On March 23, 2021, NASA announced its updated acquisition plan to ensure continuous human presence in low-Earth orbit through the Commercial LEO Destinations (CLD) project. NASA is no longer pursing NextSTEP Appendix K.
Critical tenets of the acquisition strategy included:•Alignment with National and Agency guidance and direction •Supports National and Agency desire to have no gap of US presence •Provide opportunity for US leadership in LEO•Focus on key capabilities including continuous US human presence in LEO and continuation of research activities including US National Lab and exploration objectives •Ensuring competition to drive down costs and provide redundancy•Enabling maturation of industry capability and NASA requirements prior to committing to fixed-priced services contract
NASA’S FUTURE LEO NEEDS•NASA will be refining its post-ISS requirements during Phase 1. But, at this point, NASA estimates that we will require 2 crew on-orbit continuously and the ability to perform approximately 200 investigations annually.•Precise budget estimates for services are not available at this time and it depends on prices established by the Commercial LEO Destination provider(s). But NASA intends to spend many hundreds of million dollars annually for destination services.
DragonXL or just a full Starship.Or possibly launch a Dragon XL with Starship and recover the whole thing later.
Quote from: Robotbeat on 03/28/2021 04:45 amDragonXL or just a full Starship.Or possibly launch a Dragon XL with Starship and recover the whole thing later.When I brought up Dragon XL I was mostly thinking of the type of free flyer that docks with ISS, gets loaded with microgravity research/manufacturing, detaches, does its thing, reattaches, then is reset to repeat the process. Dragon XL with its Cygnus-like design is already well suited to winning this type of contract sooner rather than later. Convincing NASA it is safe to allow a spacecraft as massive as Starship to dock with ISS is something I believe to be easier said than done. I can see SpaceX writing up a proposal to get feedback but I don't see Starship winning this type of contract until later in the decade. I guess a Starship could bring this type of free flyer back for <insert reason> one day. It's not something I can argue in favor of being useful enough to do in the near future though.There are other types of free flyers we could also discuss. For example pre-merger Orbital ATK was proposing Cygnus variants with multiple ports, robot arms, airlocks, basically everything that is needed to recreate ISS's capabilities contained in modules that can dock themselves. In theory SpaceX could offer Dragon XL versions of those Cygnus variants. I don't see it happening though. Instead I think it is far more likely SpaceX will offer Shuttle-in-a-Starship to provide construction support to other companies that want to assemble their own full service stations.
73. Question: May companies propose to go to ISS as part of Appendix K or is that only for Appendix I?Answer: Proposals may include an ISS component or activities. However, the component or activity must be for a short, temporary time-frame and companies may not propose to use the commercial port location of Node 2 Forward—that is for Appendix I. Any docking or berthing proposals would need to meet ISS Visiting Vehicle requirements. A clarification of this point will be added to the final version [of] the Appendix K RFP.
Unlike NextStep Appendix I (which was awarded to Axiom), the free-flying habitat wasn't intended to be docked to the ISS, it was meant to be free flying. For the predecessor NextStep Appendix K, NASA had stated the following:Quote from: Appendix K Q&A Document73. Question: May companies propose to go to ISS as part of Appendix K or is that only for Appendix I?Answer: Proposals may include an ISS component or activities. However, the component or activity must be for a short, temporary time-frame and companies may not propose to use the commercial port location of Node 2 Forward—that is for Appendix I. Any docking or berthing proposals would need to meet ISS Visiting Vehicle requirements. A clarification of this point will be added to the final version the Appendix K RFP.
73. Question: May companies propose to go to ISS as part of Appendix K or is that only for Appendix I?Answer: Proposals may include an ISS component or activities. However, the component or activity must be for a short, temporary time-frame and companies may not propose to use the commercial port location of Node 2 Forward—that is for Appendix I. Any docking or berthing proposals would need to meet ISS Visiting Vehicle requirements. A clarification of this point will be added to the final version the Appendix K RFP.
Quote from: yg1968 on 03/29/2021 12:59 amUnlike NextStep Appendix I (which was awarded to Axiom), the free-flying habitat wasn't intended to be docked to the ISS, it was meant to be free flying. For the predecessor NextStep Appendix K, NASA had stated the following:Quote from: Appendix K Q&A Document73. Question: May companies propose to go to ISS as part of Appendix K or is that only for Appendix I?Answer: Proposals may include an ISS component or activities. However, the component or activity must be for a short, temporary time-frame and companies may not propose to use the commercial port location of Node 2 Forward—that is for Appendix I. Any docking or berthing proposals would need to meet ISS Visiting Vehicle requirements. A clarification of this point will be added to the final version the Appendix K RFP.If you're trying to argue a free flyer isn't allowed to dock to ISS you'd be better off not citing a source describing which proposals that include docking/berthing are acceptable.
I didn't say that it wasn't allowed to dock, I said that it wasn't meant to be docked to the ISS (full-time) unlike the Axiom module. The free flyer can only dock for a short time per the Q&A document. But companies could decide that they don't want to dock at the ISS at all. Docking to the ISS isn't a requirement. The free flyer is meant to be autonomous from the ISS.
(...)Aside: I haven't been able to find the Axiom thread. If someone can point me in the right direction so I can read and talk about Axiom in the appropriate thread I'd greatly appreciate it.
Under the former NextStep Appendix K, Free Flyer solicitation, it is interesting to note that NASA had indicated that CRS2 services would not be provided for the free flyer:Quote from: Former Appendix K Q&A43. Question: CRS2 services, do we assume that's available for the FF [Free Flyer]?Answer: No, contracted CRS2 services are specific to Station deliverables. [...]62. Question: Is it reasonable to provide both a habitation and transportation solution? Answer: Proposals should include the full technical approach and business case to demonstrate commercial FF [Free Flyer] viability.SpaceX could therefore decide to use Starship or Dragon2 to bring cargo up and down to its free flyer.
43. Question: CRS2 services, do we assume that's available for the FF [Free Flyer]?Answer: No, contracted CRS2 services are specific to Station deliverables. [...]62. Question: Is it reasonable to provide both a habitation and transportation solution? Answer: Proposals should include the full technical approach and business case to demonstrate commercial FF [Free Flyer] viability.
Quote from: yg1968 on 03/29/2021 02:16 amI didn't say that it wasn't allowed to dock, I said that it wasn't meant to be docked to the ISS (full-time) unlike the Axiom module. The free flyer can only dock for a short time per the Q&A document. But companies could decide that they don't want to dock at the ISS at all. Docking to the ISS isn't a requirement. The free flyer is meant to be autonomous from the ISS.OK, but I wasn't talking about Axiom's module station core construction plan. I don't know why you replied to me because I'm trying to talk about free flyers.Aside: I haven't been able to find the Axiom thread. If someone can point me in the right direction so I can read and talk about Axiom in the appropriate thread I'd greatly appreciate it.
