Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT_ZIP/spacedig/V15_0/V15NO070.ZIP/V15NO070

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Date: Wed,  5 Aug 92 05:00:06
From: Space Digest maintainer <[e-mail]>
Reply-To: [e-mail]
Subject: Space Digest V15 #070
To: Space Digest Readers
Precedence: bulk


Space Digest                Wed,  5 Aug 92       Volume 15 : Issue 070

Today's Topics:
                         Calendar and Zodiak
              Energiya's role in Space Station assembly
                            ETs and Radio
                            Future of ESA
         Origin of life, extraterrestrial life, Mars Observer
                             Pre-breathe
          ReEe: aA 12 mile tether that gernerates 5000v?
                        Soyuz as ACRV (9 msgs)
                     STS-46 Element Set (216.97)
                          What is the ASRM??

    Welcome to the Space Digest!!  Please send your messages to
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----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 4 Aug 92 12:32:16 GMT
From: "Mike M. Skala" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Calendar and Zodiak
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Greg Moore) says:
>
>In article <[e-mail]>
>[e-mail] writes:
>>
>>June---------Roman in origin
>  ^^^------------------- I believe from Jove, a Roman god.
>

try Juno wife of Jupiter (== Jove), probably
derived mother goddess

mike

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

Date: Tue, 4 Aug 92 13:28:32 BST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Energiya's role in Space Station assembly

> with an Energia core is something under a thousand miles.  Unless
they
> have in-flight refuelling for the thing, which I doubt, you're
going to

> have to cross Siberia, Alaska, and Canada to get that thing to the
U.S.
> I wouldn't want to fly something like that on that route.
>


I don't see the addition of in flight refueling as being a major
problem. It has certainly been done before with far less "stable"
aircraft. This is really not a big deal. At the current value of
rubles, I suspect we could pay for the engineering and hardware and
testing for a few $100K or possibly even less.


It also assumes there are no intermediate landing strips that can
handle the aircraft. I don't know the answer there, but I could
suggest traveling the other way if this is a problem. Europe is known
to have a few good airports :-)

And as to the Siberia/Alaska route: I don't have the faintest idea
what you are implying. After all, the Alaska route is part of the
commercial airline airway to Korea from the US. New agreements are
being formed to allow commercial service over siberian airspace to
make some routes even shorter. Since 747's fly it every day, that
can't be your beef. Since the rocket is not loaded with fuel and it
the areas are not much inhabited even if it were a flying bomb that
can't be it either. What gives???

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

Date: Tue, 4 Aug 92 13:55:02 BST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: ETs and Radio

> My understanding is that the sun is 10-15 billion years old and
Earth
> is around 4.5-5 billion years old. That may be wrong.
>


Absolutely incorrect on the first. That is closer to the total age of
the Universe as currently estimated (actually 10-20GY covers the
current low to high range. Most astrophysicists are more comfortable
with the higher number although some mavericks have data which would
point to lower numbers. The jury is still out.

Star and solar system formation are a relatively quick in the overall
life of a star. Remember, there are some high mass stars whose total
life span is only a few million years from cloud to supernova.

I don't think I've ever seen an estimate that says the Sun is more
than .5GY older than the Earth's crust.

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

Date: Tue, 04 Aug 92 17:43:41 CET
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Future of ESA

Just some remarks. ESA is investigating the possibilities to contract out
research and development tasks to our Russian colleagues. They are cheap,
good and it helps them to stay alife. ESA is already improving the computer
infrastructure of IKI (Russian Space research institute in Moscow). We
have been asked to be very helpful to our Russian colleagues. This behaviour
of ESA leaves all doors open and this is good.

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

Date: 4 Aug 92 13:34:25 GMT
From: John Roberts <[e-mail]>
Subject: Origin of life, extraterrestrial life, Mars Observer
Newsgroups: sci.space

-From: [e-mail] (Henry Spencer)
-Subject: Re: ETs and Radio
-Date: 31 Jul 92 17:39:58 GMT
-Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

-In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Gary Coffman) writes:
->>>Now subtract out all Population II stars, no heavy elements like iron...
->
->I mentioned iron for two reasons. First, it's necessary for oxygen
->transport via the blood.

-Tell it to the crustaceans, which use copper instead.

Is that true for all the crustaceans? I'd heard that for horseshoe crabs.
(In fact, horseshoe crab blood is valuable for medical diagnostics - they're
regularly caught, tapped for some of their blood, and returned live to the
ocean. I haven't heard of anybody tapping regular crabs or lobsters, though
it might be done at processing plants.) Know any zoologists? :-)  :-)

->Second, and this is opinion, it's needed
->for the planet to have a significant magnetic field to redirect energetic
->radiation from the planetary surface...

-The bulk of the radiation shielding on Earth is from the atmosphere, not
-the magnetic field.  Unquestionably the field is useful, but it's far
-from essential.  (Note that life on Earth has survived many field
-reversals, during which the field is more or less absent temporarily.)

Any correlation with the theory that evolution proceeds in bursts?
(Punctuated somethingorother, if my partway-recollection is correct. :-)

-To try and shorten this a bit... there are something like fifty proposed
-explanations for the Fermi Paradox.

-Exactly two of the proposed explanations seemed to me to have potential
-for being satisfactory:  Berserkers, and Failure Of Extrapolation.  It's
-hard to make any natural mechanism obliterate 100% of new civilizations,
-but if you assume intelligent malice backed by high technology, it's not
-so difficult... although you might have to stipulate robotic intelligence
-to get constancy of purpose and will over the time frame involved.  My
-own feeling is that Failure Of Extrapolation is more likely, though:
-there simply are important facts -- about the universe, the development
-of intelligence, or galactic civilization -- that we don't yet know.

A lot of science fiction writers make a lot of money cooking up scenarios
that would explain the Fermi Paradox. For instance, in the world of Star
Trek, inhabitants of a planet that had not achieved interstellar travel
would probably not know about the Federation. One can imagine something like
the "non-interference rule", where contact with Earth is *illegal*. That
would require a coherent interstellar culture in the local region.

I've heard that Dr. Fisk, who is to do the "final analysis" for the upcoming
SETI program, feels that there's a high probability of intelligent life
elsewhere in the galaxy, and that the chances of detecting it are good.

Everyone so far has only mentioned theories on biogenesis as a justification
for SETI. That's only part of the story. A major part of the value of any
discovery of non-terrestrial life (especially primitive life forms or fossils)
is that it would contribute to theories on biogenesis and the habitibility
of the rest of the galaxy. One major question: if life is found elsewhere,
will it be very different from earth life in its biochemical structure, or
virtually identical? If the former, it will indicate that different life
systems are possible (something we don't know now), and strengthen the
contention that life arises independently on different planets. If the
latter, it will be some indication that perhaps the form of life we know *is*
the only form possible, or it may indicate that the spread of life from
planet to planet (there are proposed mechanisms for this) predominates
over independent biogenesis on every planet. If there are many similarities
but also significant differences, interpretation will be more difficult -
it could be some combination of the two models (only one valid basic approach,
with the possibility of a *very* early common ancestor).

There's considerable interest in searching Mars for active, dormant, and
extinct life forms, before it gets contaminated with microorganisms from
Earth. The primary goal of this is not to "save Mars for the Mars germs",
but to protect the scientific value of any possible findings. I can't tell
whether I've ever posted the Planetary Protection Requirements for Mars
Observer (which won't be sterilized, and therefore shouldn't touch the
surface), so here they are:

"The trajectory design for an orbiter mission to Mars must satisfy the NASA
Planetary Protection Requirements. These requirements have been established to
comply with international agreements not to contaminate Mars with terrestrial
organisms during the initial period of biological exploration of the planet.
Mars Observer is considered a Class III mission because the target is Mars,
but there is no intention to enter the atmosphere or land on the planet. The
Planetary Protection requirements for the flight path design of a Class III
mission are as follows:

 a. the probability that there be no accidental impact of the launch vehicle
    upper stage on Mars shall be 99.999% or greater.

 b. the probability that there be no accidental impact of the spacecraft
    (or any separated part of it) on Mars before January 1, 2009 shall be
    99.99% or greater.

 c. the probability that there be no accidental impact of the spacecraft on
    Mars over the period from January 1, 2009 to January 1, 2039, shall be
    95% or greater.

 d. the dwell time (cumulative) of the orbiter below an altitude of 325 km
    shall not be greater than 36 days. Additionally, the dwell time below
    altitudes of 300 km, 250 km, and 200 km shall be no greater than 18 days,
    54 hours, and 3.6 hours, respectively. At this time, operation of the
    spacecraft below 325 km is not anticipated.

The second requirement above can also be restated as the probability of an
accidental impact of the spacecraft (or any separated part of it) on Mars
before January 1, 2009, shall not exceed 1.000 x 10^-4. This probability
may then be sub-allocated among the mission phases, as allowed for in the
Planetary Protection Plan. At the beginning of the mission, one third of this
amount (i.e. 0.333 x 10^-4) is assigned to the launch and interplanetary
phase, with an additional third being assigned to each of the orbit insertion
and mapping phases. Upon successful completion of the interplanetary phase
(i.e. no Martian impact), the 0.333 x 10^-4 probability assigned to it can
now be re-allocated to the orbit insertion phase, thus giving it an impact
probability budget of 0.667 x 10^-4. Finally, upon successful completion
of the orbit insertion phase, the full mission impact probability budget of
1.000 x 10^-4 can now be assigned to the mapping orbit phase.

It is worth noting that, of requirements "b" and "c" documented above, the
former is more stringent, and satisfaction of it also guarantees satisfaction
of the latter."

John Roberts
[e-mail]

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

Date: 4 Aug 92 12:30:01 GMT
From: John Roberts <[e-mail]>
Subject: Pre-breathe
Newsgroups: sci.space

-From: [e-mail] (Allen W. Sherzer)
-Subject: Re: Soyuz as ACRV
-Date: 4 Aug 92 00:42:42 GMT

-In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:
->natural response would be "Why don't you just EVA out of Freedom's
->airlock and traverse over to the second Soyuz then?"  Again, not
->possible.  The current EMU requires a substantial pre-breath before an
->EVA can be attempted.

-We use some of the savings to fund the hard suit (which they should have
-done in the first place). Pre-breath won't be needed. This gives us two
-ways to get the crew to the vehicle.

That reminds me of one of those many items I'm always forgetting to post:

On STS-50 (I think), cabin pressure was lowered to 10-11 psi (I forgot
whether that's typical or not), and pre-breathe was only about half an
hour. Since everyone's always said that pre-breathe of several hours is
necessary with the current suits, that's a significant difference.

Anyone know the details?

John Roberts
[e-mail]

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

Date: 4 Aug 92 10:03:38 +0200
From: [e-mail]
Subject: ReEe: aA 12 mile tether that gernerates 5000v?
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Andrew Haveland-Robinson) writes:
>
> In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:
>
>>The 5000 volts are induced by the Earth's magnetic field as the spacecraft
>>orbits. The same principle in using magnets to enduce a voltage when you
>>pass a magnet through a coil of wire.
>
> I can see that this will work, though it's practicality may be limited
> as it would start to slow down the shuttle if any serious power could
> be drawn.
>
On the contrary, if energy is extracted from an orbiting body, its kinetic
energy *increases* by this exact amount.  All this additional energy is
provided by the gravitational binding energy.  A very useful use of a tethered
loop could be not to extract electric energy at the expense of gravitational
energy, but the  contrary: electric energy, coming from solar cells for
instance, can then be used in the opposite way to lift up the satellite orbit.

    Daniel Pfenniger

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

Date: Tue, 4 Aug 92 12:33:40 BST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Soyuz as ACRV

> question has been 'let the Russians do it!'  Am I the only person
here who

> realizes that the Russians (a) face technological limitations, just
as we
> do, (b) face financial limitations, just as we do, and (c) face
political
> limitations, just as we do?  The two big advantages that the
Russians have
>


Ever here of "buy cheap, sell dear?"

You can bootstrap a long way off of resources that are temporarily
cheap. You simply apply your limited cash to higher value investment
instead of reinventing wheels.

Maybe the CIS program will collapse, and maybe it won't. In neither
case do we gain by foregoing the utilization of cheap, existing
resources.

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

Date: Tue, 4 Aug 92 12:48:13 BST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Soyuz as ACRV

> I don't think you can fit any usable cargo in a three-man capsule.
>


Personally I can think of a lot of material processing and biological
material return that could be sent back in a space the size of three
people (actually the volume is a bit more than that).

The truth is, I can't really think of that many cargoes that would
come back from the space station that could possibly NEED more space
and weight than this, other than the crew and garbage.

It would certainly be rather silly to ship instrumentation back and
forth at those launch costs. Once something is there it should
probably stay there forever, just in case it might be useful. You are
probably better off tethering your "junk" together into a floating
junk yard than you are sending it back down.


It will be quite awhile (unfortuneately) before we have 10 KT lots of
extraterrestrial samples to ship back, so where is the need for a
shuttle size payload going down?

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

Date: Tue, 4 Aug 92 12:50:53 BST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Soyuz as ACRV

> DeLuca comments that dumping the Shuttle and betting on
non-existant
> technology is unwise.  I agree.  This is precisely what we did when
we
> canned Apollo/Saturn in order to develop the shuttle.  Lets not do
it
> again.
>


I agree with this, but also with Alan. Ie, first we start using the
alternative means (Gary is correct there). THEN we dump the higher
priced spread (and use the savings for something else).

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

Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1992 11:58:22 GMT
From: "Allen W. Sherzer" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Soyuz as ACRV
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Greg Hennessy) writes:

#It's an example.  Replace it with any complex and delicate piece of orbital
#equipment that we might want to retrieve.

>It's still a bad example. Any complex and delicate piece of machinery
>that goes up on a billion dollar per launch shuttle is almost
>certainly going to be better and cheaper split into smaller peices,
>launched on unmanned rockets.

No need to split it up. The Air Force has a Titan IV fairing which is fully
compatible with the Shuttle. They should be able to lift anything the
Shuttle can.

   Allen
--
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Allen W. Sherzer | "If they can put a man on the Moon, why can't they     |
|  [e-mail]     |  put a man on the Moon?"                               |
+----------------------262 DAYS TO FIRST FLIGHT OF DCX----------------------+

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

Date: 4 Aug 92 12:29:02 GMT
From: "Allen W. Sherzer" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Soyuz as ACRV
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Matthew DeLuca) writes:

>>Let's compromise. I'll earmark a third of my savings to NASP. That will
>>be enough to build a NASP vehicle which will provide far better data on
>>high speed flight.

>When did you get to do the earmarking?  That's Congress that gets to do that,
>and they certainly don't look at money in the same way.

It's a literary device to show what could be done if we quit wasting money
today. NASA will keep the money becaus that's the way the system works.

>>>Since the HLV doesn't exist, this number is pretty meaningless.

>>On the contrary. 95% of this HLV can be bought off the shelf today. The 5%
>>that doesn't exist are basically chunks of metal.

>Odd, I seem to recall just the other day that the Delta-deraived HLV design
>(is that the one we are talking about here?

Sure, why not. If it fails we can build the Titan derived HLV with the money
saved from about 45 days of Shuttle operations.

>[HL Delta] transfers fuel about in response to engine failure.

Yup.

>Please don't tell me that you think in-flight fuel transfer among boosters
>is just 'chunks of metal'.

Come on now, be realistic. Rockets pump fuel all the time. If they don't,
they don't work. Pumping to a burning chamber or another tank isn't that
big a difference.

The system used for HL Delta uses off the shelf pumps which are already
flight certified with a safety factor of two. The Saturn 1B did the exact
same thing and it worked just fine.

You keep taking minor problems with solutions using off the shelf flight
certified components and treating it like we are designing an anti-mater
engine. Get real.

>Besides, the normal pork-barreling will assure that no matter what, we'll
>buy stuff from them anyway.

Nope. This sort of comemrcial procurement is being used more and more. It
is also the law of the land.

>>>Uh-huh...tether it down?  What are you attaching your tether to?

>>Space Station Freedon.

>There went your microgravity work.

sure for the brief period of time while you are lowering something down. On
the other hand, you are saving fuel (which costs $10,000 a pound just to
deliver) and reduce the need for re-boost (which also trashes the micro-
gravity environment).

Surely you don't believe that using teathers forever ends ALL microgravity
potential for Freedom? Your grasping at straws.

>Not to mention, of course, that we heven't even begun to consider using
>tethers to move payload about.  You can't just pull technologies out of
>the air and use them on cost analyses.

OK, if the teather doesn't work then we will stick an engine on the
canister and de-orbit it that way. This will add maybe 1% to the total
cost.

BTW, the idea of using a teather came from an engineer at the Freedom
Program Office. He should know better than your or I what is practical.

>>>Who puts the thing in the canister?

>>what thing?

>Whatever you are trying to return to Earth.

The exact same person who would put it in if the Shuttle where
returning it.

>>>You need to put a bit more thought into this one.

>>No, all I need to assert is that the problem can be solved for less
>>than $3 billion a year. If it can, then we save money.

>Up above you asserted it can be done for $100 million, including startup
>costs and everything.  You are clearly incorrect.

You haven't shown that my number is incorrect. I think it could be done
for $100M/year.

But you are confusing the issue. So what if I am wrong. It could cost a
billion per year or even two billion per year and it would still save us
huge amounts of money.

>>>Man-in-a-can is no replacement for the
>>>Shuttle, no matter how much money you might save,

>>Why?

>Because it is a step backwards in both technology and capability.

You haven't shown that. It provides equal capability and provides more money
for technology. You seem to worship technology for the sake of technology.
Most engineers prefer lower cost.

  Allen

--
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Allen W. Sherzer | "If they can put a man on the Moon, why can't they     |
|  [e-mail]     |  put a man on the Moon?"                               |
+----------------------262 DAYS TO FIRST FLIGHT OF DCX----------------------+

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

Date: 4 Aug 92 12:45:01 GMT
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Soyuz as ACRV
Newsgroups: sci.space

In <[e-mail]> Allen W. Sherzer writes:
>You seem to worship technology for the sake of technology.
>Most engineers prefer lower cost.
  This reminds me of the quote ' An engineer is someone who can build
for 4 dollars, what any fool can build for 5'.
 -----------------------------------------------------------------
               ** Of course I don't speak for IBM **
Greg Nicholls ... [e-mail] or [e-mail]
                  voice/fax: [phone]

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

Date: 4 Aug 92 14:49:44 GMT
From: "Allen W. Sherzer" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Soyuz as ACRV
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Matthew DeLuca) writes:

>the shuttle has capability equalled by no other behicle in the world.  I
>just don't see using Soyuz capsules as an alternative.

by itself, no. However the total package I propose can do everything the
Shuttle can do and more for less than half the cost.

>It depends on your definition of 'operational service'.  After Challenger
>they dropped a lot of the operational service aspects from the system,
>and it's a lot more of a science and research vehicle.

It's an operational system which carries experiments.

>But it's better suited to many more.  I'd like to see Hubble come back in
>a canister...

Your never going to see that. Hubble wouldn't survive the trip down.

Besides, it would be cheaper to build and launch another than it would
be to bring it back and launch it again.

>I was referring to independent in the sense that we will have science
>capability independent of the space station.  Using capsules, it's the
>station or nothing.

Since the station provides better capabilities there is no need for
the Shuttle. If the station fails, we launch another which is easilly
paid for by the savings.

>I agree that it's not a sure bet, but by the time we can get a Soyuz system
>up and running, it'll be well into the second-level prototyping stage, and
>we should be able to predict with some assurance whether or not it will
>generate something usable.

Amazing. When I say the same thing about the far more conservative HL
Delta your all over me for using 'unproven technology'.

>Going through the expense and hassle of setting
>up Soyuz just to toss it away a couple of years later is silly.

It's called 'risk reduction'. It's done all the time.

  Allen
--
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Allen W. Sherzer | "If they can put a man on the Moon, why can't they     |
|  [e-mail]     |  put a man on the Moon?"                               |
+----------------------262 DAYS TO FIRST FLIGHT OF DCX----------------------+

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

Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1992 15:05:11 GMT
From: "Allen W. Sherzer" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Soyuz as ACRV
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Matthew DeLuca) writes:

>I'm not saying that.  Show me a proposal that has a capability similar to
>the shuttle, and I'll go for it.

The overall system I am proposing does exactly that. You have yet to find
any technical holes in it.

>If capsules were so wonderful to begin
>with, we would never have built the shuttle.

Huh? Odd as it may seem this won't be the first time anybody has gone
up a technological blind alley.

Reusable spacecraft ART the way to go (although it's hard to call the
Shuttle reusable"). However now is not the time. Larger markets are
needed. To promote those markets we need to lower costs. Using the
Shuttle doesn't do that.

>>>You are making the fatal mistake of tossing out a current technology for
>>>one that doesn't exist yet...

>>I didn't see Allen saying that.

>I see Allen using the savings from canning the shuttle to build his pipe
>dreams.

Pipe dreams? I don't call conservative designs from experienced spacecraft
builders pipe dreams.

However, it is clear you haven't been reading my postings. The HLV will be
built by the contractor and owned by the contractor. There will be no
out of pocket expenses unless and untill the contractor has demonstrated
the ability to reduce costs.

All we agree to is to buy launch services when they are available.

*THEN* and only then (when the new system has been demonstrated) do we
ship the Shuttles to the Smithsonian Air and Space.

>I'd like to see a Soyuz:

>(a)  Stay up for two weeks for large-scale biomedical studies.

No problem. It will fly up to Fred, do the experiment, and return.

>(b)  Put a crew of three outside to mate a new booster to a communications
>     satellite.

No problem. Put the booster on a HLV, send them up in a Soyuz to Fred, and
they they mate the booster.

>(c)  Deploy and retrieve a tethered satellite.

No problem. Put the crew in a Soyuz, send them to Fred, deploy and retrieve
the satellite from there.

>(d)  Retrieve and return a long-duration exposure facility.

No problem. Use the OTV to retrieve the facility, bring it to Fred. There
remove the experiment panels, attach new ones, and return the experimental
panels with the next supply drop.

Why do you insist on focusing on one small part of this approach and then
demand it do everything?

  Allen

--
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Allen W. Sherzer | "If they can put a man on the Moon, why can't they     |
|  [e-mail]     |  put a man on the Moon?"                               |
+----------------------262 DAYS TO FIRST FLIGHT OF DCX----------------------+

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

Date: 4 Aug 92 15:17:37 GMT
From: "Allen W. Sherzer" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Soyuz as ACRV
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Matthew DeLuca) writes:

>as demonstrated by the recent satellite repair mission, it doesn't have to
>be a dedicated mission to retrieve said object.

But you need a dedicated flight (or the better part of one) to send it
back up. Any of the payloads you mention could be rebuilt and launched
on a Titan IV for less money than retrieval and relaunch on a Shuttle.

>>But I'm feeling generous today. [OTV and return module].

>Well, my payload is crippled, so I can't bring it to the station.

So we will use the OTV.

>good that you are going to fund an OTV, although it's a pity that you've
>already budgeted yourself out until sometime in the next century.

Let's see, I'm building:

1. Two SSTO efforts    $ 6 billion
2. OTV                 $ 2 billion
3. Lunar base          $20 billion
     Total             $28 billion

We are saving about $4 billion per year so it will take 7 years to pay
for it all. So we are just barely budgeted into the end of the decade.
I can squeez you in for 2000 if you have a pet project.

Look at what we get:

      Option A                    Option B
    1. Working HLV              1. Working space shuttle
    2. two SSTO efforts
    3. Reduced MLV launch costs
    4. An OTV
    5. Lunar base

Are you actually saying that for the same amount of money that Option B
is better than Option A?

>I do hope it can move a 40,000 pound object across 20 degrees of orbital
>inclination.

for you, no problemo. Note that 40,000 pounds is better than the Shuttle.

>Of course, we can also wonder if the station can tether 40,000 pounds out
>of orbit...it certainly wasn't designed for it, and we don't even know
>how to do it.

As I said, the idea came from an engineer at the Freedom program office.

  Allen

--
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Allen W. Sherzer | "If they can put a man on the Moon, why can't they     |
|  [e-mail]     |  put a man on the Moon?"                               |
+----------------------262 DAYS TO FIRST FLIGHT OF DCX----------------------+

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

Date: 4 Aug 92 14:30:23 GMT
From: "Gary Morris @pulsar" <[e-mail]>
Subject: STS-46 Element Set (216.97)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle,sci.space

[I haven't seen these elements from Spacelink posted yet,
 so here they are. --GaryM]

STS-46 element set JSC-006 (orbit 54)

STS-46
1 22064U 92 49  A 92216.97367329  .00088100  00000-0  25600-3 0    66
2 22064  28.4702 326.5839 0005254 291.6367  68.3711 15.91598598   540

Satellite: STS-46
Catalog number: 22064
Epoch time:      92216.97367329 =====> (03 AUG 92   23:22:05.37 UTC)
Element set:     JSC-006
Inclination:       28.4702 deg
RA of node:       326.5839 deg          Space Shuttle Flight STS-46
Eccentricity:     .0005254                SGP4 Keplerian Elements
Arg of perigee:   291.6367 deg         from NASA flight Day 4 vector
Mean anomaly:      68.3711 deg
Mean motion:   15.91598598 rev/day              G. L. Carman
Decay rate:     8.8100e-04 rev/day~2      NASA Johnson Space Center
Epoch rev:              54

G.L.CARMAN

--
Gary Morris KK6YB        Internet: [e-mail]
San Diego, CA, USA       Phone:    [phone]

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

Date: 4 Aug 92 14:09:21 GMT
From: "James B. Pettengill" <[e-mail]>
Subject: What is the ASRM??
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.space.shuttle

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Henry Spencer) writes:
>
> In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Brent Butler) writes:
> >If anybody has some info on NASA's Advanced Solid Rocket Motor...
>
> It was (note past tense -- it's dying in Congress as we speak) a project
> to build a somewhat improved SRB for the shuttle, including better joint
> design, slightly improved payload capacity, and getting Thiokol out of
> the SRB business.  (The ASRM plant would have been NASA-owned, to avoid
> giving one company such a stranglehold on NASA business again.)
>
the asrm program is dead for now but not for long. it should be resurrected
latter this year or next.
fred can't get off the ground without asrm.
as of the last redesign the third flight is above the shuttle max payload.

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End of Space Digest Volume 15 : Issue 070
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