Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/pc/text/spacedig/v16_6/v16no664.txt

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Date: Thu,  3 Jun 93 05:27:19
From: Space Digest maintainer <[e-mail]>
Reply-To: [e-mail]
Subject: Space Digest V16 #664
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Space Digest                Thu,  3 Jun 93       Volume 16 : Issue 664

Today's Topics:
              Big Rock Can Hit Earth in Yr 2000 (2 msgs)
                          engine development
                            ET Foam Honed
                 Galileo (and other probes) question
             Hey Sherz! (For real!) Cost of LEO (4 msgs)
                  Intelsat salvage and marginal cost
                   Jonathan's Space Report, no. 156
                      Magellan Update - 06/02/93
Mambo Wolfe (was Re: Tom Wolfe's THE RIGHT STUFF - Truth or Fiction?)
                   Moon vs. asteroids, Mars, comets
                   More on Comet-Jupiter Collision
         Question about B&W markings on US launchers (2 msgs)
                         Some numbers for Ken
            Space Marketing would be wonderfull. (2 msgs)
                          wasteful spending

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

Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1993 00:09:58 GMT
From: Mike Van Pelt <[e-mail]>
Subject: Big Rock Can Hit Earth in Yr 2000
Newsgroups: sci.space,talk.environment,sci.physics,sci.astro

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Dave Tholen) writes:
>Just the kind of comic relief I needed after a hard day at the office.

According to Dave Barry, astronomers tell us that the Earth
is an upthrust target in a cosmic game of Wack-A-Mole.

--
Mike Van Pelt          | What happens if a big asteroid hits Earth?
[e-mail]         | Judging from realistic simulations involving a
                       | sledge hammer and a common laboratory frog, we
                       | can assume it will be pretty bad. -- Dave Barry

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

Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1993 01:10:22 GMT
From: "Phil G. Fraering" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Big Rock Can Hit Earth in Yr 2000
Newsgroups: sci.space,talk.environment,sci.physics,sci.astro

choy@dvinci (Henry Choy) writes:

>What's going to be done about Toutatis? It's reputed to be
>one km wide and a close visitor of earth. It doesn't have
>an invitation, but in the year 2000 it may come as close
>as the moon's orbital radius, maybe even closer. Is anyone
>thinking of
> - blowing it away?
> - carving it into little pieces?
> - changing its flight plan?
> - stopping it at customs?
> - revoking its visa?
> - hitching on for a joyride?
> - moving earth (and heaven too if it comes to that)?
> - what to think about after reading this?

I'm tempted to say that I'm not worried, Asterix the Gaul will save us!
--

+-----------------------+---------------------------------------+
|Phil Fraering          | "...drag them, kicking and screaming, |
|[e-mail] | into the Century of the Fruitbat."    |
+-----------------------+-Terry Pratchett, _Reaper Man_---------+

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

Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1993 00:35:59 GMT
From: Henry Spencer <[e-mail]>
Subject: engine development
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:
>... You know that a new engine is going to cost 5 billion
>dollars to develop as the DC folks know.

Hmm, the same way we all know that it would cost at least a billion to
develop a three-stage air-launched winged orbital launcher (especially
since all three stages would use new motors)?

(Pegasus's original development budget, including three new motors, was
fifty million.  I expect they've overrun that a bit, but not a whole lot.)

Dennis, there are more ways of doing things than the NASA way.  Did you
see the USAF estimate of how much DC-X would have cost *them* to build?

>Hell the Japanese folks know this
>ask them abou the LE-7 and it is "just" an upgrade of existing engine
>technology...

Anyone who calls the LE-7 an "upgrade" of existing engine technology is
kidding himself.  The Japanese are learning, the hard way, what the US
learned over the last 15 years:  staged combustion looks sexy but is a
horrible mistake if you want a reliable engine developed at a reasonable
cost.

>... Have any tests
>been run (I fugure they have but would like to know the numbers) on the
>longevity of the RL-10's? How many thousand seconds have they fired without
>rebuild or reinspections?

The RL10 is rated to fire 4000 seconds, continuously or with up to ten
restarts, on a single flight (i.e., no rebuild or inspection allowed).
I don't know exactly what the test history behind the rating is; perhaps
Allen does.
--
Altruism is a fine motive, but if you   | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
want results, greed works much better.  |  [e-mail]  utzoo!henry

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

Date: 2 Jun 93 17:52:36 -0600
From: Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey <[e-mail]>
Subject: ET Foam Honed
Newsgroups: sci.space,alt.folklore.science

I was in Huntsville, Alabama last week for the annual International
Space Development Conference, where members of the National Space
Society and fellow travelers meet.  Of course I had to visit the
Alabama Space and Rocket Center, home of Space Camp, a Saturn V, and
other wonders.

The weirdest thing I saw was their Shuttle.  They have created a
complete launch assembly by mounting a test (non-flying) Shuttle
Orbiter, the *Pathfinder*, on a big orange External Tank, and
strapping Solid Rocket Boosters to it.  (Trivia buffs tell me these
are "filament-wound" SRBs, atype which also never flew.)

The whole thing is mounted on tall concrete pylons slanting into the
sky, so you can walk underneath the belly of it and gawk.  It's
orbiter-on-top, by the way, the way you think it *ought* to look,
rather than orbiter-on-bottom the way it actually flies into space.

As Josh Hopkins ([e-mail]) and I strolled around it,
I looked closely at the external tank and noticed something strange.
The tank is covered with a few inches of orange insulating foam.  The
foam had a lot of little dark marks on it, about a centimeter long.
At first I thought the damage must come from birds pecking at the tank
or something.  But how would birds attack the underside of a big
cylinder with nowhere to perch?

Gradually I realized that the scars were pennies!  People fling
pennies into the foam, like ninjas hurling shuriken, and if they're
moving fast enough they stick.   In a few places I could see ballpoint
pens and screwdrivers sticking out of the ET.  I was looking at
hundreds of pennies embedded in the foam of the tank.  Kind of a
high-tech wishing well.

As I told Josh, I guess this monument symbolizes NASA's recipe for a
space program:

Take one Shuttle, then keep throwing money at it.

--
     O~~*           /_) ' / /   /_/ '  ,   ,  ' ,_  _           \|/
   - ~ -~~~~~~~~~~~/_) / / /   / / / (_) (_) / / / _\~~~~~~~~~~~zap!
 /       \                          (_) (_)                    / | \
 |       |     Bill Higgins   Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
 \       /     Bitnet:     [e-mail]
   -   -       Internet:  [e-mail]
     ~         SPAN/Hepnet:      43011::HIGGINS

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

Date: Wed, 02 Jun 93 19:32:06 EDT
From: Tom <[e-mail]>
Subject: Galileo (and other probes) question

The Galielo probe is just a box, essentially, which (we intend) will fall
into Jupiter's atmosphere, slowed by a drag-chute, right?

If so, wouldn't it be worthwhile, for later gas-planet probes to use some
kind of glider configuration?

Given that Jupiter most likely has lots of turbulence and thermals in it's
atmosphere, one could imagine a glider-probe crusing around for weeks in
the atmosphere, not just one oh-so-short drop.

Maybe it could seek out warm areas using IR detectors, to stay aloft in
the thermals, then dropping out for a long coast into deeper areas.

Has there been any work done on using gliders rather than just drop-probes?

-Tommy Mac
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tom McWilliams 517-355-2178 wk   \ They communicated with the communists,
[e-mail] 336-9591 hm \ and pacified the pacifists. -TimBuk3
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

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

Date: Wed, 2 Jun 1993 23:36:12 GMT
From: Dave Michelson <[e-mail]>
Subject: Hey Sherz! (For real!) Cost of LEO
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Pawel Moskalik) writes:
>>
>>Dream on. Americans have not been pre-eminent in spaceflight since
>>February 20th 1986.
>>
>
>What has happened on this day ? Did I miss something ?

That was the day Mir was launched...

As Pete Conrad once said, "If Skylab was still up there, it would still
be the biggest and the best.  For a few bucks back then, we could have
made it a reusable space station.  We didn't."

--
Dave Michelson  --  [e-mail]  --  University of British Columbia

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

Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1993 00:09:20 GMT
From: Henry Spencer <[e-mail]>
Subject: Hey Sherz! (For real!) Cost of LEO
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <1uiuir$[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Ken Hayashida) writes:
>Allen, you judge everything by a dollar and cent.  If the world operated
>like that then saving a guys life with a multimillion dollar MRI or
>CT Scan would be out of the question because you didn't feel it was
>"cost-effective." ...

I hate to remind you, Ken, but *your* medical system *does* operate that
way. :-)  If it's not cost-effective, i.e. profitable, for the doctor to
do the scan, then in the US it doesn't get done.
--
Altruism is a fine motive, but if you   | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
want results, greed works much better.  |  [e-mail]  utzoo!henry

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

Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1993 01:03:01 GMT
From: "Phil G. Fraering" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Hey Sherz! (For real!) Cost of LEO
Newsgroups: sci.space

[e-mail] (Henry Spencer) writes:
...
>any realistic claim to pre-eminence in spaceflight since December 19th 1972.

>(For those who don't recognize the date:  the Apollo 17 splashdown.)
>(If pushed, I might be willing to concede an extension for Skylab.)

*Shove!*

--

+-----------------------+---------------------------------------+
|Phil Fraering          | "...drag them, kicking and screaming, |
|[e-mail] | into the Century of the Fruitbat."    |
+-----------------------+-Terry Pratchett, _Reaper Man_---------+

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

Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1993 01:04:24 GMT
From: "Phil G. Fraering" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Hey Sherz! (For real!) Cost of LEO
Newsgroups: sci.space

[e-mail] (Gary Coffman) writes:

>In article <1ugieo$[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Pat) writes:
>>
>>Dennis, whom we all have a ton of respect for once posted a NASA
>>figure  that a shuttle mission only cost $27 million dollars.
>>
>>NOT!.....

>Well, most Shuttle missions only cost $27 million. It's the *first*
>one each year that costs $3.8 billion.



But there's also the refurbishment of each orbiter.

I would imagine that there's ~ 2.5 billion dollars for the first
launch, then 27 million for the next three, then a half billion or
so if you ever want to launch the vehicles again...

I'm using those numbers for example purposes. I hope to find
some more accurate ones in my Quest to FTP the Whole Federal
Budget And Enlighten Ken Hayashida. (If I don't see any mean
nasty windmills along the way).


--

+-----------------------+---------------------------------------+
|Phil Fraering          | "...drag them, kicking and screaming, |
|[e-mail] | into the Century of the Fruitbat."    |
+-----------------------+-Terry Pratchett, _Reaper Man_---------+

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

Date: Wed, 2 Jun 1993 21:58:30 GMT
From: Henry Spencer <[e-mail]>
Subject: Intelsat salvage and marginal cost
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:
>...Fact is that the Shuttle was lauched an extra time for that mission.

Sorry, wrong.  That mission was *added* to an existing flight -- a very
rare flight (first test of a new orbiter) that wasn't heavily booked.
That's not going to happen too often.

>Since the marginal cost is $37 million...

It's really pretty meaningless to talk about marginal cost for the
shuttle.  The shuttle system has essentially no elasticity in it; there
is typically *no way* to add an extra flight, at any price.
--
Altruism is a fine motive, but if you   | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
want results, greed works much better.  |  [e-mail]  utzoo!henry

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

Date: 2 Jun 93 21:26:07 GMT
From: jeff findley <[e-mail]>
Subject: Jonathan's Space Report, no. 156
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]>,
  [e-mail] (Jonathan McDowell) writes
|> Jonathan's Space Report

|> Mir
|> ---
|>
|> The Progress M-18 cargo craft docked with Mir on May 24. The Mir complex
|> now consists of the core module, the Kvant, Kvant-2 and Kristall modules,
|> the Sofora structure, and the Soyuz TM-16, Progress M-17 and Progress
   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
|> M-18 ferry craft. A return capsule on board Progress M-18 will be
|> used to return experimental samples to Earth in July.
|>

I have not heard of the Sofora structure.  Could anyone point me to any journal
articles which describe this structure?  Aviation Week would be ideal.

Jeff
--
+---------------------------------+------------------------------------------+
| Jeff Findley, SDRC              | This is a test of the .signature system. |
| Cincinnati, OH                  | Remember, this is only a test.           |
| e-mail: [e-mail]   | All opinions above are my own, I think.  |
+---------------------------------+------------------------------------------+

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

Date: 2 Jun 1993 23:34 UT
From: Ron Baalke <[e-mail]>
Subject: Magellan Update - 06/02/93
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro,alt.sci.planetary

Forwarded from Doug Griffith, Magellan Project Manager

                       MAGELLAN STATUS REPORT
                            June 2, 1993

1.  The Magellan Transition Experiment continues to go extremely well.
The spacecraft has completed its "walk-in" phase to the desired
aerobraking corridor.  The spacecraft has made 62 atmospheric drag
passes and the periapsis is now under 140.6 km and the apoapsis has
been reduced below 7900 km.  All subsystems are reported to be
nominal.

2.  The solar panels continue to increase by 40 degrees C during the
drag pass, reaching a peak of 62 degrees C.

3.  Spacecraft controllers are continuing to study the attitude
control during the drag pass.  Both the attitude and rate errors are
well within the desired limits, and the average propellant usage is
under the 0.05 kg allocation, but controllers are considering
performing the desat (desaturation of the reaction wheels) shortly
before the drag pass in order to reduce the residual momentum and the
resulting thruster activity.

4.  The periapsis altitude will continue to drift downward at about
0.2 km per day for the next few days, and the first "1/2 up" COTM is
now planned for orbit #7702 at 10:24 AM PDT June 4th.  This will be
followed by a series of 1/2 up COTMs at intervals of 4 to 9 days as
the general downward drift continues.

COTM = Corridor Orbit Trim Maneuver
     ___    _____     ___
    /_ /|  /____/ \  /_ /|     Ron Baalke         | [e-mail]
    | | | |  __ \ /| | | |     Jet Propulsion Lab |
 ___| | | | |__) |/  | | |__   M/S 525-3684 Telos | The tuatara, a lizard-like
/___| | | |  ___/    | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | reptile from New Zealand,
|_____|/  |_|/       |_____|/                     | has three eyes.

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

Date: Wed, 2 Jun 1993 22:23:21 GMT
From: Jeff Swanson <[e-mail]>
Subject: Mambo Wolfe (was Re: Tom Wolfe's THE RIGHT STUFF - Truth or Fiction?)
Newsgroups: sci.space,rec.arts.books

[e-mail] (Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey) writes:

>In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Jeff Swanson) writes:
>> You view this sort of book as exactly what it is -- an entirely
>> subjective account of human foibles and idiosyncracies, run through
>> the screen of Wolfe's stylistic objectivity.
>>     I love this book. I think it should be required reading
>> in any good high school/college level writing course.

>I think that's a bit strong.  It might have an unfortunate influence
>on the writing style of our young men and women.

Welp, I figure that echoing or ripping off Wolfe is a self-correcting
phenomenon. But, you must admit that there's sometimes a fine line
between "ripped off" and "was influenced by". :)

--Jeff
***>[e-mail]

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

Date: Wed, 2 Jun 1993 19:44:31 GMT
From: Gary Coffman <ke4zv!gary>
Subject: Moon vs. asteroids, Mars, comets
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <jthomas-010693102034@192.152.5.136> [e-mail] (Jay Thomas) writes:
>And by the way is wrong with self replicating factories. Even in the west
>and Americas they used self replicating machines: horses, mules, and oxen.

Tell you what, when you can *demonstrate* a lunar processing machine as
functional as a horse that can replicate itself as easily and cheaply as
a horse, we'll be impressed. Until then, we'll expect you to lift the whole
of manufacturing technology from basic metalworking to precision mechanics
and electronics to Luna to make your robot machines. And that's *heavy*,
*bulky*, and horribly complex and expensive even if lift costs were free,
which they aren't. At best you can expect to cast a few simple aluminium
structural members from lunar resources. Everything else will have to be
imported because the basic technology base required to manufacture complex
mechanisms is huge.

A very simple machine, that's not self directed, or even teleoperated,
requires 1 in 4 Americans to produce and support. Can you name it?

Gary
Gary
--
Gary Coffman KE4ZV          |    You make it,     | gatech!wa4mei!ke4zv!gary
Destructive Testing Systems |    we break it.     | uunet!rsiatl!ke4zv!gary
534 Shannon Way             |    Guaranteed!      | emory!kd4nc!ke4zv!gary
Lawrenceville, GA 30244     |                     |

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

Date: 2 Jun 1993 22:20:56 GMT
From: Claudio Egalon <[e-mail]>
Subject: More on Comet-Jupiter Collision
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro

I was giving some thought about that... Assuming
that the comet really collides with Jupiter, is
it possible that its remnants form a ring around
Jupiter or, even better, add to the ring that
already exist?

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

Date: 2 Jun 93 17:45:46 -0600
From: Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey <[e-mail]>
Subject: Question about B&W markings on US launchers
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Brian Schar) writes:
>
>> In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Mike Parsons) writes:
>> >Why do several US launchers (especially early ones like Redstone, Titan
>> >and Saturn) have strong black and white stripe markings?

[Massive quote from Dennis Newkirk deleted; please edit your
responses, Brian.]

> I believe the black and white stripes were used as a passive thermal
> control scheme, as opposed to all black (absorb a lot of visible light) or
> all white (reflect a lot of visible light).  Stripes would give you a
> balance between the two no matter what the angle of the sun.

This does not hold up as an explanation for markings on a rocket,
which will, after all, only function for a few minutes.  However, it
is an accurate explanation for the dark-and-light markings on some
*satellites* and interplanetary spacecraft.  See pictures of the early
Pioneers for some examples.  For some reason this method of thermal
control is not so popular anymore.  I wonder why.  Today we see U.S.
spacecraft wrapped in shiny metallized Kapton more often.

Bill Higgins, Beam Jockey              | "We'll see you
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory  | at White Sands in June.
Bitnet:           [e-mail]  | You bring your view-graphs,
Internet:       [e-mail]  | and I'll bring my rocketship."
SPAN/Hepnet:           43011::HIGGINS  | --Col. Pete Worden on the DC-X

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

Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1993 00:41:36 GMT
From: Henry Spencer <[e-mail]>
Subject: Question about B&W markings on US launchers
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey) writes:
>...is an accurate explanation for the dark-and-light markings on some
>*satellites* and interplanetary spacecraft.  See pictures of the early
>Pioneers for some examples.  For some reason this method of thermal
>control is not so popular anymore.  I wonder why.  Today we see U.S.
>spacecraft wrapped in shiny metallized Kapton more often.

White paints unfortunately don't stand up to prolonged vacuum and raw
sunlight as well as one might like; their reflective properties deteriorate
with age.  The modern preference is to use more stable materials, which
permits tighter margins and less-drastic overbuilding.
--
Altruism is a fine motive, but if you   | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
want results, greed works much better.  |  [e-mail]  utzoo!henry

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

Date: 2 Jun 93 15:50:10
From: Steinn Sigurdsson <[e-mail]>
Subject: Some numbers for Ken
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Allen W. Sherzer) writes:

   In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Steinn Sigurdsson) writes:

   >   DDT&E   Launch Cost   Total Cost    Payload    $/LB to LEO
   >    $5B        $6M         $9.63M      24,000 LB     $401

   >Nice numbers.

   Thanks.

   >Can you really get 8% on something this risky?

   Full faith and credit of the US is backing it so I think so.

Oh, US treasury funding, ok.

   But to address this I tried it with 12% interest. Cost per launch
   went up by $660,000 per flight (about 10%), still far cheaper than
   the competition.

   >And what the hell are you guys planning to launch @200/year!?
   >(yeah, I know, this cheap you make a market for yourself...)

   It would make the market a lot bigger that's for sure. I was thinking
   we could launch science experiments on the extra flights. After all,

Suits me ;-)  Problem though, science intruments ain't cheap,
even if a lot of the mass constraints are removed, and you
don't try to go for leading edge instrumentation on all flights.
If they're probes as opposed to up&down payloads you're going
to have severe downlink problems - we're talking serious expansion
of DSN and TDRSS or equivalent. But then you still have to pay
for ongoing data analysis, and that's increasingly expensive.

   we can launch a DC-1 200 times for just about what it costs us to
   launch Shuttle eight times.

   >I still think your launch costs are optimistic, way optimistic,

   Could be. On the other hand, they can be off by quite a lot and it's
   still a good idea. If we account for costs the way Ken and Dennis do,
   it can cost 20 to 40 times as much and STILL be cheaper than Shuttle.

   >but I guess there's only one way to find out if that rate
   >and cost can be achieved ;-)

   Yep. Of course, if it doesn't work, we will know LONG before we build
   the DC-1.

Well, we can hope, if you can keep the support staff under 100/flight
and get the turnaround expected...  I still think fuel is going to
be more of a problem than allowed for, especially the LH2, should have
gone with kerosene ;-)

|  Steinn Sigurdsson    |I saw two shooting stars last night        |
|  Lick Observatory    |I wished on them but they were only satellites    |
| [e-mail] |Is it wrong to wish on space hardware?        |
| "standard disclaimer"    |I wish, I wish, I wish you'd care - B.B. 1983    |

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

Date: Wed, 2 Jun 1993 20:51:15 GMT
From: Iain Wacey <[e-mail]>
Subject: Space Marketing would be wonderfull.
Newsgroups: sci.environment,misc.consumers,sci.astro,talk.environment,talk.politics.space,sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Frank Crary) writes:
>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (bill nelson) writes:
>
>>Unfortunately, the only place highway billboards have gone away is where
>>they have been legislated out of existance...
>
>Then the only place they have gone away is in Utah: Allowing highway
>billboards is a condition for receving federal highway funds. Utah
>refused to allow tabaccoo ads on non-interstate highways, and doesn't
>get non-interstate highway funds as a result...
>
>                                                       Frank Crary

>                                                       CU Boulder


 Wrong. There are no billboards in Vermont.  We also seem to
still receive Federal highway funds.

Iain Wacey
[e-mail]

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

Date: 2 Jun 1993 23:13:19 GMT
From: Ralph Seguin <[e-mail]>
Subject: Space Marketing would be wonderfull.
Newsgroups: sci.environment,misc.consumers,sci.astro,talk.environment,talk.politics.space,sci.space

All I know is that I'm going to rekindle my interest in model
rocketeering (but on a slightly larger scale, something sufficient
to attain escape velocity and carry a small payload :).  If one of
those things passes through the airspace around me... <puff> and
it's meteor[ite]s...

-Ralph

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

Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1993 00:17:50 GMT
From: Henry Spencer <[e-mail]>
Subject: wasteful spending
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <1uiuir$[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Ken Hayashida) writes:
>>If you claim to support spaceflight by men and women, why do you
>>support this wasteful spending which our opponents use to show
>>that manned space will never work? I have asked you this question
>>several times. I note you ignore it every time.
>
>I ignore this question because it implies that the work is useless, which
>it is clearly not.  Unless we understand how to fly orbiter, to rendezvous
>with targets in various orbits, and to perform EVA's in the cargo bay of
>the orbiter; in my opinion we cannot hope to use DC-whatever for space
>station work, as you claim...

Ken, why do you assume that this work must be done *on the shuttle*?  Allen
didn't say it was useless, he said it was wasteful.  Using the shuttle for
such experiments *is* wasteful:  it's an inordinately costly way to do
experiments that are of marginal relevance to a DC-served space station.

A DC-1 won't fly like the shuttle, so flight experience is only marginally
relevant.  The basics of rendezvous maneuvering were sorted out during
Apollo, so refining it on the shuttle is only a small gain.  And if working
in the shuttle cargo bay is so different from previous EVA work that it has
to be learned all over again, why is it relevant to post-shuttle operations?

My own feeling is that shutting down the shuttle would be a mistake, and
as long as we've got it, we might as well experiment with it... but this
experimenting is neither vital nor a bargain, it's strictly killing time
in a mildly useful way until we can get down to business.
--
Altruism is a fine motive, but if you   | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
want results, greed works much better.  |  [e-mail]  utzoo!henry

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

End of Space Digest Volume 16 : Issue 664
------------------------------