Author Topic: Dennis Wingo's article on "NASA's Solomon's Choice in 2014" (ISS vs. SLS/Orion)  (Read 30619 times)

Offline woods170

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Interesting how a number of the "ISS-Centric -- Defund SLS/Orion, and move all funds to an ISS-centric approach to BEO Exploration" votes are from the same IP address. Someone's been busy setting up lots of accounts here.

Poll removed to allow the thread to continue.

Someone actually had the nerve of pulling such a stunt? Hmmm... What's the forum penalty for cheating?

Offline QuantumG

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Interesting how a number of the "ISS-Centric -- Defund SLS/Orion, and move all funds to an ISS-centric approach to BEO Exploration" votes are from the same IP address. Someone's been busy setting up lots of accounts here.

Poll removed to allow the thread to continue.

Someone actually had the nerve of pulling such a stunt? Hmmm... What's the forum penalty for cheating?

Presumably they've already dealt with the guilty party, or at least blocked the IP.
Human spaceflight is basically just LARPing now.

Online Chris Bergin

Interesting how a number of the "ISS-Centric -- Defund SLS/Orion, and move all funds to an ISS-centric approach to BEO Exploration" votes are from the same IP address. Someone's been busy setting up lots of accounts here.

Poll removed to allow the thread to continue.

Someone actually had the nerve of pulling such a stunt? Hmmm... What's the forum penalty for cheating?

IP block. Accounts banned.

A lot of work for the sake of a few percent on a poll that will have absolutely no impact on anything.

Per the thread. Will read the opening post and give a view. Just not had the time yet. Glad Andy kept the thread open, as one person's silliness shouldn't impact on any one else.
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Offline JohnFornaro

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Firstly I'd like to say a few words to the person who set up those dummy accounts to try and game the system.

This thread had included some interesting reading.  I didn't really "approve" of Jon's either/or choice offered in the OP, but at the same time, in the labyrinth that is Congress, such a binary choice selection could arise, I suppose.

I did raise an eyebrow over the number of votes cast for ISS over SLS.  Turns out the "election" had been rigged by that person.  Who didn't even have a financial stake in the outcome of this poll.

In the real world of mission prioritization, does anybody think, with so many billions of dolalrs at stake, that our manned and unmanned  mission prioritizations are not gamed by corporate insiders?

Quote from: JohnSmith
And BTW my comment of a "Slow motion death march."

SLS started in 2011 and is expecting first flight by 2017. But SLS is a continuation of Ares V, which started in 2004.

I continue to think that a track record of actual accomplishment in the construction of an LV would result in far less funding uncertainty.  I flat out do not understand the silence which accompanies my observation.  Apparently, all these rocket scientists are on board with that slow motion march.
Sometimes I just flat out don't get it.

Offline john smith 19

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In the real world of mission prioritization, does anybody think, with so many billions of dolalrs at stake, that our manned and unmanned  mission prioritizations are not gamed by corporate insiders?
Quite. But that ship has sailed.  :(
Quote
I continue to think that a track record of actual accomplishment in the construction of an LV would result in far less funding uncertainty.  I flat out do not understand the silence which accompanies my observation.  Apparently, all these rocket scientists are on board with that slow motion march.
It's particularly interesting because "all up testing" started as a way to get the necessary flight data in a short timescale. With that pressure off (and the huge increase in data collection and processing abilities) you could design stage test and test flights that show people clear progress. In principle say 2 full SRB's strapped to a crude steel framework with a skin to simulate the core. A first stage showing they had the tank/SSME integration issues licked and so on. OTOH....

< Warning. Extreme cynicism ahead >
"Keep quiet, keep taking the pay checks and stop raising so many objections. All progress is good progress, as you're progressing toward to your retirement. That's all that matters."
</extreme cynicism>


But hopefully not.  :(

My worst case scenario for this is they build the first one and the various parts don't quite line up over the launch structure flame trenches.  :(

If you don't think that can happen there is a story in the car industry about a certain model, some examples of which pulled to the left, despite being in perfect mechanical order.

It turned out this only happened when the front shock absorbers came from different factories, which took their datum points from different points on the car structure. 
« Last Edit: 10/07/2013 03:23 pm by john smith 19 »
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline jongoff

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Interesting how a number of the "ISS-Centric -- Defund SLS/Orion, and move all funds to an ISS-centric approach to BEO Exploration" votes are from the same IP address. Someone's been busy setting up lots of accounts here.

Poll removed to allow the thread to continue.

That's super lame that someone did something like that just to bias a poll. It's not like the results of this poll are somehow going to shape US space policy, so I'm kind of surprised that someone would stoop to that level just to influence the position they wanted to win. I'm glad you caught that.

Is there any way to scrub those bogus votes from the poll and put the poll back up? I had been intending to close the poll today anyway, but wanted to see where things stood in the end.

~Jon

Offline jongoff

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I did raise an eyebrow over the number of votes cast for ISS over SLS.  Turns out the "election" had been rigged by that person.  Who didn't even have a financial stake in the outcome of this poll.

Yeah, that has me super torqued. Now I have no idea what the relative preferences really were. The status quo approach was definitely in the lead, but once you scrub the cheating, I wonder how much that would take out of the "keep ISS" approach. Are we talking a few percent (dropping it back to the ~50% vs 35% that things had been at for a few days), or most of the support.

I hope Andy and Chris can sort things out.

~Jon

Offline M129K

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Well, the poll is down, but I'll give my opinion anyway. First of all, while I know nothing about the sequester that wasn't in the video from John Green and that it's bad, I don't think it will last long or that it will require the cancellation of either project. That said.

I would always prefer if both programs would continue full steam ahead. However, that seems like a bad idea with a $16.6 billion dollar budget; it would cost too much of the other programs. As much as I love SLS and Orion, they would be my first choice for starting gutting any program. I think there are many ways in which the huge costs of these programs could have been reduced, but most of these would have required a completely different approach from the start in 2010; since that isn't possible though, I'd do it differently. Scrap Orion. Kill Block 2 SLS and Block 1B SLS. Evolve Block 1 to Block 1A and stick with it as a cargo launcher from there. Use it to launch habitats and in-space stages and let crew launch be done in a "1.5 launch" architecture by a commercial crew vehicle. That should save about $1 billion a year. Hopefully it would work and it would be enough.

If it wouldn't work though... Well, as much as I love SLS, I'd still scrap it. The station is finally paying off its cost with pure science, and I think scrapping it by 2020 would be a bit of a waste. If the will for exploration (and a small amount of funding for it) remains, a lunar EELV-based architecture would be my preferred way to go. Put a storable propellant stage in orbit on a normal DIVH, then fuel it with a tanker launched on the 70 ton to LEO, 7 CBC beast version of Delta IV. Launch a lander, launch a crew vehicle, then send the stack to the moon. A lunar landing in 5 launches, only two of which with any serious HLV. Could, even on a tight budget (say, 600 million) be done potentially once every two years, depending on lander cost. Should the will and funding for a mission to Mars ever arise again, a SHLV could still be developed, but it would be different; I'm envisioning a 7 meter core, two large KeroLOX boosters, RS-68 main engines, a 7 meter upper stage with 8 RL-60s powering it. But that's just far ahead in the future.

For now, I just hope we can continue both and that NASA will not be restricted to the puny 16.6 billion dollar budget.

Offline Robotbeat

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The AMS (a very sensitive high-energy particle physics instrument) alone is a powerful piece of equipment that really needs at LEAST 2028 to get full use out of it. It has enough consumables to last 30 years, so as long as anyone would ever even dream of keeping ISS in operation. It is much better than any other instrument of its type, getting far clearer data. It has already made some important discoveries.
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Offline Lar

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Seems a no brainer to me.

The argument for SLS is that it gives capability we don't have. And keeps certain centers and contractors busy. We'll have the capability soon enough, for far less cost. And Schumpeter writes of the virtues of creative destruction... those centers and contractors need to find other things to do that add actual value.

It would be silly to splash ISS any eariler than we have to. By 2028 we may well have on orbit construction capabilities that make what we can do now look like fumbling around helplessly and building a replacement ISS (in a better orbit please) will be much easier.

So I vote option 3. Splash SLS.
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Offline Longhorn John

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SLS was still over half the vote, despite the rig to bring it down.

Offline jongoff

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SLS was still over half the vote, despite the rig to bring it down.

Huh? The ditch ISS to fund SLS/Orion was one of the least voted-for options. Unless you're also including the "maintain the status quo" votes, I guess.

To be honest, I'm really surprised that the "keep up the status quo even though the budget is much less" approach seemed to be the hands-down winner.

~Jon

Offline john smith 19

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To be honest, I'm really surprised that the "keep up the status quo even though the budget is much less" approach seemed to be the hands-down winner.
TBH I think a lot of people feel that neither NASA nor the Legislature will chop either programme, therefor both will continue, at whatever pace their funding level permits them.  :(

As do I, despite my voting for the more ISS centric approach

The 2nd Augustine Commission was quite clear that NASA was not getting enough money to meet all its obligations then. Now it has even less and that ongoing legally binding requirement to keep SLS going.  :(
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline baldusi

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What a shame about the poll. I'll simplys state that whoever says they should ditch ISS to do BEO, should get L2 and read the daily memos about ECLSS. Also, ISS is the first real chance for a commercial LEO market, but only if NASA slowly commercializes more and more parts of the infrastructure until 2028 (yes, a 25 year process). Besides, ditching it now would have made it the biggest jobs program ever with extremely little science return/potential.
Having said that, politics will keep the status quo at ridiculous low levels. Particularly when this pork is relatively "small" and absolutely not polemic wrt party lines. Any agreement to be reach in Congress, will use NASA's darlings (JWST, SLS, ISS, Orion, Commercial Crew, etc.) a bairganing chips. I'll repeat it, this is "cheap" and "non-partisian" pork. The most likely to survive. I worry more about the SMD and aeronautics.

Offline randomly

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Chuck's post does a great job of covering my thoughts on this subject as well. I'm a believer in the advantages of large fairing HLV such as DIRECT or SLS, but with the funding NASA can expect in the future the painful reality is that NASA has too much on it's plate and not enough money to execute. It's one of those horrible decisions of having to amputate the leg to save the body.

I prefer a version of option 3
I would rather see SLS cancelled, retention of Orion,  retention of ISS, a commitment to developing orbital fuel transfer technology, and a shift to support and reliance on commercial lift for a BEO program. Spacex developed F9 for less than 1/10 of what NASA estimate it would have cost, we need to leverage that level of commercial efficiency to have an effective BEO program with the funding limitations we are looking at.

Offline john smith 19

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I prefer a version of option 3
I would rather see SLS cancelled, retention of Orion,  retention of ISS, a commitment to developing orbital fuel transfer technology, and a shift to support and reliance on commercial lift for a BEO program. Spacex developed F9 for less than 1/10 of what NASA estimate it would have cost, we need to leverage that level of commercial efficiency to have an effective BEO program with the funding limitations we are looking at.
Pretty much my view as well but the joker in the pack is that NASA has a legal obligation to develop SLS in a way that does not exist for the other items. :(

Until this 800 lb gorilla is dealt with the status quo will probably continue  :(
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline deltaV

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Here's what Augustine Committee member Jeff Greason said about SLS shortly after its announcement (hat tip to SpacexULA for the link):
Quote from: Jeff Greason (http://www.transterrestrial.com/?p=36879)
As far as I can discern NASA’s SLS/MPCV architecture, it seems to fall within the parameters we studied on the Committee. An architecture like that needed something like $12B/year for human spaceflight in order to actually do exploration missions within NASA’s traditional cost structure. Right now it looks like the budget available will be more like $9B or even $8B/year. ... I’m not saying that SLS can’t be built — only that if it is built, the cost of keeping it operating will be so high that NASA’s budget won’t support developing, for example, planetary landers that would be needed to make it useful. ... If NASA had a top-line budget of $25B/year and that could be sustained, this might be an executable approach. At $18B/year or less, I don’t think it is.

...

The Committee found that while our existing 25-ton launch vehicles were too small or fly too infrequently for a robust human exploration program, 70 tons was ample. We did not thoroughly explore sizes in between but from what I learned there, my opinion is that 35- to 50-ton vehicles, if low cost and scalable to a reasonable flight rate, are probably sufficient. Doing an Apollo-class mission takes two or three launches of 50- to 70-ton vehicles, and with launchers that size propellant depots aren’t mandatory but it really does help to simply transfer propellant between spacecraft. It is tractable in the near term to do missions that way.

The U.S. can have 50- 70-ton vehicles that come from the same industrial base as existing launch vehicles — Atlas 5 Phase II and Falcon Heavy. NASA could fund both of those vehicles for a total of about $3-$4B, comfortably — a small fraction of SLS development costs. And the annual cost to keep the vehicles flying would probably be under $0.5B/year because they come from the same production lines as other, smaller launchers that have other customers. It is hard to say what SLS will cost to keep operating but based on what I saw on the Committee I would expect more than $2B/year. It would be far cheaper to launch two of the alternative vehicles than one SLS, so I cannot see how SLS offers good value compared to the alternatives.

The capsule picture is a lot more complicated and it is hard to say what makes a good capsule strategy without clear mission requirements. I can envision some architectures under which MPCV might be a good tool in the toolbox.

The committee's budgeting supports Mr. Greason's SLS pessimism. See e.g. the budget sand charts available at http://web.archive.org/web/20121119085849/http://www.nasa.gov/ppt/378555main_02%20-%20Sally%20Charts%20v11.ppt . In particular the committee found that with a "constrained" budget, which is more than NASA is likely to get, no exploration is possible. Even with a "less constrained" budget with $3-5 billion extra per year exploration doesn't really get started until after ISS is splashed in 2020.

Mr. Greason wrote the above two years ago (right after SLS was announced) but his analysis is still right on.  In the past two years NASA's budget has fallen further. SLS's progress to date may indicate that the committee was a bit too pessimistic, but not to the extent of about $5 billion per year that would be required for ISS and SLS-based exploration to coexist.

I therefore support canceling SLS and extending ISS.  The ISS has a key role to play supporting exploration via e.g. centrifuge experiments to determine if partial gravity is enough and testing of life support system prototypes, but I do not support using ISS as an exploration staging point. I therefore voted "other".

I do not have a detailed proposal for an exploration architecture right now but here's an outline. Our goal should be to visit a Martian Moon by the 50th anniversary of the first shuttle launch (i.e. April 2031). The architecture to get there would probably involve Falcon Heavy class launch vehicles, solar-electric propulsion, and rendezvous at either EML-2 or an elliptical high earth orbit. Do tech development first, delaying hardware development until either costs fall (by e.g. Falcon Heavy, solar-electric propulsion, propellant depots) or budgets rise.
« Last Edit: 10/10/2013 04:57 pm by deltaV »

Offline RanulfC

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Missed the poll along with this whole thread, man I need to keep an better eye on you folks :)

Not that it matters much but as far as I can see Option-1 is the default "political" position and most likely outcome, but Clongton's post pretty much floored me given his normal postion on the subject but I very much have to agree with his argument and say I'd favor the Option-3 outcome. Having said that I have to point out that there IS a serious disconnect with the idea that "Orion" is somehow required for BLEO operations and people want to "keep" it even if launched on an EELV. I don't think people quite realize that "Orion" is simply the ultimate embodyment of the "Apollo," "flags-and-footprints" sortie mission paradigm with all the short-comings that entails. "Orion" is "required" only if your "program" requires having a capsule that astronauts "live" in all the way from launch to landing, and therefore you plan on throwing all the REST of the equipment away piece by piece with every mission.

"Orion" isn't designed FOR "BLEO-Missions" it is simply designed to return DIRECTLY to the Earth from BLEO missions. These are NOT the 'same' thing and never have been. It doesn't (and shouldn't) matter that Dragon, CST, DreamChaser, BO's Capsule, etc are not "capable" of doing BLEO missions because the vehicle(s) needed to perform BLEO missions should NOT be arbitrarily "limited" by requiring that the be a single, monolithic "vehicle" usable from launch to landing, and especially requiring the definition be constricted to a vehicle capable of performing "direct" Earth entry and landing from BLEO. Launch and landing can and should be handled by simple "surface-to-LEO" vehicles such as those mentioned above unfortunatly it is currently politically unacceptable to NOT have a US Government owned and operated vehicle capable of doing those same duties and it is also "unacceptable" to compete with those same vehicle so it is a "requirement" that "Orion" have capabilities for BLEO missions, which further entrenches the fully disposable, unsustainable, and overly-expensive BLEO mission planning that is in and of itself causing part of the budget problems.

"Orion" is part of the problem not part of the solution, despite this (and my opinion on the matter) it is tied to SLS and that itself is tied to the "politics" of the situation. Which means as I've noted above that the most likely "option" is going to be the politically favored and approved "option" no matter what the public or other might think/want.

Randy
From The Amazing Catstronaut on the Black Arrow LV:
British physics, old chap. It's undignified to belch flames and effluvia all over the pad, what. A true gentlemen's orbital conveyance lifts itself into the air unostentatiously, with the minimum of spectacle and a modicum of grace. Not like our American cousins' launch vehicles, eh?

Offline jongoff

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Missed the poll along with this whole thread, man I need to keep an better eye on you folks :)

Not that it matters much but as far as I can see Option-1 is the default "political" position and most likely outcome, but Clongton's post pretty much floored me given his normal postion on the subject but I very much have to agree with his argument and say I'd favor the Option-3 outcome. Having said that I have to point out that there IS a serious disconnect with the idea that "Orion" is somehow required for BLEO operations and people want to "keep" it even if launched on an EELV. I don't think people quite realize that "Orion" is simply the ultimate embodyment of the "Apollo," "flags-and-footprints" sortie mission paradigm with all the short-comings that entails. "Orion" is "required" only if your "program" requires having a capsule that astronauts "live" in all the way from launch to landing, and therefore you plan on throwing all the REST of the equipment away piece by piece with every mission.

Wishing we had a +1 button. The good news is that there are some promising technologies on the horizon that should allow us to completely break the Apollo paradigm. I'm hoping that 10yrs from now people look at that approach as being as anachronistic as poodle skirts and record players.

~Jon

Offline RanulfC

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Missed the poll along with this whole thread, man I need to keep an better eye on you folks :)

Not that it matters much but as far as I can see Option-1 is the default "political" position and most likely outcome, but Clongton's post pretty much floored me given his normal postion on the subject but I very much have to agree with his argument and say I'd favor the Option-3 outcome. Having said that I have to point out that there IS a serious disconnect with the idea that "Orion" is somehow required for BLEO operations and people want to "keep" it even if launched on an EELV. I don't think people quite realize that "Orion" is simply the ultimate embodyment of the "Apollo," "flags-and-footprints" sortie mission paradigm with all the short-comings that entails. "Orion" is "required" only if your "program" requires having a capsule that astronauts "live" in all the way from launch to landing, and therefore you plan on throwing all the REST of the equipment away piece by piece with every mission.

Wishing we had a +1 button. The good news is that there are some promising technologies on the horizon that should allow us to completely break the Apollo paradigm. I'm hoping that 10yrs from now people look at that approach as being as anachronistic as poodle skirts and record players.

~Jon

Carefull though! Remember "poodle-skirts" actually made a breif comeback a while ago ;)
(Thanks though! :) )

Randy
From The Amazing Catstronaut on the Black Arrow LV:
British physics, old chap. It's undignified to belch flames and effluvia all over the pad, what. A true gentlemen's orbital conveyance lifts itself into the air unostentatiously, with the minimum of spectacle and a modicum of grace. Not like our American cousins' launch vehicles, eh?

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