Author Topic: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight  (Read 53341 times)

Offline muomega0

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #60 on: 09/03/2012 04:36 pm »
I drag out the TO problem of Ares...

You really have no understanding of what the problem really was.

He has lots of opinions, however.

I do have some understanding of the former, and I do have a lot of the latter.   Pretty good observations.

You need to adjust the ratio.

First, from the snappy comebacks department.

It was pointed out that I have "no understanding of what the [TO] problem really was".  A group of people were paid $11B in part because they asserted that they, being rocket scientists, understood TO, and late changes to the OML, and who knows how many other issues besides.  They lost the support of their own political constituencies, because they couldn't produce.

Why?  Maybe they don't understand what they're doing either.  At least I don't pretend to be an expert.

Second, as to adjusting the "ratio".  Presumably this is some ratio of the number of my expressed opinions to the demonstration of my technical knowledge underlying certain failed programs?  As always, I will continue to read on these topics.

I don't know the technical abilities of the various site lurkers.  I have asked questions about why certain decisions on prioritization have been made.  It cannot have gone unnoticed that the types of answers which dominate the responses have to do with my ignorance, leaving the questions unanswered.  [Snif.]  Yes, this does hurt my feelings, but I'll get over it.

It remains that one of the cost drivers in HSF is exactly that managerial arrogance will not serve to solve difficult technical problems.  Neither will late changes in fundamental design requirements.  At some point, reducing payload mass results in a rocket not getting off the ground.  Even politicians understand this, eventually.

Here is a partial explanation.  One adjusts the ratio of frequencies such that the lower stage, which may be excited by a vibration due to the solids near the end of the burn, does not have the same frequency as the upper stage.  Damping can be added too.  The further the two frequencies are apart, the less chance for amplification.  Note that the lower stage is consuming mass, so its frequency is always changing.
MIT video on resonance beat frequency


--------------
The real cost of Ares I was carrying the crew and its effect on LAS mass:

The SRB debris field creates a substantial penality on LAS mass  Start at ~3min
In this particular example, the mass is overestimated as it went from 9000lbs to 22,000 lbs.
« Last Edit: 02/10/2017 08:51 pm by muomega0 »

Offline muomega0

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #61 on: 09/03/2012 05:05 pm »
An interesting report but it is concerned with poor prediction of cost in science mission payloads, not with lowering the cost of human spaceflight.

The subject line says "spaceflight," not "human spaceflight." And because so many of these discussions seem devoid of references to actual reports on the subject, I think a little data is not going to hurt the discussion.
I would argue that the bureaucracy in both HSF and SMD is one of the primary, if not the primary, causal factor in both schedule slip and cost projection errors.  You simply cannot calculate what FAR based contracting will do.  It grows.

Another is the mentality in NASA management that if a program gets started, it will be finished.  Rightly so, no one on Capitol Hill wants to kill a NASA project, even when it is so screwed up its at least a eight years behind schedule and $7 billion over budget.

When you have "incompetent and arrogant" NASA managers running around saying a billion dollars doesn't buy you much, you have a problem. 


I simply disagree when people tell us the private sector cannot build an HLV.  Are you telling me ULA cannot?  I think they can, I think their best people believe so too... for billions less.


Respectfully,
Andrew Gasser
TEA Party in Space

Could you be more specific on what you mean by "bureaucracy"?

The historical costs of just the SSME, ET, and SRB contracts totaled $1B/year.  For sake of argument, suppose half this is bureaucracy, so only 500M is needed for the main parts.

Now add contractor integration, assembly, avionics, etc.(500M).  Or is this bureaucracy?

Launch operations (500M).

Do not forget to recover 10B or 20B over 10 or 20 years for the development costs. (1 to 2B/year)

Summary :  1.5B   + 1/2B/year to recover development costs. 

So perhaps the HLV can be developed for billions less, but as Augustine stated, even if you were handed the HLV for free and operational, nasa could not afford to operate it.  Nor should they because the product lines are not needed.

So when someone says $1B does not buy you much,  can you see how this likely applies to HLV?   Do you have ways to reduce the above costs?  The private sector is free to build a HLV, why are they not doing so?

Yes Bureaucracy (lobbyists telling Congress to build an HLV) is driving costs right now.   Without the HLV, NASA could save $60B over 20 years and conduct the same missions.

Further, NASA receives bids for almost all of the LV work since 80% of NASA is outsourced, so are the contractors overbidding the work or are the NASA managers arrogant and incompetent for taking bids that are too large? 

Offline ChileVerde

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #62 on: 09/03/2012 05:08 pm »
The most intractable problem with Shuttle-type SRBs is not vibration or risk, it is cost. Even if they are made expendable (apparently the plan as the SRB retrieval ships have been sold)...

Just for the record:

Quote
http://www.space.com/17224-shuttle-rocket-recovery-ship-merchant-marine.html

NASA's Space Shuttle Rocket Recovery Ship Gets New Mission
Robert Z. Pearlman, collectSPACE.com
Date: 22 August 2012 Time: 11:46 AM ET

<snip>

On Tuesday (Aug. 21), NASA signed a memorandum of understanding with the U.S. Transportation Department's Maritime Administration (MARAD) to transfer the agency's solid rocket booster recovery ship, MV Liberty Star, to the National Defense Reserve Fleet to be used for training at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy in Kings Point, NY.

<snip>

Edit: More:

Quote
http://uspolitics.einnews.com/pr_news/111215777/nasa-maritime-administration-announce-new-home-for-liberty-star

NASA, Maritime Administration Announce New Home For Liberty Star
PR Newswire
WASHINGTON, Aug. 21, 2012

<snip>

NASA will continue to have access to Liberty Star if the agency requires its use and it is available.

<snip>

NASA still is working to identify a suitable new use for M/V Freedom Star, the other recovery ship.

<snip>
« Last Edit: 09/03/2012 05:19 pm by ChileVerde »
"I can’t tell you which asteroid, but there will be one in 2025," Bolden asserted.

Offline JohnFornaro

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #63 on: 09/04/2012 07:14 pm »
An interesting report but it is concerned with poor prediction of cost in science mission payloads, not with lowering the cost of human spaceflight.

The subject line says "spaceflight," not "human spaceflight." And because so many of these discussions seem devoid of references to actual reports on the subject, I think a little data is not going to hurt the discussion.

I agree and appreciate the reference.

Neither does the subject line say "unmanned" spaceflight.  Should we be talking about "alien" spaceflight?

Both manned and unmanned spaceflight suffer from issues which drive costs higher.

Appreciate as always the references and other documentation.
Sometimes I just flat out don't get it.

Offline vulture4

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #64 on: 09/09/2012 02:44 pm »
An interesting report but it is concerned with poor prediction of cost in science mission payloads, not with lowering the cost of human spaceflight.

The subject line says "spaceflight," not "human spaceflight." And because so many of these discussions seem devoid of references to actual reports on the subject, I think a little data is not going to hurt the discussion.

I agree and appreciate the reference.

Neither does the subject line say "unmanned" spaceflight.  Should we be talking about "alien" spaceflight?

Both manned and unmanned spaceflight suffer from issues which drive costs higher.

Appreciate as always the references and other documentation.
Good points. Although they have no current requirement for human spaceflight, the DOD is moving forward with an ambitious and (IMO) pretty well-structured plan for reducing the cost of launch, beginning with development of a reusable booster stage. Their reasoning is that the booster stage has the lowest pressure and thermal loads during its descent through the atmosphere, so is the logical initial target for reuse.

The cost of SRB reuse was of course quite high, but this was a function of 1) the need for offshore recovery, 2) the need to completely disassemble and rebuild the SRBs between launches, in part due to salt water exposure, and 3) the complexity and cost of the solid-propellant refueling process, requiring  shipping the fueled segments across the country and fabrication of major elements including insulation and nozzles.  Even the solid propellant itself was much more expensive than cryogenic liquid rocket propellants. None of the DOD reusable booster stage concepts (SFAIK) utilize solid propellants or offshore recovery. The major unknown is whether a winged booster with runway recovery or a vertical landing concept is more practical.

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/news/beyondnextgen.html

Offline AnalogMan

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #65 on: 09/29/2012 12:10 pm »
Thought this just-released report may be of interest to readers of this thread:

NASA's Challenges to Meeting Cost, Schedule, and Performance Goals
Office of Inspector General, Audit Report IG-12-021, September 27, 2012

"Over its 50-year history, NASA has been at the forefront of science and space exploration and is justifiably proud of its numerous scientific discoveries and technological innovations. However, many NASA projects cost significantly more to complete and take much longer to launch than originally promised. In this era of constrained Federal budgets, NASA’s ability to deliver projects on time and within budget is more important than ever if the Agency is to maintain a robust portfolio of science and space projects.

This report examines NASA’s project management practices to better understand the Agency’s challenges to achieving its cost, schedule, and performance goals.  In conducting this review, we interviewed 85 individuals, including the Administrator, Deputy Administrator, Associate Administrators, Center Directors, project managers, project staff, former NASA Administrators and staff, and external parties. We also solicited input from other NASA employees through an internal Agency blog. The findings we present in this report are primarily based on our analysis of the input we received and additional information from previous studies conducted by NASA, our office, the Government Accountability Office, and other organizations."


Four factors were identified that appear to present the greatest challenge to successful project outcomes - these are:

•  NASA’s Culture of Optimism
•  Underestimating Technical Complexity Increases Cost and Schedule Risk
•  Funding Instability Can Lead to Inefficient Management Practices
•  Limited Opportunities for Project Managers’ Development

The 72-page report can be found here:
http://oig.nasa.gov/audits/reports/FY12/IG-12-021.pdf

Offline JohnFornaro

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #66 on: 09/29/2012 02:31 pm »
I just posted this on another thread, where although the discussion asks what is the next mission after MSL, the only acceptable answer appears to be MSR.

Part of what is happening on that other thread is readily applicable to the entirety of NASA.  The "Optimism" referred to in the OIG report is incorrectly labeled, in my opinion.  It should be called: "Willfull Substitution of Optimism over Realism".

I repost here.

One of the interesting things we learned while doing Aerospace Corp's CATE process on the decadal surveys was that the advocates are often pretty good at estimating their own costs. The problem is that their estimates don't take into account the external factors that they are not able to control.

The problem?  Per the OIG, this is but one of the many problems in having the advocates estimate their own costs.  In fact there are multiple problems, broken down into four factors.  It would be a mistake to limit the discussion to merely the CATE process and merely to planetary science.

http://oig.nasa.gov/audits/reports/FY12/IG-12-021.pdf

(From an editorial standpoint, and for reading clarity, I inserted the "outline" titles of the four factors in the body of the OIG text.  If this is a struggle for some, via a chain of reasoning concluding that I have distorted the fundamental reading of the report, then tackle the document itself, linked above.  In addition, I bolded a select few items below, as they pertain to the quoted post above.)

Quote from: OIG report
Multiple factors underlie NASA’s historical inability to consistently meet project cost, schedule, and performance goals. However, based on our interviews with 85 individuals involved in all levels of project development, we identified four factors [my bold] that appear to present the greatest challenges to successful project outcomes.

Factor I: NASA’s Culture of Optimism

However, this same optimism can sometimes prevent managers and leaders from making critical assessments of requirements, budgets, and schedules to determine what a project can realistically accomplish within a set budget and timetable. To this point, when asked whether their projects had been successful, every project manager we interviewed answered in the affirmative, regardless of the project’s fidelity to cost and schedule goals. ...

From our discussions with senior NASA officials and project managers, we identified three related ways in which optimism contributes to cost and schedule challenges. First, the mindset has manifested itself in a lack of documented success criteria for cost and schedule performance in NASA projects. ...

Second, NASA’s culture of optimism appears to increase the difficulty of developing and maintaining realistic cost estimates. Many interviewees indicated that project managers and senior NASA leaders are often hesitant to admit they cannot overcome technological challenges or meet mission requirements within the funding profile provided. ...

Finally, many project managers we spoke with mentioned the "Hubble Psychology"– an expectation among NASA personnel that projects that fail to meet cost and schedule goals will receive additional funding and that subsequent scientific and technological success will overshadow any budgetary and schedule problems. ...

Factor II: Underestimating Technical Complexity Increases Cost and Schedule Risk

Project managers cited the technical complexity inherent in most NASA projects as a major challenge to achieving cost and schedule goals. Five sub-factors [my bold] explain the inherently uncertain nature of estimating costs for the types of space technologies NASA develops. First, because NASA projects often involve technologies that are new and unique, many development efforts do not have readily available historical data, cost models, lessons learned, and other information project managers can use to estimate the effort needed to develop the required technologies. Second, NASA projects often involve combining several interdependent technologies to accomplish novel missions, and the resulting complexities are often difficult to predict. Third, NASA systems generally require more testing than other development efforts because, unlike land-based systems, they function remotely in space where repair or replacement is extremely difficult or impossible. Fourth, because space systems are often one-of-a-kind instruments, NASA cannot produce them in sufficient quantities to benefit from manufacturing economies of scale where the average cost of a product decreases as quantity increases.  Lastly, according to many of the interviewees, the quality and availability of parts and instruments procured from some contractors has decreased over time. This affects managers’ ability to estimate project costs accurately because a part’s poor quality may not be evident until testing has begun, resulting in the need for costly rework or identifying alternative suppliers late in development. ...

Factor III:Funding Instability Can Lead to Inefficient Management Practices.

Nearly 75 percent of the individuals we interviewed stated that funding instability was among the most significant challenges to project management. ...

Funding instability can result in inefficient management practices that contribute to poor cost, schedule, and performance outcomes. For example, inadequate funding in the early phases of a project’s life cycle decreases management’s ability to identify and address key risks at project inception. Moreover, in the absence of sufficient funding, project managers may have to defer the development of critical technologies to a time when integration of those technologies may be more difficult or when the costs of material and labor may be greater. In some cases, shifting tasks to later project phases may require managers to sustain a workforce longer than originally planned or add shifts in an attempt to make up for lost time, both of which can lead to increased costs. For example, an independent review of the JWST Project noted that deferred work can potentially result in overall costs doubling or tripling due to its impact on other work.

Interviewees noted that funding instability originates primarily from two sources: external decisions [my bold] made by the President and Congress and internal decisions [my bold] made by Agency personnel. ... Although it is difficult to quantify the cost and schedule impacts to individual projects, many interviewees said starting the fiscal year without an approved budget can force project managers to delay work, limits the Agency’s ability to make necessary program changes, and prevents the Agency from beginning new projects.

While external factors may contribute to funding instability, internal [my bold] Agency decisions also play a significant role. ... NASA leadership often takes funds from the budgets of other program areas to cover those increased costs. ...

Factor IV: Limited Opportunities for Project Managers’ Development.

[Here, the gist is that hands on experience is of crucial importance for project managers.  There is much learning gained by these managers over the years, growing from smaller missions to flagship missions.  There are not as many smaller missions these days, and the flagship missions suffer from the lack of personnel experience, contributing to cost overruns.]

Conclusion

Nevertheless, in our judgment NASA needs a “unity of effort” – strong, consistent, and sustained leadership by the President, Congress, and NASA management – to meet the challenges outlined in this report and achieve more consistent fidelity to cost and performance goals. Articulating a clear, unified, and sustaining vision for the Agency and then providing the necessary resources to execute that vision is a critical cornerstone of success. For their part, NASA leaders must temper the Agency’s culture of optimism by requiring realistic cost and schedule estimates, well-defined and stable requirements, and mature technologies early in project development. In addition, to the extent possible they must ensure that funding is adequate and properly phased and that funding instability is identified as a risk and accounted for in risk mitigation strategies. Finally, they must be willing to take remedial action when these critical elements are not present.

Although technological innovation and mission success as defined by scientific advancement and discovery are central to NASA’s core existence, an appropriate balance must be struck that also recognizes the importance of meeting project cost and schedule goals. Accordingly, we believe that NASA needs to find ways to reward managers for good stewardship of NASA’s resources as enthusiastically as it does for successful technological achievements and to hold managers appropriately accountable for mismanagement of resources. With renewed focus on and appropriate recognition of technical, cost, and schedule risks and rewards, NASA project managers will be better positioned to meet the performance goals expected by Congress and the U.S. taxpayer.

Quote from: BlackStar
The advocates hated this, because it drove up the cost of the things they wanted to do, and also because they viewed it as an affront, as if somebody was calling them deceitful. But it is really a very hard-headed, senior management approach to the issue.

Congress and the Executive branch can be blamed for a great number of problems with our country, and more narrowly, NASA.  So-called "external" factors are part and parcel of the American experience.  What is lost to certain NASA managers is that the "Hubble Psychology" is totally wrong.  When they "take affront" at this, or insist that their feelings are hurt when criticized for bloated programs, they willfully become part of the problem.

I take great exception to the first factor, as worded by the OIG, a "Culture of Optimism", because this ends up being a false characterization. 

The first factor more correctly, albeit more wordily, should be: "Willfull Substitution of Optimism over Realism".  Note how the OIG points out what I think is the cost problem: "...when asked whether their projects had been successful, every project manager we interviewed answered in the affirmative, regardless of the project’s fidelity to cost and schedule goals".  "Every" project manager.  Every project manager is an advocate.  Cost is no object, according to every "advocate".  A willful substitution of optimism over realism.

We really don't need that bogus bill suggested by Rep. Wolf, creating a new appointed, unaccountable bureacracy to fix these problems.  We don't really need a ten year term, but I think it would help.  What we need is for NASA to accomplish its goals on time and on budget.  Then it could demonstrate that it deserved 1%.

Romance without finance don't stand no chance.
Sometimes I just flat out don't get it.

Offline vulture4

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #67 on: 09/30/2012 12:52 am »
Dan Golden served through parts of three administrations and actually did cut resources for some projects causing them to fail through resource starvation, but overscoped JWST and set it firmly on the path to excessive cost.  As long as we refuse to fund large projects unless the cost is underestimated, we aren't going to get accurate estimates.

Any meaningful R&D involves uncertainty, and the logical way to proceed is the incremental process traditional in aviation, where you didn't commit to production until you had a flying prototype that performed reasonably well. Unfortunately we learned the wrong lesson in Apollo, that a major development project could, through the magic of systems engineering, be simulated on paper, built, and flown. Even for aircraft this isn't true; compare the A380 (big, but no revolutionary tech) with the 787 (average in size, but required major advances in the state of the art and years of delay). The MSL worked, and I applaud it, but an evolutionary approach with a series of probes would have made more sense, a one-off design of that complexity is generally low in reliability and high in cost.

As to Mr. Wolf, he like most of Congress thinks that you can get engineers to do the impossible (i.e. make SLS/Orion fly with the amount of funds available) as long as you pass a law that says they will be beaten to a pulp if they fail.

Offline JohnFornaro

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #68 on: 09/30/2012 02:17 pm »
As long as we refuse to fund large projects unless the cost is underestimated, we aren't going to get accurate estimates.

Huh?

As long as we refuse to fund large projects unless their costs are properly estimated, we aren't going to get accurate estimates?

Quote
Unfortunately we learned the wrong lesson in Apollo, that a major development project could, through the magic of systems engineering, be simulated on paper, built, and flown.

This is way off.  Apollo was not Boeing's Dreamliner.  Mercury and Gemini missions proved flight capabilities.  And Apollo had a couple of accidents as well.  Systems engineering played a part, and so did paper, but the magic was old fashioned.  Design, build, test, fly.  Over and over again, until successful.
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Offline spectre9

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #69 on: 10/01/2012 06:36 am »
The magic happened because everything NASA needed to do the mission they wanted was being built.

They don't do it that way anymore.

Like vulture says - "underestimate and you will be funded"

Pretending you don't need entire parts of the architecture and you're not sinking cost for nothing into the parts you are building is all part of it.

Offline JohnFornaro

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #70 on: 10/01/2012 01:28 pm »
Here is a partial explanation.  One adjusts the ratio of frequencies such that the lower stage, which may be excited by a vibration due to the solids near the end of the burn, does not have the same frequency as the upper stage.  Damping can be added too.  The further the two frequencies are apart, the less chance for amplification.  Note that the lower stage is consuming mass, so its frequency is always changing.

Thanks for that info.  Without getting too sidetracked, here's what I think:

They tried, towards the end of the program, a damper, sold to the public as a shock absorber, which only cost what, about 2 tons of payload?  Rather than address the problem from the very beginning of the design, as suggested in the common reference, they addressed the problem late in the design, after hardware was, well, "cast in concrete".  If I remember correctly, the SRB features a finocyl arrangement of the grain.  Straight thru the tube.  I looked at some of the vibration charts of the burn.  It seemed to me, that if the vibrations were generally predictable at certain points of the burn, that the finocyl could have a varying profile, such that the frequencies could cancel each other out to a measurable extent.  Knowing something about the way the grain is presently cast, how a varying profile could be cast would be a manufacturing challenge.  Rather than try and solve the manufacturing challenge first, I would try and model the burn, and run a simulation to see if there is anything to my theory.  Successive runs of the simulation could fine tune the exact profile required.  I do understand that modeling the stochastic process of the burn is not a simple matter, largely because it is not fully understood.  But hey, that would be my approach.

Were I an administrator, say, who would not have a doctorate in this specific field, I would direct research along these lines after a discussion about its theoretical validity.  But that's not my domain; instead, I broach the subject here, in part, because of the learning experience, in part as what might be a helpful suggestion.
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Offline JohnFornaro

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #71 on: 10/01/2012 01:29 pm »
Like vulture says - "underestimate and you will be funded"

Oh my garnet. 

I reread his post.  I thought I was a cynic!
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Offline spectre9

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #72 on: 10/02/2012 03:41 am »
I consider myself a realist.

The plan to me looks like they just want to have a warehouse full of SLS cores and then build the payloads after, way after.

Then just hope they have enough big rockets to do something.

Offline QuantumG

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #73 on: 10/02/2012 03:51 am »
This sums it up..

Half do Apollo 8, then redo Apollo 8, then ??? no idea, why are you asking?

Big Rocket!

Human spaceflight is basically just LARPing now.

Offline spectre9

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #74 on: 10/02/2012 04:07 am »
I think Orion is poorly justified.

Why does it need to be so large to do a BLEO reentry?

Just to fit one more person in?

NASA can't afford 3 man Apollo missions. Why are they planning for a 4th astronaut?

Offline JohnFornaro

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #75 on: 10/02/2012 01:36 pm »
It's not the meat of the capsule it's the motion of the rocket.   Not the best paraphrase of "It ain't the meat, it's the motion", but hey.

There's nothing wrong with the size of the Orion capsule.  The problem is that they propose to waste launch vehicles by purposely reframing the direction to sensibly evolve to a larger LV into a neurotic obsession with creating a BFR as quickly as possible, for deliberately faulty reasons.
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Offline BeanEstimator

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #76 on: 10/02/2012 07:29 pm »
Thought this just-released report may be of interest to readers of this thread:

NASA's Challenges to Meeting Cost, Schedule, and Performance Goals
Office of Inspector General, Audit Report IG-12-021, September 27, 2012

Four factors were identified that appear to present the greatest challenge to successful project outcomes - these are:

•  NASA’s Culture of Optimism
•  Underestimating Technical Complexity Increases Cost and Schedule Risk
•  Funding Instability Can Lead to Inefficient Management Practices
•  Limited Opportunities for Project Managers’ Development

The 72-page report can be found here:
http://oig.nasa.gov/audits/reports/FY12/IG-12-021.pdf

In the spirit of offering more than just the above mentioned four reasons for the apparent cost growth...here is an integrated list (little dated) going back to documented reasons in the 70's.  You'll find that a lot of the "X's" continue throughout the decades.
Note:  My posts are meant to discuss matters of public concern.  Posts and opinions are entirely my own and do not represent NASA, the government, or anyone else.

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Offline neilh

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #77 on: 10/02/2012 07:45 pm »
In the above chart, why was "lack of probabilistic estimating" a reason for cost growth in the 80s and 00s, but not in the 90s?
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Offline BeanEstimator

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #78 on: 10/02/2012 08:45 pm »
In the above chart, why was "lack of probabilistic estimating" a reason for cost growth in the 80s and 00s, but not in the 90s?

it just wasn't found in any documents on cost growth in that time period.  not that it wasn't 'an issue'...it just isn't cited by any doc in that time period. 

NASA didn't institute probabilistic estimating policies until late in the 00s (circa 06 IIRC)

NASA now has a joint cost/schedule probabilistic policy at KDP-C and individual probabilistic (cost & sched) at KDP-B.
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Offline neilh

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Re: Understanding What Drives Costs in Spaceflight
« Reply #79 on: 10/03/2012 01:53 am »
In the above chart, why was "lack of probabilistic estimating" a reason for cost growth in the 80s and 00s, but not in the 90s?

it just wasn't found in any documents on cost growth in that time period.  not that it wasn't 'an issue'...it just isn't cited by any doc in that time period. 

NASA didn't institute probabilistic estimating policies until late in the 00s (circa 06 IIRC)

NASA now has a joint cost/schedule probabilistic policy at KDP-C and individual probabilistic (cost & sched) at KDP-B.

Thank you for the explanation.
Someone is wrong on the Internet.
http://xkcd.com/386/

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