Re: CEV and habitable space

On Fri, 29 Apr 2005 12:18:41 -0500, Jeff Findley wrote
(in article <9a3b0$42726c71$927a2ce9$9903@xxxxxxxx>):

> If that's 10' in diamter by 20' long, that's 1570 cubic feet.
>
> An MPLM is 21.5 feet long by roughly 14.8 feet in diameter, which is 3696
> cubic feet.
>
> Certainly you need more flights to resupply a station with a smaller
> shuttle. But remember that today's shuttles have external airlocks and CG
> issues which prevents you from using the entire 60' length anyway.

The initial size of the U.S. Lab and Hab modules was baselined to
provide for 40 racks (10 each floor, ceiling, port and starboard).
This design used the majority of the length of the orbiter cargo bay.
This was changed in mid-1990 to 24 rack "mini-modules" solely due to CG
abort limits for the orbiter. At the same time, the PLM was
redesigned from it's original size (can't recall right now but I think
it was something like 16 racks) to a "mini-PLM" of the current
configuration.

As it turns out, with the increased inclination of the station's orbit
due to Russian participation, the orbiter lacked the upmass capability
of launching fully-loaded 24-rack modules, let alone 40 rack modules,
so it's a good thing the change was made. The structures people ended
up going substantially overweight as well when it turned out that
composite racks ended up weighing as much or more than the aluminum
ones they were to replace and when the waffle-grid pressure hull wasn't
as stiff as required, necessitating redesign and some use of
stiffeners. By the mid-'92 time frame leading up to the Spring '93
CDR, Boeing was offering $100 bonuses to engineers for each pound of
reduced design weight. Mass is much more important than volume for
most purposes, especially resupply - face it, you don't want to launch
empty space (with atmosphere to circulate, heat, dehumidify,
decontaminate, and remove CO2 from). You want to launch *stuff* and as
much of it as you can, reasonably.

--
Herb Schaltegger, GPG Key ID: BBF6FC1C
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin, 1759
<http://www.individual-i.com/>

.

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