RUN!! Forrest!! RUN!!

Bob Noel wrote:
In article , Bob Fry
wrote:

It's time someone said that both the shuttle and the ISS have turned
out to be stupid ideas.

People have been whining about the space program for decades.

Well, maybe we'd whine less if it accomplished more. It took us less
than ten years to go from the atmosphere to the surface of the moon and
back. 36 years later we've gone nowhere.

On the 20th anniversary of Apollo, Bush Sr. asked NASA for a mission
plan for a Mars landing. The plan came back with a $200 billion price
tag. This number was deliberately cooked up to be as expensive as
possible to guarantee the idea would be shelved. Why? Because they were
afraid that if the Mars mission were doable we'd pull the plug on the
ISS gravy train.

There's an old joke that you're not a real country unless you have your
own airline and a national beer. Five years ago putting a man in space
was something only the superpowers had done. Now that Burt Rutal and
Paul Allen crashed that party, we either need to either s--t or get off
the pot. For the price of a shuttle launch we can send a robot to Mars
where real discoveries can be made. I'm fully in favor of manned space
exploration but all this ****ing around in LEO isn't getting us
anywhere.

-cwk.

wrote:

Well, maybe we'd whine less if it accomplished more. It took us less
than ten years to go from the atmosphere to the surface of the moon and
back. 36 years later we've gone nowhere.

We were supposed to have this cheap reusable "pickup truck" as a cheap and
reusable way to get stuff into low earth orbit. That wasn't supposed to be
an end, but a means.

For example, why should any particular vehicle to be leaving LEO have to be
built and assembled on the ground, be capable of withstanding (as a whole)
the acceleration to get into orbit, or even fit some particular ground
launch vehicle? Better to lug the necessary parts into orbit, insert tab A
into slot B, and let it be on its way.

But the pickup truck became the end itself somewhere along the way.
Depressing.

- Andrew

Andrew Gideon wrote:
wrote:


Well, maybe we'd whine less if it accomplished more. It took us less
than ten years to go from the atmosphere to the surface of the moon and
back. 36 years later we've gone nowhere.


We were supposed to have this cheap reusable "pickup truck" as a cheap and
reusable way to get stuff into low earth orbit.

It is, indeed, depressing.
Decades ago as a kid I was reading Heinlein books like "Rocket Summer,"
and knew even then that everybody lifting off from their backyards in
their own rockets wouldn't ever be a reality.

But it does feel like we made it to the moon and then just gave up the
venture into space, for the most part. Who knew once we finally leaped
off the planet, there'd be so much delay and so much nitpicking...and so
little further progress.

It's great, livin' in the future. We've got Jetsons ultralights and
Dick Tracy miniphones, but I sure wish we had Heinlein's Mars, and all
the rest.

In article IHWGe.226148$xm3.73811@attbi_s21,
StellaStarr wrote:

Andrew Gideon wrote:
wrote:


Well, maybe we'd whine less if it accomplished more. It took us less
than ten years to go from the atmosphere to the surface of the moon and
back. 36 years later we've gone nowhere.


We were supposed to have this cheap reusable "pickup truck" as a cheap and
reusable way to get stuff into low earth orbit.

It is, indeed, depressing.
Decades ago as a kid I was reading Heinlein books like "Rocket Summer,"
and knew even then that everybody lifting off from their backyards in
their own rockets wouldn't ever be a reality.

But it does feel like we made it to the moon and then just gave up the
venture into space, for the most part. Who knew once we finally leaped
off the planet, there'd be so much delay and so much nitpicking...and so
little further progress.

It's great, livin' in the future. We've got Jetsons ultralights and
Dick Tracy miniphones, but I sure wish we had Heinlein's Mars, and all
the rest.


The problem, of course is that it takes so damn much raw energy even to
make orbit, so the cost is astronomical. It will remain so until we make
some physics breakthrough that allows true antigravity machines.

"ORVAL FAIRAIRN" wrote in message
news
In article IHWGe.226148$xm3.73811@attbi_s21,
StellaStarr wrote:

Andrew Gideon wrote:
wrote:


Well, maybe we'd whine less if it accomplished more. It took us less
than ten years to go from the atmosphere to the surface of the moon
and
back. 36 years later we've gone nowhere.


We were supposed to have this cheap reusable "pickup truck" as a cheap
and
reusable way to get stuff into low earth orbit.

It is, indeed, depressing.
Decades ago as a kid I was reading Heinlein books like "Rocket Summer,"
and knew even then that everybody lifting off from their backyards in
their own rockets wouldn't ever be a reality.

But it does feel like we made it to the moon and then just gave up the
venture into space, for the most part. Who knew once we finally leaped
off the planet, there'd be so much delay and so much nitpicking...and so
little further progress.

It's great, livin' in the future. We've got Jetsons ultralights and
Dick Tracy miniphones, but I sure wish we had Heinlein's Mars, and all
the rest.


The problem, of course is that it takes so damn much raw energy even to
make orbit, so the cost is astronomical.

Rutan has it partially figured out. Give him a couple of years and the
energy and cost problems are liable to be a thing of the past.

Burt Rutan is an exceptional human being, fellow pilot, engineer,
creative thinker, entrepreneur, and a fellow home builder.. I truly
admire this man... But let us not get carried away... His fragile,
epoxy composite, airframes will not attain orbital speed and then
re-enter into that 5400 degree cutting torch we call the atmosphere at
Mach 17.5... His machine is a shuttlecock... And like a shuttlecock is
light as a feather and popped straight up at low speeds....
Interesting and arresting to watch, and he and Branson just may make a
bunch of money off the idea - and more power to them... Shucks, I might
even buy a ride... But, putting a working load into orbit is a real
task requiring huge amounts of explosives and oxidizers and no amount
of blue sky pronouncements is going to change the laws of physics...
Slowng back down by atmospheric braking is always going to be a life
and death situation..

Now, we would be vastly further ahead had we spent a tiny fraction of
the cost of the orbiters on a fleet of cost effective, large capsules
of the general configuration of the Gemini's, et. al. lifted by
subsequent generations of the Saturn rocket, for moving loads into
orbit and the blunt capsule for bringing them back.. What should have
had wings is the lower stages of the booster, which would glide back to
a recovery area and land softly...

denny

"Denny" wrote in news:1122835901.916937.201370
@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com:

Snipola
Slowng back down by atmospheric braking is always going to be a life
and death situation..
Snipola

An obvious answer there is to stop using atmospheric braking. Well,
at least to the extent that it is currently done.

I wonder, with the use of lightweight solid fuel rocket motors, if
an orbital craft couldn't go up with an extra for deorbit, using it
to slow the craft down so it doesn't slam into the atmoshpere at
Mach 17.5, but perhaps something a bit more manageable, like Mach 10?

It would take too much energy to lift a craft with enough deorbit
energy reserves to have a completely non ballistic re-entry. But
perhaps a compromise point can be reached. A balance between 100%
ballistic re-entry and 100% non-ballistic. Slow down half-way and
let the atmosphere do the rest.

Just an idea....

Brian
--
http://www.skywise711.com - Lasers, Seismology, Astronomy, Skepticism

Seismic FAQ: http://www.skywise711.com/SeismicFAQ/SeismicFAQ.html
Blog: http://www.skywise711.com/Blog

Sed quis custodiet ipsos Custodes?

ORVAL FAIRAIRN wrote:

The problem, of course is that it takes so damn much raw energy even to
make orbit, so the cost is astronomical. It will remain so until we make
some physics breakthrough that allows true antigravity machines.

But even if we ignore the cost of the energy involved, there's also the cost
of the vehicle. The shuttle was supposed to save that cost by being
reusable.

There were probably other savings intended; it's been a long time those
topics were discussed and I just don't remember anymore.

BTW, there are other places to save on that energy cost besides the ultimate
of antigravity (assuming that it's sufficiently "magical" that one need not
pay the cost of the potential energy gain of climbing into orbit {8^).
Anything that involves expending the energy on the ground, from the fancy
laser ideas to just shoving a large bomb up the tailpipe laugh saves on
the cost of lifting fuel, for example.

- Andrew

Andrew Gideon wrote:

BTW, there are other places to save on that energy cost besides the ultimate
of antigravity (assuming that it's sufficiently "magical" that one need not
pay the cost of the potential energy gain of climbing into orbit {8^).

two words: space elevator! not as crazy as it sounds since
it was suggested seriously in 1957 by Artsutanov or romanticized
later in 1978 by Arthur C. Clarke, a number of key technologies
are coming together (e.g., carbon nanotubes to make a cable
that'd could take it) that might eventually make it practical
before we got antigravity that is :-))

There are a lot of stuff about it on the web, just google away,
e.g., wikipedia, but the following is a good starting point,
from NASA no less:

http://trs.nis.nasa.gov/archive/00000535/


--Sylvain

two words: space elevator!

Two more words: Big TFR.

It's a sure target. So is a vacuum subway tube for orbital speed cross
country transport.

Jose
--
He who laughs, lasts.
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