To The Moon Bump.
WoaoaoaaoaoHH!!! Stop the gosh-darned presses!! We still have the Saturn V prints!? This isn't hugh, it isn't even merely HUGE, It's:
GIGANTIC!!!
I'm with you - substitutes/retools to get the parts we would need is not be that hard. Spending the money to scrub the requirements to get the hardware converted from 1960's tech to 2003 tech would be nigh-insignificant in comparison to ground-up development. It was a watershed of new ideas and was a system built to do a lot, reclaiming it's capability would be outstanding.
Ahh!! Man, I'll all in a tizzy about this!
I would be too stupid to destroy the Saturn 5 designs. They don't have to rebuild it. Just incorporate the best of Saturn 5 designs in future heavy lift vehicles.
One problem would be finding the needed vacuum tubes...maybe someone has an old console TV that could be raided?
The Saturn V is mid-60s tech. We can do oh so much better.
yes, but it's those "washers, nuts, bolts, connectors, gaskets, rivets, ball bearings, and clamps that aren't being made to those spec's any more.
It IS a real problem, but not the THE real problem.
See, would you REALLY want to rebuild a 1950-1960's era rocket, when a new design can give you more power and less weight ... and can be made cheaper. The Apollo 10-function "computer" weighed over 50 lbs and has less functions that a modern cell phone or calculator.... repeat that era design 10,000 times ...)
(Cheaper, that is, IF (and it's a big IF) NASA could really get off it's bureacracy and designed it as engineers, not paper-pushers....)
Here is a posting from Henry Spencer from about 16 months ago basicly describing how best to use current production aerospace hardware to improve the Saturn V for a 21st century lunar mission.
----
Newsgroups: sci.space.history
From:
henry@spsystems.net (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: What "low hanging fruit" would improve Apollo today?
Organization: SP Systems, Toronto, Canada
Message-ID:
H24zKo.H3M@spsystems.net References:
050920021612122367%aacaroll@coastside.net Date: Sun, 8 Sep 2002 20:29:12 GMT
Lines: 179
In article
050920021612122367%aacaroll@coastside.net, Andrew Carol
aacaroll@coastside.net wrote:
>I've often wondered what changes we could do to the basics of the
>Saturn V stack or the CSM and LM using technology available today, but
>without massive rocket hardware development costs.
Let's see. I assume we are (for some reason) specifically constrained to
build something resembling the Apollo/Saturn stack. If we were merely
going back to the Moon, we would almost certainly approach things rather
differently.
>In essence, I'd bet the basic mechanics were pretty good and while we
>could invent better engines the improvement would only be slight
>compared to the development costs. Not worth it.
Nope, not so. There was stuff available very nearly off the shelf in 1970
that would have produced sizable improvements, and even more so today.
For the first stage...
Even a second production batch of S-ICs then certainly would have had F-1A
engines (25% more thrust) and tank stretches. F-1 variants with roughly
50% more thrust were sketched. The main advantage of this is to permit
tank stretches, in the first and subsequent stages.
An interesting alternative would be the RD-172, which not only has about
as much thrust as the F-1A, and is currently in production, but has rather
higher Isp. (The RD-172 is used in Sea Launch; it's a slightly uprated
RD-170.)
We probably would not bother reworking the structure to carbon composites,
unless we had other ambitions for the first stage (see next paragraph),
because weight savings in the first stage of a three-stage rocket don't
increase payload all that much. We would probably do a general structural
scrub, reducing the conservatism of the design and eliminating useless
odds and ends like the fins, just on general principles.
If we were being more ambitious, we might consider Boeing's old S-ID
proposal, doing an Atlas stage-and-a-half trick on the S-IC: jettison an
outer structural ring, with the outer four engines, midway up. Not only
does that generally improve performance, but it makes the stage a useful
launcher in its own right: all by itself, no upper stage, it has about
the same payload to LEO as the shuttle. Here some carbon structure might
be useful.
Alternatively, we might go in a different direction, and revive the
Flyback F-1 proposed as a shuttle booster: add wings, jet engines, and
pilots, making the S-IC reusable. The extra mass would hurt payload, but
we could probably get most or all of that back with engine upgrades, tank
stretches, and lighter structure.
Oh, one thing we would do in any case is structural provisions for
strap-ons. The Apollo-era ideas in that direction were *big* solids, but
we'd probably want to use liquids, perhaps with the same engines. (The
Energia strap-ons might be interesting, especially if we were using
RD-172s in the S-IC. They're modified Zenit first stages, and I'm sure
the Ukrainians would be happy to get a production order...)
For S-II engines, the first option would be the J-2S, which was about
finished its development; it was mostly intended as a simplification
(that's what the S is for) but it did have slightly higher performance.
Also of interest, politics permitting, would be the Vulcain, which is the
same size, has noticeably higher performance, and is in production. Maybe
add an extension skirt to it to boost performance further, since we have
no need for sea-level operation. (The SSME probably would not be worth
the trouble, it's too expensive and the wrong size.)
Certainly we'd stretch the tanks, and get heavily into composites for the
structure. We might want to increase the outer ring of engines from four
to six -- there is room, although it would complicate gimbaling -- to add
some more thrust.
The third stage is where we'd really sweat engine performance and
structure mass. Maybe an SSME would be worth the trouble here. But an
interesting alternative, harking back to the long-forgotten S-IV, would be
to use a cluster of RL10s. They have SSME-class performance, they are
cheap and reliable, and that would give us engine-out capability on that
stage as well as the lower ones.
Carbon fiber everywhere, of course. And a tank stretch.
More ambitiously, we might consider a full-diameter third stage. With no
Saturn IB equivalent to worry about, there is no reason to make the third
stage slimmer than the first two, and that taper is both aerodynamically
and structurally inconvenient. Build a relatively short squat third stage
with the full 33ft diameter instead. Maybe it could be a shortened second
stage with fewer engines; maybe it would need a custom design.
Still more ambitiously, take that full-diameter design and stretch its LH2
tank upward. Put the RL10s in an outer ring, perhaps attached to the
interstage ring; they take the stage into a rather high parking orbit,
800km or so, burning some of the LH2 and all the LOX. The high parking
orbit is inefficient... but there's a payoff. When it's time to leave
parking orbit, drop the RL10 ring and light the center engine: a Phoebus.
(For those who don't know the name, Phoebus was the NERVA program's
original goal, essentially a nuclear J-2.) That's why the high parking
orbit: it's a "nuclear-safe" orbit, with a decay time exceeding 10kyr in
the event of a failure, making the whole thing politically passable. The
Phoebus 2B, I think it was, was considered nearly ready for flight.
The Instrument Unit, guidance and telemetry electronics, essentially
disappears into a corner of the third stage. Strap-down gyros, full
triple redundancy, etc. are essentially free now. For a bonus, revise the
guidance to use body lift on the way up. (We tip over faster, reducing
gravity losses, and then when aerodynamic loads start to drop off after
max Q, we pitch up and use body lift to recover the lost altitude. It
was investigated at the time; it would increase payload a bit.)
On top, of course, what we build is not much like the original Apollo.
Even assuming we keep the LOR mission profile -- which is not a good way
to do long surface stays -- we overhaul things quite a bit. We've got a
lot more mass to play with, and even if we didn't go for a full-diameter
third stage, considerably more room -- there's no reason not to make the
spacecraft as wide as the third stage. (Apollo's diameter was fixed very
early, by incorrect preliminary ideas about top-stage diameter.)
The LM is all carbon fiber, and the descent stage probably uses LOX/LH2
propulsion with a modified RL10. (RL10 deep throttling, for use as a
lunar landing engine, was proven in the 60s.) The ascent stage might want
to still use hypergolics, for maximum reliability. The cabin would be
rather larger -- indeed, we might put the main cabin on the descent stage
and have only a minimum flight deck on the ascent stage -- with room for
another couple of astronauts. It would have manually-deployed solar
arrays for surface power (a small one was *almost* part of the J-series
LM upgrade), and generally would be designed for a longer stay.
The SM is all carbon fiber, and it too might use LOX/LH2 main propulsion
with an RL10, perhaps with large RCS tanks as an emergency get-you-home
backup. Very probably it would be solar-powered. Both LM and SM would
be rather larger.
The CM too would be larger; not necessarily *heavier*, but *larger*,
partly just for more comfortable accommodations and partly because almost
everything about a reentry vehicle gets easier if we can reduce its
density. Empty space inside costs little. It would be designed for land
touchdown, possibly with a big parafoil rather than conventional
non-maneuvering parachutes.
CM and LM electronics would be drastically better and lighter, of course.
>4 - The CSM and LM could get better guidence (4 gyros to avoid gimble
>lock) ...
What was significant was not the number of *gyros* but the number of
*gimbals* on the gyro platform. Gemini had a four-gimbal platform, but
the Apollo design was fixed earlier and its designers were more willing to
accept operational restrictions to save mass. Nowadays we would use a
strap-down system with no platform at all (and probably no moving parts).
>5 - Some of the CSM and LM could probably benefit from composite
>materials for stronger/lighter solutions in places. Nothing exotic
>like composite fuel tanks, but for structural members, landing legs,
>walls, etc.
Lots of composite structure, including composite tanks. Even composite
LH2 tanks are flight proven (on DC-XA). The one area where we might
hesitate is composite LOX tanks; aluminum-lithium might be used instead
(as on DC-XA and the current shuttle ET).
>6 - Using industrial serial busses could eliminate miles of wiring in
>the LM and CSM.
And distributed intelligence would improve functionality at the same time.
>7 - Radio and telemetry would be much smaller packages using much less
>power.
Also, we'd certainly use X band, perhaps even higher, for higher data
rates with smaller dishes and lower power.
>8 - I know batteries have improved, but have fuel cells? Are there
>lighter more efficent version today?
Generally, although the improvements have not been vast. Solar cells,
which barely existed in useful form when Apollo was conceived, would
probably be preferable.
--
Socialists always tell us they're going to | Henry Spencer
do better next time. -- Ed Wright |
henry@spsystems.netwho cares whether we can rebuild saturn 5. If we can't build something better than we could 40 years ago, we've got more problems than not being able to find blueprints.
I'm sure we can rebuild the P51 Mustang for use a a fighter again but I'd place my bets on the F22 Raptor.