Author Topic: Wingo Op Ed: Establishing the VSE  (Read 23391 times)

Offline wingod

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RE: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #40 on: 04/25/2008 07:20 pm »
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OV-106 - 22/4/2008  11:52 PM

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jml - 22/4/2008  9:56 PM

Shuttle-C may save some initial development and infrastructure costs, but side mount payload implies a need for an EELV to serve as crew launcher.

Why?

Please note that I went out of my way not to mention a rocket ANY rocket as even the ESAS architecture with sufficient financial support could be successful.  The point was to get NASA to think about what is needed to get that financial support.



Offline wingod

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #41 on: 04/25/2008 07:23 pm »
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renclod - 23/4/2008  4:20 PM

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MarkWhittington - 23/4/2008  9:16 PM

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psloss - 23/4/2008  1:08 PM
Didn't some "anti-Mars" language make it all the way to the President's pen in the FY 2008 omnibus appropriations bill?  If so, that implies there is likely bipartisan "support" for this particular position.  

On the Mars language, it actually originated with House Democrats. While annoying, it did not rise to the level of being a sufficient reason to veto the bill and cause a government shut down.

For the record (my transcript, unofficial of course):

April 3, 2008 - Hearing

House - Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics
NASA's Exploration Initiative: Status and Issues

1:21:50 into the podcast

Representative Dana Rohrabacher (R - CA) :


I just want to make shure that people [who] read this record ... of this hearing ... that they do not come a way thinking that there is any type [of] consensus that we should be making Mars the driving force for prioritizing the spending that is about it... That would be perverse ! That would be giving up what we can accomplish today for something that is a majestic dream as we march to the future . But that's not the way to have a realistic and a responsible policy for America's space exploration.

Let me just for the record say that I'm one hundred percent in favour of that limitation saying that we should not be spending money on things that exclusively are for accomplishing a future manned Mars mission... that we have other things we need to do ...

Do we need to fix the Hubble telescope ? The chairman of this subcomitee took the leadership on insuring that we did not let that asset go. That costs us some money. Quite frankly I supported that...

Should we be making shure that we have a very robust system for identifying Near Earth Objects that may indeed be a threat to the Earth ? And should we establish a system on how to counteract those threats if we find something headed in our direction ? The answer is yes !

Should we be utilizing Space so we can put a greater effort into conserving and utilizing the Earth's resources for the benefit of human kind ? Yes !

All of those things cost money. It would be a horrible deservice to the people of the world - and especially to the taxpayers [in] the United States - for us to start prioritizing our spending based on the ideea of stepping human foot on Mars 30 or 40 years down the road. That would be a horrible misuse of the money when we have other things that we need to do, that can help people right now ... So let me make shure that that's thoroughly on the record.



Yep, and when you get a broad selection of congresspeople agreeing on a principle you damn well better listen.  THEY WRITE THE CHECKS.



Offline wingod

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #42 on: 04/25/2008 07:35 pm »
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MarkWhittington - 23/4/2008  1:44 PM

One other thing on Wingo's piece. He seems to assume that a plan to go back to the Moon can somehow be crafted that will have a broad enough political consensus that opposition to it will be nil or at least minimal. Political sustainability, as a lot of VSE critiques keep saying. This is folly, IMHO. No matter what kind of plan one comes up with, no matter what the justifications, there will be opposition. Barney Frank, whom Wingo quotes as the voice of the people, is a case in point. He would not care if it were proven that VSE contributes to the economic well being of the country. He would oppose it anyway because a pot of money would be spent on it that, in his mind, would better go to social welfare programs. There are just some people who are impervious to reason and, alas, many holds seats in the Congress. So sustaining VSE is going to be a constant effort. And sniping at it is not going to help very much.

What is being discussed is that there is and has been a continuing disconnect between the people that write the checks and the people that spend them at NASA.  Of course you will never have a full consensus on this, but all you need is just over a majority in both houses and a friendly white house.  

Without considering Barney Frank's position (60 Minutes obviously thought it was worthwhile) yo are doomed to failure in that you at least have to craft a counter to it.  I actually agree (as do most of the people on this site in a recent poll) that the Moon comes first.  Everything rational argues for this if we want a hope of building a spacefaring civilization.

Too many are not willing to sacrifice the perfect for the good, and when that happens the good fails.

More on this to come soon in another article.  Thanks for the feedback here and in other arenas.  I have gotten some extremely interesting replies from very interesting places.





Offline Bill White

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #43 on: 04/25/2008 09:02 pm »
Always remember the Golden Rule: He who writes the checks makes the rules.
EML architectures should be seen as ratchet opportunities

Offline daver

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #44 on: 04/25/2008 10:16 pm »
Thanks Wingod, truly enjoyed the article.

Offline gospacex

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RE: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #45 on: 04/25/2008 10:37 pm »
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ChrisInAStrangeLand - 25/4/2008  4:48 AM
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gospacex - 23/4/2008  11:21 PM
Stop for a second and realize that non-hydrogen fuels also exist, and for the Moon it can turn out that it's much easier to produce and use those instead.
I agree, the Apollo samples brought back were absolutely drenched in hydrazine and rp1.

No they were not.

I am talking about fuels which contain no hydrogen at all. For example, active metals (Al,K,Mg etc). Would you agree that those are abundant on the Moon?

Offline kraisee

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #46 on: 04/25/2008 11:19 pm »
I thought Dr. Hinners comment in reply to Mr. Rohrabacher's was extremely valid though - essentially that there are architectures which start with a Mars mission profile and work backwards to Lunar.   They define a profile in which you really do get to test systems on the moon which will eventually take you further afield when the time & funding is right.

The legislation limits make this more efficient approach "tricky" though.

I believe there are benefits to not limiting the program to "pure" Lunar architectures alone - and instead creating a more "generic" approach which can eventually grow to take us anywhere.

While I can certainly see the validity of not spending money on Mars which doesn't have to be spent yet, I am equally glad that there are enough loopholes around current legislation which allow us not to get bogged down in exclusive Lunar-only development.


Dennis' article does a very good job of opening the debate up and focusing on the bigger picture rather than the minutae.   He's helping to make sure we don't exclude valuable options at this early stage, options which might really be useful in 10 or 20 years time.

It is all-too easy to lose sight of the fact that we aren't trying to just do a replica of the short 6-landing Apollo program - that the VSE is supposed to be the first steps in a sustainable long-haul program which starts us down the very long path towards ever-wider expansion into space.   Making the right/wrong choices now, will have critical repercussions in the long-term and we need to keep that in mind during these early phases.

My hat off to Dennis for trying to raise the subject to a higher profile for discussion before we get totally fixed into one set of decisions that may, or may not, be helpful beyond just returning to the moon.

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

Offline A_M_Swallow

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #47 on: 04/26/2008 01:13 am »
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kraisee - 26/4/2008  12:19 AM

While I can certainly see the validity of not spending money on Mars which doesn't have to be spent yet, I am equally glad that there are enough loopholes around current legislation which allow us not to get bogged down in exclusive Lunar-only development.

Time to talk about manned trips to the asteroid belt?

Offline A_M_Swallow

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RE: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #48 on: 04/26/2008 01:24 am »
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gospacex - 25/4/2008  11:37 PM

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ChrisInAStrangeLand - 25/4/2008  4:48 AM
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gospacex - 23/4/2008  11:21 PM
Stop for a second and realize that non-hydrogen fuels also exist, and for the Moon it can turn out that it's much easier to produce and use those instead.
I agree, the Apollo samples brought back were absolutely drenched in hydrazine and rp1.

No they were not.

@gospacex, her sarcastic comment was agreeing with you.  She forgot to add a ;)

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I am talking about fuels which contain no hydrogen at all. For example, active metals (Al,K,Mg etc). Would you agree that those are abundant on the Moon?

Powdered solids will require new engines to be developed.  Current space pumps cannot handle solids.

On the Earth powders are sometimes pumped using fluids.  LOX is a fluid and expands when boiled.


On Mars reusable launch vehicles could use 2 CO + LOX = 2 CO2
A reversible process.

Offline kraisee

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #49 on: 04/26/2008 03:10 am »
What studies have been done regarding making a solid propellant from lunar regolith materials?

I can imagine a number of mixtures, but the 'rubberized' bonding agent seems to be the unknown factor.   If a suitable bonding agent can be made, I could imagine a company like ATK one day getting a contract to build disposable or reusable SRB's which can have their mixtures processed and poured on the lunar surface.

I don't see it being at an industrial scale for quite a long time, but I see it happening on the distant horizon unless a really good nuclear option comes in and just blanket-replaces all in-space propulsion methods outright (go EMC2!).

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

Offline kraisee

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #50 on: 04/26/2008 03:12 am »
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A_M_Swallow - 25/4/2008  9:13 PM

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kraisee - 26/4/2008  12:19 AM

While I can certainly see the validity of not spending money on Mars which doesn't have to be spent yet, I am equally glad that there are enough loopholes around current legislation which allow us not to get bogged down in exclusive Lunar-only development.

Time to talk about manned trips to the asteroid belt?

*Precisely*

Nothing to do with Mars at all ;)

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

Offline wingod

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #51 on: 04/26/2008 04:22 am »
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kraisee - 25/4/2008  10:10 PM

What studies have been done regarding making a solid propellant from lunar regolith materials?

I can imagine a number of mixtures, but the 'rubberized' bonding agent seems to be the unknown factor.   If a suitable bonding agent can be made, I could imagine a company like ATK one day getting a contract to build disposable or reusable SRB's which can have their mixtures processed and poured on the lunar surface.

I don't see it being at an industrial scale for quite a long time, but I see it happening on the distant horizon unless a really good nuclear option comes in and just blanket-replaces all in-space propulsion methods outright (go EMC2!).

Ross.

More like a hybrid with an aluminium solid and LOX as the oxidizer.  Isp of about 250-300 if memory serves. Bova talks about it in his book welcome to moonbase and references some work done in the 80's on the subject.



Offline wingod

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #52 on: 04/26/2008 04:25 am »
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kraisee - 25/4/2008  10:10 PM

What studies have been done regarding making a solid propellant from lunar regolith materials?

I can imagine a number of mixtures, but the 'rubberized' bonding agent seems to be the unknown factor.   If a suitable bonding agent can be made, I could imagine a company like ATK one day getting a contract to build disposable or reusable SRB's which can have their mixtures processed and poured on the lunar surface.

I don't see it being at an industrial scale for quite a long time, but I see it happening on the distant horizon unless a really good nuclear option comes in and just blanket-replaces all in-space propulsion methods outright (go EMC2!).

Ross.

I continue to be amazed at long time spacers who do not understand that ISRU is far closer than anyone thinks, based upon a lot of work in the mining industry here on the Earth that wins metals out of poorer and poorer quality ores.

There are many processes that win metals and oxygen from regolith that can be put on an Atlas or Delta vehicle and sent to the Moon directly.  3600 kg from a Delta IV Heavy is a pretty darn good payload.

This is why we must bring in a wider community than is currently the case with aerospace engineers in the return to the Moon.



Offline A_M_Swallow

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #53 on: 04/26/2008 10:28 pm »
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wingod - 26/4/2008  5:22 AM
More like a hybrid with an aluminium solid and LOX as the oxidizer.  Isp of about 250-300 if memory serves. Bova talks about it in his book welcome to moonbase and references some work done in the 80's on the subject.

An experiments with powdered aluminium and LOX is mentioned on this website.
http://www.space-rockets.com/lsp.html

See AIAA 94-2842, AIAA 92-3450 and AIAA 86-1763 by J.H. Wickman for further details.

Offline A_M_Swallow

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #54 on: 04/26/2008 10:31 pm »
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wingod - 26/4/2008  5:25 AM
I continue to be amazed at long time spacers who do not understand that ISRU is far closer than anyone thinks, based upon a lot of work in the mining industry here on the Earth that wins metals out of poorer and poorer quality ores.

There are many processes that win metals and oxygen from regolith that can be put on an Atlas or Delta vehicle and sent to the Moon directly.  3600 kg from a Delta IV Heavy is a pretty darn good payload.

This is why we must bring in a wider community than is currently the case with aerospace engineers in the return to the Moon.

Has anyone written and costed a plan for producing lunar ISRU materials within say 5 years?

Offline wingod

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Re: Spaceref Article by Dennis Wingo: Establishing the VSE
« Reply #55 on: 04/26/2008 10:53 pm »
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A_M_Swallow - 26/4/2008  5:31 PM

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wingod - 26/4/2008  5:25 AM
I continue to be amazed at long time spacers who do not understand that ISRU is far closer than anyone thinks, based upon a lot of work in the mining industry here on the Earth that wins metals out of poorer and poorer quality ores.

There are many processes that win metals and oxygen from regolith that can be put on an Atlas or Delta vehicle and sent to the Moon directly.  3600 kg from a Delta IV Heavy is a pretty darn good payload.

This is why we must bring in a wider community than is currently the case with aerospace engineers in the return to the Moon.

Has anyone written and costed a plan for producing lunar ISRU materials within say 5 years?

Mike Duke has.  I have his recent charts.  There is a lot of stuff that is going on well outside of the aerospace community such as the cast basalt used for water pipes in Germany, acid leach methods for copper, gold, and platinum mining in Africa.  There was also  work by Rockwell that was never published using magma electrolysis and flourine methods to get metals and oxygen out of regolith.  There has been some recent work on the Carbonyl process that has been published.  Just google nickel carbonyl for more info.  Mark Sonter from Australia did his masters thesis on metals processing on asteroids that also pertains to lunar resources of these metals.

There was a good paper at the LPSC this year (2045.pdf) that basically validates my hypothesis regarding the surviviability of low velocity impactors.


I am pretty well plugged into what is going on.


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