Commercial Crew - Discussion Thread 3

[Zed_Noir]

I really want Starliner to fly all its planned crew rotation missions following CFT.

People on social media are thinking it’ll fly only once or twice and be scrapped. Or never fly at all.

Starliner is also part of Blue Origin's Orbital Reef program so if that goes forward there is additional potential there.

But isn't that contingent on Starliner being certified/man rated on Vulcan? Orbital Reef sounds like they are willing to buy if available, but who is the sucker who is going to pay for the cert first?

That may be the plan but if something happened their choice would be (finish) paying for cert of Starliner, develop own vehicle or buy a Dragon flight, the latter of which is probably not a realistic option.

From the technical and economic perspectives, Crew Dragon, Soyuz, or the Chinese spacecraft are the only options, so you are using "realistic" in some other sense. Presumably Dream Chaser and Starship will become available eventually.

Ahem. The only current option is additional Crew Dragon flights. Maybe with the Starliner flights added as an option if someone pays for certifying it on another booster or two.

The Soyuz and the Shenzhou are too small in crew and payload carrying capacities. Nevermind the geo-political hundles.

DreamChaser will take a lot of time and money to be able to carry people to orbit and back.

If the Starship is operational, the whole Orbital Reef concept is toasted. IMO.

[erioladastra]

I really want Starliner to fly all its planned crew rotation missions following CFT.

People on social media are thinking it’ll fly only once or twice and be scrapped. Or never fly at all.

Starliner is also part of Blue Origin's Orbital Reef program so if that goes forward there is additional potential there.

But isn't that contingent on Starliner being certified/man rated on Vulcan? Orbital Reef sounds like they are willing to buy if available, but who is the sucker who is going to pay for the cert first?

That may be the plan but if something happened their choice would be (finish) paying for cert of Starliner, develop own vehicle or buy a Dragon flight, the latter of which is probably not a realistic option.

From the technical and economic perspectives, Crew Dragon, Soyuz, or the Chinese spacecraft are the only options, so you are using "realistic" in some other sense. Presumably Dream Chaser and Starship will become available eventually.

Due to political considerations Soyuz and a Chinese spacecraft are not realistic options.  Crewed Dreamchaser is a possibility but the same issue there as certifying Starliner on their own dime.  And realistically there is no way in heck Bezos would buy a Dragon flight I suspect.

[Zed_Noir]

I really want Starliner to fly all its planned crew rotation missions following CFT.

People on social media are thinking it’ll fly only once or twice and be scrapped. Or never fly at all.

Starliner is also part of Blue Origin's Orbital Reef program so if that goes forward there is additional potential there.

But isn't that contingent on Starliner being certified/man rated on Vulcan? Orbital Reef sounds like they are willing to buy if available, but who is the sucker who is going to pay for the cert first?

That may be the plan but if something happened their choice would be (finish) paying for cert of Starliner, develop own vehicle or buy a Dragon flight, the latter of which is probably not a realistic option.

From the technical and economic perspectives, Crew Dragon, Soyuz, or the Chinese spacecraft are the only options, so you are using "realistic" in some other sense. Presumably Dream Chaser and Starship will become available eventually.

Due to political considerations Soyuz and a Chinese spacecraft are not realistic options.  Crewed Dreamchaser is a possibility but the same issue there as certifying Starliner on their own dime.  And realistically there is no way in heck Bezos would buy a Dragon flight I suspect.

It's either flying on the Crew Dragon or no Orbital Reef, IMO. As stated up thread if Bezos waits too long and the Starship becomes operational, could render the Orbital Reef concept moot. As it is, might be already too late for the current Orbital Reef concept to be implemented.

[erioladastra]

It's either flying on the Crew Dragon or no Orbital Reef, IMO. As stated up thread if Bezos waits too long and the Starship becomes operational, could render the Orbital Reef concept moot. As it is, might be already too late for the current Orbital Reef concept to be implemented.

Well that assumes Bezos wouldn't go it alone.  If I have learned anything about him he goes his way at his pace where he wants to go. 

The Starship concept of ops for long term orbital style station is not really likely to make a true station, if there is actually a market(s), moot. 

[kevinof]

I figure there’s zero chance Orbital reef will get to orbit in less than 10 years so the discussion is all mute. Right now Dragon is the only game in town and if Bezos and co don’t like that then they had better get busy. But I won’t hold my breath.

[deadman1204]

I really want Starliner to fly all its planned crew rotation missions following CFT.

People on social media are thinking it’ll fly only once or twice and be scrapped. Or never fly at all.

Starliner is also part of Blue Origin's Orbital Reef program so if that goes forward there is additional potential there.

But isn't that contingent on Starliner being certified/man rated on Vulcan? Orbital Reef sounds like they are willing to buy if available, but who is the sucker who is going to pay for the cert first?

That may be the plan but if something happened their choice would be (finish) paying for cert of Starliner, develop own vehicle or buy a Dragon flight, the latter of which is probably not a realistic option.

From the technical and economic perspectives, Crew Dragon, Soyuz, or the Chinese spacecraft are the only options, so you are using "realistic" in some other sense. Presumably Dream Chaser and Starship will become available eventually.

Due to political considerations Soyuz and a Chinese spacecraft are not realistic options.  Crewed Dreamchaser is a possibility but the same issue there as certifying Starliner on their own dime.  And realistically there is no way in heck Bezos would buy a Dragon flight I suspect.

It's either flying on the Crew Dragon or no Orbital Reef, IMO. As stated up thread if Bezos waits too long and the Starship becomes operational, could render the Orbital Reef concept moot. As it is, might be already too late for the current Orbital Reef concept to be implemented.

Again with this silly idea that starship will own all things space, cause there is no room for any other company. It seems to me there is more than 1 aircraft manufacturer, more than 1 automobile company, ect.

Besides, without competition, spaceX will become ULA 2.0. That is how business works.

[Zed_Noir]

<snip>

Due to political considerations Soyuz and a Chinese spacecraft are not realistic options.  Crewed Dreamchaser is a possibility but the same issue there as certifying Starliner on their own dime.  And realistically there is no way in heck Bezos would buy a Dragon flight I suspect.

It's either flying on the Crew Dragon or no Orbital Reef, IMO. As stated up thread if Bezos waits too long and the Starship becomes operational, could render the Orbital Reef concept moot. As it is, might be already too late for the current Orbital Reef concept to be implemented.

Again with this silly idea that starship will own all things space, cause there is no room for any other company. It seems to me there is more than 1 aircraft manufacturer, more than 1 automobile company, ect.
<snip>

I clearly stated the current Orbital Reef concept might be too late for implementation. Nothing about the viability of another Blue Origin orbital platform concept.

IMO, the Orbital Reef concept will likely not work as a second follow on orbital platform operator.

[yg1968]

https://twitter.com/SenBillNelson/status/1620571250132414464

[su27k]

Human spaceflight safety in a new commercial era

As important as that cultural shift is—encouraging debate, avoiding the normalization of deviance seen in both the Challenger and Columbia accidents—there is a bigger change with potential implications for safety. All three accidents NASA memorializes involve vehicles owned and operated by the agency. But, the last time NASA astronauts launched on such a vehicle was the final shuttle mission in 2011. Since they, they have flown to the space station—owned and operated by multiple governments—on either Russian Soyuz vehicles or commercial crew vehicles: SpaceX’s Crew Dragon and, as soon as this April, Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner.

That shift, at a minimum, changes the dynamic of safety with NASA no longer in full control. “It’s a challenge,” Nelson acknowledged. “Who, at the end of the day, if it’s a NASA mission, is responsible? It’s us. Therefore, we’ve got to look over their shoulder, we've got to ask the questions, and use the same degree of rigor that we would, if it were a government mission only.”

[yg1968]

The February award stipulates the contract runs through March 31, 2028.

The starting date of the February contract was in 2023 (if needed). But if you look at the current schedule, SpaceX-6 would be in 2023. Overall, I get an extra mission for SpaceX in 2023 (or in 2029 if Boeing-1 is ready in 2023) but other than that, it's one per year for SpaceX.

2023 SpaceX-6 and 7
2024 SpaceX-8 and Boeing-1
2025 SpaceX-9 and Boeing-2
2026 SpaceX-10 and Boeing-3
2027 SpaceX-11 and Boeing-4
2028 SpaceX-12 and Boeing-5
2029- SpaceX-13 and Boeing-6
2030- SpaceX-14 and perhaps one other mission to be awarded.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commercial_Crew_Program

It was mentioned today that they are targeting early 2024 for Starliner's PCM-1 mission. So with that I now get the following schedule:

2023 SpaceX-6 and 7
2024 Boeing-1 and SpaceX-8
2025 Boeing-2 and SpaceX-9
2026 Boeing-3 and SpaceX-10
2027 Boeing-4 and SpaceX-11
2028 Boeing-5 and SpaceX-12
2029 Boeing-6 and SpaceX-13
2030 SpaceX-14 and perhaps one other mission to be awarded.

[DanClemmensen]

Does this sound right?
With the just-ended Crew-5, the five CCP flights have covered about 854 days on-station at ISS or an average of about 169 days coverage per mission. If we multiply that by 20 (14 Crew Dragon, 6 Starliner) we get about 3381 days for the 20 missions. This is short by 270 days of the 3652 days of a decade that would end in November 2030, so Crew-14 would end its mission no later than end of February 2030.

To extend this NASA will need to either increase the average mission time. This should be possible since it's supposed to be 180 days. Alternatively, they can add a mission. Adding a Starliner mission is hard due to lack of Atlas Vs. Adding a Crew Dragon mission may be hard due to the constraint of five missions per capsule, a total of 20 missions for the four Crew dragons already includes at least seven non-CCP missions (4 flown, 3 planned).

[tbellman]

To extend this NASA will need to either increase the average mission time. This should be possible since it's supposed to be 180 days. Alternatively, they can add a mission. Adding a Starliner mission is hard due to lack of Atlas Vs. Adding a Crew Dragon mission may be hard due to the constraint of five missions per capsule, a total of 20 missions for the four Crew dragons already includes at least seven non-CCP missions (4 flown, 3 planned).

I don't believe the five missions per Dragon capsule is a hard constraint.  I.e, there's reasonable chance that the limit can be extended to more missions as they fly and gain experience in what things wear out and what don't.  Just like the "ten missions per Falcon booster" turned out to not be a hard limit.  Of course, there's also the risk that they find out that five was optimistic...

And as we get closer to 2030, there should be crew transport systems getting ready (and certified) for flying to the commercial station(s) that will replace the ISS.  That may include Starliner on Vulcan, Dream Chaser, and/or Starship.  These should all be capable of servicing the ISS as well.

(Then there's the theoretical possibilities of utilizing Soyuz, or possibly even Shenzhou, but especially the latter seems very unlikely for both technical and political reasons.)

[DanClemmensen]

To extend this NASA will need to either increase the average mission time. This should be possible since it's supposed to be 180 days. Alternatively, they can add a mission. Adding a Starliner mission is hard due to lack of Atlas Vs. Adding a Crew Dragon mission may be hard due to the constraint of five missions per capsule, a total of 20 missions for the four Crew dragons already includes at least seven non-CCP missions (4 flown, 3 planned).

I don't believe the five missions per Dragon capsule is a hard constraint.  I.e, there's reasonable chance that the limit can be extended to more missions as they fly and gain experience in what things wear out and what don't.  Just like the "ten missions per Falcon booster" turned out to not be a hard limit.  Of course, there's also the risk that they find out that five was optimistic...

And as we get closer to 2030, there should be crew transport systems getting ready (and certified) for flying to the commercial station(s) that will replace the ISS.  That may include Starliner on Vulcan, Dream Chaser, and/or Starship.  These should all be capable of servicing the ISS as well.

(Then there's the theoretical possibilities of utilizing Soyuz, or possibly even Shenzhou, but especially the latter seems very unlikely for both technical and political reasons.)

All true. However, I don't think NASA will let crewed flights fly on an F9 that has flown more than 4 prior flights. SpaceX uses its more experienced F9s for non-crewed missions.

SpaceX may also be able to build out one more Crew Dragon, which extends the total missions to 25. If 5 missions is a hard limit, they will need this anyway to fly that last mission. They seem to have at least the skeleton of an additional Crew Dragon already available.

And of course NASA may be OK with abandoning ISS in February 2030. I don't think they ever said when in 2030 they would turn the lights off.

[Zed_Noir]

FYI, SpaceX is building a fifth Crew Dragon capsule. Also that SpaceX plans to increase the number of missions for each capsule to about 10. From one of the Crew Dragon pre-launch press briefing by SpaceX's Sarah Walker.

[SummerFrog]

It's either flying on the Crew Dragon or no Orbital Reef, IMO. As stated up thread if Bezos waits too long and the Starship becomes operational, could render the Orbital Reef concept moot. As it is, might be already too late for the current Orbital Reef concept to be implemented.

Well that assumes Bezos wouldn't go it alone.  If I have learned anything about him he goes his way at his pace where he wants to go. 

Bezos may not collaborate with others and will pursue his own goals at his own pace. The operational concept of Starship for a long-term orbital station may not lead to a viable market for a true station, making it irrelevant.
The Starship concept of ops for long term orbital style station is not really likely to make a true station, if there is actually a market(s), moot.

[DanClemmensen]

It's either flying on the Crew Dragon or no Orbital Reef, IMO. As stated up thread if Bezos waits too long and the Starship becomes operational, could render the Orbital Reef concept moot. As it is, might be already too late for the current Orbital Reef concept to be implemented.

Well that assumes Bezos wouldn't go it alone.  If I have learned anything about him he goes his way at his pace where he wants to go. 

Bezos may not collaborate with others and will pursue his own goals at his own pace. The operational concept of Starship for a long-term orbital station may not lead to a viable market for a true station, making it irrelevant.
The Starship concept of ops for long term orbital style station is not really likely to make a true station, if there is actually a market(s), moot.

All near-term CLDs (your "true stations"?) seem to be built from elements that can be launched on heavy-lift LVs and then assembled in space. But Starship is a superheavy. This changes the game entirely, and AFIAK there are no serious near-term plans that take advantage of it. A custom non-EDL SS designed to be a station core could be larger than any of the currently-planned CLDs. It could be served by CCP-type missions until a crewed Starship can be certified.

[Asteroza]

It's either flying on the Crew Dragon or no Orbital Reef, IMO. As stated up thread if Bezos waits too long and the Starship becomes operational, could render the Orbital Reef concept moot. As it is, might be already too late for the current Orbital Reef concept to be implemented.

Well that assumes Bezos wouldn't go it alone.  If I have learned anything about him he goes his way at his pace where he wants to go. 

Bezos may not collaborate with others and will pursue his own goals at his own pace. The operational concept of Starship for a long-term orbital station may not lead to a viable market for a true station, making it irrelevant.
The Starship concept of ops for long term orbital style station is not really likely to make a true station, if there is actually a market(s), moot.

All near-term CLDs (your "true stations"?) seem to be built from elements that can be launched on heavy-lift LVs and then assembled in space. But Starship is a superheavy. This changes the game entirely, and AFIAK there are no serious near-term plans that take advantage of it. A custom non-EDL SS designed to be a station core could be larger than any of the currently-planned CLDs. It could be served by CCP-type missions until a crewed Starship can be certified.

Wait, weren't the Starmax guys doing hab modules that use the full payload of Starship though?

[DanClemmensen]

It's either flying on the Crew Dragon or no Orbital Reef, IMO. As stated up thread if Bezos waits too long and the Starship becomes operational, could render the Orbital Reef concept moot. As it is, might be already too late for the current Orbital Reef concept to be implemented.

Well that assumes Bezos wouldn't go it alone.  If I have learned anything about him he goes his way at his pace where he wants to go. 

Bezos may not collaborate with others and will pursue his own goals at his own pace. The operational concept of Starship for a long-term orbital station may not lead to a viable market for a true station, making it irrelevant.
The Starship concept of ops for long term orbital style station is not really likely to make a true station, if there is actually a market(s), moot.

All near-term CLDs (your "true stations"?) seem to be built from elements that can be launched on heavy-lift LVs and then assembled in space. But Starship is a superheavy. This changes the game entirely, and AFIAK there are no serious near-term plans that take advantage of it. A custom non-EDL SS designed to be a station core could be larger than any of the currently-planned CLDs. It could be served by CCP-type missions until a crewed Starship can be certified.

Wait, weren't the Starmax guys doing hab modules that use the full payload of Starship though?

Yep. I think it's dumb, because the payload bay of the SS that is carrying that module is by definition bigger than the module, so a non-EDL custom SS would have a larger volume even without much customization, and a non-EDL SS is cheap to build. Whatever they were going to build into the module can be built into the much more robust SS instead.

[edzieba]

It's either flying on the Crew Dragon or no Orbital Reef, IMO. As stated up thread if Bezos waits too long and the Starship becomes operational, could render the Orbital Reef concept moot. As it is, might be already too late for the current Orbital Reef concept to be implemented.

Well that assumes Bezos wouldn't go it alone.  If I have learned anything about him he goes his way at his pace where he wants to go. 

Bezos may not collaborate with others and will pursue his own goals at his own pace. The operational concept of Starship for a long-term orbital station may not lead to a viable market for a true station, making it irrelevant.
The Starship concept of ops for long term orbital style station is not really likely to make a true station, if there is actually a market(s), moot.

All near-term CLDs (your "true stations"?) seem to be built from elements that can be launched on heavy-lift LVs and then assembled in space. But Starship is a superheavy. This changes the game entirely, and AFIAK there are no serious near-term plans that take advantage of it. A custom non-EDL SS designed to be a station core could be larger than any of the currently-planned CLDs. It could be served by CCP-type missions until a crewed Starship can be certified.

Wait, weren't the Starmax guys doing hab modules that use the full payload of Starship though?

Yep. I think it's dumb, because the payload bay of the SS that is carrying that module is by definition bigger than the module, so a non-EDL custom SS would have a larger volume even without much customization, and a non-EDL SS is cheap to build. Whatever they were going to build into the module can be built into the much more robust SS instead.

That assumes that most of the module's cost is in the structure, not the fitout. It also would tie their entire business into a single vendor and a single product, whereas a module that can launch on multiple vehicles mitigates that external SPoF risk.

[DanClemmensen]

It's either flying on the Crew Dragon or no Orbital Reef, IMO. As stated up thread if Bezos waits too long and the Starship becomes operational, could render the Orbital Reef concept moot. As it is, might be already too late for the current Orbital Reef concept to be implemented.

Well that assumes Bezos wouldn't go it alone.  If I have learned anything about him he goes his way at his pace where he wants to go. 

Bezos may not collaborate with others and will pursue his own goals at his own pace. The operational concept of Starship for a long-term orbital station may not lead to a viable market for a true station, making it irrelevant.
The Starship concept of ops for long term orbital style station is not really likely to make a true station, if there is actually a market(s), moot.

All near-term CLDs (your "true stations"?) seem to be built from elements that can be launched on heavy-lift LVs and then assembled in space. But Starship is a superheavy. This changes the game entirely, and AFIAK there are no serious near-term plans that take advantage of it. A custom non-EDL SS designed to be a station core could be larger than any of the currently-planned CLDs. It could be served by CCP-type missions until a crewed Starship can be certified.

Wait, weren't the Starmax guys doing hab modules that use the full payload of Starship though?

Yep. I think it's dumb, because the payload bay of the SS that is carrying that module is by definition bigger than the module, so a non-EDL custom SS would have a larger volume even without much customization, and a non-EDL SS is cheap to build. Whatever they were going to build into the module can be built into the much more robust SS instead.

That assumes that most of the module's cost is in the structure, not the fitout. It also would tie their entire business into a single vendor and a single product, whereas a module that can launch on multiple vehicles mitigates that external SPoF risk.

A company that customizes an SS has an entirely different business model than a company that builds LV-agnostic modules.  It's a different way of thinking about the problem. The concept won't work until SpaceX creates a custom SS department or SpaceX decides to build it themselves.