CCDev to CCiCAP to CCtCAP Discussion Thread

[saliva_sweet]

My gut feeling is that SpaceX may win the war with reuse but may lose a battle when it comes to NASA picking them for manned flight. I also like the way Sierra Nevada is positioning themselves internationally with Dreamchaser. The JAXA agreement is a good example of this.

It would be rather difficult for NASA to go with only Atlas V based designs with the current cumulus cloud rule violations over the future of RD-180.

[arachnitect]

My gut feeling is that SpaceX may win the war with reuse but may lose a battle when it comes to NASA picking them for manned flight. I also like the way Sierra Nevada is positioning themselves internationally with Dreamchaser. The JAXA agreement is a good example of this.

It would be rather difficult for NASA to go with only Atlas V based designs with the current cumulus cloud rule violations over the future of RD-180.

Why? There's no interruption.

NASA continues to rely on Atlas V, Antares, Soyuz, Progress, ISS Russian Segment, etc.

Maybe they want two LVs and that's fine, but the provenance of the engines is a not a valid issue.

[Hauerg]

As soon as all crew to iss, freight to iss, and man usaf launches depend on russian engines it CERTAINLY will be an issue.

[arachnitect]

As soon as all crew to iss, freight to iss, and man usaf launches depend on russian engines it CERTAINLY will be an issue.

What's USAF got to do with anything?

You think Dragon CRS is going away? HTV?

ISS is already entirely reliant on Russian support, including all crew rotation. Russian support becomes even more important after ATV-5. NASA wants to do seat swaps with Russia even after Commercial Crew comes online.

This noise about RD-180 is doubly irritating because the hypothetical supply interruption (which was never officially proposed and has been walked back anyways) didn't applied to commercial flights at all.

I can think of a few good reasons to not do CST/DC combo, but the engines are not an issue.

[saliva_sweet]

It would be rather difficult for NASA to go with only Atlas V based designs with the current cumulus cloud rule violations over the future of RD-180.

Why? There's no interruption.

NASA continues to rely on Atlas V, Antares, Soyuz, Progress, ISS Russian Segment, etc.

Maybe they want two LVs and that's fine, but the provenance of the engines is a not a valid issue.

Rogozin accomplished a lot with those two tweets. I can tell you there is a strong motivation to NOT keep US's long sought after domestic crew launch capability as the subject of his witticisms.

[Hauerg]

Well, YOU said there would be no issues with atlas v only options. If Wladimir has a bad day we might rethink if that is a good idea.
And spacex might or mightnot get crs2.

[arachnitect]

Russia/US are joined at the hip on ISS operations. Either partner can throw the whole business into chaos at a moment's notice no matter what LV US crew is on. A fully domestic crew vehicle doesn't change that.

NASA has no business passing over an otherwise superior provider on the basis of "uneasiness" about the engines.

[ncb1397]

1.)It sends the wrong signal to Russia to award new contracts for Russian engines at the current time.
2.)Bolden explains Commercial Crew's motivation as ending reliance on Russia and stopping the transfer of mllions of dollars to Russia for crew flights. Atlas V fails on both counts.
3.)ISS wise, having domestic crew access including the engine leaves only a Zvezda replacement module to continue ISS without the Russians.
4.)Atlas V award would only further cripple the U.S. propulsion industrial base while NASA's goal ostensibly is to promote U.S. space capabilities and technology.

[sghill]

I have not seen or heard anything that would dissuade me from thinking that SpaceX can and will finish first and offer the cheapest service.

I tend to agree because I keep thinking of the costs of an Atlas 5 launch versus an F9 launch.

[arachnitect]

1.)It sends the wrong signal to Russia to award new contracts for Russian engines at the current time.
2.)Bolden explains Commercial Crew's motivation as ending reliance on Russia and stopping the transfer of mllions of dollars to Russia for crew flights. Atlas V fails on both counts.
3.)ISS wise, having domestic crew access including the engine leaves only a Zvezda replacement module to continue ISS without the Russians.
4.)Atlas V award would only further cripple the U.S. propulsion industrial base while NASA's goal ostensibly is to promote U.S. space capabilities and technology.

1. Not NASA's problem. NASA is the carrot, other agencies get to be the stick.
2a. It's a lot less money, but yes, I'll concede the money one in principle.
2b."Reliance on Russia" is a relative measure; station is inoperable without the Russians. If people want to be 100% free of the Russians, they're gonna get sticker shock. If getting to the station with no Russian hardware is a priority for NASA, they certainly haven't been acting like it over the past decade.
3. "only a Zvezda replacement" is rather understating the problem. In the time it takes to figure that out, crew vehicle could be moved to a different LV or alternate engine could be ready.
4. 2 more RD-180s each year isn't going to change the situation for the U.S. industrial base. If anything, more demand for ORSC engines means a future domestic replacement could spread its fixed costs over more units.

NASA relies on other countries -including the Russians- for a part of almost anything they do. Russian engines are not sufficient reason to disqualify 2 of the 3 potential CCtCap providers.

[docmordrid]

I have not seen or heard anything that would dissuade me from thinking that SpaceX can and will finish first and offer the cheapest service.

I tend to agree because I keep thinking of the costs of an Atlas 5 launch versus an F9 launch.

So does Boeing,

http://m.aviationweek.com/awin/boeing-spacex-detail-capsule-test-plans

[John Mulholland, VP Commercial Programs]

"We'll be going over [to SpaceX] soon to see what it will take to make sure our new vehicle is compatible with the Falcon 9. If the price point stays extremely attractive then that is the smart thing to do.”

[ncb1397]

1.)It sends the wrong signal to Russia to award new contracts for Russian engines at the current time.
2.)Bolden explains Commercial Crew's motivation as ending reliance on Russia and stopping the transfer of mllions of dollars to Russia for crew flights. Atlas V fails on both counts.
3.)ISS wise, having domestic crew access including the engine leaves only a Zvezda replacement module to continue ISS without the Russians.
4.)Atlas V award would only further cripple the U.S. propulsion industrial base while NASA's goal ostensibly is to promote U.S. space capabilities and technology.

1. Not NASA's problem. NASA is the carrot, other agencies get to be the stick.
2a. It's a lot less money, but yes, I'll concede the money one in principle.
2b."Reliance on Russia" is a relative measure; station is inoperable without the Russians. If people want to be 100% free of the Russians, they're gonna get sticker shock. If getting to the station with no Russian hardware is a priority for NASA, they certainly haven't been acting like it over the past decade.
3. "only a Zvezda replacement" is rather understating the problem. In the time it takes to figure that out, crew vehicle could be moved to a different LV or alternate engine could be ready.
4. 2 more RD-180s each year isn't going to change the situation for the U.S. industrial base. If anything, more demand for ORSC engines means a future domestic replacement could spread its fixed costs over more units.

NASA relies on other countries -including the Russians- for a part of almost anything they do. Russian engines are not sufficient reason to disqualify 2 of the 3 potential CCtCap providers.

1. The carrot isn't leverage if the horse gets the carrot regardless. It is the US government's problem which NASA is a part of.
2. What sticker shock? 18 billion a year for NASA doesn't seem to bat an eyelid. 100 billion + for station construction didn't bat an eyelid. Besides, there are more efficient propulsion available for station keeping and attitude control that can reduce operating costs long term. It could be more life time cost nuetral then.
4.) death by a thousand pin pricks. Antares ISS resupply using NK-33, Atlas V using RD-180, commercial crew potentially using RD-180 not to mention the death of U.S. commercial in the 2000s. That SpaceX revived an industry that NASA and DoD oversaw the decimation of is simply miraculous.

Never said they would be disqualified, only that there are knocks against them and should be factors. There is nothing really stopping CST-100 and Dreamchaser from using Delta or Falcon though. It is up to Sierra Nevada and Boeing to update their proposals in light of the current environment. Yes, Delta costs about 50 million more per launch than Atlas but I would bet that is related more to launch rate and higher domestic wages than inherent to the vehicle. If NASA has a problem paying U.S. wages, I would suggest relocating Marshall Flight Center to Malaysia.

[guckyfan]

http://m.aviationweek.com/awin/boeing-spacex-detail-capsule-test-plans

That article is from 2013. I fell for that too.

[arachnitect]

1.)It sends the wrong signal to Russia to award new contracts for Russian engines at the current time.
2.)Bolden explains Commercial Crew's motivation as ending reliance on Russia and stopping the transfer of mllions of dollars to Russia for crew flights. Atlas V fails on both counts.
3.)ISS wise, having domestic crew access including the engine leaves only a Zvezda replacement module to continue ISS without the Russians.
4.)Atlas V award would only further cripple the U.S. propulsion industrial base while NASA's goal ostensibly is to promote U.S. space capabilities and technology.

1. Not NASA's problem. NASA is the carrot, other agencies get to be the stick.
2a. It's a lot less money, but yes, I'll concede the money one in principle.
2b."Reliance on Russia" is a relative measure; station is inoperable without the Russians. If people want to be 100% free of the Russians, they're gonna get sticker shock. If getting to the station with no Russian hardware is a priority for NASA, they certainly haven't been acting like it over the past decade.
3. "only a Zvezda replacement" is rather understating the problem. In the time it takes to figure that out, crew vehicle could be moved to a different LV or alternate engine could be ready.
4. 2 more RD-180s each year isn't going to change the situation for the U.S. industrial base. If anything, more demand for ORSC engines means a future domestic replacement could spread its fixed costs over more units.

NASA relies on other countries -including the Russians- for a part of almost anything they do. Russian engines are not sufficient reason to disqualify 2 of the 3 potential CCtCap providers.

1. The carrot isn't leverage if the horse gets the carrot regardless. It is the US government's problem which NASA is a part of.
2. What sticker shock? 18 billion a year for NASA doesn't seem to bat an eyelid. 100 billion + for station construction didn't bat an eyelid. Besides, there are more efficient propulsion available for station keeping and attitude control that can reduce operating costs long term. It could be more life time cost nuetral then.
4.) death by a thousand pin pricks. Antares ISS resupply using NK-33, Atlas V using RD-180, commercial crew potentially using RD-180 not to mention the death of U.S. commercial in the 2000s. That SpaceX revived an industry that NASA and DoD oversaw the decimation of is simply miraculous.

Never said they would be disqualified, only that there are knocks against them and should be factors. There is nothing really stopping CST-100 and Dreamchaser from using Delta or Falcon though. It is up to Sierra Nevada and Boeing to update their proposals in light of the current environment. Yes, Delta costs about 50 million more per launch than Atlas but I would bet that is related more to launch rate and higher domestic wages than inherent to the vehicle. If NASA has a problem paying U.S. wages, I would suggest relocating Marshall Flight Center to Malaysia.

If you want NASA to be more supportive of US rocket industry, I can understand that position, even if I don't agree that it's necessary. The 2 annual commercial crew flights are only a fraction of the job then: bring home Orion SM, stop using RD-180 for all science launches, stop accepting foreign launches in barter arrangements (JWST, GPM, GRACE-FO, etc).

For COTS, NASA had an explicit goal of bringing new LVs to the market. For crew NASA had no such luxury; look how CCdev > CCiCap >CPC/CCtCap weeded out anybody who was building new rockets. If NASA wants to implement a new industrial policy, kneecapping commercial crew at the 11th hour is the wrong way to go about it.

Never said they would be disqualified, only that there are knocks against them and should be factors.

How do you weight that factor? Either it's weighted enough to swing the competition or it's not a factor at all.

2. What sticker shock? 18 billion a year for NASA doesn't seem to bat an eyelid. 100 billion + for station construction didn't bat an eyelid. Besides, there are more efficient propulsion available for station keeping and attitude control that can reduce operating costs long term. It could be more life time cost nuetral then.

We've talked about this elsewhere, and how substantial of an undertaking it would be. The top line of NASA's budget looks big, but moving even $50M around causes a fight on capitol hill and throws somebody's life work out the window. And even if it could happen it would rely on the Russians for years during a tricky handover.

SpaceX revived an industry that NASA and DoD oversaw the decimation of is simply miraculous.

Oh come off it. Spacex would never have gotten where they are today without both NASA and USAF.

edit: had an acronym wrong

[sghill]

I have not seen or heard anything that would dissuade me from thinking that SpaceX can and will finish first and offer the cheapest service.

I tend to agree because I keep thinking of the costs of an Atlas 5 launch versus an F9 launch.

So does Boeing,

http://m.aviationweek.com/awin/boeing-spacex-detail-capsule-test-plans

[John Mulholland, VP Commercial Programs]

"We'll be going over [to SpaceX] soon to see what it will take to make sure our new vehicle is compatible with the Falcon 9. If the price point stays extremely attractive then that is the smart thing to do.”

So much for "best value."  I bet Michael Gass at ULA sh*t puppies when he read that!  By considering SpaceX for manned launches, Mulholland basically just stated that the F9 is as "safe" as Atlas for far less cost.  He publicly eviscerated the two justifications ULA gives for purchasing that launcher.  Boeing and LockMart won't even buy their own boosters!

[Oli]

So much for "best value."  I bet Michael Gass at ULA sh*t puppies when he read that!  By considering SpaceX for manned launches, Mulholland basically just stated that the F9 is as "safe" as Atlas for far less cost.  He publicly eviscerated the two justifications ULA gives for purchasing that launcher.  Boeing and LockMart won't even buy their own boosters!

Its not exactly surprising that F9 is more attractive for crew cost-wise. Atlas needs a special US (dual centaur) and 2 boosters in order to launch CST-100.

However I do not think NASA cares so much about cost when it comes to launching their astronauts.

[newpylong]

I have not seen or heard anything that would dissuade me from thinking that SpaceX can and will finish first and offer the cheapest service.

I tend to agree because I keep thinking of the costs of an Atlas 5 launch versus an F9 launch.

So does Boeing,

http://m.aviationweek.com/awin/boeing-spacex-detail-capsule-test-plans

[John Mulholland, VP Commercial Programs]

"We'll be going over [to SpaceX] soon to see what it will take to make sure our new vehicle is compatible with the Falcon 9. If the price point stays extremely attractive then that is the smart thing to do.”

So much for "best value."  I bet Michael Gass at ULA sh*t puppies when he read that!  By considering SpaceX for manned launches, Mulholland basically just stated that the F9 is as "safe" as Atlas for far less cost.  He publicly eviscerated the two justifications ULA gives for purchasing that launcher.  Boeing and LockMart won't even buy their own boosters!

Boeing and Lockheed do not make Atlas or Delta, and haven't for some time now. Legacy workers are now ULA.

Of course Boeing will go with what will profit that company if possible. If not possible, they will go with what makes their product work. They are not stupid.

[baldusi]

Interesting point is that Dual Centaur, probably because of human rating requirements, will require RL-10A4, even after the rest of the EELV migrate to RL-10C1/2. That will certainly impact its costs structure.

[sghill]

Boeing and Lockheed do not make Atlas or Delta, and haven't for some time now. Legacy workers are now ULA.

And who owns ULA......  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Launch_Alliance

[Jim]

Boeing and Lockheed do not make Atlas or Delta, and haven't for some time now. Legacy workers are now ULA.

And who owns ULA......  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Launch_Alliance

Not relevant.