You've got me thinking on this about how I would fix the manned space program to achieve this. What flaws can you find with the following steps: 1) give up on current shuttle 2) fasttrack the simple-safe heavy booster to bring back proper heavy lift capability. Use Soyuz for man lift in the meantime.
3) Remove paperwork around spaceflight, make it about as difficult to certify as say putting a car on the road. Determine the lowest possible payload size acceptable (i.e. I'm thinking kilogram sized payloads for food stuff, spare parts, fuel canisters etc, the smaller the better) Then set in stone that NASA will buy commercially from the cheapest possible provider whoever can get this minimum payload to the ISS. If you can do it 10,000 units at a time all the better, but it is $/kg that is the metric. This allows startup companies to start small with their freaky idea and if they can get it to work cheaper than anyone else, they have a market. Hopefully as time increases an increasing one. 4) extend the ISS into an orbital construction facility (one nut at a time via option 3 if needed). Any big modules can be lifted by the heavy lift you built earlier. Using heavy lift is a last resort though as option 3 should give you the cheaper option. 4) once 3 has got competition for a supply route going, Add a new catagory which has the minimum cargo capacity at approx 1 human + life support. (We're still only using this for cargo). Again the choice to buy is purely based upon $/kg 5) Man rate option 4. Choice now becomes $/person. At this point stop using Soyuz and switch to this for getting people in space. By this point you have a constant supply line to an orbital construction facility. If you choose to build your moon mission here, great. You may also choose to build your orbiting hotel here. 6) Passenger rate system. Now we expect a procedure to make space travel as reliable as car driving. This is the point we can start to worry about more than just $/person and pay very close attention to safty.
Other ways to get small players into the field: * There is a requirement for re-entry vehicles for both regular return,trash return, escape pods etc. Again, set spec, buy at lowest cost at time of purchase. * Space Tug - seems a simple space craft to build.; and something that over time more of would be needed.
Now we have lots of competition at all levels of the supply route to space. We have an easy entry path of the supply route that startups who have innovative ideas can have an easier time of. We have a progression path to space whilst keeping a heavy booster option.
A further thought to enhance competition would be to standardise parts. e.g. for the heavy lift option, you don't contract boeing to make a SSME, you offer to buy an engine fropm whoever can meet these specs. In the same way there are multiple people Airbus can buy their jet engines from and put on the same aircraft, you make sure that there are multiple companies you can buy your engines for your heavy lift booster off.
Probably a good job I'm in this armchair and not in charge:-) And how to pay for this, that's for another post:-)
Economics, no matter how much they mass produce any space transport system I can't believe it'll ever be cheaper than say a high end car. Although I might be able to afford a low end one I can't see me affording a high end one. Hence my logic of it would need to be reusable for me to afford it. For the moment I'd certainly say just go with what's cheaper. On that subject, any ideas on how the shuttle would perform if you used the same technology but _just_ had to transport people? If you only had to run at 80% vs 110% would it still be so insanely expensive? I'm sure the turnaround times would vastly dwindle. Hence my logic that reusable can be cheap as was origonally intended.
As for nuclear rockets, all I'm sure of is politics change. Here's a thought experiment for you, what would happen if China developed a ground launched Orion launch system?
Can't argue really. I suppose I am just biased as there is no way I will ever get into space on a none-reusable design:-( Maybe I just have to wait for some nuclear technology to change the game's rules
Skylon only had one engine (well a pair of the same engine). In order to air breath it had/has an extra compressor and some aerodynamic tweaks. It was/is a rocket engine all the time and used air compressed from the intake as the oxydiser. But until they get it to work I'm not holding my breath...
Absolutley. Every car I have driven (except the one I am now driving) is now on the scrap heap because of an accident. Therefore cars have a 100% accident rate and the car I am driving is now an accident waiting to happen!
I understand, was supposed to use the same external tank and twin solid rockets
AFAIK the current plans for the heavy lift carrier still use the shuttle ET & SSMEs but with payload on the top.
http://www.safesimplesoon.com/default.htm Witho ut a structure mounted on the side it doesn't matter if anything falls off, there is nothing to hit.
My current hope is they drop the shuttle completely and fast track this program. I'm sure with all of NASA behind it they could shave many years off the planned program. Can they ever repeat the initial success of their first rush into space?
Bear in mind that the shuttle is an experimental system pressed into the main system. It was a stop gap measure. The origonal plans called for a 2nd generation shuttle which did fix the system propeerly. NASA have not been able to do this. If it was an X plane and 2 flights out of 113 had failed would you really call the program a disaster? I doubt it since many X plane projects have had worse safty records than this. That said many of them had an abort system which the shuttle sadly lacks...
While i don't agree with ID or believe in the existance of a supreme being, your comments reminded me of something which I do believe in. If others hadn't read it you might find it interesting. Shamelessly quoting G'Kar from Babylon 5... --------------- If I take a lamp and shine it toward the wall, a bright spot will appear on the wall. The lamp is our search for truth... for understanding. Too often, we assume that the light on the wall is God, but the light is not the goal of the search, it is the result of the search. The more intense the search, the brighter the light on the wall. The brighter the light on the wall, the greater the sense of revelation upon seeing it. Similarly, someone who does not search--who does not bring a lantern--sees nothing. What we perceive as God is the by-product of our search for God. It may simply be an appreciation of the light... pure and unblemished... not understanding that it comes from us. Sometimes we stand in front of the light and assume that we are the center of the universe--God looks astonishingly like we do--or we turn to look at our shadow and assume that all is darkness. If we allow ourselves to get in the way, we defeat the purpose, which is to use the light of our search to illuminate the wall in all its beauty and in all its flaws; and in so doing, better understand the world around us."
Because you can? Because it's difficult and not off the shelf? Because it's cool to set up your own network with your mates without someone else doing all the tricky stuff for you? What more excuses does a geek need? Seriously, I used to be heavy into packet radio before I went to Uni and had my first access to the internet via this medium. The reason to do packet radio now would be similar to the reasons for wanting to hack software; because geeks like to understand how things work and where possible build their own version of the commercial offering. Other reasons would be that designing abd building a working radio is very difficult and if nothing else looks damn good on a CV and is a great thing to talk about in interviews. Becomming a radio amateur was one of the best things that ever happened to me for my career.
Off topic I know, but I used to be involved with a bunch of Radio Amatuers whose hobbies of caving and radio collided. So what did they do? joined their hobbies together to experiment with underground radio. A very interesting field.
[puts on pedantic hat] speed _does_ have an effect on latency. i.e. since that 1K packet can be serialised faster then low ping times are essential. This is why the stock exchanges have uber fast networks, not because they need the speed, certainly not because they need the bandwidth but because they like the idea that latency is as low as possible so that new data is availiable asap and bids happen asap. Also possibly they may have money to burn. Obviously as well low latency can be achieved by fast links as for a given load there is less chance of you having to queue for access to shared medium. This is one reason why a common IP routing algorithm relied upon ping times for determining routes rather than any measure of speed. [takes off pedantic hat and looks for drink]
Sorry for the rant, I used to work for Nortel and we had these things drummed into us constantly as part of the network planning gubbins.
Or the futurama quote:
Move this spaceship to Area 51
But that's where we're faking the moon landings Sir.
Dammit, then we'll just have to land on the moon.
Sorry, I realised I'd trolled. I suppose I should have added that the internet and technology in general comes about through international co-operation.
Take the space program for instance, I think we all know where a lot of that technology was developed...
I guess that's it. I'm lucky in that I live in the outskirts of London so I have good public transport and a car. Want to drink? Jump of the Train/Tube/Bus, want to do anything else, walk or jump in car.The fact I can walk/train everywhere I need to is wonderful and worth so much quality of life I'd really advise all Americans to look into it (or at least start steps towards it).
Driving sucks, REALLY! No seriously it is the worst use of my time I have ever encountered, why do you want to do more of it? (9 years 'round various cities has convinced me of this:-)) You can't use your mobile, you can't have a drink, you can't snooze, you can't read a book, all you can do is get mad that everyone is in your way!
Now, not only do I get a nice relaxing stroll into work every morning, also should things ever go tits up with any form of transport you have no need to worry, I grab by umbrella and come rain or shine it works. But yes this did mean I had to move house to be near my company and pay through the nose in rent, but it was cheaper than the petrol i would have spent to live elsewhere...
So I guess I'm saying, new fuel technologies are a good thing, but the highest quality of life I have ever had I now have through making sure I use my car when I want, but that I can live without it. If anyone asks I now advise them to do similar.
Want to make suburbs less popular? 1) Clamp down hard on drink driving 2) Encourage house prices to rocket so you can only rent not buy 3) Allow lots of pubs and clubs to open in the town centre and discourage them in the outskirts. 4) Allow development of trendy apartments near the trendy new-town.
Watch as suckers like myself move into the town centre to have a social life. Job done. Sorry this is/. so:
Hey lets see lots of people sue Google for taking photos of their house and putting them on google earth.
At least if I don't like the internet archive I can use a robots.txt. No equivalent to stop google photographing my house.
Anyway as far as I got it the issue behind this case was that the internet archive was not respecting robots.txt like they were supposed to due to a bug. So should the article be stressing that they are actually being sued over this bug?
Much as I adore Dr Who, I think I have missed something here. If you are holding Dr Who as an example of a good show, be aware who the actors are starring in the new series and notice how good looking they all are. Oh and there is a romance between the main characters going on there too. (Although I am very glad they pushed the mainstream sexuality issue) So the new Dr Who seems to suffer many of the standard pop sci-fi problems too. Does this mean popular entertainment and quality Sci Fi are exclusive, and is this really a bad thing? {rant about Stargate, X-Files, Star Trek, Farscape, Babylon 5, and Firefly cut for relevance} There is lots of good sci-fi out there, there is a lot in the library too. Or is this some attempt to educate the unwashed masses at the correctness of out way? Maybe the unwashed don't like to have to think too much, where would the soaps be if they started to incorporate some of the things we love about sci fi?
By that argument isn't every human equally responsible for all the actions of all other humans? Why discriminate via religion, why not creed? Or Music preference?
Some men rape so why shouldn't the male of the species clean out their own house first?
You know this does make me wonder, how much would it cost, and how many flights would it take to lift a shuttle repair facility to the ISS. I wonder how useful an in orbit garage where you could fix the shuttle from a lot of damage would be. Add in a tug so you could rescue the shuttle from a none ISS orbit and bring it in and who cares how much ice hits the tiles? I wonder if this would cost less than all this burocracy? Also there are what, 4 shuttles left? Could we have one sent to live at the ISS perminantly like the soyuz capsule that lives there? Then if something went really wrong there's a backup plan. Or is this down to the problem of different orbits again? Or is there a problem with things degrading when left in space for a long time?
There's an old saying that generals are always perfectly prepared to wage the last war. But that's what we do, we fix all the problems we can and move on to the next surprise. e.g. look at the tactics used in WWII ground warfare using the lessons learned from WWI. Except that didn't apply as the airplane had come along and brought blitzkreig. GWI & GWII similar... Or Terry Pratchett where the Pseudopoleans each had an army of Trojan Horses? Back to the point isn't the idea that we make mistakes, fix them and move on. I always tried to say that "yes I make mistakes, but I never make the same one twice" as long as NASA learns from their failures and people are willing to be part of this test program then where is the issue? -- I just upgraded my computer, it now has an infinite ammount of write only memory
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You've got me thinking on this about how I would fix the manned space program to achieve this. What flaws can you find with the following steps:
:-) And how to pay for this, that's for another post :-)
1) give up on current shuttle
2) fasttrack the simple-safe heavy booster to bring back proper heavy lift capability. Use Soyuz for man lift in the meantime.
3) Remove paperwork around spaceflight, make it about as difficult to certify as say putting a car on the road. Determine the lowest possible payload size acceptable (i.e. I'm thinking kilogram sized payloads for food stuff, spare parts, fuel canisters etc, the smaller the better) Then set in stone that NASA will buy commercially from the cheapest possible provider whoever can get this minimum payload to the ISS. If you can do it 10,000 units at a time all the better, but it is $/kg that is the metric.
This allows startup companies to start small with their freaky idea and if they can get it to work cheaper than anyone else, they have a market. Hopefully as time increases an increasing one.
4) extend the ISS into an orbital construction facility (one nut at a time via option 3 if needed). Any big modules can be lifted by the heavy lift you built earlier. Using heavy lift is a last resort though as option 3 should give you the cheaper option.
4) once 3 has got competition for a supply route going, Add a new catagory which has the minimum cargo capacity at approx 1 human + life support. (We're still only using this for cargo). Again the choice to buy is purely based upon $/kg
5) Man rate option 4. Choice now becomes $/person. At this point stop using Soyuz and switch to this for getting people in space.
By this point you have a constant supply line to an orbital construction facility. If you choose to build your moon mission here, great. You may also choose to build your orbiting hotel here.
6) Passenger rate system. Now we expect a procedure to make space travel as reliable as car driving. This is the point we can start to worry about more than just $/person and pay very close attention to safty.
Other ways to get small players into the field:
* There is a requirement for re-entry vehicles for both regular return,trash return, escape pods etc. Again, set spec, buy at lowest cost at time of purchase.
* Space Tug - seems a simple space craft to build.; and something that over time more of would be needed.
Now we have lots of competition at all levels of the supply route to space. We have an easy entry path of the supply route that startups who have innovative ideas can have an easier time of. We have a progression path to space whilst keeping a heavy booster option.
A further thought to enhance competition would be to standardise parts. e.g. for the heavy lift option, you don't contract boeing to make a SSME, you offer to buy an engine fropm whoever can meet these specs. In the same way there are multiple people Airbus can buy their jet engines from and put on the same aircraft, you make sure that there are multiple companies you can buy your engines for your heavy lift booster off.
Probably a good job I'm in this armchair and not in charge
Economics, no matter how much they mass produce any space transport system I can't believe it'll ever be cheaper than say a high end car. Although I might be able to afford a low end one I can't see me affording a high end one. Hence my logic of it would need to be reusable for me to afford it.
For the moment I'd certainly say just go with what's cheaper.
On that subject, any ideas on how the shuttle would perform if you used the same technology but _just_ had to transport people? If you only had to run at 80% vs 110% would it still be so insanely expensive? I'm sure the turnaround times would vastly dwindle. Hence my logic that reusable can be cheap as was origonally intended.
As for nuclear rockets, all I'm sure of is politics change.
Here's a thought experiment for you, what would happen if China developed a ground launched Orion launch system?
Can't argue really. I suppose I am just biased as there is no way I will ever get into space on a none-reusable design :-(
Maybe I just have to wait for some nuclear technology to change the game's rules
Skylon only had one engine (well a pair of the same engine).
In order to air breath it had/has an extra compressor and some aerodynamic tweaks. It was/is a rocket engine all the time and used air compressed from the intake as the oxydiser.
But until they get it to work I'm not holding my breath...
Absolutley. Every car I have driven (except the one I am now driving) is now on the scrap heap because of an accident. Therefore cars have a 100% accident rate and the car I am driving is now an accident waiting to happen!
I understand, was supposed to use the same external tank and twin solid rockets
o ut a structure mounted on the side it doesn't matter if anything falls off, there is nothing to hit.
AFAIK the current plans for the heavy lift carrier still use the shuttle ET & SSMEs but with payload on the top.
http://www.safesimplesoon.com/default.htm
With
My current hope is they drop the shuttle completely and fast track this program. I'm sure with all of NASA behind it they could shave many years off the planned program. Can they ever repeat the initial success of their first rush into space?
Buck Rogers spaceplanes don't.
Not 100% disagreeing with you on this, but...
What about air breathing concepts such as:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skylon
IMHO if you go the air breathing route to get the bulk of your speed and height then winged spaceplane does seem to make some sense.
The weight of the shuttle (with full cargo) is more than saturn 5 could lift into orbit.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_V
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_shuttle
So lifing all that reusable structure is what makes it more expensive per kg.
Bear in mind that the shuttle is an experimental system pressed into the main system. It was a stop gap measure. The origonal plans called for a 2nd generation shuttle which did fix the system propeerly. NASA have not been able to do this.
If it was an X plane and 2 flights out of 113 had failed would you really call the program a disaster? I doubt it since many X plane projects have had worse safty records than this.
That said many of them had an abort system which the shuttle sadly lacks...
While i don't agree with ID or believe in the existance of a supreme being, your comments reminded me of something which I do believe in. If others hadn't read it you might find it interesting. ... for understanding. Too often, we assume that the light on the wall is God, but the light is not the goal of the search, it is the result of the search. The more intense the search, the brighter the light on the wall. The brighter the light on the wall, the greater the sense of revelation upon seeing it. Similarly, someone who does not search--who does not bring a lantern--sees nothing. What we perceive as God is the by-product of our search for God. It may simply be an appreciation of the light ... pure and unblemished ... not understanding that it comes from us. Sometimes we stand in front of the light and assume that we are the center of the universe--God looks astonishingly like we do--or we turn to look at our shadow and assume that all is darkness. If we allow ourselves to get in the way, we defeat the purpose, which is to use the light of our search to illuminate the wall in all its beauty and in all its flaws; and in so doing, better understand the world around us."
Shamelessly quoting G'Kar from Babylon 5...
---------------
If I take a lamp and shine it toward the wall, a bright spot will appear on the wall. The lamp is our search for truth
Because you can? Because it's difficult and not off the shelf? Because it's cool to set up your own network with your mates without someone else doing all the tricky stuff for you? What more excuses does a geek need?
Seriously, I used to be heavy into packet radio before I went to Uni and had my first access to the internet via this medium. The reason to do packet radio now would be similar to the reasons for wanting to hack software; because geeks like to understand how things work and where possible build their own version of the commercial offering.
Other reasons would be that designing abd building a working radio is very difficult and if nothing else looks damn good on a CV and is a great thing to talk about in interviews.
Becomming a radio amateur was one of the best things that ever happened to me for my career.
Off topic I know, but I used to be involved with a bunch of Radio Amatuers whose hobbies of caving and radio collided.
So what did they do? joined their hobbies together to experiment with underground radio. A very interesting field.
[puts on pedantic hat]
speed _does_ have an effect on latency. i.e. since that 1K packet can be serialised faster then low ping times are essential.
This is why the stock exchanges have uber fast networks, not because they need the speed, certainly not because they need the bandwidth but because they like the idea that latency is as low as possible so that new data is availiable asap and bids happen asap. Also possibly they may have money to burn.
Obviously as well low latency can be achieved by fast links as for a given load there is less chance of you having to queue for access to shared medium. This is one reason why a common IP routing algorithm relied upon ping times for determining routes rather than any measure of speed.
[takes off pedantic hat and looks for drink]
Sorry for the rant, I used to work for Nortel and we had these things drummed into us constantly as part of the network planning gubbins.
Or the futurama quote: Move this spaceship to Area 51 But that's where we're faking the moon landings Sir. Dammit, then we'll just have to land on the moon.
Please do, I much preferred ATM.
Sorry, I realised I'd trolled.
I suppose I should have added that the internet and technology in general comes about through international co-operation.
Take the space program for instance, I think we all know where a lot of that technology was developed...
Remind me who invented HTTP? Try CERN. Any guesses where CERN is?
I guess that's it. I'm lucky in that I live in the outskirts of London so I have good public transport and a car. Want to drink? Jump of the Train/Tube/Bus, want to do anything else, walk or jump in car.The fact I can walk/train everywhere I need to is wonderful and worth so much quality of life I'd really advise all Americans to look into it (or at least start steps towards it).
:-)) You can't use your mobile, you can't have a drink, you can't snooze, you can't read a book, all you can do is get mad that everyone is in your way!
Driving sucks, REALLY! No seriously it is the worst use of my time I have ever encountered, why do you want to do more of it? (9 years 'round various cities has convinced me of this
Now, not only do I get a nice relaxing stroll into work every morning, also should things ever go tits up with any form of transport you have no need to worry, I grab by umbrella and come rain or shine it works.
But yes this did mean I had to move house to be near my company and pay through the nose in rent, but it was cheaper than the petrol i would have spent to live elsewhere...
So I guess I'm saying, new fuel technologies are a good thing, but the highest quality of life I have ever had I now have through making sure I use my car when I want, but that I can live without it. If anyone asks I now advise them to do similar.
Want to make suburbs less popular?
/. so:
1) Clamp down hard on drink driving
2) Encourage house prices to rocket so you can only rent not buy
3) Allow lots of pubs and clubs to open in the town centre and discourage them in the outskirts.
4) Allow development of trendy apartments near the trendy new-town.
Watch as suckers like myself move into the town centre to have a social life.
Job done.
Sorry this is
5) Profit!
Hey lets see lots of people sue Google for taking photos of their house and putting them on google earth. At least if I don't like the internet archive I can use a robots.txt. No equivalent to stop google photographing my house. Anyway as far as I got it the issue behind this case was that the internet archive was not respecting robots.txt like they were supposed to due to a bug. So should the article be stressing that they are actually being sued over this bug?
Much as I adore Dr Who, I think I have missed something here. If you are holding Dr Who as an example of a good show, be aware who the actors are starring in the new series and notice how good looking they all are.
Oh and there is a romance between the main characters going on there too. (Although I am very glad they pushed the mainstream sexuality issue)
So the new Dr Who seems to suffer many of the standard pop sci-fi problems too.
Does this mean popular entertainment and quality Sci Fi are exclusive, and is this really a bad thing?
{rant about Stargate, X-Files, Star Trek, Farscape, Babylon 5, and Firefly cut for relevance}
There is lots of good sci-fi out there, there is a lot in the library too. Or is this some attempt to educate the unwashed masses at the correctness of out way? Maybe the unwashed don't like to have to think too much, where would the soaps be if they started to incorporate some of the things we love about sci fi?
By that argument isn't every human equally responsible for all the actions of all other humans? Why discriminate via religion, why not creed? Or Music preference? Some men rape so why shouldn't the male of the species clean out their own house first?
Shameless linkage
http://www.freewebs.com/oolon/SMOGGM.htm
You know this does make me wonder, how much would it cost, and how many flights would it take to lift a shuttle repair facility to the ISS.
I wonder how useful an in orbit garage where you could fix the shuttle from a lot of damage would be. Add in a tug so you could rescue the shuttle from a none ISS orbit and bring it in and who cares how much ice hits the tiles?
I wonder if this would cost less than all this burocracy?
Also there are what, 4 shuttles left? Could we have one sent to live at the ISS perminantly like the soyuz capsule that lives there? Then if something went really wrong there's a backup plan. Or is this down to the problem of different orbits again? Or is there a problem with things degrading when left in space for a long time?
There's an old saying that generals are always perfectly prepared to wage the last war. But that's what we do, we fix all the problems we can and move on to the next surprise.
e.g. look at the tactics used in WWII ground warfare using the lessons learned from WWI. Except that didn't apply as the airplane had come along and brought blitzkreig.
GWI & GWII similar...
Or Terry Pratchett where the Pseudopoleans each had an army of Trojan Horses?
Back to the point isn't the idea that we make mistakes, fix them and move on. I always tried to say that "yes I make mistakes, but I never make the same one twice" as long as NASA learns from their failures and people are willing to be part of this test program then where is the issue?
--
I just upgraded my computer, it now has an infinite ammount of write only memory