An article in New Scientist about the NASA Ares rocket program reports that a White House advisory panel chaired by former Lockheed Martin CEO Norman Augustine recommends against further development of the Ares rocket because it will take too long to develop.
The rocket is set to make its first test flight on 27 October. But the committee believes the rocket will not be ready to loft crew to orbit until 2017, two years after the ISS is scheduled to be abandoned and hurled into the Pacific Ocean, Augustine said. Extending use of the space station to 2020 would not make much difference, since this would eat up funds available for Ares I and delay its first flight to 2018 or 2019, added committee member Edward Crawley of MIT.
What I found most interesting: How can a rocket that is a derivative of the existing Space Shuttle solid rocket booster take, what, 10 years to develop? When did Ares development begin? 2005? 2006? Some of the contracts were announced in 2006 and 2007. So how does it take 10 years to develop a rocket that is, again, a derivative design? Wasn't one of the points of the derivative design that it was more proven and therefore supposedly safer?
Maybe NASA has so little money to spend on it that the development is stretched out with more tasks done in series? As a percentage of GDP NASA's budget is a tenth of what it was in its glory days. Though in inflation adjusted terms the absolute amount of spending decline is not that great.
America pretends to have a serious space program.
| Share | | Randall Parker, 2009 October 25 12:20 AM Space Launch |
Maybe the contractors, understanding that they're almost certainly not going to sell any significant number of the final product, (Maybe none at all.) are relying on the development phase as their real source of income, and thus taking it slow? As you say, it's not a serious space program.
Don't worry, when the Chinese space program passes the American, there will be more funding. No moon landing without Sputnik.
The thing making the test flight this month is not Ares-1. Charitably, it's a test article that in some ways resembles Ares-1. Less charitably, it's a Potemkin rocket that lets them pretend they've launched something relevant.
"Don't worry, when the Chinese space program passes the American, there will be more funding."
No, I don't think so. Why would the Chinese loan us the money?
NASA spends most of its budget these days on global warming research. It has nothing to do with the space program, but it helps send the children of climate modelers to college.
From now on, every government agency is just a cash cow for some special interest or another. The Chicago way, boys, it's how the outfit does things.
Sadly, the Potemkin rocket and AGW modeling are the products of today's NASA. It IS ludicrous that it takes 10 years to modify an existing SRB and call it ARES. Ten years with all of today's advanced CAD technology and other advancements. Pathetic. Never mind ARES' serious POGO problems.
philw1776,
Yes, Saturn I and Saturn V were designed by guys using slide rulers and paper. You'd think it would be much easier to design and build something today.
How about Spacex?
NASA would have to be an order of magnitude or two more risk averse than in the moon shot days ... so manned programs are going to be more and more problematic. No surprise it has been the unmanned missions that have kept it going.
America pretends to have a serious "civilian" space program.
There - fixed that for you.
Lono,
The DOD's space budget is bigger than NASA's. But not enormously so. $17 billion for NASA versus $21 billion for DOD.
Kent,
Private space efforts hit up against the need to make a profit. There's pretty much just satellite launch so far. Space tourism is still a very small business.
R Parker
"Yes, Saturn I and Saturn V were designed by guys using slide rulers and paper. You'd think it would be much easier to design and build something today."
Yeah, but they didn't have Enviromental impact studies, endangered species reviews, Minority impact reviews, quotas, Six Sigma capacity studies, etc. to contend with - only a Presidental directive to go to the moon.
Today, unless some politicians family/friend/constituency is involved, its declaired ___________.
They reportedly destroyed the plans and tooling for Saturn in order to protect funding for the shuttle. Otherwise, hey, just launch Saturn V's.
My father was involved early in the manned space program, and commented in 1964 that NASA Houston had managed to create an enormous bureaucracy in record time. I worked on a NASA project in '68 and they were already pathetic.
NASA is pathetic and should be put out of its misery.
Time to provide the right sort of incentives for private companies.
The Saturn V is gigantic, too big to be useful outside of lifting space stations into orbit.
The last lift-off is also 33 years ago so it was build with technology that isn't used anymore and people that are now retired or long dead.
Have you any proof of your statement that they destroyed the plans.
ps. Is NASA Houston had managed to create an enormous bureaucracy in record time a complement? Because going to the moon required an enormous amount of people and to steer that you simply need an enormous bureaucracy.
Because going to the moon required an enormous amount of people and to steer that you simply need an enormous bureaucracy.
Maybe back then with slide rules, but today or tommorrow?
WHAT HAPPENED TO THE SATURN V PLANS?
Despite a widespread belief to the contrary, the Saturn V blueprints have not been lost. They are kept at Marshall Space Flight Center on microfilm. The Federal "Archives in East Point, GA also has 2,900 cubic feet of Saturn documents. Rocketdyne has in its archives dozens of volumes from its Knowledge Retention Program. This effort was initiated in the late '60s to document every facet of F-1 and J-2 engine production to assist in any future re-start.
The problem in re-creating the Saturn V is not finding the drawings, it is finding vendors who can supply mid-1960's vintage hardware (like guidance system components), and the fact that the launch pads and VAB have been converted to Space Shuttle use, so you have no place to launch from.
By the time you redesign to accommodate available hardware and re-modify the launch pads, you may as well have started from scratch with a clean sheet design.
Other references: Several AIAA papers delivered in recent years discuss reviving the Saturn V. For example, AIAA paper 92-1546, "Launch Vehicles for the Space Exploration Initiative". This paper concluded that a revived Saturn V was actually cheaper than the NLS vehicle.
An overview of the infrastructure still available to support production of a 1990s Saturn V and how that vehicle might be used to support First Lunar Outpost missions can be found in the December 1993 issue of _Spaceflight_, published by the British Interplanetary Society."
Read more: http://www.faqs.org/faqs/space/controversy/
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I don't agree with the above assessment. Using the plans with modern components and guidance systems should have been enuff to get a restart much faster than what we're doing now.
The future of human space exploration looks bleak. After making great leaps 50 years ago, stagnation has taken over. No human has left Earth orbit in 37 years, and NASA's current unambitious goals look to be further delayed or scaled back.
http://www.watchinghistory.com/2009/11/future-of-space-exploration.html