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Space Science Technology

More on the Orbital Space Plane 317

Posted by michael from the now-30%-less-likely-to-explode dept.
AP has a decent piece looking at NASA's orbital space plane program, and describing it as a sedan compared to a tractor-trailer. National polls show that public support for the space program continues to be very strong.
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More on the Orbital Space Plane More

More on the Orbital Space Plane

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  • Why settle for a sedan? (Score:5, Funny)

    by mdvolm ( 68424 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:03PM (#6841088) Homepage
    I, for one, would rather see NASA go with the "overpowered sports-car" model (AKA Ferrari). Those pictures of the "sedan" models aren't nearly sleek enough.

    Let's build a Star Wars style ship and paint it Empire black! Yeah! Now that would increase the support for the space program. It's all about marketing...

  • Seems like a good plan for travel.... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by rokzy ( 687636 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:04PM (#6841093)
    and remote control is good.

    "The space plane will have only two missions: to carry people up and down from the space station, and to act as a standby lifeboat, parked at the space station for the evacuation of astronauts if there is an emergency."

    But what about when the shuttle repaired Hubble? will this kind of mission be no longer possible?

    • Re:Seems like a good plan for travel.... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by CheechBG ( 247105 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:12PM (#6841133) Homepage
      Rockets, my man, rockets. Shoot Hubble II into orbit with a rocket, and if a EVA is necessary to "assemble" it, then put the space plane on station and get it done. No hauling needed.

      Granted, though, I'm not entirely certain that this 2 step process would be entirely cost effective. It's cheaper to shoot a rocket than it is to fire up the current Shuttle system, and I would imagine the proposed Space Plane system would have a significantly lower cost-per-flight, given the much reduced weight, but will both of those factors mitigate the cost of the single Shuttle flight? Only time will tell.
      • If the Hubble II doesn't have a flaw in the first place, it's *very* cost-effective :)

      • Rockets? Ummm, no (Score:2, Informative)

        by DesScorp ( 410532 )
        While I'd like to see more use of disposable, cheaper rockets, it's near impossible to launch something like Hubble into orbit with them. Have you actually SEEN how big Hubble is? Things like Delta or Titan rockets couldn't do it. If we still had the Saturn V, MAYBE that could do it. But we've had nothing like the Saturn for decades now, and the costs to develop an equivilant to it wouldn't make it truly cost effective. There are some missions where we simply need a big 'ole space truck like the shuttle. Do

        • Re:Rockets? Ummm, no (Score:5, Informative)

          by cmowire ( 254489 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @08:40PM (#6841852) Homepage
          You haven't been keeping up. The Delta IV Large [astronautix.com], which is the current largest available production booster, has a 5 m diamater fairing and can lift 25,800 kg to LEO. The Hubble Space Telescope [astronautix.com] is a mere 10,863 kg. At that rate, even the Delta IV Medium [astronautix.com] could lift it.

          • And thats only the U.S. hardware (Score:4, Informative)

            by reality-bytes ( 119275 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @10:00PM (#6842202) Homepage
            Lets not forget the Ariane 5V [astronautix.com] system in service since 2001 which can launch a 5.4m wide 80,000kg payload to GTO [wikipedia.org]

            Then there's always talk of foreign investment breathing life back into the dormant Russian Energia [astronautix.com] lauch system which was designed to inject up to 200,000Kg of payload into LEO [wikipedia.org] which has already been tested in a 110,000Kg payload configuration for launching the cancelled Buran Orbiter

            It makes the shuttle's maximum payload to LEO of 28,803Kg look rather small.

            • Re:And thats only the U.S. hardware (Score:5, Insightful)

              by cmowire ( 254489 ) on Monday September 01, 2003 @01:09AM (#6842912) Homepage
              I'm not sure where they got the figure for the Ariane 5V, that sounds a tad heavy.

              I wouldn't bank on the return of the Energia. It's big and requires cooperation between the Ukraine and Russia, which doesn't happen so easily. Right now, there's some good potential for heavy lift boosters via straightforward structural modifications of the Delta and Atlas boosters (to allow them to support a heavier payload) clustered in various configurations -- they don't have to stop at three boosters. It's theoretically possible, and I'm wagering that the people who designed the Delta and Atlas probably had that in mind for future development, because satelites keep getting bigger.

              See, the interesting part, and the thing that makes it impossible for NASA to get a shuttle replacement together, is that you generally don't need to get even 28,000kg to a useful orbit. If you could get 5,000 kg to a useful orbit cheaply, you'd send up your satelite in 5,000 kg chunks and put it together while up there. But in order to do that you either need spacesuits that don't require prebreathing and extended preperations, an inflatable, presurized drydock, or really good robotics. And you'd need to fly it on a regular schedule.

              The problem is that we need to keep the shuttle around until we're at least done building the space station because none of the exsisting modules would fit on it and would require a LOT of modification in order to be launched on a Delta or an Atlas booster, and might require some booster modifications to boot. And NASA really didn't want to give up their existing abilities, so they kept trying to avoid this.

              I think that part of the drive for the OSP by NASA is because they realize that they are eventually going to be forced to give up the shuttle. The timings might be such that the shuttle is canceled shortly after all of the completed station modules are sent up. So the OSP is insurance that they will be able to stay in the manned spaceflight business after that happens, even if it takes a while before a true shuttle replacement shows up. They are going to railroad it through congress and hope that they can get it built and operational before they have to give up the shuttle.

              And the railroading of the OSP is probably a good thing. Part of the problem with the X-30 and X-33 projects was that they took far too long to produce anything even mildly useful with them, so people would try to get a nice career as a middle manager, instead of designing and building the fscking thing. Remember that the most impressive aircraft of the cold war (U-2, SR-71, F-117) were build in the Skunk Works using an astonishingly small number of people in an incredibly short time span.

            • And overlooking the incredibly obvious! (Score:4, Interesting)

              by reality-bytes ( 119275 ) on Monday September 01, 2003 @01:32AM (#6842987) Homepage
              You've already got a system capable of delivering probably 60-65 tons or so to LEO right under your nose!

              Take the exisiting SRB+Fuel tank combination that launches the shuttle and design a payload-sled based around the shuttles existing motors without the fancy cargo-bay, wings, avionics, cabin, life-support etc. Hey-presto you have a heavy unmanned launcher based around existing technology.

              You may even get better than 65tons payload because you won't need the fancy 'throttled' ascents (no need to avoid aerodynamic loading on wings).

              Now why didn't I think about that before?
              • Where should I start...

                Designing a new cargo sled for the shuttle would be more complex than simply designing a new rocket. The SRB's were a nasty hack to get the shuttle off the ground, and have a lot of problems. No two (including the ones installed at the time) produce the exact same thrust. Once you light the SRB it will burn until it runs out of fuel.

                The foam and external tank issue is another problem. The foam keeps splitting off and hitting the spacecraft.

                FWIW you would really be better off bri

        • Re:Rockets? Ummm, no (Score:3, Interesting)

          by Anonymous Coward
          Combining humans and cargo in one vehicle is not such a good idea. Humans require extra safety margins, less G loads and abort options that cargo does not. All of those requirements add weight to the vehicle which in turn increases fuel loads and that then in turn increases strucutral requirements ... Also a lot of cargo is dangerous to humans, so when loaded on a manned craft more protections must be taken.

          To build the best human->LEO transport system you want to keep it small/simple/safe and single p
      • "Rockets, my man, rockets. Shoot Hubble II into orbit with a rocket, and if a EVA is necessary to "assemble" it, then put the space plane on station and get it done."

        Except that the shuttle cargo bay isn't just to haul cargo but also functions as a drydock. Working on something within the bay gives the astronauts numerous convenient tie-down points to reach all the important parts of the satellite. If you can no longer assume that all your manned missions are going to bring along their own enclosed stru
    • I think they should probably be thinking about a spaceworthy-only boat that ferries stuff from the ISS to other destinations in orbit. They'd have to bring fuel up to the ISS for it, and so on, though of course this is also an ideal application for nuclear propulsion. Maybe if you were really creative you could come up with some kind of nice power storage system and just use solar, and ion drives, and just charge it all the time :)

  • I like this... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by chrisgeleven ( 514645 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:04PM (#6841096) Homepage
    This new spacecraft NASA is working on actually sounds like something that will work. Seems like they are trying to keep it as close as possible to the K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple, Stupid) principle.

    The cheaper and more reliable something is, the better off we are.

    • Re:I like this... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by LooseChanj ( 17865 )
      So did the shuttle 30 years ago.
    • Hrm, so NASA is now focussing on designs that are "simple, flexible, durable, dependable and relatively cheap."

      Perhaps they should have thought of that back in the 70's when the original Space Missile (er shuttle) was designed. (Designed top-down, but that is a whinge for another day).

      Q.

      • Re:Solution = Common Sense (yet again) (Score:4, Insightful)

        by cmowire ( 254489 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @08:49PM (#6841900) Homepage
        In retrospect, yes, NASA shouldn't have bothered developing the shuttle and should have just kept with Saturn-derived boosters.

        But, at that point, the only way that NASA could fund any sort of manned space flight program was to promise that it would be reusable and would dramatically decrease the cost of all launchers. Also, given that the Saturn V line needed to be shut down, it had to be capable of assembling a space station out of parts, instead of being one or two Saturn launches. And everything piled on from there, with the NASA chiefs going on with blinders on hoping that everything would work its way out in the end.

  • We shouldn't depend on Government (Score:5, Insightful)

    by meckardt ( 113120 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:05PM (#6841101) Homepage

    NASA did a great job getting us to the moon during the cold war, but it has since turned into a bureaucratic machine, as highlighted in the Columbia post mortem report. I doubt this will change in the future, regardless of any efforts to do so, because bureaucracy is the nature of such agencies.

    It would be MUCH better if the Government provided incentives to the various companies who are attemping to build space transportation systems. Those folks will be in it for profit, and their isn't any profit in destroying your launch systems to meet a schedule.

    • Government provided incentives

      If there is any real enefit in space, then surely no government sponsored handout is needed. Govt sponsorship destroys your whole argument. As soon as there is some overnment-set goal to meet to get the sponsorship, then other profit oriented goals go out of the window.

      • If there is any real enefit in space, then surely no government sponsored handout is needed.

        True. But a government handout would provide an incentive that would get us to space sooner. Giving more money to NASA will not get us into space; giving a prize to the first people to build a real spacecraft would get us into space. Those of us in favor of the idea believe that the benefits would be worth a fairly big prize, and note that the prize would not be awarded for anything but working hardware. (Money

    • Bubba Says Highly Innaccurate (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Arbogast_II ( 583768 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @07:52PM (#6841618) Homepage
      Anyone who doubts NASA is in its glory age right now, needs to scribble out a Perl Script (or your language of choice), and download all these NASA Pictures of the Day. NASA in the 90's and this decade is accomplishing FAR MORE than the NASA of the Apollo Era.

      http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html

      This Space Plane is an excellent solution to a pressing problem.

      The NASA program that holds the most incredible promise is Project Prometheus. This program should have an incredible impact on the future of mankind, yet is barely known. It is the coolest thing America is doing today. It is highly inaccurate to suggest NASA is idle or unsuccessful. Remember, the Space Shuttle is an important, highly visible PR project as much as a serious project. Much of the real scientific and engineering achievement occurs beneath the publics radar by computer controlled machines.

      http://www.nuclearspace.com/a_project_prometheus3. htm
    • With all the NASA bashing going on after the loss of columbia, it should be remembered that while NASA makes the go/no-go decisions. Day to day shuttle maintenance and operation was contracted out (at congress' insistance no doubt) to the United Space Alliance (Boeing and Lockheed Martin). In not sure how the blame for recent events falls between these parties.

  • Maybe NASA could... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Kotukunui ( 410332 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:06PM (#6841105)
    enter this design in the X-prize [xprize.org] competition and win themselves $10 million.
  • ...when the robots do everything else.

    Oh... wait... damn, they're gonna do that, too.

  • Not a shuttle replacement (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ruiner13 ( 527499 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:09PM (#6841120) Homepage
    For those too lazy to read the article, this is only designed to be a commuter to the space station and back. It only would have a crew of 4, and would carry light cargo. It isn't meant as a do-everything satellite launcher/people mover like the current space shuttle. They plan on developing another vehicle to do the other chores of the space shuttle. Frankly, with the budget constraints NASA is under, I'm really surprised to read about them seriously developing more than one type of shuttle replacement, although I do think they are going in the right direction. We have several rockets designed to carry heavy payloads, I really don't see why they need to have the payload and crew all in one vehicle. What they should do is keep the rockets to lift the heavy payloads safely into space, then have the humans do what they need to do to the payload once it is in space (such as fine tuning, final preparation, and/or activation).

    • Re:Not a shuttle replacement (Score:4, Insightful)

      by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:37PM (#6841258) Homepage Journal

      What they should do is spend the money they'd spend on a new cargo launch vehicle on space elevator development. the problem is that we still need to develop the cheap carbon nanotube construction methods in order to actually do it. Since they need an apparent success sooner than that in order to stay afloat, they're going to have to develop this light space plane, get the public back on their side, then take the time to develop a new heavy launch vehicle, and if THAT is then successful, they can start thinking about space elevators again. I mean, they're working on them now, but not in earnest.

      I really would love to see the government spend a big chunk of cash on space elevator development, and spend it wisely.

      • Your comment:
        the problem is that we still need to develop the cheap carbon nanotube construction methods in order to actually do it.

        From the article:
        "The two biggest reasons that schedules slip and costs increase is that you change the requirements or you're counting on technology that didn't pan out," Smith said.

        It would seem that a space elevator is exactly the thing that Nasa needs to avoid at this time. Cheaper, Better, Faster doesn't work. Cheaper with specific (possibly far reaching but obtain

    • Not a shuttle replacement - not yet (Score:4, Insightful)

      by gad_zuki! ( 70830 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:42PM (#6841283)
      >It only would have a crew of 4, and would carry light cargo.

      Also, the article mentions NASA would also have to build a different heavy lifter, thus seperating the two technologies. The cheap taxpayer part of me is asking why we don't just use cheap Soyuz tech and rockets for some/most launches.

      I wonder if the new heavy launcher that will eventually replace the shuttle will just be a simple rocket like the Europeans and Russians use, not another manned shuttle. If the spaceplane flies there will be no need for a manned huge shuttle/lifter.

      The downside is that the science done on the shuttle would be down on a station, for the most part. I don't know if this is a big deal or not or if the space planes cargo section will make this a non-issue.

      I like the idea that a spaceplane means that there will have to be a space station of some kind because there wont be enough real estate on the spaceplane to do much. Also, the optimist in me sees this as a logical step towards a permanent moon base.

      I don't understand the current obsession with Mars when a moonbase could do so much more, but I'm sure that's a sticking point for many and not something I want to argue. Both would be amazing human accomplishments.
    • What they should do is [...] have the humans do what they need to do to the payload once it is in space (such as [...]
      activation).
      Surely they could type the numbers in from the front of the printed manual before they launch the equipment into space? It's not exactly rocket science...

  • yeah, great (Score:4, Insightful)

    by spoonist ( 32012 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:13PM (#6841136) Journal
    "
    ... the space agency is rushing to design, build, test and fly..."

    Haven't [slashdot.org] they [slashdot.org] learned [slashdot.org] anything [slashdot.org]?

    I'm not certain they've done "Better, Cheaper, Faster" too well.

  • We need new technology... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Quaoar ( 614366 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:14PM (#6841140)
    ...particularly in the field of self-diagnostics. The Columbia disaster would have been preventable had there been more ways to detect damage on the exterior of the shuttle other than a camera pinned to the ground. Perhaps an array of sensors along the heat shield could report about the integrity of the vessel. Even external cameras are a possibility. A solution as simple as these could keep the aging shuttles flying safely for several more years while a more advanced space solution is developed. I do not think the problem involves the size of the shuttle. Certainly, the exact same thing could happen on a smaller ship, and you sacrifice the huge carrying capacity of the shuttle by going smaller.

    • Perhaps an array of sensors along the heat shield could report about the integrity of the vessel. Even external cameras are a possibility. A solution as simple as these could keep the aging shuttles flying safely for several more years while a more advanced space solution is developed.

      Well, this "space jeep" isn't more advanced, it's less advanced. From the article:

      The key to the project, Smith said, is to keep the spacecraft simple and use technology that already has been developed. That also makes

      • Actualy what help in the investigation was all of the test sensors still in the wings from the early days.

        The main problem is the limited number of ships, turnaround time and what do you do if the "perfect" heatshield is damage? If they had a real fleet not 4 but 10 to 12 of different configurations and could do different jobs would be better off. Esp if turnaround time was in the orginal 2 weeks timeframe. Would be better than strip it down and rebuild. In other words the shuttle is a jack of all trades

    • The Columbia disaster would have been preventable had there been more ways to detect damage on the exterior of the shuttle other than a camera pinned to the ground. Perhaps an array of sensors along the heat shield could report about the integrity of the vessel. Even external cameras are a possibility. A solution as simple as these could keep the aging shuttles flying safely for several more years

      Problem is... These *aren't simple solutions. Cameras add weight, and need to be shielded from the extreme en

  • Here we don't go again.... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Tangurena ( 576827 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:15PM (#6841149)
    When the shuttle was originally planned, there were going to be several different models. The first would be a small capacity, pick up truck type. Followed by 2 larger models and 1 huge lifter. Due to politicking by the military, the first model to get built had a much larger model, and also had to glide back to the continental US in the event it was carrying some spy satellite (not even UK was trusted back then). The NRO decided not to use the shuttles for the KH series anyway.

    Because the shuttle had to be made far larger than the first one planned, too much new technology had to be invented to make it fly. If the planned progression happened as planned, the shuttles would have cost $200,000,000 rather than costing $2,200,000,000 each.

    I predict that the progression of craft will not happen.

    • "When the shuttle was originally planned, there were going to be several different models."

      Yeah, it was also supposed to be ready in time to push skylab back into a correct orbit before gravity had its way with it, and instead it was delayed and skylab made a big impact (har) in Australia. The shuttle was also supposed to only take a team of around 10 men about a month to service between missions. The heat resistant tiles ended up being waaaay to complex for that idea to work (each tile is uniquely cut

  • 60% huh? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by evil9000 ( 72113 )
    I guess people are more interested in creating things that will benefit mankind than bomb another nation in the OPEC region.

    • Re:60% huh? (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I guess people are more interested in creating things that will benefit mankind than bomb another nation in the OPEC region.

      come on, now, be serious. there's no reason we can't do both.
    • Since oppressed Iraqis are part of mankind, free Iraqis are also part of mankind, and the technology and civilization to put a space program into practice requires the free flow of oil, bombing lunatic dictatorial OPEC nations is of great benefit to mankind.

  • Good riddance to the space shuttle (Score:5, Insightful)

    by n0nsensical ( 633430 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:22PM (#6841173)
    The leading article [economist.com] of this week's Economist (subscriber-only unfortunately) is a great summary of why the space shuttle needs to be retired. The shuttle is too expensive, unsafe, and unnecessary to justify dumping more money into the program. The vast amount of money that NASA spends on the shuttle and space station could be much better spent elsewhere. The space station exists because of the need to give the shuttle a purpose and the shuttle program only continues because of the space station. NASA should ditch the shuttle, encourage private enterprise in the space business, and concentrate on developing new methods of space travel that might actually result in new exploration instead of simply traveling around the earth in circles.
    • "The space station exists because of the need to give the shuttle a purpose"

      lol
    • Our grandchildren will be dead and buried.

      Its time to accept that NASA was good to start us off, but its time to break away from mommy, and start to walk on our own. One of the great myths of the last 20 years was that government created the internet.

      The government created DARPA and it successor, a network whos users still numbered in the thousands as of 1990. It was when the government opened up that network and was used by university students for non-academic work (piracy) and businesses that the intern
    • encourage private enterprise in the space
      To do what?

      What makes think that if there was a buck to made in space the private enterprise would not be doing it already?
      concentrate on developing new methods of space travel that might actually result in new exploration instead of simply traveling around the earth in circles.
      If simply travelling in circles was what they were doing, you'd have a point. But they aren't.

  • Spaceship One? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by eexlebots ( 203658 ) <eexlebots.subrevolt@com> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:23PM (#6841176) Homepage
    SpaceShip One has to be significantly cheaper than the 2.4 billion they're talking about for the simple ferry system NASA is talking about here. Couldn't they use some jacked version of SS1 (capable of reaching orbit) and save a lot of money/time/effort/etc?

    • Re:Spaceship One? (Score:2, Informative)

      by LooseChanj ( 17865 )
      Erm, no. SS1 will only reach speeds of around mach 5 or so, and altitudes of around 62 miles. And that's a much more benign mission profile than 17,500mph and ~300 miles up.

  • need new challenge (Score:4, Interesting)

    by jr87 ( 653146 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:24PM (#6841184) Homepage
    What the space program really needs is a lofty goal and a challenge. We should aim for something like Mars, or semi permenant lab on the moon. We need someone to compete against. (I heard the private sector is starting to get interested in space so maybe in time?) We need a challenge like JFK's challenge to get to the moon. We need to find the drive to continue exploration. The tech gap to get to Mars is far less than it was to the moon. I just think motivation and $$$ are all that is really needed.

    • Re:need new challenge (Score:5, Insightful)

      by demachina ( 71715 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @07:29PM (#6841489)
      Unfortunately George W. Bush is no John F. Kennedy. He generally hates big government unless its in the Defense, Justice, or Homeland Security departments. He is a complete zero when it comes to interest in science or space. He is 100% about making money for himself and his friends and at present none of them has pitched any business plan for space:

      1. Shoot rockets into space
      2. ?????
      3. Profit

      Its no accident George's appointment as head of NASA is an accountant, with no clue about engineering or space, whose main goal was/is to cut spending at NASA. What little space program there is primarily to transfer money to big aerospace/defense contractors. Not sure anyone cares if they actually do anything useful with the money before they pocket their cut.

      For the U.S. to have a space program that matters again there would need to be a visionary leader like JFK, a mission that matters (one beyond low earth orbit), a lead engineer like Kelly Johnson and a lean, mean organization like the Skunk Works of old.

      Having NASA design yet another space plane is just wasting billions of dollars, and another decade and when your done, if they even manage to finish it this time, you'll still just be going back and forth to LEO. We wont have moved a single step forward.

      A new space plane program has been started every couple of year at least since I worked there in the early 90's and everyone of them has been scraped after wasting money and time.

  • Reinventing the wheel - a square shaped one (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Captain Igloo ( 600475 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:27PM (#6841199)
    Guess which design will be chosen? Do you really think, those in charge will drop the proposals that have too many bells and whistles, as written in the article?

    Of course, NASA will select the design with wings, probably the most expensive and error-prone variant, because it will be pushed through by the aerospace industry lobby.

    We will observe this agency bypass any principle of common sense and experiences from successful space programs, just to have a new shiny and politically pleasing toy. It's like re-inventing the wheel - this time not a round, but a square shaped one.

    What's so bad about winged designs?
    • Wings are useless during launch and in space, they just add to weight penalty.
    • Winged vehicles are unstable during re-entry and need a complex and error-prone automatic flight control system.
    • Wings are less fault tolerant and more vulnerable to damage.
    The worst idea is however to put a winged vehicle on top of a rocket! This concept has been repeatedly rejected due to very good reasons, the most important one being the high lateral and bending loads on the rocket!

    The good old ballistic capsule still holds all safety records in manned spaceflight - there are only very few lethal accidents, related to the large number of successful launches and returns. The Apollo capsule could land in an area of about 2 miles diameter so accuracy is not such a big concern. It could be further improved by using a parawing instead of parachutes.
    The only real problem with ballistic capsules is the high re-entry deceleration due to the low drag and therefore the late beginning of aerobraking. However, no astronaut was ever killed due to re-entry or landing impact deceleration and the problem could be dealt with by using additional inflatable structures to increase drag during the early re-entry phases.
    • While I haven't looked at current proposals I do seem to remember that the USAF back in the '60's was actually rather close to developing an Aerospace plane, in fact you COULD call the X-15 perhaps the first of these. There is no need to make an Aerospace plane that rides into space atop some huge rocket. There's no reason you couldn't design some sort of hybrid air-breather/rocket that could get to altitude via an air-breathing system and then achieve orbit via a rocket system.

      • While I haven't looked at current proposals I do seem to remember that the USAF back in the '60's was actually rather close to developing an Aerospace plane, in fact you COULD call the X-15 perhaps the first of these. There is no need to make an Aerospace plane that rides into space atop some huge rocket.

        You are mostly likely thinking of the X-20 DynaSoar, which was considered the next step after the X-15 until it got cancelled in favor of Mercury/Gemini/Apollo. However, the X-20 concept did involve laun

    • capsuls can't control their landing (Score:5, Interesting)

      by maynard ( 3337 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @07:36PM (#6841531) Journal
      What's so bad about winged designs?
      • Wings are useless during launch and in space, they just add to weight penalty.
      • Winged vehicles are unstable during re-entry and need a complex and error-prone automatic flight control system.
      • Wings are less fault tolerant and more vulnerable to damage.

      The worst idea is however to put a winged vehicle on top of a rocket!
      I'm not going to disagree with your points against winged shuttles, only that you misunderstand the design goals of the shuttle, and why they were valid goals.

      The Shuttle, and any next generation craft, is an attempt at creating not just a reusable vehicle, but also one which offers control at landing at a specific place; in this case a runway. Unlike a reentry capsule, which decends to some semi-random location by parachute, the Shuttle can glide toward a specific spot and land. This is a definite step up from previous capsuls in terms of technology and space readiness. And NASA wanted to do even better with their nextgen shuttle, the X-33 design goals were 'single stage to orbit', and would have allowed for a launch and land system without the costly solid fuel rockets. Also a reasonable design goal. Too bad the materials science for the hydrogen tanks isn't quite ready yet, nor are funds available to continue R&D.

      NASA is failing because of two primary problems:

      a) They lack funding from Congress, and as such are unable to both meet their launch goals and provide the necessary R&D for nextgen launch vehicles.

      b) They have foolishly cut safety funding in order to meet those same launch goals, as demanded by Congress. They should have either said straight - we can't meet your goals with the funding alloted, or dumped the Shuttle program and moved to traditional rockets (as you stated in your previous post).

      But to say that their R&D toward an orbital space plane was misplaced goes against the very grain of space exploration. At some point we're going to need vehicles that can operate in both space and the atmosphere. NASA obviously committed themselves toward the goal of creating such ships. Space will go nowhere if we only launch rockets into LEO and land in capsules by parachute. You can argue that our materials technology isn't ready yet for the challenges creating real land to space ships, but you can't argue that such a technology is the end goal for any space faring society.

      This is JMO, coming from someone who isn't either an aerospace engineer or involved with NASA - and as such has simply a semi-informed opinion to offer.

      Best,
      Maynard
      • The winged design of the shuttle is far from having shown any improvement in space readiness - the higher complexity and the intention to re-use the vehicle have dramatically increased turnaround times. By the way, the idea of returning damaged satellites, repairing them on the ground and sending them back into space has never been successfully exploited.

        For several reasons, the X-33 was dead from arrival, a fatally flawed design with the additional lack of capacity to carry people. At least with chemica

    • The good old ballistic capsule still holds all safety records in manned spaceflight - there are only very few lethal accidents, related to the large number of successful launches and returns.

      Shuttle - 2 fatal accidents in 113 flights. (One launch one landing.) One ascent failure resulting in a mission being reflown.

      Soyuz - 2 fatal accidents on reentry, 2 launch accidents resulting in loss of vehicle, multiple landing accidents in 106 flights. (Not to mention multiple complete loss of mission accidents.

      • Re:Reinventing the wheel - a square shaped one (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Waffle Iron ( 339739 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @10:10PM (#6842254)
        If the Soviet Union (notorious for the poor quality control of its industries), could build a capsule-based space system with a reliability matching the U.S. shuttle system, then that tells met that capsules are inherently far safer than a space plane. Also note that in contrast to the shuttle, the fatal accidents happened in the 60s and early 70s, and there have been no fatalities since that time.

  • Interesting article at SpaceDaily (Score:5, Informative)

    by tftp ( 111690 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:31PM (#6841218) Homepage
    Read this [spacedaily.com] to find out what knowledgeable people think about the "Smaller Shuttle" idea.

    • Re:Interesting article at SpaceDaily (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Waffle Iron ( 339739 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @10:24PM (#6842324)
      I read that article back when it came out, and it made perfect sense to me. Then by chance I stumbled across the entry for the cancelled Big Gemini [astronautix.com] project on astronautix.com.

      Seeing that kind of pissed me off. Way back in 1967 McDonnell Douglas had created a dirt cheap space taxi solution for up to 10 crew just by sticking an extension on a standard Gemini capsule. However, the focus on the Apollo missions and later the Space Shuttle pushed aside any non-glamorous low cost solutions such as this one. Now our government is planning to spend countless billions to build from scratch a new space system that will probably have less capability than what Big Gemini could have provided 35 years ago.

  • "Stubby Wings" description from the article (Score:3, Insightful)

    by TWX ( 665546 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:34PM (#6841236)
    At one point, the reporter describes the craft has having stubby wings. The thing is, these craft look to have lifting body or partial lifting body designs, so they're essentially _all_ wing (at least the non-capsule ones are). The design at the top left side is especially so.

    I hope that one of these designs pans out. It would make a lot of sense to have something cheap and small for human transport. By the look of the Space Shuttle, if it's going to be practical for people, the entire cargo bay would need to be converted a'la bus, which just doesn't seem like a very good idea.

  • There can be only One (Score:4, Interesting)

    by WolfWithoutAClause ( 162946 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:36PM (#6841250) Homepage
    I think that the 'space plane' should seat one person. Not atleast two. Not atleast one. One.

    The reason is that that means that they would have to launch much more often to launch the same number of people. This means that for compared with the Space Shuttle that seated 7, the cost is almost halved; just from having to launch more.

    In addition the planes would be cheaper in absolute terms because they are smaller. (It turns out that smaller rockets are about the same cost as big rockets per kg of payload- everything else being equal; which it seldom is at the moment; for example Pegasus is a small vehicle, but that's a solid vehicle with numerous stages, and it turns out to be very expensive, a liquid fuelled rocket with less stages would be cheaper if launched reasonably often).

    This means, in turn that they would have to make proportionately more planes. That in turn gives economies of scale- each time you double the production run, the cost per item goes down by 15%.

    It turns out that economies of scale are the most powerful known way to reduce costs- more powerful than reusability or using hydrogen fuel, or anything else.

    Of course seating one person has it's problems- we probably don't have a rocket that small anymore, so you have to build a smaller rocket. There are also problems with the smaller size making it harder to fit a person in. But these are mainly difficulties not insoluble problems- pretty much it's much cheaper in the long run to seat one. That means that America might be able to capture space tourism market share from the Ruskies; at the moment the Shuttle is ridiculously more expensive for launching people into space.

    • I think that the 'space plane' should seat one person. Not atleast two. Not atleast one. One. The reason is that that means that they would have to launch much more often to launch the same number of people. This means that for compared with the Space Shuttle that seated 7, the cost is almost halved; just from having to launch more.

      However you will suffer four times as many failures, unless you push the reliability of the design further into 9's. But if you do that then the cost rises... See, there is an o

      • However you will suffer four times as many failures, unless you push the reliability of the design further into 9's.

        No, that's wrong. I think the safety and reliability improves as you launch more.

        Sure, you'd get more failures per decade, but the death rate would be lower- you'd kill less people.

        The real point is that you would be able to fix the bugs in the launch system before more people die. With the Shuttle 7 people die before you even know you have a problem; so the death rate is going to be 7x wo

  • $2.4 Billion LIFEBOAT? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:40PM (#6841270)
    The space plane will have only two missions: [...] and to act as a standby lifeboat, parked at the space station for the evacuation of astronauts if there is an emergency.

    This strikes me as a complete waste of money, if that's one of it's uses.

    Come on people! Use a bloody Soyuz for that! They're a hell of a lot cheaper than $2.4 Billion Dollars! It's a freakin' lifeboat!

    Okay, I understand that we would be limited to six people instead of seven. I don't have a problem with that, personally. We might have to be build another docking area. Fine. I think a Soyuz and a second docking area would be a hell of a lot cheaper than $2.4 billion dollars!

    Don't get me wrong, I think the space-plane is a wise idea. Flying the shuttle is an expensive way to get people up to the space station (unless it's delivering parts, too). I could also see having one docked there if we were going to use Space Station personnel as a "fix-it" crew (if the Hubble has problems, send up the parts and use the "sedan" to drive over and fix it).

    But leaving one of these expensive things docked there just to get astronauts back to the ground in the event of a catastrophe? Why not just use a Soyuz capsule which does the same thing at possibly a quarter of the cost?

  • Not very smart (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Edmund Blackadder ( 559735 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:43PM (#6841284)
    There was a previous article posted on slashdot regarding this that made a lot of sense. Unfortunately i do not remember the authors name and cannot do a search. If anyone remembers pelase post a link.

    The article made a lot of sense. It basicly said the following things:

    building spaceplanes is stupid. They are expensive and dangerous. And what is even worse most of the expense and danger on spaceplanes does not have to do with space exploration at all, but with take off and landing ... something that can be done relatively simply and reliably using balistic capsules.

    A simple ballistic capsule with a parachute is many times simpler, safer and cheaper than a space plane. Every other space agency has figured this out a long time ago, but apparently NASA has too many Billions to burn through in order to have this simple revalation.

    Saying the thing is projected to cost only 2.3 billion (or whatever they said) is completely meaningless, because if anyone pays attantion to the history of these projects they would know that this is guaranteed to go over budget.

    Making the craft smaller will not bring much savings in development. The greatest development costs of a space plane that carries people will go in engineering and testing to ensure safety. The level of safety required is the same for four or seven people.

    Well these are not my points they are from the article i mentioned. But I think they are good points.

    I am for space exploration, but lets face it projects like these are clearly wastes of money.

    Nasa should develop a simple safe ballistic craft, (something like the soyuz) and use the big bucks for actual space exploration.

    It is completely mindbogglig that we are wasting money and lives because nasa insists on exotic ways of going into and out of orbit.
    • -As a matter of fact, the chinese have already done what you suggest, and built a modified version of Soyuz for their own manned space program. This is a very obvious, cost-effective and safe way to go, but national pride will rule out this option.
      Let us however assume logic prevails. In that case, a slightly upgraded russian R-7 (Soyuz) launcher could carry an upgraded Souyz derivative with capacity for four persons. The current version of R-7 is from 1967 and uses kerosene/LOX in all stages.
      A bigger deriv

  • KH-11 and other CIA Sats (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Genady ( 27988 ) <gary.rogersNO@SPAMmac.com> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @06:43PM (#6841287)
    Okay, if we do decide to go with an orbital space plane what is going to ferry the huge Hubble sized spy sattelites into orbit? I've got to thing that the KH series of sattelites is at least in part the reason we still have a shuttle.
    • what is going to ferry the huge Hubble sized spy sattelites into orbit?

      Rockets, man, rockets. That's what most satellites are launched on, all over the world, reliably and safely.

    • I've got to thing that the KH series of sattelites is at least in part the reason we still have a shuttle.
      Nope. The USAF uses Titans to launch the big spy sats and always has. The last non-civilian flight of the Shuttle was in 1989.
  • In Soviet Russia, the space program supports the public.

  • Maybe they are suffering from penis envy.... (Score:4, Funny)

    by LordChaos ( 2432 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @07:05PM (#6841374) Homepage
    From the article:

    "We're doing everything we can to get it up by 2008"

    Have they tried viagra??
  • I guess only Floridians could take a poll among Floridians and assume it reflects the will of the American people, and it's also not surprising that 60% of Floridians polled think the space program is cool seeing as most of NASA is based there! I actually agree with them but c'mon Florida, you don't exactly have your finger on the pulse of the Nation!

  • seems stupid. (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Why develop something with capabilities so similar to Soyuz, when you can just pay the russians to provide backup support while the shuttle is brought back into service?

    In the interim develop a real shuttle replacement. Something that can be heavy lifted to altitude, then launched horizontally, or take off from the ground.

    Whatever they design should have some kind of dual role...making it sellable to the commercial aircraft companies at some point as a base platform for cargo or passengers.

    NASA just does

  • Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @07:27PM (#6841479)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • What about the USSRs Energia and Buran Launch and orbital system??
      Niether one is in service, or ever was in service. Neither one was developed completely. Both were abandoned over a decade ago. They are ex-parrots.
  • In chatting with some friends (ordinary people, plain old working stiffs) around the time Columbia went missing, most of them were shocked when I mentioned that nobody's even set foot on the moon in 30 years, or that there was supposed to be a bunch of in-orbit infrastructure a lot more ambitious than the new Mir clone that was never built, or that the current equipment wouldn't get people out of orbit if we wanted it to.

  • how sad (Score:3, Interesting)

    by tloh ( 451585 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @07:42PM (#6841566)
    This initiative has been a long time coming. As it has already been pointed out by many posters, a smaller shuttle would have been seriously considered and perhaps even realized during the inception of the current shuttle if it hadn't been for political and bureaucratic wrangling (especially on behalf of the US defense force). I would like to be excited about this announcement, I really would. But I find the most proper reaction to be a simple yawn, as in "here we go again".

    The fundamental ideas behind this announcement has been around for a really, really long time, and it was not an isolated development. The Europeans were putting serious effort into a program called "Hermes" with nearly the identical objectives for years before abandoning it 10 years ago. Similarly, Japan - with a space budget of a tenth that of NASA's - continues to pursue their own mini-shuttle dubbed "HOPE-X".

    With these events in plain sight, one has to wonder why on earth it is so difficult to do the right thing. The ISS, despite being somewhat of a white elephant, is still a pretty decent lightning rod for stimulating international cooperation. Isn't it reasonable to assert that pooling resourced from all 3 nations who've already dreamed of mini-shuttles (US, Euro, Japan) in addition to anyone else who might want to participate (Russia, China, India) might actually get an astronaut-ferry built with decent price/performance/safty perameters? With the resources of international partners, we can reduce not just develope costs by leveraging the R&D others have already put into it, but also distribute the manufacturing responsibilities and perhaps even operational costs. Additionally, what can be learned from the work already put into the X-prize by various participants. Think of the possibilities if space faring for the forseable future is "standardized" on one vehicle by several nations which helps to build it. Economy of scale means production up, cost down, and in the end, science and exploration wins - everyone happy!

  • Seems like OSP is a winner all the way around. Have a cheap way to get people in space, use existing booster technology, means, more manned space flight.

    The shuttle costs, according to FY2000, 759 million dollars to launch. By comparison Atlas V and Delta IV are in the range of 100M to launch.

    The expendable vehicles have a better turnaround time, are cheaper to operate. Fundamentally, exendable vehicles don't have to solve a lot of the complexity a reusable vehicle does. They don't have to deal with re-entry. They don't have to have reusable engines. They don't have to reusable fuel tanks.

    • doesn't mean they're cheap. Let's get realistic here, USD 100M to launch a rocket? Imagine where we'd be if it cost 100M dollars to fly a 747 across the Pacific. We're not going anywhere with those kind of costs. NASA needs to start contracting out for space access the way the Post Office did and let smart people take some risks to get us all a payoff.

  • Buran had remote control (Score:3, Informative)

    by tjstork ( 137384 ) <[moc.liamg] [ta] [ykswordnab.ddot]> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @08:45PM (#6841885) Homepage Journal
    The russians had working remote control on their shuttle effort. I actually have the priviledge of working with one of the guys that did it.

  • Space travel isn't feasible (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Animats ( 122034 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @10:57PM (#6842477) Homepage
    Space travel isn't really feasible. There just isn't enough energy in chemical fuels to propel much of anything into orbit. Only with hacks like throwing away parts of the spacecraft is it possible at all.

    It's just barely possible to overcome this limitation. But the costs are enormous. Desperate efforts to reduce weight are needed to make it work at all. The result is spacecraft that are both incredibly expensive and fragile.

    That's where it's been for thirty years. And it's not getting any better. In fact, it's getting worse. The Saturn V had the best cost per unit weight to orbit ever. The Shuttle costs far more, and the latest disaster runs up the cost per unit weight even more. All of NASA's attempts to design replacements for the Shuttle have been flops. There have been three major attempts. This latest one is doomed for the same reasons - adding wings pushes up the weight and cuts the payload to the point of uselessness.

    Heavy-payload spaceflight is an ego trip for superpowers, not a useful technology. Commercial small boosters have been built and launched successfully, but that's the limit of commercial interest. Single stage to orbit remains a fantasy. (Roton looked promising, but a bit of weight growth made the thing; it was that marginal.) The spaceplane idea goes back to the USAF's Dyna-Soar in the 1960s, but still hasn't worked.

    We either have to go to nuclear propulsion or give it up. Those are the options.

  • "Hey Chuck ..." (Score:3, Funny)

    by bigsteve@dstc ( 140392 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @11:53PM (#6842688)
    (With no humans aboard, the craft could be used to haul light cargo to the orbiting lab.)

    " ... its your turn to ring down for a Pizza!"

  • Haven't they learned anything from TV and movies? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by foniksonik ( 573572 ) on Monday September 01, 2003 @12:05AM (#6842718) Homepage Journal
    Seriously, even in Star Trek they only used heavy rockets in the beginning... later they used 'light shuttles' to carry people and light supplies into orbit where they would dock with a much larger space only ship.

    Physics and human biology make logical arguments for using small ships for people and large rockets for cargo. When you do them both at the same time you're purposes contradict each other... getting people up safely and getting cargo up efficiently. We all know that safety and efficiency are typically exclusive of each other, why fight it?

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