Re: Endeavor is back!

On Aug 24, 12:25 am, "Neil X." <nei...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Yeah, see, everything you write about new technological advances we
can't foresee, and it costing more not to pursue technology than to
pursue it, that applies in spades to the Space Shuttle program. If we
want to have a viable space program, we need spaceships, not
rockets.

Rockets will always be a part of the equation until we develop a
"single stage to orbit" spacecraft/space plane.

The Space Shuttle was conceived as the mechanism by which we
would develop the technology to do things like shuttle to and from
Mars and other planets in out solar system.

Actually it was never designed to be anything more than a really high
tech truck to carry things to and from low earth orbit. And it was
nothing more than an idea until Nixon killed Apollo.

It was supposed to be the
bridge to our future in space, our technological leap to actual
spaceships that did things other than orbit the Earth and return to
the surface.

Yeah, that didn't happen, for many reasons. But the idea was a good
one, and it's a shame that the next leap after the Shuttle hasn't
occurred. But if there was going to be a leap in interplanetary
travel to say, Mars, the Shuttle was the visionary mechanism that
might have made it possible. I've read your posts about what a
mistake it was to abandon 1960s rocket technology in favor of the
shuttle., and I've never understood them. If we really want to
develop novel technology for space travel, using 1960s technology in
the 2000s strikes me as the completely wrong way to go about it.

You confuse the getting to and from space with what you do when you
get there. The Space Shuttle (or any other launch vehicle/spacecraft
are the science part of it, the are the means of getting there and a
platform to do the research once you are there.

Story Musgrave (the astronaut who did the first Hubble Telescope
repairs) has been quoted as saying that if he could beam himself into
orbit he would. He hates launch and re-entry. Those are the most
dangerous parts of any spaceflight and the shuttle never addressed the
issue of crew safety in an emergency. There is no way out. Apollo had
a Launch Escape System that pulled the whole spacecraft away from the
booster in the event of a "catastrophic failure"

We should have stuck with Apollo at least through the 1990's and then
started work on a truly reusable spacecraft. We would be much farther
along in the Space Exploration business if we had

New technologies that can do new things require a new vision to
develop something novel. Using 60s technology in 2007 is the opposite
of that, IMO.

Except that is EXACTLY what NASA is doing with the Ares/Orion program

Compare this

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:AresFamily.jpg

with this

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_V

NASA even refers to it as a "Heritage Plus" design. There isn't
anything "new" about the Ares launch vehicles, it's an adaptation of
Space Shuttle AND Saturn V technology (The Ares V is going to use the
Liquid Hydrogen/LOX powered J-2 engines which the Saturn V used on its
Second and Third Stages. That's almost 50 year old technology.

You're confusing two seperate ideas.. How do we get there, vs what do
we do when we get there.

I know that I am just a carpenter, but the Space Program is something
that I have had a passion for since I was about seven years old. (That
would have been 1968, when Apollo 7 and 8 were launched) I have never
lost the passion, I read about what NASA is up to all the time. I know
the history of the various manned programs, I know the politics behind
the decisions, etc

The Space Shuttle wasn't what NASA wanted, it was forced on them by
the Nixon administration when they canceled the Apollo program. NASA
had a whole bunch of different science based missions that utilized
the Apollo Hardware,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Applications_Program

The Shuttle ended up being NASA's consolation prize when Apollo was
killed by Nixon

Anyway, the bottomline on the Space Shuttle is that it has never
performed as advertised, it has cost WAY more than it was supposed to
and it has killed 14 Astronauts because it never gave them a way to
bail out in the event of an emergency

Conceptually it was a great idea, but it was the right idea at the
wrong time. So now we find ourselves back at square one.

Scot



Peace,
Neil X

.

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