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To: green iguana

That Crew Veh looks like it's stacked on an SRB stage 1.
I see an apparent escape rocket assy on the cap.

This looks entirely ill-considered, as solids can't
be throttled or shut down, and in an emergency could
plow right into the capsule's escape assy.

Traditional laments about shutting down Saturn V
production may commence now.

NASA appears to be returning to yesteryear's designs
without applying yesteryear's safety standards.


8 posted on 08/02/2005 9:13:00 AM PDT by Boundless
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To: Boundless

SRB stage 1, LH/LO stage 2. Saturn V lamentations have already proceeded. Hopefully NASA has thought up some safety protocols for potential SRB problems...


13 posted on 08/02/2005 9:17:43 AM PDT by green iguana
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To: Boundless
...This looks entirely ill-considered, as solids can't be throttled or shut down...

Why would you want to do that even with a liquid fueled booster?

35 posted on 08/02/2005 9:44:50 AM PDT by FReepaholic (I'd rather hear a fat girl fart than a pretty boy sing.)
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To: Boundless
Has there ever been a throttleable engine on any operational spacecraft or booster other than the lunar module and the space shuttle? Can't have been many. All the Titans, Saturns etc. I am sure were on/off just like a solid.

I don't see anything inherently unsafe about riding a single SRB to space. Remember it was not the O-ring failure on the SRB that directly doomed the Challenger, rather it was the ensuing explosion of the main (liquid) fuel tank.

41 posted on 08/02/2005 9:54:47 AM PDT by Uncle Fud (Imagine the President calling fascism a "religion of peace" in 1942)
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To: Boundless
solids can't be throttled or shut down

Actually it's done all the time. They blow a hole in the end opposite the nozzle. It's done with the shuttle's SRBs, and with solid stages on ICBMs as well as other space lauch vehicles.

Still I too don't care for the exclusive use of solids, especially ones as large as the Shuttle SRBs, on manned vehicles.

60 posted on 08/02/2005 10:14:53 AM PDT by El Gato
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To: Boundless
That Crew Veh looks like it's stacked on an SRB stage 1. I see an apparent escape rocket assy on the cap. This looks entirely ill-considered, as solids can't be throttled or shut down, and in an emergency could plow right into the capsule's escape assy.

It would be relatively easy to have "drogue" panels deploy at upper-stage separation to provide the necessary drag if the escape tower can't pull the upper command module away fast enough. Or even have the service module thrusters kick into reverse at separation of the upper module.

This is not difficult.

Albeit, definitionally, it IS ROCKET SCIENCE! :-)

125 posted on 08/02/2005 12:21:29 PM PDT by Paul Ross (Strict Constructionist Definition=Someone who doesn't hallucinate when reading the Constitution)
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