Get that dang space shuttle of my lawn.

[GoSlash27]

1 minute ago, Red Iron Crown said:

I would say that critically examining any experimental cutting edge science project in retrospect is just essential.

^This. Especially since the pitfalls were all known during development, not just in retrospect. The shuttle fell victim to "mission creep" during the design process and the goal morphed from cheap space exploration to keeping the contract from getting cancelled.
 We wound up with something at the end of the process that wasn't what was originally intended.

 And FWIW (in deference to B.M.), no offense... but most of the things I design in KSP wind up being exactly what I had intended them to be. Whether what I had intended winds up panning out or not... a bit of a crap- shoot

Best,
-Slashy

[Xavven]

One thing the video does get right is that strapping a payload to the side instead of on the top of a rocket limits your options when there is a malfunction. And let's be honest -- a 0% failure rate is not a realistic expectation.

If a rocket is exploding, I want to have an escape tower that pulls me away from it and then parachutes me to safety, and does it automatically in case I'm incapacitated.

The Shuttle, on the other hand, had very poor abort features. The Challenger crew didn't die in the initial explosion. But without parachutes, and the shuttle being so damaged that it was incapable of controlled flight, the pilot (Michael J. Smith) had no choice but to fly what was essentially a brick straight into the ocean. What's worse, the crew most likely lost consciousness from hypoxia, although there's evidence that Smith flipped some switches to try to regain control, it was not actually possible to recover the situation because of the terrible, terrible design.

If there's a silver lining, it's that we can learn from our mistakes. We have tried this design and seen its strengths and weaknesses. It will make our future designs better. It's easy to sit here and point out the problems in hindsight, but NASA didn't know this would happen at the time. Part of success is trying out ideas, failing, and then learning from those failures.

[GoSlash27]

24 minutes ago, Xavven said:

One thing the video does get right is that strapping a payload to the side instead of on the top of a rocket limits your options when there is a malfunction. And let's be honest -- a 0% failure rate is not a realistic expectation.

If a rocket is exploding, I want to have an escape tower that pulls me away from it and then parachutes me to safety, and does it automatically in case I'm incapacitated.

The Shuttle, on the other hand, had very poor abort features. The Challenger crew didn't die in the initial explosion. But without parachutes, and the shuttle being so damaged that it was incapable of controlled flight, the pilot (Michael J. Smith) had no choice but to fly what was essentially a brick straight into the ocean. What's worse, the crew most likely lost consciousness from hypoxia, although there's evidence that Smith flipped some switches to try to regain control, it was not actually possible to recover the situation because of the terrible, terrible design.

If there's a silver lining, it's that we can learn from our mistakes. We have tried this design and seen its strengths and weaknesses. It will make our future designs better. It's easy to sit here and point out the problems in hindsight, but NASA didn't know this would happen at the time. Part of success is trying out ideas, failing, and then learning from those failures.

^ And to be fair, we did get some pretty good hardware and experience from the program.

Best,
-Slashy

[White Owl]

Repeated over and over in these conversations is the assertion that the shuttle's capability to return a useful payload from orbit was used only a handful of times. It's been repeated so often, many people probably believe it's true.

Consider payloads launched by the shuttle and recovered by the shuttle in the same flight, and it's clear that the payload return capability was used more often than not. I'm tempted to say that capability was used in every single successful flight... but there's probably an exception or two hiding somewhere in the list. Not even counting all the crews.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Red Iron Crown said:

You can rearrange the major parts to make thrust easier to balance, though.

I think that kind of layout was actually the original idea.

[Xavven]

7 minutes ago, String Witch said:

I think that kind of layout was actually the original idea.

 

Ooo, I honestly do like that design better than the Shuttle, but if the rockets malfunction, does it take out your wings? Don't answer that... it's a rhetorical question. Provided there's a recovery chute, it seems like a safer design.

[Sharpy]

3 hours ago, Jovus said:

I actually wouldn't call it cynical, exactly. There are very good reasons to want to retain jobs for aerospace-related fields in your own country rather than letting them drift off and, say, work for the Soviets. But we're skirting the line of the political here.

There are good reasons, and there are good methods. The Shuttle killed the Liberty space station project, while Russians successfully completed Mir - which, arguably, was a greater achievment of both engineering and science than the Shuttle.

[Alshain]

9 hours ago, W. Kerman said:

Don't beat up on Soyuz, it works and the Russians keep making them.

Nobody is "beating up" on Soyuz, I'm saying the Shuttle is not as 'deadly' as the guy makes it out to be.  It's track record is about the same as Soyuz.

[regex]

The STS only has a deadly reputation because, when it goes, it takes a lot of crew with it. @Alshain is right in that its record compares favorably with the "Toyota-pickup of spacecraft".

Edited August 27, 2016 by regex
stupid phone...

[Kerbart]

12 hours ago, Maltman said:

So I just watched this: (...)

I never knew it was such a poor design. I was wondering what y'all think. (...)

As others pointed out, it wasn't a poor design. It was a triumph of innovation in many ways, its poor performance more the result of unrealistic design parameters than anything else. When the initial idea for the shuttle was launched (no pun intended) our (the US, not mankind) experience regarding manned reentry was limited to Mercury and Gemini and a bit of Apollo. Safety considerations where also a bit lower during the race for the moon.

As for reusability; if there is one thing KSP teaches us, it's that it's really, really costly to put anything into orbit. Every kg you don't have to bring with you counts! And now we build an STS with wings, retractable landing gear, atmospheric flight control surfaces, and a cargo bay that can be opened and closed. On paper it sounds great,  and the contractors involved are not going to “no” to juicy government contracts, especially when their proposed alternatives would be “wasteful” conservative designs.

And before we judge too quickly: these were decisions made in the early 1970s when running out of natural resources (not just oil, but also copper, silver and other metals) was a real concern. 

For me there's no discussion that the shuttle was a failed experiment. Operating it was far more costly than envisioned, the high cost let to corner-cutting that made it far more deadly than Soyuz (regardless of the metrics used). Of course, there's the 100+ missions, and some unique achievements that only the Shuttle could accomplish. But the high mission count, in my eyes, was more due to the dollar auction effect (“we’ve spent so much on it, we might as well spend a little bit extra to get more return value out of it”) than because it was such a great program. That doesn't mean the design was bad though. It was a great design. Just not a feasible concept; especially in practice. We've learned a lot since the inception of the shuttle as to why a reusable program is so tricky.

Had we gone down the way of single-use craft, the US would likely have accomplished a lot more for less money. But that's water under the bridge, and hindsight. Which is always easy.

[foamyesque]

The Shuttle design had problems -- the lack of abort modes until booster jettison stands out --, but it also had a bunch of capabilities no other launch craft has had, to my knowledge. It had the highest return weight and cross-range capability of any craft I know of, it had highest crew per flight, was the best platform for EVA, had the longest in-space endurance, was the most capable OV for orbital construction, had the largest deployable payload mass for a manned vehicle, and so on.

Edited August 27, 2016 by foamyesque

[Stargate525]

No one's mentioned that the frikkin CIA decided to mandate the thing needed to be able to hit a polar orbit as well. Mission creep indeed.

[Corona688]

15 hours ago, Maltman said:

Video bashing the space shuttle. I never knew it was such a poor design. I was wondering what y'all think.

NASA tried and failed to justify another order of Saturn V's when they stopped sending moon rockets...  Skylab was a cry for help, more or less, "See?  See?  The Saturn V is still useful!  Please don't make us give it up!"  No good.  After throwing away Saturns for a decade -- each one costing as many man-hours as the Great Pyramid to build -- people were sick of it.  NASA had to sell the idea of a cheaper, reusable launch system to get any interest.

Enter the Navy, which had its own uses for a new payload lifter -- covertly boosting a series of stupidly huge top-secret film satellites.  So NASA had it decided for them that their trim, low-fat, reusable launch system must be able to lift the navy's 15-ton depleted uranium lawn gnomes.

To cope with this, their slim, trim, low-fat reusable launch concept grew an external tank and the largest SRB's the world had ever seen.  The rest is history.

Still, for all its faults, the space shuttle is the only vehicle in the history of man to perform repairs in space.  With it gone, we have absolutely nothing else for the job.

Edited August 27, 2016 by Corona688

[Maltman]

1 hour ago, foamyesque said:

The Shuttle design had problems -- the lack of abort mods until booster jettison stands out --, but it also had a bunch of capabilities no other launch craft has had, to my knowledge. It had the highest return weight and cross-range capability of any craft I know of, it had highest crew per flight, was the best platform for EVA, the longest in-space endurance, was the most capable OV for orbital construction, had the largest deployable payload mass for a manned vehicle, and so on.

And it looked cool.

The Space Shuttle has always been a symbol of space travel (me being a 90's kid). I always assumed it was just the bees knees and that we (USA) left the Russians in the dirt... Until I started playing KSP and getting into more spacey things.

So the Buran had liquid boosters instead of solids and I know that solids are cheaper but more dangerous because you can't just turn them off. I think it's interesting that the space craft with the highest crew count was also one of the more dangerous and that things like solids (which are more dangerous right?) were used here.. I would think that the more human life that was at risk, the safer it should be. I know that space travel is inherently risky but we're America we're supposed to be the good guys!

Why did they ditch the Buran and stick with the Soyuz?

 

11 minutes ago, Corona688 said:

Still, for all its faults, the space shuttle is the only vehicle in the history of man to perform repairs in space.  With it gone, we have absolutely nothing else for the job.

Can't they just strap some robotic arms on a dragon? I'm tempted to make a light-bulb joke with this whole "send 8 people up at a time in a giant space glider".

Edited August 27, 2016 by Maltman

[biomecaman]

51 minutes ago, Stargate525 said:

No one's mentioned that the frikkin CIA decided to mandate the thing needed to be able to hit a polar orbit as well. Mission creep indeed.

 

I'm a fan of the SS so here it goes.

There you go. Trying to do too many things at once leads to the classic "jack of all trades master of none"

The Soyuz does ONE thing! it goes up with a few people. and comes down. and it's not a cozy ride i've heard
 

1 hour ago, foamyesque said:

The Shuttle design had problems -- the lack of abort mods until booster jettison stands out --, but it also had a bunch of capabilities no other launch craft has had, to my knowledge. It had the highest return weight and cross-range capability of any craft I know of, it had highest crew per flight, was the best platform for EVA, the longest in-space endurance, was the most capable OV for orbital construction, had the largest deployable payload mass for a manned vehicle, and so on.

and on... the shuttle can land on a runway. talk about easy recovery


My main workhorse in my career mode game is a... Space Shuttle. why? it's cheap. I have 3 versions. a 20 man transport. a payload transport. and a long range (minmus and back) 4 man transport. does the job, and yeah it's a bit of a challenge. but isn't that the point of NASA? Do the things that are hard?


Also the Brits are jealous.






 

[Corona688]

1 hour ago, Stargate525 said:

No one's mentioned that the frikkin CIA decided to mandate the thing needed to be able to hit a polar orbit as well. Mission creep indeed.

Herregud, that's a new one to me.  They really were putting all their money in one basket and hoping it worked.

[Vanamonde]

Since this is primarily about the actual shuttle, the thread has been moved to the real spaceflight subforum. 

Pet peeve of mine: when people complain that the shuttle was a bad design. So was the model A. The first of its kind always is. That doesn't prove that the whole idea is unfeasible. 

Oh my god, this video is aggravating me. 

First of all, this dope should stop calling the shuttle the "deadliest" spacecraft. While literally true, it's also misleading because the shuttle just plain made more flights than any other design (I think). 131/133 successful flights over the course of 30 years is not a terrible record, especially when you're doing something no one has done before. (Not meaning to discount the fatalities; merely talking about failure rates.) 

Okay, the longer I listen, the madder I get. Vehicle failure rate of 40%? Yes, 2 of the 5 were lost. But again that's misleading because only 2 flights out of 133 failed, and the two that were lost had flown many times before their failures. 

Soyuz remains the most reliable flying system not because it's so spectacularly advanced, but because there hasn't been a political or economic drive to make something newer. It's a lack of desire to exceed Soyuz rather than a lack of ability. 

We'd be on Mars if we'd stuck with Saturn Vs? So politics had nothing to do with space flight curtailment? 

And civilian craft are now succeeding where the shuttle failed? Sure enough, with 50 years of newer tech and the lessons learned by the shuttle itself. 

So much rage. 

[GoSlash27]

20 minutes ago, Maltman said:

Why did they ditch the Buran and stick with the Soyuz?

They went bankrupt and couldn't afford to support the Buran. The Ukranians Kazakhs, OTOH, needed Soyuz running to keep their economy afloat. Nobody was getting paid at the time ( ugly situation), but the techs and scientists continued working on Soyuz for IOUs and subsistence pay (when available). Soyuz soldiered on and Buran died.

Best,
-Slashy

 

Edited August 27, 2016 by GoSlash27
Brain- fart

[Corona688]

33 minutes ago, Maltman said:

Why did they ditch the Buran and stick with the Soyuz?

Now, I only know this as rumor, but it fits at least as well as anything else I've heard.  I don't think they "ditched" the buran -- I think they built exactly one as a deterrent.

First, remember how military-minded the USSR's space program was.  Their first space station (pre-mir) had nonfunctioning life support and functioning machine guns.  They considered that important and made sure that bit got tested.

When you don't know the payload it's built around, the shuttle is a bizarre design...  It's obviously not the cheap, reusable space launcher the public was sold, but the US wasn't playing an elaborate joke, it was a real machine.  What was it good for?  Something military, perhaps?

Someone in Russia may have thought "That'd be a great way to carry nuclear weapons and a C&C crew to orbit.  That must be what they're planning."  and matched the shuttle program bird-for-tat as they'd done with pretty much everything else they considered nuclear and nuclear-related.

LOL, bird-for-tat, the clbuttic mistake

Edited August 27, 2016 by Corona688

[Corona688]

49 minutes ago, Maltman said:

Can't they just strap some robotic arms on a dragon? I'm tempted to make a light-bulb joke with this whole "send 8 people up at a time in a giant space glider".

It'd need to include crew and spacesuits, too.  Space repair is hard.  There's no reason you need a space shuttle to do it, but the space shuttle is the only vehicle which has ever actually done so.

Edited August 27, 2016 by Corona688

[Bill Phil]

We can all bash on its design, or support it, for pretty much all time. But, instead, let's focus on the real issue:

Lack of infrastructure.

They had only one assembly facility capable of building ETs. Few launch pads, a single VAB, and a small fleet of shuttles. They needed more. And that implies more money.

[tater]

Station was "make-work" for Shuttle to keep the launch cadence up. Nothing Shuttle did could not have been done better or cheaper (or both) by other technologies. 

Station would have been built in fewer loads, with another HLV---Shuttle was itself an HLV that wasted most all the payload to LEO on the Orbiter vehicle itself. Faction in the cost of Shuttle, even replacing the HST with a new one would have been cost-effective vs the too high cost of launch via shuttle, plus the repair mission.

It was a colossal waste of resources, IMO. I said the same thing back when it first flew, as did many space nuts I knew.

1 hour ago, Corona688 said:

Still, for all its faults, the space shuttle is the only vehicle in the history of man to perform repairs in space.  With it gone, we have absolutely nothing else for the job.

For this to matter the first step is to demonstrate that repairing something is cost-effective vs launching a replacement. 

[Bill Phil]

1 hour ago, Corona688 said:

NASA tried and failed to justify another order of Saturn V's when they stopped sending moon rockets... 

Oh, no. Before they even started.

[Corona688]

23 minutes ago, tater said:

For this to matter the first step is to demonstrate that repairing something is cost-effective vs launching a replacement. 

Which is why it isn't done often, but has been crucial when it has.

There may be other criteria than cost as well (i.e. service on manned craft).

[tater]

26 minutes ago, Corona688 said:

Which is why it isn't done often, but has been crucial when it has.

There may be other criteria than cost as well (i.e. service on manned craft).

So far we have what, the HST repair/service? They flew 5 such missions. I think it is fair in this situation to look at total costs for a shuttle launch, which is like the figure in the video above. 5 service missions, plus one for delivery results in nearly 9 B$ in Shuttle costs alone. The instrument was what, about 1.2B$? That's 10.2 B$, total. The HST was ~11 mt, so We had 3 possible non-shuttle launch systems, Titan IIID (used for the very related Keyholes), Atlas V, or Delta IV M. All would have been cheaper than a Shuttle launch. So ~1.7 B$ to build and launch. Broken? Launch a newer one. 10.2/1.7 = 6 new HSTs. Literally a new HST delivered to orbit for every single HST related Shuttle flight.

I have a scheduled maintenance coming up on my Rover...I'll be rather miffed if the service bill is 80 grand.

Edited August 27, 2016 by tater