If NASA had more funding...

[Nibb31]

What I would do?

Bring back the g'ol Ares I (And modify it with liquid bioosters), and replace the Ares V with the SLS Blocks. Slow down funding to Earth science, and vastly increase funding for planetary science and Commerical Crew. Utilize the last stage of the SLS as a wet-workshop, and dock three of these "SLS Skylabs" at EML2, a plan that has been already suggested. One will serve as a labatory/workshop, the other will serve as living quarters, the other as a hangar for the Orion MPCV, which will now dock by being towed into the hangar by a Canadarm arm that goes through after the hangar opens it's airlock. After being towed into the hangar, the craft will be tethered to the sides of the hanger, the solar panels will fold up, and it will sit there, waiting to refuel, as the airlock closes and presurrizes, and the astronauts can now once again check their vehicle in a shirt-sleeves enviroment.

Who needs a hangar? A fuel tank and a fuel-tank-sized airlock are two totally different things with totally different constraints. It would be like turning a swimming pool into a submarine. On orbit.

And then, disregarding the venting problems, dealing with fumes, the extra complexity of adding airlocks to propellant tanks, the venting and sealing operations, and so on... where do you put all the equipment that would go inside those wet workshops? The isolation and panelling, the wiring and plumbing, the ECLSS, the ISPRs, furniture, curtains, lockers... That's literally tons of equipment that you would have to spend many expeditions on just to bring the equipment and outfit your modules.

Wet workshops were a bad idea. That's why the idea was abandoned decades ago.

Use the Ares I for LEO operations, and once again use the Orion MPCV as a craft going to the ISS, and later, as a "booster" that will take Orion to orbit where it will dock with the other mission components (As in Project Constellation).

You said you wanted to increase funding for Commercial Crew, and now you want to use Orion for LEO operations? You can't have it both ways. Orion is optimized for BEO exploration. It would be like using a Humvee to go to the grocery store.

Using Orion for ISS deliveries would put the Commercial Crew partners out of business, wasting billions of taxpayer money and screwing an emerging industry. And without LEO Orion flights, there is no reason for Ares I to exist.

Announce the goal of a Mars landing before 2033, and a base before 2035, and then proceed to dump money into a two part expedition (Part one is landed in a area deemed suitable for a base, part two lands in the same area and sets up shop). Carry on with the Asteroid Redirect Mission..

Most major aerospace projects these days require at least 10-15 years of implementation between inception and operational readiness. I don't see why any of your proposed projects, which are among the most ambitious and complex, could be done in 2 or 3 years.

By scrapping SLS and going back to a new Ares I and a redesigned Ares V, you just added 5 more years of delay to the first manned Orion flight, now in 2022. You also spent 10 years designing and building your EML-2 Skylab (work on that can only start when the development of SLS is done, because of budgetary reasons), and another 10 years messing around with asteroids. You could theoretically announce your manned Mars expedition in 2040, with a planned landing sometime around 2050. This is an optimistic timeline, hoping that there are no major wars, economical crises, civilization outbreaks, technological revolutions, disease outbreaks, zombie plagues, etc... that might take a higher priority, or simply a new administration that doesn't like what the previous one did.

The Mars Constellation plan required no less than 7 Ares-V launches for a single expedition. At 2 launches per year (the current max launch rate for SLS), you need 3.5 years just to assemble the vehicles for a single expedition. No way are you going to have a permanent Mars base with that infrastructure.

Your timeline is all wrong.

[NASAFanboy]

Who needs a hangar? A fuel tank and a fuel-tank-sized airlock are two totally different things with totally different constraints. It would be like turning a swimming pool into a submarine. On orbit.

And then, disregarding the venting problems, dealing with fumes, the extra complexity of adding airlocks to propellant tanks, the venting and sealing operations, and so on... where do you put all the equipment that would go inside those wet workshops? The isolation and panelling, the wiring and plumbing, the ECLSS, the ISPRs, furniture, curtains, lockers... That's literally tons of equipment that you would have to spend many expeditions on just to bring the equipment and outfit your modules.

Wet workshops were a bad idea. That's why the idea was abandoned decades ago.

You said you wanted to increase funding for Commercial Crew, and now you want to use Orion for LEO operations? You can't have it both ways. Orion is optimized for BEO exploration. It would be like using a Humvee to go to the grocery store.

Using Orion for ISS deliveries would put the Commercial Crew partners out of business, wasting billions of taxpayer money and screwing an emerging industry. And without LEO Orion flights, there is no reason for Ares I to exist.

Most major aerospace projects these days require at least 10-15 years of implementation between inception and operational readiness. I don't see why any of your proposed projects, which are among the most ambitious and complex, could be done in 2 or 3 years.

By scrapping SLS and going back to a new Ares I and a redesigned Ares V, you just added 5 more years of delay to the first manned Orion flight, now in 2022. You also spent 10 years designing and building your EML-2 Skylab (work on that can only start when the development of SLS is done, because of budgetary reasons), and another 10 years messing around with asteroids. You could theoretically announce your manned Mars expedition in 2040, with a planned landing sometime around 2050. This is an optimistic timeline, hoping that there are no major wars, economical crises, civilization outbreaks, technological revolutions, disease outbreaks, zombie plagues, etc... that might take a higher priority, or simply a new administration that doesn't like what the previous one did.

The Mars Constellation plan required no less than 7 Ares-V launches for a single expedition. At 2 launches per year (the current max launch rate for SLS), you need 3.5 years just to assemble the vehicles for a single expedition. No way are you going to have a permanent Mars base with that infrastructure.

Your timeline is all wrong.

I'm not scrapping the SLS.

I'm scrapping the Ares V, but keeping the Ares I so it can keep up the manned missions until the SLS comes into play.

The Mars Constellation Plan was also inefficent, using orbital construction (Which cost a good number of the launches). I'm going there in three launches, Mars Direct style (Crew launch on hab, land near MAV, MAV launches, dock with ERV, ERV go to Earth).

I'm only going to use the Ares I as a emergency booster until 2017, after which the Commerical Crew comes into play. I'm not screwing the industry...I'm merely holding it up until the support's come. You're saying that the Commerical Crew will launch in 2015....wrong. They'll most likely come into play around 2017.

What proof do you have that wet workshops are a bad idea?

If anything, it'll be either a wet or dry workshop. Also, the hangars are optional, and if they are not included, the third module becomes another labatory/galley/utility/storage module. A Mars Landing AFTER 2040 is not an optimistic goal for the future generations, nor will it be for my generation. It is an EXTREMELY pessmisstic goal (And, as always, are you just really burn't out by the waste of money the Space Shuttle was? If so, good for you, but the new generations of engineers need optimistical thinking) And, I thought we where assuming NASA had more funding?

Edited November 16, 2013 by NASAFanboy

[Bacterius]

There are no habitable locations in this solar system

Curious, I thought Earth was habitable, don't quote me on that though.

[jwenting]

Out of the scope of NASA. Their job is to do practical spaceflight R&D and exploration, not science fiction. There are no habitable locations in this solar system, and nobody is going interstellar within this century, so it's better to concentrate on achievable goals.

NASA's been chasing butterflies and fighting wind mills for a long time... That said, searching for habitable planets is at the moment rather impossible to do as we lack the fundamental science to engineer anything that will let us get close enough to another solar system to find out whether any planet there can be habitable.

In fact, most all the science we do have says rather clearly that getting to those other stars is going to take a very long time indeed, thousands of years most likely.

And that's not something that gets their sponsors in congress votes in the next elections, so will never be on their list of priorities.

[Nibb31]

I'm not scrapping the SLS.

I'm scrapping the Ares V, but keeping the Ares I so it can keep up the manned missions until the SLS comes into play.

The only reason Ares I existed was to make production of ATK SRBs economically worthwhile given Ares V's low launch rate. If you're not using SRBs, then you don't need Ares I. And if you are redesigning it with a liquid first stage, then it's no longer the Ares I. It's a new rocket. Ares I was a bad design that's gratefully dead and buried. It's not coming back.

I'm only going to use the Ares I as a emergency booster until 2017, after which the Commerical Crew comes into play. I'm not screwing the industry...I'm merely holding it up until the support's come. You're saying that the Commerical Crew will launch in 2015....wrong. They'll most likely come into play around 2017.

And how do you plan to design and build and new launcher in less than 2 years? Find me an example of a single modern aerospace project that was executed in less that 10 years, from inception to operational design. It simply is not possible. The trade study phase and procurement paperwork alone takes years.

If you're really in a hurry to launch the MPCV to LEO for some reason, then stick it on a Delta IVH. You might be able to do the man-rating redesign and paperwork in 3 or 4 years. At this stage, it still can't be done before Commercial Crew comes online.

What proof do you have that wet workshops are a bad idea?

What proof do have that they are a good idea? I gave you arguments about why they were impractical. NASA also thought they were a bad idea, which is why the idea was scrapped 45 years ago.

If anything, it'll be either a wet or dry workshop. Also, the hangars are optional, and if they are not included, the third module becomes another labatory/galley/utility/storage module. A Mars Landing AFTER 2040 is not an optimistic goal for the future generations, nor will it be for my generation. It is an EXTREMELY pessmisstic goal (And, as always, are you just really burn't out by the waste of money the Space Shuttle was? If so, good for you, but the new generations of engineers need optimistical thinking) And, I thought we where assuming NASA had more funding?

Engineers are pragmatic folks, not dreamers. What we need is to stop dreaming about bigger rockets and goals that are too far away and to focus on goals that we can reach today.

We need to build confidence, knowledge, and experience so that your dreams are achievable one day. We have taken baby steps, but we still need to learn to walk before we run. I'd rather see us achieve more moon landings than to see NASA grounded another 10 years as they redesign again for a Mars mission in another 20 or 30 years.

Why is 2040 or 2050 pessimistic? Why the rush? If your goal is for Mankind to walk on Mars, why is it more important to Humanity that it happens during your lifetime and not mine? We will get there one day eventually, when the time is right, only it takes decades to pull off this sort of thing and we are simply not there yet.

Edited November 16, 2013 by Nibb31

[Richy teh space man]

I think if NASA did have more money, a good starting place to any interplanetary journey would be some kind of space station around Earth with the ability to support construction of craft capable of this.

That and more investment into things like artificial intelligence, 3D printing, and extra terrestrial mining, so they could build bases on other worlds prior to landing people there.

[sgtscuba]

I think if NASA did have more money, a good starting place to any interplanetary journey would be some kind of space station around Earth with the ability to support construction of craft capable of this.

That and more investment into things like artificial intelligence, 3D printing, and extra terrestrial mining, so they could build bases on other worlds prior to landing people there.

Maybe even printing part of the ship up there to save weight/bulk on resupply trips

[hugix]

Out of the scope of NASA. Their job is to do practical spaceflight R&D and exploration, not science fiction. There are no habitable locations in this solar system, and nobody is going interstellar within this century, so it's better to concentrate on achievable goals.

There are locations in our neighbourhood that are worth investigating. The main reason to explore Mars is to discover if it ever could have harboured life. And then there is Europa. NASA has plans to send a spacecraft with a submarine to the inner oceans of Europa. With more budget this idea could become reality.

[Richy teh space man]

Maybe even printing part of the ship up there to save weight/bulk on resupply trips

Yeah, for parts that are too bulky or heavy to lift all in one piece that could work well.

[NASAFanboy]

The only reason Ares I existed was to make production of ATK SRBs economically worthwhile given Ares V's low launch rate. If you're not using SRBs, then you don't need Ares I. And if you are redesigning it with a liquid first stage, then it's no longer the Ares I. It's a new rocket. Ares I was a bad design that's gratefully dead and buried. It's not coming back.

And how do you plan to design and build and new launcher in less than 2 years? Find me an example of a single modern aerospace project that was executed in less that 10 years, from inception to operational design. It simply is not possible. The trade study phase and procurement paperwork alone takes years.

If you're really in a hurry to launch the MPCV to LEO for some reason, then stick it on a Delta IVH. You might be able to do the man-rating redesign and paperwork in 3 or 4 years. At this stage, it still can't be done before Commercial Crew comes online.

What proof do have that they are a good idea? I gave you arguments about why they were impractical. NASA also thought they were a bad idea, which is why the idea was scrapped 45 years ago.

Engineers are pragmatic folks, not dreamers. What we need is to stop dreaming about bigger rockets and goals that are too far away and to focus on goals that we can reach today.

We need to build confidence, knowledge, and experience so that your dreams are achievable one day. We have taken baby steps, but we still need to learn to walk before we run. I'd rather see us achieve more moon landings than to see NASA grounded another 10 years as they redesign again for a Mars mission in another 20 or 30 years.

Why is 2040 or 2050 pessimistic? Why the rush? If your goal is for Mankind to walk on Mars, why is it more important to Humanity that it happens during your lifetime and not mine? We will get there one day eventually, when the time is right, only it takes decades to pull off this sort of thing and we are simply not there yet.

The goal as always been the 2035 Mars Mission, followed by a base before 2050 (For NASA)

Why the delay? I want it to happen in your lifetime, too. The Ares I has already been built and tested, and launched. We won't be starting from scratch.. We'll just be rehiring engineers and restarting contracts.

[Nibb31]

I think if NASA did have more money, a good starting place to any interplanetary journey would be some kind of space station around Earth with the ability to support construction of craft capable of this.

That and more investment into things like artificial intelligence, 3D printing, and extra terrestrial mining, so they could build bases on other worlds prior to landing people there.

Orbital construction, including 3D printing, still requires getting the raw materials up there, as well as the facilities for transforming those raw materials and the people to run those facilities. Basically, you want a Star Trek orbital shipyard and asteroid mining before you start doing basic exploration. That's not how the real-life tech tree works.

It has to work the other way round. Exploration and experimentation must happen before we get to asteroid mining. You need asteroid mining for orbital construction to be viable. Until then, we are stuck with building stuff on the ground and hauling it to orbit, and decades of R&D are necessary for each of those steps, because we simply don't have the technological readiness level yet.

[Nibb31]

The goal as always been the 2035 Mars Mission, followed by a base before 2050 (For NASA)

[citation needed]

There is no fixed plan for a Mars 2035 mission. There might be some Powerpoint slides and few airy concepts, but there is no commitment from NASA. They don't even have a clear mandate from Congress for a mission once SLS goes live. NASA is controlled by Congress and all Congress wants is jobs.

Why the delay? I want it to happen in your lifetime, too.

I'd like it too. I'd also love to win the lottery, but it's not happening. Don't worry, I can deal with it.

The Ares I has already been built and tested, and launched. We won't be starting from scratch.. We'll just be rehiring engineers and restarting contracts.

No it hasn't. Ares I-X was a PR stunt with an old shuttle SRB (not the same as on Ares-I), different avionics, and a dummy upperstage and payload. It had exactly zero parts in common with the actual Ares-I design.

Ares-I was scrapped before it was even close to being finished. It had fundamental flaws, including underperforming to the point that it could never have launched a gutted Orion to LEO. It also had serious thrust oscillation problems that meant that it had to be loaded with all sorts of active tamping equipment if they wanted the astronauts to survive the launch, which added the payload problems.

It was simply a bad idea, and everybody at NASA knew it, except for top management. This is why a lot of NASA engineers worked on the DIRECT proposal on their spare time, which basically became SLS as soon as Constellation was canned.

Ares-I was built around an SRB. If you want to revive Ares-I on a liquid first stage, then it will be a totally different rocket from Ares-I with totally different first and second stage load requirements and flight profiles. So yes, you would be starting from scratch.

Edited November 16, 2013 by Nibb31

[Richy teh space man]

Orbital construction, including 3D printing, still requires getting the raw materials up there, as well as the facilities for transforming those raw materials and the people to run those facilities. Basically, you want a Star Trek orbital shipyard and asteroid mining before you start doing basic exploration. That's not how the real-life tech tree works.

I never said it didn't require getting the raw materials there, from Earth would do until we can support extra terrestrial mining. And yes, it would require building said facilities.

Also can you clarify what you mean by 'basic exploration' since we've already been doing that for years.

It has to work the other way round. Exploration and experimentation must happen before we get to asteroid mining. You need asteroid mining for orbital construction to be viable. Until then, we are stuck with building stuff on the ground and hauling it to orbit, and decades of R&D are necessary for each of those steps, because we simply don't have the technological readiness level yet.

I never mentioned asteroid mining or that it was necessary..

The point of orbital construction and making things in orbit is that you can make something that would be too bulky, heavy or expensive to risk launching all in one.

And yes I know the technology to do all this isn't available now, hence why I suggested investing in this area..

[Nibb31]

Building modules on Earth, in factories where you can have numerous workers constructing, fixing and testing stuff, and assembling the modules on orbit, is how we built the ISS and how the Russians built MIR. It works.

If you are launching all the material from Earth to LEO, then there is no advantage of doing the brunt work in space. You still need to put the same mass of material into orbit, but in addition, you also need to send the hundreds of workers and facilities to keep them alive, healthy, and prductive. It's also much more dangerous, complicated, and infinitely more expensive. It makes no sense.

By exploration and experimentation, I meant learning about asteroids, mining them and refining them, because that's the underlying rationale for orbital construction. Orbital construction doesn't make sense if you're still bringing the raw materials and equipment up from the ground. It also implies learning how to live in space and on other planets. We have barely scratched the surface of space exploration.

[Wahgineer]

And how do you plan to design and build and new launcher in less than 2 years? Find me an example of a single modern aerospace project that was executed in less that 10 years, from inception to operational design. It simply is not possible. The trade study phase and procurement paperwork alone takes years.

Apollo, Mercury, Gemini

Though technically not modern, if they could do it in the 60s, what is there (hypothetically) to stop us from doing the same in 20teens?

[PakledHostage]

if they could do it in the 60s, what is there (hypothetically) to stop us from doing the same in 20teens?

A lack of money and support from the general public.

[Nibb31]

I specifically said "modern".

The 60's was a whole different period. The budgets were pretty much unlimited, stuff was much cheaper, and crazy risks were taken. The World still had vivid memories of WWII and was preparing for WWIII. Human lives didn't have the same value as they do now.

Today there is a lot more quality control, risk management, legal paperwork, and public relations. Things must be safer and cleaner. Testing and QA are much more thorough. Systems are also more capable and therefore more complex. It's public money, so there are procurement procedures and safeguards. All of those things are real and make sense, so you can't just handwave them away.

Examples of modern aerospace programs: SLS, Orion, A380, B787, F-22, F-35... All of those programs took more than 10 years to come to fruition, even though they are not particularly cutting edge. It's pretty much impossible to do any large engineering project (including low-tech stuff like bridges, highways, railroads, power plants or large buildings) in less than a decade.

Edited November 18, 2013 by Nibb31

[Wahgineer]

You two obviously didn't pay attention to the (hypothetically) and the Though technically not modern,.

[magnemoe]

I specifically said "modern".

The 60's was a whole different period. The budgets were pretty much unlimited, stuff was much cheaper, and crazy risks were taken. The World still had vivid memories of WWII and was preparing for WWIII. Human lives didn't have the same value as they do now.

Today there is a lot more quality control, risk management, legal paperwork, and public relations. Things must be safer and cleaner. Testing and QA are much more thorough. Systems are also more capable and therefore more complex. It's public money, so there are procurement procedures and safeguards. All of those things are real and make sense, so you can't just handwave them away.

Examples of modern aerospace programs: SLS, Orion, A380, B787, F-22, F-35... All of those programs took more than 10 years to come to fruition, even though they are not particularly cutting edge. It's pretty much impossible to do any large engineering project (including low-tech stuff like bridges, highways, railroads, power plants or large buildings) in less than a decade.

For the airplanes the main problem is that they must perform significantly better than the existing ones or it would be better to just upgrade the existing.

This is far harder today than it was 50 years ago then planes was pretty ****ty and it was easy to do improvements, this will be even harder in the next generation.

Only way to avoid it is technological shifts, jet engines was one such shift for airplanes.

For space the main issue is budgets, but also management, add that lots of the easy milestones are done. New missions tend to be even more spectacular to gain both scientific value and public interest.

[thereaverofdarkness]

...pay their electric bills.

NASA's funding is pathetically low. If they had WAY more funding, there's tons of wonderful things they could do. But as it stands, income increases will first go to upkeep because they can't pay for the handful of flights and experiments they're running right now.

[Rocketscience101]

But of course telescopes and rovers have their limits. even though some ground teams are limited to the tools at their disposal, they do bring surface samples back, which can be annalized, and teach us more. The telescopes help map out the destination, the probes give us the basics to go there, and the Manned missions place give us more advanced understanding, which leads to permanent outposts, to place telescopes, and launch probes, and men from.

[Nibb31]

But of course telescopes and rovers have their limits. even though some ground teams are limited to the tools at their disposal, they do bring surface samples back, which can be annalized, and teach us more. The telescopes help map out the destination, the probes give us the basics to go there, and the Manned missions place give us more advanced understanding, which leads to permanent outposts, to place telescopes, and launch probes, and men from.

Robots can also bring samples back, for a fraction of the cost and risk of sending humans to do the job. And although robots are less mobile and slower to react (for now), they don't get tired, cover a larger variety of terrain, and can work 24/7 for years with very little logistics. A manned mission would be limited to a month or two on the ground, depending on supplies, and could only explore a very limited area around their base or ascent vehicle. For a fraction of the cost, you could send swarms of robots to multiple places of interest and observe for longer periods (seasonal changes, climate and sismological statistics, etc...), and there is no technological barrier to making them smarter and more autonomous.

The dream to put humans on Mars is not rational. If it happens one day, it will be for political or inspirational reasons, but if you are interested in maximizing your science investment, then robots are a much better option.

[NASAFanboy]

Robots can also bring samples back, for a fraction of the cost and risk of sending humans to do the job. And although robots are less mobile and slower to react (for now), they don't get tired, cover a larger variety of terrain, and can work 24/7 for years with very little logistics. A manned mission would be limited to a month or two on the ground, depending on supplies, and could only explore a very limited area around their base or ascent vehicle. For a fraction of the cost, you could send swarms of robots to multiple places of interest and observe for longer periods (seasonal changes, climate and sismological statistics, etc...), and there is no technological barrier to making them smarter and more autonomous.

The dream to put humans on Mars is not rational. If it happens one day, it will be for political or inspirational reasons, but if you are interested in maximizing your science investment, then robots are a much better option.

The probelm is, the General public frankly could care less. Yes, they do care about manned spaceflight and things like the moon landings and the ISS, but stop anyone on the streets and they be like "Huh. What's Cassini?"

Frankly, I'd rather have a man on Mars rather than five pages of telemetry. No one but the space enthusiasts care about the science payoff, the rest think "it's a precursor to a base and manned mission". Even if landing on Mars is not rational, the future Mars mission has already become some sort of pop-culture fad among my generation (Those born in late 1990's, early 2000's) and will likely be carried out in the future, regardless of lack of science payoff.

Achievements and colonization first. Science second (My personal view)