If it even needs stating....

[vt_hokie]

<i>I can only imagine that you must fly around town in a F-15 or something--I mean why bother with a "legacy system" like an automobile when we have supersonic jets available for transportation.</i><br /><br />LOL! Hell no, I get around in one of these! <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /><br /><br />http://www.gravitywarpdrive.com/Flying_Disc_Operational_Specifications.htm<br /><br />In all seriousness, I drive a Saturn SL2. It was nice to see GM do something innovative for a change when it created Saturn, although new Saturns are just rebadged GM crap (most of the new ones will be rebadged Opels). There is no longer an independent engineering team and they've cut a lot of corners on the design of recent vehicles. The bizarre looking "ION" has numerous downgrades compared to the original S Series. Now, even the dent resistant plastic body panels are going away. <img src="/images/icons/frown.gif" /><br /><br />Lifting body designs have the advantages of lower reentry g-loads and greater crossrange. The are easier to design for reusability. They can be scaled up to a shuttle class vehicle - something that cannot be done with capsules. Thus, they can offer the type passenger or cargo volume, and the on-orbit servicing capability that capsules simply cannot. Also, they can land in a controlled manner, and bring people and delicate cargo back to Earth in a civilized fashion with a runway landing, instead of doing the old fashioned "parachute back in a tin can" approach. <br /><br />

 

[spacefire]

<font color="yellow">Smaller interior volume than a capsule, heavier than a capsule</font><br />Then the question is:<br />What would be cheaper in the long run? Assuming extensive usage. Not one-two missions per year.<br />Here's the options:<br />A fully reusable orbiter on a big throwaway booster<br />A smaller booster with a capsule that - in the event it were to be reused - needs extensive structural testing besides complete refurbishment.<br />A fully reusable TSTO where the first stage also gets recovered?<br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p>http://asteroid-invasion.blogspot.com</p><p>http://www.solvengineer.com/asteroid-invasion.html </p><p> </p> </div>

 

[mlorrey]

"So you are saying that since you don't get to fly to Endor in the Millennium Falcon just screw it all? How many people get to fly in an F-15? Or ride on a nuclear sub? Sorry that space isn't your playground yet--hey, it might never be in our lifetimes. Tough #$%&. "<br /><br />Bullcrap. This isn't 1970, this is the 21st century. It is long past time for space travel to be commonly available to anyone of means. Not just a handful of billionaires and government selected fighter jocks and scientists.<br /><br />Moreover, they promised. They conned us out of hundreds of billions of dollars promising that they would be building the infrastructure up there for people to travel to. <br /><br />Goddard never got to see men in space cause he died of tuberculosis at 63, and mankind felt killing tens of millions of their fellows to be a more important priority at that time.<br /><br />Private industry suffers from the short-term profit goals established by an artificial economy, due to tax and securities reporting laws the government created. An executive who makes an investment that won't pay off for 10-20 years gets fired by the stockholders. Moreover, they demonstrate in most of their proposals the operations cost difference between building a vehicle on their own risk capital, vs doing so on government money, which they term "zero interest principal", i.e. free money. Corporations do not have any loftier goals than keeping their workers and equipment employed as much as possible to earn as much profit for their stockholders as possible.

 

[tomnackid]

"Lifting body designs have the advantages of lower reentry g-loads and greater crossrange. "<br /><br />At what cost? The shuttle offers lower g-loads and greater cross range.<br /><br />"The are easier to design for reusability."<br /><br />I'm not sure how you arrive at this. They are more expensive to operate so they pretty much HAVE to have reusability in mind. With a capsule its optional.<br /><br /><br />" They can be scaled up to a shuttle class vehicle - something that cannot be done with capsules." <br /><br />I think you should take a look at Phil Bono's work and Boeing and Chrysler's VTOL concepts. Not to mention Gary Hudson's Phoenix and the Delta Clipper--all big ballistic vehicles. In fact when you reach these sizes a powered VTOL vehicle is much safer than any lifting body. Even the Russians realized they needed to turn Kliper from a lifting body to a winged vehicle to land on a runway.<br /><br />"Thus, they can offer the type passenger or cargo volume, and the on-orbit servicing capability that capsules simply cannot."<br /><br />This I don't even understand. Simply geometry shows that capsules have the edge when it comes to volume. As for "on orbit servicing capability" I don't even know what you are referring to.<br /><br /> "Also, they can land in a controlled fashion, and bring people and delicate cargo back to Earth in a civilized fashion with a runway landing, instead of doing the old fashioned "parachute back in a tin can" approach. "<br /><br />They can? Show me any design for a lifting body that intends to land on a runway and has a once around capability? Even the shuttle--a winged vehicle, not a lifting body--would be FUBAR if it missed its one shot at the runway. X-38, Lockheeds CEV, lifting body Kliper: they all intended to land the "old fashioned way" with parachutes. <br /><br />Why spend the next 20 years working for a more comfortable landing when astronauts are perfectly capable of handling an Apollo style landing right now???? NASA isn't in the amusem

 

[vt_hokie]

<i>As for "on orbit servicing capability" I don't even know what you are referring to.</i><br /><br />I didn't state that very well. I meant the ability to perform tasks such as Hubble servicing or CMG replacement on ISS, for example.<br /><br /><br /><i>NASA isn't in the amusement park business.</i><br /><br />Apparently NASA is in the stunt business, though, as it is currently gutting many worthwhile scientific endeavors so that it can fund its "Apollo on steroids" flag and footprints PR stunt.<br />

 

[tap_sa]

<font color="yellow">"I meant the ability to perform tasks such as Hubble servicing or CMG replacement on ISS, for example. "</font><br /><br />CMIIW but the mass of replacement hardware in all those missions has been far from STS max capacity. I see no reason why capsule-based design couldn't repeat them with a service module having compartment for transporting the needed hardware.

 

[centsworth_II]

<font color="yellow">"Assuming extensive usage. Not one-two missions per year.'</font><br /><br />If you only have the money to pay for one or two missions a year, you would be wasting money to pay for a more expensive system capable of launching more missions per year. Missions that you are not going to launch anyway.<br /><br />It's the old story of "why pay for more" car, or computer, or space delivery system than you need. Given a fixed budget you MUST balance the amount devoted to the payload and to the delivery system. Putting it all into a fancy space plane makes no sense if there is nothing left over to pay for a worthwhile mission. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[vt_hokie]

<i>vt_hokie admitted in a post yesterday that lifting bodies are not a viable choice for Lunar missions. he is just trying to cause trouble again.</i><br /><br />I'm just stating what I strongly believe. I'm sorry that because I don't agree with you, you feel that I'm "trying to cause trouble".<br /><br />I may have acknowledged that a lifting body might be more challenging for a direct lunar return. Personally, I don't think we should be looking at an Apollo-style direct return, but instead a dedicated LEO-Lunar Orbit vehicle that can return to Low Earth Orbit. <br /><br />However, I will point out once again that Lockheed Martin's engineers apparently felt that a lifting body was the superior solution for lunar and Mars missions, before their initial proposal was shot down by Dr. Griffin's administration.

 

[spacefire]

so, no matter which way you look at it, NASA is bound to fail at opening up the final frontier for humankind, because its budget is limited and its bureaucracy unlimited.<br />Maybe manned spaceflight should be taken away from NASA. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p>http://asteroid-invasion.blogspot.com</p><p>http://www.solvengineer.com/asteroid-invasion.html </p><p> </p> </div>

 

[frodo1008]

At this stage of the game don't you think that statement (while at least a straight statement, for which I thank you) is a little premature? Even NASA's VSE costs are only predictions, and the VSE costs are for the ENTIRE system. launch vehicle, capsule, Heavy Lift Launch Vehicle, and even all that is takes for going all the way back to the moon! Again, these are estimated costs, which could indeed go up, and quite probably in the nature of such projects will do so.<br /><br />All we have from the pure private companies are statements from the companies themselves as to what the costs of the pure private LEO capsules are going to be. After all, it is just as much in the interests of these companies to start out with a low estimate as it is in NASA's. <br /><br />In the end IF these start-up small companies can really deliver the product for such low costs, then it would be to the advantage of NASA to make use of them! But, the VSE is a complete system, and is naturally, for the reasons I stated above going to cost far more!<br /><br />NASA estimates a single stick SRB flight of the capsule system with some six astronauts on board to be in the $200 to $250 million dollar range, and I think this is very reasonable. Also, it will depend on the number of flights just how inexpensive ANY system is going to be (the economy of scale factor). IF LEO and beyond become as busy as has been predicted in the next two decades, there may very well be plenty of flights for both the VSE and other systems to keep the overall costs down! I at least, certainly hope so!<br />

 

[centsworth_II]

<font color="yellow">"Maybe manned spaceflight should be taken away from NASA"</font><br /><br />I could go for that. Put manned spaceflight in the DOT. Let it use some of that 65 billion dollar Department of Transportation budget. I'll be happy to see real science get the lion's share of the paltry 16 billion dollar NASA budget. That's your problem spacefire, you've got DOT budget dreams that you expect to be done on a NASA budget. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[vt_hokie]

Hey, not if it takes away from the high speed rail and maglev development that I want to see! <img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" /> It's pathetic that the United States has a third world rail system while high speed rail flourishes overseas. The current administration isn't even willing to fund Amtrak adequately. <img src="/images/icons/frown.gif" />

 

[centsworth_II]

<font color="yellow">"NASA is bound to fail at opening up the final frontier." -- spacefire</font><br /><br />It's not NASA's job to open the final frontier to Joe Blow. It's job is to open it to research. IMHO <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[vt_hokie]

<i>It's not NASA's job to open the final frontier to Joe Blow. It's job is to open it to research. IMHO </i><br /><br />Even so, the way to do that is to enable more "average" Ph.D. holding researchers to gain access to space, instead of maintaining the "elite fighter jock" mentality.

 

[centsworth_II]

<font color="yellow">"...enable more "average" Ph.D. holding researchers to gain access to space, instead of maintaining the "elite fighter jock" mentality..."</font><br /><br />I agree. And that's why I oppose spending the NASA budget chasing after an "elite fighter jock" toy: the spaceplane.<br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[tomnackid]

I may have acknowledged that a lifting body might be more challenging for a direct lunar return. Personally, I don't think we should be looking at an Apollo-style direct return, but instead a dedicated LEO-Lunar Orbit vehicle that can return to Low Earth Orbit.<br />---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br />OK, its time to learn some orbital mechanics. I know its not as fun as drawing fantasy spaceships but its kind of important. So your coming back from the moon. Essentially your falling a quarter of a million miles. By the time you reach the vicinity of earth you are moving at much faster than orbital speed. How do you slow down to go into orbit and rendezvous with your lifting body shuttle? Braking rockets? Then all of that fuel you need to slow down has to be carried with you the whole way. I won't go into the rocket equation right now but simply remember that every additional pound requires and EXPONENTIAL growth in propellant requirements. Aerobraking has worked for Mars and Jupiter probes, but if you are going to carry a heat shield for aerobraking with you the whole way why not just reenter directly anyway? What do yo gain from making you mission depend on a dangerous and complex braking maneuver and on orbit rendezvous??? Maybe when propellant is produced on the moon such maneuvers will be economical, but now its a waste of resources. <br /><br />Heinlien's quip about LEO being "...halfway to anywhere." is one of the most misconstrued concepts in all of space advocacy. Heinlien was referring to a prior capability for orbital flight in an earlier "future history" story messing up the plot of a story about the first trip to the moon, since if a society has extensive orbital capability (including nuclear power plants in orbit!) then going to the moon is not all that much more difficult. He DID NOT mean that a space station in LEO is like some kind of island where you can pull in to stock up on supplies since obvi

 

[frodo1008]

Actually if you are a relatively leading individual in a science area that could make use of space (as most science areas can be so shown), and you are in reasonable health, NASA will be able to put you into space for your research (the shuttle will generally be out of the question as it is going to be dedicated to finishing up the ISS, and then retired). Either the VSE or other private industry capsule systems are going to be going out to the completed ISS after about 2010 – 1012. And the redoubtable Soyuz will be used in the meantime. Of course, almost all scientific work will to a great extent be taking the actual data from the physical research done on the ISS, and using it for science itself. So the number of actual scientists involved in going out to space itself is going to be naturally limited.<br /><br />Also, when you run down the CEV for its going back to the moon as you do, you realize that you are talking against scientists going back to one of the finest areas of scientific interest that mankind can reasonably reach! <br /><br />These early flights back to the moon will evolve into a permanent capability by the time we can go on to Mars. There are still vast scientific questions about the moon. Just one instance for example is,. How many people have actually walked on the far side of the moon? None, so why do we keep hearing the "Been there, done that”, crowd all the time?" <br /><br />There is also the very real possibility that there could be water ice in deep craters at the moon's poles, shouldn't it be to our advantage to send people back to find out? <br /><br />There is even a great advantage for robotic probes that are sent to the moon. The round trip time for communications to such probes is some three seconds, whereas the round trip time for Mars is in many minutes at its closest approach.<br /><br />What I find amusing about your position is that you seem to be well aware that it is indeed NASA's budget that drives the CEV design. NASA has

 

[vt_hokie]

How much of that lunar exploration really requires a human presence, and how much are we sacrificing in order to send humans back there with the CEV/SDLV hardware? How many Hubble or MER or Cassini type of programs could be funded for what we'll spend on Apollo 2.0? <br /><br /><br /><i>So carping at NASA for something that is completely beyond their control anyway is a waste of your valuable time and effort! </i><br /><br /><br />Yeah, I suppose. I grew up wanting to take part in the space program in some way, though, and now I am completely uninspired by our less than ambitious plans and continual compromises due to poor policy decisions and inadequate budgets. But I guess it's just as well...I need to get into a different field anyway. Aerospace engineering ain't gonna get me to the point of being able to afford a decent lifestyle, it seems. It's crazy these days, but to afford what used to be considered a normal home nowadays requires a doctor's or lawyer's salary! I don't know who buys all the overpriced real estate in this country, but even a normal middle class lifestyle almost seems out of reach to me right now. And they wonder why more young people aren't going into engineering! <br />

 

[tomnackid]

My wife and I have a "normal home" and neither of us has anything like a doctor's or a lawyer's salary. (I am a graphic artist and my wife is a fund raiser for hospice) furthermore we live in Fairfield county Connecticut and before that lived in NYC! You just have to be patient and use your head. As I suspected you are very young and clueless about a lot of things in the real world. If you are that willing to give up a career in engineering because you think you won't make enough money then it is better that you do so. I wouldn't want to ride in or use anything made by a half hearted bitter engineer.<br /><br />Actually before I was an artist I went to grad school with the hopes of working in space biology. (See "An analysis of the gravitropic response in kalenchoe stems" for some exciting reading ) Then Challenger happened and having the luxury of a career in biology focused on space research kinda went out the window for a while. But on the upside last year I worked on illustrations for a series of books by Scholastic called "Space university" where I got to develop and draw alien life forms and environments. Not to mention the classic "black hole sucking in matter from a companion star" illustration.<br /><br />I can't have much sympathy for someone who's attitude is " I couldn't go into space so now I'm going to do what I can to ruin manned spaceflight for everyone."

 

[vt_hokie]

I may be clueless about a lot of things, but the rapidly skyrocketing cost of living is one thing I'm not so clueless about! <br /><br />Also, I have been laid off once already (only two years out of college at the time) and am hardly in a stable or secure position now. I certainly am not going to spend the rest of my life being a slave to some big ego overpaid MBA execs while always being afraid of the next round of layoffs.<br /><br /><i>I can't have much sympathy for someone who's attitude is " I couldn't go into space so now I'm going to do what I can to ruin manned spaceflight for everyone."</i><br /><br />Is that really what you think I'm saying? Hardly. I very much want to see manned spaceflight advance.

 

[frodo1008]

My major area wasn't even engineering. I was mostly connected to Quality Assurance and Manufacturing. My pay wasn't even what the average engineer got. but I did have the fantastic pleasure of actually dealing with the hardware itself. <br /><br />I was, and still am an idealist. I made a reasonable middle class living, raised a family, and NEVER owned my own home. If all you are seeking is material wealth, then indeed engineering (aerospace or otherwise) is NOT for you! <br /><br />In science or engineering it is the interest for what you are doing that is important! If you make less, and yet are happy with the work that you do, then you are among the fortunate. Of course, if you are well paid while doing what you like, then you are among the VERY fortunate. But if you just get well paid to do something you hate doing then you are still a loser! But even that is better than a lot of people who both don't like what they do AND don't get paid well for doing it, UGH!<br /><br />Material wealth is a chimera that far too many pursue just for its own sake. Totally pathetic! Most who reach this goal of material wealth are just as unhappy as those that are poor, and in many cases even more unhappy! I don't even have to be religious to realize this!<br /><br />I will NEVER lose my idealism just to serve at the alter of mammon! Please, as you sound like someone of good character, believe me it is best to be idealistic. I will always have good feelings and memories of my past!<br />And after you retire, and get a great deal older, that is what is ultimately the most important!<br /><br />Just as a practical suggestion, if you are not already associated with either NASA or its contractors (and it doesn't sound that way), then instead of being negative towards the CEV project, just perhaps you should wait until NASA awards the final contracts, and then see if you can join the winner, and actually help in the effort? Perhaps you would no longer find it so uninspiring.<br />

 

[vt_hokie]

I still consider myself to be an idealist in many ways, but one who has been hit with the demands of life in the real world. Believe me, had you met me when I was straight out of college, I'd sound just like you do in your post. Am I too focused currently on wealth? Perhaps. Maybe working for companies where the leaders are generally not engineers or scientists who've worked their way up, but rather business types who have their own good 'ol boy network and look down on engineers as slave labor, has led to some of their greed rubbing off on me! <img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" />

 

[tomnackid]

Very nice post frodo! I remeber when I was a grad student in bio, just after my MS and just beginning a PhD the new department chair brought in a speaker who gave a talk with the main idea being "Follow your bliss". I went home and told my wife that I couldn't spend the next 20 years doing post docs and dealing with academic politics and performing other people's research with the hope that someday I might have enough clout to determine my own destiny. I always wanted to be a scientific writer or illustrator but came from a working class family (I was the first to go to college) who had no clue about making a living in the arts. Anyway the next day I applied to the University's "Master of Science & Technical Communications" program. Within a year I was illustrating textbooks. I wasn't hired to do that, but there was a need and it was something I enjoyed so I just took it upon myself to do it! I have worked as a professional artist ever since and never regretted it. It's not a road to riches (although I still have hopes of being the next Michael Whelan) but it keeps a roof over our heads (in a very expensive part of the country) and it sure beats having to actually work for a living!

 

[spacefire]

a space ferry could use efficient engines (maybe Ion), and get to the Moon on a slower trajectory with minimal dV change. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p>http://asteroid-invasion.blogspot.com</p><p>http://www.solvengineer.com/asteroid-invasion.html </p><p> </p> </div>

 

[radarredux]

> <i><font color="yellow">It's not NASA's job to open the final frontier to Joe Blow. It's job is to open it to research. IMHO</font>/i><br /><br />For what it is worth, Michael Griffin agrees with you. I have seen a quote where he says eventually NASA's contribution to space exploration should be less than the private sector. Getting from here to there is the challenge.</i>