Re: Thoughts on 1969

On Jul 20, 7:51 pm, Frogwatch <dboh...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Jul 20, 10:00 pm, "jonathan" <N...@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:





"Fred J. McCall" <fjmcc...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in messagenews:rk3a65h1r2hg4utbcudb08fq7cg1h2po3e@xxxxxxxxxx

"jonathan" <N...@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
:
:As far as some of the other
:concerns you mentioned, whenever a reusable technology, like the
:X-33, starts showing promise, the military cherry-picks the program
:for their military space plane. Those programs haven't really been
:canceled, they've mostly gone black.
:

Poppy***.

:
:Before long you'll see the military start launching reusable spacecraft.
:

Want to bet?  Got any cash?

Ya!  The X-37b is scheduled for launch next January.
And our military is launching it. It was to launch last February.

"It is a reusable robotic spacecraft that is a 120%-scaled derivative of the
X-40A.' "The X-37 was transferred from NASA to the Defense Advanced
Research Projects Agency on September 13, 2004.[1] The program has become
a classified project"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_X-37

"On November 17, 2006 the U.S. Air Force announced it would develop the X-37B
from the NASA X-37A"

And remember the X-33?

"Construction of the prototype was some 85% assembled with 96% of the parts
and the launch facility 100% complete when the program was canceled by NASA
in 2001..."

The X-33 needed only some $8 milllion dollars for a new fuel tank, it's
aerospike engines and air frame was allready, yet was canceled
as soon as ....Bush took over. Just before it was ready...poof it vanished!
Funny about that.

X-37a....transferred from NASA to the military
X-40a....transferred from NASA to the military to create the X-37b
X-41 Common Aero vehicle.....Classified.
X-42  Liquid Rocket......Classifiedhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-plane

Need I go on?  They've all been cherry-picked for this...

Military Space Plane

"The MSP Architecture heavily leveraged work being done
by NASA. NASA's X-33 is a technology leader for SOV, X-37 leads
SMV, and Upper Stage Flight Experiment leads MIS. X-37, in particular
uses a very similar outermold line to Boeing's SMV concept, and lessons
learned from X-37 will transfer directly to a planned SMV
demonstration program."http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/msp.htm

I think cherry-picked by the military is a perfectly accurate term for the our
reusable efforts.

:
:Space Solar Power, as a goal which could replace fossil fuels, end climate
:change and make America the next energy "Saudia Arabia", ensuring American
:prosperity and security well into this century....is all that and more.
:

I did not say they always kill "re-usable" craft, I said they always
kill private spacecraft.  I personally think re-usability when roughly
90% of your mass must be fuel is a silly idea.  Forget re-usability,
just make em cheaper to build, operate and throw away.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -





The cost of the RS68 is about $20M, it takes
three to lift a payload of about 25tons.

The aluminum/lithium external tank of the
shuttle costs about $49M when I last checked.
Let's call it $40M for several smaller load
bearing tanks.

That's about $4000 per kg just for engines
and tanks.

The delta4 heavy costs, at present, around
$254 million per shot, or about $10000/kg.

A reusable booster dosn't gaurentee lower
cost to leo, but it is the only alternative
that offers this posibility.

Better to spend the dollars up front to
displace the disposables than limp along in
the limbo that is the status quo.




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