Lobbying, Other

Briefly: wish lists, space socialism, and questionable polls

Earlier this week the Greater Houston Partnership and the Bay Area Houston Economic Partnership issued a release this week critical of the administration’s human spaceflight plans and asking for a revised plan. They don’t ask for much: a “limited” number of additional shuttle flights, continuation of Constellation, and to “fast-track” a heavy-lift launcher starting in 2011. They notably don’t mention how much doing all of these things simultaneously would cost, or where the funding should come from. The partnerships, of course, are worried about the local impact if the administration’s plan goes through: they fear the loss of “up to 7,000 direct and indirect jobs with a resulting loss of income and expenditures reaching $1 billion in the Houston region.”

In an op-ed in Wednesday’s South Florida Sun-Sentinel, Space Frontier Foundation co-founder Bob Werb calls for Republicans to continue the fight against socialism—in space. He notes that while the administration’s plan would rely on commercial providers to transport astronauts to LEO while canceling the “socialist boondoggle” called Constellation, “Republicans have been either silent or opposed” to the proposal. “You might think that Florida’s Republicans in particular would embrace this change because it means more jobs for Florida than the prior ‘program of record,'” he writes. “You would again be wrong. Maintaining the socialist status quo seems to be more important than either Republican ideology or jobs for the people of Florida.”

About a month ago Daily Kos published a poll on space spending performed by polling firm Research 2000, that had some interesting results, including that Republicans were more likely to think we spend too much on space. Yesterday the site announced that the polls the company performed for Daily Kos were “likely bunk” based on an independent analysis that found irregularities in the data. Not all the polls were analyzed in the study, and the space spending poll was not specifically mentioned, but “I no longer have any confidence in any of it, and neither should anyone else,” Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas said in a post yesterday.

108 comments to Briefly: wish lists, space socialism, and questionable polls

  • Mark R. Whittington

    (1) The problem with polling on an issue most people are not familiar with is that any result can be obtained by how the question is framed. That works both ways.

    (2) I really wish Obamaspace supporters would stop misusing the language by screaming “socialist!” at those of us who think space exploration is important. They come across like liberals who like to scream “racist!” in order to cut off debate.

    (3) Glad to see that the Kos Kids have gotten another black eye, this time with BS polling. Maybe Ferris can apologize.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Mark R. Whittington wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 8:04 am

    what a hoot.

    two points

    first if anyone owes anyone an apology it is people who use the word “Hitler” and other pejorative terms to describe the current administration.

    As for the Polls..anyone who made any statement based on those polls did so on solid grounds…they parallel what other reputable polls say.

    Back to apology. When people like you apologize for all the lies you supported and perpetuate about Saddam and the threat he posed to the US, then we can talk about apologizing.

    On your blog you beat the drum of “the WMD went to Iraq Bush will be vindicated” at every opportunity. Every jerk who comes up with the slightest statement along those lines, you publish. Dont talk to me about apology until you deal with that.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    Mark R. Whittington wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 8:04 am

    we have space exploration Mark. Cassini is doing great work at Saturn, Pluto is on track to being visited…in a few years if JOVE works Spacecraft will be in orbit around every planet from Mercury to Saturn telling us a lot

    What you want is not exploration but a big government program that so far has spent 10 billion dollars and done nothing. It will take at least 150-200 billion more to get 6, 4, or 3 government employees back to the Moon to do “what” (oh stop the Chinese from conquering it according to you).

    thats pork…you are just a big government water carrier. After the guy who you liked Bush the last, took the country when it was prosperous, at peace, and relative stability…paying down on the debt and screwed it to the point where we are headed into what is probably the worse economic down turn in its history.

    one would think people like you who thought he was so great would just feel shame.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Ferris Valyn

    I really wish Obamaspace supporters would stop misusing the language by screaming “socialist!” at those of us who think space exploration is important. They come across like liberals who like to scream “racist!” in order to cut off debate.

    Physician, heal thyself.

    Glad to see that the Kos Kids have gotten another black eye, this time with BS polling. Maybe Ferris can apologize.

    Apologizes? Really? For what? the fact that a group of good people got ripped off because someone they hired had dishonest operations?

    Are you next going to ask that the Maddoff victums apologize as well?

  • Chad A Schaefer

    I’m loving the way the word ‘socialism’ is used to describe anything government-run, as a derogatory statement. Pretty fun to watch it be the ultimate insult, when, in fact, I could go on and on about the great ‘socialist’ programs of Eisenhower (the interstate road system), Nixon (food stamps), Reagan (earned income tax credit), public streets, public schools, public parks, fire departments… but I digress.

    I see some advantages to the new policy (anything that encourages the private sector to advance in space is beneficial to all of us), but the de-emphasis on current programs, and the pushback of exploration for NASA is a setback that will leave a gap that will not be filled quickly.

    Low earth orbit is no space policy. There is so much to be learned and gained by the moon, Venus, Mars… we are only scratching the surface, and we need to be going.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Chad A Schaefer wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 9:55 am
    There is so much to be learned and gained by the moon, Venus, Mars… we are only scratching the surface, and we need to be going…..

    The US or other nations have vehicles in orbit around all three of those bodies. They are there at minimal cost making nice discoveries every day.

    We are not going…we are there.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    Constellation is no more a “socialist” program then Obama’s health care plan was.

    What Constellation has become however is represenative of everything that has gone wrong in a government agency and its relationship with “private” companies. It (Constellation) is a poster child for government spending for no purpose other then to keep government (and government/industry) infrastructure intact.

    As a result cost have run amock. that it took 1/2 billion dollars to do the Ares1-X test flight, which essentially tested little in regards to the finished vehicle…shows that the cost have just gotten out of control. That the “program” needs about 20 billion more (at least) just to get to LEO (and go no further) should make all simply gasp and ask “what went wrong”.

    Instead the drum bangers like Whittington and the wind person (and a few others) try and justify their support as “for exploration”. OK Ignoring why exploration by people is important right now (and that alone is questionable by THEIR justifications for it) the question again is “why does it cost so darn much”?

    until they can answer that their support should be seen for what it is…mindless.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Do we want humans in space? Here is one way to pay for it (a road that is less “socialist” than either Constellation or FY2011):

    http://bit.ly/cKXqAA

    Its time to take Congress off the critical path.

  • Vladislaw

    Mark R. Whittington wrote:

    “(2) I really wish Obamaspace supporters would stop misusing the language by screaming “socialist!” at those of us who think space exploration is important. They come across like liberals who like to scream “racist!” in order to cut off debate.”

    I find it odd, when people like Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, make a living off of shouting “socialist” about anything the current President does, Mark does not mention or compare “conservatives” who say it but goes totally outside to bring liberals into it.

    Gosh Mark why not compare apples to apples and come down on everyone shouting socialist.

  • Anyone here followed Space Frontier Foundation co-founder Bob Werb’s opinions? Well, to fill you in- last Christmas my uncle sent me a fruitcake, and I thought of Werb.

  • PS — FWIW, I continue to believe a basic shuttle derived program remains the best route for NASA policy (DIRECT as my clear 1st choice, but perhaps sidemount if the numbers truly work) however it scarcely seems worthwhile spending time arguing for that on the tubes of the intra-web.

    Either Congress will get that deal done, or they won’t.

    If Congress gets that deal done, then maybe NASA will take us beyond LEO within a reasonable time frame.

    If not, then I believe Robert Oler is correct and what we can look forward to is this:

    what is going to be left standing…is a few uncrewed efforts, ISS, access to ISS, a few technology experiments, and whatever the commercial people can make work. We are in for a decade long “funk” (or worse)

    Under this scenario “commercial” will only have a few tax dollars to work with for LEO and ISS with NO tax dollars available for BEO.

  • Dennis Berube

    Oh how quickly we have forgotten about all the spin offs from the Apollo project! What Obamas plan does, is postpones any hopes of reaching space in the next few years, unless we utilize the Russian Soyuz, which is a very good spacecraft. However paying them upwards of 50 mil. when the money should be supporting Orion, is a waste. We need our own access to space, and I dont really think the private sector can deliver it quicker than NASA. Today the Soviets could launch a Soyuz lunar mission, with a kicker stage, if they wanted to. It would be a welcomed sight to once again see mankind venturing out to the lunar environment. If America had stayed on course we would already have a lunar base, and quite probably a large telescope on the Moon. It seems today that mankind has lost its will to explore and venture forth.

  • Gary Church

    “until they can answer that their support should be seen for what it is…mindless.”

    Is that Survival Imperative “mindless” Mr. Oler? What do you think is mindless, spending trillions on the defense industry when the only defense is an off world colony that could be established for a fraction of what those fleets of cold war toys cost?

    Your entire “Long live the Republic” ideology will disappear with rest of the human race if “something bad” happens. You are living on the assumption that “it will never happen.” It happened in 1908 and all it would take is something a little bigger and we will be in that movie “The Road.” Have you watched it yet?

  • Gary Church

    “the Russian Soyuz, which is a very good spacecraft.”

    Well, it is definitely an old spacecraft. And cheap to make with the Russian economy being run by the Russian Mafia. I think laying off U.S. space program workers and paying the Russians a couple billion to transport our astronauts is…..pathetic. And I do not think SpaceX is going to find it very easy to build a capsule with an escape system. The situation sucks.

  • What Obamas plan does, is postpones any hopes of reaching space in the next few years, unless we utilize the Russian Soyuz, which is a very good spacecraft.

    Nonsense. ULA and SPaceX can have crew transport long before we would have gotten it from Ares/Orion, and for far less cost.

    I dont really think the private sector can deliver it quicker than NASA.

    Fortunately, it doesn’t matter what you think.

  • Gary Church

    From the NASA Solar B page from 2002

    “If NASA can’t protect astronauts, its vision of sending a crew into deep space may come to nothing. Data collected by NASA and a Russian-Austrian collaboration show that astronauts on the ISS are subjected to about 1 millisievert of radiation per day, about the same as someone would get from natural sources on Earth in a whole year. Spending three months in these conditions translates into about one-tenth the long-term cancer risk incurred by regular smokers. While this may be an acceptable risk, sending astronauts beyond the Earth’s protective magnetic field will vastly increase their exposure. “If you sent two people to Mars, one of them would die,” says Marco Durante of the Federico II University in Naples, who has studied the health effects of radiation in Mir astronauts for ESA. Radiation inside the ISS, and the now defunct Mir, is caused when the fast, heavy ions that make up cosmic rays collide with the aluminium hull, releasing a shower of secondary particles into the living quarters.”

    There is no flexible path for HSF; only HLV’s can lift the plastic sections and only off world water can provide the thousands of tons of additional shielding. And only Nuclear Pulse Propulsion can push that mass around the solar system. It is a narrow path.

  • Gary Church

    “Nonsense. ULA and SPaceX can have crew transport long before we would have gotten it from Ares/Orion, and for far less cost.”

    That is nonsense; there are not just one, but two escape systems available for Orion, and the parachute system has already been extensively tested. Your ULA/SpaceX crew transport is at this point more fantasy than fact.
    Stop making things up.

    You want to whip up a capsule cheap and nasty? I remember a certain company trying to do the same thing with the Apollo capsule and our first 3 astronauts died. What was that company Rand?

  • Set it straight

    LOL, it doesn’t matter what any of us think!

  • Gary Church

    “On your blog you beat the drum of “the WMD went to Iraq Bush will be vindicated” at every opportunity. Every jerk who comes up with the slightest statement along those lines, you publish. Dont talk to me about apology until you deal with that. Robert G. Oler”

    I have to agree with you Mr. Oler. Some people seem to have a follow the leader gene that keeps their brain from working. Like when they were saying waterboarding was not really torture. And they were actually discussing this on the radio, “do you think it’s torture Mr. so and so?” God, please save us from ourselves.

  • Kelly Starks

    > Robert G. Oler wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 9:30 am
    >
    >== first if anyone owes anyone an apology it is people
    > who use the word “Hitler” and other pejorative terms
    > to describe the current administration.

    That was the last admin that was called that– we had a election about 18 months ago. A guy Named Obama won, it was in the news?

    >== When people like you apologize for all the lies you
    > supported and perpetuate about Saddam and the threat
    > he posed to the US, ==

    Ok, RGO has officially left this reality.

  • Kelly Starks

    >== Bush the last, took the country when it was prosperous, at
    > peace, and relative stability…paying down on the debt and
    > screwed it to the point where we are headed into what is
    > probably the worse economic down turn in its history.

    >Robert G. Oler

    Yeah that Obama guy also added more to the debt in his forst year then Bush did in al 8 of his, adn Obama plans to double total US debt.

    You also might have noticed the 9-11 thing where we were attacked, hence getting us to fight back in the war?
    Nits I know, but…

  • Coastal Ron

    Dennis Berube wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 11:47 am

    Oh how quickly we have forgotten about all the spin offs from the Apollo project!

    Actually, they live on in our industry, and that is why SpaceX has been able to do what it has done so quickly, and at a relatively low cost. Their Merlin engine is based on the pintle engine from the lunar lander. Their stages/tanks use friction-stir welding of Al-Li, both fairly recent improvements for space and aerospace vehicles. You could probably trace a good part of the current wiring standards back to the Apollo 1 fire, which makes it easier for everyone to build & buy safer electrical systems now. The whole industry stands on the shoulders of the 50’s & 60’s space program, but it has evolved so much that it’s just hard to see.

    However paying them upwards of 50 mil. when the money should be supporting Orion, is a waste.

    I agree with Rand, in that it’s better to pay the Russians a small amount to save us from making a huge & costly mistake. Ares I duplicated existing capability, and the biggest thing that people overlook is that we don’t know if flying people or sensitive cargo on a SRB-only 1st stage is such a good idea. The vibration issues are real (they had to add vibration dampeners), as are the safety concerns if the LAS has to be used (14G’s!!!). Ares I was only needed to cover part of the Ares V development cost (build an HLV, get a crew launcher for free), which is not a good reason to build such a risky vehicle.

    If Griffin would have moved to man-rate Delta IV Heavy instead, and build the LEO-only version of Orion first, then we wouldn’t be having this angst, because they would have bee ready either this year or next. We have three good choices for domestic capsules systems (Orion-lite, Dragon and CST-100), and it looks like NASA is moving along the path to pick one soon – if they get their way on the budget.

    Today the Soviets could launch a Soyuz lunar mission, with a kicker stage, if they wanted to.

    Actually, it more like if they could afford to. America could go back to the Moon if we wanted – we have always had the ability, but what we have lacked was the money, and that shows up in the form of lack of national interest from Congress. This is not a slam against them either, but just pointing out that the Moon has not been an urgent priority, and that is reflected in their budget priorities.

    If America had stayed on course we would already have a lunar base, and quite probably a large telescope on the Moon. It seems today that mankind has lost its will to explore and venture forth.

    It all boils down to money. Do you spend Billions on potholes and new libraries, or on sending astronauts to run around on the Moon? We have a finite amount of tax revenue, and we have borrowed massive amounts, so we have to make sure what we spend it on provides us the most return. I don’t think Constellation was a good investment, because I didn’t see a big ROI in real terms. Slowing things down, and getting our basic technologies down pat for LEO seem like a better investment for me, especially since it can have quicker payoff for smaller space companies.

  • LOL, it doesn’t matter what any of us think!

    Some of us have more influence than others…

  • Ben Joshua

    Dennis Berube wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 11:47 am

    “Oh how quickly we have forgotten about all the spin offs from the Apollo project!”

    Actually, in order to pay for Ares, research and tech dev that would lead to spinoffs would have been budg-gutted, never to materialize.

    The new policy and NASA FY11, call for research and tech dev that will undoubtedly lead to spinoffs, in the form of new industrial processes with applications in the greater marketplace, and capabilities that the newly unbound private sector will utilize creatively and inventively.

    After the gap, we’re headed for some unexpected and unpredictable practical advances. It may not be footprints on Mars by X date, but developments to come will lead to economic growth and jobs, probably at the end of a long and deep recession.

  • Gary Church

    “the newly unbound private sector will utilize creatively and inventively.”

    How exactly was it “bound?”

  • Kelly Starks

    >Rand Simberg wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 1:15 pm

    >>LOL, it doesn’t matter what any of us think!

    > Some of us have more influence than others…

    All of us have no influence. Its strickly a inside the beltway thing, and space advocates are the last people who NASA or Congress have to worry about ni space policy.

  • Gary Church

    “If Griffin would have moved to man-rate Delta IV Heavy instead, and build the LEO-only version of Orion first,”

    Well, yes Ron, I have to agree. Why can’t they “fast track” an Orion Delta now?
    I have not heard anyone putting this out there.
    Delta IV heavy is a hot bird- the ultimate expendable. I like reusable but it would definitely fly better than the kerosene cluster.

  • Gary Church

    “All of us have no influence. Its strickly a inside the beltway thing, and space advocates are the last people who NASA or Congress have to worry about ni space policy.”

    I have to disagree. I take inspiration from MADD. Not mutually assured destruction of dumasses; Mothers against drunk drivers.

    It really comes down to how much money “they” will lose if there is rioting in the streets. Mao and political power flowing from the barrel of a gun is trumped in capitalist society by smaller dividend checks. So when there are grumblings from the unwashed masses the profit loss ratio is evaluated and depending on how the numbers all work out- things change or they do not. It rarely turns out the way everyone predicts. Thus economics is witch doctory.

  • borecrawler

    I am not a huge fan of bloated government, but one of the few places where government has succeeded has been in Manned Space Exploration. Maybe, if commercial companies had started in the 1950’s, they would be close to where NASA has gotten us, but the simple truth is, they didn’t! Now, they are making unrealistic claims about how they can do everything from getting us to Mars to cooking our dinner. I believe and hope that commercial companies succeed, but it will take time. MEanwhile, we have the present to deal with. The answer does NOT lie in withholding funds for space exploration. The answer lies in finishing what we have started. Many of us feel it needs to be modified, but not scrapped. Why does Obama want to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Let’s get going on Heavy Launch and go beyond LEO, instead of stalling and playing politics. The onluy political hope I have is that the debate will stall until Obama is out of office and cooler (and more space-minded) heads prevail in the next administration.

  • Gary Church

    “The vibration issues are real (they had to add vibration dampeners), as are the safety concerns if the LAS has to be used (14G’s!!!).”

    Vibration…O.K. But sidemount will not have that issue because it uses the shuttle config.

    14Gs? That is all acceleration away from death Ron. Human beings can take alot more than that for short periods without permanent injury. Your LAS argument is no good. I recommend you change your mind on that. Immediately.

  • Socialism is the most over-used and abused word in political discourse since daytime hate radio put devil horns on liberals and gave them pitchforks.

    At least the Werb opinion is above average in using it accurately, but that’s not saying much.

    So far everyone that has gone to space to work has done it on a “socialist” vehicle, so that is like arguing against cars that have wheels.

    That will change sooner or later, but there is no value in red-baiting 50 years of history to make a point.

  • Kelly Starks

    > Gary Church wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 1:31 pm

    > Why can’t they “fast track” an Orion Delta now?
    > I have not heard anyone putting this out there.

    That was one of the commercial crew options discussed – though naturally L/M would prefer to use noe of their Atlas’ instead of Boeings Delta.

    ;)

    Course – then you have to build the Orion’s and integrate them, and Boeing complained about having to compete with a gov cost + contract.

    One plus for a Orion CC is they can use the Orion as a lifeboat. Otherwise they need to launch a orion or Soyuz separately as a lifeboat – or add that CC proposals much have Orion 6 month parked in space capacity..

  • Kelly Starks

    > Gary Church wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 1:36 pm
    >
    > I take inspiration from MADD. == Mothers against drunk drivers.
    > It really comes down to how much money “they” will lose if there is rioting in the streets. ==

    NASA’s a gov agency. The gov prints the money, what maters are how many votes can your interest group and its topic swing – and kids killed by drunk drivers is a much bigger public interest then Constellation vrs whatever.

  • Coastal Ron

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 1:13 pm

    You also might have noticed the 9-11 thing where we were attacked, hence getting us to fight back in the war?

    And where did those terrorists have their base? Afghanistan. And where did Bush spend most of his time & money? Iraq. It wasn’t until Obama was elected that we decided to try and finish the job that Bush started in Afghanistan, but that Bush forgot about when he focused on Iraq.

    So if we take the money from the tax breaks Bush gave to the wealthiest in America (during a war no less), add in the $500B cost for the Bush Medicare program (no cost savings), and add in the cost of the Iraq war, we wouldn’t have been digging ourselves so far into debt already when the economic meltdown happened – during Bush’s watch. See a trend here?

  • Kelly Starks

    > == one of the few places where government has succeeded
    > has been in Manned Space Exploration. Maybe, if commercial
    > companies had started in the 1950’s, they would be close to
    > where NASA has gotten us, but the simple truth is, they didn’t! ==

    Actually they did. Who do you think builds, maintains, and supports all NASA flights? Few people in Mission control, to the launch pads are NASA civil servants. They are the commercials in the running for commercial crew Boeing and Lockheed/Martin.

  • Coastal Ron

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 2:15 pm

    That was one of the commercial crew options discussed – though naturally L/M would prefer to use noe of their Atlas’ instead of Boeings Delta.

    ULA is a 50-50 joint venture between Lockheed Martin and Boeing, so Lockheed Martin doesn’t care which launcher anyone uses, since they get 50% of any. If you asked them, they would want more business for ULA. Period.

  • Kelly Starks

    ULA doesn’t build the Orion Lockheed Martin does, so they would prefer 100% of the launcher fees – but at this point who knows whats going down.

    NASA did just give them $160M ish to keep working on Orion.

  • Coastal Ron

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 2:15 pm

    One plus for a Orion CC is they can use the Orion as a lifeboat. Otherwise they need to launch a orion or Soyuz separately as a lifeboat – or add that CC proposals much have Orion 6 month parked in space capacity.

    If a lifeboat is needed soon, then the one to watch for is Dragon, not Orion. Think about it:

    – A production version of Dragon is going to be demonstrated this summer, and another two next year, so they are starting to crank them out.

    – Dragon already has an air scrubbing system, since it was designed for pressurized scientific payloads (live payloads), and they just need to add controls, displays, seats and a few other small mods. It can also stay attached for up to two years at the ISS, versus 6 months for Soyuz.

    – Falcon 9 charges $56M to send a Dragon to the ISS, and then SpaceX would probably lease the capsule to NASA for the duration. Even if they charged $100M for the leased capsule (or bought one outright), that’s a bargain over Orion.

    A likely scenario would be that SpaceX would offer NASA a lifeboat Dragon after they have finished their COTS demo flights, and in fact they could send one up configured for crew but carrying part of their ISS cargo commitment, which would be a twofer for them. They could do this as soon as 2011/12, especially since they don’t need an LAS.

    From a practical standpoint, this does not add any crew capability to the ISS, since the constraint right now is getting people to the ISS. IF Congress decided to keep the Shuttle program going (which I don’t favor), then you could use a lifeboat capsule to allow the Shuttle passengers to stay on the ISS, and ride home on either the next Shuttle or the lifeboat (needs to be rotated at some point anyways).

  • Coastal Ron

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 2:33 pm

    ULA doesn’t build the Orion Lockheed Martin does, so they would prefer 100% of the launcher fees – but at this point who knows whats going down.

    Whoa taco, you’re getting confused again (or at least your writing is). Lockheed Martin builds the Orion CEV, which was originally designed for the Ares I, but like all good capsule systems, could be put atop anything that can lift it’s considerable weight.

    United Launch Alliance, which does not build payloads (forbidden by their charter from L/M & Boeing), will launch just about anything you pay them to.

    Lockheed Martin get’s 50% of the profits from ULA, regardless which model launcher is used, so they care most about more launches.

    I don’t know where you’re getting this “100% of the launcher fees” stuff, but I thought I better bring you up to date.

  • Kelly Starks

    > Coastal Ron wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 2:48 pm

    >> Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 2:15 pm

    >> “One plus for a Orion CC is they can use the Orion
    >> as a lifeboat. Otherwise they need to launch a orion or
    >> Soyuz separately as a lifeboat – or add that CC proposals
    >> much have Orion 6 month parked in space capacity.”

    > If a lifeboat is needed soon, then the one to watch for is
    > Dragon, not Orion. ==

    SpaceX wouldn’t be considered (and I don’t think it has 6 month loiter time anyway). Last year I would have thought SpaceX was a serious contender. What I overlooked is they have no experience, and the political issues with shutting down NASA flight capacity to fly astronauts with a company with virtually no experience at anything — not going to happen. Especially not bidding against Boeing and L/M, who have their fingerprints on about every manned and unmanned launch in US history.

    Even Musk says he’s got a slim chance of even getting token flight.

    >== IF Congress decided to keep the Shuttle program going
    > (which I don’t favor), then you could use a lifeboat capsule
    > to allow the Shuttle passengers to stay on the ISS, and ride
    > home on either the next Shuttle or the lifeboat (needs to be
    > rotated at some point anyways).

    Be easier to add the long duration abilities to the orbiter.

  • Kelly Starks

    > == Lockheed Martin builds the Orion CEV, which was originally
    > designed for the Ares I, but like all good capsule systems, could
    > be put atop anything that can lift it’s considerable weight.==

    Actually capsule usually are tailored to noe target launcher, but Orion folks have said they could save a ton or two of weight adabting it to the genteler EElV’s.

    >==Lockheed Martin get’s 50% of the profits from ULA, regardless
    > which model launcher is used, so they care most about more launches.

    I thought they still could offer Atlas nidependantly outside of ULA? And certainly they build them for ULA – so they’ld get a litle more that side of the contract.

    Minor nit though. They are projecting $5b-$15B to finsh Orion (depending on NASA oversite and buracratic choices), plus a couple hundred million a capsule, so a fraction of the EELV profits small potatose.

  • Coastal Ron

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 3:04 pm

    SpaceX wouldn’t be considered (and I don’t think it has 6 month loiter time anyway)

    There you go again…

    A quick look on the amazing Internet would tell you:

    – Soyuz can stay attached to the ISS for up to six months (~180 days)
    – Orion, as designed today, has an endurance of 210 days in space, but lifeboat duration has not been published.
    – Dragon is designed for a mission duration of one week to 2 years.

    Last year I would have thought SpaceX was a serious contender. What I overlooked is they have no experience

    Well yes, but no other U.S. company does either, and that is the reason for the COTS/CRS program, to provide them with the knowledge they need, and verify they have created that ability. So far they have passed 15 of 22 milestones needed to qualify them for doing COTS Resupply missions. When they do, they will be certified to do something only the Shuttle, Soyuz, ESA and JAXA have so far been certified for, which is docking with the ISS.

    Until Orbital Sciences is certified sometime later, SpaceX will be the only U.S. company that has the knowledge and ability to send a spacecraft to the ISS.

    With their COTS certification, Dragon is also human certified by NASA, and SpaceX has already stated that they only need to add seats, controls/displays, and a few other things internally for crew transport. The reentry will have already been demonstrated as part of the COTS program, and if they don’t need to transport crew up, then they don’t need an LAS. Without the leadtime for the LAS (construction & test program), they could start doing lifeboat duty by late 2011 or 2012 at the latest. By that time they will have demonstrated their launcher and capsules more than three times, and all part of an existing NASA contract.

    SpaceX has done a good job identifying the minimum viable product (MVP) to build that provides the most amount of flexibility. And flexibility in business means that you have more opportunities to win more customers.

    No doubt SpaceX will have at least one setback as they move forward, but they have already demonstrated the ability to create technology that works, and solve problems quickly. They have a lot going for them, and Lockheed Martin and Boeing better decide quickly how they are going to carve out their their niche in commercial space.

  • Dragon was designed from the beginning for long-duration capability, because it was a requirement for Dragon Lab.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 1:13 pm

    You also might have noticed the 9-11 thing where we were attacked, hence getting us to fight back in the war?

    this question is one of my test to determine if people are capable of independent thought. It is sort of like the question my first commanding officer asked concerning The Revolution. (who would have been on the side of the Colonials? Lots of people raise their hands…”AH he would respond, the traitors among us”….and his relative was on the deck with Jones…so go figure).

    The 9-11 thing was not a declaration of war, any more then Tim McVeigh’s criminal act in OKC was. At best 9/11 was an attack by a stateless person against a state…there is no data to suspect that Saddam or the Iraqi people had anything to do with it. And yet the “we are at war” meme was used to push us into Attacking Iraq.

    To believe 9/11 was the start or even part of a war is to show very shallow thinking.

    It is the same sort of thinking that declares “SpaceX wouldn’t be considered (and I don’t think it has 6 month loiter time anyway). Last year I would have thought SpaceX was a serious contender. What I overlooked is they have no experience, and the political issues with shutting down NASA flight capacity to fly astronauts with a company with virtually no experience at anything — not going to happen.

    SpaceX has an enormous amount of experience. You should go look at the folks who they have hired. It is just like a startup airline…they go out and hire experience …the tricky thing is putting together a structure that uses that experience in a competent and safe way. …and SpaceX has clearly done it. They have some issues with their last launch…but what they accomplished and the assets (money) that they used to accomplish it shows a basic competence in their organizational skill…which is the essence of experience.

    As for “Astronauts” who cares about the “spoiled and pampered pets of Uncle Sam”. Space is about to change in a rather significant manner. Thanks to some other forces we are going to give free enterprise a try.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    borecrawler wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 1:38 pm

    I am not a huge fan of bloated government, but one of the few places where government has succeeded has been in Manned Space Exploration.

    Sadly you are about thirty years out of synch Robert G. Oler

  • Kelly Starks

    > Coastal Ron wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 3:51 pm
    >
    >- Orion, as designed today, has an endurance of 210 days
    > in space, but lifeboat duration has not been published.

    Its the same, I wrote some of the specs.

    >> “Last year I would have thought SpaceX was a serious
    >> contender. What I overlooked is they have no experience”

    > Well yes, but no other U.S. company does either, ==

    You might have noticed we’ve been flying manned space craft for about half a century. The companies who flew those are, or merged with, Boeing and L/M. So with Congress screaming how can you trust US astronauts to untried star ups – the guys who’ve been doing it since we flew the first Mercury’s are the obvious choice. I’m nor saying Dragon couldn’t do it – thats just irrelivant.

    Even Musk agrees.

    >== With their COTS certification, Dragon is also human
    > certified by NASA, ==

    NASA made no such claim, nor even defined yet HOW they would certify a ship to carry people.

  • Coastal Ron

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 3:10 p

    >==Lockheed Martin get’s 50% of the profits from ULA, regardless
    > which model launcher is used, so they care most about more launches.

    I thought they still could offer Atlas nidependantly outside of ULA? And certainly they build them for ULA – so they’ld get a litle more that side of the contract.

    Apparently you don’t understand how a joint-venture works. ULA has the launcher assets (manufacturing, launch facilities, etc.) for both Atlas and Delta (II & IV), and the parents have to go through ULA if they want a launcher. The employees are no longer Boeing or Lockheed Martin, their checks come from United Launch Alliance.

    Minor nit though. They are projecting $5b-$15B to finsh Orion (depending on NASA oversite and buracratic choices), plus a couple hundred million a capsule, so a fraction of the EELV profits small potatose.

    Again, instead of guessing what might be the right information, all you have to do is a little Internet search before you post. Regarding Orion, Lockheed Martin has stated:

    “If I were utterly unconstrained by funding requirements and asked to provide my best estimate of what would be a rational test program, it’s in the range of $4.5 billion to $5.5 billion,” Joanne Maguire, executive vice president of Denver-based Lockheed Martin Space Systems, said in a June 17 interview.

    Also, don’t confuse revenue with profits. ULA (Lockheed Martin and Boeing) would enjoy any $130-300M launcher contract you send their way.

    Apparently, in the matter of volume vs quality, you have chosen to go for the largest volume of posts possible. I wonder what would happen if you decided to try for quality instead? Also, I haven’t seen such bad spelling since Dan Quayle… ;-)

  • Robert G. Oler

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 1:13 pm

    Yeah that Obama guy also added more to the debt in his forst year then Bush did in al 8 of his

    another one dimensional statement. It is sort of “his disaster is twice as bad as the person I like”.

    You wont find a single post anywhere (and I post under my real name) defending Obama’s economic policies. The only thing coherent about Obama’s plan, is that it is a logical extension of the things (crony capitalism). I would have supported some stimulus, but for the most part it was badly spent. It addressed several issues that Mr. Obama found on his plate when he walked into the Oval.. several states on the brink of implosion etc…but did not address it very well. Texas for instance took a lot of stimulus money to run its budget into the black, but made no really hard choices to fix things for the next year. (Texas has a right wing Gov.).

    I was for a stimulus but would have directed it into things like national power grids, and other country changing products that at the end of spending the dollars there is something for it. FDR for instance to keep the shipyards open (which we needed) built cruisers and aircraft carriers that were compromises in design but affordable and did the job in WW2. Coupled that with Obama’s inability to really reform the federal government, to get rid of projects that take 1000 to do what 100 can do (Constellation)…and we have essentially accomplished little.

    But none of that is what got us where we are. It is what has stalled fixing things…but in the end what got us where we were on Jan 20, 2009 is the tenure of Mr. Bush.

    He took surpluses turned them into deficits that were growing as he left office. He declared ‘war” and refused to even try to pay for it, fought them badly and left them for his successor…his federal government programs were a lot like Constellation…programs with no value other then the jobs they subsidized.

    Worse as it finally all came home and the banks started imploding Bush and Cheney were willing to abandon all their rhetoric of free enterprise and failure/success and head for the federal government to bail out all the folks whose success were to “float all boats” (remember the rising tide?).

    I dont think Obama has done all that well in his tenure…but the mess he found, was the mess Mr. Bush and his thunderheads made. Ossama Bin Ladin is still breathing.

    statements like yours are some of the most rhetorical thin I have seen.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 4:04 pm

    it wont matter if the “elite” astronauts will or want fly on Dragon. Musk will find people who will. The astronaut office is on a fast track to oblivion…much like the rest of NASA

    Robert G. Oler

  • Kelly Starks

    > Coastal Ron wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 4:09 pm

    >==Apparently you don’t understand how a joint-venture works.==

    That would depend no the specifics of the vbenture.

    >> “Minor nit though. They are projecting $5b-$15B to finsh
    >>Orion (depending on NASA oversite and buracratic choices),
    >> plus a couple hundred million a capsule, so a fraction of the
    >> EELV profits small potatose.”

    > Again, instead of guessing what might be the right information,
    > all you have to do is a little Internet search before you post.
    > Regarding Orion, Lockheed Martin has stated:

    I guess you don’t realize the numbers don’t contradict what I said?
    > “If I were utterly unconstrained by funding requirements
    > and asked to provide my best estimate of what would be
    > a rational test program, it’s in the range of $4.5 billion to $5.5 billion,==

    It gose to $15 if she has to continue the way currently contracted and with current NASA purchasing rules.

    > Also, don’t confuse revenue with profits. ULA (Lockheed
    > Martin and Boeing) would enjoy any $130-300M launcher
    > contract you send their way.

    Yeah but with only 10 launches (or less) up for bid, their profit no the launches would be less then the profit frmo constructing the 10 Orions, much less the Orion dev program.

  • Kelly Starks

    > Robert G. Oler wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 4:13 pm
    >> Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 1:13 pm
    >> Yeah that Obama guy also added more to the debt in his forst year then Bush did in al 8 of his
    > ==. It is sort of “his disaster is twice as bad as the person I like”.

    His choice. The extra debt was for programs he was pushing and could have deferred. So you can hardly blame one for his actions, and excuse the other for doing 8 times worse.

    > === …but in the end what got us where we were on Jan 20, 2009 is the tenure of Mr. Bush.

    ;/

    Not even worth going into.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 4:18 pm

    Yeah but with only 10 launches (or less) up for bid, their profit no the launches would be less then the profit frmo constructing the 10 Orions, much less the Orion dev program.

    this is where Musk (if he makes his cost numbers) has ULA by the “shorts”. If Musk can make his cost numbers he will have 10-20 launches just from the civilian market (established customers and new startups). So his profit base is far larger…

    Where this is going to come down to (assuming Musk and his products keep working) is a battle between Delta and Falcon for both NASA (or more correctly civilian government space) and military launches. (Atlas with its Russian engine is going to flounder).

    Falcon 9 heavy and the TriDelta are about DoD HLV.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Coastal Ron

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 4:04 pm

    > Well yes, but no other U.S. company does either, ==

    You might have noticed we’ve been flying manned space craft for about half a century.

    Notice I said “U.S. company”. All the spacecraft to date have been U.S. Government.

    >== With their COTS certification, Dragon is also human
    > certified by NASA, ==

    NASA made no such claim, nor even defined yet HOW they would certify a ship to carry people.

    Words matter here, and notice I used the word “human” and not “crew” – there is a difference. The Dragon capsule was designed to meet NASA’s published human-rating standards. These include little things like no sharp edges and accessibility, and also environmental issues since the Dragon opens into the ISS and exchanges air (no noxious fumes, etc.).

    NASA has never needed to create crew standards for anything but NASA vehicles, and each of those has been different because of the evolving set of circumstances, so it’s NASA that is behind the times here for crew standards. I’m sure SpaceX has looked at all the standards from the Shuttle going back to the 60’s capsules, and they have their own experts to rely on too.

    Remember that NASA did not impose any standards or changes to the Soyuz when we started using them. They just certified it as equivalent.

    The environmental stuff is pretty straight forward, and there are plenty of closed-loop systems out there to use as examples. We’re not talking anything too tough for any of this, so it’s really just a matter of NASA deciding what the crew standards will be, and everyone else adjusting to them.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 4:24 pm

    His choice. The extra debt was for programs he was pushing and could have deferred…..

    not really. the plug got pulled when Bush did the TARP. That was the opening of the federal treasury to those who were suppose to “lift all boats”.

    The extra debt is mostly a function of the economy sinking. Programs like health care have not even started to affect the debt…and Obama is probably accurate in that this will change the numbers positively.

    Anyone who came into the office (and I supported very heavily McCain) was going to have to spend money to try and stop the downward trend…but McCain flew into the TARP and was stuck in it.

    The main thing that Obama has failed on is reforming the federal government. He needs to do what he has done for human spaceflight…for all aspects of the government. We have structures that are left over from “post war” it is like staying with black and white TV when the technology is there for HDTV.

    I dont like what Obama has done, but the ship was bow down well before he walked on the deck. eight years of simple incompetence had done its toll.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Gary Church

    “The environmental stuff is pretty straight forward, and there are plenty of closed-loop systems out there to use as examples.”

    Closed loop is defined as “A closed ecological system must contain at least one autotrophic organism. While both chemotrophic and phototrophic organisms are plausible, almost all closed ecological systems to date are based on a phototroph such as green algae. ”

    No such examples have ever been flown or tested for flight to my knowledge. Do you know what you are referring to here Ron?

  • Coastal Ron

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 4:18 pm

    First you said:
    >> “Minor nit though. They are projecting $5b-$15B to finsh
    >>Orion

    Then I pointed out that Lockheed Martin said “the range of $4.5 billion to $5.5 billion”.

    Then you said:
    I guess you don’t realize the numbers don’t contradict what I said?

    There’s that math problem again.

    You gave a range of $10B, from $5-15B.

    Lockheed Martin gave a range of $1B, from $4.5-5.5B.

    You were off by a factor of 10x. Maybe good enough for government work, but not good enough for the real world… ;-)

  • Gary Church

    “Where this is going to come down to (assuming Musk and his products keep working) is a battle between Delta and Falcon for both NASA (or more correctly civilian government space) and military launches. (Atlas with its Russian engine is going to flounder-Falcon 9 heavy and the TriDelta are about DoD HLV.).”

    They are not HLV’s. I would say 70 metric tons is where HLV starts. And that falcon “heavy”, is a 27 engine mess.

    What this is coming down to is the U.S. losing it’s proven heavy lift hardware for a non-man-rated expendable with less lift and kerosene cluster throwaway that supposedly will carry astronauts but has not shown it can carry anything yet except a dummy load. No escape system tested, no re-entry system tested. And it will all be so cheap and quick to make happen while fork over hundreds of millions in tax dollars at a time to the russians after laying off our own space work force. This stinks.

  • mike shupp

    Robert Oler wrote

    “As for the Polls..anyone who made any statement based on those polls did so on solid grounds…they parallel what other reputable polls say.”

    Well, no. I wrote a fairly long comment at the time pointing out that the Research 2000 poll gave results quite different from polls conducted ever since Apollo days. To quote a couple paragraphs,

    “… very very consistantly those old surveys have shown that space program supporters were predominantly (a) white, (b) male, (c) college educated, (d) more affluent than average, (e) older than average [“baby-boomer-style old” not “WW 2 vet-style old”]. And just as consistantly those old surveys showed that people who wanted space program budgets cut or eliminated were more often than not (a) non-white, (b) female, (c) educated to high-school level or less, (d) poorer than average, (d) quite old or quite young.

    “This survey however puts older white males in the lead in finding space programs too expensive; unprecedented numbers of blacks and hispanics and women and younger people apparently have become backers of space programs. It would appear that the survey was large enough that real differences are being measured here.

    “On the one hand, I find this puzzling. Gallop and other polling agencies have been sampling voter reactions to space program budgets for 50 years, and this response is something new. It’s tempting to wonder if Research 2000 really got a representative sample of voters.”

    You could have read it here first.

  • Robert G. Oler

    mike shupp wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 6:58 pm

    I read your post and found it entertaining…I never went into the “book” of the Kos polls…my point was that the raw numbers agreed with mainstream polls.

    And I suspect that polls taken “now” would find that the breakdown of who does and does not support a human exploration program is changing as economic situations in communities have started to change.

    you did a nice analysis

    Robert G. Oler

  • DCSCA

    SpaceX has an enormous amount of experience. You should go look at the folks who they have hired. It is just like a startup airline…they go out and hire experience …the tricky thing is putting together a structure that uses that experience in a competent and safe way. …and SpaceX has clearly done it. <— ROFLMAO past is prologue. Per CNBC, Tesla Motors has yet to turn a profit. Musk has no cash.

  • DCSCA

    All the spacecraft to date have been U.S. Government. <– manufactured by U.S. companies.

  • Kelly Starks

    > Gary Church wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 6:56 pm

    > == What this is coming down to is the U.S. losing it’s proven heavy
    > lift hardware for a non-man-rated expendable with less lift and ==
    >== And it will all be so cheap and quick to make happen while fork
    > over hundreds of millions in tax dollars at a time to the russians
    > after laying off our own space work force. This stinks.

    Yup. Gov planing at its best.

  • Kelly Starks

    > Coastal Ron wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 4:28 pm

    >>“> Well yes, but no other U.S. company does either, ==

    >> Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 4:04 pm

    >> You might have noticed we’ve been flying manned space

    >>craft for about half a century.”

    > Notice I said “U.S. company”. All the spacecraft to date have been U.S. Government.

    The topic was experience, not ownership. Boeing and L/M have a half century experience in designing, serviceing, and operating maned space craft, as well as training the crews and planing the missions.

    >>>== With their COTS certification, Dragon is also human
    >>> certified by NASA, ==

    >>NASA made no such claim, nor even defined yet HOW they would certify a ship to carry people.”

    >==The Dragon capsule was designed to meet NASA’s published human-rating standards. ==

    Which NASA does not consider acceptable to certify a craft to carry people. In truth they never defined it for any of their craft either, but they can ignore – or use – their rules as they see fit

    >== Remember that NASA did not impose any standards or
    > changes to the Soyuz when we started using them. They just certified it as equivalent.

    They were under pressure to do that.

  • Kelly Starks

    > Coastal Ron wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 6:44 pm

    >>>Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 4:18 pm

    >>>First you said:
    >>> “Minor nit though. They are projecting $5b-$15B to finsh Orion”

    >>Then I pointed out that Lockheed Martin said “the range of $4.5 billion to $5.5 billion”.

    > Then you said:
    > “I guess you don’t realize the numbers don’t contradict what I said?”

    Yeah, I figured you didn’t understand. The $4.5B – $5.5B range was IF NASA took a hands off oversignt policy toward Orions development. I.E. treated it like a commercial product. Otherwise, if NASA continues handeling it like a normal gov dev program, it will cost as much as before — which was $20B. Last I knew they were over $5B (most of $9B actually) into their $20B budget — but of course now it needs to be redesigned.

    Welcome to gov contracting. Normally mil is 3 times commercial costs to dev something, NASA generally 4 times, though in some cases its much worse. NASA and its contractors agreed it would take $1.2 billion to do space ship 1 – which Cost Paul Allen $35M.

    Corse then there is the legendary $100 screw driver and hammer – which during congressional a hearing, the congressmen were bitterly told were tools sold to them for $1.25, which legally required the $99 worth of paperwork — due to the laws passed by the congressmen in the hearing. Laws passed – to keep the companies from overcharging the gov.

    Your government at work.

    Oh, probably not a snowballs chance in Hell NASA will agreed to the relaxed oversight to lower the Orions cost to $5B + or -.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 9:47 pm

    It is unlikely that Lockmart could deliver an Orion for 5 billion dollars in any set of circumstances. Lockmart has not delivered a commercial aerospace product (ie where they had a financial stake in its success or failure) since the L1011. Lockmart has floundered on a lot of projects for the military/space complex. The Lockheed Terrain fighting vehicle (or whatever it is called now) literally floundered while Marines were dying in Anbar.

    Second government contracting does not have . The MRAP and other things have proven that.

    We do need new rules…and we need responsibility for failure.

    As for NASA/LM oversight. One of the things I have followed thanks to some internal friends is the effort by the Astronaut office to change some of the windows on Orion. A thought came to mind “just say no”.

    As for Soyuz. NASA was pressued to do that, but they could not come up with any logical reason…and they bumped into a political class that was determined to bend them. Thats going to happen more and more

    Robert G. Oler

  • DCSCA

    “it wont matter if the “elite” astronauts will or want fly on Dragon. Musk will find people who will. The astronaut office is on a fast track to oblivion…much like the rest of NASA…”

    <- There have always been stooges ready to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel. Truax had riders lined up for his rocket in '82 as well. Musk will have to underwrite insurance policies for his own passengers and crews most likely. But then, Musk may simply sell out soon anyway, as a good CELO should, for the benefit of his investors. The history of Tesla should be a signpost of 'things to come' with this fella. All the more reason for investors and riders in his rockets to remain somewhat wary. NASA will survive as long as there is a manned space program at its core. Only a strong-willed president and a like-minded Congress could kill it with the agreement of the American people– and that's not likely to happen with this president, this Congress or the people of the United States who value the pride and accomplishment their space achievements represent.

  • DCSCA

    In an op-ed in Wednesday’s South Florida Sun-Sentinel, Space Frontier Foundation co-founder Bob Werb calls for Republicans to continue the fight against socialism—in space. <- Someone should remind this fella that it was first facist and then socialist states that led the way into space. Capitalists have always followed behind, playing catch-up and cashing in along the way where they could.

  • Coastal Ron

    Gary Church wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 5:51 pm

    No such examples have ever been flown or tested for flight to my knowledge. Do you know what you are referring to here Ron?

    Closed loop from the standpoint of not able to take in outside air to process, like an airliner. Maybe an inelegant use of the term, and “closed-circuit” would probably be the better description. Spacecraft have to reprocess and revitalize their air, and they can’t rely on outside sources of oxygen like an airliner or submarine.

    There are lots of existing environmental systems that SpaceX can draw from, including the current Shuttle. In fact SpaceX already has an environmental system on Dragon, since they need to keep biological experiments alive for their DragonLab and COTS contracts. This type of equipment is not too complicated, and the science behind it is well understood. Heck, my neighbor is a professional diver, and carries a closed-circuit rebreather on his back when he dives to depths below normal scuba (<130ft).

    Or, just watch the movie "Apollo 13", and watch them figure out how to put a square Lithium Hydroxide canister in a round hole… :-)

    There's lots of settled science on how to keep people alive in an enclosed space, much of it published by NASA (your tax dollars at work). This won't be a problem for any commercial space company.

  • Rhyolite

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 1:13 pm

    “Yeah that Obama guy also added more to the debt in his forst year then Bush did in al 8 of his, adn Obama plans to double total US debt.”

    Wrong. That’s not even close. And it is easily falsifiable given that the Treasury department publishes the the daily total outstanding public debt on its web site:

    http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/BPDLogin?application=np

    Here are the facts about the debt:

    Date Total Debt
    1/20/2001 $ 5,727,776,738,304.64
    1/20/2009 $10,626,877,048,913.08

    So Bush added $4.9 Trillion to the debt in eight years. Keep in mind that he inherited a surplus so his borrowing was heavily back loaded – in the last year of his administration alone, 1/20/2008 and 1/20/2009, he added $1.4 Trillion to the debt.

    For your statement to be true, the Obama administration would have to have added $4.9 Trillion to the debt in their first year. The reality is:

    Date Total Debt
    1/20/2010 $12,327,380,804,696.82

    So the first year of the Obama administration added $1.7 Trillion to the debt – a staggering sum, no doubt. But it is a factor of three off from your claim and only 21% more than the debt added in the last year of Bush administration.

    It shouldn’t be surprising that the difference between the last year of the Bush administration and the first year of the Obama administration is as small as it is because the government was operating for most of the year on Bush’s last budget and the economy was only getting worse at that point.

    I don’t like to accuse people of lying – especially with the claim is so nonsensically false – so I will give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you are simply repeating something you heard. Given that, you should consider whoever you heard if from to be dishonest and unreliable. And you should also exercise more common sense about the factoids you repeat – this stuff is easily checked.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Rhyolite wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 12:27 am

    Nice job. I knew what he was claiming was false but just thought I would stick to one line…the 9/11 thing.

    thanks for posting this

    Robert G. Oler

  • Coastal Ron

    DCSCA wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 8:58 pm

    Per CNBC, Tesla Motors has yet to turn a profit. Musk has no cash.

    Aaah, now I understand how you get your information – you scan the headlines, but don’t read the detail. That can be the only explanation how you use your information is such a funny (i.e. wrong) way.

    For instance, Tesla Motors is a separate company from SpaceX. SpaceX has stated that they have been profitable for the last three years, and Musk has said that he hasn’t needed to invest any more money in SpaceX. So whatever you were trying to imply turns out to be incorrect.

    Tesla, despite being a startup in the field of high-cost consumer products, did declare a profit in August of last year, but since they are still expanding their sales and the number of products, they will continue to run in the red for a while. Is this unusual? No, and the success of the IPO means that there are enough interested investors willing to bet on the future of the company (i.e. bet that Musk is on the right track). Have you ever created a company that went public successfully?

    For Musk and his personal cash position, this has been covered by everybody, and what you leave out is that because of his divorce costs, and because he didn’t want to sell any of his considerable holdings in any of his three companies, that he has been relying on loans from friendly companies and individuals. You also left out that he sold a small amount of his Tesla shares for $15.5M when they IPO’d, so your statement about “no cash” is no longer valid.

    If only you had read past the headlines… :-)

  • Coastal Ron

    DCSCA wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 11:23 pm

    But then, Musk may simply sell out soon anyway, as a good CELO should, for the benefit of his investors.

    His public statements on why he started the company are more of an indication of what the future holds. He believes so much in the goal of lowering the cost to access space, that he put up a significant amount of his fortune to do it. Have you ever felt that strong about something?

    The history of Tesla should be a signpost of ‘things to come’ with this fella.

    Yes, that he will build a company with strong products, and that it generates enough investor interest that they are able to bring in significant amounts of working capital to allow them to expand quicker. Bad news for competitors, like Boeing and Lockheed Martin, since it means that SpaceX will be intruding further into their commercial marketspace. Oh, and SpaceX has a $2.4B backlog of orders – pretty good indication of what the market thinks of SpaceX too (and by extension, Musk).

  • Coastal Ron

    Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 9:52 pm

    Welcome to gov contracting.

    I was a manager at one of the largest defense contractors, creating my fair share of DD250’s (government bill of sale). We received one of the first Commercial Off The Shelf (COTS) contracts from the DOD, so I’m quite familiar with government contracting and contractor costs/profits. One of my best friends is also a Contracts Manager for Boeing (we met on the COTS program), so I know the inside scoop.

    Normally mil is 3 times commercial costs to dev something, NASA generally 4 times, though in some cases its much worse. NASA and its contractors agreed it would take $1.2 billion to do space ship 1 – which Cost Paul Allen $35M.

    Practically nothing big NASA does has commercial equivalents, so I don’t know where you get such a number from. Also, it depends if you’re doing a fixed-price or cost-plus contract, are you allowing change orders, etc. It all boils down to how well defined the product requirements are – if they keep changing, then the price keeps going up. After one government product is made, and it’s successful, a commercial company could come in and build it cheaper, but that’s the same for any 1st generation product. If there was a market for Shuttle vehicles, I have no doubt that Boeing could build one just as capable, but that costs less to buy and operate. NASA hardly ever gets to the point of serial production, so there are no apples-to-apples comparisons that are easy to make.

    Lax government oversight does play into overblown contractor costs, as it’s in the contractors interests to squeeze the most money out of their customer, but this happens in the commercial world too – business as usual. The best practice is to have a well defined product requirement, and keep changes to a minimum – that’s the only way to force contractors to stick to the original negotiated price.

    Concerning SpaceShipOne (the correct spelling) – those kind of statements lead me to think that you’re making some of this stuff up, because SpaceShipOne was a project to win the $10 million Ansari X PRIZE. To make what you say true, NASA would have had to put out an RFQ, and had some reason why they wanted a SUB-ORBITAL vehicle when they already had a FLEET OF ORBITAL VEHICLES!! Please cite your references.

  • Rhyolite

    Coastal Ron wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 1:23 am

    “Bad news for competitors, like Boeing and Lockheed Martin, since it means that SpaceX will be intruding further into their commercial marketspace.”

    ULA hasn’t been getting that much commercial business so I am not sure how much it hurts them. I think it is worse news for Arianspace, who does have a significant commercial presence, since they don’t have as much room to cut their prices as ILS does.

  • Rhyolite

    Spase Blagher wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 1:45 pm

    Well said.

    I am reminded of the movie quote: “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

    Socialism by most conventional definitions is public or collective ownership of the means of production and distribution of goods and services.

    A government designed rocket (by MSFC) built in a government owned factory (Michoud) is a text book example of a socialist enterprise.

    But then again so is your local municipal water company. And so is the power grid in large parts of this country (Bonneville Power Administration and Tennessee Valley Authority).

    The US government has owned factories – read socialist enterprises – since at least the time George Washington set up the Springfield Armory in 1777 to manufacture gun carriages for the Revolutionary War.

    The problem is that “socialist” has been turned into an epithet in some conservative circles for anything they don’t like. This why Mr. Whittington doesn’t like to have it thrown back at him – how dare you use that word, we own that word – even though it is a completely correct usage. It just doesn’t mean what he thinks it means.

  • Frediiiie

    DCSCA says:
    “Tesla Motors has yet to turn a profit.”
    Musk said on TV interview after recent IPO for Tesla that the company is in expansion mode. If they were just selling the Roadster and battery packs they’d be turning a profit now. They’re gearing up for the higher volume Model S. His other companies Solar Cities and SpaceX are both profitable.
    SpaceX has been for the past 3 years according to Musk in an interview after Falcon 9 first launch.

    “Musk has no cash.”
    But he has lots of assets. There’s a difference.
    Besides it’s the cash and assets the company commands that counts.
    If Musk personally fell off the planet tomorrow the company would go on.

  • Frediiiie

    DCSCA wrote:
    “But then, Musk may simply sell out soon anyway, as a good CELO should, for the benefit of his investors.”
    Before Tesla and SpaceX Musk started Zip2, then Paypal. In both cases the companies were sold out from under him by the people who had put up the money. They saw the quick profit and sold. Certainly in the Paypal case Musk was very dissapointed. He wanted to develop the company further into a full online bank. For more info on this see some of his early interviews on Youtube.
    For Tesla Musk has said he wants to go from Roadster (low volume high cost) to Model S (medium volume medium cost) to, eventually, a Low cost high volume model. But you’re right. he may never get there. He may sell out. Who knows.
    SpaceX is a horse of a different colour. Musk really wants to “make life interplanetary”. There have already been hints that they may develop a Merlin 2, a BFR (Big Falcon Rocket), and a hint about a possible lunar lander.
    (just a hint).
    Personally I think Must will just push the envelope in any direction he thinks there’s a possible market on the theory that developing anything and everything that is economic will ultimately get him to Mars.
    I think he’s got a much better chance than NASA or any government program.

  • Coastal Ron wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 1:58 am

    “Lax government oversight does play into overblown contractor costs, as it’s in the contractors interests to squeeze the most money out of their customer, but this happens in the commercial world too – business as usual. The best practice is to have a well defined product requirement, and keep changes to a minimum – that’s the only way to force contractors to stick to the original negotiated price.”

    This is an excellent point. The culture of government contracting has this “make more money from changes” thing built in.

    When I moved from a business that was commercials billing commercials to NASA, it was an eye-opener.

    I was used to a little bit of workscope creep before, and ended up doing engineering support for a contracting office to help them sort out abuse. We had multiple vendors, so it was possible to play them against each other and convince them how workscope creep would be tracked and the numbers of work orders they got would be reduced proportionally. They worked extra hard to control things themselves.

    This isn’t possible the way things work on the government side. It’s like workscope creep is part of the culture.

  • DCSCA

    @ Coastal Ron wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 1:23 am; Frediiiie wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 3:28 am

    <- Point is, he may be lighting a fire in the hearts and minds of commercial space enthusiasts but for the cold calculus of sound business investors seeking a profitable return for their investments, the business history is somewhat mixed given the largess of the capital required for the limited market for his goods and services. CNBC simply mused matter-of-factly that from a business POV, Tesla has yet to turn a profit over several years. And the economic climate is sour. That should naturally be a cautionary point for investors to weigh.

  • DCSCA

    @Coastal Ron wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 12:55 am <- You do realize that highlighting his personal problems is not a strong selling pointy and only serves to highlight added outsode pressures of instability with respect to 'selling' him to investors. Nobody wants to put the space program in the hands of Professor Harold Hill.

  • Coastal Ron

    DCSCA wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 5:42 am

    You do realize that highlighting his personal problems is not a strong selling pointy and only serves to highlight added outsode pressures of instability with respect to ‘selling’ him to investors. Nobody wants to put the space program in the hands of Professor Harold Hill.

    CEO’s who own a large part of a company are always under scrutiny, so there is nothing unusual about Musk’s situation. Tesla IPO investors were able to understand his cash situation, and that he still retained a large percentage of the company stock (also required by the U.S. Government loan conditions). In Silicon Valley (where Tesla is located) this type of scrutiny is the norm.

    Musk has not needed to put money into SpaceX for many years, and since they have been profitable for the last 3 years, and have a $2.4B backlog of orders, as long as they execute their business plan they could IPO soon too.

    They other thing to consider for SpaceX is that their product line is just about complete, with only Falcon 9 Heavy not in production. The questions about SpaceX are turning from whether their product can work, to whether they can execute their business plan and hit their cost numbers. As long as his products work, and they are saving $ Millions, customers don’t really care what happens in his personal life.

  • Kelly Starks

    > Coastal Ron wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 3:51 pm
    >
    >- Orion, as designed today, has an endurance of 210 days
    > in space, but lifeboat duration has not been published.

    Its the same, I wrote some of the specs.

    >> “Last year I would have thought SpaceX was a serious
    >> contender. What I overlooked is they have no experience”

    > Well yes, but no other U.S. company does either, ==

    You might have noticed we’ve been flying manned space craft for about half a century. The companies who flew those are, or merged with, Boeing and L/M. So with Congress screaming how can you trust US astronauts to untried star ups – the guys who’ve been doing it since we flew the first Mercury’s are the obvious choice.

    Even Musk agrees.

    >== With their COTS certification, Dragon is also human
    > certified by NASA, ==

    NASA made no such claim, nor even defined yet HOW they would certify a ship to carry people.

  • Kelly Starks

    > DCSCA wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 11:23 pm
    >
    > Musk may simply sell out soon anyway, as a good CELO
    > should, for the benefit of his investors. The history of Tesla
    > should be a signpost of ‘things to come’ with this fella. All
    > the more reason for investors and riders in his rockets to
    > remain somewhat wary. ==

    Interesting thought. Musk seems to mainly be doing this based on dreams of colonizing Mars and revolutionizing the car industry. How long will he stick with it once tesla just becomes another struggling electric car line, and SpaceX doesn’t find itself opening the final frontier to scores of uber rich would be Mars colonists?

    > == NASA will survive as long as there is a manned space
    > program at its core. ==

    But will the public see it as having that when it can’t do more then hitch a ride with the Russians to the station?

    I think that will spawn public pressure to reform NASA into a agency doing something – but its debatable.

  • Kelly Starks

    > Rhyolite wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 12:27 am
    >> Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 1:13 pm
    >> “Yeah that Obama guy also added more to the debt in
    >>his forst year then Bush did in al 8 of his, adn Obama plans to double total US debt.”
    > Wrong…

    Currious

    Curious, I was totaling the yearly deficits
    http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy01/hist.html
    http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/federal_deficit_chart.html
    http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/downchart_gs.php?year=2001_2008&view=1&expand=&units=b&fy=fy11&chart=G0-fed&bar=1&stack=1&size=m&title=&state=US&color=c&local=s

    ’01-08 deficits total to -1,958.410B
    I was sure I heard the projection for ’09 was 1,800B or so, but it lists as 1287.06B

    More importantly the debt as you pointed out, grew more then twice as fast as the total of the deficits. I must have heard the debt increase for ’09 and assumed it was the deficit.

    The debt growing that much faster then the deficit is disturbing. Are we not even paying enough on the debt to keep up with the interest?!

  • Kelly Starks

    > Coastal Ron wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 1:58 am
    >> Kelly Starks wrote @ June 30th, 2010 at 9:52 pm
    >> “Welcome to gov contracting.”

    > I was a manager at one of the largest defense contractors, ==

    So why were you confused?

    >> “Normally mil is 3 times commercial costs to dev something,
    >> NASA generally 4 times, though in some cases its much worse.

    >> NASA and its contractors agreed it would take $1.2 billion to do space ship 1 – which Cost Paul Allen $35M.”

    > == I don’t know where you get such a number from. ==

    It was the rule of thumb I got from McDonnell Douglas.

    >== If there was a market for Shuttle vehicles, I have no
    > doubt that Boeing could build one just as capable, but that
    > costs less to buy and operate. ==

    Sure, Rockwell proposals for the shuttles after Columbia, or the refit programs would have easily done that.

    > == Lax government oversight does play into overblown
    > contractor costs, ==

    Ove often seen the opposite, where gov demands weer for contractors to “up the burn rate” or at least not lower it. After all gov personnel are paid more the more expensive their program gets and the larger its head count.

    Also requirements creep from the gov continuously changing the specs is a big problem.

    > Concerning SpaceShipOne – those kind of statements lead
    > me to think that you’re making some of this stuff up, ==
    Nope, that quote first came from O;’Keefe and later the contractors.

    Of more interest is the Xprize folks revealed that since they only got half the $10 million, they took out a insurance policy against anyone wining. Surprisingly, it was given a low cost, because the insurance company checked the experts in manned space flight – who really were NASA experts (shades of the “brother in law” problem.)- who all agred.
    1- they were all experts.
    2- It would cost NASA $1B to $1.2B to do the Xprize.
    3- NASA had access to the best and brightest in the country – so no one could do it cheaper.
    4- No one would put up a billion to win $10M and a plaque. So no one would ever win the Xprize.

    Opps.

    ;)

  • Kelly Starks

    > DCSCA wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 5:34 am

    > Point is, he [Musk] may be lighting a fire in the hearts and
    > minds of commercial space enthusiasts but for the cold calculus
    > of sound business investors seeking a profitable return for
    > their investments, the business history is somewhat mixed
    > given the largess of the capital required for the limited
    > market for his goods and services.

    Very true. New launcher companies have not done that well, and Musk is not getting the market interest he was projecting. Presumably after he start having successful launches (not it was successful except for) customers might warm to him – but basically hes positioned for a share of a very small current market, and its not at all clear a big new one he could serve is around the corner? I mean Falcon/Dragon certainly isn’t a good choice for some future major orbital tourist market by Virgin Galactic or something, or significant scale industrial production in space, etc

  • Gary Church

    “This type of equipment is not too complicated, and the science behind it is well understood. Heck, my neighbor is a professional diver, and carries a closed-circuit rebreather on his back when he dives to depths below normal scuba (<130ft)."

    A closed loop system is one that uses an organism to recycle metabolic products Ron. You cannot change definitions like that- it is misrepresentation. C'mon, own up. I will not bring it up again. I promise. It just makes you look bad. Closed loop is not C02 scrubbers- it is the holy grail of life support allowing voyages lasting years and requires large volumes for the organisms. It will not fit into dragon. This is why water has utility for algae based closed loop and radiation shielding. Algae are much more tolerant of heavy nuclei irradiation.

  • Coastal Ron

    Gary Church wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 12:19 pm

    Yikes, I did agree with you about the terminology I used, and said “Maybe an inelegant use of the term, and “closed-circuit” would probably be the better description.”. I was agreeing with you, so you can stop beating this closed-loop sea-horse… ;-)

    BTW, I have appreciated your perspectives recently – not agreeing with all of them, but heck, no one agrees with me all the time either.

    And, FWIW, if the Congress decided in their infinite wisdom to force NASA to build an HLV (which I don’t think we need yet), SDHLV Sidemount would be one of my first choices (based on development cost)….. out of a list of lots of bad choices, of course…

  • Gary Church

    “BTW, I have appreciated your perspectives recently – not agreeing with all of them, but heck, no one agrees with me all the time either.”

    My perspective is pretty simple- I see a “narrow path”, not a flexible path, and the survival imperative. Your perspective is more complex. But I suspect we both have the same goal; space.

  • Rhyolite

    Kelly Starks wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 11:48 am

    “The debt growing that much faster then the deficit is disturbing. Are we not even paying enough on the debt to keep up with the interest?!”

    I think you may be looking at official budget deficit numbers. Unfortunately, these numbers are as much smoke and mirrors as the are real substance.

    First, the official deficit numbers do not include emergency supplemental spending, which has exploded over the last ten years. Included in this category are:

    – The 2001 Stimulus Bill
    – 9/11 Costs
    – The Airline Bailout
    – Both Wars
    – Katrina Costs
    – The 2008 Stimulus Bill
    – The Fannie and Freddie Bailouts
    – TARP
    – The 2009 Stimulus Bill

    These alone amount to Trillions in spending and I am sure I am forgetting more than a few.

    Additionally, the most often quoted official deficit numbers do not include the amount of the Social Security surplus that is “loaned” to the treasury.

    However, these deficit numbers do include debt service.

    Looking at the total increase in the debt is a better, though not necessarily more reassuring, gauge of the real fiscal situation of the US than using the official budget deficit numbers.

  • Kelly Starks

    >Rhyolite wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 9:28 pm

    >>Kelly Starks wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 11:48 am

    >>“The debt growing that much faster then the deficit is disturbing.
    >> Are we not even paying enough on the debt to keep up with the
    >> interest?!”

    > I think you may be looking at official budget deficit numbers.
    > Unfortunately, these numbers are as much smoke and mirrors as
    > the are real substance. ===

    Arg.

    I thought they would include the total budget numbers — but yes that would explaing the couple extra trillion betwen friends.

    ;/

  • Gary Church

    “SDHLV Sidemount would be one of my first choices (based on development cost)”

    It is the correct path- in my opinion we must have an HLV for BEO-HSF. No way around it. I have never liked the SRB’s since I researched the whole story on them; they are inferior to monolithic designs. But they are 3 million pounds of thrust each and their is nothing out there even close. The SSME’s are real hot rods- expensive but they are what allow the two stage to orbit system work. And finally the external tank; they have shaved tons off of it. The hardware works- the orbiter was always the failure.

    But we will see. It does not look good. Where is Obi-wan?

  • DCSCA

    Kelly Starks wrote @ July 1st, 2010 at 11:46 am <– His electric car company has sold, what… 1500 units in 7-plus years and has yet to turn a profit; it just did an IPO to raise cash and he can't manage his personal life bu has dreams of colonizing Mars… Good Lord. It is fine to admire someone who 'dreams the impossible dream' but capital investors don't share this fluffy thinking– they want a lucrative return on a sound investment and these 'personal' problems of his factor in with people who have to make decisions on investing huge sums of money, especially in lean times. The market for his 'goods and services' are simply too limited for big dollar investors to park money in it when they can turn faster profits investing in other down-to-earth-ventures… like deep seaoil drilling. ;-)

  • Kelly Starks

    >== he market for [Musks] ‘goods and services’ are simply too limited
    > for big dollar investors to park money in it when they can turn faster
    > profits investing in other down-to-earth-ventures… like deep sea oil
    > drilling.

    Actually very true. Musks Tesla car company stock offering raised $244 M. Some individual deep oil rigs cost more then 10 times that. Launching a new biz jet model costs a billion or 3.

    The new space industry hasn’t really attracted big money from investment communities.

  • Kelly Starks

    >…But we will see. It does not look good. Where is Obi-wan?

    “..You don’t need a HLV program….”

    “….We don’t need a HLV program…”

    ;)

  • DCSCA

    @Kelly “The new space industry hasn’t really attracted big money from investment communities.” Because, as we know, investors see there’s just no big market for it yet in this era. They’re so desperate for markets that deliver a high yield on investments, they create their own markets– like ‘risky’ derivitives- invent junk products for it– and sell them amongst themselves– and it is (or was) a more profitable enterprise.

  • Kelly Starks

    > DCSCA wrote @ July 3rd, 2010 at 5:01 am

    >>@Kelly “The new space industry hasn’t really attracted big money
    >> from investment communities.”

    > Because, as we know, investors see there’s just no big market
    > for it yet in this era. =

    Agreed. New space has generally talked laughably big, and delivered very little.

    The big established space industry is now seeing their market declinig a lot.

    realy if a big market opens, “old space” can take it and run with it in a way new space just can’t. Sop even if a real market opens -I wouldn’t be putting my money on Musk or Masden or their ilk.

  • New launcher companies have not done that well, and Musk is not getting the market interest he was projecting.

    He’s not?

    Can you substantiate this? How much was he projecting, and how much has he gotten?

  • Kelly Starks

    >Rand Simberg wrote @ July 3rd, 2010 at 4:16 pm

    >> New launcher companies have not done that well, and Musk is not
    >> getting the market interest he was projecting.

    > He’s not?

    He was talking about maybe tens of launches per year – adn thats not what his SpaceX web page ever showed?

  • He was talking about maybe tens of launches per year – adn thats not what his SpaceX web page ever showed?

    In what year? Do you have an actual citation? Or are you just making it up? He has a lot of business. He just landed a big launch contract from Iridium.

  • Kelly Starks

    > Rand Simberg wrote @ July 3rd, 2010 at 7:07 pm

    >== Do you have an actual citation? Or are you just making it up?

    I never make stuff up Rand.

  • I never make stuff up Rand.

    I’ve noticed that you have a vivid imagination when it comes to things like this.

  • DCSCA

    @Kelly- “Musks Tesla car company stock offering raised $244 M.” Musk launched an IPO this month (instead of a rocket) because Tesla is cash poor. Which speaks volumes. Review Tesla’s history and you’ll get a sense of the ‘guidance system’ in work at SpaceX. ;-)

  • Kelly Starks

    ;)
    Yeah, some of Musk’s statements and decisions don’t make me feel all secure here.

    He’s still talking about maybe launching commercial maned Mars missions in 10 years.

    8O

  • DCSCA

    @Kelly Starks wrote @ July 4th, 2010 at 11:35 am – Yeah. It’s that ‘private enterprise will lead the way and build a golden ladder to space colonization’ thing. Of course, we know that over the 80-plus years of rocketry, ‘private enterprise’ has never led but been a follow-along, cashing-in on the successes of government funded rocket developement in various political guises. Of course, ‘private enterprise’ did triumph, in spectacular technicolor, by the end of ‘Destination Moon.’ It’s a rough, but well scripted business plan for private space enthusiasts. Wonder if Elon’s seen it. Of course, he’d have to bring his own popcorn along for the ride. ;-)

  • DCSCA

    @Kelly– ^… that’s ‘government subsidized and grown’ popcorn, of course. ;-)

  • Kelly Starks

    > DCSCA wrote @ July 4th, 2010 at 6:02 pm
    >== Yeah. It’s that ‘private enterprise will lead the way and build
    > a golden ladder to space colonization’ thing. Of course, we know
    > that over the 80-plus years of rocketry, ‘private enterprise’ has
    > never led but been a follow-along, cashing-in on the successes
    > of government funded rocket developement in various political guises.==

    They have lead in development — but often got burned for it. Like P&W’s innovation in extremely durable reusable engines. When they bid for the Shuttle main engines they had the lowest bid, adn engines with hours of burn time on them — but Rockwells rockedye div got the contract.

    >== Of course, ‘private enterprise’ did triumph, in spectacular
    > technicolor, by the end of ‘Destination Moon.’ It’s a rough, but well
    > scripted business plan for private space enthusiasts. Wonder if
    > Elon’s seen it. Of course, he’d have to bring his own popcorn
    > along for the ride. ;-)

    Shudder. Yeah thats -by newspace standards – a well developed busness plan. Of course the true theme song of their financing plan is “Send Me An Angel”.

    ;)

  • Kelly Starks

    > DCSCA wrote @ July 4th, 2010 at 6:07 pm

    > @Kelly– ^… that’s ‘government subsidized and grown’ popcorn, of course. ;-)

    Subsidized! No, however after years of study they will issue details popcorn technological and purchase specifications.

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