Author Topic: Could Ares I be converted into a medium lift vehicle to replace an EELV?  (Read 18162 times)

Offline CitabriaFlyer

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Given all of the effort placed into Ares I, could a 4 or 5 segment reusable SRB make for a cost effective, partially reusable first stage for a medium lift vehicle.  Does refurbishing a single SRB cost more than building an Atlas or Delta core from scratch?

Offline Danny Dot

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The development cost would be huge and make the system more expensive in the long run, even if the per flight cost was less.

Payloads designed for EELVs might have a problem with the higher vibration environment of the large solid first stage.

Danny Deger
« Last Edit: 11/17/2010 09:08 pm by Danny Dot »
Danny Deger

Offline ugordan

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EELVs are by and large used for higher energy orbits. Ares I needs to have a third stage in order no to have an abysmal payload capacity to anything above LEO.

Now, why would anyone want to replace a proven, two-stage vehicle with one that has three stages and a rougher environment for the payload on the way up?

Offline kraisee

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The estimated cost of an Ares-I launch was going to be ~$800m each -- and that was with Ares-V sharing some of the infrastructure costs.

The cost of even the largest Delta-IV Heavy EELV is currently (very high, due to very low flight rates) more like ~$300m and can actually reach GTO -- the destination most commercial & DoD payloads require.   Ares-I can not get to GTO without an additional stage (yet more expense).

Sure, they could try to make a cargo version of Ares-I, but nobody would ever buy flights on it, given those costs.

Ross.
« Last Edit: 11/17/2010 09:21 pm by kraisee »
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Offline CitabriaFlyer

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So what was the driving force to develop Ares I in the first place.  Why not just put Orion on an EELV or a Jupiter 130?

Offline kraisee

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Three primary reasons:

1) To secure the greatest political support possible for Griffin's plans, he ensured that MSFC (Shelby) got as much work as possible: Two shiny new launch vehicle development efforts.

2) To go straight to building the Ares-V would have cost about $25-30bn in one hit.   Congress would never have swallowed that horse-pill.   But Griffin believed he could get Congress to agree to buy two smaller $15bn pills instead.   Ares-I was intended to develop many of the technologies that would later filter into Ares-V -- the Mars vehicle he really wanted.

3) ATK has major political connections across the nation, so getting their support was also key (even moreso than Boeing and LockMart, because ATK is far more "active" politically than both of those companies combined).   Scott Horowitz (working at ATK at the time, trying to expand the SRB market into new areas) came up with the original "Stick" design and promoted it to anyone who would listen.   This occurred at just the time Griffin was looking for a way to offset the costs of a Saturn-V beater.   He figured The Stick was a good dovetail with his mongo-booster, and would also secure ATK's strong leverage throughout Congress.


There are other reasons, but those are the real heavy-hitters that really drove the plan.

Ross.

PS -- I have heard many, many people say that Griffin's real drive was to usurp von Braun's memory by being recognized as the designer of the largest rocket ever to fly.   Although it is absolutely nothing more than a rumor, given his previous "I'm the smartest person in the room" comments, I personally believe it.   YMMV.
« Last Edit: 11/17/2010 10:02 pm by kraisee »
"The meek shall inherit the Earth -- the rest of us will go to the stars"
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Offline sdsds

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Three primary reasons:
[....]
2) Ares-I was intended to develop many of the technologies that would later filter into Ares-V -- the Mars vehicle he really wanted.
[...]

There are other reasons, but those are the real heavy-hitters that really drove the plan.

All three of these that kraisee presents seem to have been major influences.  Note that (duh) only number 2 above was talked about or even hinted at in defending Ares I.

Stunningly, most of the talk was about safety!  That's really counter-intuitive, but the claim was that the Ares I design would provide safety through incredibly high reliability.  In particular, the claim was made that a single lift-off ignition event, and one that could be executed with extremely high consistency at that, would eliminate many possible causes of failure.  (Note though that if this rationale works, it only works for a vehicle with exactly one motor!)  Similarly the single upper stage engine was claimed to reduce the riskiness surrounding stage separation and second stage ignition.

The supporters of this approach used some fancy Probabilistic Risk Assessment statistical methods to prove they were right.  There are, of course, three kinds of lies:  "Lies, damned lies, and statistics."
— 𝐬𝐝𝐒𝐝𝐬 —

Offline renclod

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So what was the driving force to develop Ares I in the first place.  Why not just put Orion on an EELV or a Jupiter 130?

1/ To make NASA a "smart buyer" . This is not an opinion, but was stated by NASA top guys along the years. It was claimed that NASA has lost the expertise of developing new, real launch systems and needs to re-build it in order to tackle the Vision for Space Exploration. Best way to do that was to start small - with the CLV designed in-house. After that, NASA would let the CaLV (heavy lift) design go to contractors, but the experience gained with the CLV would make NASA a "smart buyer" and allow them to keep things under control.

2/ Speculation: To secure the future of ATK's large solid rocket motors. It was considered fundamental (by Congress, for instance) that the RSRM be tied with the development of the next crew launch vehicle. As the STS is coming to a halt, the new game in town would be the CLV. Who ever gets to build the CLV would be hugely influential in the future - for CaLV, lunar surface systems, ground ops, mission control, the whole shmeer.

If you combine 1 and 2 you get Ares I.


Offline butters

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How about a 5-seg SRB from ATK with an ACES-71 tanker from ULA.  What kind of residual propellant to LEO could be achieved with that? 

Would the T/W be too low at upper stage ignition because of the staging point?

Assuming that ACES-71 could also fly on SLS and ACES-41 on Atlas and Delta for carrying crew and cargo/satellites, could Stick be an economical solution for low-value propellant launches at high flight rates?  Or would Atlas 55x be the more economical booster for propellant tankers?

Would ATK be willing to abandon SLS in favor of a depot architecture if they would be providing a Stick for every propellant launch?  ATK reloading Sticks at high production rates and ULA cranking out ACES at high production rates.  Seems like a good compromise all around, right?

Offline renclod

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Given all of the effort placed into Ares I, could a 4 or 5 segment reusable SRB make for a cost effective, partially reusable first stage for a medium lift vehicle. 

I would say yes, if you use the RSRM like the Shuttle does, in a stage-and-a-half-to-orbit launcher configuration with a ground-started SSME.

1 (one) RSRM-5 seg and 1 (one) RS-25 powered stage. Side-mount, asymmetric configuration just like the Shuttle.

Both motor and engine ignited on pad, same as with the Shuttle.

Oh... and, Jim ? Don't bother. I know, it's not viable.

« Last Edit: 11/18/2010 08:37 am by renclod »

Offline alexw

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How about a 5-seg SRB from ATK with an ACES-71 tanker from ULA.  What kind of residual propellant to LEO could be achieved with that? 
   Nothing useful. The AIUS is much larger than (regular) ACES, almost as big as SIVB, and it still couldn't put the ~20mT Orion into orbit.

Quote
Assuming that ACES-71 could also fly on SLS and ACES-41 on Atlas and Delta for carrying crew and cargo/satellites, could Stick be an economical solution for low-value propellant launches at high flight rates?  Or would Atlas 55x be the more economical booster for propellant tankers?
     No, because although the SRBs are cheap at high production rates, you'd probably need at least an SSME-based upper stage to deliver a useful payload to orbit. It seems very unlikely that building such a new production facility at Michoud would be remotely economical compared to just making use of all the unused Atlas & Delta capacity at Decatur. (FWIW, SLS could also deposit ACES-71 into orbit almost without a burn.)

Quote
Would ATK be willing to abandon SLS in favor of a depot architecture if they would be providing a Stick for every propellant launch?  ATK reloading Sticks at high production rates and ULA cranking out ACES at high production rates.  Seems like a good compromise all around, right?
     No ACES variant remotely contemplated could reach orbit on an Stick. The SRB is a high-thrust strap-on for getting above the atmosphere, not really a first stage rocket like Atlas or Delta (or anything else). In many respects, the Shuttle is basically a very large ground-started upper stage.
     -Alex

Offline Patchouli

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One thing that escapes me is why did they choose to use the J-2X on Ares I when the LCPE probably would have worked better?
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/trw_rocketengine_000926.html

Offline kraisee

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Because PWR has a much bigger political presence in Congress than TRW has.

Ross.
"The meek shall inherit the Earth -- the rest of us will go to the stars"
-Robert A. Heinlein

Offline AS-503

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So what was the driving force to develop Ares I in the first place.  Why not just put Orion on an EELV or a Jupiter 130?


Wow. Where to start....

Post Columbia Shuttle accident virtually everyone agrees that if we are to have a manned space flight program we should move out beyond Earth orbit.

Retire the shuttle as soon as possible translates to...fix the root cause of Columbia and return to flight ONLY to finish the ISS.

This was all decided in the summer of 2003. The Shuttle won't even fly again until July of 2005 (STS-114). And being the orbiter Discovery she won't get off the ground without alot of fuss.

Fast forward to 2004, Bush says...Moon,Mars and Beyond (Hell Yeah)! See The Vision for Space Exploration (VSE). Except you have to do it with maximum use of existing infrastructure (open to interpretation) and you are going to get XXX dollars to do it.

In 2005 NASA conducts a study of what they think the VSE means to them. Out comes the Exploration System Architecture Study (ESAS). This is literally called "Apollo on Steroids" by the NASA brass when it is unveiled.

In the mean time the war in Iraq (you remember Shock & Awe) is still dragging on....Katrina and other financial catastrophes. The Bush administrations promise of XXX dollars is turning into something a lot less than XXX, while Apollo on Steroids is running into technical difficulty and other bound-to-happen obstacles of developing enterprise class launch vehicles.

Mike Griffin made a pretty well worded defense of the ESAS choices with regard to what the VSE was asking for in this speech from Jan of 2008.

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=26756


I am not defending this speech but I do think It is pretty well laid out.

Until the Augustine commitee made its report public I was in support of CxP. When I found out that we could not afford it much less the spacecraft/payloads, I had to let go of CxP.

My tears have dried now.

Of late I am starting to really favor the all liquid design ideas. Guess I am setting myself up for some more tears.

Offline marsavian

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One thing that escapes me is why did they choose to use the J-2X on Ares I when the LCPE probably would have worked better?
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/trw_rocketengine_000926.html

Because it was neither Shuttle or Saturn derived  ;)

http://smartdata.usbid.com/datasheets/usbid/2001/2001-q1/pintleenginepaperaiaafinal.pdf

Offline Danny Dot

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So what was the driving force to develop Ares I in the first place.  Why not just put Orion on an EELV or a Jupiter 130?

There was a belief by many that an all solid first stage would be safer than a liquid first stage.  There were also some questionable calls that developing Ares I would be cheaper than man rating an EELV.

Danny Deger
Danny Deger

Offline Patchouli

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One thing that escapes me is why did they choose to use the J-2X on Ares I when the LCPE probably would have worked better?
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/trw_rocketengine_000926.html

Because it was neither Shuttle or Saturn derived  ;)

http://smartdata.usbid.com/datasheets/usbid/2001/2001-q1/pintleenginepaperaiaafinal.pdf

Really interesting file you found there.
According to that they could still say LCPE was at least Apollo derived since the LEM decent engine was a pintle injector engine.

Though I think Spacex now owns the IP on LCPE while NG still holds the designs for the TR-107.

But still it does seems Ares I was designed by politics and not good engineering practices.

« Last Edit: 11/20/2010 05:29 am by Patchouli »

Offline madscientist197

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Short answer: 'Yes' (three characters)

Long answer: 'Why?' (four characters)
John

Offline Patchouli

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Short answer: 'Yes' (three characters)

Long answer: 'Why?' (four characters)
LM came to the same conclusions on about the stick on their early CEV concept.
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/cevkheed.htm

They also preferred a lifting body vehicle over a ballistic capsule.

Offline fotoguzzi

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Sure, they could try to make a cargo version of Ares-I, but nobody would ever buy flights on it, given those costs.
Sorry for the cross-post. This seems to be the correct thread:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12394991

Does not this proposal seem very close to the subject of this thread? And also, do I remember being patiently counseled that rocket design wasn't the same as Lego (R) design?

(Now I discover that there is a huge thread on this proposal: http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=24055.400 )

Modify: change word; add link
« Last Edit: 02/25/2011 09:56 pm by fotoguzzi »
My other rocket is a DIRECT Project 2

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