[Space] Space Launch System, SLS - Page 5

On September 05 2011 01:15 Suisen wrote:
koreakool, what you say is very strange. Earth can sustain life. Space can't. There is nothing to depend on for survival besides earth.
It is theoretically possible to have a colony on Mars. But why be piss poor on Mars when you can live as a king on earth? And any colony will always depend on earth.
And you realize that NASA isn't really spending a lot of money on finding habitable planets, if they exist. Right now the Kepler space telescope is doing a good job. But right not there is no program for building a more advanced planet finding space telescope. There is only the James Webb. James Webb ST started in 1996. Kepler also was delayed because of budget cuts time and time again.
Also, when habitable planets are found. Humans will never travel there. Humans may live there one day because of a 'trick', but that's different.

I don't know either why you think there is no opportunity for permanent bases on the bottom of the ocean. It's a lot more viable and cheaper than human space flight.
Now actual science in both places is done best by robots, but that's a different story.

On September 05 2011 02:06 Suisen wrote:
But there is no where to go to. Mars is already dead. Yes earth will be uninhabitable someday and the way we are acting now it will be sooner rather than later. But how is space of any benefit?

We have to find some habitable planet and NASA isn't working on new projects in trying to find them because they want to go back to orbit a manned white elephant, want to go back to the moon, go 'beyond LEO' or go to Mars.

Say one day we find a planet that has photosynthesis organisms, lots of liquid water and oxygen. It's 30 light years away. We want to spread mankind across the universe to prevent going extinct. I don't see why it matters if we go extinct or not. But let's ignore that. What does what we are doing today with human space flight have anything to do with it? Things like humans in cryogenics or worldships that are habited by entire generations while it speeds across our galaxy is pure science fiction. And it will always be SF.

Instead what we will do is send a tiny probe with some nanobots to that planet. The effective payload may be less than 1 gram. The rest of the spaceship may be much much larger and be all about protecting, speeding up and accelerating down this 1 gram of effective payload.
When it arrives it can create humans from DNA. It's absurd to transport an actual humans, as we know them now, across space. The laws of physics are just stacked against it.

You people have all kinds of romantic ideas about living in space. But in fact there is nothing for us out there. Yes, it is technologically possible to have a base somewhere that is primarily self sufficient. But why bother? Humans in space is never going to be economically viable. Technology will make it cheaper. But technology will make everything more cheaper so it won't be more profitable. Mining helium 3 on the moon, zero G manufacturing, all these things I don't see becoming profitable as long as it requires humans along robots to carry out the work.

On September 05 2011 04:42 SpoR wrote:
i am totally ignorant to all this stuff about nasa but isn't the point of the space shuttle to have a mostly reusable ship and tanks (They pick the tanks up out at sea or whatever right?) and so the occupants can have a fixed wing aircraft to land back safely on earth?
Wasn't this design pretty close to perfect and the reason why they got rid of the old rocket designs and why they've been using it for 30 years?
Why are they going back to this old stuff?

On September 05 2011 01:15 Suisen wrote:
koreakool, what you say is very strange. Earth can sustain life. Space can't. There is nothing to depend on for survival besides earth.
It is theoretically possible to have a colony on Mars. But why be piss poor on Mars when you can live as a king on earth? And any colony will always depend on earth.
And you realize that NASA isn't really spending a lot of money on finding habitable planets, if they exist. Right now the Kepler space telescope is doing a good job. But right not there is no program for building a more advanced planet finding space telescope. There is only the James Webb. James Webb ST started in 1996. Kepler also was delayed because of budget cuts time and time again.
Also, when habitable planets are found. Humans will never travel there. Humans may live there one day because of a 'trick', but that's different.

I don't know either why you think there is no opportunity for permanent bases on the bottom of the ocean. It's a lot more viable and cheaper than human space flight.
Now actual science in both places is done best by robots, but that's a different story.

On September 05 2011 07:59 SpoR wrote:
Venus is way to violent and hot for habitability. Didn't probes all melt that they sent in there?

That core would use surplus space shuttle main engines and the J-2X upper-stage engine now in development. With upgrades approved by Bolden after a lengthy engineering analysis within NASA, the rocket could “evolve” to the 130-metric-ton capability Congress ordered in the three-year NASA reauthorization act passed and signed by President Barack Obama in December 2010.

NASA estimates obtained by Aviation Week show NASA told Booz Allen analysts that the core SLS could be developed for about $10 billion, plus $1.5 billion to cover the agency’s full-cost accounting approach that includes civil service salaries.

NASA already has spent about $5 billion on the Orion capsule, which could fly unmanned in 2017 for another $6 billion, plus $0.7 billion for full-cost accounting. The “21st Century Ground Systems” Congress ordered for the new vehicle would cost about $2 billion, plus a $0.4 billion full-cost escalator.

WASHINGTON — NASA would get $17.7 billion in fiscal 2013 under President Barack Obama’s budget, about $59 million less than Congress approved for the current fiscal year.

The proposal includes significant funding for the agency’s primary space programs — nearly $3 billion for the heavy-lift Space Launch System that will eventually transport astronauts to Mars, and $830 million for the Commercial Crew and Cargo Program that will replace the space shuttle and taxi crew and cargo to the International Space Station.

The release of President Barack Obama’s NASA budget plan for fiscal 2013 has triggered the usual chattering about what (and who) got too little or too much funding. Some offer hyperbole about the “catastrophic” impact of a cut or even an insufficiently large increase.

The 2013 submission clearly implements the 2010 Authorization Act compromise within an overall budget cap, and honors the deals struck last fall between then-Office of Management and Budget Director Jack Lew and key senators on exploration funding and the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). So the only quasi-justified uproar is over Mars exploration having to pay for saving JWST.

But without the overt provocations of recent years, some in Congress are digging up obsolete assumptions to justify further criticisms of the Obama administration’s spaceflight budget priorities.

One such argument is the claim from both houses of Congress that the funding for the Space Launch System (SLS) — which increases from the 2012 level — is too small to enable the SLS to launch the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV) as a backup for commercial crew services. Some even suggest that NASA is putting too much money into the legislatively stipulated primary means of carrying astronauts to and from the international space station (commercial crew) and therefore shortchanging the backup (SLS). Of course, NASA is spending nearly four times as much on Orion and SLS as it is on commercial crew, so the argument appears lopsided.

But how justified is the underlying concern? Let’s step back and review history. In 2010 Congress enacted authorization legislation that directed NASA to build an evolvable Space Launch System. To the Senate’s credit, it tried to avoid Constellation’s mistake of building two launch systems (Ares 1 and Ares 5) nearly simultaneously by developing just one system incrementally over time, with the initial version serving closer destinations and the later version enabling more aggressive missions. With this in mind, it directed NASA to ensure that the SLS be available to launch the MPCV to the international space station, if necessary, as a backup to commercial crew capabilities, which the law declares will be NASA’s primary means of space station crew transfer.

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. -- The nation's space exploration program is taking a critical step forward with a successful major technical review of the core stage of the Space Launch System (SLS), the rocket that will take astronauts farther into space than ever before.

The core stage is the heart of the heavy-lift launch vehicle. It will stand more than 200 feet (61 meters) tall with a diameter of 27.5 feet (8.4 meters).

NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., hosted a comprehensive review. Engineers from NASA and The Boeing Co. of Huntsville presented a full set of system requirements, design concepts and production approaches to technical reviewers and the independent review board.

Top NASA officials have picked a leading candidate for the agency's next major mission: construction of a new outpost that would send astronauts farther from Earth than at any time in history.

The so-called "gateway spacecraft" would hover in orbit on the far side of the moon, support a small astronaut crew and function as a staging area for future missions to the moon and Mars.

At 277,000 miles from Earth, the outpost would be far more remote than the current space station, which orbits a little more than 200 miles above Earth. The distance raises complex questions of how to protect astronauts from the radiation of deep space — and rescue them if something goes wrong.

NASA Chief Charlie Bolden briefed the White House earlier this month on details of the proposal, but it's unclear whether it has the administration's support. Of critical importance is the price tag, which would certainly run into the billions of dollars.

Documents obtained by the Orlando Sentinel show that NASA wants to build a small outpost — likely with parts left over from the $100 billion International Space Station — at what's known as the Earth-Moon Lagrange Point 2, a spot about 38,000 miles from the moon and 277,000 miles from Earth.

At that location, the combined gravities of the Earth and moon reach equilibrium, making it possible to "stick" an outpost there with minimal power required to keep it in place.

To get there, NASA would use the massive rocket and space capsule that it is developing as a successor to the retired space shuttle. A first flight of that rocket is planned for 2017, and construction of the outpost would begin two years later, according to NASA planning documents.

It gives purpose to the Orion space capsule and the Space Launch System rocket, which are being developed at a cost of about $3 billion annually. It involves NASA's international partners, as blueprints for the outpost suggest using a Russian-built module and components from Italy. And the outpost would represent a baby step toward NASA's ultimate goal: human footprints on Mars.

On September 23 2012 15:58 acker wrote:
O.o

That's pretty cool, if a decade later than I hoped.

Still have hope to see first human on another planet before old age

On September 23 2012 15:46 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:
Now we know why the SLS system isn't being scrapped:




Source

On September 24 2012 03:05 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:
You guys are forgetting the SLS launch calendars, along with the fact that the Moon is already a valid outpost especially if we want to have a base for future deep space missions etc.

Also this completely gives the middle finger to the unmanned fuel depots being proposed and even groups who are actively working on said projects while seeking fundraising.

via NAsa watch:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/82/Orbitalaltitudes.jpg