You mean SpaceDev's Dream Chaser space plane?
Conceptual design:
Shown on top of modified Atlas V rocket:
Posted on 02/13/2010 5:05:52 AM PST by saganite
It’s an interesting time in aerospace, and perhaps nowhere is it more interesting than at United Launch Alliance.
NASA proposes scrapping its existing plans for human space flight and instead looking to industry to develop the next rockets and spacecraft to get U.S. astronauts into orbit and beyond. A hard fight over the strategy shift is ahead in Congress, but the future of space flight seems destined to change no matter the outcome.
And all this comes at a time when Centennial-based ULA, the primary contractor for government satellite missions, completes the melding of the rival rocket divisions of Lockheed Martin Corp. and The Boeing Co. into one company.
The ULA picked Centennial as its headquarters in late 2006. Soon it will announce the location of a new headquarters campus consolidating its offices around the southern metro area.
CEO Michael Gass recently spent an hour answering questions about NASA’s strategy shift and the ULA’s evolution.
Asked what milestone he’s most proud of, it wasn’t the successful debut of the Delta IV Heavy rocket, the smashing of a rocket stage into the moon for NASA’s high-profile LCROSS project, or the company’s string of 39 consecutive successful launches since the merger.
Gass said he’s most proud of how ULA’s 4,200 employees dropped their former affiliations with Lockheed Martin and Boeing and worked to knit together the rival rocketmakers.
“One day you’re competitors and the next you’re in the same company, and people did that with such professionalism,” Gass said.
Veterans of Boeing’s Delta and Lockheed Martin’s Atlas rocket programs switched jobs after the merger to better integrate the company. The smoothness of ULA’s transition has been noted in the industry. The company averaged one mission per month without mishap while consolidating two corporate and rocket lineages.
Gass credited the teamwork of ULA employees and the steady pace of launches the company’s maintained.
“It sharpens the sword, and it makes the organization better,” Gass said.
Gass also described a future for NASA that, without his quite saying it, sounded like the agency’s human space flight strategy is drifting into the ULA’s sweet spot as a business.
NASA will need companies that can reach the International Space Station (ISS), which is expected to survive as an orbiting research post until 2020. ULA is the company that most regularly sends things into orbit, a status that becomes more glaring once the space shuttle fleet is grounded.
The shuttles retire later this year. America will rely afterward on seats NASA’s buying aboard Russian Soyuz capsules to get astronauts to the ISS until a domestic rocket is available.
ULA, particularly its Atlas V rocket, is an obvious candidates for some kind of role, perhaps becoming NASA certified as safe to carry astronauts (what’s known as “human rated”).
Gass suggested human rating isn’t a significant leap for his company. It already sends the government’s most sensitive satellites aloft, he said.
Other companies seek NASA business, too, of course.
The agency wants competition to keep costs down and foster innovation. NASA awarded two new entrants to the large rocket field a combined $3.5 billion in late 2008 to conduct cargo services to the ISS between 2010 and 2016.
Hawthorne, Calif.-based Space Exploration Technologies Corp., or SpaceX, won $1.6 billion for 12 resupply flights scheduled to start in December. It’s currently assembling its heavy-lift Falcon 9 rocket in Florida for a first full-blown test launch in spring.
Dulles, Va.-based Orbital Sciences is working with Minneapolis-based Alliant Techsystems Inc. — maker of space shuttle booster rockets — to build engines for its cargo rockets designed to fulfill a $1.9 billion contract for eight ISS resupply flights starting in 2011.
Broadening commercial heavy lift into orbit could bring down the price enough that it spurs a revolution in what’s possible for deeper space, Gass said. Make it reliable and cheaper to ferry things into orbit, and suddenly launching missions from low earth orbit to the moon or elsewhere in the solar system becomes more of a real possibility.
“That’s a game changer,” Gass said.
He stressed that the pursuit of such advances will lean on established players in aerospace and suggested they’ll probably spring from current technologies.
That includes the Orion capsule being built by Gass’ former colleagues at Lockheed Martin Space Systems Co.
NASA’s proposed budget eliminates funding for the agency’s Constellation program that was building the Orion and its rockets, the Ares I and Ares V, as a replacement for the space shuttle.
Gass joined a number of people in the industry I’ve talked to who say the country shouldn’t just walk away from the work that’s already gone into Orion.
“I personally hope we can leverage that incredible work and investment that’s been done,” he said.
He didn’t rule out Orion one day riding on a ULA rocket.
Under NASA’s new strategy, should it come to pass, the Orion could be among a number of crew vehicles bidding for work from NASA, and looking to the ULA and others for a lift toward the stars.
Instead of a rehashed Apollo capsule, why not a reduced size shuttle. Start with the Dyna-Soar, scale it up to carry 4-5 passengers, no cargo.
The shape of a capsule is best for re entry. Seems those guys back in the 60’s got it right the first time.
At least all the talent and skills will not be wasted, as will be lost when the massive firings within the NASA manned space divisons begin.
Of course none of these hopeful ventures get around the legal problems of direct private ventures into anything beyond LEO. For anything beyond LEO, all these companies will be totally reliant on NASA contracts - and thus still at the mercy of politicians and bean counters.
The laws of physics haven’t changed. Apollo was based on real science.
The shuttle design is more complex and has more opportunity for problems. Additionally, a smaller shuttle wouldn’t have the payload capabilities necessary.
Nasa contracting is nothing more then the same people handing their friends new contracts. But they are better than the Air Force contracting office.
NASA has done this before. They passed along transhab, the capsule now being produced by Bigelow Aerospace, and VASIMR, an electric propulsion system. Both of those programs, which NASA turned over to private companies because they couldn’t continue funding them, are nearing fruition. Moving viable projects from NASA to the private sector is a good idea no matter whose back gets scratched.
As I said, NO cargo capability. Leave that for unmanned drones. If you are going to have commercial flights, use a space plane. Those work for re-entry also, as we have seen for ~130 flights. Mounting it atop the booster removes the chances of damage to the thermal protection systems. You also have better re-usability.
A small version will be less complex, as there will be no big rocket engine on it, just a small one big enough to slow it down for re-entry. Overall, it would be no more complex than the Orion. For the other proposals to Orion, look here... http://www.astronautix.com/craft/cev.htm
Just out of curiosity, does anybody know why we’re still using rockets? Why aren’t we designing rail guns that can launch coffin sized pods? With our understanding of physics and some micro-maneuvering engines we could easily place the pods into an area small enough catch them. Everything we need could be broken down to coffin size and re-assembled. When we aren’t sending building materials and people, we could send water and oxygen. Although every load would be small, a rail launcher could be used 24/7/365.
My guess is, we’re still using rockets because we’ve always used rockets.
You mean SpaceDev's Dream Chaser space plane?
Conceptual design:
Shown on top of modified Atlas V rocket:
Good for launching certain things but anything that could be injured by the G loads (human bodies, electronics) aren’t good candidates. So far as I know, we’ve never used a rail gun to launch anything.
If you plan upon putting a human in this pod the acceleration would kill him/her.
The initial acceleration of the pod would be like a luge track roof support pole (traveling WAY over 90 mph) hitting a supine astronaut (luger) at rest. Disaster.
Gass said he’s most proud of how ULA’s 4,200 employees dropped their former affiliations with Lockheed Martin and Boeing and worked to knit together the rival rocketmakers.
“One day you’re competitors and the next you’re in the same company, and people did that with such professionalism,” Gass said.
Does anybody recall how many Amercans got the axe and how many were downsized and outsourced to China when they executed this merger?
Yes, although Lockmart had a spaceplane proposal too. It would also be launched on an Atlas.
Launching a man from Earth using a rail gun would kill him, but what about the moon? The big problem is that it would have to be a rail of about 12 km long. That’s doable, though.
My thinking was to send people up in capsules and have all their supplies waiting for them. However, the g-load problem could be solved if the body was completely surrounded by hyperoxiginated (breathable) water. The navy uses liquid suits for extremely deep dives. A fetuses, for an example of a body packaged in water, have survived accelerations that killed the mother, such as traffic accidents and falls from great heights. The real problems with launching somebody in a coffin-sized capsule are: 1. very limited life support. You’d better be 100% sure you can catch them in the allotted time, and 2. I get claustrophobic in small cars and I’d never ask somebody else to do something in the realm of personal danger that I wouldn’t or couldn’t.
There may be a problem with Atlas. I worked for an Atlas contractor and a direct on that contract told me the company had lost significant documentation. The follow-on hardware was being assembled by people who just knew how. It’s been a long time and I’m sure most of those people are gone. I never asked but I’m sure the reason the documentation hadn’t been re-assembled was that the company would never admit they had the problem and company thinking is; we only do stuff we’re paid to do. Company politics would prevent a manager from using company money to do something that the customer should (in company thinking) pay for. Can we still build the Atlas?
It’s possible that ongoing obsolescence solved the problem as documentation would have been created along with later hardware.
And you should know this because...? Perhaps you would favor handing out the contract to to low bidders riddled with PLA agents simply to get a low price?
Military procurement has always been terrible - it is the nature of the beast.
Army procurement used to operate on the principle: embezzle funds and buy shoddy hardware, ask for more;
Navy procurement used to operate on the principle: buy the best hardware, ask for more for its personnel;
Air Force procurement used to operate on the principle: buy all the best for its personnel, ask for more to buy hardware.
“Why aren’t we designing rail guns that can launch coffin sized pods?”
I think the g-forces would be prohibitive for a manned railgun launch. Projectiles can go hypersonic before they’ve even left the rails. You’d be a little puddle of goo at the back of the pod!
“And you should know this because”
Because I’ve been watching NASA procurement for a long time. For example their IT is procured through a Veterans Administration contract and they won’t look at anyone they haven’t done business with for 10 years.
Army and Navy procurement are better. The Air Force screwed up the new tanker despite 10 years of working on it. They screw up every major procurement they do. Delay after delay, cost overrun after cost overrun.
But perhaps you prefer to continue with the nepotism and corruption. So take your cheap shot about PLA agents and stuff it.
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