🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Dec31.182405.7430@iti.org> aws@iti.org (Allen W. Sherzer) writes:
>In <1992Dec31.004513.12224@ke4zv.uucp> gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman) writes:
>
>>You misrepresent my position. All I'm saying is that new systems are
>>rarely as cheap and easy in metal as they are on paper. 
>
>Gary, I refer you to my recent posting where I compared DC costs to 
>Shuttle costs. I encoumbered DC with development costs but not Shuttle.
>I doubled DC's DDT&E, production and operations costs. It still came up
>a winner.
>
>Nobody is saying it will be a piece of cake. Are you saying that a factor
>of two isn't enough to cover the risk? If not, then what's your point?

Yeah, I'm saying a factor of two isn't enough to cover the likely 
stretchout in the development timeline as problems appear. I said
in the other post that realistic numbers based on other new spacecraft
development programs would be a tripling of MacDD's projected base costs 
and a tripling of their projected development timeline. That would still 
be cheaper than the monsterous delays and costs of Shuttle development.
I think *everyone* agrees that the Shuttle development program was about
as badly managed as is possible while still getting a working system in
the end. Even if that system is mostly bandaids on top of bandaids that
have to be torn down and inspected after every flight. At least it flys.
I think comparisons to new airliner construction, such as the references 
to the progression of the 7xx series, is bogus because SSTO is attempting 
something no other craft has ever done, with an engineering tean that has 
no experience with similar reusable spacecraft to draw on. I don't expect 
them to make major mistakes, like mounting the engines upside down, as 
happened in a California nuclear power plant, but I do expect them to be 
bitten by numerous smaller gotchas as the program progresses. Each of those 
will cause schedule slips and additional development time.

Gary
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