🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <2526787@ub.cc.umich.edu> Henry_Edward_Hardy@UB.CC.UMICH.EDU writes:
>And now, a question of my own: what would it cost in current
>dollars to build say, five Saturn V heavy launch vehicles as
>opposed to building and maintaining the same launch capacity
>through the shuttle program? I have heard that some of the dies
>and plans for the Saturn series launch vehicles are no longer in
>existence, and wonder if anyone can confirm or disconfirm this as
>well.

*All* the tooling is gone, likewise most of the specialized skills and
training.  Many of the subcontractors are gone.  Some of the plans are
gone.  The launch facilities are gone, converted to handle the shuttle.
(The idea of retaining Saturn compatibility was rejected as too costly.)
Wernher Von Braun is dead, and the lack of an equally competent leader
is not a small obstacle.  The in-house engineering development capability
at Marshall, very important in the history of the Saturns, is totally
gone and it would all have to be contracted out.

It wouldn't be as hard as starting from scratch, but a lot of the work
would have to be done over.  It would be considerably more expensive,
even in constant dollars, than it was in the 60s -- not all of the work
needs to be re-done, but on the other hand NASA is much less efficient
than it used to be.

The way to get cheap transportation into orbit is to forget doing it
through the government at all.  Do it the way it was done for aeronautics:
offer a guaranteed market (not subsidies, but payment for results only --
the way it was done for aviation was lucrative contracts for carrying
air mail) and let private industry do it.  There is no shortage of
companies that could make a bundle carrying cargo to orbit at a tenth of
the current price, if they knew for sure that the market would be waiting
for them once they finished hardware development.  (The existing hardware
can't possibly do it at that price.)
-- 
Allegedly heard aboard Mir: "A |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
toast to comrade Van Allen!!"  | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu