No More Space Shuttle = ?? for ISS?
- Thread starter stueyross
- Start date
Sure, why not have two for double the price...
^^ It takes more than a billion dollars per Shuttle launch according to the latest estimates. I'd rather if they had spent that money on developing a new system long ago rather than sticking with the overpriced options. As for an alternate manned platform, they could've had a simple capsule design like Soyuz. They could've built on, modiefied the Apollo design. Much cheaper than starting from scratch.
It's bad that we had no alternatives. It's even worse that we didn't even start developing an alternative until just recently!! That's decades of no development of alternatives despite excessive costs of the Shuttle!
Mr Awe
It's bad that we had no alternatives. It's even worse that we didn't even start developing an alternative until just recently!! That's decades of no development of alternatives despite excessive costs of the Shuttle!
Mr Awe
They couldn't go with a modified Apollo even if they wanted to, the factories that make the parts and the assembly lines no longer exist, the same applies to the shuttles so they couldn't build more Apollos if they wanted to, thus NASA is forced to start from scratch with the Orion.
Several. Does the Navy have just one ship? Does the Air Force have just one plane? Does the Cavalry have just one horse?
Video documentaries and web reports I have seen (sorry, I don't have links) indicate that not only is the upper hull of the Orion capsule the same taper as the Apollo command module, NASA has selected the same material for the heat shield and sent a team to a Apollo command/service module in a museum to reverse engineer the connector that routes oxygen and power around the edge of the heat shield. It's basically a scaled up Apollo command module which will have updated avionics and utilize some modern composite materials. Some work is having to be redone and/or reverse engineered because some of the Apollo technical documents weren't retained.
A major difference in the service module is the use of solar panels instead of fuel cells. Goals of Orion include long periods with the spacecraft dormant in lunar orbit or docked to the space station, which wouldn't be possible with the cryogenic oxygen and hydrogen supplies for fuel cells boiling off.
A major difference in the service module is the use of solar panels instead of fuel cells. Goals of Orion include long periods with the spacecraft dormant in lunar orbit or docked to the space station, which wouldn't be possible with the cryogenic oxygen and hydrogen supplies for fuel cells boiling off.
I don't mean now, back then! But, you've highlighted the problem with their decision-making--scrap what was working before having a tried and true alternative in hand.
Mr Awe
In any case, the industrial base can be recreated; needs to be, in fact.
