totm dec 2019 Russian Launch and Mission Thread

[SOXBLOX]

4 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Wasn't Mir that what gave a purpose for a ten shuttle flights more?

Sorry, I don't understand. What do you mean?

[kerbiloid]

5 minutes ago, SOXBLOX said:

Sorry, I don't understand. What do you mean?

In about a ten of Shuttle flights  the shuttles docked to Mir.

Just were passing by and had a stop?

Shuttle didn't have a native docking adaptor (they were going to dock to the Apollo port of Skylab, but never did it).
They adapted Buran's APAS-89 as APAS-95 and used it to dock to Mir (then to ISS, where it became a standard, later evolved into IDSS).
Probably, they were very interested in visiting Mir at fifteen years before ISS was being built.

[tater]

1 hour ago, kerbiloid said:

So, looks like Nauka is now not a part of the new station, though who knows how many times this can change else.

They could not plane change it from ISS to and SSO orbit though, could they? The props required would be brutal.

[kerbiloid]

18 minutes ago, tater said:

They could not plane change it from ISS to and SSO orbit though, could they? The props required would be brutal.

As it seemingly isn't present on the video scheme, probably it will not be a part of it.

Among all other variants, the schemes on the posters in the video are probably the most up-to-date, and more evident than the previous ones from the internet.

Nowhere else a double NEM is mentioned, so probably they want more than before.

Upd.
At 01:17 both phases of development are visible.
The Phase 1 (to the left) includes all modules from the internet picture and descriptions, but instead of Nauka there is another NEM.
So, either Nauka stays on ISS, or it is not depictured on the scheme properly, but as a second NEM as an artist representation.
And the second NEM is nowhere mentioned, so looks excessive.
This is unclear.

The other part of the station except Nauka looks unchanged. 

(Reorbiting by Nucleon looks not outstanding, as the station is not constantly inhabited. So, they can easily spend a half-year on it.)

Edited April 25, 2021 by kerbiloid

[DDE]

1 hour ago, kerbiloid said:

In about a ten of Shuttle flights  the shuttles docked to Mir.

Just were passing by and had a stop?

Shuttle didn't have a native docking adaptor (they were going to dock to the Apollo port of Skylab, but never did it).
They adapted Buran's APAS-89 as APAS-95 and used it to dock to Mir (then to ISS, where it became a standard, later evolved into IDSS).
Probably, they were very interested in visiting Mir at fifteen years before ISS was being built.

You're trying to make sense out of a system that doesn't make sense. I think u/Senno_Ecto_Gammat on r/space used to have a canned rant about how the Shuttle was constantly used for missions and tasks that made zero sense, just to justify its continued existence. Compared with those experiments, a visit to Mir is tame.

[kerbiloid]

4 minutes ago, DDE said:

You're trying to make sense out of a system that doesn't make sense. I think u/Senno_Ecto_Gammat on r/space used to have a canned rant about how the Shuttle was constantly used for missions and tasks that made zero sense, just to justify its continued existence. Compared with those experiments, a visit to Mir is tame.

If they had already the docking adaptor.
But they had to adapted it to shuttle, so probably they were having some aim for that.

I think, the aim was to train in Shuttle docking and basic experience of a modular station.

4 minutes ago, DDE said:

Shuttle was constantly used for missions and tasks that made zero sense

Which ones for example? _{Except the Mir docking, lol}

Edited April 25, 2021 by kerbiloid

[CatastrophicFailure]

24 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

Which ones for example? _{Except the Mir docking, lol}

Launching out of Vandy to nick a Soviet spy satellite then using those big silly wings to land back at the same....

...er, waitaminnit... 

ooh, new emoji!

[sh1pman]

36 minutes ago, tater said:

They could not plane change it from ISS to and SSO orbit though, could they? The props required would be brutal.

As I said before, they should buy a Starship service to grab Nauka and do the plane change. Maybe it will need several refillings along the way, still no big deal with Starship capability.

[kerbiloid]

Why should they buy Starship when none of its stages is close to a test flight, let alone commercial usage.

The 1st stage never flied with more than 3 engines (of 30+ required).
And several times it looked like problem with one engine has killed the rocket.

The 2nd stage has never flied, never deorbited.

To the date, Starship is a purely hypothetical rocket.
Angara at least has flied twice.

Edited April 25, 2021 by kerbiloid

[sh1pman]

13 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

Angara at least has flied twice.

When is the next flight, 2028?

And they should buy Starship because it’s the only thing that will be able to do such a thing economically. Maybe a nuclear electric tug can do it as well, but I think Starship will fly sooner.

[kerbiloid]

58 minutes ago, sh1pman said:

When is the next flight, 2028?

When the Starship first flight?

59 minutes ago, sh1pman said:

And they should buy Starship because it’s the only thing

It isn't the thing. It is a wish. It will be thing when it starts flying. Too many exotics in one rocket to buy it in advance.

[sh1pman]

11 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

When the Starship first flight?

Orbital flight? Probably around the time of Nauka launch, maybe even sooner.

[SOXBLOX]

3 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Why should they buy Starship when none of its stages is close to a test flight, let alone commercial usage.

I wouldn't buy something not close to testing either. Only problem here is Starship/Superheavy is close to testing.

1 hour ago, sh1pman said:

Orbital flight? Probably around the time of Nauka launch, maybe even sooner.

If Nauka's track record is anything to go by, SS will fly way sooner. 

[SunlitZelkova]

I think kerbiloid is just saying Starship is too dicey in its schedule and exotic in its engineering for a foreign national space agency to commit to right now.

There are also pride reasons why it wouldn't happen, I'm sure the politicians who give Roscosmos money would hate to hear "we need the Americans to help assemble our first national space station in 25 years".

[sh1pman]

38 minutes ago, SunlitZelkova said:

I'm sure the politicians who give Roscosmos money would hate to hear "we need the Americans to help assemble our first national space station in 25 years".

MinFin aren't politicians, they don't care. They'll be happy to give less money for cheaper options.

Edited April 26, 2021 by sh1pman

[kerbiloid]

5 hours ago, sh1pman said:

Orbital flight? Probably around the time of Nauka launch, maybe even sooner.

This inspires.

 

***

4 hours ago, SOXBLOX said:

Only problem here is Starship/Superheavy is close to testing.

 

5 hours ago, sh1pman said:

Orbital flight? Probably around the time of Nauka launch, maybe even sooner.

 

***

4 hours ago, SOXBLOX said:

SS will fly way sooner. 

Promise?

 

***

3 hours ago, sh1pman said:

MinFin aren't politicians, they don't care.

MinFin doesn't live in vacuum, they are a part of the government, and obviously follow the political decisions.

And this is exactly the case when just a common sense makes to ask: why  OneWeb doesn't wait forStarship which is almost ready, but prefers Soyuzes?
Aren't OneWeb a commercial project?

[sh1pman]

10 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

And this is exactly the case when just a common sense makes to ask: why  OneWeb doesn't wait forStarship which is almost ready, but prefers Soyuzes?

OneWeb already exists and needs to launch now, not wait for a future rocket. Future rockets are for future payloads. Soyuz is a cheap rocket that suits their needs now. When the new station is started, Starship will most likely be flying. That’s why it’s a good option.

[kerbiloid]

1 hour ago, sh1pman said:

That’s why it’d be a good option.

Let me correct it for you.

[tater]

12 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

And this is exactly the case when just a common sense makes to ask: why  OneWeb doesn't wait forStarship which is almost ready, but prefers Soyuzes?

They could also use F9, but they don't. Guess they don't want to give Starlink's owner their money.

I would assume that the cost is likely pretty similar, though. What does a commercial Soyuz launch cost these days?

Starship is definitely not a thing yet, and short of them publishing a user's guide with charges to customers, it's not actually an option.

[kerbiloid]

2 minutes ago, tater said:

They could also use F9, but they don't. Guess they don't want to give Starlink's owner their money.

I didn't mean they avoid SpaceX.
I meant exactly the Starship.

[tater]

Just now, kerbiloid said:

I didn't mean they avoid SpaceX.
I meant exactly the Starship.

It's literally not an option for commercial launches yet. It will be an option when there is pricing.

The first orbital launches might well be this year, though we have yet to see a chomper nose. Getting SS to orbit is not really going to be a problem. EDL from orbit? Yeah, they are going to crash a bunch of them before that is a thing—but any orbital payloads can offset those costs.

I think the trick for traditional sat companies will be that as expensive as launch is, the sats are MORE expensive. OneWeb is not going to put a billion bucks worth of sats on a vehicle that has barely flown (I mean after they test it to orbit, then it will have barely flown, hop tests are not "flown" in this sense, only making orbit). SpaceX can afford to, since they can cube out SS with sats, and the sat cost is still trivial (sounds like they cost as much as expensive cars maybe).

EDIT: OneWeb sats are apparently ~$1M each (from an article about them from 2019 https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/14/spacex-oneweb-and-amazon-to-launch-thousands-more-satellites-in-2020s.html  ). 

I would assume Starlink sats are an order of magnitude cheaper.

[sh1pman]

3 hours ago, tater said:

It's literally not an option for commercial launches yet. It will be an option when there is pricing.

But if you’re a billionaire, you can already book a crewed lunar flyby on Starship. That option has been available for quite some time now.

[SunlitZelkova]

1 hour ago, sh1pman said:

But if you’re a billionaire, you can already book a crewed lunar flyby on Starship. That option has been available for quite some time now.

There is a difference between a billionaire using personal money and an organization using state or corporate funds.

Once Starship flies, it will be an option, but apart from billionaires using their personal money, it is too risky for anyone else. NASA's endorsement does raise confidence, but keep in mind they are also the same people sticking to the rather impossible 2024 date. I'm sure the reaction at Roscosmos is one of "what are they thinking?" when they heard the announcement, although the continued use of the 2024 date despite the White House wanting to review the schedule may also give them a chuckle. And of course, the goal of a corporation is profit. No matter what NASA says, if they (SpaceX) can't guarantee 101% that Starship will be functional and on time, the likes of OneWeb will not use it.

And DearMoon isn't exactly "scheduled". It is planned, but the date will certainly shift.

Musk said there will be "hundreds" of uncrewed Starship flights before people fly on it. Using the minimum of 200 uncrewed flights (for the number "hundreds"), starting in July of this year, that means there needs to be (very) roughly one launch every four or five days or so to allow for a DearMoon launch sometime in December 2023.

Edited April 26, 2021 by SunlitZelkova

[tater]

1 hour ago, sh1pman said:

But if you’re a billionaire, you can already book a crewed lunar flyby on Starship. That option has been available for quite some time now.

Hardly a good business plan though.

[SOXBLOX]

 

On 4/26/2021 at 10:49 AM, kerbiloid said:

Let me correct it for you.

Actually, it would be "it'll be", unless you want to put Starship in the perfective past...