"Father of the Space Shuttle" George Mueller Dies At 97

The Washington Post reports that long-time NASA engineer and administrator George Mueller died on October 12 of congestive heart failure, at 97. Mueller had a hand in NASA programs as Associate Administrator of the NASA Office of Manned Space Flight going back to the Apollo program, but not only as an administrator: he played a large role in the design of Skylab, and in lobbying for the Space Shuttle; this last earned him the (sometimes disputed) nickname of "Father of the Space Shuttle." During his Apollo days, Mueller became well known for his insistence on "all-up" testing, rather than incremental, per-component tests. From the Washington Post's story: As applied to the space program, [all-up testing] implied specifically such techniques as the testing of all three stages of the giant Saturn V booster rocket while they were coupled together and with a payload attached to boot. It was reported that the scheme had its doubters, among them such leading lights of rocketry as Wernher von Braun. But in time, the forceful Dr. Mueller proved persuasive enough to overcome all such reservations, and it was “all up” for the mammoth Saturn V, the launch vehicle upon which NASA pinned its hopes of sending Americans to the moon.

Re:All Up Testing?

[0123456]

The problem comes when you want to test the first stage of your rocket in flight. It needs to be tested in an environment as close as possible to a real launch. You either spend a lot of money building a fake second and third stage, or you put a real second stage on top. That also has to be tested in an environment as close as possible to a real launch. So you spend a lot of money building a fake third stage, or you put a real third stage on top. Then you need a realistic payload. So you might as well put a real spacecraft on top.

So long as there's a good chance of the first stage working, you probably save money and time in the long run by just launching the whole thing. You can test whichever stages work, and you don't have to spend money building fake stages.

Re:All Up Testing?

[trout007]

I work at KSC and here is the issue. Sometime just creating the relevant environment is more expensive then just having a test flight. For example to simulate the aerodynamic and vibration loads on a rocket stage are near impossible. We will shake the avionics or even whole spacecraft. But nobody has a shaker big enough for a whole stage so you need to test it in flight. And for example on the Saturn V are you just going to test the first stage? Then you need to simulate the rest of the vehicle weight, cg, and aerodynamic loads. At that point its just easier to use the second and third stage.