The Cool Science Stuff Thread

[islandman]

There are no spare Saturn V parts just laying around and nobody is making any. Sure, the schematics still exist, but just about everything associated with a rocket this big is a "custom job."

It makes far more sense to design a brand new lift vehicle based on today's technology than to return to the 60s.

Fair point, but wouldn't everything associated with a rocket this big today also be considered a "custom job"?

I can see how your second statement holds true for the insides of the rocket, but a Saturn's outer geometry is already in hand and proven, which I would assume would reduce the time it would take any company to produce an interim alternative to the shuttle. Seems silly to reinvent that particular wheel, but I'm no engineer.

 

[Saint Peter]

Yes. Rockets should be cylindrical with roundy noses.

 

[rosco rathbone]

We don't need no government rockets going to the government moon.

 

[islandman]

To fetch the government cheese.

 

[where]

http://www.virgingalactic.com/

 

[Colonel Hogan]

Fair point, but wouldn't everything associated with a rocket this big today also be considered a "custom job"?

I can see how your second statement holds true for the insides of the rocket, but a Saturn's outer geometry is already in hand and proven, which I would assume would reduce the time it would take any company to produce an interim alternative to the shuttle. Seems silly to reinvent that particular wheel, but I'm no engineer.

Of course. But the "outer geometry" is the least critical aspect of the design. Most rockets, as you've probably noticed, are cylindrical. The critical engineering decisions usually revolve around fuel type (liquid - [Kerosene, liquid hydrogen and oxygen] or solid), number of stages and number of engines per stage. And, of course, the guidance system.

You note that the technology of the Saturn V is proven. Most other booster technologies are proven as well. The Saturn V offers no particular advantages over other boosters. If it did, I can assure you the engineers would have jumped on it from the beginning.

 

[Weird Harold]

Fair point, but wouldn't everything associated with a rocket this big today also be considered a "custom job"?

Not necessarily, but even if it is "a custom job" it would be easier to design CAD/CAM templates from scratch than to convert drawings and specifications designed for manual machining to CAM templates.

There are a lot more parts "on the shelf" to day than there were in the 60's when rocketry was just being invented; your cell phone has more computing power and memory than the entire Mercury, Gemini, and Appollo programs combined put into space, for example. A lot more is known and proven about fly-by-wire digital flight controls, for another example.

 

[Karen Kraft]

I've got a question, W.H.:

Why don't they gin up a bunch of money from the "international community" and start throwing the space junk out of the way (like toward the sun or something)?

 

[islandman]

Of course. But the "outer geometry" is the least critical aspect of the design. Most rockets, as you've probably noticed, are cylindrical. The critical engineering decisions usually revolve around fuel type (liquid - [Kerosene, liquid hydrogen and oxygen] or solid), number of stages and number of engines per stage. And, of course, the guidance system.

You note that the technology of the Saturn V is proven. Most other booster technologies are proven as well. The Saturn V offers no particular advantages over other boosters. If it did, I can assure you the engineers would have jumped on it from the beginning.

Size matters!

Not necessarily, but even if it is "a custom job" it would be easier to design CAD/CAM templates from scratch than to convert drawings and specifications designed for manual machining to CAM templates.

There are a lot more parts "on the shelf" to day than there were in the 60's when rocketry was just being invented; your cell phone has more computing power and memory than the entire Mercury, Gemini, and Appollo programs combined put into space, for example. A lot more is known and proven about fly-by-wire digital flight controls, for another example.

And there you have it.

Thanks to both of you for the discourse.

 

[Balladeer08]

Why don't they gin up a bunch of money from the "international community" and start throwing the space junk out of the way (like toward the sun or something)?

Throw toward the moon. It could become useful one day.

 

[Colonel Hogan]

Size matters!

And there you have it.

Thanks to both of you for the discourse.

Just to clarify, I wasn't suggesting an alternate booster that did not match or exceed the Saturn V in thrust capability. In that respect, "size" most certainly matters.

 

[Byron In Exile]

Yes. Rockets should be cylindrical with roundy noses.

They haven't tried square ones yet, though.

 

[Colonel Hogan]

Why don't they gin up a bunch of money from the "international community" and start throwing the space junk out of the way (like toward the sun or something)?

This is a much better idea if they can get it to work. http://science.slashdot.org/story/11/03/16/1738214/NASA-Wants-To-Zap-Space-Junk-With-Lasers

The thousands of pieces of space junk represent almost as many distinct orbits. Going into space to retrieve it and send it somewhere else would entail scores and scores of individual missions in order to "rendezvous" which each object of groups of objects. Awfully damned expensive just to throw away a bolt or two zipping along at 17,000 miles an hour. Better to know where they are and just avoid them.

Obviously it is getting harder to do that. Reducing the junk population makes sense. Traveling into space to actually retrieve it,however, probably doesn't.

 

[Colonel Hogan]

http://www.bizjournals.com/denver/news/2010/12/13/nasa-pact-will-bring-research-park-to.html

Good news for a talented and inspired engineer!




Good news for Pete, too.

Congratulations!

http://www.mynewoldschool.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/Tang.gif

 

[Colonel Hogan]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article7011322.ece

http://gizmodo.com/#!5461806/obama-cancels-kennedys-dream

One of the biggest distortions of history is that the manned space program generally and the Apollo program specifically represented John Kennedy's "dream."

Murray and Cox's book, "Apollo: Race to the Moon" devotes an entire chapter entitled "He would rather not have done it" examining Kennedy's reluctance to a long-term commitment to manned spaceflight.

Jerome Wiesner, a member of the faculty of MIT, was Kennedy's science adviser during the 1960 presidential campaign. Wiesner's opposition to manned spaceflight was no secret. At Kennedy's direction, Wiesner also headed a group charged with identifying the most pressing scientific areas that should be emphasized during the new Kennedy administration. Not surprisingly, the so-called "Wiesner Report said that man spaceflight was NOT one of these and specifically called for diminishing the significance of the Mercury program which was then in progress. Within days of receiving the report, Kennedy appointed Wiesner as his full-time science adviser -- not something you would do if your "dream" was in a different direction.

Instead, it was the American public's fear and outrage with each Russian space success that produced the nightmare that Kennedy could not escape. Kennedy's decision to beat the Russians to a manned lunar landing was almost entirely political in nature and was believed within the administration to be the soonest that the United States could prevail at any significant technological victory. "Significant" being defined as one to which the American people would enthusiastically respond.

Cloaking that mission with the aura of an exploratory vision was a pretty easy sell, once Kennedy had capitulated to its "necessity." But not until then.

 

[Weird Harold]

Why don't they gin up a bunch of money from the "international community" and start throwing the space junk out of the way (like toward the sun or something)?

What Col. Hogan said:

This is a much better idea if they can get it to work. http://science.slashdot.org/story/11/03/16/1738214/NASA-Wants-To-Zap-Space-Junk-With-Lasers

The thousands of pieces of space junk represent almost as many distinct orbits. Going into space to retrieve it and send it somewhere else would entail scores and scores of individual missions in order to "rendezvous" which each object of groups of objects. Awfully damned expensive just to throw away a bolt or two zipping along at 17,000 miles an hour. Better to know where they are and just avoid them.

Obviously it is getting harder to do that. Reducing the junk population makes sense. Traveling into space to actually retrieve it,however, probably doesn't.

 

[HB1965]

Interesting take. You don't think the older functions of NASA are ready to be handed off yet?

Manned space flight will never be monetarily profitable.

"Privitization" is Obama-speak for consigning it to the dust-bin of history.

What you are saying would make sense if NASA only dealt with space flight technology. There are a score of other things that NASA researches that can be privatized

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/nasalife/

AFAIK, SpaceX is mainly concentrating on satellite launches and stuff like that. That's where the money is.

And in Aeronautics Technology, Nuclear Medicine, alternative fuel research...

On the other hand there's a case to be made that any privatization of any NASA functions will just be used as a means to defund them.

Or an as effort to preserve some of the more costly aspects.

I don't know how much future there is in manned spaceflight beyond the orbit of the moon anyhow. Mars, maybe. But it seems that spacemen are probably going the way of jet fighter pilots.

There is a great need for manned spaceflight. Probes and satellites can only see so much. At some point man is going to have to see first hand. The only way that this will happen is if they can develop an alternate fuel source that doesn't cost millions of dollars to process and technology for Keeping people alive in the craft that doesn't cost millions of dollars to construct.

The only economically rational purpose for rockets is launching satellites. No private companies are going to sink money into something like a Mars rover, or probes to the other planets, let alone sending humans into space, even in low earth orbit. There's no way to make a profit doing that sort of thing.

Right. So how does privatizing the economically rational stuff end up killing the manned space flight program?

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article7011322.ece

http://gizmodo.com/#!5461806/obama-cancels-kennedys-dream

The ancillary things they do do turn a profit. NASA has never been good at capitalizing on this. Privatizing maybe the only thing left to hold onto what is there.
There is a point that's made in the first of those articles. One of the things that came out of the Challenger investigation was that there were certain elements that were being ignored in favor of getting things done on time. Elements that mean the safety of those that we are sending to space. I would rather that NASA focus on making those technologies better than on racing to beat others back to the moon. We will always have the fact that the first man on the moon was an American. Nothing can change that. It's time now to focus on what the long range goals of NASA were. To get out in to space and be able to deep space exploration safely

 

[Byron In Exile]

One of the biggest distortions of history is that the manned space program generally and the Apollo program specifically represented John Kennedy's "dream."

That's not important.

 

[Byron In Exile]

The ancillary things they do do turn a profit.

The drive to put a man on the moon in nine years drove the greatest advancement in technology since WWII, at a fraction of the cost.

It assumed all the characteristics of a national emergency.

The "profit motive" by itself can offer nothing comparable.

 

[Byron In Exile]

There are no spare Saturn V parts just laying around and nobody is making any. Sure, the schematics still exist, but just about everything associated with a rocket this big is a "custom job."

It makes far more sense to design a brand new lift vehicle based on today's technology than to return to the 60s.

Absolutely.

Transistors were new, then. There were no such things and integrated circuits. Even something as primitive by today's standards as the Apollo Guidance Computer (which had less computing power than a cheap modern calculator) was a minor miracle: a computer that didn't take up an entire room.

 

[Colonel Hogan]

That's not important.

An accurate historical record is always important -- at least to history. Such a correction of the record in no way diminishes what was accomplished by Mercury, Gemini and Apollo, nor does it deny whatever enthusiasm for the program Kennedy himself may have embraced after having issued the challenge.

 

[islandman]

Absolutely.

Transistors were new, then. There were no such things and integrated circuits. Even something as primitive by today's standards as the Apollo Guidance Computer (which had less computing power than a cheap modern calculator) was a minor miracle: a computer that didn't take up an entire room.

It's called a 'retrofit', a process through with a tool's lifespan is extended beyond original constraints with the use of new technologies and processes.

 

[Colonel Hogan]

There is a great need for manned spaceflight. Probes and satellites can only see so much. At some point man is going to have to see first hand. The only way that this will happen is if they can develop an alternate fuel source that doesn't cost millions of dollars to process and technology for Keeping people alive in the craft that doesn't cost millions of dollars to construct.

I think both of those questions were at the core of Rosco's doubts about the future of manned spaceflight.

Secondly, most advocates of manned space exploration give little or no thought to the limits imposed by the very presence of "man" in the equation.

For example, the surface of Venus has an atmospheric pressure 92 times that of Earth. Mean surface temperature is about 860 degrees Farenheit compared to a maximum temperature of 250 degrees F in Earth orbit. Those extremes imply one hell of a spacesuit. Comparatively speaking, it makes the Apollo EVA suits look like a windbreaker and a pair of sweat pants. The greatest challenge to the first men on Venus will likely be trying to figure out how to move as they lie there slowly melting.

As for a manned mission to Mercury, given its proximity to the Sun, the Sun's gravity dominates Mercury's own. Thus, the amount of fuel a rocket needs to escape Earth's gravity pales in relation to the amount of fuel needed for a spacecraft to resist the Sun's gravity and slow its approach sufficiently to be held in an orbit around Mercury in preparation for a descent to the surface. And once you're done playing around down there, think about how much fuel you're going to need to overcome that same Mercurial/solar gravitational field and get home.

Distance, time, physics and human biology effectively limit manned space exploration to Earth orbit, the moon and Mars. People who "dream" of anything more ambitious for a human space traveler are more accurately described as "hallucinating."

 

[rosco rathbone]

Goodness Gracious

 

[rosco rathbone]

I

Distance, time, physics and human biology effectively limit manned space exploration to Earth orbit, the moon and Mars. People who "dream" of anything more ambitious for a human space traveler are more accurately described as "hallucinating."

I'm hoping that we figure out some way to upload our consciousness to a machine substrate, enabling us to explore the cosmos.