🚀 go-pugleaf

In <1993Jan7.072839.1460@ke4zv.uucp> gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman) writes:

>I don't condemn DC for being a paper design. All new vehicles are paper
>designs at some point. What I do condemn is the idea of giving up an
>operational system in the *hope* that the paper vehicle will meet it's
>promise on schedule and on budget. That would be like telling Delta to
>quit flying all it's current aircraft today and laying off all it's 
>personnel today because there's going to be a cheaper aircraft available
>in 5 or 10 years. 

If Delta used the tactics NASA does to crush its competition,
the resulting anti-trust suit would force them to go out of
business.


>>	Shuttle could have lower costs then  NASA currently has,
>>	but it still needs a tremendous infrastructure.  The OPF,
>>	the VAB, Tilting bay,  the crawler/transporter.  Launch towers.

>Of course Shuttle *already* has this infrastructure, and it's paid
>for whether Shuttle continues to use it or not. 

Not using that infrastructure for the Shuttle would allow you to use
it for a rebuilt Saturn V, Russian-built Soyuz or Energia boosters, 
etc.  There are alternatives.


>Currently there aren't that many missions needing heavy lift, seven 
>people on orbit, remote manipulation, long duration experiments, or 
>payload return. Shuttle does it with less than 8 launches a year. DC 
>may put Atlas, Delta, Titan, and Pegasus out of business, but it doesn't 
>have the capacity to match Shuttle or a true HLV for the times they're 
>needed. 

Can you give an example of a mission that needs *all* of those
things, on a single vehicle?

Of course, the Shuttle does it with less than 8 missions a year,
because at Shuttle prices, that's all anyone can afford.


>Once we have Freedom in operation, even less need
>will be found for Shuttle, and it can be phased out. But there will still
>be missions where there's no viable substitute for heavy lift and only
>the Russians still have an operational very heavy lift vehicle. It may
>make sense just to contract with them, 

Why does this have to wait for Freedom?  We could do that right now.  
In fact, we'd save money launching Freedom on Energia instead of Shuttle.


>but I'd like to see the US 
>develop a new generation VHLV designed from the ground up to achieve
>the lowest possible cost per pound. We've never tried to do that so
>we don't know how cheaply it can be done.

A new gneration VHLV designed to achieve the lowest possible cost
per pound would be an SSTO, which you support as research vehicles 
only.