NASA cuts space shuttle price

[Aero]

Got $29 mil?

Here's a recession bargain: the space shuttle. NASA has slashed the price of these 1970s era spaceships from $42 million to $28.8 million apiece.

The engines are more my price range even though I still can't afford one.

As for the space shuttle main engines, those are now free. NASA advertised them for $400,000 to $800,000 each in December 2008, but no one expressed interest. So now the engines are available, along with other shuttle artifacts, for the cost of transportation and handling.

http://apnews.excite.com/article/201001 ... FEIG0.html

[Tom Ligon]

Ha! The last time I saw Aleta Jackson (NSS/L5 space enthusiast) she was coming out of a presentation room at Leprecon with a small rocket engine from Rotary Rocket slung over her shoulder, while I was about to roll my fusor, Dog and Pony II into the room for my presentation.

Since I now use a SSME as an example of 6 GW of rocket power, maybe I could get one for my presentations. A large enough dolly to roll it in might be a challenge, but I'd like to see Aleta top it!

[CaptainBeowulf]

Um, couldn't the engines be reused on an Ares V? Seems like a waste of money. The shuttles could be put in a museum with mock-up engines.

This is assuming that Obama has indeed decided to go with the Ares V "classic" or, in DIRECT parlance, Jupiter 251 or 256 (depending on whether the J2-X is used as a second/third stage). Such a thing would use SSMEs, rather than RS-68s. Unless they're determined to develop the still theoretical expendable SSME - which will likely only be cheaper than keeping on making regular SSMEs if the Ares V flies more than several dozen times.

[Skipjack]

I prefer Direct over Ares, but I am not a big fan of either concept. I mean the running costs more than the development costs though. I hope for something better and cheaper to come from one of the private companies. Maybe Polywell or MLTs will enable something really cheap and sustainable one day.
The SSMEs are still pretty awesome engines though, no question about that. A masterpiece of engineering history.

[Josh Cryer]

Um, couldn't the engines be reused on an Ares V? Seems like a waste of money. The shuttles could be put in a museum with mock-up engines.

This is assuming that Obama has indeed decided to go with the Ares V "classic" or, in DIRECT parlance, Jupiter 251 or 256 (depending on whether the J2-X is used as a second/third stage). Such a thing would use SSMEs, rather than RS-68s. Unless they're determined to develop the still theoretical expendable SSME - which will likely only be cheaper than keeping on making regular SSMEs if the Ares V flies more than several dozen times.

Obama wants to build Ares V in 10 years, but they'd build new engines anyway. They practically rebuild them every flight as it is. All you're really getting here that is unique is the Shuttle itself.

[CaptainBeowulf]

I think a Jupiter style Ares is still a good idea. Currently, it's still only the government that can afford heavy lift. I think we need a decent heavy lift capability. An Ares-III, Ares-IV, or Ares-V shouldn't cost much more than a space shuttle to run because:

1. With shuttle, you throw away the external tank anyway.
2. With shuttle, you still have to refurbish the SRBs.
3. With shuttle, you still have to refurbish the SSMEs. With Ares, you throw them away, costing a bit more $$$.
4. With Ares, you don't have to inspect and repair the orbiter after each flight, so you save some money there.

So, for much the same cost, you can lift a payload equivalent to the weight of an orbiter+payload. Cost per pound of payload to orbit is a lot less, since you are lifting more payload for a similar price.

I still don't see why initial Ares development has to be so expensive, even scaled back to "classic". Three SSMEs can be laid out inline on the ET. Two more can be added to either side of the central engine making a cross instead of a line without fundamentally unbalancing the system. A four engine configuration would remove the central engine, still leaving the system balanced with 4 engines arranged symmetrically around the sides. It could be flown first as a 3-engine, with 4 and 5 engine variants developed later.

A 3-engine configuration doesn't need a stretched tank. As a result, it also doesn't need 5 segment SRBs. Both of those features could also be developed later. You'd still have gotten a great near-term heavy lift vehicle with just a standard-length tank, 4-segment SRBs, and 3 SSMEs. Two launches would allow you to assemble a robust stack in orbit to go to the moon with. One launch would get you a large orbital payload, or a space observatory that could fly itself to a lagrange point.

Regular and small satellites and space station access should go to EELVs and the private sector at this point. Delta-IV and Atlas-V can easily launch a capsule or space station resupply mission. Hopefully Space-X and others will have working LVs for that size of payload soon as well.

If the private sector becomes successful enough at light and medium launch, then it will eventually develop heavies. At that point government can just buy commercial LVs for all earth-to-orbit stages. The logical thing to do at that point would be to spend development money on building VASIMR or hopefully fusion-powered vessels which would be launched commercially in two or three big parts and assembled in orbit. Eventually commercial would again catch up and start to do interplanetary itself.

I want us to go to Mars, but I don't want to jump the gun on it. The correct strategy right now is to get the commercial side scaling up, while government leads with a heavy system that puts giant space telescopes at lagrange points and stuff.

[Skipjack]

An Ares-III, Ares-IV, or Ares-V shouldn't cost much more than a space shuttle to run

That is my problem. The shuttle was never cheap in any meaning of the word. It was a bad design because it was built to do everything and it ended up doing nothing cheaply.
Something that costs only a little more than the shuttle is not going to achieve anything. In order to make space flight relevant, it has to become affordable. What point is there in going back to the moon, or even Mars if we have to leave again afterwards and not to come back again for at least 50 years? Yes it will be an achievement, but it wont have any lasting effect.
Space should be a business like anything else. You have to do things in a way that make sense from a business POV. Building something for billions of USD and then only using it once, is not good business.

Regular and small satellites and space station access should go to EELVs and the private sector at this point.

There I fully agree with you!
I would make it all commercial. Leave it up to them what vehicle they build for what purpose and buy the best design.
A trucker does not design trucks to carry his loads. He checks the available options and buys the one that fits his needs best. I dont see why space exploration should be any different.
It should be NASAs job to be that trucker and to create a market for the "truck manufacturers" to serve to.
Competition will then foster development.
What NASA can do, IMHO is fund and conduct research into enabling technologies, that said manufacturers can use for future, better "trucks".

[MSimon]

When I worked at Sundstrand in Rockford I used to walk by the APU refurbishment room every day (a small detour for me) it had a big plate glass window so you could look at stuff. Watch it being worked on. And once or twice having made friends with some of the workers I got to touch stuff.

The most interesting stuff though was the schedules on the walls outside the room and some of the QC data.

And there was a junk bin in the room I worked in that for weeks had a defective APU turbine wheel. I picked it up almost every day until it was gone.

[kunkmiester]

One issue I've heard is man-rating. There's additional testing to certify an engine to lift people, and that of course costs a ton of money. This came up in Popular Mechanics(or was it Science?) a while back--they were talking about other ideas that were cheaper. One reason was that they wanted to use space shuttle engines, since they were already cleared for manned flight, meaning you just have to do the tests on the rocket body. They also wanted to just used a modified shuttle tank since the tooling was there, rather than build a new body.

[Skipjack]

One issue I've heard is man-rating.

Manrating is a very stretchable and ultimately meaningless term. It originally came to life when ICBMs were used as the main means to get people into space. They were then "manrated" depending on various criteria. Space X has built its hardware from the beginning with manned flight in mind. So they should be able to meet all critieria.
The EELVs should also be easily "manrateable" since they do have a rather good flight record by now.
In contrast, the new 5 segment boosters needed for AresI and V are VERY different from the shuttle boosters. But noone seems to have a problem with them being "manrated"? Heck even the people at NASA are not sure anymore what exactly they should call manrated.
So I would be careful with any speculation on that matter.

One reason was that they wanted to use space shuttle engines, since they were already cleared for manned flight, meaning you just have to do the tests on the rocket body.

Well actually because they are among the most powerful engines available and they are still being produced and we still have the tooling for them. All that makes for a quicker and cheaper process. It makes sense to me. They are very powerful and good engines, though a little on the pricy side (that might go down, if they are mass produced though).

They also wanted to just used a modified shuttle tank since the tooling was there, rather than build a new body.

That would be DIRECT then, more than Ares, I guess. It is an argument though, that is true. But then the question is, whether it is still not cheaper to just simply let the market decide that?
Fixed price contracts always suck. Yes they make a lot of jobs (both conservative and dem senators are working the system to keep jobs in their states that way), but they ultimately result in a loss of money.

[kunkmiester]

There is no free market that can decide until there's a customer besides NASA who wants such things, and can afford them.

Something I've thought about is an academic alliance. This would be a large number of universities in the country(you could even go international) that get together to form a space agency to address THEIR concerns. This would include lobbying Congress to redo the laws pertaining to space launch to allow easier work in the private sector, and clarifying such things as the manrating issue you mentioned. With every senator getting fussed at by the university or two in his state, and a number of reps having at least a junior college(I think they could get in on this too) in thier district, you'd have a lot of mass. The knowledge card can be waved--"they're obstructing science!"--and with a bit of publicity, they could easily override NASA and others.

This would break NASA's hold on the majority of the market, allowing easier private development, and with the universities pooling resources for stuff like probes and space telescopes, the market for heavier lift vehicles would be greater, and the various organizations would be much less inclined to bureaucratic inertia than a government agency, and more likely to take steps like DIRECT that would actually cost less. The public-private partnerships would also be impressive. Imagine Boeing getting with MIT.

I've yet to really think about this enough to write out a proposal for my university's astronomy department though. I'll have to see about some help with that.

[Skipjack]

until there's a customer besides NASA who wants such things

What things are that? Cheap access to LEO for cargo? For crew? You think it is only NASA that wants and needs that?
I think that NASA is actually the smaller market for that. They should have to adapt their strategies to what is available on the market, not force others to build their launchers according to some NASA strategy that will never work anyway (because of budget overruns, constant changes in the requirements and every politician in the country trying to have a say in it). This results in vehicles with low flight rates. That in turn means low return on development expenses and generally a low sustainability.
In fact I think that this is one of those examples where I (yes me, that "socialist") is for small government.

[kunkmiester]

I probably had that mixed up in my head at the time. You're right, but the bureacracy gets in the way. This has only recently begun to change, as low cost systems like SpaceShipTwo and others get into the market. For the longest time though, if you wanted to build a rocket, you had to talk to NASA at some point. There have been DOZENS of ideas that would cut the cost drastically, but none of them went anywhere, and there's reasons for that.