Topic: Alternatives for NASA

[Nemesis]

1/ Link to full article What to do with the ISS?

Send the ISS somewhere.

The ISS, you see, is already an interplanetary spacecraft -- at least potentially. It's missing a drive system and a steerage module, but those are technicalities. Although it's ungainly in appearance, it's designed to be boosted periodically to a higher altitude by a shuttle, a Russian Soyuz or one of the upcoming new Constellation program Orion spacecraft. It could fairly easily be retrofitted for operations beyond low-Earth orbit. In principle, we could fly it almost anywhere within the inner solar system -- to any place where it could still receive enough solar power to keep all its systems running.

At the very least an interesting concept.  Move it to lunar orbit or Mars orbit unmanned and don't worry much if it takes a year or 6 to get there and then use it as a base of operations.

2/ Link to full article Alternative to Ares as a heavy launch vehicle and return to the Moon launcher.

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. (AP) — By day, the engineers work on NASA's new Ares moon rockets. By night, some go undercover to work on a competing design. These dissenting scientists and their backers insist they have created an alternative rocket that would be safer, cheaper and easier to build than the two Ares spacecraft that will replace the space shuttle.

They call their project Jupiter, and like Ares, it's a brainchild of workers at the Marshall Space Flight Center and other NASA facilities. The engineers involved are doing the work on their own time and mostly anonymously, with the help of retirees and other space enthusiasts.

The Jupiter design would also require two separate launches to get to the moon, but its rockets would both rely on a shuttle external tank at their center. Some of the design concepts go back to proposals floated at Marshall in the early 1980s. Others date to the early '90s, when Marshall worked on a new rocket system that never flew.

Besides being a simpler, more powerful system, backers say, the Jupiter rockets would save NASA $19 billion in development costs and another $16 billion in operating costs over two decades.

2nd Link

Proponents say the Direct 2.0 approach is more capable than Orion, can lift more mass into Earth orbit and boost more mass out of Earth orbit on to other destinations. The concept is simple: use the same orange external tank and booster rockets as the shuttle, but don't use the orbiter. Put additional engines on the bottom of the tank, and the cone-shaped Orion capsule on the nose. They call the rocket system Jupiter, and not only would Jupiter have less cost per launch, but it would cost less per kilogram to put things in orbit. They also say the crew abort limits are safer than Ares 1, and would require only minor modifications to the current mobile launch platform.

Instead of having the separate Ares-I Crew Launch Vehicle (CLV) and Ares-V Cargo Launch Vehicle (CaLV) they use just one single Jupiter launcher, capable of performing both roles.

If Jupiter is as I understand it, it is at most a refinement of things designed into the shuttle program but never used. There were several proposed repackaging of the equipment.  One had the shuttle engines added to a cargo module replacing the shuttle in the standard configuration.  Another had the engines mounted on the bottom of the fuel tank and a cargo or manned module on top of the tank with either 2 or 4 of the reusable boosters added.  A 2nd stage could be added between the tank and the module for longer range operations.

If so then the Jupiter should be very much practical as the shuttle engines are among the most efficient LOX/Liquid Hydrogen engines ever designed.

[NJAntman]

All such ideas are doomed to stay just ideas as they smack of practicality and frugality, neither of which creates more jobs that congressmen can bring home or more contract money that can be doled out.

NASA has become a Congressional playground. They need to go back to research and get out of the way of progress.

[Tus-XC]

The only problem with putting the ISS around the moon or mars is we don't have detailed gravitational mapping of either of them, thus we can't account for those effects accurately when we design the orbits.  Once that happens though (and there is a mission for this for the moon) then this can be accomplished.  My only problem is I don't think the ISS would have adequate shielding against radiation once it pops out of earth protective magnetic bubble.

[Dracho]

We know where the lagrange points are though..

[Tus-XC]

We know where the lagrange points are though..

Ya, we could use those, i just forget which ones are stable.

[Nemesis]

Any movement of the station to Lunar orbit would be slow.  That would give time to map the lunar gravitational field in detail before the ISS achieved its final orbit so that should not be an issue if it were to be moved. 

I did read an interesting article a few years ago about a satellite that was moved from Earth Orbit to Lunar orbit to replace a failed lunar satellite.  The had a major issue with fuel vs time as the satellite had not been designed to move itself that far.  They finally used chaos theory in the move.  They sent it to various regions where the balance between Earth/Lunar, Earth/Solar gravity was close and then nudged it with minimal fuel over the "barrier" to cause it to fall to the next point.  The satellite made the trip in months rather than the more straight forward routes that would have taken years and it  used less fuel doing so. 

As to radiation, I really don't know.  I would think that at least for a Martian orbit it might well be shielded enough due to the greater distance.  Whether more shielding could be added or a "storm shelter" put in place I couldn't do more than guess. 

It is still an interesting idea.  Especially if you include the concept of a cycler.  A cycler was proposed by one of the Apollo astronauts as a station that could be put in its own orbit that took it back and forth between Earth and Mars.  Even if it was only briefly manned at each end it could be used to carry cargo useful to Martian explorers. 

It also illustrates he concept that a station could be expressly designed to function as a station and a ship.  Use it as a station until complete then send it on its way with all the systems debugged and functional.

[Panzergranate]

On a TV documentary on the future plans of all the space agencies for a manned mission to Mars, with the date aimed at being sometime from 2118, the ISS was stated as being an extremely factor in the planning by NASA.

The ISS's other function, as planned by NASA, is to be Earth's first orbital dry dock, as the proposed Mars Mission Craft will need to be assembled in space, due to its sheer size. It was pointed out that all the possible designs looked at so far, are incapable of being launched from the Earth's surface..... how exactly does one find a launch gantry able to cradle a space craft between 1/4 miles and 1/2 mile long anyhow??

The ISS isn't even near halfway built, so far, as there is more to be designed and added on, mainly construction facilities.

[Nemesis]

On a TV documentary on the future plans of all the space agencies for a manned mission to Mars, with the date aimed at being sometime from 2118, the ISS was stated as being an extremely factor in the planning by NASA.

I'm assuming a typo. 

[Panzergranate]

No, they said they were aiming for 2018.

They've been moving the date for manned missions to Mars since the 1970's.... NASA employs builders to quote completion dates.

CERN is busy making the anti-matter fuel at the rate of a dozen or so anti-atoms per year, though they might figure how to ramp this up.

NASAs only rival in the making seems to be Virgin Space, who have been funding the Space Ship One project.

Free enterprise will be what drives space travel in the future.

[Nemesis]

NASAs only rival in the making seems to be Virgin Space, who have been funding the Space Ship One project.

Virgin was not involved with Space Ship one.  They are backing Space Ship 2 and hopefully it will succeed well enough to get backing for an orbital Space Ship 3.

[Dracho]

China is going to bootstrap into deep space far faster than anyone things.  They don't have to invent anything new like Apollo did, they just have to engineer the hardware.

[Nemesis]

China is going to bootstrap into deep space far faster than anyone things.  They don't have to invent anything new like Apollo did, they just have to engineer the hardware.

The exact reason Space Ship one succeeded.  The flight capabilities are similar to the X15 and they cost a similar amount to develop WITHOUT allowing for inflation.  Without the X15 and all the other  aeronautic development in the intervening decades it would have cost far more. 

Also Space Ship one has the advantage of decades of material developments. One of the predecessors of the X15 exploded multiple times due to a leather gasket getting soaked with LOX and exploding under impact.  Spaceship One was using materials and processes that were well developed and understood, understandings that were hard earned (with lives in some cases) by the earlier efforts.

Just as Space Ship One benefits from all this so does anyone else coming later, China, Japan, India and anyone else like SpaceX with the Falcon launchers they are working on all have the benefit of KNOWING what has already been proven to work or to fail.  Half their job is already done. 

China also has access to at least some of Russia's  blueprints.  The Chinese manned capsule is a derivative of the Soyuz, a very successful design without having to go through the years of trial and error to learn all the things that don't work.

[Panzergranate]

If China uses the same level of technology that they use in their aftermarket PC powersupplies, and the same level of quality control regarding machining of parts, plus chemical hardening afterwards, that they apply to their "fecked in under 5,000 miles" scooters and motorcycles, then we may see the first major space disaster(s) in human history.

However, we do need to seriously colonise the Moon and if China has the drive to take the human race permanently onto another rock in space, well they've my support.

[Nemesis]

I would expect China like the U.S.S.R. before it to do the best they can as it is at least partially for propaganda reasons they do it at all.   It helps to give them the image of a world class power able to compete with anyone.