Re: CEV design tweaked

Allen Thomson wrote: 
http://www.space.com/news/060120_cev_overhaul.html

  CEV Makeover: NASA Overhauls Plans for New Spaceship
By Brian Berger
Space News Staff Writer
posted: 20 January 2006
12:04 p.m. ET
[EXCERPTS]

  WASHINGTON  NASA's Project Constellation program has been
overhauled to include a slightly smaller Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV)
and a new human-rated booster with an Apollo-era upper stage engine.


Apollo era technology ... that's so ... modern.

  NASA still intends to make use of the solid-rocket booster technology
that has helped lift the space shuttle off the pad for a quarter
century.


Wow, SRBs ... that's so ... chinese.

But the agency recently approved CEV launcher plans calling
for development of a new five-segment solid-rocket booster instead of
the four-segment motor currently in production.


Because their original design doesn't work.

That's so ... NASA.

  NASA also has dropped plans to power the so-called Crew Launch
Vehicle's upper stage with a Space Shuttle Main Engine modified to
start in flight, opting instead to go with an updated version of the
J-2 engine that was used on NASA's Saturn 5 rocket.


Wow, the Saturn V ... that's so ... 60's.

  Project Constellation Manager Jeffrey Hanley briefed engineers at
Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., on these and other
changes Wednesday, according to individuals who spoke on the condition
of anonymity because the changes had not yet been officially announced.


Because they don't want to be fired by the Monkey Boy.

  Other newly approved changes to the CEV, according to sources
familiar with the details, include reducing the diameter of the vehicle
from 18 feet (5.5 meters) to 16.4 feet (5 meters) for additional weight
savings and using existing Russian docking hardware for missions to the
International Space Station (ISS). Previous plans called for using a
U.S.-developed system.


What US system would that be?

  These sources said NASA's overhauled space transportation plan
probably will not save money in the near term, but should prove cheaper
in the long run because both the J-2 engine and five-segment
solid-rocket booster are needed for the heavy-lift cargo vehicle NASA
is developing for the lunar sorties it still hopes to begin as soon as
2018.


It will all be over on January 20, 2009.

By going with the J-2/five-segment booster combination for the
initial CEV flights, NASA can skip development of an air-lit Space
Shuttle Main Engine and put its resources toward producing an
expendable version of that engine, which NASA still plans to use for
the heavy-lift rocket's main stage.


Which throws away priceless national treasures on a grand scale.

AmeriKKKa, burning up in the atmosphere.

http://cosmic.lifeform.org


.

Relevant Pages

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