Re: Automated Orbiter Rapid Prototype (AORP)


"Brian Thorn" <bthorn64@xxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:2kc3a25p7gp02nctb9klct14tlbps3hh5a@xxxxxxxxxx
On Tue, 27 Jun 2006 13:26:33 -0400, "Jeff Findley"
<jeff.findley@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
The crews on ISS flights actually do lots of work while at ISS. It
wouldn't
be easy to offload this work an ISS crew of three (which is the current
limit), two of which spend most of their time keeping ISS running.

Actually, it wouldn't be so bad if they just left the MPLM at the
Station between Shuttle visits, instead of trying to unload and reload
everything in a week.

True, but that only helps you with MPLM resupply flights, not with assembly
flights. I'm sure that the EVA requirements, and other work, needed for
assembly flights would pretty much require a crew on the shuttle.

Plus, as Chris pointed out later in this thread, "AORP is basically a hack".
It's a last ditch effort to save a shuttle that's otherwise been abandoned
by its crew. If you wanted to fly the shuttle without a crew, and have a
high confidence of getting it back in one piece, you'd likely need a lot
more changes than just AORP. Not the least of which is an automated
rendezvous and docking solution, which is clearly absent on the shuttle. I
believe someone else pointed out this little problem in this thread.

Then there are the contingencies that only a crew can handle, like failure
to close the payload bay doors. It would be hard to close them manually
without a person on board.

Jeff
--
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a
little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor
safety"
- B. Franklin, Bartlett's Familiar Quotations (1919)


.

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