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Subject: SPACE Digest V13 #459

SPACE Digest                                     Volume 13 : Issue 459

Today's Topics:
               Re: Saturn V blueprints
               Re: Saturn V blueprints
           Re: FACE on MARS -- Request for info...
               Re: Saturn V blueprints
               Re: Saturn V and the ALS
      Re: Voyager pic's on the CD-ROMS at ames.archives
               Re: Saturn V blueprints
               Re: Saturn V and the ALS

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Date: 24 Apr 91 22:27:05 GMT
From: wuarchive!sdd.hp.com!caen!ox.com!hela![e-mail]  (Allen W. Sherzer)
Subject: Re: Saturn V blueprints

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (/dev/null) writes:
>Rebuilding the Saturn V WILL cost more than ALS.  I said this
>all along!

The most pessamistic assumptions I can find (make by people who wanted
to kill Saturn in fovor of ALS) say rebuilding Saturn Vs will cost 25%
less and be done 20% sooner than ALS.

Now what is it about launcher design that you know that these people
don't?

  Allen
--
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|Allen W. Sherzer | If you love something, let it go. If it doesn't come back |
|   [e-mail]   | to you, hunt it down and kill it.                         |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+

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Date: 24 Apr 91 14:43:59 GMT
From: swrinde!mips!spool.mu.edu!news.nd.edu!mentor.cc.purdue.edu!noose.ecn.purdue.edu!en.ecn.purdue.edu![e-mail]  (/dev/null)
Subject: Re: Saturn V blueprints

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Henry Spencer) writes:
> In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Michael V. Kent) writes:
> >The main thrust (pardon the pun) of ALS is to reduce the cost and increase
> >the reliability of ELV's.  ALS is not being designed to push the performance
> >envelopes but the cost and reliability envelopes instead...
>
> Ha ha ha ha ha.  ALS is being designed to do *everything*, including pushing
> advanced launcher technology.  Oh sure, it says in the book that high
> reliability and low cost are primary objectives... along with the 57 other
> primary objectives.  Note that ALS isn't even officially *trying* to build
> a launcher right now -- it is a *technology* program only at present.
>
> ALS is suffering from the same disease as the shuttle:  it is so expensive
> that it has to be all things to all customers.  Really cheap for bulk
> payloads.  Really reliable for irreplaceable one-of-a-kind payloads.
> Man-rateable.  Capable of launch on a few hours' notice for immediate
> replacement of military satellites.  Capable of successful launch under
> attack (!).  Practical at launch volumes ranging from huge (for SDI) to
> near zero (for realistic scenarios with no new major programs for either
> NASA or the USAF).  A major new high-tech program to maintain US launcher
> technology at competitive levels.  An off-the-shelf program that avoids
> pushing technology.  The next big program to keep the US launcher industry
> productively busy.  An economical program to provide a new launcher at
> affordable development cost.  A short-term effort to get a new launcher
> into service soon.  A clean-slate design that avoids all the mistakes
> of the old designs.  Compatible with existing launch facilities.  Meant
> for high efficiency in new, totally redesigned launch facilities.  And
> so on, and so on.  Yes, I have seen *ALL* of these cited as ALS objectives.
> Some of them even make sense.  But not all of them together.
>
> Not that I am worried.  ALS is the one new launcher design that is utterly
> guaranteed never to fly.  Its low costs are consistently linked to very
> high launch volumes.  There is only one customer who can generate that
> kind of volume... and Congress does not want to face the all-out political
> war that would erupt over any SDI deployment decision.  One simple way to
> postpone it indefinitely is to refuse to develop the launch capacity for

A better way to stop SDI is to stop funding it. (Although I think it would
be a mistake to do that)
Also, a large number of formerly shuttle cargos could be sent using
the ALS, cheaper.

> it.  *No* US big-launcher project aimed at high volume will be funded for
> full-scale development, ever.
>
  Unless the space station gets off the ground, or some such other project.
I would hesitate using the word EVER.

> The only kind of heavylift launcher that Congress will fund will be one
> designed for maximum reliability and a modest launch rate.  Civilian

MODEST LAUNCH RATE?!?!?  I assume you mean rate = cost.  I'd be verY
suprised if all the retooling, retraining and redesign of the launcher
would equate to a modest launch rate.

> control of the program will be a bonus, as will unsuitability for military
> uses (no quick reaction, no polar orbit, no hardening, no bare-base launch,
> etc.).  A proven design or simple derivative of one is a better bet than a
> clean-slate one, given Congress's memories of the shuttle experience.
>
The military is a major launch customer.  To preclude them would
preclude a BUNCH of buisness and shoot your program down in
Congress.

As for more 'dirty' military uses, we have those ICBMs for that.

> You know, that sounds an awful lot like the Saturn V.

Then by all means scrap the idea of using it!!!

> And the bean-counter replied,           | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
> "beans are more important".             |  [e-mail]  utzoo!henry


--
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Brent L. Irvine     |            These are MY opinions   |
| Malt Beverage Analyst     |            As if they counted...:) |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+

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Date: 24 Apr 91 06:59:54 GMT
From: elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!suned1!slced1![e-mail]  (Lloyd E Vancil)
Subject: Re: FACE on MARS -- Request for info...

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (R. Kannan) writes:
> Recently I have heard numerous times that some Mars mission
>actually found evidence of some form of skillful habitants. I am told
>that there are
>
>    1. pyramids like in Egypt but with the twist that the base
>       is pentagonal.
>
>    2. formations that resembles a face.
>
>    3. the ruins of a town ....
>
 I have ftp'd a file called MARSFACE.ARC from WUARC's mirrors.msdos.gif
(I think)  Any way, This file contains the Viking Orbiter frames in Raw and
Enhanced formats converted to GIF files.  The images are of the by now
infamous "NATIONAL ENQUIRER PROVES THE EXISTANCE OF ALIENS"  3-d face on the
surface of Mars.  The Image is fascinating and I am told that some very High
tech things have been done with the data.   One of the people I talked to at
NASA (Ames) told me that the CD of the VIking data should be out by the end of
the year and that he had seen a computer generated model of the area around
those particular images.

As far as the images "Proving" we are not alone goes, that is a leap in logic
beyond reason.  It is as much proof of aliens as the "man tracks in stone" are
proof of creationism.
    1. The image is too poor to conclude anything other than, "yep
           it look a face."  I think it looks like a chimpanze with
           a "Prince Valiant" haircut.
    2. The surrounding "pryimids" "Ruins of a town"  etc are no more than
         images of something, probably debri from a nearby astroid strike.

It's wonderful to speculate.  It's fun to dream.  But, don't jump to the
conclusion that everything is as it appears.



--
 | suned1![e-mail] | * S.T.A.R.S.!   .       +      o       |
 | [e-mail]    | The Revolution has begun!   .     +    |
 | sun!suntzu!suned1!lev         | My Opinions are Mine mine mine hahahah!|

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Date: 24 Apr 91 18:26:44 GMT
From: agate!bionet!uwm.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!unix.cis.pitt.edu!dsinc!ub!ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu![e-mail]  (Craig L Cole)
Subject: Re: Saturn V blueprints

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Henry Spencer) writes...
>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Michael V. Kent) writes:
>
>The only kind of heavylift launcher that Congress will fund will be one
>designed for maximum reliability and a modest launch rate.  Civilian
>control of the program will be a bonus, as will unsuitability for military
>uses (no quick reaction, no polar orbit, no hardening, no bare-base launch,
>etc.).  A proven design or simple derivative of one is a better bet than a
         ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>clean-slate one, given Congress's memories of the shuttle experience.
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Better not tell the guys at GM Saturn. Their "clean-slate" automobiles
are a hekkuva lot better put together than GM's "dervatives." Moderate
pricing and high quality were both achieved.

I'd love to see Saturn V's come back, but new and reliable aren't
necessarily exclusive.

I do think we could build a derivative of the Saturn V (Saturn VI as
someone put it). The improvements in electronics, materials processing,
etc. over the past twenty years would make a lot of the Saturn V's
construction pretty outdated. A lot of improvements could be made
immediately improving performance without degradation in reliability.

Craig Cole
[e-mail]
[e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 24 Apr 91 20:30:17 GMT
From: dog.ee.lbl.gov!hellgate.utah.edu!caen!dali.cs.montana.edu!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!rpi![e-mail]  (Michael V. Kent)
Subject: Re: Saturn V and the ALS

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Allen W. Sherzer) writes:
>
>Boy I got a feeling of deja vu reading that. It took me a while but I finally
>tracked down why. The following is from the Congress Record of Feb. 29, 1973.
>It is part of a early hearing on the Space Shuttle.
>
>Senator Snerd: Mr. Nasa-guy I see this budget for lots of research for a
>               radically new vehicle, this 'Space Shuttle'. Now it seems to
>               me that putting all that very new technology into an
>               operational vehicle is asking for trouble. How will you know
>               if it works? Wouldn't we be better off sticking with what we
>               have and what is good enough?
>
>Mr. Nasa-guy:  Senator, the Pentagon has given a bad name to this sort of
>               thing. The Space Shuttle is being designed around reliability
>               and cost. The actual research is expensive but the end result
>               will be cheap, reliable access to space because that is what
>               we are aiming for. Putting the latest technology in will work
>               to reduce costs.
>
>Now history has shown that Senator Snerds concerns where indeed valid and
>that Mr. Nasa-guy was wrong. Question: what has changed about the current
>situation as regards to ALS which would cause us to expect ALS to be any
>different?

If ALS is as much of an improvement over the today's launchers as the
Shuttle is over the launchers of the 1960's, then it will be money well
spent.  You scream almost daily of the Shuttle's "poor" reliability rate.
Name ANY Western manned launcher that has a 97.4% success rate with over
20 manned flights under its belt.  In fact, name any manned launcher (other
than the Shuttle) with over 20 flights.  McDonnell Douglas would be damned
proud if its Delta booster (currently the most reliable in the business) had
a 97.4% success rating.  NASA's estimates predict a 98.7% rating for STS.

--
Michael Kent                                  [e-mail]
McDonnell Douglas                             Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
St. Louis, Missouri                           Troy, New York
                               Apple II Forever!

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Date: 23 Apr 91 17:36:51 GMT
From: olivea!samsung!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!caen!hellgate.utah.edu!fcom.cc.utah.edu!cc.utah.edu!cc.usu.edu![e-mail]  (The Barking Pumpkin Digital Gratification Ensemble)
Subject: Re: Voyager pic's on the CD-ROMS at ames.archives

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Mark A Wieczorek) writes:
>     Has anyone been viewing the pictures on the CD-ROMS in
> ames.arc.nasa.gov? I'm trying to find out how to convert
> the format of the browse pictures (which is .IBG) to GIF. Has anyone
> been able to do this. One of the posts to this news group said to
> uncompress the full resolution pictures into FITS format and
> then convert this to whatever you want using pbmplus. Well how do
> you uncompress these pictures to FITS. If anyone has the source code,
> knows where to get it, or has any ideas on getting IGB to GIF
> please Email me.
>
> Thanks,
> Mark Wieczorek
> v096my2q@ubvms
>

'Sorry for the "ME TOO" posting, but I've been having the same problem. Also,
is pbmplus PD, shareware, or a commercial product? Where to get it?

Thank you,
James Knowles
[e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 25 Apr 91 01:29:36 GMT
From: usc!rpi![e-mail]  (Michael V. Kent)
Subject: Re: Saturn V blueprints

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (/dev/null) writes:
>In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Michael V. Kent) writes:
>> I wholeheartedly agree on this point.  But my other point is that re-designing
>> a Saturn V is going to require extensive development.  Thus, contract = bad.
>> Rebuilding a Saturn V will require almost as much money as a new launcher.
>>
>
>I agree.   BUT when rocketdyne offers to deliver X number of F-1 engines,
>for a fixed price, then that's ok.

According to the latest AvWeek, that may actually happen.  The Synthesis
Group is proposing a Saturn-like rocket based on External Tanks and F-1
engines.
                                                  Mike

------------------------------

Date: 24 Apr 91 14:24:15 GMT
From: agate!bionet!uwm.edu!spool.mu.edu!samsung!noose.ecn.purdue.edu!en.ecn.purdue.edu![e-mail]  (/dev/null)
Subject: Re: Saturn V and the ALS

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Henry Spencer) writes:
>
> not go on.  But it is important to distinguish building a reliable and
> cost-effective launcher from doing R&D in advanced launcher technology.
> The two are not the same; indeed, they are incompatible.  If we want

Incorrect.  R&D has been given a strange reputation by the US
military "we have to have this weapon, damn the costs" attitude
throughout the cold war.  The ALS is being designed around
reliablility and cost.  While actual research can be expensive, the product
you get (cheap effective launchers in this case), will be what
you aim for.

What I was trying to convey, is that while we are using our 'good
enough' Saturn V launcher, many nations will be looking into new
more cost effective, more reliable systems that the Saturn V cannot
compete in in any form short of it not being a Saturn V anymore.
We would lose the edge that makes the US aerospace industries the
best in the world.

It would be very bad to find ourselves in the situation with aerospace
that the auto industries found themselves in in the 70s to now!

> something that works well and that has some chance of being cheap, we
> *want* technology that is old enough to have been debugged.
>
Nice idea, too bad with the redesigns you propose below, you have to debug
it all over again.  And, the ALS has the same chance of being chaep as the
Saturn V with being far less hassle.

> >(Also, much of the Saturn would have to be redesigned ...
>
> Nonsense again.  Almost nothing would need redesign; the only area I
> can think of where this would be beneficial would be the electronics.
> We'd need to redesign the *tooling*, and that would cause small changes
> in the design of the launcher, and much of it would have to be re-tested,
> but the basic design is not broken and does not need fixing.
          ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
You just said that you'd need to revise the drawings and retest, etc.

These "small changes" you say will be needed are likeley to escalate
to whole redesigns.  I've seen it happen so many times "All we need to
do it move this here...oh, that would mean we have to move this here...and oh,
this has to move here...etc etc"

Also, the ALS program is not being done to 'redesign' the Saturn, rather
a small number of people have proposed bringing tha Saturn V back in leiu
\of any ALS systems.


> "The best is the enemy of the good." - Admiral Gorshkov.  Somehow I think
> a country with reliable and cost-effective low-tech launchers is much more

Before you extoll on the virtues of the USSR's 'low cost low tech' launchers,
keep in mind, their 'low price' is based on a need for hard currency at
any price, and the Energiya Buran cost almost US$1,000,000,000 for its
maiden voyage in street exchange rates (15 rubles = US$1)

> of an aerospace leader than one which can't make its high-tech birds work.

The notion that we can't get the 'our birds' to work is a bit overblown.
Now, as for 'the best' vs 'good', I think you misinterpreted my statement.
I was attacking the complacent attitudes, and how we need to strive to
have the cheapest and most reliable launcher possible.
Basic paper design doesn't cut it for R&D either, doing it does far more
for experience, at least in aerospace.

--
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Brent L. Irvine     |            These are MY opinions   |
| Malt Beverage Analyst     |            As if they counted...:) |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+

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End of SPACE Digest V13 #459
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