🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1993Jan4.023652.11293@ringer.cs.utsa.edu> sbooth@lonestar.utsa.edu (Simon E. Booth) writes:
>Would a DC spacecraft (properly provisioned of course) be capable of lunar
>flight? ...

If refuelled in orbit, the capability is theoretically there.  You'd want
to look carefully at the landing-gear issues, life support etc. would need
supplementing for the longer trip, and you'd need a suitable module in
the cargo bay to provide living quarters and an airlock.

>I get the impression that even if a DC isn't capable of a direct ascent flight
>to the moon, extra fuel could be loaded in earth orbit...

Nothing short of nuclear propulsion will give you a single-stage lunar
mission.  Orbital refuelling will definitely be necessary.

>What type of ground facilities would be needed?  I think it was mentioned here
>a while back that the payload would be loaded inside a VAB, so would the large
>shuttle type gantry structures be required, except perhaps for fueling?

No gantry.  A few trucks resembling the elevator trucks used at airports.
Fuel connections would probably be near the base of the craft, avoiding
any need for a gantry for that.
-- 
"God willing... we shall return."       | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
       -Gene Cernan, the Moon, Dec 1972 |  henry@zoo.toronto.edu  utzoo!henry