[Alien Being]

The Saturn V was the John Holmes of rockets.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[OldAndSlow]

I worked in a NASA shop 10 years ago. I was surprized to learn that we couldn't restart production of the Saturns. We don't have all the manufacturing specs, prints, etc. And we certainly don't have any of the jigs and special setups that they used to make those birds.

The moral of the story is that when you shut down the manufacturing line for a complex product, you shut it down for good.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[AKAImBatman]

we need to work on something similar to NERVA.

You mean, something like this? :-)

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[cplusplus]

They are magnificent! I think they still stand as being some of the most complicated and powerful things ever built! And all that was done 40 years ago... they were absolutely amazing.
A little snippet from wikipedia: "The Saturn V is arguably one of the most impressive machines in human history. Over 110 m high and 10 m in diameter, with a total mass of three thousand metric tonnes and a payload capacity of 118,000 kg to LEO, the Saturn V dwarfed and overpowered all other rockets which have ever successfully flown, with the exception of the Soviet Energia booster."
118000 kilos to low earth orbit! It would take about 5 space shuttle missions to lift that same amount. I wonder what could be accomplished now given our advances in lightweight materials and computing power?

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[eclectro]

They do have the plans archived somewhere though.

But even if they could restart production, the question is if they should. The reason being that new technology supplants the old eventually.

But there is a beauty to the tried and true that works.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[LWATCDR]

You really would not want to build Saturn Vs today anyway. We can do much better with proven parts.
The RD-170 motors "Pratt already builds a development of it as the RD-180 for the Atlas V" puts out more thrust than the F-1 did and is a more modern desgin. The RS-68 "used in the Delta V" puts out more thrust then the j-2. Throw in LiAl structure "used in the Shuttle ET" and modern electronics "used in your desktop pc" you could have a Better heavy lifter than the SatrunV with not that much development and no new engine programs.
You would have to build a new launch pad but then you would have to do the same if you brought back the Saturn.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[AKAImBatman]

118000 kilos to low earth orbit! It would take about 5 space shuttle missions to lift that same amount.

Actually, the space shuttle puts 104,000 kg into LEO. That same amount comes back at the end of the mission.

For all intents and purposes, the Space Shuttle was the successor to the Saturn V. It used all the engines and knowledge we'd gained in that program, as well as the knowledge from the X-15 and Dynasoar projects. It is truly an awe inspiring piece of technology that simply tried to be too many things to too many people.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[cmowire]

See, I don't think there's a point in restarting Saturn V production.

The thing is, with the aerospace components we've got now, with the alloys and welding techniques, it would be about as smart to restart Saturn V production as it would be for Porsche to dig up the plans for the 914 and restart that production line. I mean, sure the 914 was a cool little machine at a good price, but when Porsche decided to make an "economical" sports car, they started over and made the Boxter instead.

It stopped making sense to restart the production lines after 1980. By that point, all of the non-custom components were completely obselete, the electronics were dated, etc. By 1984, we had all of the Saturn V-related facilities completely repurposed for the shuttle, so even if we could build a Saturn V, we'd have nowhere to launch it.

It's OK that we can't make a Saturn V anymore. It'll cost just as much to redesign the Saturn V around more modern parts than it will be to make a brand new design, with a few microcontrollers instead of heavy 60's vintage computers, more optimal aerodynamics and staging, etc, some ability to recover portions of it, etc.

We can still make J-2 rockets (they re-used everything but the nozzle to make the X-33's rocket engines) and a F-1-performing rocket isn't that hard to get started, either. Remember, part of the reason why the SSME is so damn expensive and tempremental is because it's got staged combustion. The F-1 was much simpler.

The problem is, people are far too attached to the *machine*, instead of the *idea*. I mean, sure, the Saturn V was the last machine that NASA has built that really lived up to its promises. The shuttle is a *beautiful* machine that has some nice properties, but has been strung along for the past 20 years and really never lived up to its promises. So, instead of asking why we can't build the Saturn V, we need to be asking why we can't get stuff up to space cheaply and safely.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[CrimsonAvenger]

NERVA, or the new P&W engine, for that matter, are not sufficient. We need a specific impulse in the thousands of seconds, at least, to reach the outer system in reasonable times.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[wikdwarlock]

You forget, perhaps, that this is, indeed, rocket science.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[cplusplus]

The shuttle's max payload to LEO is 28800 kg. If you include the weight of the shuttle itself, then, yes, it is 104000kg.
Saturn V's payload is 118000kg. If you want to lift a massive amount to LEO at once, the Saturn V was the way to go. Skylab was launched with a single two stage Saturn V. What normally would have been the third stage was the entire Skylab space station.
In fact, if you examine only lifting capacity, you could have boosted the entire International Space station to low earth orbit with two Saturn V's (with plenty to spare). How many trips have the shuttle and other rockets made to take parts up for that thing? Certainly more than two. As a heavy lifter, few have matched the Saturn V.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[AKAImBatman]

If you want to lift a massive amount to LEO at once, the Saturn V was the way to go.

I'm certainly not arguing that. I'm merely attempting to point out that the Space Shuttle received all the power of the Saturn V, and then some. In certain ways, it's actually more powerful. The only problem with it is that we sacrificed the ability to replace a manned vehicle with cargo.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[cmowire]

VW + Porsche cooperation, yeah.

Like the VW/Porsche SUV. Except that the 914 didn't suck. ;)

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[Rei]

3 Mile Island is the one of the worst examples of a nuclear disaster you could give. It was just well publicized; there are dozens of much less publicized reactor accidents that were far worse.

There are serious issues with launching a nuclear rocket from the surface of the earth (at the very least, there's the fact that rockets have nasty habits of exploding even without a nuclear reactor in them - especially during testing. And unlike RTGs, these will be far, far larger, and in most designs use high-pressure hydrogen flowing right through the core - not an easy technological feat for generating enough power to run a ~900 ISP engine. A detonation a couple thousand feet off the ground over Cape Canaveral, if the fuel elements got compressed, could render a couple hundred to a couple thousand acres of southern Florida unlivable (hiigher altitude disaster = better, because the radiation is more dispersed).

Now, launching one from space, even LEO, isn't that bad. On the way up, you can keep your fuel in a container designed to keep fuel from vaporizing in the event of an accidental reentry (like RTG fuel is), you can use a much more proven rocket to get it up there, the testing-rocket (if it didn't have its own LOX supply) wouldn't be at risk for an H2/O2 explosion, and if the testing-engine exploded, much of the radioactive waste would remain in orbit. Also I wouldn't want the used fuel to get anywhere close to earth on a return trip (when it has built up large amounts of the dangerous shorter half-life daughter elements); it should be required to throw its spent fuel on a sun-intercepting trajectory first (shouldn't be too hard - if you have it overshoot earth, you can have earth accelerate it toward the sun.)

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[AKAImBatman]

Skylab was actually a little weird. See, the US decided that they had to have a response to Russia's Solyut station. An idea was hatched to take the third stage of a Saturn booster (A Saturn IVB, IIRC) and modify the interior to be habitable. Of course, the problem was that the Saturn IVB didn't have enough fuel to actually get the entire thing into orbit. So Skylab was going to have to liftoff fuel of rocket fuel. This decision resulted in a lot of weird design choices for the station. Chief among them was the grated floor, through which the fuel was supposed to pass.

Before Skylab was ready for launch, however, a Saturn V became available from the cancelled Apollo missions. Thus Skylab went up dry, but the population had to suffer through Star Trek TNG's grates-for-flooring ships. :-)

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[Rei]

The Saturn wasn't that cheap per kg. It's cheaper than the Shuttle, but about the same as an Ariane, and more expensive than most Russian and Chinese rockets (and soon, will we add Japanese, Indian, Brazillian, and Israeli to that list? :) )

Part of the problem with building massive rockets (or rockets with low ISP for that matter, which tend to grow big) is that you really pay a penalty in terms of required structural integrity. It's one of the weaknesses of the "Big Dumb Booster" philosophy. Even construction and transportation of parts starts to make you pay prices: remember, one of the hardest issues to resolve for the shuttle was connecting the joints between manufactured SRB segments (and hence, the Challenger disaster).

Before we do our next new major rocket design, I'd like to see some serious materials and fuel research. Even possibly some research on how to make more affordable superalloys. Things like that are real payload multipliers.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[vsprintf]

The Saturn V was the John Holmes of rockets.

The Saturn V died from AIDS? I thought it died from lack of aids from NASA.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[ZB Mowrey]

If you include the weight of the shuttle itself, then, yes, it is 104000kg.

Saturn V's payload is 118000kg.

I'm merely attempting to point out that the Space Shuttle received all the power of the Saturn V, and then some.

These statements do not correspond well. The Sat V rocket could have carried the Shuttle *fully loaded*, with room to spare. Conversely, it would take 104 Full Shuttle Loads to carry One Saturn V rocket, "with a total mass of three thousand metric tonnes"...(that's 3 MILLION KG)...into LEO.

How exactly is that "all the power of the Saturn V, and then some."??

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[bleckywelcky]

Check this out:

http://www.boeing.com/defense-space/space/propul/R S68.html

The Rocketdyne RS-68. From conception to production in $500 Million and 4 or 5 years. The first large liquid-fueled rocket engine to be designed in the United States in 25 years. And the performance aint shabby considering that the deciding factor for every trade study was cost. I think if we applied this same model of design to a new reusable spacecraft with a short life span, it could work extremely well. The problem is, everyone wants the next vehicle to last 50 years or be the most efficient thing in the world and handle all of NASA's needs.

You can draw a comparison from this to the personal computer market. Back when I was younger, I always wanted the latest and greatest boards and devices to build my computers with. I would plop down $2000 for a ton of top-of-the-line equipment. But as I grew older, I realized that I could get less leading-edge stuff and it would still allow me to get my work done and play most of the latest games (although not all). So instead of spending $2000 on new equipment, I would spend $800. But, the time between upgrades changed. I would spend $800 every 1.5 years instead of $2000 every 2 to 2.5 years. But to make the $2000 investment match the cheaper one, I would have had to stretch it out to 3.75 years between upgrades. So my choice was financially more efficient. Not to mention that at the end of the $2000 life span, the equipment would not be that great anyhow even if it was the best at the start of the life span. However, the $800 equipment would almost always have decent performance throughout its entire life span.

So, I think NASA needs to redefine their goals for human spaceflight and to restructure their plan for reaching those goals. Instead of spending $X for a craft that can do everything and last Y years, they should just spend $X/3 for a craft that can do most things and last Y/2 years. This way they can also customize different crafts and different revisions of the crafts to take care of different tasks (1 version to do science, 1 version to build and resupply the ISS, etc).

It's all about diversification and simplification of systems, not trying to cram everything into 1 solution.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[AKAImBatman]

How exactly is that "all the power of the Saturn V, and then some."??

Because the shuttle is cargo. It's all about what makes it into orbit. In the case of the Saturn V, a mere fraction of the vehicle ever makes it up. In the case of the shuttle, a large percentage of the vehicle's mass makes it up.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[nyekulturniy]

Regrettably, the blueprints, as well as the tools and dies, of the Saturn series have been lost. We could probably build a Saturn-like rocket to serve the ISS, but wouldn't an upgraded Titan do as well?

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[IdahoEv]

Aren't Saturn Vs just magnificent? They're magnificent! I reckon it's time for them to make a come-back. Please?

This is next to impossible. Besides the fact that the plans and blueprints are no longer complete, tens of thousands of parts in the Saturn-V were off-the-shelf in 1968 but are not manufactured anymore. Some don't have any modern equivalent, meaning extensive redesign would be necessary. Where equivalent-function parts exist, they may be of different size, requiring re-layout of panels and boards.

And since human spaceflight requires extensive testing of integrated components, *every* system would have to be tested against *all* of these changes.

Also, we'd want to do most of the design in CAD, of course, for rapid development and because that's what current engineers know. But none of the existing blueprints are in CAD, so they'd have to be laboriously redrawn in the computer and checked.

Given the availability of modern engines like those in the Delta rockets and technologies (like computers) it would be of similar expense (and maybe even cheaper) to design a new heavy lifter with modern components than to rebuild a saturn-V. And cheaper to operate, to boot.

Ev

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[Thor Ablestar]

Oops, I mentioned nu-cu-lur. Mod down -5: Evil.

Firstly, the Green movement should be stopped, and instead of screaming "The nuclear waste is THE threat to humanity" we must invent a wise way to operate with it.

For instance, here in Russia are a lot of retired nuclear submarines rotting [LOCATION CENSORED]. And here in [LOCATION CENSORED] is a big nuclear fuel recycling plant that is almost bankrupt. We can clean the waste if we either pay to the plant (we have no money for it) or let it import the waste and process it. But the GreenPeace of Russia is going to do everything to stop the import and so let the submarines release our home-made waste to our seas and to the fish we eat.

In Georgia (I mean a Caucasian country, not US state) the background radiation is 10 times higher due to uranium deposits and height (so cosmic rays penetrate the atmosphere more easily). But Georgia had the fame of republic of USSR where people live longest.

You may remember that during a launch of Cassini there also was an environmental scandal because it has isotope power sources aboard.

And only then we can think about anything more efficient than disposable chemical rockets.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[macshome]

I don't know about the fuel thing, but I've been to the full size training unit in Huntsville and they showed us shoes that had blocks on the soles that would lock into the grated floors.

Re:Saturn Vs, Please?

[CaptainAvatar]

It's Hohmann, not Holmann. Says I, an ex-astrophysics student named Holman :)

I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[Gentoo Fan]

Why rely on several decades old tech for long term dependancies? Some R&D never hurt anyone (except the budget, but that's a separate discussion).

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[Simon G Best]

Why rely on several decades old tech for long term dependancies?...

Well, after a few years, technology tends to be more than just a few years old. (Yes, it is now time to slap yourself on the forehead.)

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[Gentoo Fan]

What I meant was: The shuttle design/tech is a few decades old *now*. The ISS is still not finished, and should hopefully be up there in orbit for a long time. So it seems foolish to assume that the shuttle(s) will still be a viable vehicle for a long time to come when there may be a better approach, just that it needs to be looked into *now*.

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[Anonymous Coward]

Decades old tech? Like doors, floors, stairs? Old = Good in my book. You can have all the new you want, I'll take proven and reliable.

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[julesh]

Unfortunately, this doesn't sound like R&D. This sounds like taking a step backwards and losing the capacity for manned flight for the foreseeable future.

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[kfg]

(except the budget, but that's a separate discussion).

Yes, but it's the discussiont that must be held before your primary query can be addressed.

Look to your own household for examples, do you, for instance, drive a car that is the embodiment of Saturn V era technology (such as a Ford Taurus) or something more akin to today's level of technology (like a McLaren F1).

My guess is that budgetary issues took primacy before you even went out car shopping.

KFG

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[KyleJacobson]

Well at least we landed on the moon... I dont care what proof others have of it, IM NOT LISTENING!!! *plugs ears and yells loudly while running in circles*

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[Simon G Best]

Oh I see!

Well, they have been developing newer stuff for years, including single-stage-to-orbit (SSTO) vehicles (such as, if I remember correctly, the X-33?). Oh, and I think they've got aerospike engines, too!

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[Alioth]

A McLaren F1 is no more akin to 'todays technology' than a new Ford Taurus. If you wanted to do that example, something like, say, a Volkswagen TDi is 'more akin to today's technology' than a Taurus. The VW doesn't cost more than the Taurus.

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[Suidae]

losing the capacity for manned flight for the foreseeable future.

Because we can't put men on disposable rockets??

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[MindStalker]

Unless we buy russian rockets we have no disposable rockets that have a return capsule capability. So no, not if you want them to get back.

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[melandy]

Some R&D never hurt anyone

Well, actually, it does. Remember Apollo 1?

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[roman_mir]

Windows...

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[justanyone]

"Old == Good" only if "old == well-used".

Engineering has a principle of 'characterization'. You characterize a part by determining what it does under all the circumstances you can think of. You end up knowing exactly how/when/where it fails with good statistical accuracy.

NASA needs to order raw materials and pay by the pound C.O.D. (Cash On Delivery), auctioned off to lowest bidder.

For person-rated craft, NASA needs to choose the reliabilty of the craft they're willing to pay for, and publish it. Yes, cold hearted. But yes, necessary. That puts firm dollar figures in front of the vehicle manufacturers. That allows them to characterize every component of the craft and go through successive iterations of design to improve the reliability.

I believe P&W, Allis, Boeing, MD, et al have well-characterized engines now, but they don't have the volume necessary or the incentive to deliver the goods. We can do better with competitive bidding, newer vehicle design, and less political input into NASA technical decisions (egad the Shuttle is old, let it retire).

Pay for delivery, let the private sector drive the process.

-- Kevin

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[roju]

Maybe 'more modern' in this case is referring at least in part to a high-efficiency, clean deisel engine?

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[Rei]

Please tell me you were kidding when you said "I thought that NASA might even use the winner of the x-prize for the future of space exploration". That's like if someone held a go-cart race, and you said "I thought that Ford might even use the winner of that go-cart race for the next SUV."

X-prize craft are about as close to orbital spacecraft as fish are to bicycles.

There were a number of technical problems involved in programs like the X-33 (if I remember right, the X33 had some problems with the aerospike engines and with fabricating a tank as light as their design called for kept causing ruptures after repeated use). But, yes, the goal should be "keep trying, with different approaches, until we get something better.". There's no reason why launch costs *have* to be this expensive; the only major thing that *has* to be expended (the fuel) is cheap. It's always the practical side of each particular design that gets in the way.

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[susano_otter]

X-prize craft are about as close to orbital spacecraft as fish are to bicycles.

So researching and developing fish is a necessary and productive precursor to a robust and useful bicycle?

Who knew?!

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[Rei]

X-prize craft didn't do R&D that would help reach orbital (heck, some of them were little more than tweaked V2s). They were unscalable designs targetted for a single purpose (reach 100km with no orbital velocity). They were glorified sounding rockets.

As an example of why, say, SpaceShipOne cannot scale: It has a low ISP engine with necessarily heavy tanks (since it uses a self-pressurizing oxidizer). This means that is has a very sharp scale-up curve. However, it only currently has 1/20th the delta-V to reach orbit. To get 20x the delta-V with such a low ISP/high mass rocket, you'd have to scale up the rocket somewhere around 1000-fold. A carrier for such a heavy rocket would make a Cossack look like a hummingbird; its effectively impossible. To get SpaceShipOne to orbit, you'd have to ditch both the engines and the tanks; yet, that's 90% of the rocket.

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[shutdown -p now]

And what exactly is wrong about buying Russian rockets?

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[susano_otter]

Valid points, all.

As is mine, I think. Let me rephrase it:

X-Prize contestants, the Mercury/Redstone system, the Saturn V, and the Space Shuttle all operate within the same general problem space.

Fish and bicycles... don't.

It's not like fish are to bicycles as the Apollo Project is to the Space Shuttle Orbiter.

Especially given the X-Prize sponsor's stated intention to make the X-Prize a recurring competition, with several win categories, and annual financial and social encouragement to extend and better previous achievements by previous contestants.

That, in itself, put X-Prize contestants over time a lot closer to orbital missions than fish will ever get to bicycles.

Sure, suborbital lobs are the most trivial task in spaceflight, so it's hardly surprising that the very first spaceflight attempt ever made by a private entity would be a suborbital lob. That doesn't mean they're the only thing X-Prize contestants will ever do, or the only thing future designs will be capable of.

Some people see the X-Prize as the beginning of a new and exciting era in space travel. You see it as a pointless dead end, bereft of all value before it's even accomplished. Is it all the rain we've been having lately, or is your world always this bleak?

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[legLess]

I suppose I could have spoken of the Ferrari Enzo, but my mommy always told me that if you can't say anthing nice don't say anything at all.

Heh. It's the first time I've seen a Ferrari and thought, WTF?

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[xSauronx]

i dont care where we landed, i want a fucking lightsaber already.

Halt shuttle maintenance and production, and make lightsabers. Watch:

1 ignore sending people to space

2 make light sabers

3 profit

see? thats terribly easy. lightsabers are going to sell like hotcakes and nasa will be rich enough to buy someone elses spaceship.

Re:I would hope they are at least "investigating"

[Junior J. Junior III]

No problem, just crew all future manned space missions with TV news anchors, lawyers, politicians, and boy bands. No need for return capsules at all, and the earth rids itself of 99% of mind pollution.

Im not surpised

[deft]

I'd be appaulled if they DIDN'T consider retiring the fleet as an option. To NOT do so would be pig headed. There could very well be a better way, regardless of how great the shuttle program has been, and how much it means to me as someone who grew up having the best "show and tell" pictures because my dad worked on the shuttle.

There's alot of brilliant people over there that don't make it a habit of ignoring all the options, and all the possibilities. Thats what lets them acheive such great heights. I'd be sorry to see it go though.

Re:Im not surpised

[meringuoid]

I've said it before, and I'm sure I'll say it again, especially since I keep getting +5 Insightful for this :-)

1. Retire the Shuttle and use Soyuz, which works just fine.

2. With the money saved, build ships to go somewhere new. Or even somewhere we went FORTY YEARS AGO.

The Shuttle was a neat idea that didn't work out. There's no shame in admitting that. Russia ditched Buran because of the cost and continued to run a fine Earth-orbit operation for years based on Soyuz tech. Let's use American technology to take mankind further, rather than just duplicate what's already there.

Re:Im not surpised

[RedWizzard]

Soyuz works fine for what it does, but it's an artificial limitation on the usefulness of the Station because it limits the number of occupants to three. A replacement for Soyuz is desirable, IMHO.

Re:Im not surpised

[evilviper]

The Shuttle was a neat idea that didn't work out.

I've got to disagree with you, COMPLETELY. The shuttle worked out very well, and has done so for a very long time.

It's under a cloud now, and it's politically a bad-word, but it was an incredibly successful project. Wouldn't have anything like the hubble without it.

Now, I will concede that the Shuttle is past it's prime, and a re-design is in order. Not because it doesn't or hasn't worked, but simply because we can do better. Also because a newer craft would require less per-trip investment, and pay for itself.

Re:Im not surpised

[Friggo]

Soyuz works fine for what it does, but it's an artificial limitation on the usefulness of the Station because it limits the number of occupants to three. A replacement for Soyuz is desirable, IMHO.

No, It's not an artificial contraint on the number of personel on the space station. It just limits the number of people that can go to/from the station at any one time to three.

Re:Im not surpised

[RedWizzard]

It just limits the number of people that can go to/from the station at any one time to three.

No, it limits the total number of occupants to three. No matter how many additional modules are added, while Soyuz is the "liferaft" only three people can occupy the station. That's a serious limitation.

Re:Im not surpised

[Lars T.]

It worked out very well given that it was changed for military missions (which made it more expensive) and that the budget was cut (resulting in it having solid fuel boosters from the cheapest bidder).

Why not just....

[elid]

...outsource it to India? :-)

Well...

[hype7]

if the retirement (what a lovely euphemism) is in lieu of a new program, great.

If the scrapping is in lieu of nothing... that's not so great.

I do think a vehicle capable of re-use is important to the goal to get us off the planet; if they need to use rockets to get the ISS done while a new vehicle is built, so be it.

-- james

Re:Well...

[julesh]

It does sound from the article like there won't be a replacement any time soon.

BTW: "In lieu of" doesn't mean what you seem to think it means.

Re:Well...

[Suidae]

I'm not so sure on the reusability thing. Launch and re-entry is very rough on equipment, it may very well be that its cheaper and safer to make stuff that is rugged enough for one use and that can then be either thrown away or recycled.

As has been mentioned before, we probably need a combination of cheap disposable tech for heavy equipment lifting and light, reliable, reusable tech for moving people.

Re:Well...

[zippthorne]

It is important to note that there is no indication that "reusable" = cheaper, which was the primary reason for the Space Shuttle experiment. The space shuttle was a test to see if we could put stuff and people in orbit more cheaply and safely than before by using a reusable design. Almost 30 years later, the results of that experiment are being ignored: we can't. To be fair this answer was well supported after the Challenger disaster...

The space shuttle is not only less functional than the saturn V -- can put 30,000 lbs into LEO vs. the saturn V's 200,000 lbs into LEO or 10,000 lbs to the MOON, it is more costly (Since you must average the fixed cost over a small number of launches and the per-launch costs were approaching saturn-V levels anyway).

It is also less safe. Although the two disasters during the past hundred or so launches mean a 2% failure rate for the program, both of those occured during production phase of the program rather than the development phase as in other systems.. i.e. Arianne has a dismal safety record compred to the shuttle, but its numbers are improving with every launch.

Furthermore, since the structural mass of any launch vehicle is about 10% (on a GOOD day), calling it reuseable in the same way as your car is reuseable is a bit of a stretch.

Factor in aerospace margin-o-safety of 1.1 compared to automobiles at about 2 and you begin to realize that a significant portion of the non-fuel part of a reusable launch vehicle will be replace during the necessary maintenance interval between each an every launch.

As long as the use of chemical rockets require systems to be built within a hair's breadth of their tolerances, I would personally prefer a fresh one each launch. I'd know that there were no fatigue problems since the rocket was new and, perhaps more importantly, every single one is an improvement over the last one.

I know it seems like I'm unfairly reaming the shuttle program, but it was necessary to have the program to shake out all of its difficulties. If it had gone the other way -- lots of cheap launches, then we'd have learned much also, so in a sense, failure is just a usefull as success would've been.

I think NASA is aware of the difficulties and i'm glad to hear that they are finally thinking of scrapping the program (even if it is just a rumor), but I seem to recall that the replacement for the shuttle was scrapped not because of technical problems but because the various pieces of the project could not be spread around enough States to make it feasable to enough congress people.

Re:Well...

[mOdQuArK!]

It is important to note that there is no indication that "reusable" = cheaper, which was the primary reason for the Space Shuttle experiment. The space shuttle was a test to see if we could put stuff and people in orbit more cheaply and safely than before by using a reusable design. Almost 30 years later, the results of that experiment are being ignored: we can't.

Hardly. The reusable/cheap argument was really given only lip service, and the Space Shuttle turned out to be more of a jobs & pork program for NASA than an attempt at achieving a truly well-engineered solution.

There's plenty of documentation on how top-down the Shuttle design process was, ending up with a design where every little change required massive reanalysis on how that change affected every other part of the Shuttle. Any half-assed industrial engineer would be able to tell you how inefficient & error-prone that kind of design process is going to be. (This doesn't mean that the final design will necessarily be bad, only that it will be very expensive to change.)

NASA _should_ have approached the problem with a mindset geared toward creating & maintaining a fleet of shuttles (probably using a similar approach to designing airplanes for commercial use), but they blew quite a bit of money & public trust trying to maintain an engineering nightmare flying.

In other words, the issue of whether or not something reusable can make for a cheaper space program than the throwaway approach has _not_ been tested.

Re:Well...

[zippthorne]

What were the other stated goals? More lifting capacity? More delta-V? staying up longer?

Was spreading tax-money around an actual stated goal of the program?

I'll conceed that the reusable premise has not been thoroughly tested, but maintain that the ostensible purpose for the space shuttle was to reduce the cost of space flight to an acceptable long-term level. The fact that it turned out to be a pork project is in fact a documented result of what i'll call the reusable experiment.

As it turned out the politics could not be overcome for such a large and long-term project. What we know to be lip service now was not as obviously so then.

You are definately correct in pointing out that with only one data point in the history of this country, and i think two overall -- USSR cancelled their reusable program before it really started though, there really isn't enough statistical evidance that a reusable program can't be cheaper, only that so far, 100% of the time they haven't been.

It was inevitable.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, let's face it. Who has money for new technology or updating technologies in existing space shuttles? The nation has much more important priorities, like conquering other countries and pissing off the rest of the world.

Besides, the pursuit of science is useless unless it can serve a political purpose, right?

Re:It was inevitable.

[merky1]

Hey, that brings up an excellent Idea... Lets put O'sama in Space. Then there will be lotsa money for space exploration. It wouldn't be too hard, now that spaceship one is a go....

i can't help but think

[phaetonic]

could the recent privatization of space travel have something to do with this?

Re:i can't help but think

[goldspider]

In a word: no.

Not at least until the private sector comes up with a vehicle that is capable of what the shuttle accomplished.

The X-Prize was a good start, but they are still a long way off.

Re:i can't help but think

[XanC]

My understanding is that NASA is going to be focusing on tasks in which there's no money (or incentive for private investment) at the moment. Basically, that means exploration. The rest (research, tourism) can be done privately.

Re:i can't help but think

[mr_snarf]

could the recent privatization of space travel have something to do with this?

No.

Since when has space flight been privatised? As great and important as Burt Rutan's team's achievment was, it was only sub-orbital, can't really be considered space travel. In 10 years time privitised space travel maybe be a reality, but we still need something in the mean-time.

Note: I think the winning of the x-prize was truely an important event. More privitized sub-orbital flights are sure to follow. But its only the beginning at the moment.

Re:i can't help but think

[mr_snarf]

Yes, you have a very good point. NASA and other space-agencies should be at the cutting edge of space-exploration and research. Personally I think this is why safety shouldn't be such a huge issue. The people who sign up for this know the risks. These days we have become too caught up in making everything perfectly safe, so that nothing ever gets done.

No, I wouldn't strap myself ontop of several hundred tons of fuel which is on fire, but there are plently of people out there willing it. Remember the days when explorers were heros?

Re:i can't help but think

[shawn(at)fsu]

While I applaud the effort of the XPrize contestants and winner I think were getting a little ahead of ourselves. It was historic yes but was it really that ground breaking? I don't think the folks at NASA are worrying about "who's going to be last out the door has to shut off the lights" just yet. I think government space agencies will continue to be the giants for a while to come and private enterprises will be standing on there shoulders. Think of all the money that our government has spent to get information that scaled composites used to do their thing. NASA has put a men on the moon and brought them home, scaled composites barely got out of the atmosphere.

Maybe NASA realizes that the space shuttle is old, based on old technology and old agendas that it had a hard time living up to. My father said that when they were starting the shuttle program they were saying something about a launch every couple of weeks or something insane like that.

Re:i can't help but think

[Yunzil]

Not at least until the private sector comes up with a vehicle that is capable of what the shuttle accomplished.

Which was... what? Not live up to the plans for it?

The shuttle was a dog from day 1. Its payload wasn't big enough and there really weren't as many missions that required humans to be present as it was originally thought.

Re:i can't help but think

[plaiddragon]

Not at least until the private sector comes up with a vehicle that is capable of what the shuttle accomplished.

Which was... what? Not live up to the plans for it?

Orbit

no shuttles

[wh173b0y]

would it be cheaper to use disposible rockets to finish the iss? or are they worried about the possiblity of long term failure of the aging shuttle fleet...

Re:no shuttles

[AKAImBatman]

Let me put it this way. The Space Shuttle costs $500 million dollars for each flight. A Delta II costs ~$50 million (with possible bulk discounts bringing the price down from there). The shuttle has a maximum cargo loadout of 28.8 metric tons. The Delta II has a maximum loadout of 10.9 metric tons.

1 Shuttle Flight:

$500m
28.8 metric tons

10 Delta II flights:

$500m
10 x 10.9 = 109 metric tons

Any questions?

Re:no shuttles

[AxelTorvalds]

Plus there is a, what? 2%? chance that any given shuttle flight is going to end catastrophically. How reliable are the deltas?

Re:no shuttles

[AKAImBatman]

The Delta II's have a similar launch success rating. Which is more than sufficient for cargo. Manned flight would require a greater degree of preparation and certification for the rocket.

Re:no shuttles

[Timesprout]

Any questions?

Yes, what are these metric tons of which you speak, are they related to these?

Also 500 Million a flight is worth it to get treasured moments like the inaguration of the Columbia where Ronald Regan almost brought a tear to my eye telling me about the all current evil terrorist Afghanis were wonderful brave freedom fighters battling for good against the nasty evil empire Russian terrorists who are now our friends.

Re:no shuttles

[ericzundel]

An interesting idea, but I think this equation is a bit too simplistic.

First of all, in a Delta II there's no place to sit!

Second, even if it were unmanned (just use Soyuz to get the people up there) there is no infrastructure to steer your cargo toward ISS and safely rendevous. I think that infrastructure will take a big bite out of the Delta II payload.

So we'd have to spend the R&D on a new third stage with rendevous capabilities, and the total payload would be reduced.

Re:no shuttles

[wing03]

This was covered on a PBS program.... Can't remember the name.

The Russians are doing disposable successfully with the Soyuz and yes indeed, they are cheaper to launch/build and can do far more work for less money.

The one group in the states that insists on reuseable space craft are/were the millitary.

Actually, I think it was the airforce specifically insisting on vehicles that behaved like aircraft in the atmosphere.

I don't recall too much else from the program, but there might have been some mention of opposition to the navy having control of aircraft on their carriers. The impression I got was that the USAF wanted to have their hands at the controls when it came to the future of space warfare and defence rather than some other organization.

Re:no shuttles

[Anonymous Coward]

This is silly. The modules currently built or under construction won't fit. They are designed specifically to fit in the cargo bay of the shuttle, both in shape and the location of attachment points. This is mentioned in the article.

Re:no shuttles

[AKAImBatman]

That was just an example. There are other rockets they could use, all of which have greater cargo capacity than the Delta II.

Re:no shuttles

[cmowire]

The reason why the shuttle behaved like an aircraft was that it was also intended to launch from Vanderberg AFB, grab a Russian sattelite and/or launch a nuke, and then land. You need crossrange (a.k.a. gliding range) for that. Heck, you need crossrange to hit polar orbit without ending up in the drink in case of abort.

The problem is, both groups wanted reusable, but congress wanted NASA and the airforce to do *Everything* (even stuff that is launched on Atlas, Delta, and Titan launchers) on the shuttle. When, had they just made something for exploration of space and space station logistics, they could have made some different (and, in retrospect, better) design decisions.

The USAF has *always* been chomping at the bit to take over space. Since the 50s. One of the main reasons why the Russians orbited the first satelite is because we wanted the first satelite to be a civilian satelite, for a variety of political and international relations reasons. The USAF *could* have launched something sooner, but was told not to.

On the other hand, we did cause Russia to waste a similar amount of money to ensure they had strategic parity. Buran was just as much, if not more, of a military vehicle as the shuttle.

Re:no shuttles

[CrimsonAvenger]

Yes.

What happens when you want to lift something that masses 27 metric tons? A Delta can't do it. And a lot of pieces aren't built to be easily disassembled/reassembled in space. Like the habitat modules.

Re:no shuttles

[AKAImBatman]

What happens when you want to lift something that masses 27 metric tons?

You RTF Responses.

Re:no shuttles

[Gadzinka]

And Russians built better and cheaper rockets...

If you want to mod me down, look for Russian rocket engines bought lately for installation in American crafts (saw something about it on Discovery the other day).

Robert

Re:no shuttles

[Thud457]

What's funny is that the AF insisited on having all that input on the Shuttle design -- and now they predominantly use disposable rockets to get their payloads up. Quitters!

Supersonic Spaceplane

[Anonymous Coward]

What ever happened to the supersonic spaceplanes that they were working on that were to eventually replace the shuttle? I seem to remember reading about them years ago...

Re:Supersonic Spaceplane

[AKAImBatman]

The Supersonic Spaceplane was scrapped in favor of the ScramJet Spaceplane, which was scrapped in favor of the DC-X Delta Clipper, which was scrapped in favor of the X-33 VentureStar, which was scrapped in favor of a little ScramJet missile (the X-43). Thus we've come full circle.

The real problem is that NASA has been trying to build craft out of untested technologies. The end result is that each program (with the exception of the DC-X) failed due to delays and cost overruns. For example, the VentureStar HAD to have hydrogen slush, composite tanks, linear aerospike engines, and new thermal protection systems all working perfectly the first time. There was no room to change out anything that didn't behave as expected.

As a result, we've been kind of chasing our tails around a bit instead of building craft out of proven technology.

Re:Supersonic Spaceplane

[IdahoEv]

What ever happened to the supersonic spaceplanes that they were working on that were to eventually replace the shuttle? I seem to remember reading about them years ago...

An equivalent question: "What happened to the rapid adoption of 90nm wafers that was going to bring us all 6GHz processors by late 2003?" Or "what happened to fusion power, which has been 20 years away since 1960?"

The answer to all of them: it turned out to be a shitload harder than we expected.

New operating regimes (higher speed, pressure, temperature, smaller manufacturing scales, whatever) sometimes bring new problems, and things have to slow down until the scientists and engineers solve them or find workarounds.

At the same time, nobody in 1960 even considered that you might be able to buy a gigaflop CPU for $300 at walmart in 2004. Nobody predicts the future very well.

Re:Supersonic Spaceplane

[Thud457]

Sounds like in this case NASA is doing what it should be doing -- research. Apparently none of the proposed solutions are ready for primetime so they either need to : a) do further refinement or b) try something else. Now, promoting the proposed implementation as the final "goal" is a bit disingenous of them, and makes them look like they have a chain of failed programs when really, they are doing R&D.

Re:Supersonic Spaceplane

[WindBourne]

Actually, X-43 was started shortly after X-33. Some think that the X-33 was finished for the military. Still hard to know in light of the current political situation.

The X-43 was flown successfully 2x (and 1x as a failure) and then was turned over to the airforce. Almost certainly for doing missles or a defense against sunburn missles.

Re:Supersonic Spaceplane

[AKAImBatman]

Sounds like in this case NASA is doing what it should be doing -- research.

Not quite. NASA was trying to make fully usable vehicles instead of research vehicles. The X-43 is the first item on that list that gets back to the core research aspect.

Re:Supersonic Spaceplane

[RedWizzard]

Just some minor pedantry: DC-X was the name of the 1/3 scale Delta Clipper demostrator. Had the program continued there would have been a DC-Y prototype, and hopefully finally a DC-1 launch vehicle. The Delta Clipper program was aimed to design an unmanned reusable lifter with quick turnaround (the DC-X set a world record turnaround of 26 hours), but it wouldn't have had the cargo capacity of the Space Shuttle (9 tons v 29 tons).

References:

• Wikipedia DC-X page
• Astronautix DC-X page
• Astronautix DC-Y page
• Armadillo Aerospace's DC-X page (with videos)

Re:Supersonic Spaceplane

[AKAImBatman]

Actually, X-43 was started shortly after X-33.

I said that. "The X-33 was scrapped in favor of the X-43A."

Some think that the X-33 was finished for the military.

I can't say I've ever heard that. I do find it somewhat doubtful, though. The X-33 prototype hit the ground and blew up. If they wanted to finish it, the engineers would have had to start over with a new vehicle.

Re:Supersonic Spaceplane

[jadel]

The X-33 prototype hit the ground and blew up.

AFAIK the X-33 never reached the flight testing stage, you may be thinking about the DC-X which crashed on landing and caught fire after a number of test flights.

Good and Sensible

[thpr]

It's called "business sense" in my book. Occasionally analyze your largest components of spending to determine if they are necessary in their current incarnation. Look at alternatives, weigh risks, do cost/benefit and all that.

NASA is irresponsible if they DON'T do this occasionally (just not constantly) and such an investigation doesn't mean anything with regards to the formal "plans". If you have any knowledge of a strategy team or executive in a large company, you'll know just how often weird things that are "out of plan" are considered and subsequently dismissed... I guess it gives the rumor mill something to do.

Re:Good and Sensible

[RealProgrammer]

[nods in agreement]

As in any bureaucracy, NASA has entrenched heavyweights. There is a lot of intertia on the side of the Shuttle program (and the whole reusability mindset). They do a study about feasibility of the Shuttle, but the decision is a probably based more on internal politics than the results of a study.

Fighting against the Shuttle intertia you have the build-it-cheap-and-trash-it crowd, who want to make $1000 vehicles that burn up on reentry (or maybe on Kansas, but that's neither here nor there [ok, so I guess it's there]).

I know that probably glosses a lot, but that's my outsider's model of what's going on.

How they're going to get down.

[StarKruzr]

Like this.

Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

I'd much rather my tax dollars were spent with Burt Rutan and Scaled Composites...

Re:Burt Rutan...

[Anonymous Coward]

Rutan has been spectacularly lucky. After he blows the fuck out of a few people I think NASA will look pretty good in comparison.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[ZeroGee]

Rutan's accomplishment, while impressive, is a glorified airplane. Doing orbital insertion and orbital return is a far more complex task. The media frequently links "private space enterprise" with the X-prize attempts, but while they are a start towards a burdgeoning industry, we are still miles away from having another realistic orbital option in place.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[TheOste]

It may be an airplane, but I would say that with the ideas and innovations driven primarly by rutan and scaled composites that we will see much chepaer orbital insertions. Remember the first rocket powered human flights were not orbital insertions.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[WayneConrad]

I'd much rather my tax dollars were spent with Burt Rutan and Scaled Composites...

I'd rather my tax dollars weren't spent except where absolutely necessary (say, for defense). Everything else, leave to industry. A free market economy can make far better decisions about how to spend money than can politicans.

"How should the government spend my money" is the wrong question. How little of my money can we get away with the government getting is the right question.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[Anonymous Coward]

You have no reason to think that Rutan can design reusable orbiters any better than NASA. What NASA does all of the time is far more complicated than what Scaled Composites did. When Rutan can get beyond the Mercury project, you let us know.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[ZeroGee]

Once again, while I do admit that what Scaled has done is good for the "space industry," there is not necessarily a direct correlation between suborbital jaunts such as SpaceShipOne's and true orbital flight. The design skillset and materials required are completely different between the two types of "flight," and Rutan will not be seen as the "Father of Private Spaceflight" -- whoever builds the first private orbital plane will be.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[Mark of THE CITY]

Vostok always went orbital, from the first lauch. It was Mercury that didn't.

Gagarin orbited before Shepherd sub-orbited.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

I'd put his record against NASA's anytime!

He has built something along the lines of 300 aircraft designs, 39 of which have been completely unique designs from the ground up.

He's never lost a craft or a pilot.

NASA has a similar resume (although orbit and the moon are an order of magnitude more complex), and have "blown the f*ck" out of quite a few people.

This is, of course, and apples and oranges comparison, because it simply isn't possible to compare the two any other way.

But to say he has been "spectacularly lucky" is just plain horse crap.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

While I agree completely with you, we would be giving up far more than you may realize.

The internet, for instance, couldn't have been done without the governments of the world, and the American government in particular.

GPS, OnStar, satellite TV, any many other technological and medical advancements are the direct result of government spending. It could be argued that all or most of these would have come about eventually, but it may have been a very long wait.

But the principle that government should only do what can only be done by the government is sound, and I stand behind it.

When I see the vast waste in the government, and the huge amounts of handouts, it really makes me dislike taxes...

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

I think the point is that Burt Rutan and Scaled did something that few thought possible, and more importantly they did it using an ingenious design and with incredible efficiency.

More important still is the rate at which they made, and continue to make, progress.

Burt already has plans made for a 7 man orbital rocket, and even space station for the common man.

I think the trend is far more important than where we are in the trend. And if you follow the trend out 10 or 20 years, I think you'll see groups and companies surpassing NASA and other governments in terms of complexity, success, usefulness, and efficiency.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[code_rage]

How far would Rutan have gone without federal R&D? Some of the contracts on which he developed his expertise were federal contracts. Carbon composite structures probably had a lot of federal R&D, particularly from the military. And let's face it -- the huge economic expansion of the 1960s was greatly aided by the GI Bill.

It is simply a myth that private enterprise always knows how to spend money better than the govt. We can debate about the particulars (where to draw the line), but extreme libertarian viewpoints have never been demonstrated in a modern economy.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

I don't think it is safe to assume he won't be the person who builds the first private orbital spaceship.

He already has plans for it, and now that there is a $50M purse up for grabs to the winner, I doubt he's just going to dissappear from the scene.

Don't underestimate Burt Rutan. The Ansari's did and it cost them $10M...

Re:Burt Rutan...

[diamondsw]

Ah yes, I too loved the 19th century. Lovely working conditions back in the day...

Re:Burt Rutan...

[John Miles]

Honestly, NASA hasn't blown the fuck out of that many people, when you get right down to it. Three on Apollo 1, seven on Challenger, and seven on Columbia. Seventeen deaths in over thirty years. BFD. I'll bet more NASA employees than that have keeled over during their morning coffee/cigarette breaks.

If we want manned space exploration to happen, we'll have to grow a (collective) pair and make the necessary sacrifices that pioneers have always made.

Now, I'm as happy for Rutan as anyone, but when you stand on the shoulders of giants, as he does, it's just plain rude to wear cleats. All of his NASA-bashing talk will sound a lot more credible when he radios in his "neener-neener-neener" comments from Earth orbit.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[ZeroGee]

Don't underestimate Burt Rutan. The Ansari's did and it cost them $10M...

Come on. Ansari put up the prize for the publicity. $10 million is a drop in the bucket. Are you seriously trying to claim that the people behind the X-Prize were rooting for the participants to fail? Take off that tinfoil hat, please.

Fair enough, if Rutan can do an orbital spaceship, more power to him. But we're still ten years off, at least, before we get to a "SpaceShipOne" level of craft that can be a reusuable-to-orbit vehicle. A lot of things can happen in that time. Scaled's experience thus far doesn't even make them a favorite in that race. It's wide open.

Not to mention that a SpaceShipOne development cost > $20 million for a "$10 million prize." $50 million doesn't even DENT the development costs for ORBITAL travel.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[crawling_chaos]

How little of my money can we get away with the government getting is the right question.

As long as you continue to receive the same level of benefits, of course. Which means the government will be taking more of someone else's money while leaving you yours. Hey. You just summed up someone's "economic recovery" program!

Re:Burt Rutan...

[jmays]

I'd rather my tax dollars weren't spent except where absolutely necessary (say, for defense)

You're right helping other people individually and/or the whole race is ABSOLUTELY out of the question. Fuck them ... just protect me.

Yeeah.

A free market economy can make far better decisions about how to spend money than can politicans.

A free market? You mean one without regulation? Or just the one that is controlled by greedy bastards? Megacoporations are ALWAYS into helping people and CERTAINLY don't exist purely for themselves.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[WolfWithoutAClause]

How far would Rutan have gone without federal R&D?

I'd say he'd probably have gone; for example, all the way around the world without refuelling.

Scaled composites was started because he had proven expertise in composite aerospace vehicles, and Scaled composite was the company he started to leverage that to generate income.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[ZeroGee]

I think the point is that Burt Rutan and Scaled did something that few thought possible, and more importantly they did it using an ingenious design and with incredible efficiency.

Maybe few outside the industry. Rutan's accomplishments were not exactly "revolutionary." Other X-prize teams with far less expertise and less manpower came quite close to succeeding, as well. This was just not an area of much research prior to the "X-prize" -- which is the main reason why the X-prize was such a great thing for science. All the participants were going for the notoriety and the fame, not for the $10 million bonus. (See actual development costs of SpaceShipOne for more details).

Burt already has plans made for a 7 man orbital rocket, and even space station for the common man.

So do lots of other groups. Orbital travel is far from just over the hill, however. Going from current private airplane technology (where Rutan already had years of experience) to what SpaceShipOne achieved is nothing compared to going from what SpaceShipOne achieved to being able to cheaply and easily transport people and materials into orbit.

I think the trend is far more important than where we are in the trend. And if you follow the trend out 10 or 20 years, I think you'll see groups and companies surpassing NASA and other governments in terms of complexity, success, usefulness, and efficiency.

Agreed 100%. The future of space travel will be run by multi-national private industry, and will be far more efficient and successful than what NASA could justify to Congressional Committees. Just don't throw your life savings into Rutan's corner just yet. There's a long way to go, and lots of other people to lead us there.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[Damek]

I would contend that free markets do not exist, but that is a discussion for another day.

What I want to address is your statement that the "right question" is "How little of my money can we get away with the government getting" - I think that is ignorant and short-sighted.

The real "right question" is, how do we forge policies that ensure a strong nation, broad prosperity, and effective government? We're all in this together - it isn't just about you and your money. Focusing soley on the money spent is the wrong way to approach your participation in civil society.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[cje]

I'd rather my tax dollars weren't spent except where absolutely necessary (say, for defense). Everything else, leave to industry.

As far as the space program is concerned, the problem with this is that "industry" is typically only interested in things that can be done for financial gain. Now, there are certain things associated with space that are (or will be) profitable; space tourism is an obvious example. Additionally, the aerospace industry (i.e., Boeing) already sells its services to the government in the form of launch vehicles to put satellites into orbit, and competing for various technical contracts.

The problem is that not everything that involves the space program is done for (or will result in) financial gain. For example, consider the recent Mars rover missions. By all accounts, these missions have increased our knowledge of the Red Planet by several times more than all of the previous missions combined. Are these missions profitable? Is anybody making money off of them (aside from the private sector contractors that won the bids to do a lot of the work that went into them?) Probably not.

CEOs in the boardrooms of private industry would never say "I know! Let's build a spacecraft to explore the Saturn system and a probe to land on Titan!" They would never undertake such a mission because there would be no financial reason for them to do so. This is not a "slam" against corporations; it's just a basic statement of fact. The fundamental role of the corporation is to earn profits for its shareholders, and there is nothing financially profitable about building a complicated probe to explore the moons of Saturn.

But does that mean that such a mission is not profitable in other, less tangible ways? Aside from the more zealous libertarian types who only want to see their tax dollars spent on tanks or the extreme fundamentalist types who view exploration of the heavens as blasphemy, most people would probably agree that expanding our knowledge of the universe that we live in is a Good Thing (TM). It's profitable from an intellectual and scientific (if not economic) standpoint. And it's hardwired into our very being; curiosity (and the desire to satisfy that curiosity) is one of the things that makes us human.

So I'm all for expanding the role of private industry in space, but there will always be a role for publicly-funded missions as well. And that is how it should be. Space is an awfully big place; there's plenty of room for both the public and the private sectors.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[code_rage]

I'm not going to get into a pissing match, trying to prove Rutan's inadequacy. He's clearly a very skilled and brilliant designer. The question is however, would the private sector, on its own, do as well? Again, the kernel of my argument is that Rutan did not do the basic research on composites, only the applied R&D. That in itself points to a very effective argument that has been made about NASA -- that it should be more like the NACA of old -- perform and direct basic research and generic technology development, then let the private sector figure out what sorts of specific platforms to build from it, and how to exploit the technology in the operations arena. (and going back to NACA, keep in mind that it was govt money that seeded the development of the airplane and airline industry).

Just today I read an article where a vulture capitalist stated that they are only interested in projects where profits can be realized in 5 years. Here it is
http://www.wired.com/news/space/0,2697,65364,0 0.ht ml?tw=wn_story_page_prev2

Re:Burt Rutan...

[Alomex]

Everything else, leave to industry. A free market economy can make far better decisions about how to spend money than can politicans.

Except for things such as defense which are public goods. In particular, advanced theoretical knowledge is a public good. At least part of space exploration (say Titan mission) is a public good and hence has to be financed by government money or not at all.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[orac2]

NASA hasn't blown the fuck out of that many people, when you get right down to it...Seventeen deaths in over thirty years.

You are of course, as is normal in these discussions, forgetting the people who weren't astronauts but who also died because of their jobs. Look under Ground Staff Fatalities, for the US the total comes to 8 people who also died in space-related industrial accidents, but who didn't get buried in Arlington. You could make an argument that several of these individuals died in generic construction snfaus, but on the other hand, the list doesn't include the people who died of heart attacks from sheer over work and stress during the Apollo crash program.

So far, the only memorial these people have is a small statue stashed in the visitor's center beside JSC, and they only got that after legendary pad leader Guenter Wendt kicked up a fuss. I think that's uncool.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

I don't think there was another X-Prize entrant that was realistically within a year of succeeding. Name one that actually had a good chance of doing what Burt did (3 successful flights back to back with no losses).

I have no doubt that it is at least an order of magnitude more difficult to go into orbit, but I doubt Burt has set his sights on it without knowing what is involved.

As for it taking a while, I imagine it will take longer than I think, and come a lot quicker than you think.

If you would have described what Burt and Scaled accomplished to someone in 1996 or even 2000, they would have had a very hard time believing it. Nonetheless, here we are. And I think future progress will be as rapid or better, respective to their complexity (which I understand is large, but we also need to remember NASA did it in the 60's with limited technology and poor computer simulation abilities).

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

I never even implied that the Ansari's were rooting for anyone to fail. They have plenty of dough. But when the heir to the Ansari fortune was interviewed live, the day the prize was one, she said they didn't expect anyone to win and were pleased that someone was able to make progress so fast and win the prize. I don't even own a tinfoil hat.

The $50M prize for orbital flights deadlines in 2008, IIRC, and even though the development cost will no doubt go over $50M, I wouldn't be at all surprised to see Richard Branson fund it. $1.2 BILLION in pledges have already been made to go aboard Virgin's VSS. I don't think there will be any problem finding someone to fund Scaled for orbital flights.

Remember, we did orbital flight and lunar landings in the 60's with limited technology and no experience. I think Scaled is in a far better position to duplicate and even surpass that success by 2008, or the end of the decade if he fails to reach win that prize.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[WolfWithoutAClause]

The question is however, would the private sector, on its own, do as well? Again, the kernel of my argument is that Rutan did not do the basic research on composites, only the applied R&D.

Well, technically wood is a mixture of polymers in a particular matrix shape and so counts as a composite material, so even the very earliest aeroplanes were composite. Companies do do quite a bit of research themselves- the idea that only government does this is falacious. I mean, for example, the internet came out of arpanet (government), but there were lots of companies working on much the same thing as well, for example Xerox Parc developed a system with networking, a mouse, windowing and object oriented programming.

(and going back to NACA, keep in mind that it was govt money that seeded the development of the airplane and airline industry).

Not really- the Wright brothers didn't use government funding to develop the airplane, and that was the true seed. The airline industry you may be able to argue was developed with government money; but we'll never know what would have happened if they hadn't done this- we may very well have had airliners anyway due to organic growth.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

Fine, 17 compared to 0.

I don't think its fair or reasonable to say that Burt Rutan has been lucky when he has a perfect safety record over a long career.

It should also be noted that his composite plane that thousands have built has a kit plane has never had a death due to plane failure. Two private pilots have died flying that plane design, but both died from flying into mountains or other structures, and both were pilot error and had nothing to do with the plane design.

I repeat, you can't say that a 40 year perfect safety record, entirely untarnished, is luck.

And I think it is safe to say that Burt Rutan does want manned space exploration, has grown a pair, and has made sacrifices in his pursuit. The only thing he hasn't sacrificed was safety (which cannot be said of NASA, since many of their failures and deaths we forewarned of from within, and the warnings were stifled due to the NASA culture).

Re:Burt Rutan...

[aristus]

When I see the vast waste in the government, and the huge amounts of handouts, it really makes me dislike taxes...

I'm curious what you mean by "handout". Say the guvmint wants to develop a super-duper, say, navigation system. They contract with, say, Bell Labs. After 5 years the military has its new toy, and Bell Labs gets 20 years of patent protection on R&D it got paid tons of money to do, plus yummy tax breaks, etc.

Is that not a handout? Why isn't all that tech public domain?

Re:Burt Rutan...

[John Miles]

Out of those 17, only 7 of them count for this comparison: the Challenger crew. The others died doing things that don't apply to Rutan's efforts (unescapable ground fire in launch vehicle, failed reentry from orbit).

And where in the world did I say anything about luck? I don't have to disrespect Scaled Composites in order to respect NASA, and my point is that the opposite is also true. When Rutan puts a nuclear-powered spacecraft in orbit around Saturn, drives across the surface of Mars, and, hell, makes it to LEO and back in one piece, then we can compare his success rate with NASA's. Right now, they aren't even playing the same ball game.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[evilviper]

I'd rather my tax dollars weren't spent except where absolutely necessary (say, for defense). Everything else, leave to industry.

Space travel is absolutely necessary.

If you disagree, you need to start defining your opinion on what is absolutely necessary, and what is not. Schools? Roads? Libraries? Research? Art? Police?

Frankly, Space exploration is just an extension of scientific research, and funding scientific research is more important than you would imagine.

Then there's the price... Companies aren't going to invest a trillion dollars, with little or no hope that they will make that money back. Even if it was a guaranteed cure for cancer, it wouldn't possbily be worth it. And you can bet that no company is going to be anywhere near that alturistic.

It would be far too cumbersome to have everyone directly decide if, and how much, they want to give to NASA, so we elect representatives to decide.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[zippthorne]

The problem is that the cost is so high that only governments and CEO's can afford it. When the Sir Edmond Hillary's can afford it, then mars will be explored without any public expense whatsoever.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[vsprintf]

You could make an argument that several of these individuals died in generic construction snfaus, but on the other hand, the list doesn't include the people who died of heart attacks from sheer over work and stress during the Apollo crash program.

And that is somehow different from the thousands upon thousands of people who die from industrial accidents, stress, and overwork every year in corporate America? They don't even get that small statue. When they write articles about drivers who died in a race, they don't include the name of the guy who had a heart attack while machining pistons for one of the engines. Such is life - and death.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[edbarbar]

The problem is that not everything that involves the space program is done for (or will result in) financial gain. For example, consider the recent Mars rover missions. By all accounts, these missions have increased our knowledge of the Red Planet by several times more than all of the previous missions combined.

So explain why it is important that we increased our knoweldge of the red planet several times over, how it was worth $820 Million, and why it was important to do it right now (instead of waiting until space exploration was say ten times cheaper)?

Re:Burt Rutan...

[Teancum]

I'll have to raise an objection here about the internet. The only real thing that government funding did with DARPAnet was to establish protocols that had a widely used standard that were also not encumbered with copyright nor patent issues.

By about 1990 there were at least a dozen networking protocols, including some being used far more than the internet. Any one of those protocols could have become as dominant, or even done with a company like AT&T coming into the fray and pushing their own networking protocol (again without government assistance directly, although a network developed by AT&T back in the 1980's or 1970's would clearly have been intended for government institutions...indeed it was).

There was also the issue of how the internet came around with essentially no distance toll charges. The government didn't enforce distance charges on DARPAnet, and as a result the subsequent networks followed the same tradition until you get to the commercial networks that essentially follow the same principle. All you typically pay for is bandwidth, not how far your packet actually travels. This is by far the most unique thing about the internet as opposed to earlier networks like the POTS lines or TELEX (which has horrendous rates for use...and BTW is also digital).

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

I dislike "corporate welfare" more than any other form of handout!

A university developed a blood pressure medication recently, at a cost of about $800,000. The government took the technology for the medication, paid the university back (or made the drug company do so), and GAVE the patent on the technology to the drug company. The value of the patent over the life of the patent protected drug is in the billions of dollars.

That is attrocious! There is absolutely no excuse for that. The only winners are the drug company and maybe the government. The losers are the citizens who could have used that medication to better their lives, without turning over their hard earned money to the drug companies.

I have no problem with a company being rewarded for their R&D efforts, but the reward should be reasonable for the effort and cost put in, and should be for something they actually did!!!

Re:Burt Rutan...

[Teancum]

daVinci and Armadillo Aerospace were somewhat close, but I would say that without Scaled Composites pushing them along, it would have been another 2-3 years for either of those teams. Still, I think it would have happened eventually, although the prize money more than likely would have run out.

I've also noticed that Brian Walker ("The Rocket Guy") has pretty much dropped away altogether, although he also made some rather interesting progress on his own equipment. It is hard to say what would have happened with him without the X-Prize or Scaled Composites. At least now there is a place to even put in a flight plan for going into space. Before the X-Prize, you could only do that if you were a NASA astronaut.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

Certainly all 17 count. Mike Melville could have easily died from a failed reentry or an unescapable fire prior to launch.

I thought you were the same person this conversation started out with, who said "Rutan has been spectacularly lucky.", but you came in later in the conversation.

I don't at all disrespect or undervalue what NASA has accomplished, only the current state of NASA, which according to the governments own investigation following the last accident, which concluded that NASA was bloated and had a culture that discouraged anyone that bucked the system (pointing out flaws, waste, or needed improvements).

I don't want to see NASA go away. But I'm very happy to see more and more private endeavors coming onto the scene with regard to space. I think as more and more groups like Scaled join the pursuit of space, our growth, knowledge, and the accessibility of space will increase rapidly. That is a good thing.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[Teancum]

Ansari did not put up the prize. It was a bunch of other people, including folks like Tom Clancy and Tom Hanks (with his cute photo from the movie Apollo 13 on the sponsorship page).

Ansari simply put up enough money to "buy off" the X-Prize Foundation to put the name onto the X-Prize as a johnny-come-lately, after the prize was fully funded.

Still, it will be interesting to see what the X-Prize Foundation will do with the Ansari money, as that is what they are running off of at the moment.

BTW, the $50 million for the "America's Prize" might still offer at least some financial incentive that will be useful if you are trying to invest in a company trying to build an orbital rocket. Even more useful is the "guarenteed" contracts to keep going up once the spacecraft is built.

I would love to see NASA do something similar. For example, $2 Billion to build a new system to fly 7 astronauts to the ISS, and a guarenteed $150 million per flight for 15 flights afterward. That would get the attention of Boeing and McDonell-Douglas, and be far cheaper than the current shuttle program... to even run the shuttle program for 1 year.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

daVinci and were certainly the two closest, but either one still has a long ways to go.

I hope daVinci never attempts a launch, as it will almost certainly result in a fatality unless they make significant progress from here.

Likewise, as much as I like Carmack, Armadillo Aerospace has some serious stability issues (the video of the last launch that pancaked their rocket was less than inspiring), and I personally wouldn't fly on it anytime in the near future.

The incredible thing about Scaled is the simplicity and inherent stability of the system. The feathered wing is ingenious, inexpensive, inherently stable, and inexpensive. I would go on SpaceShipOne tomorrow if it were a possibility and I could afford it.

As for the Rocket Guy, I'm jealous that he gets to spend all of his time doing what he loves and having so much fun, but he has almost no chance of going up and coming back down in one piece, no matter how long he spends. I watched a show on him, and for a one man team doing it all at home, it is amazing what he has accomplished. Nonetheless, I'd never fly on what he is building.

Burt Rutan and Scaled have done something that NASA wouldn't have done in 50 years, and that is make space accesible to the average citizen (with an above average bank account). When Virgin licensed their technology and put out the feelers to see how many people wanted to take a trip for $210,000, over $1.2B worth of pledges came back. That is incredible, and encouraging.

Here's to hoping I can have dinner with my wife in space on our 25th anniversary (15 years from now). I'll settle for our 50th anniversary if I have to, but I don't think it will take near that long.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[code_rage]

"Well, technically wood is a mixture of polymers "

Boy you really got me! Zing! Gee, there's really no answer for the great examples you gave. I guess you're right, the govt is purely an obstacle to the real innovators... nothing good ever came out of a govt research program, grant, or subsidy.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

I strongly disagree.

In an interesting letter written by Robert Kahn and Vinton Cerf on the topic of Al Gore's contribution to the Internet, they said "Gore provided much-needed political support for the speedy privatization of the Internet when the time arrived for it to become a commercially-driven operation.".

In otherwords, even though the internet is a commercial operation now, it did not start that way (and would not have started at all without the governments involvment).

The reason we have one internet globally that interoperates successfully is due to government research and standardization.

If you take away all government involvment, including the funding of research at universitities, I don't think you'd have the internet at all, at least in any way that resembles what we have now in scope and usefulness.

Indeed, we may be 15 or 20 years behind in computer technology in general. It was, afterall, military spending that led to the creation of the first computers, and there to better and faster computers, and all that followed.

We may have gotten there without it, but the end result would have been vastly different, much less "compatible", and much, much later in the coming.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[cje]

So explain why it is important that we increased our knoweldge of the red planet several times over, how it was worth $820 Million, and why it was important to do it right now (instead of waiting until space exploration was say ten times cheaper)?

First of all, space exploration is getting cheaper. The missions of the past (i.e., the Viking landers, the failed Mars Observer, the Cassini and Galileo missions, etc.) all had price tags that ran into the billions of dollars. The cost of space exploration is not going to just magically decrease as a function of time. It's going to take research, development, and (in some cases) trial and error. The lessons learned from the twin MER missions and all of the others going on right now are going to benefit us all, public and private sector, in planning future missions and making them more cost-effective and reliable.

Now, $820 million is obviously nothing to sneeze at. It's a lot of money. But it's quite attractive when compared to a price tag of $7 billion, and in the grand scheme of things, it's just a drop in the bucket of the entire federal outlay. To put things in perspective, we (by which I mean the United States) are spending more than that per week in Afghanistan and Iraq. So we increased our knowledge of our closest neighbor in the solar system several times over for less than what we're spending in one week to support our current military engagements. Kind of makes you think, doesn't it? (Well, it makes me think, anyway.)

Why is learning about Mars important? Well, the most obvious reason is that it's the most Earth-like planet in the solar system, and was likely even more Earth-like in the distant past. Studying the past, present, and future of Mars can give us insights into our own planet's past, present, and future. Beyond that, at a more fundamental level, we gain more knowledge about the universe around us, and increasing the collective knowledge of Mankind is always a worthwhile endeavor. We can debate about whether or not it's worth $820 million in this specific case, but as I've said, there are other tangible benefits as well.

Additionally, Mars is really the only viable option for human colonization if at some point we decide to (or, in a more grim scenario, are forced to) spread humanity beyond the gravity well of Earth. Mercury and Venus are completely inhospitable, we obviously can't live on the gas giants, and while some of their satellites may be candidates for settlement, Mars is really the only place in the solar system that is comparable to Earth. The more we learn about it now, the better-prepared we will be to put human boots on its surface if (and when) the time comes.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[edbarbar]

Interesting points. I guess it just shows how hard it is to make these kinds of judgements.

The lessons learned from the twin MER missions and all of the others going on right now are going to benefit us all, public and private sector, in planning future missions and making them more cost-effective and reliable.

Well, that's good provided that there is a significant value to what's being studied and more is going to be spent on it.

I've been trying to figure out "What's a good way of deciding whether Federal money is well spent." I think I figured out how the math makes sense for me.

The US govt. is spending more than federal receipts, so our kids have to pay it off/be burdened by the interest. So, the measure isn't whether there is some other federal program that is more expensive, but whether this particular expenditure will pay off at better than the rate of interest on the debt forever.

I guess in this case, you could argue you might find out something very important about global warming you wouldn't have otherwise, or some other thing like that. Personally, I think that makes the proposition very iffy, especially since you then have to jump over the other burden which is could you do the research later at an even cheaper price tag with the same benefit?

I might argue that with a space elevator, this project would be a lot cheaper, but the project might be delayed a hundred fifty years. Or perhaps you might wait until other commercial efforts make the space proposition easier. When I first saw the White Knight and Spaceship One, I thought to myself (and expressed to my friends), "That's going to work."

Compare that to the shuttle, true, a much more ambitious project, but one that had the fundamental problem of solid boosters that you can't shut off, thousands of tiles all over the body, and engines that really push the envelope. My personal sense is that the shuttle has actually slowed down space exploration.

WRT colonization, you have a really huge hurdle to overcome there. My theory is that we will never move human bodies around in any meaningful way in the heavens, but rather will find it cheaper to move micro machines around that build a replicator, then we will beam instructions to the replicator, and the replicator will build versions of whatever the current life form is/whatever works there.

I don't know how far away that is, but I suspect it is really far away, and then probably things will be so different and miniaturized that the real question might by "why do it at all."

Re:Burt Rutan...

[WolfWithoutAClause]

As many Americans do, you seem to be explicitly or implicitly assuming the law of the excluded middle to be self evident and correct.

You may like to look it up, and find out where your logic has failed here.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[adavidw]

I'm curious to find out more. Do you have a source for your information?

Re:Burt Rutan...

[keraneuology]

The problem is that not everything that involves the space program is done for (or will result in) financial gain. For example, consider the recent Mars rover missions. By all accounts, these missions have increased our knowledge of the Red Planet by several times more than all of the previous missions combined. Are these missions profitable? Is anybody making money off of them (aside from the private sector contractors that won the bids to do a lot of the work that went into them?) Probably not.

Ok, so we know more about Martian geology? So what? Does the information have any practical use? Will it further spaceflight? If no, why shouldn't this be part of R&D for commercial spaceflight operations?

Yes, I'm a little grumpy about NASA - the organization that spent and failed to at the very least fire those directly responsible for ignoring the warnings of engineers and causing the destruction of two shuttles and the deaths of several astronauts. But the question goes beyond my petty grumpiness.

But does that mean that such a mission is not profitable in other, less tangible ways? Aside from the more zealous libertarian types who only want to see their tax dollars spent on tanks or the extreme fundamentalist types who view exploration of the heavens as blasphemy, most people would probably agree that expanding our knowledge of the universe that we live in is a Good Thing (TM). It's profitable from an intellectual and scientific (if not economic) standpoint. And it's hardwired into our very being; curiosity (and the desire to satisfy that curiosity) is one of the things that makes us human.

We can spend billions of dollars on spacecraft that are built with a hodgepodge of metric/standard instructions and go careening off into oblivion, have parts installed upside down and create 300 million dollar thuds in the desert, or spacecraft that have bugs in the radio that scramble the useful data that would otherwise be spent. As a public organization, NASA - nor the federal government in general - simply does not have the mindset required to generate an honest return on the investment that is collected from the public under threat of jail. Or, if you resist, death. Does knowing that water really does flow downhill on Mars make you feel any better about such a massive grab - which is never enough? I know of a certain school in a certain urban area that attracts some of the brightest kids in the city. A science teacher spent over 10 years teaching 5th and 6th graders the wonders of the scientific world. While NASA execs spend public money on mahogany panels and private jets for their senior accountants and public relations wonks, this school has textbooks that refer to manned space stations in the future tense. Every single year the teacher discovers that at least 1/3 of the students don't know that eggs come from chickens. Most of them have never seen any kind of bird in person other than a pigeon, or any mammal other than human, squirrel, cat, dog, rat, mouse. But I suppose that listening to thunder on the moon of some distant planet (which, if not for a gifted engineer who probably had modern textbooks growing up, would never have been possible because testing the radio was deemed too expensive before launch) provides a much better return on the public investment.

If public funding of space missions is so important and the public is so accepting, then all funding of NASA and similar programs should be through voluntary contributions. When you file your 1040 there should be a checkbox to contribute above and beyond the absolutely minimum collected by the government. Spending hundreds of billions of dollars on thing that generates no return is deplorable. -DEFECIT- spending of hundreds of billions that generate little return is such a horribly unacceptable concept that words fail me.

Yes, there are commercial products that r

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

I can't find the article that I referenced in my previous post (I read it a couple of months ago), but I was able to find this story on the same subject and the underlying causes:

http://www.tompaine.com/feature.cfm/ID/4201

The root of the problem boils down to the vast amount of influence that large industries and companies have in affecting legislation. President Bush in particular has embraced the lobbyists with open arms, in many cases appointent the lobbyists themselves in his administration!

This deals a major blow to public rights. The funding is done by OUR money, but the rights get turned over to companies who charge US outrageous prices for OUR technology.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[Teancum]

I'm not denying that the "internet" had some major contributions from government research grants. And certainly back in the 1970's and 1980's when the TCP/IP protocols were being developed it was only government research grants that could afford long-distance dedicated digital communication links, originally in the form of dedicated long-distance telephone lines (from AT&T Long Lines department... incredibly expensive at the time for even a 2400 baud connection).

My thesis is, however, that by 1990 there really were many LAN technologies, and in almost every case these were ramping up for ever larger and larger WANs. There is also nothing really unique about TCP/IP in the 7-layer architechture, except for the fact that it is totally copyright and patent free, together with the fact that by the time wide area networks were finally being put together TCP/IP already had more than 10% of the overall mindshare in this are, including over half of all major research networks, with an emphasis on universities.

The University connection was even more critical with the technology, because it was there that students (both graduate and undergraduate) were able to gain considerable experience with "The Internet" by learning TCP/IP protocols from the ground up. They also had student projects using these protocols, so naturally when they went on to an employer or advanced research project team, naturally they stuck with what they already knew. With groups like Apple Computer and Novell putting huge restrictions and non-disclosure documents on who could read the fine technical document, while RFCs where free to download for incoming freshmen CS students, it was very obvious just what budding hackers would get access to and experiment with.

BTW, much of this same university knowledge transfer is also occuring with Linux, for much of the same reason. The difference is that Microsoft was also fully aware of this fact, and gave away or at least at substantially lower cost huge student and educational discounts for much of their development software and operating systems. Apple Computer was also aware of the need to stick with educational institutions to push their product, because it brought about the next generation of software developers. The availability of that software is still impacting what I am doing for software development to this day.

So basically what I'm saying, is that although the U.S. Federal Government was involved with the initial setup of the protocols, it pretty much grew on its own and the government has done more to screw it up than actually help out. Al Gore's contribution to the internet is an absolte joke, and is perhaps more responsible for the current mess at ICANN and the things that are wrong about the internet than actually getting the current networks up and going.

The need was already in the marketplace to exchange data, and the effective monopoly over digital data communication was with only one company in the USA: Western Union. If there is a person or company that royally screwed up and threw away their big chance of becomming a multi-billion dollar company larger than Microsoft, Phillip Morris, IBM, and General Electric combined, it was that company. In some ways, thank goodness, because it is a much better world without them, but long-distance digital data communication could have looked considerably different.

Re:Burt Rutan...

[DigitalRaptor]

Al Gore's contribution to the internet is an absolte joke

While I appreciate your long and thoughtful post, unless you can produce a resume and personal first-hand knowledge that rivals that of Robert Kahn and Vinton Cerf, I have to take their word for it, and they give credit where they (and I) believe credit is due.

EOF

Re:Burt Rutan...

[Teancum]

While I admire Robert Kahn and Vinton Cerf, and certainly _THEY_ recieved considerable assistance from the federal government, I'm trying to point out that there are many other ways that large scale compuer networks could have come about. What we know as "The Internet" could have come about in many different forms than what we currently know.

I am speaking (or writing, as this case may be) from the perspective of somebody who has dealt with asynronous communications and network protcols extensively, and dealt with many things besides TCP/IP for those communications protocols. I'm not dissing TCP/IP, because I use it not only for web surfing, but also for dedicated low-level application specific software development as well. For what it does, it does very well.

I'm just pointing out that there are many other ways it could have gone, and neither Vinton Cerf or Robert Kahn are gods, they are simply very good engineers who happen to have the happy coincidence of being at the right place at the right time with the right set of skills to get everything to work out with the contributions they have made. If I had been there back then with many of my present software development skills, I would have been able to contribute considerably to the development of TCP/IP. Instead, I'm working in different areas and making unique contributions to the computer industry in my own way.

As far as Albert Gore Jr.'s role in the whole thing, he didn't contribute any engineering ideas or plan any real aspects of the development of the technology. I will acknowledge Mr. Gore's role in securing funding for DARPAnet and helping to move it beyond the "laboratory" in the sense of giving political support at perhaps a crutial moment. I do think Rep. Baucher of Virginia has done far more for the computer community, and specificly the free software/open source movement by comparison than anything that Al Gore did.

I also think that the transition from research universities to the commercial interests, in particular with ICANN, as well as Internic, Verisign, and much of the "internet governing bodies" are messed up, with much of the negotiations being done through then Senator Gore's office as one of the major participants.

I will also give credit where credit is due, and it was largely due to Al Gore that the White House "got on-line" well before even HTTP was a popular protocol. It was at the start of the Clinton Administration that you could finally send an e-mail to president@whitehouse.gov (no need to spam protect that one, however). The George H.W. Bush (Bush I) administration simply was clueless regarding the internet at the time and I don't think they even had access to USENET except through COMPUSERV dial-up. The White House website, again under the Clinton administration and due to the efforts of then Vice-President Gore, was one of the first websites up for any government agency. In this aspect, he was a major contributor to getting government access to ordinary citizens electronicly through the internet, and of that I will give Al Gore total credit. The White House was "on-line" for at least four years before the Senate and U.S. House got going, and for awhile even there it was Democrats (with the big "D") who were better connected, in part thanks to Al Gore. It was only after constituants in Republican districts started to complain that they couldn't get access to "their" congressmen that the Republicans finally started to make their own websites and e-mail accounts.

Constellation class

[Lurkingrue]

At risk of getting facetious replies from all the Trekkies/Trekkers out there, does anyone know anything more about this "Constellation" class ship they mention in the article?

Re:Constellation class

[slashd'oh]

"Named after the patterns that stars form in the night sky, Constellation Systems is responsible for developing the Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) and related exploration architecture systems. Constellation Systems is the combination of large and small systems that will provide humans the capabilities necessary to travel and explore the solar system. Constellation Systems will be made up of Earth-to-orbit, in-space and surface transportation systems, surface and space-based infrastructures, power generation, communications systems, maintenance and science instrumentation, and robotic investigators and assistants." (source)

Re:grammar

[erick99]

I don't think it is necessary for you to repeatedly go over this ad nauseum forever do you?

Not really news

[stratjakt]

They've been constantly considering the viability of the Shuttle program since it began in the 70s, and it's always been under the threat of having the plug pulled at any moment.

I don't know why it's so "hip" to hate the shuttle program around here. If you look past the cost, the shuttles are pretty damned cool, and have a better safety record than any commercial passenger jet.

It's just so sci-fi. The shuttles are honest-to-god spaceships, everything else is just strapping a tin can onto a big bottle rocket.

They just needed to shoot lasers and have a socket to mount an R2 utility droid and they'd be teh coolest EVAR!!!1!1!!!

I find your lack of faith disturbing.

Re:Not really news

[spicy salsa]

The safety record of the shuttles are much worse than any commercial jet. Very few shuttles exist compared to the amount that have been destroyed. Not only that, but very few shuttle flights occur compared to airline flights. I don't even need to look up the statistics to know that the safety record of the shuttle is very poor compared to airliners. Of course thats to be expected; space flight has inherent risks.

Free Flat Screen HERE!

Re:Not really news

[stratjakt]

I still don't care. The space shuttle is cool as hell. Way cooler than anything you have in your house.

I mean, really, it has a GIANT ROBOT ARM sticking out the back of it. How friggen Star Wars is that? Do the Soyuz capsules have GIANT ROBOT ARMS? No. They barely even have windows.

Here we are, with a fleet of space ships with GIANT FUCKING ROBOT ARMS STICKING OUT THE BACK OF THEM, and all these so called "geeks" on slashdot can't do anything but bitch about it and moan how much they'd rather see the type of boring-ass rockets that you'd see in 1950's sci fi films.

And I can only conclude, you aren't geeks, you're a bunch of poseurs. If high prices negate the "coolness" of technology, why the hell do you all get erections every time you see an iPod?

Re:Not really news

[ZeroGee]

The shuttles are also strapped onto "big bottle" rockets for a large portion of the flight -- without the Big Dumb Booser or the SRBs, it wouldn't get very far.

The shuttle does have an advantage in that it can easily allow the ISS to install equipment straight out of the shuttle's bay, but other than that, the shuttle isn't very special.

If you took an airplane completely apart and put it completely back together before every flight, then you would have a point of comparison. But for the amount of effort that goes into the Shuttle program for "safety reasons," it's record is quite poor.

Looking past the cost to something being "pretty damned cool" is not exactly a good trade for where you should put time and resources.

Re:Not really news

[Skye16]

I hate it because it is a figurehead of a situation I dislike. Let me explain.

The Shuttles we have now are pretty much ancient. They're not cutting-edge technology anymore, not by a long shot. On one hand, it's great to have a reuseable spacecraft that has a relatively large payload. On the other, it's so very expensive keeping our fleet that most of the money allocated to NASA gets spent on shuttle maintenance and not on a: exploration and b: Research and Development. Since Congress is not thrilled with the idea of giving up even more money for (a) and (b) to happen in earnest, it's the space shuttles that are holding us back (even as they are our greatest step forward to date). Of course, the X-prize was wonderful and all, but that's nowhere even remotely close to what NASA did with the shuttles 30+ years ago. They are still the pinnacle of space flight. It's just that it costs so much, we can't seem to move past it to something bigger/better/faster/cheaper :(

And that's why I "hate" the shuttle program. It's more frustration than hatred, but after a while, it still boils down to a crappy feeling.

Re:Not really news

[Rasta Prefect]

They've been constantly considering the viability of the Shuttle program since it began in the 70s, and it's always been under the threat of having the plug pulled at any moment.

If Nasa had been up front about the shuttle's limitations, it probably never would have been approved

I don't know why it's so "hip" to hate the shuttle program around here. If you look past the cost,

The cost is why we hate it. It's expensive as hell, and frankly doesn't deliver much that couldn't be done better and more cheaply in other ways. The International Space Station is rapidly becoming another of these projects - the cost has been cut to the point that the thing is nearly useless, but it still costs a fortune.

the shuttles are pretty damned cool, and have a better safety record than any commercial passenger jet.

Really. I wasn't aware commercial passenger jets crashed once every 57 flights, killing all passengers aboard. I'd challenge you to find a commercial jet with a _worse_ safety record.

Re:Not really news

[octothorpe]

The shuttles are cool but they've never gotten anywhere near to the cost/lb that the program was started for. I remember as far back as the mid-seventies that they were being critisized for being too expensive as compared to one-shot rockets. It's not really NASA fault, they kept having to scale back the designs due to budget cuts, the origional vision was to have a 100% reusable system built out of titanium alloy instead of the partially resuable alluminum design that they ended up with. The lighter weight of a more expensive alloy and not throwing away the fuel tanks might have made the cost/flight cheap enough to be competative.

Re:Not really news

[meringuoid]

boring-ass rockets that you'd see in 1950's sci fi films

Hey! I resent that! 1950s sci-fi rockets had a chequered band around the middle! A CHEQUERED BAND! Is there a chequered bit around anywhere on the Shuttle? No. A nice two-tone design with the heat tiles, I'll give you that, but no cool-looking chequered bit. Dan Dare wouldn't go up in a Shuttle if you had him at gunpoint. Hell, if you get Dan Dare at gunpoint you're the villain anyway and you're going to get a kicking but that's beside the point. Any cool rocket needs a chequered bit, robot arms come a distant second.

Re:Not really news

[Anonymous Coward]

What is the "big dumb booster"?
Only the shuttle and the SRB's have engines. The external tank is just what it sounds like - a tank. Not a booster.
And of course it wouldnt get very far without the ET or SRB's, thats like saying a plane wont get very far if you take off its engines and remove its fueltanks!

The russian proton rocket offers a cost effective alternative to the shuttle, and it doesnt need several 100 people watching it 24/7...

And it is also a very bad comparison to compare an aircraft servicing to a spacecraft servicing.
After all, your standard aircraft doesnt have to sit atop the equivalent (in explosive terms) of a small nuclear bomb. It also doesnt need to travel at ~17500mph, or, in fact, endure temperatures of more than 3000K! If an aircraft has a fault during flight it can, most of the time, simply divert to an airport for repairs - a task that is simply impossible in orbit.
And i really dont think the shuttle has a poor safety record considering the complexity of the system. 2 failures out of over 100 flights isnt bad for a massively complex vehicle that does what the shuttle can.

And finally, i really dont think nasa has the shuttle because it looks cool.
It may look cool but it has to get the job done. It is the only vehicle in history to be able to carry men into space on multiple occassions and that in itself is an achievement.

Cheers,
Simon

Re:Not really news

[Muhammar]

If Nasa had been up front about the shuttle's limitations, it probably never would have been approved

But this is not explanation or even apology - this is the essence! Once you start being deceitful, you have to continue doing so - the pretense must be kept alive by steady flow of bulshit. That does not square well with developing safe reliable economical dependable space vehicle. If NASA top guys sold congress a balooney shuttle project, it is their fault, not the fault of congresmen. You may dislike these elected politicians but they actualy represent the taxpayers and NASA brass does not. Supression of diasgreeable information from engineers by NASA management (to save money, reduce delays or to improve the agency image) is exactly what brought the two shuttles down! It was the discrepancy between the original grandiose promises and the technical reality. The technical problems needs to be identified and fixed, not supressed for sake of PR. Problem with the manned space flights is that is a very overprized shabby science done for sake of institutional legacy. Guys from JPL should take over NASA, the Washington NASA brass should be retired.

Re:Not really news

[Suidae]

The Shuttles we have now are pretty much ancient. They're not cutting-edge technology anymore, not by a long shot.

Well, not all of it is 70's era equipment:

Here is the original 1974 shuttle cockpit

Here it is again in 2000.

Here's a wide-angle shot.

For the most part I agree, as long as the shuttle program continues, its going to be very difficult to develope a replacement. I say we sell the shuttles to private industry, buy some of that stuff the Russians use to move people to the ISS to use in the meantime, and focus on a space elevator and the technology that will be used with it to put stuff into orbit.

After all, the carbon fibers are nearly there now, and once we've got the space elevator, we won't need rockets anymore.

http://oea.larc.nasa.gov/news_rels/2000/GCTHUMBN AI LS.HTML

Re:Not really news

[WolfWithoutAClause]

The lighter weight of a more expensive alloy and not throwing away the fuel tanks might have made the cost/flight cheap enough to be competative.

It wasn't really expense that precluded NASA from using titanium- it was the fact that the Russians controlled the world supply, and the Military wanted every little bit they could get their hands on.

Throwing away the tanks actually seemed to be a good idea at the time...

Re:Not really news

[njdj]

If you look past the cost, the shuttles are pretty damned cool, and have a better safety record than any commercial passenger jet.

They have a far worse safety record than any commercial passenger jet.

Shuttle: 2 flights lost with all crew in 20 years. And there weren't that many shuttle flights per year.

Passenger jet: take the Concorde as an example. There was approximately one Concorde flight every day for 30 years. They lost one flight in that time.

Other passenger jets have even better safety records. How many Boeing or Airbus flights are there per day? Thousands? Tens of thousands?

Re:Not really news

[hemp]

If they would just build another one and name it 'Enterprise' - the program might be canceled, but it would live on in reruns for ever!

Not necessarily a bad thing

[Anonymous Coward]

Not necessarily a bad thing... the Soyuz does just fine sending things up and down.

NASA can focus on more far-reaching projects and crafts.

Still, I group up with the shuttle and will miss it.

All the more reason.

[AltGrendel]

All the more reason to develop the space elevator.

Re:All the more reason.

[Mukaikubo]

And in the 70 or so years until it starts being feasible to people who don't see the world through rose colored eyes?

Re:All the more reason.

[DigitalRaptor]

Actually, NASA's own study of space elevators concluded that a working prototype initial space elevator could be built in 10 - 15 years for $15 billion.

I'm not sure about you, but I'd rather have 12 space elevators than our current mess in Iraq.

Just because it's a large undertaking, doesn't mean it isn't worth starting.

Get Rid Of it.!

[Space_Soldier]

They should have got rid of it as soon as it got off the assembly line. The Shuttle Programme was supposed to create an inexpensive, safe, and reusable rocket. Unfortunatly, they got ripped off. Not only that it is not safe, but it is also highly expensive. And if it explodes/implodes, it is not reusable.

Re:Get Rid Of it.!

[stratjakt]

No, that was all media spin and typical yapping.

The real point was an excuse to do a whole lot of research as to what works and what doesn't in space, so it could eventually lead to an inexpensive reusable system. The question: Can you strap a glider onto a big ass rocket, send it to space, land it, and use it again? The answer: yes.

Nothings perfect the first time out. I mean, we don't exactly use the Wright brothers design anymore. It was a pretty crappy airplane, but groundbreaking.

Re:Get Rid Of it.!

[Laebshade]

Ok, the other stuff you mention I agree with, but how are you supposed to reuse something that exploded/imploded?

Re:Get Rid Of it.!

[Waffle Iron]

No, that was all media spin and typical yapping.

That's also the logic they used to get congressional funding for the STS. They said at the time that this particular system would have reliability and costs more akin to aircraft operations than existing rockets. If they knew those promises were false and they were just getting bucks to play around with technology, then it was fraud.

NASA's honeydew list:

[Thud457]

1. Retire that busted-ass camel of a shuttle
2. Mothball that special-olympics in space the ISS
3. Put out bids for contract for regular scheduled launches
4. Shed all daily operations to contractors and concentrate on research
5. Draw up plans for a real space station
6. stand back and get out of the way
7. ????
8. Profit!!!, errr success!

Re:NASA's honeydew list:

[bcrowell]

I love it, except for #5. At this point in history, the only good reason to build a space station is, perhaps, to serve as a hotel for space tourism; and that's something that should be considered by private industry, not a government agency.

All the real science is done by uncrewed satellites and probes. And may I preempt the usual argument, which is that the Hubble could only be repaired because of the existence of the shuttle. If the shuttle hadn't existed, we would have been in an entirely different alternate history. Maybe more money would have flowed to space science, if the vast majority of NASA's budget hadn't been going to nationalistic propaganda exercises like the shuttle. When communications satellites are launched, the owners simply assume there's some risk of failure, and they insure against it.

Re:NASA's honeydew list:

[Solder Fumes]

Profit...yes.

Once we get to the point of people actually working in space, and using the weightless environment and resources to generate products, there will be insane profit. A space-based economy will make some of today's biggest companies look like a kid's piggy bank.

Re:NASA's honeydew list:

[OldeTimeGeek]

Maybe more money would have flowed to space science,

Really?

Do you honestly think that NASA would have gotten anywhere close to the same amount of funding without the shuttle than they did with it? I doubt it. A disturbingly large number of the population of the U.S. think the whole space program - shuttle, robots, satellites, etc.) is a waste of money. There may have been some interest, for a while, but this would have disappeared (along with funding) when people got bored and looked away. The only way NASA can keep getting money is to stage high-visibiity projects, such as the Shuttle, which may not do fantastic science, but are interesting to look at and have people directly involved.

A short history of science funding in Congress:

Large science projects get killed in committee

Large science projects with people in them get funded (sometimes).

Large science projects with people in them that benefit large compaines in multiple locations (pleasing multiple constituencies) get funded (often).

Large science projects with people in them which make lots of money for someone that allow us to poke our fingers in the eye of another country get funded (always).

Mod parent up!

[ggvaidya]

Althought "+1 Insightful" or "+1 Funny", I really can't say :). Cool post, man!

Re:fp!

[BinxBolling]

Why reusable? Every kilogram of the craft that is "reused" is a kilogram of payload that it couldn't take up and leave in orbit.

Use shuttle as cargo ship?

[Anonymous Coward]

Would there be any benefit (time/safety/cost-wise) in converting one or more shuttles for robotic operation, and create a smaller, man-rated vehicle for transporting personnel?

Re:Use shuttle as cargo ship?

[cmowire]

Not really.

The problem is, at this stage of the game, the shuttle is simply too complicated and sophisticated for what we need.

If you really need heavy-lift, especailly after the shuttle retirement, the best option is an expendable canister with two RS-68 engines (what the Delta IV uses) strapped to an external tank and two SRBs.

If you need return mass, you might as well just go expendable. It's a lot cheaper. Or run the man-rated transport people with just 2 crew.

Re:Use shuttle as cargo ship?

[cmowire]

There's a problem here.

I got a lesson on this from a friend of mine, and he's right.

Sunken costs mean jack.

So, really, the correct question to ask is if it's cheaper to keep paying for the shuttle so we can launch these already fabbed pieces, or is it cheaper to redesign the bits and launch them on an expendable booster? Or, is it cheaper to build a Shuttle-C like booster that has trunion pins?

The problem is, even without crew, the shuttle will still be expensive as all hell to run, not even counting the costs necessary to modify it to be robotic. And they will still be screwed if another one blows up.

Re:Use shuttle as cargo ship?

[cmowire]

The shuttles have *never* had an unmanned flight.

Because there's no way to retract them, and because them deploying at the wrong time would result in loss of vehicle, the landing gear are not computer-controlled.

The closest they came was having an unmanned shuttle attached to the back of a 747.

The Enterprise never had engines or plumbing installed. It has all of the fittings for use as a test piece, so it was mated to a booster and brought to the launch pad to make sure that everything would hook together properly, but it never did any powered flight, just some manned glide test flights to prove that it was aerodynamically stable.

The problem is, you can't simply count the cost of making a robotic shuttle. You have to test the landing software to make sure it works properly. And the costs won't be that much lower, because you still need the 98-99% reliability to make it worth your while, so you'd still end up tearing-down and rebuilding the shuttle and all of the usual problems.

Dump the NASA for manned space flight.

[zorkmid]

Really.

They rocked the world back in the 60's and early 70's.

They still rock the world with their unmanned space exploration.

But for about the past 20 years it seems that their manned space flight plan consists of very expensive (and sometimes deadly) joy rides.

I say we (US Tax payers) Give Burt Rutan 500 Million (the cost of a *one* shuttle mission) and stand back.

Re:Dump the NASA for manned space flight.

[WolfWithoutAClause]

I say we (US Tax payers) Give Burt Rutan 500 Million (the cost of a *one* shuttle mission) and stand back.

I'd say, if I were in Rutan's shoes- head for Brazil, the weathers great!

Re:Dump the NASA for manned space flight.

[pipingguy]

I say we (US Tax payers) Give Burt Rutan 500 Million (the cost of a *one* shuttle mission) and stand back..

Count me in on that, I have a few dozen engineering friends that would love to get involved. 3 Canadians, 5 Americans, 4 Indians, 2 New Zealanders, 2 Australians, etc.

All are top in their fields and would be in the rocket propulsion department (piping to the engines).

Re:Dump the NASA for manned space flight.

[lildogie]

> I say we (US Tax payers) Give Burt Rutan 500 Million
> (the cost of a *one* shuttle mission) and stand back.

If he continues to be successful, he'll get his 500 million from the private sector.

I wouldn't want to hobble him with _taxpayer_ dollars. That's what ruined NASA.

Indeed.

[StarKruzr]

It's about time an American leader took the reins and firmly directed everyone's eyes at their feet rather than the stars. How dare we run around sending up multi-million dollar spacecraft when there are health care programs and social security to complain about and whine over?

After all, there's clearly no future in space.

Re:Indeed.

[M1FCJ]

I'm fed up with this kind of argument. Let's do some back-of-the-envelope calculations, shall we?

Let's say there are around 1/4 billion people in USA. The total cost of NASA will be 15 billion per year (this year it was 15.4 billion so I'm cutting a couple of space probes from the current plan).

15billion / .25 billion is 60$, per year. Overall NASA costs someone than 17 cents day, tops.

How can you claim you will save America with 17 cents a day per person?

Stop whining and do something about your country but stop complaining about NASA's costs.

Re:Indeed.

[M1FCJ]

/. ate my paragraph... Here it is:H ow much does a loaf of bread cost? How much does a bottle of aspirin cost?

How can you claim you will save America with 17 cents a day per person?

Re:Indeed.

[StarKruzr]

Joke, dude. I totally agree with you.

Sad, but understandable

[H_Fisher]

I can understand why they'd want to retire the Shuttles - lots of risks, lots of money involved in not only flying them but keeping them updated, and (now) a lot more questions than before about the safety of them. I wish I had a dollar for everyone who's convinced that the space shuttle ought to never fly again, especially the wave of posts that appear on /. since the Columbia disaster that basically say "good riddance, the shuttles are a liability."

But like it or not, I think scrubbing the shuttle program without a clear choice for a reusable replacement is a bad idea. Yes, disposable rockets might be more cost-effective in the short-term, but I don't trust NASA (as a bureaucratic US gov't agency) not to turn any project into a bottomless pit of money over time - even a rocket program built on a combination of proven technology (the type of rockets used for Mercury or Apollo missions) and modern tools would still carry the temptation to slowly inflate pricetags if the corproate architecture of NASA doesn't change - not to mention the everpresent risks of death due to, as they so coyly put it, a "mishap."

Disclaimer: IANAAOA (I am not an astronaut or astrophysicist).

Private spaceflight

[mind21_98]

This is where private spaceflight (like SS1) would come in handy, once it matures enough. NASA could simply outsource the actual launch and mission control to these companies so they can concentrate on development. In any case, they should keep the ability for manned flight until they find a suitable replacement.

Re:Private spaceflight

[meringuoid]

How about outsourcing to the S.P.Korolev Rocket and Space Corporation? The Russians would surely jump at the chance.

The shuttle was designed by a comittee

[RealAlaskan]

The shuttle was designed by a comittee, and its politics was always its strongest point. I'm not surprised that NASA thinks they can do better than that today, 30+ years later.

What would really be a great thing would be for NASA to get out of engineering, and just let contracts for delivery of pounds or people to orbit. Let the vendors figure out the details.

Re:The shuttle was designed by a comittee

[Anonymous Coward]

What would really be a great thing would be for NASA to get out of engineering, and just let contracts for delivery of pounds or people to orbit. Let the vendors figure out the details.

Doing so would require Presidential intervention: In the beginning, NASA was a mainly scientific (barring political hoo-ha) endeavor which only became commercialized later in answer to ever present budget concerns. In the '80s, after the Challenger disaster, President Reagan again made NASA a mainly scientific operation when he officially prohibited NASA from taking any commercial contracts.

Interestingly enough, I don't know that the shuttle has ever been considered "operational;" that is, officially out of the R&D phase. See the CAIB report for details.

Re:Who cares.

[AKAImBatman]

Why do we need to travel faster than light? In a space society, a large number of people could be traveling from one end of the universe to the other in one day. So what if everything planet based ages a few billion years in the meantime? They should've gotten off their asses and hopped on a .99c space ship!

Goddamit, put that damn myth to bed!

[Thud457]

• Manned - requires 99.999% success rate EXPENSIVE(think aircraft / ICBM building)
• Unmanned - requires "only" 99.9% (99%?...) less expensive (think ship building. No, really, that's how the Soviets looked at it.)

Obviously, need a two-tier system, not one do-everything, do nothing well system.

As far a reusable/disposable, for the time being, whichever is more economical. Be sure to show your work calculating continuing program costs for reusable designs.

Re:Goddamit, put that damn myth to bed!

[timster]

Absolutely and of course, let's not forget the Shuttle, with its 98% success rate. Can you say "not good enough"?

Calculate accidents per person mile.

[HornWumpus]

The shuttle will still be worse, but the difference will be much smaller.

SS1 is at 1963 level

[peter303]

While SS1 is a great undertaking, it just achieved the capabilities of the X-15 of 1963. Orbital flight requires a ship that can withstand rentry stresses of Mach-20 heating. Suborbital flight only reaches Mach-5.

Thank you Ghost of Wernher von Braun!

[kippy]

This is a Godsend. The Shuttle was a tarbaby from the get go. In my opinion, they should just halt plan to get the remaining 2 (or is it 3) back in space and work on plans to put them in museums.

But what about all the skilled labor wasted? Well, there are multiple plans I've heard of to build a new class of rocketry largely based on the shuttle launch stack (or bundle). That whole workforce would still be valuable and employed and the shuttle derived vehicle could be capable of launching to Mars directly without pointless pit stops at the ISS, L5, moon or wherever: Mars Direct

Re:Thank you Ghost of Wernher von Braun!

[Dasein]

science fiction feet

Is that like "happy feet" or "dancing feet". I think you were looking for "feat". Time for some snide AC to go back to grade school.

Re:Thank you Ghost of Wernher von Braun!

[AdamInParadise]

You do know that von Braun is the father of the outdated "pointless pit stops at the ISS, L5, moon or wherever" strategy, right?

Re:Thank you Ghost of Wernher von Braun!

[orac2]

Thank you Ghost of Wernher von Braun!

Hmmm... I'm not sure Von Braun's ghost is the best entity to summon here. Von Braun had more than a little to do with putting the shuttle on NASA's technology roadmap. Mars Direct is called Direct partly because it deliberately abandons a big chunk of the Von Braun architecture, which is that you have a space station, serviced by shuttles, where you assemble your outward bound spaceships. Even when you take out the station, Von Braun's 1969/1970 Mars architecture relies on shuttles to cover the gap between LEO and the ground. This article entitled The Von Braun Master Plan: National Dream or National Nightmare? sums up the objections to Von Braun's architecture -- and NASA's long term adherence to it -- concisely.

BTW, Here's Von Braun's 1950's vision

Re:Thank you Ghost of Wernher von Braun!

[kippy]

I'm aware of how bloated the von Braun plan was. Pretty much everyone who knows about Mars Direct does. I just invoked his name because von Braun is dead and Zubrin is not.

Farewell ISS, oh how I will miss you

[c]

and finish the International Space Station with disposable rockets

I misread this as: and furnish the International Space Station with disposable rockets. ie. to plunge it into the atmosphere for end-of-life

cool and not cool

[geg81]

This is cool. It costs about $3.26 billion total and yields amazing scientific results

This is not. It costs about $2.4 billion / year and kills a few people occasionally.

Think Lewis & Clark

[Thud457]

Well, the base, err, spacestation is a stepping stone for further development. It makes it easier to assemble large vehicles in orbit. Gives you a leg up to get to the moon when you want to build a moon city. Gives you someplace to corrdinate construction of solar power satellites when the oil runs out.

All the plans I've seen for L5 colonies assume a lunar base shipping construction materials.

Those people have to get to space somehow. Currently, it's cheaper for them to be born there. (Err, raising / educating them until they're useful may sink that assumption...) So yeah, a spacestation isn't currently needed, but it's basic infrastructure for further development.

Re:Think Lewis & Clark

[cmowire]

The problem with the ISS as a base, is that it's in the absolute wrong orbit. It only gets a few economical opportunities for lunar launch angles a month, is equally sub-optimal fuel-wise for both the Russians and the US. And space construction techniques are hamstrung by NASA not letting any ISS astronauts even *try* to debug broken modules and by spacesuits that require long pre-breathe procedures and are essentially minor-change versions of the suits from Apollo.

Re:Think Lewis & Clark

[LifesABeach]

Wouldn't we need a spacestation, in space, for Basic Inftrastructure development?.

Also, memo to USA's NASA, and Russia's RKA,
If your having problems with getting results, I respectfully submit this web page, "www.scaled.com". These engineers may not be as talented, or as glorious as the rest of us engineers. But their Score Borad results is kicking our collective ASSSSSSSsssssssssses. OUCH!

Re:Think Lewis & Clark

[modavis]

Kazrath> Small efficent shuttle from surface - orbit.

Be careful it doesn't run into the rocket equation. Hurts worse than the Van Allen belts, they say.

Boy oh boy, SSTO is just so freakin' great, I'm afraid somebody might actually build one and fly it, and it would be a letdown.

That no one has done so in 47 years is a small comfort, but I still worry.

Kaboom!

[1019]

"..and finish the International Space Station with disposable rockets ..."

I thought this meant destroying the station with rockets, which I thought would be sort of moving backwards. After RTFM, it all became clear.

Re:Kaboom!

[jd]

Given the horrible costs of the ISS, the fact that it has been scaled back to the point where it is virtually incapable of Real Science, has so many components failing that it's unclear they can even keep it running, and the older modules are nearing the end of their operational lifespan...

...maybe NASA firing rockets at the ISS wouldn't be such a bad thing...

Re:fp!

[MushMouth]

60% (60 tons at $10 Million/Ton) of the weight of the shuttle is in the wings, total shielding, and landing gear. All of that can be dumped (the shielding for a small crew re-entry vehicle has very little weight)

Let me sum up all the posts

[gphinch]

We need a space elevator.

Re:Let me sum up all the posts

[l3v1]

He probably read some of Arthur C. Clarke's [i.e. The Fountains of Paradise, 1979], a very good point for'im. Just the idea with the cables sound somewhat... coiling [i.e. around our necks] :) However, if one saw some of Star Trek's Voyager's, one could've seen Neelix and co. operating a suborbital magnetic elevator. Now that ruled :D

Any craft, not just reuseable

[Grendol]

I hope they develop any sort of manned space craft honestly. It does not have to be 're-usable' in my opinion. The operations and maintenance costs of a one size fits all re-useable space craft are some of the major problems, and potential contributors to the safety problems the shuttle fleet had.

I think a mix of craft, with different mission designs, some re-usable and maybe some not, some cargo and people haulers, and some pure passenger craft should be our new approach. It would allow for greater mission variety. IE. if you need a people hauler with camping capability, you get an RV, if you need a cargo capable system, you get a pickup truck or moving van, if you need just a small team car pool system you buy a honda civic.

In some ways I feel that President Nixon's mandate that a reusable spacecraft be used has hurt all spaceflight for the last two decades.

If there are cost effective and performance effective single use space craft, should they really not be an option?

your thinking

[Prince Vegeta SSJ4]

reusable, exactly? The astronauts? Thinking about expendable, then you could include astronauts.

Ermm, actually its not funny...

[Tracer_Bullet82]

its insightful.

India has the neccesary "intellectual" labour and which it doesn't, the US can easily transfer the skills; and technology .

The cost definitely can be lower.With good discussions, I'm sure the Indian government can be easily persuaded to chip in.

Make that with any discussions,which country does not want the glamour of "space pioneers".

Re:Ermm, actually its not funny...

[nyekulturniy]

Do you mean long-range rockets such as the polar sattelite India launched in 2003?

Lots of replies for Burt Rutan

[joeytmann]

Seeing that there are lots of replies about giving Burt Rutan 500 million or what ever and see what he can do...kinda silly. No disrespect to Mr.Rutan but he just did was NASA had done 50 years ago. Their sub-orbital flight went what 328KM? Sorry can't remember the exact figure. Some one care to look up the elevation of the orbit of ISS? I don't think even Burt Rutan can make that leap on $500 million....but I do have to admit it would be cool to watch him try. Anyways, I say let NASA do its thing. Atleast they are looking at all the options..

Let the flaming begin.

Re:Lots of replies for Burt Rutan

[Anonymous Coward]

328 km? That'd be just about to the orbit of the ISS (400 km). SSO did 328,000 ft, or 100 km. Burt Rutan and Co got there in a couple years for less than $20 million. NASA did nothing even comparable 50 years ago with respect to the budget.

The first manned sub-orbital flight (somewhat comparable to SSO) was Mercury 3 which did go higher, yes, but also took 4 years with a government budget of close to $4 billion in current dollars to get to that point in the program. So they managed pretty much the same thing (not reusable, though, like SSO is) for 200 times the cost with countless more people working on the project. I'd say Rutan wins that comparison.

I bet Burt could get there for under $500 million, and even if it cost 10 times that, it'd still be less than 1/3 the development cost of the Shuttle... not to mention the likely per-launch cost savings that a new vehicle would have over the Shuttle.

Damn, I fell for your troll!

Reduced shuttle benefits?

[lothar97]

I know when my dad retired early from his company, he got reduced benefits paid.

I wonder if the shuttle has taken this into consideration. Is the shuttle program fully ready to draw funds from a reduced 401(k) plan? I would hate to see the shuttle end up in some old age home, obsolete, and unable to pay their bills. Oh wait...

Getting rid of them... ?

[kkovach]

I'll take one!

- Kevin

NASA - prime the pump of free enterprise!

[Thud457]

I like buying in bulk! Normally, mass production drives down costs due to increasing efficiency.

PLUS, IF ALL OUR MIL-IND COMPANIES ARE BUSY WORKING TO PUT US IN SPACE, WE"RE NOT FOMETING IDIOTIC, WASTEFUL FOREIGN WARS TO KEEP THEM BUSY. Think of it as UN resolution 35397, "The US Aerospace full employment act so they stop bombing the rest of us" act.

Retarded Policy

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok I get it, a few people died publically, caused a media stir but cmon people. They died for a cause more nobel than shooting a fucking iraqi defending his home. How is that nobel but not death in the pursuit of science.

Ask any astronaught if they want the program retired. If the risks are unacceptable to them. You'll get a resounding no.

I mean ffs we have people risking their lives to fish for crab in the north pacific. A whole lot more chance of dying as a crab fisherman or a warzone doctor, but people do it.

Lets stop making policies based on a few lives. I for one would happily die in the pursuit of science.

Funny the russians always had this figgured out. Maybe thats why we're talking about using their dilapidated technology.

I pose, if two russians died to make it safer for one american, is it better or more ethical than two americans.

This administration seems to think so.

Re:Retarded Policy

[greymond]

if two russians died to make it safer for one american, is it better or more ethical than two americans.

That is totally correct - If anyone other than an american dies in order to make things better for us then that is great. That's why we use "cannon fodder" in our military operations whenever possible.

What fun... as long as they get the music right

[PornMaster]

Love in an elevator... livin' it up while I'm goin' down...

Re: Kerry's position on NASA

[code_rage]

Take a look at this article about Kerry's official position on space. Or better yet, see what Kerry's web site says about NASA.

General outlines:
- More NASA funding for research
- More balanced priorities (read: less spending for operations, less human spaceflight, more research)
- Probably no Human Moon/Mars program -- he claims Bush can't pay for it either, which I agree with.
- More aeronautics R&D
- Continued international cooperation
- NASA management reforms

So in short, it seems Kerry endorses more science, more R&D, and less Buck Rogers. While I like the Buck Rogers stuff, I have to agree that unless we're going to do it in a radically different manner, we've reached a dead end with Shuttle and ISS. I would rather park Shuttle and halt development of ISS, instead of spending another $50B to complete construction. I've posted comments to this effect on many occasions... so I won't bore you with it again.

Here's a question

[ZeroGee]

What do you do when you need to bring up 20 metric tons on one flight, because it's a pre-fabricated module that took years of development on Earth? Can't exactly reassemble everything in space.

Re:Here's a question

[AKAImBatman]

You fly it on a Delta IV Heavy or Titan IV. (The Titan IV can actually boost more than twice the Space Shuttle's cargo capacity.)

Last time I checked, a Titan IV launch costs $300m. I have no numbers for the Delta IV Heavy.

Re:Here's a question

[ZeroGee]

So now you're talking about 60% of the shuttle's cost without the ability to steer the space vehicle to exactly where you need it to be without adding lots of thrusters and other forms of correction once in orbit. By the time you develop those systems and install them, your ~ 300m has approached ~ 500m, the cost of a shuttle launch anyhow. Not exactly a far more cost effective solution as you suggested.

Re:Here's a question

[AKAImBatman]

So now you're talking about 60% of the shuttle's cost

And over twice its cargo capacity.

without the ability to steer the space vehicle to exactly where you need it to be

BULLSHIT.

Sorry for that outburst, but you're attacking me without understanding what you're talking about. Take a look at this picture. You see that large cylindrical section at the top? That's the space craft that's carrying the cargo. It has full maneuvering abilities, and should have no difficulties in moving the cargo where it needs to go.

By the time you develop those systems and install them, your ~ 300m has approached ~ 500m, the cost of a shuttle launch anyhow

Let me make this as clear as I can. Commercial rockets can take cargo ANYWHERE the Space Shuttle can go, and MUCH, MUCH FARTHER. The Titan IV could precisely deposit a 12 tonne payload anywhere in Lunar orbit, or Mars orbit, or a million other places in the solar system.

You don't really think we'd fly rockets that can't adjust their position, do you?

Re:Here's a question

[ZeroGee]

Batman,

You're awfully aggressive. I'm referring to the fact that the payloads in the shuttle are specifically designed so they can be removed directly from the shuttle bay and captured by the ISS's robotic arms for installation. Did you bother to RTFA?

From the article:

Even more critically, the space shuttle provides an excellent delivery service, bringing the cargo right up next to the space station, where the station's robot arms can remove it from the cargo bay and attach it to the desired location on the station. Without the shuttle's services, a station-bound cargo module would need its own hefty rocket and guidance package that would need years of expensive testing before it could be trusted with irreplaceable station components.

Our rockets can put the payload into any orbit and location, but getting the payload to line up for docking directly after being placed in orbit is another issue entirely.

Re:Here's a question

[AKAImBatman]

Even if overall lift capacity is not a problem, what makes you think that a shuttle payload would fit in any launcher besides the shuttle

Granted, I don't know for sure, but I do know a few things:

1. The Titan IV is a USAF rocket. The Space Shuttle was supposed to replace it, the Shuttle failed to meet its weight to orbit goals. Cargos designed for the shuttle ended up being launched on the Titan.

2. The Titan has a lot of room and twice the cargo capacity. I'd be mightily surprised if a mounting adapter couldn't be cheaply developed.

3. The use of disposable rockets is NASA's idea, not mine. We do have to assume that they realize the implications of swapping out the launch system.

Re:Here's a question

[AKAImBatman]

My apologies. I think I'm getting a bit tired.

Yes, the Space Shuttle can perform a variety of maneuvers in a short time that make it a nice delivery system for the ISS. However, the Titan is a maneuverable craft, and can place the cargo within reach of the arm. Obviously, there is no maneuvering ability once the Titan releases its cargo, so they need to make sure they get it right the first time.

No redesigns are required, but then NASA tends to be a little touchy on changing mission profiles.

Re:Here's a question

[ZeroGee]

And over twice its cargo capacity.

From this page:

Lift Capability: Can carry up to 47,800 pounds (21,682 kg) into a low-earth orbit up to 12,700 pounds (5,761 kg) into a geosynchronous orbit when launched from Cape Canaveral AFS, Fla.; and up to 38,800 pounds (17,599 kg) into a low-earth polar orbit when launched from Vandenberg AFB. Using an inertial upper stage, the Titan IVB can transport up to 5,250 pounds (2,381 kg) into geosynchronous orbit.

Over twice the cargo capacity, huh? Check your sources.

Re:Here's a question

[visgoth]

Perhaps now would be a good time to consider building an orbital tug that would intercept the cargo and bring it into the correct position. Use the current boosters to put the package in an accessible orbit, then let the tug do the precision work.

Re:Here's a question

[AKAImBatman]

Hmm... seems you're right. I am tired. I mixed up the pounds (47,000) with the kg (21,000). I think I need to get some sleep. Sorry 'bout that.

Re:Here's a question

[Garion Maki]

that ~500m would be a one time investment tho, once you get the r&d, you can keep using it at the ~300m price, probably even less if you start bulk production.

Re:Here's a question

[Richard_at_work]

Thats 60% of the Shuttles LAUNCH cost, the $300million USD stated for a Titan IV launch includes the disposable vehicle. Oh, and unmanned "dumb" boosters havent had much problems putting payloads into very precise orbits since the 1950s. Sure one goes wrong every now and then,k but just looking at the Delta rockets launch history, out of 307 launches, there has been 15 failures and 1 incorrect orbit. Over a 44 year period, and 4 generations of rocket, 95% is a pretty impressive success rate.

If you look harder you can find specific data on launches between 1988 and 2002 on all launch vehicles. For those who wont click through, let me bring the data to you:

• Nasa Launches 1988 - 2002
  • Launches - 56
  • Success - 55
  • Rate - 98.21%
• DOD Launches 1988 - 2002
  • Launches - 111
  • Success - 100
  • Rate - 90.09%
• Commercial Launches 1988 - 2002
  • Launches - 112
  • Success - 103
  • Rate - 91.96%

Total number of successful launches between 1988 and 2002? 258 out of 279 launched. Total number of Shuttle missions at $500million a pop? 113 since 1981.

Some more maths coming up, still keeping up there?

THe space shuttle Endeavor cost $1.7billion USD in 1990, for a total of $8.5billion USD for the fleet of 5 assuming each cost the same as Endeavor. Each shuttle launch costs $500million. Each Titan launch costs $300million including the cost of the vehicle.

Total Launch costs of 113 Shuttle missions since 1981: $65billion USD.
Total Launch costs of 279 non shuttle missions since 1988: $83.7billion USD.

Price to have shuttle match non shuttle launches: $139.5billion USD.

Theres no doubt which is cooler, but now tell me which is the better deal? Granted, this is assuming that all boosters cost the same as the Titan, which is about the most expensive option behind the shuttle. Plus this doesnt take into account the cost of caring for the shuttle between launches.

Re:Here's a question

[winwar]

"No redesigns are required, but then NASA tends to be a little touchy on changing mission profiles."

Gee, I wonder why? Things seem to blow up when they deviate from them.

"Obviously, there is no maneuvering ability once the Titan releases its cargo, so they need to make sure they get it right the first time."

That, I'm afraid, would be totally unacceptable for space station deliveries. Do you want to risk the station over one rocket? If it can go wrong, it will. Therefore, additional systems would be needed, at additional cost, time for testing, etc. Pretty soon that rocket would probably act like a shuttle "mini-me" with a similar cost....

This, of course, assumes the rocket is CAPABLE of launching some of the specialized cargo (weight may not be the most important feature here). All of these safety (control) features will of course reduce payload.

Re:Here's a question

[Detritus]

The Titan IV program is dead, deceased, pushing up daisies, pining for the fjords, over. The last launch is planned for 2005. The last Titan IV was manufactured on April 11, 2002.

Re:Here's a question

[IOdine]

Are you aware of how Zarya and Zvezda linked up?

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

NASA is not planning to retire the Shuttle early.

[Nano2Sol]

If the reader had read the MSNBC story they might have understood that NASA commsioned several studies on different scenarios for the Shuttle. Since NASA commissions studies all the time on options for all its programs, so this study shouldn't come as any surprise.

To follow the space election political discussion including the fate of the shuttle from both sides, read this thread on NASA Watch.

Re:NASA is not planning to retire the Shuttle earl

[Nano2Sol]

I'll just point out that I believe the Shuttle should be retired as soon as possible, but there must be a viable domestic replacement vehicle in place ASAP.

Re:Consternation class

[cosmo7]

"Named after the situation NASA is in, Consternation Systems is responsible for developing the Not Another Shuttle Again (NAMBLA) and related exploration architecture systems. Consternation Systems is the combination of large and small systems that will provide Congress the capabilities necessary to cook up pork barrel politics for decades to come. Consternation Systems will be made up of artists' impressions, low-budget animations and constantly slipping schedules and a budget that expands and contracts according to the performances of DC's most expensive hookers and assistants."

So how long ...

[qray]

Till we can buy a space shuttle on eBay? This space for sale.

It can't play Quake.

[LTSharpe]

Even it's computers are too ancient. And that is why the shuttle should be abandoned. As much as I admire older technology, the shuttle is the most overengineered piece of hardware in existence.

Space Elevator

[Winterwind]

Sending buttloads of cash into orbit on rockets everytime we want to go up is just a waste. Let spend a really obscene amount of cash to build a space elevator once. Then we can go up and down all we want for relatively pennies a trip.

A much more accurate comparison

[Teancum]

That really isn't a fair comparison between the Cassini program and shuttle program.

A much more accurate comparison would have been between the Apollo program and the Shuttle program, both of which involved manned spaceflight.

The Apollo program achieved an incredible goal, namely that of putting a crew of two on the moon, and was both an incredible engineering accomplishment as well as accomplishing some very useful science that is still being sorted through to this day.

While you can cite some very good references to useful science that was produced on the shuttle, there is another very important comparison that needs to be made:

Skylab vs. The ISS

Skylab + Apollo did an incredible amount of pure scientific research, and the internal volume of useable lab space was almost identical to what is now available on the ISS.

The Shuttle + ISS program is incredibly expensive, and while they have proven the ability to do major space construction projects with the ISS (needed if we ever get L-5 going), there has been comparatively little actual science.

Re:A much more accurate comparison

[geg81]

A much more accurate comparison would have been between the Apollo program and the Shuttle program, both of which involved manned spaceflight.

I think manned spaceflight in general gives poor return on the investment, hence my comment.

The Apollo program achieved an incredible goal, namely that of putting a crew of two on the moon, and was both an incredible engineering accomplishment as well as accomplishing some very useful science that is still being sorted through to this day.

In the 1960's, perhaps there wasn't much choice other than to put people there. Today, there is no need to do that: robotic probes are much cheaper.

Re:A much more accurate comparison

[Teancum]

No, I think you could have pretty much done just about everything today that you could have back in 1960, at least as far as lunar exploration was concerned. There was a considerable flurry of unmanned lunar exploration (the Ranger and Surveyor series, for example) well before Neil Armstrong landed there.

The two approaches to exploring space really go hand in hand, and I've pointed out earlier (in previous articles, not just this one) that I doubt the public would put up with robotic exploration without at least some sort of manned program in the wings. Sure, in terms of the amount of actual science done per $ (or euro) it is far better to send a robot.

It is also better to send a robot to Antarctica as well, but actual people do go there and live year-round under extreme circumstances. Another good example (perhaps even better) is deep-ocean exploration.

Also, like in the example with Antarctica, sometimes it is better in some circumstances to have a living, breathing person who is right there, able to use intelligent judgement (AI systems havn't become that advanced yet) and change mission parameters on the fly. Not to mention the ability to actually repair equipment on the fly and get it to work correctly. Or even a manual override if it is clear that the automated systems aren't working correctly. None of this can be done with Cassini, and even the Galleleo probe would have worked better had somebody been available to fix the Hi-gain antenna.

In the last case, I don't know why NASA just didn't perform a quick test of the equipment before sending it along. It was one of the few major probes that was actually launched not into space, but FROM space (LEO on the Shuttle). Had an astronaut been able to do a final diagnostics before firing the booster engine and even just tested the antennas before the firing, it would have been comparatively easier to fix, and would have by itself justified the cost of having astronauts on board the launch vehicle.

The point I was trying to make in Shuttle vs. Apollo is that at least both were manned spacecraft, and from just about everything I've seen written you can get a much cheaper launch vehicle from a substantially redesigned Apollo/Gemini spacecraft with a capacity of seven astronauts. Something like that could have easily been launched from a Saturn V rocket into LEO, and if the ISS building blocks had been the size of Skylab for each major module instead of the size requirement for the Shuttle loading bay, the ISS construction would have been essentially complete by now, including housing for at least 7-12 astronauts on board. That would have allowed for real science to occur instead of having two astronauts/cosmonauts that are essentially doing no science because they are working 24/7 trying to keep the station kept together and running.

All of this is with proven technology, not inventing something new that needs to be tried again. Basically, the Shuttle program has accomplished almost none of its original design goals except one: Being able to retrieve large objects from space and bring them to the ground without burning up. And that is a purpose that it has used so seldom that it is hardly worth even mentioning. I will conceed that the shuttle is a lousy program and needs to end, with the remaining shuttles being placed properly into several good museums. This even in the case that there is no other spacecraft to carry astronauts for several years.

Re:A much more accurate comparison

[geg81]

It is also better to send a robot to Antarctica as well, but actual people do go there and live year-round under extreme circumstances.

Absolutely not. If you're on a budget, you can probably get to Antarctica and live there more cheaply than you move to and live in a nice Manhattan apartment: the air is breathable, you can get food if you must, you can get there with comparatively small amounts of energy (sail and on foot). You don't even have to worry about recycling your water or your waste.

Another good example (perhaps even better) is deep-ocean exploration.

Same thing: it's an inhospitable environment, arguably more inhospitable than space, but it's comparatively easy to get there and back.

(AI systems havn't become that advanced yet) and change mission parameters on the fly. Not to mention the ability to actually repair equipment on the fly and get it to work correctly. Or even a manual override if it is clear that the automated systems aren't working correctly.

Robotic probes don't mean autonomously intelligent probes. You only need intelligence if there is a frequent need to respond quickly and intelligently, and there has been. For everything else, you can leave the intelligence on earth, with mission control.

None of this can be done with Cassini, and even the Galleleo probe would have worked better had somebody been available to fix the Hi-gain antenna.

For the sake of argument, let's assume the following mission costs (I think that's being pretty kind to the manned mission--it would probably be even more expensive):
(1) Cassini: $4bn
(2) Cassini+Robotic Arms: $40bn
(3) Cassini+Manned Crew: $400bn
It simply doesn't add up: the added flexibility you get from robotic arms or a manned crew doesn't justify the extra expense; you're better off sending 100 probes than 1 manned mission, even if many of the probes fail. And the manned mission would probably be high risk.

Re:A much more accurate comparison

[Teancum]

I think you underestimate just how difficult it is to live in Antarctica, and how much "modern" technology has made it much more accessable. In the early 20th Century (when a good portion of the initial Antarctic exploration like even getting to the South Pole was taking place), it was a major expedition that involved financing on the part of national governments in order to accomplish. You can't simply hop in your rowboat on the Hudson River and expect to get to the South Pole on a budget of a Wal-Mart stocking clerk. While at least in theory possible now, it was impossible 100 years ago.

Deep-sea exploration is happening by robotic crews for much of the same reason that robotic spacecraft are used: the inhospitalble environment (as you mentioned). Of course, there are people who take diving trips in person, and sometimes for reasons that have nothing to do with science (like the couple that got married on the deck of the Titanic... on the bottom of the Atlantic in a submarine).

Human space exploration must continue, and it need not be in direct competition for funds from the robotic science missions. It is unfortunately the science community that tries to push it that way and make it Hard Science vs. Manned Spaceflight.

Once stable populations of people are "up there" in space, the economics of going up and flying people into space will take care of themselves. The problem is how do you achieve that goal in the first place? Should NASA even be directly involved?

Re:A much more accurate comparison

[geg81]

and how much "modern" technology has made it much more accessable

Did I say anything about not using modern technology? (I talked about sailing and on foot simply to point out that you don't need a lot of energy.)

You can't simply hop in your rowboat on the Hudson River and expect to get to the South Pole on a budget of a Wal-Mart stocking clerk.

Um--the South Pole isn't the same as Antarctica. In any case, almost any place on earth is good for humans compared to space: you get gravity, air, and water, at least.

Incidentally, when people talk about "robotic exploration", the first order of business is still aerial and orbital robotic exploration: drones, balloons, etc. And those are the primary mode of mapping and exploration even here on earth because those are cheaper even here. We should be planning on sending hundreds of aerial and orbital explorers to Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and Titan. We should also be dropping hundreds of simple, non-mobile sensor packets on every big planetary body and moon.

Once stable populations of people are "up there" in space, the economics of going up and flying people into space will take care of themselves

I don't see how: unlike PCs, mass production of rockets doesn't drive down their costs significantly, since most of the costs are not in the manufacturing.

Human space exploration must continue

Why "must" it? I see no reason to continue it, at least not until we actually have achieved radical changes in technology that make it a trivial afterthought.

and it need not be in direct competition for funds from the robotic science missions. It is unfortunately the science community that tries to push it that way and make it Hard Science vs. Manned Spaceflight.

Perhaps that has something to do with the fact that the people pushing manned space flight actually try to sell it as "science" and even "useful science". If they presented it for what it was, entertainment, hard scientists wouldn't care.

ISS will not include China

[amightywind]

If the Chinese are invited into the partnership, they also can transport personnel aboard their Shenzhou manned spacecraft, whose second orbital flight is expected next year.

This is absurd speculation for a country that has recently hijacked an American surveillance plane from international airspace. The US has already balked at space collaboration with China. It is unlikely to make gratuitous gestures like this until they institute democracy and stop threatening to invade Taiwan.

As for retiring the shuttle, it would be moronic to do this without identifying the new launchers and spacecraft to take its place. The point wasn't addressed in this rather superficial article. I don't think a repeat of the 6 year stand down from manned spaceflight that occurred between Apollo and the shuttle is acceptable.

Overkill?

[ravenspear]

Isn't a Saturn V type rocket a little much for finishing the ISS. You don't need to achieve escape velocity just to reach the ISS.

Re:Overkill?

[cmowire]

The Saturn V, minus the third stage, can cary a *lot* of payload to orbit. That's what they used to launch the Skylab station. Just because it was mostly used to go to the moon doesn't mean that that's the only trajectory it can follow.

Autonomous shuttle - unmanned lift and return.

[OgGreeb]

NASA has been studying for years setting up enough automation to launch and return the shuttle unmanned. We know we can get people to/and from the ISS using the Russian hardware -- if we used the heavy-lift capability of the shuttles without having to worry about losing people, it would seem to be a good solution to the problem. We would just have to worry about getting the flight ops automated and how to maneuver into close proximty to the station remotely without slamming into it.

It's got to be cheaper to run the shuttle on autopilot then to figure out how to repair them in space.

Re:Autonomous shuttle - unmanned lift and return.

[Thor Ablestar]

You need not heavy-lift but heavy-land capacity of Shuttle. All other requirements (for the ISS project, I mean) can be satisfied with disposable rockets such as Russian Proton or Sea Launch Zenit or a lot of US rockets.

And BTW do you know why European ATV will dock the Russian side of ISS? Europeans simply use the Russian docking technology. I always wonder why America is the world automation leader but shuttles both dock and land manually while Russian ships dock automatically and Buran landed automatically.

Henry David Thoreau, is that you?

[guet]

What are you doing posting on a forum hosted on the internet - whose infrastructure is supported mostly by US Government funded institutions? Using HTML, created in an institution ( CERN ) funded by many governments. Dialling in on a telephone/ADSL line, the infrastructure for which was created by the Govt.?

For that matter, why are you using a computer? Stick to your log cabin and complaining about the new railroad : )

Re:Henry David Thoreau, is that you?

[msi]

The space programme was worth it for WD40 imo

Reusable = Mature Tech

[Anonymous Coward]

Specalized craft are always the better option from an engineering standpoint, and usually from an operational standpoint. Unfortunately, there will be people who insist on evaluating this from a pure cost perspective, and to them an N-ship fleet of do-it-all birds will always look better than N ships of X different specalizations. Starting with a nominally smaller design budget.

I must disagree with the requirement for a reusable spacecraft has set back spaceflight. NASA went that route with Skylab, which despite it's achievements relied heavily unused hardware from the Apollo program. Yes, disposable manned rockets are cheaper on a per-flight basis at the moment. They are also a derived from ICBMs, which were mostly a mature technology by 1960. Reusability imposes more difficult engineering requirements, yes, but to paraphrase Michael Collins it also implies maturity. (He also likened the shuttle to the DC-1.5, which should say just how mature the shuttle really is.) Would air travel be commercially viable if the 757 was built so that it had to be extensively inspected and refurbished after each flight?

The shuttles may have been flying since the early eighties, but they have required extensive upgrades, refittings, and maintainence to keep flying. All of these point to a design that, for all of it's capabilities, is not yet technologically mature. Something NASA - and Congress - should have been well aware of even before Challenger, let alone Columbia. The fact that they've had several programs to replace the shuttle suggests that at least part of NASA knows this fact. All of which have, on paper, required less operational overhead than the shuttle.

A second generation shuttle, using prior experience and more durable materials from the start, should be more reliable and at least as capable. Ideally, to the point where it is no longer cheaper to use throwaway rockets. Maybe not as good as the promises on paper, but that's nothing new. The shuttle was originally supposed to have a manned, fully reusable booster stage. Which was scrapped because someone decided it was too expensive compared to SRBs. Yet we're still stuck with the same, expensive prototype space "plane" for carrying bigger loads.

I'm sure most of us know the Dilbertism of how managers will waste money on frivolties to make sure their department's budget doesn't get cut next year. I submit that part of the reason we haven't seen any progress beyond the design and prototype stage in reusable craft is the same kind of self-serving logic.

Re:err

[amightywind]

Not much we could do if they were flying in international airspace with passive sensors. Hijacking airplanes is against international law, such as it is

Huff...

[Anonymous Coward]

Here is my humble opinion of what NASA should do:

1. Use the shuttle to bring the largest components of the space station. The remaining components use rockets. Retire the shuttle once we meet international goals. Shuttle done.

2. We have a space station now. Worthless? No! The next space ship we create is reusable. The point is when your done with a mission dock to the station. Take small capsules back to earth. Take capsules up to the station. The capsules are soley designed for orbit insertion of human cargo and the safety of that cargo. Each new crew reuses the station and the ship docked to it. Possibly even refuel the new space ship from the station if it is safe enough.

3. Since the new space ship does not have to reenter the earth's atmosphere make it modular. So, for each new mission snap in removable modules that can be stored at the space station. Maybe some modules could be for storage, fuel, habitation,robotics module, moon base modules. Since there is no reentry tiles ( mention in another post ) we can have an even larger space ship to replace the shuttle.

4. Now, with the new ship docked to the station: undock with crew and modules and fly over to the moon or other orbits.

5. Built a large observatory on the station to give the station more value. Need new telescope parts send it up with the next cargo shipment. The ISS crew will upgrade it no problem. OK, it does about 90% of what Hubble does ... billions saved and better repair/upgrade options.

6. If you get the vehicle far enough from earth go nuclear.

7. Throw any space junk at the sun.

Moral of the story: If you put something in orbit leave as much of it in orbit as possible. Getting humans into orbit and back to earth is a special problem with safety being number one. Solution for Humans: Capsules. Solution for stuff: Cargo ships. Seperate human cargo from non human mechanical cargo. Furthermore, with cargo and humans seperate there can be a disconnection of the humans with the profit motives of puting up cargo.

Re:Huff...

[dick johnson]

Why not convert the shuttle's into something usable for extra-orbital work?

When NASA is finished using them as trucks, launch them into space and convert them into a space fleet. I'm assuming you'd have to convert the engines and use the bays for some other use.

But you could use the shuttles as a space fleet. They'd never return to earth. But maybe they could be used to transport materials to lunar orbit and then another craft within the bay could be used to land the equipment and people on the moon.

It seems a waste to mothball these ships.

That doesn't suprise me much.

[Sp0r]

I don't think I've ever seen such a happy message from Nasa as: There's a hurricane a coming, and it may break some of our stuff. If it does, we may not be able to replace it. I know this was a bad year for Florida hurricanes, but this message was passed on before the first one of the year hit. Sounds to me like they were praying for the Shuttle Processing Building to get whisked off to the land of Oz.

J2 vs SSME

[amightywind]

I don't disagree with your post. But the Space Shuttle Main Engines capabilities far exceed the Saturn V J2's in total thrust, specific impulse, reliability, and durability. It is hoped the the successor to the shuttle will intelligently mine this great technology.

Re:J2 vs SSME

[Rei]

The problem with SSMEs is that they're a pain to maintain. If we could have a simpler, reusable engine, *that* would save money.

Re:J2 vs SSME

[amightywind]

The problem with SSMEs is that they're a pain to maintain. If we could have a simpler, reusable engine, *that* would save money.

Here it is.

Re:J2 vs SSME

[Rei]

That page says it's designed for an expendible launch vehicle. I'm interested in a simpler, reusable engine.

I'm a strong proponent of, at least for the present, big dumb simple disposable rockets for cargo, and small, higher-tech reusables for lifting people, while ditching the "really big" payloads wherever possible (since big dumb simple boosters don't scale that well). With both routes being advanced at the same time, perhaps one will end up as the clear winner, and we can move all space traffic to that method.

Re:J2 vs SSME

[AKAImBatman]

I agree. Whatever tech that was designed in the SSME program should be leveraged, just as the Saturn V tech was leveraged for the SSMEs. And just like the SSMEs, the tech should be further improved upon. For example, aerospike engines are well understood at this point and should be designed into the next LHOx engines if at all possible. Such a design may provide the extra efficiency needed to allow the next vehicle to be 100% LHOx. :-)

Can I get my shuttle hater's patch now?

[Thud457]

Errrrm, I'm not sure, but I seem to remember something about NASA originally planning some projects (Skylab, for one, IIRC) based upon availability of the shuttle. Which was then delayed. So they designed the program around using a spare Saturn (1b wasn't it?).

So the Shuttle's been screwing up other programs before it was even built!

Re:Can I get my shuttle hater's patch now?

[red floyd]

They used a 1B to get the crews up there. They used a modified V to launch the lab itself.

Cargo Bay Six

[uberdave]

The delta could probably be fitted with a payload module that mimics the shuttle's cargo bay.

Re:Cargo Bay Six

[winwar]

"The delta could probably be fitted with a payload module that mimics the shuttle's cargo bay."

"could probably"?!? I am willing to nominate you for the position of "PHB" because you obviously show no clue...

I believe it is far closer to "could not". Because if it was possible (both economic and technically) it would have been proposed as a shuttle replacement.

Re:Cargo Bay Six

[uberdave]

The article explains how this is technically feasible, even though it means a loss of performance. The delta has not been proposed as a shuttle replacement, but a supplement to the shuttle. It is not a replacement because it is both non-reusable, and it is purely a lift vehicle, not a "mass return" vehicle.

Limit and Crew

[jzarling]

Limit the remaining time to building the ISS and the repair of Hubble.

On the ISS missions limit the crew to 3 people, a pilot, the commander/co-pilot and a payload specialist.

On the Hubble missions only the necessary crew, a pilot, co-pilot, 2 people to carry out the repairs.

Then lets restasrt work on the Venture Star. The design is sound, we need a bitmore work witht he material science but it should be completed in under a decade.

Once complete, land the shuttles, decom them, and divy them up between the great science museums of the US.

The next generation "disposable" can supply the station, launch probes, and satelites.

And finally NASA, reduce the bean counters.

OK, so what's next?

[Presence1]

The shuttle has some good capabilities, but never really lived up to its promise of quick turnarounds and cheap flights. It is now 30 year old technology.

I was first going to pose the question about to whom they could sell the assts and program. But then I realized that no one would want to buy it because it couldn't be made profitable, even if one got the assets for $1.

Contrast this with Scaled Composites winning the X Prize and Branson investing to sell public commercial space flight in 3 years. Yes, this is suborbital and low capacity, but it does show that it is time to retire the old birds and develop something new.

Re:OK, so what's next?

[Rob_Warwick]

Contrast this with Scaled Composites winning the X Prize and Branson investing to sell public commercial space flight in 3 years. Yes, this is suborbital and low capacity, but it does show that it is time to retire the old birds and develop something new.

I think you mean to say ..."develop something new, and then retire the old birds."

-Rob

I'll have one of these please..

[elFarto the 2nd]

http://www.nuclearspace.com/a_liberty_ship.htm

And I want mine red, with go faster stripes on it.

Regards
elFarto

NASA will be like the FAA...

[borgheron]

NASA will, I think, start to change into something more akin to the FAA. Now that we've seen suborbital flights by private companies (such as the Ansari X prize winner SpaceShipOne by Scaled Composites) I believe that NASA will take on a more regulatory role in space.

Money from NASA should be put into private industry.

GJC

Re:NASA will be like the FAA...

[Teancum]

Unfortunately there already is a "regulatory body" that administers spaceflight: The Administration for Space Transportation. If you look into their history, you will find that they have been bounced all over the federal government, but it looks like they are in the FAA for the long-haul. It is a better fit anyway.

NASA really needs to get back to the original missions of the NACA, and do more "Star Trek"-like misisons.... to boldly go where nobody has gone before. Spending the last 20 year in LEO just doesn't work and is wasting NASA's talents and resources. It is for going to exotic places that you need a PhD. Space construction should be done by roughnecks who have the temperment to build oil drilling platforms in the North Sea or Gulf of Mexico, not somebody who just defended his dissertation in Biology or Earth Science.

If NASA could transform itself back into a "Space _EXPLORATION_" agency, I don't have any problem with their current level of funding to be maintained or even increased. It is just that LEO is more than simply explored, it is getting civilian tourists, and Scaled Composites is just the beginning. If NASA wants to stay in the space transportation business, it should be sold off to the highest bidder and made a private corporation.

Shuttle compromises

[purfledspruce]

The shuttle had to be redesigned to lower initial costs. The original design was 100% reusable and would not have had either of the problems that caused the shuttles to be lost.

The problem is that the initial design and construction costs come from a different "barrel of money" than operations costs, so NASA engineers were forced to change the design because of congress. The original design would have been much less to launch and maintain, but cost more up front.

As it was, funding was so tight that NASA had to look for more customers...eventually enlisting parts of the military. They wanted a larger payload capacity, which complicated things further.

You can read more about it here:

http://www.tsgc.utexas.edu/archive/general/ethic s/shuttle.html

Use the remaining shuttles for asteroid deflection

[wheelbarrow]

I think we need a plan to someday deflect a large asteroid that is on a collison course with earth. The best way to deflect asteroids would be to arrange a collison with another object of mass. I propose that we station the remaining shuttles in orbit. Fill them with more weight to achieve more mass. Equip them with remote control so they can be navigated from earth. Then, when the bad asteroid is detected, place one or more on a collision course.

Re:err

[Teancum]

Hijacking airplanes is not just against "international law", it is an act of war, and you risk the consequences of war if you do such an act. It is just that the P.R. China is unlikely to be a target of full U.S. military action due to some silly stunt like that. Still, if done at the wrong time you might find bombs exploding where you don't want them at.

How much cheaper would the shuttle be

[RhettLivingston]

if we simply retrofitted it as an unmanned vehicle and kept flying them as a robotic space truck? The hardest thing to replace about it is its heavy lift capacity. If it was prepared to unmanned instead of manned standards and life support was stripped, it seems possible that we could get some more use out of it for a lot less cost.

NASA press conference addressing this

[jkondel]

http://www.nasawatch.com/archives/000323.html#more Read that for the official response from NASA.

No purpose left for shuttle or station

[vlm]

I like a viable healthy space program

However, the shuttle has done all it's going to do. If the Columbia hadn't flamed out it was going to be retired to the Smithsonian after the upcoming hubble mission. The only purpose left for the shuttles is to visit the station.

The station has done all it's going to do. To "save money" its been understaffed like a cheap I.S. department. There are almost enough people in the station to safely support the station. Not enough left to do any science or discovery. So the only purpose of the station is to be a destination for the shuttle.

Basically they're two pork barrel programs that exist to support each other.

I'd much rather seen the billions spent on something useful like x-prize part II or whatever.

good

[Matt_Joyce]

The shuttle was a crap design and chosen for the wrong reasons. It never achived it's original goals, cheap reusable space travel.

Forget space exploration.....

[cbdavis]

Have people forget we are sending the US treasury to Iraq? We have NO bucks for RandD on a new system. We cant keep the current Shuttle going. So scrap it. But dont kid yourself into thinking we are going to replace it. It is going to be a long time before this country gets ANY good RandD going.

Re:YOU STFU

[khallow]

I mean really, who comes up with this shit...space elevator, so we can fucking crawl our way into space like children.

Yes! Clearly the superior way is to get into space by flapping our arms really fast.

Re: Kerry's position on NASA

[Mspangler]

Buck Rogers or Duck Dogers? Is there a difference, or is it all the same once the bureaucracy gets hold of it?

Sorry, couldn't resist.

also

[gowmc]

In other news, 3D Realms considers an early release of Duke Nukem Forever.

Sure...

[Goonie]

I'll agree with you, if nanotube guys can achieve one little thing first; I'd like them to actually create macroscale pieces of nanotube of the requisite strength, and use them to construct a bridge over, say, the Cam River.

Until then, let's not throw away our space program on the basis of a pipedream.

Not true...

[antispam_ben]

In 1986, one shuttle at a time.

No, they actually made a replacement for the Challenger. There hasn't been the first peep about a replacement for the Columbia.

Re:This is not suprising.

[Pig Hogger]

Reposted, account being moderated as "flamebait".

16 years of republican control during the last 24 years have brought about the typical bourgeois short-term thinking that has resulted in the virtual annihilation of the USA's space capability.

More englightened leadership would have started working to ensure the developmnent of a more up-to-date alternative.

But it may be too late now, the aerospatial talent is either retired or scattered thanks to the aerospatial industry post 9/11 debacle, and there is definitely no replacements for those lost talent, as the bourgeois shortsightedness send bright students into law school rather than engineering.

More Robots

[PingPongBoy]

There has been so much success with the Mars rovers and Cassini. Hopefully Hubble will be serviced by robots.

Proposition: automatic control of reusable spacecraft. This will allow more flights as well as improve space robotics.

Shuttle Retirement

[anotherwjt]

Retire the vessels to deep space , and make the complex machines do something useful on the slow trip out . $500 million is a valid golden drop kick .

Re:F-1 is 75% more powerful than RD-180.

[LWATCDR]

I was suggesting using the RD-170. The RD-180 is a derivative and is lower thrust. As to loosing life The problem with LH is that it is light for the power but not very dense so the tanks have to get very large.. For a first stage kerosene might be the better choice. That is why the Saturns used kerosene for the first stage and LH for the upper. Now an interesting option might be LM or liquid methane Better power to volume than LH and better power to weight than kerosene.
I was not suggesting using the shuttle tank btw. I was suggesting using the technology mainly the LiAl alloys in a new rocket.

Free Market Economy

[Mark of THE CITY]

Define "better," please.