Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

To: Dawggie
“I was thinking that Q was hinting that President Trump is ordering the construction of two new Space Shuttles”

That is an interesting question. My opinion is that any new shuttles would need to be designed from the ground up. The shuttle was originally designed with 1960/70s technology. I would hazard a guess that a good portion of the as designed parts do not even exist anymore.

Designing a new shuttle would be a monumental task and I honestly do not think NASA has the ability to manage such a task in a timely manner. A good portion of the talent has died or retired. Just my professional opinion.

It would be awesome though.


During the early 80s, I worked as a young engineer in the stealth department for General Dynamics (now Lockheed-Martin) in Fort Worth, Texas. I traveled to Air Force Plant Number 3 in Tulsa, Oklahoma to visit a scientist/professor who wrote a classified paper in the area I worked. He was a consultant for Rockwell at the facility. As part of my visit, he took me on a short tour of part of the facility. The only thing I remember was the autoclave forms used to manufacture the shuttle's bay doors. Wow, they were huge! You are correct, to start up that program again would be a large effort just in the manufacturing process.

As a funny side note, our facility in Fort Worth was Air Force Plant Number 4. The massive facility was built during WWII and the first plane flew out a year and a day after groundbreaking. It was pretty close to identical to Air Force Plant Number 3 in Tulsa - with one important distinction. A Ft. Worth landowner agreed to donate the land for the facility under one condition, that the slightly more than a mile-long facility would be slightly longer than the one under construction in Tulsa. Everything's gotta be bigger in Texas. :)
1,128 posted on 05/18/2018 7:45:26 PM PDT by tang-soo (Prophecy of the Seventy Weeks - Read Daniel Chapter 9)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1013 | View Replies ]


ofn


1,129 posted on 05/18/2018 7:47:17 PM PDT by xone
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1128 | View Replies ]

To: tang-soo

[“I was thinking that Q was hinting that President Trump is ordering the construction of two new Space Shuttles”]

I never could figure out why they retired them in the first place. They were much safer than the means they now use to get astronauts to the space station.


1,279 posted on 05/19/2018 6:34:17 AM PDT by stars & stripes forever (Blessed is the nation whose GOD is the LORD. Psalm 33:12)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1128 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson