Best methods of getting Human Beings to LEO!

[frodo1008]

OK, I am now going to try to start the first poll that I have ever tried here, hope it works out correctly, and becomes at least somewhat popular. I apologize ahead of time, as this may become the longest post I have ever tried, and most people know that I am known for long posts anyway!

The poll is going to be about the various choices for getting human beings into LEO, at least to the height of the ISS.

I am excluding getting materials to LEO at this time, as I think the best methodology for this is simply what some refer to as “A Big Dumb Rocket”, or a Very Heavy Lift Rocket. This could be either developed from the Delta IV, Atlas V, or the Falcon 9 (if spacex is anywhere near as successful as we all hope they will be).

Personally, I do not think that NASA should be using the relatively vast amount of funding required to develop their own rocket in the Ares V class. They should just be using these other options, and then concentrating on the methods of going further out into the solar system, and leave getting the materials up to Leo to the more private interests. While I will always be supportive of NASA, I have come to the conclusion that they should leave the details up to the contractors and pure private interests, and that would be far less expensive than doing it themselves.

So the poll is going to be about what is the best method of getting Human Beings into orbit.

The time frame is the near future, and the limits are some ten non astronaut types and pilots into an orbit similar to the orbit of the ISS (at perhaps a better inclination however). These people would be relatively wealthy and healthy, and would not necessarily be astronauts in themselves. However, they would (at least in the beginning) be people that would work on such space infrastructure as space stations, and either be now or in the neat future even just wealthy and healthy spaced tourists.

This is the kind of scenario that NASA originally wanted for the Space Transportation System, and the space shuttle.

I am excluding such very future options as laser pushing efforts or space elevators as they do not now have relevancy to getting human beings into orbit in the near future. I am certain that developmental efforts for such things are very worthwhile, but as I am now 67 years old, I do not ever expect to see it happen anyway, and so do not wish to see major efforts expended on this type of thing at this time. Let us stick to what we know at least has possibilities of working.

OK, so we now open the envelopes please!

(a) A Horizontal Take-Off Two Stage to Orbit system such as NASA wanted to begin with.

The original systems developed by the various contractors of NASA (and there were a whole lot more of them in those days) for the Space Transportation System, were for the most part Horizontal Take-Off, Two Stages to Orbit (TSTO) systems. These consisted of the orbiter as it generally now is used, but instead of the very large Solid Rocket Motors, would have a very large fly-back booster that the orbiter would generally be placed on top of and launched from at a speed of high subsonic or even possibly low sonic velocity. The booster would ordinarily be powered by large fan jets for take off (and landing), and also might have a rocket engine mounted in the back for addition thrust at altitude (above 50,000 feet at a minimum). I do not include those designs that only had rocket engines for the booster, and would then take off only vertically, as this would be just another version of the current space shuttle. Oh heck, why not, I do have some ten choices! (PS: At least I thought that I had ten choices anyway!)

Both types of systems would require quite a bit of funding for the fly back boosters at the very least. But, (in particular the Horizontal Take-Off method) would permit a far reduced launch crew, a greatly increased launch rate, and therefore in the long run should be far less expensive than the current system. That was the original idea of the Space Transportation System at least! Too bad, Congress forced NASA into the magnificent kluge the shuttle system was to eventually become, instead of doing it right in the first place!

(b) Or a Vertical Take-Off Two Stage to Orbit system.

Similar to the current shuttle system.

(c) A Horizontal Take-Off Single Stage to Orbit system.

I consider this to be the “Holy Grail” Of systems to get Human Beings into Orbit. You take off from a relatively normal airport (with at least some special facilities), using high speed jet engines to get you up to at least Mach 3. Then hypersonic jets take over to get you up to at least Mach 15, where linear aero spike rockets across the back push you into orbit. The craft itself is a type of lifting body so the wings are relatively small.

This was the original National Aerospace Plane (NASP) type of idea. I personally think it is not only be most interesting type of design, but also by far the best for having a relatively small launch crew, far more frequent launches, and in the long run far less costs.

However, there IS still a whole lot of technology (and this is what killed the NASP) to be developed, especially in the hypersonic area. But, I do have hopes that the US Military with its far greater Black Budgets will eventually develop this very important technology, in as little as another decade at least. We will just have to wait and see.

(d) Horizontal launch systems with a launch ramp.

A corollary (thanks to a great extent to the excellent Mr. Halman) to the Horizontal Take-Off concepts would be some kind of a launch ramp type of system similar in some ways to the systems used on aircraft carriers. The major difference between the aircraft carrier systems and this type of system would be that the capabilities would have to be far larger to launch the far greater masses involved. The only power that I can now see such a system using would be some type of maglev type of power.

Again, much development remaining, and therefore much expense, but a very interesting idea to reduce the eventual launch costs! For the more distant future perhaps such a system could be a tunnel system where the air pressure is greatly reduced, and therefore far higher velocities could be achieved.

(e) Vertical Take-Off and Landing Single Stage to Orbit System. (DCX type)

While I do realize the success of the DCX type of projects, I personally do not see how we could not only get such a system up to the height needed for orbit, but even more the 17,500 miles per hour horizontal velocity needed. But I did think it was a legitimate choice anyway.

(f) Vertical Take-Off and Landing Multiple Stage to Orbit Systems.

These are the systems most likely to be used in the near future, as they are at least the best understood systems, and as a result may even be the least costly systems in the near future. I am talking here about such systems as the Soyuz, Dragon with either Delta IV, or Atlas V, or Falcon 9 (all Heavy), or the Orion Ares I system as envisioned by NASA. This one choice has been beat to death on these boards, so I will say no more, except that this is indeed the most likely near future system to be used for placing human beings into orbit.

(g) Carrier aircraft to altitude and then launch orbiter.

This is the methodology used by the excellent Burt Rutan in his efforts to get space tourism off the ground. It will be used with the White Knight Two to get SpaceShipTwo up to about 50,000 feet and subsonic speed, then dropped and propelled by rocket(s) into sub orbital space. However, the main question on my own mind is whether or not Burt Rutan is now in development of a White Knight Three large enough to get a booster rocket and orbiter up to eventually get into LEO. I would think that such a craft would have to eventually be in the 747 class of size at least. So at this time I would think that Rutan and Company are just beginning the paper development of such a large craft.

However, if his efforts in sub orbital space do prove out to be profitable, then I would think that LEO would become a true reality for him and his company (and Virgin Galactic also).

Finally, choice:

(h) Carrier balloon(s) or Dirigible(s) to lift up to 50,000 feet, and then launch booster and orbiter.

This is somewhat the same as using carrier aircraft, but has the possible advantage of being much cheaper to develop. The disadvantage would be the possible safety issue of using such relatively uncontrolled craft.

OK, those are the current choices that I think are at least somewhat relevant to the near to somewhat near placing of human beings in larger numbers into LEO.

What I will do is to give the people being polled some 4 of those choices, as I know that I would want that as I like at least that many of the choices myself.

So just what would be my own personal choices?

Well, from (g) to (a) to (d) to eventually (c).

What do I think is going to actually happen?

From (f) to (g) to (a) or possibly (d) to eventually (C).

Let the discussions/debates, or whatever now begin.

And thanks for your attention!!

PS: Oh no, guess what!! While the poll thingy at the bottom told me that I could have as many as ten choices, when I tried just eight, the official message then told me I had too many choices. Another triumph for space.com!

Tell you what, I consider this to be too important a subject to just go away in a tiff. So let us do this the hard way.

I will post this as the first post on just an ordinary thread, you people select your first 4 choices. Oh heck, have as many choices as you want, just put them in what you consider to be their proper order of importance, most important first! Of course, you can always take less choices if you wish, or even let me know in your post if you consider some other way viable to get human beings into LEO (in the near to intermediate futures at least).

I will then come here fairly frequently and tally up the numbers to give results. If you find errors in my numbers please feel free to tell me, I am not infallible!!

I could even go over (although I have not done this type of thing for some ten years or so) to excel and make up a chart. Hopefully I can then import it. Hopefully........

What do all of you think, doable?? :?:

 

[Polishguy]

I like the carrier craft best. It's been proven to work (X-15, Space Ship 1), and doesn't require the development of aerospikes or other experimental engines (however, they are helpful. Though not necessary). It also doesn't require giant disposable boosters.

 

[frodo1008]

That is not only a good choice in itself, it is one of only two choices where metal is actually being cut as we post here anyway! The other being Vertical Take-Off and Landing Multiple Stage Systems. Those two currently worked on systems would then be (g) and (f). A reasonable start!

 

[vulture4]

I Generally agree. But I think one or two generations of technology demonstrators are needed. We learned from Shuttle what we used to know when NACA designed aircraft, that performance, maintainability, operating cost, and safety of radical new designs cannot be predicted from systems analysis and tabletop estimates. An obvious strategy would be to contract with Scaled Composites for tests of the remaining X-34, if it is still flyable, or perhaps a small reusable liquid-fueled LEO stage to be launched from the White Knight 2, which could test re-entry and reuse strategies. Another strategy would be to recover the first stage from the Falcon (starting with the Falcon 1) by various means including wings. Or alternatively to add internal propulsion to the X-37 and use it as the second stage of the Falcon 9.

Any of these strategies would require NASA funding. Where to get the money? Maybe drop Ares? Nah, that would upset the contractors, and anyway with only Atlas, Delta, and Falcon, we need another multibillion dollar medium-lift rocket.

 

[frodo1008]

In the first place vulture 4, we do not have a falcon heavy lift vehicle yet. We do not even have a falcon 9, capable of placing the kind of payload that a Delta II is capable of! In fact, even a demonstrator of the falcon 9 has yet to fly, let alone fly enough to establish the kind of reliability of either the Delta or the Atlas series rockets!

We all wish spacex all the success in the world, but until the falcon series of rockets establishes a true reliability record coupled with a record of a high degree of cost savings, both the Delta IV and the Atlas V are riding high in the drivers seat of spacecraft launches, and that IS a fact!

And the only NASA sub contractor that would be really out on a limb with the cancellation of the Ares series would be ATK which makes the very large SRB's.

If NASA is ever going to go back to the moon, and on to Mars some kind of space capsule is going to be needed. And that means that at this time the Orion capsule is going to be completed (as well as spacex with COTS and its entry in the Dragon) , and that makes Lock Mart happy I am sure. As well as a restartable in space relatively powerful rocket engine such as the J2X, which would make Pratt and Whitney Rocketdyne happy also. To say nothing of the fact that they also produce the excellent RS68, which is the workhorse of the Delta part of the EELV fleet, as well as a prime candidate for any future US heavy lift vehicle.

And none of the developmental ideas that you have put forth would be expensive enough to derail any of NASA's current plans anyway, to say nothing of the fact that some of them would depend more on the efforts of such a private enterprise as Burt Rutan instead of NASA money!

And none of us know just exactly what the Air Force and the military in general is doing with all that money going into those Black Programs, now do we?

Your ideas ARE good, and I fully believe will be implemented as much as possible, so relax!

 

[annodomini2]

For your Holy grail, if you're not aware a company in the UK called Reaction engines limited is working on a concept for a Horizontal Take Off SSTO, but in contrary to your 3 engine type design this only uses one.

Now they need to prove the concept will work, I'm not saying they are there yet, but IMO its the most realistic SSTO proposal to date.

http://www.reactionengines.co.uk

The only other method SSTO would require significant developments in our understanding of physics and application of our understanding into a realistic engineering solution. But this would be outside your remit obviously.

 

[vulture4]

In the first place vulture 4, we do not have a falcon heavy lift vehicle yet. We do not even have a falcon 9, capable of placing the kind of payload that a Delta II is capable of! In fact, even a demonstrator of the falcon 9 has yet to fly, let alone fly enough to establish the kind of reliability of either the Delta or the Atlas series rockets!

I concede the point. But study the engineering of the Falcon. Even though I disagree with many of the details, the simplicity of manufacturing and reliability of operation are impressive. Eliminating the TVC pneumatics by using fuel from the main pump as a hydaulic fluid! Just one fuel and one basic engine type! And the ground processing flow! Look at the number of operations, time, and man-hours! It's simple, elegant and reliable engineering that reduces cost and keeps you alive in space, not paperwork. As a clean sheet design only the Delta IV comes close, and even the Delta has much higher overhead costs.

And the only NASA sub contractor that would be really out on a limb with the cancellation of the Ares series would be ATK which makes the very large SRB's.

Alas, now that Lockheed and Boeing are major contractors they would lose big if the Ares is canceled even if a ULA rocket replaced it. And ATK is very powerful politically, it didn't even have to compete for the Ares contract.

If NASA is ever going to go back to the moon, and on to Mars some kind of space capsule is going to be needed.

There is no assurance we are even going to the moon. If we use the Apollo architecture we cannot afford it. If NASA is going back to the moon and on to Mars, a radically lower operating cost is needed. We no longer have a geopolitical imperative, or a blank check.

And none of the developmental ideas that you have put forth would be expensive enough to derail any of NASA's current plans anyway, to say nothing of the fact that some of them would depend more on the efforts of such a private enterprise as Burt Rutan instead of NASA money!

I absolutely agree!!! The technology demonstrator program was dirt cheap!! It made no sense to cancel it and there is no reason we can't restart it now, if a practical RLV is recognized as a valid goal.

And none of us know just exactly what the Air Force and the military in general is doing with all that money going into those Black Programs, now do we?

The DOD is probably going to launch an X-37 prototype, but human spaceflight is not required for the military mission.

Your ideas ARE good, and I fully believe will be implemented as much as possible

From your mouth to Charlie Bolden's ear!

 

[frodo1008]

I am indeed glad to see that for the most part we do agree! It is quite a refreshing change from the political threads!!!

Just three relatively minor points.

(1) It is true that the Delta rocket has a higher overhead than the planned Falcon 9 does. But remember a couple of points:
(a) The Delta has an already fully established and very good reliability record (especially in the case of the Delta II).

(b) The Falcon 9 has not been engineered with the US government in mind as the customer, but is purely a commercial effort. But just perhaps some of those extra governmental requirements are not just bureaucracy, but may even have something to do with that high reliability. After all, especially in the case of the Delta II, NASA has enough problems with its Mars and deep space probes without having them blown up by the initial boosting rocket!

(2) ULA (which is really Boeing Space + Lock Mart Space) would be jumping for joy to take over the first stage of the Ares I from the five segment ATK SRB! After all, it is quite probable that they would at the same time retain the rest of their contract anyway! Even Rocketdyne would benefit, as they would have to build even more RS68A's, and even perhaps take that engine up beyond the now planned 700K thrust, even perhaps up to a million pound thrust engine!!

(3) The question of NASA's going back to the moon has very probably now been even far more settled than before with the discovery of reasonable quantities of water at the poles of the moon. The question is therefore, not are we going back, but just how long is it going to take to get there!!

At the current funding levels even when the shuttle is no longer flying, I would have to say that it is probably going to take some two decades instead of just one as was originally planned for! And. probably like yourself and a whole lot of others here, I do NOT like that one bit! I was not only just around to see the original moon landing by Apollo 11, but actually was one of the 400.000 or so people to directly work on the project! So I would dearly love (and as I am now 67, just how many more years have I got?) to be around to see Americans step on the moon, again! And I am more than willing to pay whatever taxes it takes to do it!

You know, I was thinking that perhaps it would be better if I tried to again have a pol here. This time with only the following four choices.

(a) Horizontal Take-off and Landing

(b) Vertical Take off and Horizontal Landing

(c) Vertical Take-off and Vertical Landing

(d) Carrier Craft to Assist to Altitude and then drop Take-Off

Hopefully, the powers that be here would accept this. What do you think? :twisted:

 

[bdewoody]

I favor (d). It's a proven concept for high altitude flight. A large carrier transport can be developed from existing designs and there are several designs for manned lifting body type vehicles that have shown great promise.

 

[kelvinzero]

(a) Horizontal Take-off and Landing

(b) Vertical Take off and Horizontal Landing

(c) Vertical Take-off and Vertical Landing

(d) Carrier Craft to Assist to Altitude and then drop Take-Off

Hopefully, the powers that be here would accept this. What do you think? :twisted:

By vertical landing, do you mean using rockets or do you mean parachutes?
if it means parachutes I would go:
(c) (b) (d) (a) which is my guess at the most conservative order

For human spaceflight I am very conservative.
-- use something very conventional and tested, eg along the lines of the Soyuz
-- Keep most flights as cargo flights. Do your learning on these flights, never the manned ones obviously
-- Minimize human spaceflights by maximizing stay length on the ISS. Launching people teaches nothing. Learning how to keep people in space healthily for multiple year missions is vital.
-- Use the money saved on unmanned prototypes. Keep building and launching these.

 

[zbvhs]

First off: What do you mean by "best"? Minimum launch mass for a given payload on orbit? Minimum propellant? Simplest design? Easiest to erect on the ground? Maximum reusability? Maximum reliability? You need some sort of design criteria to begin with.

 

[rreilly656]

Wow, frodo, you covered a lot of territory here! I see you put on your thinking cap here.

A couple of immediate comments:

On:

"""" a) A Horizontal Take-Off Two Stage to Orbit system such as NASA wanted to begin with.

The original systems developed by the various contractors of NASA (and there were a whole lot more of them in those days) for the Space Transportation System, were for the most part Horizontal Take-Off, Two Stages to Orbit (TSTO) systems. """"

Actually, most of the proposals were vertical takeoff systems.

On:

"""" (d) Horizontal launch systems with a launch ramp.

A corollary (thanks to a great extent to the excellent Mr. Halman) to the Horizontal Take-Off concepts would be some kind of a launch ramp type of system similar in some ways to the systems used on aircraft carriers. The major difference between the aircraft carrier systems and this type of system would be that the capabilities would have to be far larger to launch the far greater masses involved. The only power that I can now see such a system using would be some type of maglev type of power. """"

Maglev seems to be what everyone assumes is needed, but rocket sleds have much more experience at sending massive payloads to multiple MACH numbers. No maglev system to date has pushed any sizable payload to high MACH numbers, and the fastest any maglev has done with a large 'payload' is around 300 mph. China Lake rocket sleds have propelled airliner-sized payloads to MACH 4.5.

 

[garyegray]

If you take into account the laws of physics, which any good rocket designer does, then that leads me to two possible choices:

1) A vertical rocket launcher with a launch escape tower for the crew, and/or,

2) A mothership carrier with a single stage to orbit rocket carried on the underbelly or under-wing.

I do not like winged configurations for crew launch because the weight penalty is huge, increasing costs unnecessarily, along with increased risk for loss of crew compared to other less complicated designs.

For example, the Space Shuttle weighs over 100 tons and can carry a crew of 7. It's payload bay can carry another 20 tons or so, depending upon the orbital inclination it is launched to. As such, you are actually paying to launch over 120 tons into low Earth orbit, with only about 20 tons or so being cargo, payload and crew. This is one reason why it costs about $1 billion for each Shuttle launch. A comparable expendable rocket costs anywhere from $100 million to $250 million depending upon the launcher chosen to get 20 tons to low Earth orbit.

My conclusion is winged ships are a huge waste of fuel and thus, money.

 

[goodbygod]

catapult?

 

[MeteorWayne]

Wow, frodo, you covered a lot of territory here! I see you put on your thinking cap here.

He usually does

 

[spaceflightusa]

Well this is odd. Because once again we could look to the past. The ATLAS in the MA-5 and Atlas 10B SCORE was essentially a single stage to orbit vehicle. Why can we not build another rocket with such effiecency? Yes I know I will hear 1 1/2 stages because the Atlas did drop its booster engines during ascent. But it was capable of putting itself into orbit as it did on the 10B and all the Mercury orbital flights. The capsule of 4,000 pounds and the rocket body itself of over 8,000 pounds lead to about 3% of gto weight that made it to orbit. Add on a couple of throwaway solids as has oft been done with Delta and Titan and you can easily reach the standard of 5%. The Atlas body itself could serve purpose (as visonaries of that era had hoped) as habitat, module for equpoiment, etc. Dont re-invent the wheel when you do not have to. Sadly,as there is a military/industrial complex there is also a space/industrial complex. Only a few viable launch companies out there. No incentive to develop cheap and efficient launchers when they can charge tens or hundreds of millions of dollars per launch. Do not think for a moment there isnt an incentive to keeps costs high. Good luck to Davids (new innovative companies) who try to slay the Goliaths (the established big boys). Perhaps the answers will NOT come from our own land but from foreign designs without the legacy of pricey backups for backups to the backups and will keep the designs safe, simple, and reliable.

 

[emudude]

G (the Virgin Galactic approach); I say this because it reduces the massive amount of fuel you need using a pure rocket configuration.

The best method of getting *anything* to LEO is to find a way around rockets, as they are prohibitively expensive for anything but high end millionaires to use.

My prediction: when nuclear fusion generation plants become commercially available (and thus nearly infinite quantities of fuel are available), we will have broad access to space. Right now, we're facing an energy crisis; launching humans into orbit is astro-nomical (pun absolutely intended) compared with launching satellites, and this is what bars us from leaving Earth. When you have loads of energy to play around with, many interesting concepts (including the beamed propulsion you didn't include, which is understandable) become much more realistic :mrgreen:

 

[heroineworshipper]

Vertical Take-Off and Landing Multiple Stage to Orbit Systems.

With a solid 1st stage. The air launched vehicles haven't taken off because of complexity, limited payload, & weather requirements. Liquid 1st stages are too complex.

 

[critter39]

I like both a and c, the reason is that NASA should know what it wants and has always liked option a. I think Nixon was the one who adopted the shuttle system, but for many years did not have anywhere to fly except LEO. I thought for many years the shuttle was wasted money, unless the X-37 is able to complete what the shuddle was not able to. I could be wrong. I like option c), because there has been a lot of work done on the X-43 project. I know they had very successful tests a year or two ago. That is just my idea, as little as it is worth.

 

[Grant1]

OK 67 year-old! I'm only 66 so pardon my sophmoric attention span and lack of common sense.
What I realy think would be the best (initial) booster would indeed be a maglev system using a very long
horizontal rail with a slow incline. One could place this near a nice cooperative mountain range. Technical
details could be worked out to allow a long sweeping curve toward the vertical at the end of the rail with
the rocket ignition taking place while on the rail. The less on board fuel you burn gaining initial speed and
altitude the greater the payload can be! Grant

 

[Couerl]

A (idealism at work)
d (my practical side)
c (meh)
b (something betta than nuthin)...

 

[writerman]

I say none of the above. It would take an international effort and a major big-bucks emphasis on developing the technology, but IMO the best way to go is the space elevator.

 

[najab]

Of the options given, I think a) is the one I think is most worth developing. We can already do big aircraft and there is nothing that fundamentally limits us from making bigger ones. We already know how to make rocketships as well, all we need to do is put the two together.

 

[netdragon]

I don't really understand the concept of "best" without any conditions attached. "best" would most likely be a space elevator. Like a rail, it would be very efficient and result in very little lost energy (much of it could be recovered by regenerative braking on descent). So what do we mean - best in 5 years, in 10, in 100?

 

[mr_mark]

A giant slingshot is the cheapest way to put humans into orbit. No propellants and no launch or crew vehicles needed. Just pull it back and let 'er go.