Author Topic: Senate Commerce Committee Executive and Congress Version - July 15 onwards  (Read 710884 times)

Offline clongton

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but there's no way inline would be ready before sidemount, there's just too much new stuff on it.

You don't understand what Side-Mount really is then. That "thing" they hang on the side of the ET is not just a huge cargo canister. It's an entire rocket all it's own that has to be developed from scratch. There is no way in hell that can be deployed faster than the inline. Put propellant tanks inside the cargo bay and it flies without the ET. It's not a cargo carrier. It's a bloody great rocket with an internal cargo bay.
Chuck - DIRECT co-founder
I started my career on the Saturn-V F-1A engine

Offline clongton

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...wouldn't you think that the program that spent $10B and didn't produce much more than powerpoint slides
~Jon

It wasn't the *program* that spent the money. It was Mike Griffin and his hand-picked crowd pursuing the Griffin vision while totally, and it seemed at times, deliberately blind to reality. They are gone now, thank God!
Chuck - DIRECT co-founder
I started my career on the Saturn-V F-1A engine

Offline yg1968

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Any confirmation yet of White House backing of this bill?

There seems to be a confirmation from the White House in this article but it's not exactly a ringing endorsement:
http://www.spacenews.com/policy/100715-senate-nasa-bill.html

Quote
“While we are still in the process of reviewing the details of the draft, the bill appears to contain the critical elements necessary for achieving the President’s vision for NASA and represents an important first step towards helping us achieve the key goals the President has laid out,” the administration official said in a July 15 statement. “We look forward to continuing to work with Congress to help advance an ambitious and achievable space program — one that helps us blaze a new trail of innovation and discovery.”

« Last Edit: 07/15/2010 11:11 pm by yg1968 »

Offline Downix

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but there's no way inline would be ready before sidemount, there's just too much new stuff on it.

You don't understand what Side-Mount really is then. That "thing" they hang on the side of the ET is not just a huge cargo canister. It's an entire rocket all it's own that has to be developed from scratch. There is no way in hell that can be deployed faster than the inline. Put propellant tanks inside the cargo bay and it flies without the ET. It's not a cargo carrier. It's a bloody great rocket with an internal cargo bay.
*chuckles*  I am suddenly imagining someone with a bright idea of mounting two Delta IV on the side....
chuck - Toilet paper has no real value? Try living with 5 other adults for 6 months in a can with no toilet paper. Man oh man. Toilet paper would be worth it's weight in gold!

Offline simonbp

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You don't understand what Side-Mount really is then. That "thing" they hang on the side of the ET is not just a huge cargo canister. It's an entire rocket all it's own that has to be developed from scratch. There is no way in hell that can be deployed faster than the inline. Put propellant tanks inside the cargo bay and it flies without the ET. It's not a cargo carrier. It's a bloody great rocket with an internal cargo bay.

All that is true Chuck, but that doesn't mean an Inline would read any sooner. The "bloody great rocket" has just as many systems and complexity as Inline, but the load paths and LOX tank for Inline are unique, and add development time.

I'm not going to argue that Sidemount has lower recurring costs, but I do think it would be ready sooner. It's up to NASA HQ now to make the decision which is more important.

Offline alexw

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...wouldn't you think that the program that spent $10B and didn't produce much more than powerpoint slides
It wasn't the *program* that spent the money. It was Mike Griffin and his hand-picked crowd pursuing the Griffin vision while totally, and it seemed at times, deliberately blind to reality. They are gone now, thank God!
   How much of the MSFC (and Ares @ JSC?) senior management is still in place? (Apart from Jeff Hanley.) The same management that, apparently, either wasn't technically competent to see the Ares forest for the trees, or were ineffective at moving their concerns upstream?
   Obviously Griffin's top-down pressure is hugely to blame, but his plans were being executed, ineffectively, by others. What reason is there to believe that they will now execute inline efficiently as DIRECT?
    -Alex

Offline Pheogh

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and on that same line of thinking, do we or do we NOT want Mike Griffin's endorsement of this plan? Oh the irony's abound :)

Offline Namechange User

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...

I'm a tax-payer, I have no horse in this race other than seeing the best return on investment for my money.

I have been a part of many bids for computer equipment for the government, and I can't tell you how many times "favored" companies were chosen which cost multiple times more for the same or less capability, sometimes in the name of a single feature "check-box" (ignoring the more important features not included) but usually for no real reason. There were other competitors with similar price-points and features and quality as our systems, but they weren't chosen either. This is just one more example of the government not making a decision based on price/performance.

Is the idea that there should be a decision based on price/performance so outrageous that I have to be characterized as demanding "all the money"? Besides, I don't work for the government, the government works for me (as a tax-payer), so it's partly my money! The money belongs to the tax-payers, not to the government workers or the government contractors. I'm allowed to have an opinion on how it's spent, and I don't have to be happy when I think it's not being spent wisely.

SpaceX is great, but there are many other contenders out there. If a robust commercial system is to exist, there needs to be more than one.

I don't disagree with your preamble.  No one should.  That doesn't mean you have to abandon everything to achieve it. 

1.6 billion, or there abouts, for what the hard-corp advocates have compared to Gemini, should be sufficient.  SpaceX claims they did everything for less than the Ares 1 tower, approximately 500K.  As folks also like to point out, some of the rockets already exist and are flight proven, meaning Atlas and Delta.  Therefore, when factoring some amount of capital investment, 1.6 billion seems sufficient.

I'm just curious why you think it's a good idea to be rewarding failure and punishing success?  I mean, if you were a neutral party looking at this, wouldn't you think that the program that spent $10B and didn't produce much more than powerpoint slides should maybe possibly be treated less favorably than the company that spent less than $500M and put a vehicle all the way into orbit?  If this situation existed in some other government agency's domain, would you act the same way?

Me, I try to reward what I want to see more of. 

~Jon

Quite honestly Jon, I am not inclined to explain my rationale to someone who is only going to whine further, try to pick something apart, etc no matter what I say.  No one will change what you choose to believe no matter the data provided. 

Look at your comments on the this forum today, quite sad actually.  Even when you say you agree with me on a point, you still choose to place an unnecessary dig in at people, programs, etc you know next to nothing about. 

As I said earlier and will say again, I hope to work with everyone in this industry, because we are all in this together and must work to make this compromise work also.  Clearly not everyone feels the same.  Some believe they are better than others, feel entitled to tell everyone else how something should be done and everything else is utterly unacceptable, etc. 

Hopefully, as we move forward, we find most out there within industry and government are willing to make this work. 
« Last Edit: 07/16/2010 12:17 am by OV-106 »
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Offline HappyMartian

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Thank you Chris Bergin. Great job. Without you... No, I'm not even going to think about it!

Cheers and More Cheers!



Edited.
« Last Edit: 07/16/2010 01:37 pm by HappyMartian »
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Offline Silmfeanor

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As someone who just relatively recently got into the thick of all this legislationing and political process, my feeling is something along the lines of carefull optimism, with carefull being the key word. Although it certainly looks better than the previous proposal, I cant help feeling uneasy with the HLV without a goal thing, smells too much like CxP to me.

Let's say it like this; in 4-5 years, when im reviewing this topic, I hope I dont feel like I was overtly optimistic. I guess there still are interesting times ahead of us. I'll just have the good faith that everything will turn out for the better and hope that faith was warranted.

edit: I'd also like to extend thanks to Chris for these very accurate and timely updates and inside informations in the process. Gives me the chance to play prophet to a few less informed friends of me again, until I direct them to NSF of course.
« Last Edit: 07/16/2010 12:21 am by Silmfeanor »

Offline marsavian

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I'm just curious why you think it's a good idea to be rewarding failure and punishing success?  I mean, if you were a neutral party looking at this, wouldn't you think that the program that spent $10B and didn't produce much more than powerpoint slides should maybe possibly be treated less favorably than the company that spent less than $500M and put a vehicle all the way into orbit?  If this situation existed in some other government agency's domain, would you act the same way?

Me, I try to reward what I want to see more of. 

~Jon

5-seg SRB, J2-X, Orion, LAS, recovery system development and testing, test and launch facilities construction, new tooling are all a bit more than powerpoint now and none of it is really wasted going forward now.

http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=21787.msg596873#msg596873
« Last Edit: 07/16/2010 12:25 am by marsavian »

Offline Chris Bergin

Thank you Chris Bergin. Great job. Without you... No, I'm not even going think about it!

Cheers and More Cheers!

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Offline Jeff Bingham

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... so ISS is going to be serviceable only by COTS and the Russians till at least 2016-2017, with no US backup.

In addition to the ESA & JAXA modules, both EELV's have the capability to provide material support to ISS, at least excepting "the last mile". But that is solvable. 

I guess here's my question.  One of OV's and 51D's chief complaints about FY11 was that it left the station in the lurch.  This does almost *nothing* to change the situation (other than a single token extra shuttle flight), but now they're happy.  Why was "relying on commercial crew" then so unacceptable, but now, when the government doesn't really have any better backup options than before, it's now acceptable?  If they honestly were so worried about the fate of ISS before, I don't see how this new budget actually alleviates any of those concerns.  Which makes me doubt the sincerity of their concerns, even though I have a lot of respect for them as individuals.

Quote
It's the lack of a firm plan for the HLV that makes me nervous. What's it going to be used for? There are great possibilities, both good and bad, and without a plan or mission, it's too easy for extrordinary waste to set in at the cost of other more worthy efforts. I want the HLV, I really, really do, but I want it knowing how it's supposed to be used.

Bingo.  They're doing the same thing they accused FY11 of, just swap out "flagship technologies" for HLV/BEO spacecraft development. 

~Jon

Jon,

You might try reading the entire bill...and recognize that it is the product of a compromise among a WIDE range of views. "Compromise"....that's when all parties involved in a discussion or dispute try to find the place where they can all agree and establish a foundation from which each can see a path forward for the things they feel are important.
Offering only my own views and experience as a long-time "Space Cadet."

Offline Danderman

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Note to everyone: this is the Senate Authorization language, the House must agree, or there's no Authorization. Also, even if this is enacted into law, the people who write the checks, the Appropriations folks, must also agree - and its sure that they won't. Authorization's job is to make people happy, Appropriations' job is to get things actually running.

Offline yg1968

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Note to everyone: this is the Senate Authorization language, the House must agree, or there's no Authorization. Also, even if this is enacted into law, the people who write the checks, the Appropriations folks, must also agree - and its sure that they won't. Authorization's job is to make people happy, Appropriations' job is to get things actually running.


Nelson said the appropriators were also on board on this. Mikulski and Shelby were both supportive.

Offline Namechange User

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Note to everyone: this is the Senate Authorization language, the House must agree, or there's no Authorization. Also, even if this is enacted into law, the people who write the checks, the Appropriations folks, must also agree - and its sure that they won't. Authorization's job is to make people happy, Appropriations' job is to get things actually running.


And why are you so sure they won't....or do you really just hope they do not?  I believe it is the latter and you are just trying to make it sound like you are informed with some "insider" info. 
Enjoying viewing the forum a little better now by filtering certain users.

Offline yg1968

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Here is Senator Hutchison's statement:

http://commerce.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?p=Hearings&ContentRecord_id=7457bd6b-1721-4c17-994c-77595f3099ae&Statement_id=7ceb6eb1-6902-49d0-b9be-934420b484b8&ContentType_id=14f995b9-dfa5-407a-9d35-56cc7152a7ed&Group_id=b06c39af-e033-4cba-9221-de668ca1978a&MonthDisplay=7&YearDisplay=2010

Nelson's statement:

http://billnelson.senate.gov/news/details.cfm?id=326398&

I don't think anybody posted it yet, but here's Chairman Rockefeller's opening statement and summary of "key elements" of the bill:

http://commerce.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?p=PressReleases&ContentRecord_id=4ae69fe8-581d-4d10-85b0-5b15643680b9

According to Nelson's statement, $1.6B will be going to commercial crew development. So it's a bit more than in the July 13th proposed bill.

It just occurred to me that Nelson is possibly including the extra COTS money in his $1.6B total. So commercial crew might be less than $1.6B.

Offline neilh

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Note to everyone: this is the Senate Authorization language, the House must agree, or there's no Authorization. Also, even if this is enacted into law, the people who write the checks, the Appropriations folks, must also agree - and its sure that they won't. Authorization's job is to make people happy, Appropriations' job is to get things actually running.


Nelson said the appropriators were also on board on this. Mikulski and Shelby were both supportive.

Although as I mentioned previously, the figures Shelby gave in his statement don't add up with Nelson's figures for increased commercial crew funding. If the top-line is the same (as a number of senators have stated), the money's coming from somewhere, and that somewhere isn't clear yet.
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Offline neilh

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Nelson's statement:

http://billnelson.senate.gov/news/details.cfm?id=326398&

I don't think anybody posted it yet, but here's Chairman Rockefeller's opening statement and summary of "key elements" of the bill:

http://commerce.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?p=PressReleases&ContentRecord_id=4ae69fe8-581d-4d10-85b0-5b15643680b9

According to Nelson's statement, $1.6B will be going to commercial crew development. So it's a bit more than in the July 13th proposed bill.

It just occurred to me that Nelson is possibly including the extra COTS money in his $1.6B total. So commercial crew might be less than $1.6B.

I just read it through again, and you are indeed correct: "And, it bolsters commercial space ventures by allocating about $1.6 billion for development in the next three years"

Supposedly Warner's and Boxer's amendments for increased commercial crew and space technology funding were incorporated, though. If so, where's the money?
« Last Edit: 07/16/2010 12:58 am by neilh »
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Offline SpaceDave

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Warner's amendment was not included in the committee session. They will fight for it now when the bill goes to the Senate floor.

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