The shuttle isn't even dead yet until next year as far as redirecting the budget money for it.This was the only real way to get a new rocket off the ground.Trying to develop new technology while still supporting the shuttle and the massive workforce that goes with it was not going to happen.2012 onwards is the real test.Will the American people sit by while NASA gets peanuts and slowly develops a rocket as their lives go by? That is the question that I want to know. Will be pretty sad if we're waiting until the 20s for SLS and to the 30s before Mars is even on the table.
Just a little aside sdsds, under what you just described, if there is only ONE crewed BEO mission per year, then we are talking two (2) launches per year, one crew and one mission spacecraft, correct? Hmm. I seem to recall someone on the previous page going on about how there wouldn't be 2 launches per year. I think he was confusing launches with a 2-launch mission
I don't believe SLS is too expensive...yet. To get Block I up and running NASA is spending $3 billion a year on HSF through 2017 which will get us our first test launch. But that includes Orion and ground infrastructure upgrades both of which would continue if SLS was canceled tomorrow, no?
Aren't we building some kind of momentum here that makes cancellation less likely as time moves forward? Won't the money spent up to that point, the effort, the parts and processes, etc., make some kind of difference in that decision making process?
I'd prefer to see more discussions on the threads about data and facts and not the crusade by the few Australians who have a problem with SLS.
Seems like a new thread is required here.I just wanted to move my last post that was OT.Is SLS too expensive to ever be a reality?Clongton tells me a mission is coming soon. That sounds expensive and if it's not Mars until 2030+ it's not going to impress many Mars fans.
I just don't understand why some people on here think that SLS can never become a reality
Quote from: M129K on 09/12/2013 06:39 pmI just don't understand why some people on here think that SLS can never become a reality Because there is no need for it.
Quote from: Jim on 09/12/2013 06:41 pmQuote from: M129K on 09/12/2013 06:39 pmI just don't understand why some people on here think that SLS can never become a reality Because there is no need for it.No need =/= not possible
I don't think you are necessarily the final word on what constitutes "need".
Quote from: jtrame on 09/12/2013 05:48 pmAren't we building some kind of momentum here that makes cancellation less likely as time moves forward? Won't the money spent up to that point, the effort, the parts and processes, etc., make some kind of difference in that decision making process?Momentum means nothing wrt cancellation. See Ares I. See J-2X. See Constellation.
You are correct, the positive momentum that SLS is seeing will make it difficult to cancel.
I know this might sound strange on this thread, but I am interested in the cost of SLS. I posted rough numbers from a document dataed from 2011, are there newer cost estimates from NASA?
I'd be interested in seeing that too. Aside from the HEFT document estimating it at 1.86 billion at a launch rate of 1 every two years I haven't seen any cost estimates that either don't include fixed costs (500 million) or that are ridiculously pessimistic, handwaving "estimates" by hardcore anti-SLS crusaders (5 billion for once per year). I'd say that 1.8 for one flight every one to two years is pretty realistic so I'll stick with that until something better comes along.
HEFT document is just as much handwaving.
Quote from: newpylong on 09/12/2013 07:05 pmYou are correct, the positive momentum that SLS is seeing will make it difficult to cancel. No basis for that statement. Momentum has never saved a project.SLS has less going for it than Constellation. I can see inside and outside the agency.As for time at the mic, I have held back on SLS compared to my CxP criticisms. And one of the reasons is that I see it going away and it doesn't need the push like CxP did. i actively supported CxP getting cancelled.
Quote from: JimHEFT document is just as much handwaving. It seems realistic to me, it's in line with my personal handwaving and I haven't seen anything better. If someone shows me anything less handwavy I'll be glad to accept it.Also, the hand waving is done by people who now their stuff, which is a big improvement over some guesstimates.
Quote from: llanitedave on 09/12/2013 06:53 pmI don't think you are necessarily the final word on what constitutes "need".That isn't my view, it is a fact. There is no directed mission that requires the SLS. Hence there is no need. There is a want from Congress to provide funding for a launch vehicle project that will spend money in their districts. But they have directed no mission that requires its capabilities.
Quote from: Jim on 09/12/2013 06:41 pmQuote from: M129K on 09/12/2013 06:39 pmI just don't understand why some people on here think that SLS can never become a reality Because there is no need for it.But this is the government. Need is more a secondary reason.The same could be said for STS and it flew successfully for over 30 years.
...In fact I think that Saturn V was the only NASA LV that had such a directed mission. Mercury and Gemini used rockets which were developed for completely different purposes...
Quote from: Jim on 09/12/2013 07:15 pmQuote from: newpylong on 09/12/2013 07:05 pmYou are correct, the positive momentum that SLS is seeing will make it difficult to cancel. No basis for that statement. Momentum has never saved a project.SLS has less going for it than Constellation. I can see inside and outside the agency.As for time at the mic, I have held back on SLS compared to my CxP criticisms. And one of the reasons is that I see it going away and it doesn't need the push like CxP did. i actively supported CxP getting cancelled. Cancelling CXP & SLS: to be replaced with.... What?
STS had a need, namely low cost access to space for large military and civillian payloads, it's just that the STS didn't work out as intended and its mission changed accordingly.
And thus is the case for SLS. It has a purpose/need. To send crewed spacecraft BLEO.
I just don't understand why some people on here think that SLS can never become a reality even though it's doing just fine for the time being, and I really don't get why A.
With the cancelling of Gemini the STS did not have a rival for launching people. SLS has 3 rivals.
Quote from: Lobo on 09/12/2013 11:16 pmAnd thus is the case for SLS. It has a purpose/need. To send crewed spacecraft BLEO. Not the same, there were payloads for the shuttle with real destinations.
Even if SLS doesn't get cancelled before it flies, there's only 15 RS-25D engines, and they're still talking about 4 engines per flight.. so they'll need RS-25D/E production up and running before the 4th flight. Last I checked, that hasn't even started yet, but correct me if I'm wrong.
Yea...kinda the same, as those payloads for the shuttle didn't require the shuttle specifically, and could have launched on any ELV with similar lift capacity and PLF size. A 1970's version of Titan IV could have done it. And that was proven obviously when Titan IV was later built and flew.
Quote from: QuantumG on 09/12/2013 11:38 pmEven if SLS doesn't get cancelled before it flies, there's only 15 RS-25D engines, and they're still talking about 4 engines per flight.. so they'll need RS-25D/E production up and running before the 4th flight. Last I checked, that hasn't even started yet, but correct me if I'm wrong.If the 4th flight is 10-15 years away, they have some time.
Quote from: Lobo on 09/12/2013 11:42 pmYea...kinda the same, as those payloads for the shuttle didn't require the shuttle specifically, and could have launched on any ELV with similar lift capacity and PLF size. A 1970's version of Titan IV could have done it. And that was proven obviously when Titan IV was later built and flew.Shuttle payload to LEO was 53,600 lbTitan to LEO was 47,790 lbShuttle had a unique payload bay that not only allowed large payloads but also offered recapture of satellites. Titan could not do what the shuttle could so its a weird comparison.
[Then how did USAF move all their payloads over to Titan IV after Challenger?
That was my only point there. NASA had some other things they wanted it to do that maybe Apollo on Saturn 1B couldn't really do. But satilite delivery didn't need anything unique about STS that I'm aware of anywa.
There's a very vocal minority who will never like SLS (or any rocket with "NASA" on the side - which I think is more the point). There will 100 more threads just like this (and I mean just like this) with the same people saying the same things.It's getting a bit boring.
Maybe one day the people who disagree will actually come up with some good counterarguments.
In the mean time, people will continue to say SLS is an albatross
and SLS supporters will continue to retort with "but NASA says everything is going fine!"
Noting that the HLV Studies thread is probably not the right place to discuss cancellation of the SLS and since a lot of the SLS threads are locked, maybe this old thread is a better place to...
And it would have kept climbing, if not for a system vulnerability that SLS doesn't share.
Non sequitur, in this context.
Apollo 12 launched through a rainstorm that was apparently on the verge of being a thunderstorm - if you had suggested to an STS manager that they launch a Shuttle mission in that kind of weather, whether at the Cape or at the TAL sites, he would have assumed it was a bad joke)
The engines for SLS are a new design iteration (which was well underway 10 years ago but shelved) that completely changes the cooling channel design
What kind of resources? According to the 2011 ESD Integration budget availability report, it seems that adding an SLS Block 1 launch to the future schedule costs about $300M in 2011 dollars.
and doing five launches per year would only cost about $1.8B extra, or about 10% of NASA's current budget
Besides, have you noticed that 4.5 is really close to 5, which is the higher number you were ridiculing, and way larger than 2, which is the lower one?
Your argument was that SLS would be technically incapable of sustaining the launch rate necessary to do a manned Mars mission.
Now you're arguing not only that the government will never fund a Mars mission
If a future government decides it wants a Mars mission, and the nation isn't in the grip of a series of financial crises, and NASA can avoid the temptation to pull another BSG like during SEI
Once they get it built, the ball is in the government's court again.
And then you go right ahead and do exactly what I said you were doing all over again.
Your "reality" seems to involve low-order extrapolation over at least a decade, probably two.
Six years ago the economy looked like it was in great shape. Eleven years ago, Columbia was still flying. Thirteen years ago, VentureStar was the next big thing. Twenty-two years ago, SEI was still on.
In my opinion, NASA needs a tool to help them get human crews out of LEO and do actual pioneering, before the growth of non-governmental spaceflight in LEO makes their human program entirely redundant.
The nature of the tool doesn't much matter, as long as it isn't extravagantly overblown like Ares.
If the USG wants a big launcher (and Congress at least does; they've stuck to the idea since 2005), they get to pay to use it or else look like fools.
Congress funds programs at NASA. Eliminate a program, and the funding disappears.
As for flat, SLS/Orion development is around $3B per year,
if NASA isn't blowing smoke with their $500M number for one launch per year (which is possible)
I'll see if I can get around to answering this weekend. Right now I have too much multiphase CFD coding to do and too little time...
Quote from: Lobo on 09/12/2013 11:57 pm[Then how did USAF move all their payloads over to Titan IV after Challenger?Not all DOD payloads left shuttle after Challenger case in point STS-39 and sts-44 in 1991. Also the military was into shuttle for more than just payloads, they wanted to have military astronauts in space and joining in on shuttle would help them achieve this. With the risk of this topic getting to far off post I think that the argument that sls will succeed even with no need because the shuttle succeeded is wrong. The shuttle is a completely different animal than sls and had many different needs during its 30 years.
Ares V development cost was somewhere in the neighborhood of $68B:http://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/nasa-sets-out-ares-v-cargo-launch-vehicle-development-plan-319979/SLS development cost is somewhere in the neighborhood of $38B:http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2011-08-05/news/os-nasa-next-moonshot-20110805_1_constellation-moon-program-nasa-supporters-internal-nasa-documentsThat’s less than a factor of two difference in total development costs. For all intents and purposes, Ares V development and SLS development are in the same cost ballpark. If you think Ares V costs were “extravagantly overblown”, then you should conclude that SLS costs are “extravagantly overblown”.
NASA has detailed its plans to spend at least $68 million until 2013 on the development of the largest rocket ever, its proposed Ares V cargo launch vehicle (CaLV) that will send the USA back to the Moon by 2020....To decide what changes should be adopted, NASA will spend the $68 million, and more, next year and through 2010, 2011 and 2012.
Just out of (slightly) left-field: Falcon Heavy has stuff-all payload prospects as well. Perhaps it should be cancelled, too? Oh hang on - it's mostly Elon's money. So is FH a case of 'build it and they will come?' SLS's main problem is a lack of clearly defined mission that a Heavy Lifter is best suited for. There was a budget-strangled campaign (Organised? Bungled? Both?!) to rob the Ares boosters of a mission - so out they went. SLS's reasons-to-be are underwhelming (Asteroid Capture, "No Moon", "Mars someday") so with no mission; why is it needed again?! Huh! Almost like someone planned this to happen...I say SLS should only be canned if it is honest-to-goodness, no-kidding going to be replaced with a FH/Delta IV-H 'launch tag team' for an exploration program. But hell, since chances are now strong that there's going to be no exploration program anymore; then can Delta IV-H and maybe Atlas V, too. After all; isn't Elon's Falcon 9 and the coming Ariane 6 going to be all the launchers the Western world needs?! .................
So that's what I'm getting at. Let's have the spread of opinion, but let's not start thread after thread after thread from same people over and over. Let's balance what we have as news and discussion.There's some bloody good threads down on page 4-10, all bumped down by "Huh, SLS - expensive innit!" threads. And I'm the one that gets the complaints, which are growing.
There's a very vocal minority who will never like SLS (or any rocket with "NASA" on the side - which I think is more the point). There will 100 more threads just like this (and I mean just like this) with the same people saying the same things.
You may want to read the flightglobal.com article again
And people, please stop insulting albatrosses!
Until then delivering mining tools to lunar orbit will be its job. I hope the budget cuts have not cancelled the mining and Moon machines.
God my heads hurts, and not from a hangover. Like Chris said, how many times can the same things be said? No one here is going to effect the outcome of the program one way or the other.
If you support SLS, enjoy the development update threads.If you don't support it, well, enjoy the SpaceX threads or something else.I personally enjoy them both, and the ULA threads, and the Orbital threads, and anything else for that matter.
Quote from: Chris Bergin on 09/13/2013 01:27 amThere's a very vocal minority who will never like SLS (or any rocket with "NASA" on the side - which I think is more the point). There will 100 more threads just like this (and I mean just like this) with the same people saying the same things.I must take issue with the implication that we critics of SLS are irrational.