Just thinking outside the box here but wouldn't it be *forward looking* if there were a THORIUM (not uranium) nuclear power plant nearby that generated electricity, drew in seawater, and then used some of that electricty to distill and crack the purified water into hydrogen and oxygen gasses? Send the remaining electricity into the grid and send the gasses off to be liquified, maybe even on site at KSC.Thorium generators (molten salt coolant) can't "melt down" and do not produce any byproducts that can be reprocessed into weapons grade material. And thorium byproduct half lives are extremely short, unlike uranium.Just musing. Returning you now to your regular programming.
The hydrogen comes from steam-reforming natural gas. Actually, after Katrina, we gave most of our hydrogen back to Air Products because Katrina shut down their New Orleans plant for a while at the same time their Canadian plant was down for maintenance, so they didn't have any for their other customers.
If so I'd suggest you start with "Fly Me to the Moon" by Edward Belbruno.
Here's some Pdfs I have foundhttp://www.agi.com/downloads/support/productSupport/literature/pdfs/whitePapers/0800_wsb.pdfhttp://esto.nasa.gov/conferences/nstc2007/papers/Belbruno_Edward_C6P1_NSTC-07-0156.pdf
And Ares I can't suffer a first stage turbopump failure.
Saying that non-existent technology X is better than well-used technology Y is disingenuous.
somewhere in these documents it is said that some WSB trajectories might double your payload to the Moon. WSB trajectories could be of interest when refueling a EML-1 /EML-2 depot...
Quote from: Lab Lemming on 07/01/2009 02:26 amAnd Ares I can't suffer a first stage turbopump failure.Ares-I 2nd stage canQuoteSaying that non-existent technology X is better than well-used technology Y is disingenuous.What's your beef? I was musing about a potential future efficient application of nuclear technology to ground support equipment for launch vehicles. And fyi, the technology DOES exist. There's a ton of information available if you look for it.
Quote from: clongton on 07/01/2009 03:09 pmQuote from: Lab Lemming on 07/01/2009 02:26 amAnd Ares I can't suffer a first stage turbopump failure.Ares-I 2nd stage canQuoteSaying that non-existent technology X is better than well-used technology Y is disingenuous.What's your beef? I was musing about a potential future efficient application of nuclear technology to ground support equipment for launch vehicles. And fyi, the technology DOES exist. There's a ton of information available if you look for it.How is it efficient? Natural gas is used to make electricity and reformed into hydrogen. The reformation is more thermodynamically efficient than the generation. If you add a source of nuclear generated electricity, the efficient thing to do would to be the nuclear power to run refrigerators, light bulbs, and air compressors while using the natural gas to make hydrogen.
the only way i can think is that the engines were constantly vectored to stay dead on centre of mass but surely if they were just millimetres off then the rocket would tilt.
Maybe a simpler question, how did they support the Saturn V before launch, were there platforms near the base that supported it, or did the arms that retracted before launch hold it?
How do you calculate the escape velocity of a rocket and how is it dependent on the density of or choice of propellant?
Quote from: engstudent on 08/13/2009 12:49 pmHow do you calculate the escape velocity of a rocket and how is it dependent on the density of or choice of propellant?Escape velocity or exhaust velocity?