I can see the need for NASA to certify hardware that is going to be interacting with their equipment/personnel.
Well they are doing that for COTS right now. But the bigger problem is the so called man rating. Until now NASA never really had any solid guidelines for it and those that it had were not consistent between centers. Even the shuttle needed quite a few wavers to be allowed to transport people. It is a total mess.
Besides, NASA never got to certify the Russian rockets and spacecraft. They dont seem to have a problem with letting their astronauts fly on those...
Even with no objective standard for what is required for "certification", the point is that NASA needs to give its okay for anything to dock with ISS, just as do each of the member space agencies. I wouldn't say this is a "mess". It's not as if we're 20 years into commercial spaceflight. The Russians did delay Dragon's first intended docking by not giving their okay in a timely manner, but as it turned out, SpaceX decided to use that time and more, so no harm done. What they need to do is have an objective standard so future flights don't have to seek permissions subject to politics, etc.
Man rating is a more complex issue, because in cases like Delta and Atlas, it primarily involves adding infrastructure such as a gantry for astronauts. In the case of Falcon, the system was designed from the start to be man rated, so the gantry is already in place and repetition is about all that's required.
Note, the Shuttle didn't provide this sort of previous repetition to be "man-rated" (it was unable to fly unmanned) nor did it include a launch failure escape system, so what qualifies as "man rated" is by definition, very subjective.
"Courage is not just a virtue, but the form of every virtue at the testing point." C. S. Lewis
Not a believer in the post Challenger Parachute Pole I see...
The development of atomic power, though it could confer unimaginable blessings on mankind, is something that is dreaded by the owners of coal mines and oil wells. (Hazlitt)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)
GIT, it is not only the things you are listing, the processes differ from NASA center to NASA center and even their paperwork is incompatible...
It is one reason why anything NASA does is so inefficient. Nobody ever cared to reform the agency and set some standards that are not completely over the top. E.g. I read somewhere that every screw has to be signed off on by not just one, but several engineers and then this has to go on to the other centers where the same thing is happening. For some reason people at NASA think that something becomes saver when 100 people sign off on it, than it is with one person signing off on it.
This is not how you can do a commercially viable endeavour and this is why the private companies are resisting deeper NASA oversight, as was originally proposed for the next phase of commercial crew.
Quite honestly, I dont think that it is necessary. Atlas and Delta have a long list of successful flights and the DOD trusts them enough to launch all their satellites that are important for national security with them.
All the proposed spacecraft will have a launch escape system, which already makes them safer than the shuttle ever was.
IIRC Dragon, Dreamchaser and BOs capsule can successfully abort during every stage of the flight (Boeings capsule might be able to, but I am not sure). Dreamchaser and Dragon will be able to do powered landings (not sure about BOs capsule, but it might).
Either way, if they just abandoned the SLS and put all the money into commercial crew, they could fund all competitory (and some serious technology development projects on top of that), which would ensure system redundancy. This means that even if one of the systems is grounded due to a failure there are other, completely different systems available that wont be affected and can be used instead. This is a savety that no single system can provide and this is why senators Hutchinson and Hall are completely full of shit when they talk about the need to fund the SLS as a backup for commercial crew (which is so totally wrong for so many reasons).
ladajo wrote:Not a believer in the post Challenger Parachute Pole I see...
Not really a fan of the fantastically expensive national boondoggle known as "shuttle".
I'm a fan of this world's only slightly reusable space launch system, and all the wonderful technology that went into that including the zero gee toilet; but I am NOT a fan of space transport systems that ignore things like cost. It's because the moron peeps at NASA think they deserve to do whatever they want with no thought of cost, that NASA is doomed to wallow in mediocrity in the future.
The future of human spaceflight, is surely going to be in the hands of private industry.
"Courage is not just a virtue, but the form of every virtue at the testing point." C. S. Lewis
GIThruster wrote: Not really a fan of the fantastically expensive national boondoggle known as "shuttle".
I was beginning to feel this way about the shuttle just about the time that Reagan announced the space station. My immediate first thought was, give it to the corp of engineers. Maybe it would be done on time and budget.
I was a huge fan of the shuttle back when it was first happening in the 70's. I remember writing my Congressman for details of the computer and TPS systems and they were the first systems to have troubles. For decades after I was still thrilled at what we'd built and flown. It wasn't till this last decade I began to realize the horrible price we paid for that experiment--that we'd spent 5X what we should have. Flying crew and cargo together is terribly expensive and though there's a lot of utility in it, it's just not cost effective. IMHO, it's not until you look at the alternatives that you start to agonize over the numbers. If we'd used a cheaper launch system, what might we have launched in addition to ISS, Hubble and some military sats?
And we're doing it again. We're building the Senate Launch System instead of building TRITON and Nautilus-X. For the price of a launch system we do not need and that will certainly cost much, much more to operate than the Atlas and Falcon, we could have an entire fleet of reusable, interplanetary, human exploration craft, complete with nuclear rocket and onboard electrical power by the mega-watt, flying out of a fuel depot orbiting at zero inclination. We could eventually turn our attention back to an economical launch system like Venturestar. We could develop and use a handful of smaller, tender type craft for all sorts of uses from lander to lifeboat, Dragon to Orion. Instead, a handful of self-absorbed senators have waylaid the US space program and it is really finished. The next decade is nothing but build a big rocket that we then can't afford to launch because it costs so much there's no money left to build stuff worth launching.
Last time, ISS was used to justify Shuttle and Shuttle was used to justify ISS. NASA got away with the scam because NASA, the Congress and the American people wanted a space program. But now that's not true. Without a bright vision for exploration, the SLS can't survive. It costs too much, too late and leaves no money left over for Nautilus-X, or TRITON.
Makes me sick.
"Courage is not just a virtue, but the form of every virtue at the testing point." C. S. Lewis
This is the travesty in the whole matter. NASA should be at the forefront of developing new technology, technology that can be used by american companies to build better launch vehicles and space craft. Instead NASA is wasting money on building a crappy launch vehicle that nobody needs and that has no mission. The cost for that is taking money away from commercial crew (which would help the finally growing space industry in the US get on its feet) and it is taking money away from technology development projects. And then it is taking money away from science and exploration projects that should be NASAs actualy job! It is a travesty!
Skipjack wrote:There is an article and interview with Elon Musk on Popular Mechanics about how he is going to achieve reusability of the Falcon 9 (and as it appears also of the Falcon Heavy).
Bulletpoints:
1st stage separation at mach 6 instead of mach 10 and more powerful second stage to compensate for that. [this should change our back of the envelope calculations a lot, less down range to return from and less reentry speed so probably no or very little heatshield]
40% payload reduction from reusability [interesting number to work with]
Reuse stage 100 times.
Turnarround for first stage 10 hours or less
Turnarround for second stage 24 hours (it has to complete a full orbit before returning which takes time).
Expect several grasshopper flights this year and going supersonic with it in Q4.
Does anyone here know how high a F9 is when doing mach 6?
Does anyone here know how high a F9 is when doing mach 6?
This was not mentioned. Originally stage 1 separation was at 100km hight and would coast to 300km before coming down again.
I am assuming that with the new flight profile, they will "aim higher" so that the rocket travels less distance downrange, but reaches a greater hight before staging occurs. That would probably give the second stage a bit more "to work with" and will reduce the problem for the first stage having to break down and travel back all the way. I think it now resembles more closely the flight profile of the Kistler K1.
Skipjack wrote:I am assuming that with the new flight profile, they will "aim higher" so that the rocket travels less distance downrange, but reaches a greater hight before staging occurs. That would probably give the second stage a bit more "to work with" and will reduce the problem for the first stage having to break down and travel back all the way. I think it now resembles more closely the flight profile of the Kistler K1.
It must be a very different flight profile if they plan for the first stage to reach a higher altitude at a lower speed. There's a finite number of places that the first stage could be upon reaching mach 6 if it's at 100% thrust. It will be some distance downrange anyways because of earth's rotation. I'll post more on this later..
GIThruster wrote:And we're doing it again. We're building the Senate Launch System instead of building TRITON and Nautilus-X. For the price of a launch system we do not need and that will certainly cost much, much more to operate than the Atlas and Falcon, we could have an entire fleet of reusable, interplanetary, human exploration craft, complete with nuclear rocket and onboard electrical power by the mega-watt, flying out of a fuel depot orbiting at zero inclination.
Well Space X and Musk seem to be our best/last hope for the moment. If he succeeds in lowering cost 10X(understand his Facon Heavy is already estimated to be $1000/lb compared to the shuttle's $10K/lb) to maybe even 100X times from the Shuttle that will be the greatest improvement in human history. All bets off then and he knows about nuclear rockets hopefully TRITON.
Yes but Pratt & Witney says developing TRITON or something like it is a billion dollar investment, and I believe it. That's not something SpaceX can do. TRITON is really an exploration/deep space technology, not a commercial/launch technology (in the foreseeable future) so SpaceX would have zero return on investment for a billion dollar or more expense. Not doable. This is the kind of thing we pay NASA for.
"Courage is not just a virtue, but the form of every virtue at the testing point." C. S. Lewis
How big of an investment would P&W have said Falcon 9 would be?
Regardless of the economics, one thing a moon base would accomplish is to put advanced propulsion like TRITON beyond the reach of bureaucrats and NIMBYs. The base would be used for a variety of other purposes, so the multi-billion dollar investment for it wouldn't be held by engine development alone. In fact, you'd probably not want to tell anyone you're building an engine until the base is up. Anyone building a moon base would have to deal with a lot of national and international politics. Building flying nuclear reactors wouldn't help with the stupid that exists in those areas.
