Low-Cost Space Shuttle Replacement Proposed

FleaPlus writes "The Washington Times and Space.com has an article on a plan for a low-cost shuttle replacement by t/Space, an organization whose team includes AirLaunch LLC and Burt Rutan's Scaled Composites. Instead of a one-size-fits-all craft, t/Space's plan is to build an air-launched four-person capsule termed the Crew Transfer Vehicle (CXV), specialized for carrying people to and from low-Earth orbit. Once in orbit the CXV would dock with a separately-launched Crew Exploration Vehicle (likely built by Lockheed Martin or Northrop Grumman), which could be optimized for traveling between Earth orbit and the Moon. The CXV would also be able to dock with a space station or serve as a crew lifeboat. The group, which has already received some NASA funding, calculates that it can have the system ready by 2008 for $400 million, with a per-launch cost of $20 million (compared to ~$500 million per shuttle launch). Development would be done under a competitive fixed-price (instead of cost-plus) contract."

Comments

Why not?

[mmc]

Why not just give them US$400M? Northrup and the others will spend that kind of money just thinking about it all - then at least they'll have two options at the end of it!

Cost

[ArbiterOne]

400 million? It costs 2 billion (taxpayer) dollars to build ONE stealth bomber. One.
This is cheap.
If we can get back into space for 400 million, call it a bargain and GO!

Good Old Boys

[StratoChief66]

What about when the backers are brought before Dubya and he asks them how much of the 400 million initial and 20 million per launch goes to helping the good old boys and the backers look at each other and groan? I've never been accused of having much faith in the US administration but I just figure the men in charge of our dear sweet US of A will just say thank you for the fine offer but we've already got a team on the problem. I've never seem the government interest peaked by cost savings unless that savings goes to their friends/screws the general public or both of the above.

Re:Hmm

[Jarnis]

Actually, considering what Scaled Composites has done so far, and the budget they've used, I have some belief that this might be doable. Of course it would not include funds for running a huge NASA paperpusher army, so it probably won't include costs of extensive certifications and testings to get the failure rate down to minimal. Space is risky business, and spending megabucks for additional 1-2% success rate is just a bad idea. Every astronaut can themselves consider the risks and decide if they are happy with the launch vehicle.

Nobody was out there demanding stacks of paper and testing from the Wright brothers when they experimented. In retrospect their contraption was highly unstable and unsafe. Same should apply for launch system developments. Sure, stuff will blow up, and people will die. People who understood the risks and knew exactly what they were doing. If they run out of people who are willing to hop onboard, they know they must spend time and money on the safety. Today, I doubt they'll have many issues as long as the (test)pilots are involved in the process and know how the tincan they are hopping into ticks.

No need to bog it all down with 100M$s of paperwork and extra safety tests and checks that really won't improve safety. The law of diminishing returns applies - sure, you want to test and make sure the damn thing works, but beyond certain point extra testing and checking is not going to change the safety much - only the pricetag will go up, see NASA :)

Re:Hmm

[acidrain]

Sure, stuff will blow up, and people will die.

Cute. It isn't that we can't find people who will take the risks, it's our safety obsessive culture that cannot tolerate your suggestion. Sure the money would be far better spent on foreign aid, in terms of lives per dollar, but public sentiment isn't rational. And NASA depends on public sentiment for it's cash, not the delivery of a product.

Re:Hmm

[Jarnis]

Which is why we need private enterprises taking the initiative.

Business, hiring qualified test pilots to do stuff they are supposed to be doing. Everyone doing it can compare their paycheck to their job description and choose if the want to ride the experimental thingy.

Yes, I can imagine congressional hearings and 'oversight' destroying the whole thing after a crew exits stage left in a fireball. That means US has a problem, and such business should relocate elsewhere...

Odd that nobody seems to raise holy hell over dead military test pilots who have over the years died while testing military hardware. Nobody ever hears of them. People also seem to shrug off accidents during pilot training and military exercises. How is this any different from space exploration? It isn't. Space = risky business, where people can die. Live with it.

I know I'd love to go up there like just about everyone else. I also know that today's hardware for doing so is somewhat unreliable and 'prototype' in many ways, so I'd currently choose not to take the ride. I could take a zero-g ride on a vomit comet (airplanes are petty mature), but betatesting a rocket is not my idea of a fun occupation. At the same time I'm quite sure you'd find immensely qualified takers for the job...

Re:Hmm

[Rei]

There are a lot of fallacies in this post. Lets go down the list:

Actually, considering what Scaled Composites has done so far

Scaled has done almost nothing in terms of sending a craft to orbit.

Of course it would not include funds for running a huge NASA paperpusher army

NASA's "paperpushing" regulations are largely due to the private companies trying to take advantage of them. Trust me, I used to work for one company that did - Rockwell-Collins. They had a Space Shuttle contract, and started charging all of their other projects that were low on budget to the shuttle contract, then simply claimed that the project was running overbudget. Eventually they were caught and smacked down with fines and regulatory penalties, but far down the line.

The regulations are designed to make sure that the net result is A) what they asked for, B) safety corners haven't been cut, and C) . Can they be improved? You bet. Have they been improved already? You bet (as much as O'Keefe has done wrong, most will agree that he made NASA regulations a lot easier to deal with).

Every astronaut can themselves consider the risks and decide if they are happy with the launch vehicle.

I'll agree with that one.

Nobody was out there demanding stacks of paper and testing from the Wright brothers when they experimented.

Experimented on themselves. When they wanted to sell their airplane to the military, the military put it through the works.

In retrospect their contraption was highly unstable and unsafe.

Unstable? Yes. Unsafe? Hardly. Early airplanes flew so low and so slow that even when you crashed, it was rarely a fatal event. The first fatality wasn't until 1908, despite several hundred (yes, hundred) teams around the world building their own airplanes in that time, many with dubious methods. If I recall the number correctly, the first cross-country flight attempt in order to win a cup involved about three dozen crashes *by the same contender*, who each time patched his airplane up and took off again. Even with all of the advances in speed (and increases in flying altitude), and with far more rugged terrain, of the dozen crashes in the first attempt to fly around the world in 1924, none were fatal. The first fatal commercial flight wasn't until two planes in (late 1920s, early 1930s? Don't recall the exact date) collided over the English Channel. I could keep going, but I think you get the picture. Early amateur airplanes were nothing like amateur rockets - their failure modes were far, far more gentle.

No need to bog it all down with 100M$s of paperwork and extra safety tests and checks that really won't improve safety.

You better believe that all of those "extra safety tests" increase safety. Take a look at the history of any rocket development program's tests. Often, you won't find burnthrough fuel/oxidizer leak, or other potentially fatal complication until you've mounted everything on the launch pad to each other and are doing your 20th or so static firing of the engines.

The law of diminishing returns applies - sure, you want to test and make sure the damn thing works, but beyond certain point extra testing and checking is not going to change the safety much

Quite true. But look at all of the public outcry (and even outcry on Slashdot) when a manned spacecraft fails. They have reasons other than pure logic to take into account: public reaction. If t-space wants to step into the public limelight as such, they better be prepared to take that on as well.