Kibble

But ice forms on the outside of rockets all the time, is there a reason it's a problem on this part of the rocket?

Cygnus and Dragon. They work great together!

Finally! <3 Orange adapter though really?

It would take a cluster of seven RS-68s (the most powerful hydrogen-burning rocket engine in production, or ever) to match 5-seg booster thrust.

Orbital assembly vs. heavy lift single-launch are useful for different tasks. Space Station was perfectly suited for orbital assembly because it can be used almost immediately after the very first couple parts are on orbit, and slowly improved while also constantly requiring launches for resupply and astronauts. Apollo was perfectly suited to heavy-lift since the destination was high-energy, so they could use hydrogen fuel for TLI.

If it was successful, they probably would have flown several more piloted Zond missions around the Moon. It may have boosted their confidence and the public and government opinion enough to try maybe a couple more times to launch N1. If they tried enough times, it would eventually work!

Lasers for orbital debris is practical! Low mass objects easily accelerated by light pressure, not having to actually boost anything onto orbit (no potential for additional debris), passively shining into sky.

Agreed! This should be renamed "39 days to Mars might be possible, some distant day, and it might be using something like VASIMR"

I love all these missions! And glad to finally see news for the next Discovery <3

You guys should research the way we detect near-Earth objects. A hostile spacecraft and a minor planet have alot of things in common - they are small, shine dimly in the infrared spectrum, not actively communicating with you, and on unpredictable planet-crossing orbits. We have discovered hundreds of these over the years, but observatories on Earth's surface are pretty limited. If you wanna detect enemy probes with more regularity, you need dedicated infrared space observatories. But those have limitations too, like, limited mirror diameter, and you can't look anywhere near the Sun without dim stars getting completely drowned out (you know, the same way you can't see stars during the day), not to mention blowing thru your precious coolant. Observatories on interplanetary orbits will be nessecary too, if you are fighting somebody inferior (as in, on an orbit closer to the Sun) to you. Like, Venus would have a huge advantage fighting Earth, because transfers would only be visible for very short times - maximum elongation! Unless Earth had some space telescopes inferior to Venus.

Looks good, but do Orion cislunar instead of (fake) Mars One.

Isn't like, the whole surface a potential Martian habitat?

Almost certainly not. But could it inspire a new, soon unpiloted Mars lander to investigate, another Phoenix type?

This is making a bad assumption - there really won't be "warships" in space, because the point of a spacecraft having weapons is so that it can disable enemy spacecraft, which is a task that does not mesh well with re-usability. Fighting spacecraft will (mostly) be disposable. Their targets mostly will be spy satellites.

What was wrong with the other thread? Anyway, the Soviets didn't think they would need to "spam" killer satellites (missiles, if you want to use a very un-space-like, misleading term) - they would be (and were) launched one at a time.

Dandridge M. Cole did it best.

Venus assist sounds like a great idea actually! We have lots of experience with people living long-term in orbital laboratories, none with people living long-term in extra-terrestrial surface labs. And it sharply decreases the amount of mass we would have to land on the surface! Maybe no exotic technologies like inflatable heat shields?

If you're on Mars or Venus, you are already also in space!

Hey does anyone know if the RO configs work yet?

You can get elements from the atmosphere. I have a chart from Wikipedia too! There are also apparently a number of trace hydrogen compounds, hydrogen chloride, flouride, and sulfide.

Just because something isn't abundant doesn't mean something isn't there. Mars isn't "abundant" in many more elements than Venus is. Just different ones!

By the time resource extraction from celestial bodies occurs regularly, we probably won't even be using money anymore >.<

Everywhere has limited access to important materiels. If you ever have to ask "Where do we get the X on Earth?" the answer is probably that it's a trace element that takes worldwide extraction and processing infrastructure to make in large scale. Minor planet aerocaptured onto Venerian orbit? Since you can make plastic from elements in the atmosphere, metal for construction purposes won't be as much of an issue.

Anywhere we go would be equally difficult to colonize and make self sufficient, at least within an order of magnitude. Venus and Mars are just, different. It is wierd to me how much people focus on Mars.

Are you going to complain about having to put your opinion of a link, on every new link you post? Sheesh. The reason that is a thing is so that the person posting the thread can also kick off the discussion. Because forums are for discussion.