Military Rockets: Solution For Nasa?

Orlando Sentinel ^ | December 30, 2008 | Robert Block

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

For more than three years, NASA chief Michael Griffin has maintained that the safest, most reliable and affordable way to return astronauts to the moon is on the Ares I, a rocket he helped design from parts of the space shuttle. Alternatives, he insisted, such as modified military rockets, were simply not capable of carrying humans to the moon and beyond.

But interviews, as well as documents obtained by the Orlando Sentinel, indicate that military rockets can lift astronauts safely into space -- and to the moon -- for billions less and possibly sooner than NASA's current designs.

While it's not clear how the next administration wants to proceed with NASA's lunar ambitions, one aerospace-industry official confirmed that NASA recently asked Kennedy Space Center to start examining the impacts of scrapping NASA's own Ares I rocket design and switching to modified versions of the military's Atlas V and Delta IV rockets as the agency's next-generation human spaceships

[dr_who]

You mean like a Redstone rocket?

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

Like the Atlas V,Delta V and the EELV rockets.

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

Titan IV,Delta IV rockets

[hornetguy]

This was too obvious. Isn’t the Titan IV a super rocket? Can’t extra stages be added if they want to go to the moon?

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

The Titan IV is a “stretched” Titan III with non-optional solid rocket boosters on the two sides. The Titan IV could be launched with either the Centaur upper stage, the NASA Inertial Upper Stage (IUS), no upper stage at all. Its a posibility.

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

The only problem with the Titan IV that is very expensive to produce.

[thecabal]

Are we revisiting Project Mercury?

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

I would include also Project Gemini too. They relied heavily in Titan II missiles.

[DemforBush]

I wish I knew enough about the technical aspects of this issue to know who’s right. The modified military rocket approach seems to make sense - it’s readily available and would build on proven designs. But I just don’t know enough about the safety factors and other considerations to really say for sure.

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

The Russians and the Chinese use military rockets to launch satellites and manned craft.During the Soviet period, most Russian military payloads reaching the orbit would be identified only as Kosmos satellites with particular numbers. Any civilian satellites, whose purpose the government would not want to explain, would also receive Kosmos names. To this day, the Russians use military rockets.

[Oztrich Boy]

Think they've got the R-7 Semyorka development cost amortized yet?

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

Their Proton Rocket was originally designed to carry a 100 megaton bomb.Proton initially started life as a “super ICBM.” It was designed to throw a 100-megaton nuclear warhead over a distance of 13,000 km.

[r9etb]

The Titan IV is a “stretched” Titan III with non-optional solid rocket boosters on the two sides. The Titan IV could be launched with either the Centaur upper stage, the NASA Inertial Upper Stage (IUS), no upper stage at all. Its a posibility.

Titan IV isn't built anymore. The basic mission would be covered by the Delta IV heavy, though.

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

I knew that. Maybe come back from retirement

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

See post#7

[r9etb]

I wish I knew enough about the technical aspects of this issue to know who’s right. The modified military rocket approach seems to make sense - it’s readily available and would build on proven designs. But I just don’t know enough about the safety factors and other considerations to really say for sure.

It makes good sense .... the biggest problem is the difference between satellite-rated and man-rated. You need to "add 9s" to the reliability numbers once you put people on-board -- which means a lot more people and a lot more safeguards, and that adds a lot to the cost.

Still, they're part of an existing product line, and if you could create some sort of re-usable command module that would be good.

[r9etb]

The Titan IV is not even built anymore. The last launch of a Titan IV was in 2005.

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

I knew that also.

[r9etb]

All the tooling is either gone or reassigned to Atlas V production, which is pretty well booked up. The technology for Titan IV is obsolete and pretty much unavailable.

The Delta IV Heavy booster is a fair equivalent, however.