In Obama's America we don't Do hard

[IntLibber]

I'm quite aware of the popcorn problem with shuttle ETs. Which is only theoretical because they've never actually taken an ET to orbit to find out, so IMHO its an excuse to do nothing until its proven.

Dragon has plenty of dv and has all axis translation.

Ok this says Soyuz is currently $51 mill per seat : http://www.universetoday.com/2010/02/10 ... yuz-seats/

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/04/ ... s-soaring/
"NASA on Tuesday signed a contract to pay $55.8 million per astronaut for six Americans to fly into space on Russian Soyuz capsules in 2013 and 2014. NASA needs rides on Russian rockets to the International Space Station because it plans to retire
the space shuttle fleet later this year.

NASA now pays half as much, about $26.3 million per astronaut, when it uses Russian ships. NASA spokesman John Yembrick said the cost is going up because Russia has to build more capsules for the extra flights. NASA had already agreed to pay as much as $51 million a seat for flights in 2011 and 2012, before the latest increase."

Ok that explains where the big increase is.

As for shuttle capacity: no we dont need full shuttle cargo capacity right now, we've never needed it to support even the construction of ISS, there's no need for more than 22,000 lb capacity now just to supply logistics.

SpaceX will be sending its first ISS supply mission in 2012. Orbital might make it by 2013, then theres the japanese and european cargo ships plus the russians, thats five different cargo vessels supplying ISS, which is three more than we have had in the past up until this year.

NASA's own specced downmass needs fall within the Dragon cargo capacity (which is several tons). If you think they need more than a few tons of downmass, please specify which science experiments will generate that much material that needs shipment back.

As for shuttles operating costs: this is the problem. $500 million per shuttle mission is such a huge waste of money, you realize that even with standard F9 cargo capacity being 12 tons (24,000 lb), you can ship 8 times more cargo to ISS on F9 per dollar (even if shuttle is flying at max cargo capacity) than shuttle can carry each mission? At 100 million per cargo mission, thats five F9 missions.

Shuttle extension is a huge waste of money that should be going to developing the next generation.

[93143]

Dragon has plenty of dv and has all axis translation.

Well, if it can do TEI from L1 like people claim, I'll give you the delta-V. But does it still have all-axis translation capability with a fifteen-ton MPLM attached to the nose?

This is why the SSPDM was supposed to have its own RCS...

As for shuttle capacity: no we dont need full shuttle cargo capacity right now, we've never needed it to support even the construction of ISS, there's no need for more than 22,000 lb capacity now just to supply logistics.

SpaceX will be sending its first ISS supply mission in 2012. Orbital might make it by 2013, then theres the japanese and european cargo ships plus the russians, thats five different cargo vessels supplying ISS, which is three more than we have had in the past up until this year.

You're not listening.

a) Large spares and ORUs (the need for which is not known, but likely) exceed the capacity of available vehicles, except the Shuttle and maybe HTV (which would probably have to be specially modified and isn't really available for that sort of thing).

b) Existing and projected logistics capability, without Shuttle, is stretched just maintaining the ISS at <50% utilization to 2015. Sure, you can pour cash into commercial cargo once it's running, but that doesn't help us right now, and it helps even less if either of the commercial vehicles (which are already part of the plan, and a necessary part of ISS logistics) are delayed for any reason (Falcon 9/Dragon is already years behind schedule and still slipping).

There were ten Shuttle flights cancelled because they weren't needed under the old plan. It is far from clear how the new plan is going to replace the lost capacity.

...you realize that even with standard F9 cargo capacity being 12 tons (24,000 lb), you can ship 8 times more cargo to ISS on F9 per dollar (even if shuttle is flying at max cargo capacity) than shuttle can carry each mission? At 100 million per cargo mission, thats five F9 missions.

Just for the sake of quibbling:

A Falcon 9 can lift 10.45 mT to 28.5°. Less to 51°. With Dragon, that's 6 mT of cargo to the ISS, and 3 mT back down. At $133M per mission.

That's ~$22,000/kg.

But the Dragons aren't necessarily going to be fully loaded either. The contract is for a minimum of 20 mT of cargo, which at $1.6B is $80,000/kg.

I don't expect it to be that bad, especially with this "full utilization" thing going...

At the current flight rate, Shuttle is about $47,000/kg for pressurized cargo in an MPLM, or probably in the range of $22,000/kg for a full load (couldn't find the number for 51°, guessed 21 mT) of unpressurized cargo. Wait, doesn't that last number sound familiar?

And that's not even taking into account the fact that the Dragon flights can't carry crew at the same time.

...

I am perfectly aware that this comparison is a bit skewed, especially considering the low expected flight rate of Shuttle during an extension, not to mention crew safety issues. I'm actually a big fan of SpaceX, and I fully expect Falcon 9 Flight 1 to reach orbit successfully.

But what if it doesn't?

Shuttle extension is a huge waste of money that should be going to developing the next generation.

It's not a waste if it's the only option.

Shuttle extension would need extra money. The Hutchison and Kosmas bills include a budget boost specifically for this purpose.


Also, Shuttle extension could actually have synergy with the next generation (Commercial inline SD-HLV could be an order of magnitude cheaper per kg to orbit than Shuttle, cheaper even than Falcon 9 Heavy, and far less expensive to develop than a clean-sheet HLV)...

SpaceX apparently claimed once (or so I heard) that they could duplicate the Saturn V's capabilities for $2B in development costs. If I believed this was possible, I'd be all for it, but I don't...

[DeltaV]

How much would it cost to bring back Saturn 5

More than the GNP of the US/World.

First, you'd have to start parallel research programs for time-travel and human-memory-transfer.

Then, once these programs were ironed-out and reliable, you'd have to go back in time (to the high point of the Apollo program), copy all of the program documents, diagrams, procedures and test data, measure and photograph all of the tooling and test facilities used, gather material samples and then brain-scan all of the thousands of engineers, scientists, machinists, etc. involved at NASA and all of the thousands of contractors/subcontractors to get a snapshot of their memories/thoughts.

Then, return from the past to the present with copies of the documents, diagrams, procedures and test data, measurements, photos, material samples and brain-scans and load the brain-scans into thousands of volunteer engineers, scientists, machinists, etc. willing to give up a few years of their lives for the good of the nation and human space exploration.

Then, gather all of the raw materials, recreate the manufactured materials, bend/cast/cut/weld metal, cast resins/polymers, weave fibers, build cables, recreate old silicon chips, code software, etc. until you can assemble a Saturn 5. Test components, subsystems and systems as you go along, and then test the full system before an actual launch.

Simple.

It's a proven, reliable technology, all the design and testing was done long ago,

Long ago, that's the problem. Without the fresh, current memories of the people doing the work, it's hopeless. A complicated engineering program like that is like a flywheel. It takes time to get up to speed, to the point where it's really producing results. Most Saturn 5 workers are either retired or dead. Engineers under heavy schedule/budget/technical pressures simply do not have the time required to exhaustively archive all of the information needed to restart a complex program at some future date, regardless of MBA/politician fantasies. Terminating something like Shuttle or F-22 is a one-way street.

with all the advances since it was cancelled, it could probably be done for even less than the original.

You're talking about all-new engineering here. Given the decline in technical project management practices (where accountants, lawyers and politicians now make the engineering decisions), multiply the original budget by a couple orders of magnitude.

[IntLibber]

Dragon has plenty of dv and has all axis translation.

Well, if it can do TEI from L1 like people claim, I'll give you the delta-V. But does it still have all-axis translation capability with a fifteen-ton MPLM attached to the nose?

This is why the SSPDM was supposed to have its own RCS...

Not quite, even Orion was going to require an upper stage to do a TLI, to be launched with the MPLM on Ares V.

Current Dragon design doesn't have the dV to leave LEO at present. Thats a political decision by Elon, he doesn't want to lay all his cards out on the table for the establishment to raise opposition to him. For now he's playing the part of the happy LEO transportation entrepreneur. The present Dragon design is launched on F9 with its unused capacity in the trunk portrayed as "Unpressurized Cargo capacity".

They are perfectly capable of putting a Kestrel engine on there with some fuel tanks. The capsule itself has 270 day endurance built in.

As for shuttle capacity: no we dont need full shuttle cargo capacity right now, we've never needed it to support even the construction of ISS, there's no need for more than 22,000 lb capacity now just to supply logistics.

SpaceX will be sending its first ISS supply mission in 2012. Orbital might make it by 2013, then theres the japanese and european cargo ships plus the russians, thats five different cargo vessels supplying ISS, which is three more than we have had in the past up until this year.

You're not listening.

a) Large spares and ORUs (the need for which is not known, but likely) exceed the capacity of available vehicles, except the Shuttle and maybe HTV (which would probably have to be specially modified and isn't really available for that sort of thing).

Unless you are talking about entire spare modules or power trusses, this assertion is nonsensical, but even there, lets look at the mass of the modules of ISS:

Unity: 14,000 kg

Trusses:
Element Flight Launch date Length(m) Diameter(m) Mass(kg)
Z1 truss 3A – STS-92 October 11, 2000 4.9 4.2 8,755
P6 truss – solar array 4A – STS-97 November 30, 2000 73.2 10.7 15,824
S0 truss 8A – STS-110 April 8, 2002 13.4 4.6 13,971
S1 truss 9A – STS-112 October 7, 2002 13.7 4.6 14,124
P1 truss 11A – STS-113 November 23, 2002 13.7 4.6 14,003
P3/P4 truss – solar array 12A – STS-115 September 9, 2006 13.8 4.8 15,824
P5 truss - spacer 12A.1 – STS-116 December 9, 2006 3.37 4.55 1,864
S3/S4 truss – solar array 13A – STS-117 June 8, 2007 73.2 10.7 15,824
S5 truss - spacer 13A.1 – STS-118 August 8, 2007 3.37 4.55 1,818
P6 truss – solar array (relocation) 10A – STS-120 October 23, 2007 73.2 10.7 15,824
S6 truss – solar array 15A – STS-119 March 15, 2009 73.2 10.7 15,824

Pirs docking module: 3580 kg
Destiny lab: 14520 kg
Quest airlock: 6066 kg
Harmony: 14288 kg
Kibo: 14800 kg
Tranquility: 15500kg
Columbus: 10300kg

Zarya and Zvezda, the two main Russian modules, both over 19,000 kg, were launched by Russian Proton rockets, demonstrating that even without Shuttle, there remains a HLV capable of replacing any other module on ISS. So your claim that Shuttle is absolutely necessary is false on its face while Proton K launchers can be built.

b) Existing and projected logistics capability, without Shuttle, is stretched just maintaining the ISS at <50% utilization to 2015. Sure, you can pour cash into commercial cargo once it's running, but that doesn't help us right now, and it helps even less if either of the commercial vehicles (which are already part of the plan, and a necessary part of ISS logistics) are delayed for any reason (Falcon 9/Dragon is already years behind schedule and still slipping).

There were ten Shuttle flights cancelled because they weren't needed under the old plan. It is far from clear how the new plan is going to replace the lost capacity.

...you realize that even with standard F9 cargo capacity being 12 tons (24,000 lb), you can ship 8 times more cargo to ISS on F9 per dollar (even if shuttle is flying at max cargo capacity) than shuttle can carry each mission? At 100 million per cargo mission, thats five F9 missions.

Just for the sake of quibbling:

A Falcon 9 can lift 10.45 mT to 28.5°. Less to 51°. With Dragon, that's 6 mT of cargo to the ISS, and 3 mT back down. At $133M per mission.

That's ~$22,000/kg.

But the Dragons aren't necessarily going to be fully loaded either. The contract is for a minimum of 20 mT of cargo, which at $1.6B is $80,000/kg.

I don't expect it to be that bad, especially with this "full utilization" thing going...

At the current flight rate, Shuttle is about $47,000/kg for pressurized cargo in an MPLM, or probably in the range of $22,000/kg for a full load (couldn't find the number for 51°, guessed 21 mT) of unpressurized cargo. Wait, doesn't that last number sound familiar?

Sorry, but at $500 million per shuttle flight (in current year dollars), and an MPLM's cargo capacity is 10 tonnes, thats $50,000 per kg, for a fully loaded MPLM.

And that's not even taking into account the fact that the Dragon flights can't carry crew at the same time.

...

I am perfectly aware that this comparison is a bit skewed, especially considering the low expected flight rate of Shuttle during an extension, not to mention crew safety issues. I'm actually a big fan of SpaceX, and I fully expect Falcon 9 Flight 1 to reach orbit successfully.

But what if it doesn't?

What does it matter if flight 1 doesn't make orbit? Show me a single launcher that hasn't had launch failures. Whats important here is that SpaceX is taking the Safe and Responsible route of proving a safe record BEFORE putting people on it, something NASA failed to do with Shuttle's first launch (funny how they always hold others to different standards than themselves).

The only reason for slippage in the SpaceX schedule is that success is their focus, not launching on time.

Lets see, how on time was Shuttle? It was many many years late and only flew a few years before it had a major failure. After that, NASA failed entirely to deliver NASP, Venturestar, GTX, and quite a few other launchers. Ares I was five years behind schedule and getting further behind with each year.

Don't even try to debate about scheduling when the national embarassment that was the Stick is so prominent on the list of NASA's many failures.

Shuttle extension is a huge waste of money that should be going to developing the next generation.

It's not a waste if it's the only option.

Shuttle extension would need extra money. The Hutchison and Kosmas bills include a budget boost specifically for this purpose.


Also, Shuttle extension could actually have synergy with the next generation (Commercial inline SD-HLV could be an order of magnitude cheaper per kg to orbit than Shuttle, cheaper even than Falcon 9 Heavy, and far less expensive to develop than a clean-sheet HLV)...

SpaceX apparently claimed once (or so I heard) that they could duplicate the Saturn V's capabilities for $2B in development costs. If I believed this was possible, I'd be all for it, but I don't...

I'd like nothing more than an extension of Shuttle, but the money isn't there. We've got a 1.4 trillion dollar budget deficit, and an impending downgrade of the country's credit rating. Granted, Obama should be consistent with his profligate spending spree and decide NASA is too big to fail like his banker and auto industry buddies.

The skepticism among the oldspace crowd toward SpaceX is to be expected. SpaceX has five launches under their belts with two successes. They're young, and they wont hire the geriatric crew at NASA. NASA stalwarts look at them as uppity whipper snappers.

I've grown up enduring a MUCH MUCH longer history of NASA failing me, and other taxpayers, in delivering. When I was a kid, we were promised we'd be living on the moon by now. Space travel would be ordinary. Industry would be migrating off Earth.

Yeah, much of NASA's failure can be blamed on Congress. I can still blame NASA for being Congress' lap dog, and for being so anti-commercial for so much of its history. History has taught me that NASA stands for No Americans in Space Anymore.

They pooched it, its time to turn them back into the research agency they were as NACA, and leave space to business.

[93143]

Well, if it can do TEI from L1 like people claim, I'll give you the delta-V. But does it still have all-axis translation capability with a fifteen-ton MPLM attached to the nose?

This is why the SSPDM was supposed to have its own RCS...

Not quite, even Orion was going to require an upper stage to do a TLI, to be launched with the MPLM on Ares V.

I said TEI from L1, not TLI from LEO. TEI from L1 doesn't take all that much delta-V, but it's probably enough for station approach even with the extra mass of the MPLM.

TLI, on the other hand, always requires an EDS or else a really huge service module. Even with hydrolox, a TLI stack is about 50% propellant by mass. It's no insult to Dragon to say that it can't do TLI...

(Also, re: the Constellation lunar mission, I think you mean LSAM, not MPLM...)

Unless you are talking about entire spare modules or power trusses, this assertion is nonsensical

"Exceed the capacity" doesn't necessarily mean too heavy. It can mean bulky, designed for the Shuttle payload bay and requiring external unloading.

Zarya and Zvezda, the two main Russian modules, both over 19,000 kg, were launched by Russian Proton rockets, demonstrating that even without Shuttle, there remains a HLV capable of replacing any other module on ISS. So your claim that Shuttle is absolutely necessary is false on its face while Proton K launchers can be built.

Apparently you didn't understand me the first couple of times I explained this.

In order to get to the ISS, you need two things: 1) a rocket, and 2) a spaceship.

Launching a module into orbit does you no good at all if you don't have a means of getting it safely to the station.

Zarya and Zvezda are both capable of functioning as independent spaceships in their own right. This is how they were able to rendezvous and dock.

Sorry, but at $500 million per shuttle flight (in current year dollars), and an MPLM's cargo capacity is 10 tonnes, thats $50,000 per kg, for a fully loaded MPLM.

$2.8B for six flights is $467M per flight. That's $47,000/kg for a fully loaded MPLM, which is what I quoted. The lower figure is for unpressurized cargo.

...except that I think the MPLM capacity is in short tons, so make that $51,000/kg...

The only reason for slippage in the SpaceX schedule is that success is their focus, not launching on time.

Fat lot of good that does us if their schedule slips harm the productivity of the ISS.

The point is, Falcon 9/Dragon on schedule is not a given. And ISS logistics are going to be in a world of hurt if it slips too much more.

Don't even try to debate about scheduling when the national embarassment that was the Stick is so prominent on the list of NASA's many failures.

Stop trying to make this into an ideological argument. I'm not trying to defend the PoR. This is a practical problem, and finger-pointing doesn't help solve it.

I'd like nothing more than an extension of Shuttle, but the money isn't there. We've got a 1.4 trillion dollar budget deficit, and an impending downgrade of the country's credit rating. Granted, Obama should be consistent with his profligate spending spree and decide NASA is too big to fail like his banker and auto industry buddies.

Okay, so we aren't as far apart as it looks.

But I must take exception to the assertion that an extra 0.1% of the deficit to protect the ISS constitutes waste or profligate spending. (Cancelling Shuttle doesn't actually save the entire Shuttle budget, unless you fire absolutely everyone and leave KSC, MSFC, etc. to rot.)

Isn't there a huge chunk of stimulus money still unspent? Like, enough to fully fund NASA for a couple of decades or something? A Shuttle extension sounds "shovel-ready" to me...

They pooched it, its time to turn them back into the research agency they were as NACA, and leave space to business.

Not before the ISS is secure.

Even then, what makes you think there's a business case for opening the solar system to humanity? ULA doesn't even see profit in crew to LEO. SpaceX is a bit leaner, but even they won't start work on a LAS unless NASA funds it. Asteroid mining? Forget it.

The technology, scientific understanding, and knowhow are not in place for business to take over. "Grey" research on the ground is not going to change this enough on its own, barring Mach-effect thrusters or something...

...

IIRC, at least one of the extension bills recommended letting unspent money in NASA's budget carry over to the next fiscal year. Think about that for a moment.

I say we at least try to fix NASA before nuking it back to the propeller age...

[choff]

There's still a few Saturn 5's on display, I suppose you're saying back engineerings totally out of the question.

[DeltaV]

There's still a few Saturn 5's on display, I suppose you're saying back engineerings totally out of the question.

Not absolutely impossible, but if you had to have that specific architecture, better to start with a clean sheet design and use the old one as a guide, instead of hoping to get a Saturn 5 by following some 40-year old blueprints, if a complete set still existed (and they didn't have CAD then, so the blueprints would have to be digitized to fit the modern manufacturing paradigm).

You could use modern knowledge/methods/materials with a clean-sheet design to get a system of very similar capability, that might even look very much like a Saturn 5, but why bother? For a near-term "gap filler" it makes a lot more sense to extend Shuttle and/or transition Shuttle to a derived HLV, until the really good stuff like MLTs and Polywell are ready.

USAF is requesting ideas for (partially-)reusable boosters, but their planned IOC for Shuttle-sized payloads is around 2030: Spacelift Development Plan ~6MB

[Skipjack]

I think Obamas plan is awesome. I really liked the emphasis on research of new enabling technologies. That is what we need at this point. The current lack of new enabling technology means that we are stuck pretty much where we are.
The plan could have been even better hadnt he been forced to compromise in some areas (Orion light) to get it past certain congress members that were insisting on keeping an overly expensive, very late and very unneeded government sponsored space capsule.

[djolds1]

SpaceX apparently claimed once (or so I heard) that they could duplicate the Saturn V's capabilities for $2B in development costs. If I believed this was possible, I'd be all for it, but I don't...

Notionally named the BFR - Big "Falcon" Rocket.

[93143]

The plan could have been even better hadnt he been forced to compromise in some areas (Orion light) to get it past certain congress members that were insisting on keeping an overly expensive, very late and very unneeded government sponsored space capsule.

Orion would have been ahead of schedule and under budget if it weren't for Ares I. The Stick's declining performance forced Orion through eight redesign cycles and left it without lunar return capability, or dual-fault tolerance, or decent radiation shielding, or land landing capability, or 6-crew capability, or most of the planned supply of drinking water, or adequate reserve power, or a toilet, or a high-gain antenna (yes, they removed the high-gain antenna to save weight)...

I think the plan is much better than the PoR. I too like the emphasis on research. It's good except for three things:

1) it leaves us unable to support the ISS now and relying on hope for utilizing it in the future. Hope is not a plan. This transition needs to be properly managed, not a leap of faith.

And DON'T start ranting about addiction and cold turkey. The analogy is not helpful and doesn't address the issue. Would you rather the ISS be a casualty of your ideology?

2) it tosses what we have (which is NOT unusually expensive; remove the Orbiter and its associated costs and workforce, and the Shuttle system starts looking quite good) only to start building it again in half a decade or more (there aren't any high-confidence game-changers in heavy lift; barring MLTs or something, the answer will be roughly the same in five years). This sort of jerking around is exactly why NASA never accomplishes anything.

3) none of these dates are before the midterm elections in Obama's (hypothetical) second term. I don't trust this man as far as I could kick him.

Now, (2) I could put up with, if it weren't for (3), but (1) is a problem regardless. It wasn't Obama's decision to cancel Shuttle, but it was sure as hell his decision to not un-cancel Shuttle, at least until commercial providers can be in position to be handed the torch rather than pick it up and try to re-light the soaked embers...

[TallDave]

SpaceX apparently claimed once (or so I heard) that they could duplicate the Saturn V's capabilities for $2B in development costs. If I believed this was possible, I'd be all for it, but I don't...

That's interesting. Maybe for $10B?

I agree with your overall point that the shuttle program needs to be extended if we need the ISS, but practically speaking how useful is the ISS anyway? Like the moon landing, its value seems to be mostly symbolic. I'd much rather see the money go into more robotic explorers and esoteric physics experiments like Gravity Probe B.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iss

high-gain antenna (yes, they removed the high-gain antenna to save weight)...

Haha. Not a good sign.

[93143]

practically speaking how useful is the ISS anyway?

There's a lot of very interesting research that can be done on the ISS. More than 900 principal investigators were lined up for it, and most of them were dumped when Griffin decided the ISS was in his way. Now the goal is full utilization again, and interest seems to be very high behind the scenes.

The trouble is that the ISS hasn't done much yet, because it's still under construction. People are getting impatient, and are wondering why we spent all that money, and want to cancel it and splash it, before it properly gets down to business...

[Betruger]

93143, or anyone else who knows the context well enough -

The ISS can't be kept in orbit for much longer than the current plan (~2020, right?) for reasons other than resupply (orbital transportation and paying for it) and station keeping, right? If not, what are the other reasons for it, in short?

It's not possible to save most of the hardware invested in the ISS by docking those huge Bigelow modules (2,100 m3 or even >3,000) to the Station and transfering the equipment to those, before de-orbiting the ISS?

Is the ISS not replaceable by such a Bigelow analog (which could be made with very few launches by comparison, if I understand right), in terms of function at least (international commitments are separate story)?

[Skipjack]

1) it leaves us unable to support the ISS now and relying on hope for utilizing it in the future. Hope is not a plan. This transition needs to be properly managed, not a leap of faith.

Well that problem is not new. It already existed with the old plan as well. Ares/Orion were unable to close the gap. The shuttle programme was ended by the previous administration. So that too was already in motion and unpreventable.
The other problem is that the old plan did not even mean that the ISS would be extended. There never was any funding for this. So Ares1 (if it was ever finished) would have been a LV without a destination.
THe new plan is much more coherent, but it still has gaps like you pointed out.
I do have high hopes for commercial crew. I also like that they are investing money in future RLV programmes. That is all good stuff.

3) none of these dates are before the midterm elections in Obama's (hypothetical) second term. I don't trust this man as far as I could kick him.

I dont think that it is fair to blame Obama for the fact that his term ends when it does. He did not make the law for that

It's not possible to save most of the hardware invested in the ISS by docking those huge Bigelow modules (2,100 m3 or even >3,000) to the Station and transfering the equipment to those, before de-orbiting the ISS?

I think that Bigelow wants to do his own station with his modules. The ISS would probably be unneeded balast for him. From what I understand his modules would make for a much larger station than the ISS (in regards to volume).
From what I understand though, he would have funded an Orion light anyway, even without NASA doing that. His plan is, if I am not mistaken, to launch his clients on the EELVs with a Orion Light.

[TallDave]

There's a lot of very interesting research that can be done on the ISS.

Color me skeptical. None of this sounds all that compelling:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internatio ... c_research

...but maybe you know about some things I don't.

I won't say the ISS is a boondoggle, but it doesn't seem very cost-effective.