Across the high frontier: a Big Gemini space TL
- Thread starter Archibald
- Start date
That pretty much what happen in OTL during 1968 Space Task Group report and 1972 as Nixon take the Shuttle...
Here the process went in different way toward Big Gemini/Titan IIIM.
in TL 2001: a Space-Time Odyssey the Soviet land first on Moon and Nixon is force to take bigger Space Program were Shuttle is little part of it.
While in TL Eyes Turned Skywards, George Low become NASA Administrator and goes for Apollo Capsule and not Space Shuttle
Sure but those were actually special cases and NASA went along BECAUSE they were unmanned. The were adamant, (and could make a very good argument against) using something like Titan for manned operations.
Number one and foremost was that manned operations brought crowds of people to watch the launch both on and off site. NASA (and the Air Force) were/are well aware of what a PR disaster an launch mishap will involve.
(There's a reason the Titan is called the American Proton
)(And OMB DOES in fact care about this sort of stuff because no matter how you slice it the government ends up paying in the end)
Following that there are operational issues which the Air Force (DoD) was willing to put up with but that NASA was not for "regular" operations
Now most if not all the arguments actually go away with a single suggestion that was made for the Titan but which runs afoul of the whole "cost" argument that OMB is pushing; Turn the Titan back into an RP1/LOX booster. But that negates the whole "cost-sharing/savings" point at it is then no longer the same Titan that the AF is using
Lastly I'm going to point out the 800lb Gorilla in the room in that politics would be rearing it's head around now which will probably be the leading factor in the argument. To wit: California is a "major" state where as Colorado is not. So while admittedly I tossed MY favorite system out there just to tweek things if an ELV is going to be mandated then the capsule is going to go to a California firm and NOT be Big Gemini and vise-versa.
In addition there is the losses of personnel and monies that are going to occur in OTHER "major" political areas, (specifically Alabama, Florida and Texas) that are going to occur if NASA isn't working on a major "new" program which is partially why Apollo hardware was tossed out in favor of the Shuttle.
HOWEVER!
I'm going to shut-up and grab the popcorn because I am looking forward to see where this TL is going and it's your TL not mine.(Which of course would be SO much better than anyone elses... if I weren't such a lazy bum that is
)Randy
Insider: it's actually endemic of the whole "approach" to space flight/exploration that has been taken to date. NASA specifically was built up and driven towards achieving a single goal of "beating" the Russians to the Moon. The way things are set up they simply don't have any other "way" to do things and no one in government cares enough to change the way things are done so it goes. Pretty much any TL that "advances" space travel/exploration HAS to be based on the supposition that "someone" at "sometime" changes that paradigm or everything turns out the same
The exact circumstance that lead to the US putting men on the Moon first were pretty much a one-off, never going to happen again set up but as the saying goes, Crazy is doing the same thing over and over again, (and we don't have the motivation to equal the first time) and being surprised when the results are always the same
Randy
Your TL, so your way if the right way of course
However I'm going to point out the numerous times this has come up on NSF and the fact that the 'reason' Saturn-1 "lost" to the Titan was simply that the Saturn-1 was not being produced anymore and there were no plans to "divert" the already built ones to such missions. (The whole Lunar Landing focus thing really)
http://www.spacelaunchreport.com/satstg2.html
And it was the Titan-IIIC not E that was the basis of "comparison" as the AF hadn't yet come up with a reason for the E
The "fun" thing about this TL is that the situation here is going to be reversed where NASA is forced to use AF capability pretty much at gun-point with all the reservations and resentment that such a relationship implies. In a similar manner this is going to fester the way the AF/NASA relationship did over the Shuttle OTL and with (probably) similar results.
Unfortunately there is no way NASA would have the same 'clout' that the Air Force does when (not if) the inevitable happens and NASA tries to throw the AF under the bus to get a new LV developed.
Randy
Archibald
Banned
It is my TL but I remain open to debate and discussion. Titan III will face limited competition from Saturn IB and an alternative (more on this later)
April 18, 1986 was one hell of BFR. Imagine if that happened at the Cape.
Of course it happened in Baikonur in April 1969.It also very nearly happened to Kourou on February 24, 1990 - when a doomed-by-a-forgotten-cloth Ariane 44L missed the launched tower by only a couple of meters...
I recently found that op-ed by Dennis Wingo
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It is my TL but I remain open to debate and discussion. Titan III will face limited competition from Saturn IB and an alternative (more on this later)
IIRC, the Jupiter and Redstone Tanks that were used for the 1st Stage of the Saturn IB weren't in production by the 1970's, not to mention it gave it a rather high dry mass and wasn't very cheap to operate given that design.
April 18, 1986 was one hell of BFR. Imagine if that happened at the Cape.
The Mars 5 & 6 missions, when one of the RD-253 engines on the 1st stage failed, and exploded near the launch pad, forcing them to wait until the rains could wash away the propellants before they could use anywhere near the Pads again.
Difference is that the much-less public nature of Soviet Launches let them keep it under wraps for a good time.
1972: NASA hell of a year (4)
Archibald
Banned
This one for Ranulf - Titan III and alternatives
"The Johnson Space Center (JSC) heavily insists on uprating at least part of the Saturn IB fleet with the high-performance XLR-129 (to replace the Apollo era J-2).
The reason is the Air Force advanced rocket engine remains the closest thing from the lost Space Shuttle Main Engine - with two major caveats. First it lacks thrust, 250 000 pounds instead of the shuttle target of 350 000 pounds.
More annoyingly before the shuttle cancellation the SSME contract had already been attributed to Rocketdyne and not Pratt&Whitney, although it was the latter that tested the XLR-129.
Six months ago a minor controversy erupted when Representative Cotter bluntly charged NASA Dale Myers (and former Rocketdyne employee) of favorizing his former company. These allegations however were rapidly quashed by the Government Accounting Office.
Ground testing of the XLR-129 may resume soon, and JSC clamour for the integration of the advanced engine into the fleet of spare Saturn IB.
There are many issues with that scheme.
Integration of the engine would be extremely difficult and costly; the stock of Saturn is barely sufficient for an eventual space station buildup.
In this context the ARES 1B option has recently gained a lot of traction.
...
"Without the space shuttle NASA is essentially stuck with capsules, yet another issue is what launcher for these capsules. It boils down to Titan III-M versus Saturn IB, although two alternatives have recently emerged – which are somewhat members of the enlarged Saturn family of launch vehicles.
Both alternatives are the result of issues with Saturn S-IB or first stage. A cluster of tanks from the long gone Jupiter missile, the S-IB is rather heavy, inefficient, and expensive to build. Its elimination would results in large savings.
…
Alternative 1 has the S-IVB riding on a downrated (3*F-1A )Saturn V first stage, which remains expensive, oversized and overpowered; that's the Jupiter 120, where the number 120 stands for 120 000 pounds into orbit. For the record, a fully fuelled CSM weights 70 000 pounds - with all that SPS fuel perfectly unuseful for low Earth orbit missions. Consideration has been given to a very large payload module that would be picked up, LM-style, through a 180 degree transposition manoeuver.
…
His name an hommage to Von Braun early missile, the Jupiter 120 is in fact at the center of a whole family of new launch vehicles. Among them is the Jupiter 232, essentially a direct return to the Saturn V launching as much as 232 000 pounds into orbit. Modularity, or a so-called building-block approach, is key to the concept.
…
Alternative 2 is, somewhat ironically, a breeding of Titan and Saturn: a cluster of Titan large solids with Saturn' S-IVB on top. The Titan boosters might be recovered at sea for reuse, lowering launch costs – a system known as the Advanced REcoverable Solid, or ARES. According to a source within NASA astronaut corp that concept has been christened Satan - a portemanteau of Saturn and Titan. As a sidenote, that nickname by itself clearly show astronaut opinion about that launch vehicle.
…
The Ares-Saturn IB, usually shortened the Ares 1B is clearly of interest to NASA. The civilian space agency so far show an evident lack of enthusiasm flying the Titan III, a military space vehicle the Bureau of Budget forced them to use essentially because it is already there.
…
A hybrid of Titan and Saturn that preserves the S-IVB translunar stage, the Ares 1B is certainly an attractive option. Experts however warns the solids performance is too low, and that the J-2 can’t fill the gap.
In this case it would take the new XLR-129 to lift a decent payload to orbit - hence JSC pressing lobbying for it.
This very advanced rocket engine remains a strong candidate to power a reborn shuttle, perhaps in the next decade; but it has not be fully tested yet. Unlike the J-2, it was not designed to be air-started in-flight; cost of the modifications might be prohibitive.
…
It is interesting to note that the XLR-129 formed the core of the Space Shuttle Engine proposals; making the Ares 1B a possible forerunner of a new shuttle.
…
Astronauts are known to be reticent to fly on solid-propelled boosters, which tend to suffer destructive, unpredictible destruct events that can easily outrun escape systems – and kill the crew.
…
It remains to be seen, however, whether Congress and the Bureau of Budget will allocate funds for another launcher which performance essentially duplicates the existing, proven Saturn IB and Titan III.
...
with the death of the Saturn V and space shuttle, NASA might get out of the launch vehicle business sooner than later…something the Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Alabama, might suffers from.”
(excerpt from Flight Global, February 1 1972: Jupiter, Titan, Saturn and Ares launch vehicles considered)
PERSONAL NOTE: that part was fun to write because it is crammed with hints to OTL projects - Kudos to those who identify all the references
"The Johnson Space Center (JSC) heavily insists on uprating at least part of the Saturn IB fleet with the high-performance XLR-129 (to replace the Apollo era J-2).
The reason is the Air Force advanced rocket engine remains the closest thing from the lost Space Shuttle Main Engine - with two major caveats. First it lacks thrust, 250 000 pounds instead of the shuttle target of 350 000 pounds.
More annoyingly before the shuttle cancellation the SSME contract had already been attributed to Rocketdyne and not Pratt&Whitney, although it was the latter that tested the XLR-129.
Six months ago a minor controversy erupted when Representative Cotter bluntly charged NASA Dale Myers (and former Rocketdyne employee) of favorizing his former company. These allegations however were rapidly quashed by the Government Accounting Office.
Ground testing of the XLR-129 may resume soon, and JSC clamour for the integration of the advanced engine into the fleet of spare Saturn IB.
There are many issues with that scheme.
Integration of the engine would be extremely difficult and costly; the stock of Saturn is barely sufficient for an eventual space station buildup.
In this context the ARES 1B option has recently gained a lot of traction.
...
"Without the space shuttle NASA is essentially stuck with capsules, yet another issue is what launcher for these capsules. It boils down to Titan III-M versus Saturn IB, although two alternatives have recently emerged – which are somewhat members of the enlarged Saturn family of launch vehicles.
Both alternatives are the result of issues with Saturn S-IB or first stage. A cluster of tanks from the long gone Jupiter missile, the S-IB is rather heavy, inefficient, and expensive to build. Its elimination would results in large savings.
…
Alternative 1 has the S-IVB riding on a downrated (3*F-1A )Saturn V first stage, which remains expensive, oversized and overpowered; that's the Jupiter 120, where the number 120 stands for 120 000 pounds into orbit. For the record, a fully fuelled CSM weights 70 000 pounds - with all that SPS fuel perfectly unuseful for low Earth orbit missions. Consideration has been given to a very large payload module that would be picked up, LM-style, through a 180 degree transposition manoeuver.
…
His name an hommage to Von Braun early missile, the Jupiter 120 is in fact at the center of a whole family of new launch vehicles. Among them is the Jupiter 232, essentially a direct return to the Saturn V launching as much as 232 000 pounds into orbit. Modularity, or a so-called building-block approach, is key to the concept.
…
Alternative 2 is, somewhat ironically, a breeding of Titan and Saturn: a cluster of Titan large solids with Saturn' S-IVB on top. The Titan boosters might be recovered at sea for reuse, lowering launch costs – a system known as the Advanced REcoverable Solid, or ARES. According to a source within NASA astronaut corp that concept has been christened Satan - a portemanteau of Saturn and Titan. As a sidenote, that nickname by itself clearly show astronaut opinion about that launch vehicle.
…
The Ares-Saturn IB, usually shortened the Ares 1B is clearly of interest to NASA. The civilian space agency so far show an evident lack of enthusiasm flying the Titan III, a military space vehicle the Bureau of Budget forced them to use essentially because it is already there.
…
A hybrid of Titan and Saturn that preserves the S-IVB translunar stage, the Ares 1B is certainly an attractive option. Experts however warns the solids performance is too low, and that the J-2 can’t fill the gap.
In this case it would take the new XLR-129 to lift a decent payload to orbit - hence JSC pressing lobbying for it.
This very advanced rocket engine remains a strong candidate to power a reborn shuttle, perhaps in the next decade; but it has not be fully tested yet. Unlike the J-2, it was not designed to be air-started in-flight; cost of the modifications might be prohibitive.
…
It is interesting to note that the XLR-129 formed the core of the Space Shuttle Engine proposals; making the Ares 1B a possible forerunner of a new shuttle.
…
Astronauts are known to be reticent to fly on solid-propelled boosters, which tend to suffer destructive, unpredictible destruct events that can easily outrun escape systems – and kill the crew.
…
It remains to be seen, however, whether Congress and the Bureau of Budget will allocate funds for another launcher which performance essentially duplicates the existing, proven Saturn IB and Titan III.
...
with the death of the Saturn V and space shuttle, NASA might get out of the launch vehicle business sooner than later…something the Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Alabama, might suffers from.”
(excerpt from Flight Global, February 1 1972: Jupiter, Titan, Saturn and Ares launch vehicles considered)
PERSONAL NOTE: that part was fun to write because it is crammed with hints to OTL projects - Kudos to those who identify all the references
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1972: NASA hell of a year (5)
Archibald
Banned
For a minute, let put the reader into George Low shoes. The month is February 1972. The space shuttle is dead, but Weinberger assured that manned spaceflight should continue.
All the options explored by the 1969 Space Task Group are dead on arrival - the shuttle was the last piece in existence.
So you have to rebuild a manned space program from zero.
Below is a short list of all the possible options in varied domains.
LAUNCH VEHICLES
SPACE STATIONS
LARGE PROJECTS
All the options explored by the 1969 Space Task Group are dead on arrival - the shuttle was the last piece in existence.
So you have to rebuild a manned space program from zero.
Below is a short list of all the possible options in varied domains.
LAUNCH VEHICLES
- Saturn IB
- Titan III-M
- ARES - SaTan (three Titan solids topped by Saturn S-IVB)
- Jupiter 120 (Saturn INT-20 : 3*F-1A S-IC + S-IVB)
- Big Gemini
- Block III CSM
- General Electric D-2
- Lockheed Corona
- Grumman subscale Shuttle
- Boeing revamped DynaSoar
- Northrop HL-20
- Martin Marietta X-24D
- NERVA
- OTV
- Centaur
- Transtage
- Apollo Service Module
- Delta stage 2 (AJ-10 or TR-201)
- Lockheed Agena
SPACE STATIONS
- Skylab B
- wet workshops
- S-II dry workshop
- Big Gemini 15ft cargo module
LARGE PROJECTS
- Viking
- Grand Tour
- Large Space Telescope
- HEAO (High Energy Astronomical Observatories)
- Space station + crew ferry
- NERVA
- Apollo 16, 17, 18, 19 and 20.
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on ARES - (SaTan) three Titan solids topped by Saturn S-IVB with high-performance XLR-129.
why use the XLR-129 ?
if they increase the number of Booster they could take Cheaper and already working J-2S engine on S-IVB
Higer ISP, reduction of subsystem = reduction S-IVB mass, restart option for S-IVB stage
the use of Modular Booster from 2 to 6 make ARES a truly versatile launcher in payload range of 88000 lb. to 22000 lb.
even more if they take seven segment booster from Titan IIIM
and with third stage Centaur it can launch heavy probes into deep space.
why use the XLR-129 ?
if they increase the number of Booster they could take Cheaper and already working J-2S engine on S-IVB
Higer ISP, reduction of subsystem = reduction S-IVB mass, restart option for S-IVB stage
the use of Modular Booster from 2 to 6 make ARES a truly versatile launcher in payload range of 88000 lb. to 22000 lb.
even more if they take seven segment booster from Titan IIIM
and with third stage Centaur it can launch heavy probes into deep space.
And to the main point there "I" need to remember to "debate and/or discuss" rather than argue which is what I actually tend to do
Titan III will face limited competition from Saturn IB and an alternative (more on this later)Looking forward to it
Thanks I'll check it out.
And because I got beat up on this a lot, (and it tweaks on of my many pet peeves
Secondly the dry-mass and overall efficiency of the Saturn-1/1B was pretty good as was the cost effectiveness overall. People tend to think it was way worse than it actually was but the actual data shows the opposite:
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=31896.0;all
Something that I found in my research that I should have known but didn't was that MSFC actually built the S-1/1B stages on-site which would be a point (in their eyes) for reviving the LV. Though to be clear this was "outsourced" Chysler/Michoud, all the tooling/equipment for both Saturn-1B and Saturn-V were still in storage in 1972 so while there would be some spike for re-starting the MAIN issue was that most of the workforce for Saturn production had been laid off prior to or just after Apollo-11.
In discussing options for "upgraded" yet "cheaper" Saturn LVs it was pointed out that a BIG part of the costs where the S-IVB stage and making "cheap-Chinese-copies" of the stage would go a long way towards meeting the goals of increased performance and lower costs. Edkyle99 on NSF worked up the figures for a Saturn-1 TSTO optimized for LEO/GEO EELV type missions (http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=26667.msg1178732#msg1178732, http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=26667.msg1182673#msg1182673) assuming an "S-IV" derived stage using RL10s and about half the dry mass of the S-IVB itself which is what the studies suggested. It would basically be a huge Centaur "balloon" stage in most respects.
Cost wise all the parts are pretty much "paid-for" already so it is pretty much a wash vis-vis the Titan for the same reasons but that's ALSO a strike against it because it wouldn't spread costs/monies out as much as a "new" LV would.
Randy
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Why thank you sir
Interesting but it doesn't make a lot of "sense" for NASA since they had already instigated the HG-3, and J-2S/J-2S200/250T research years earlier all of which had better performance than the XLR-129 would have had. The only reason NASA looked at the XLR-129 was the very reason the AF ended up dropping the research program for which was the sticking point of reusability. (The AF had no need for it and dropped the program when all data pointed to expendable being more in-line with their operations and needs) And since the XLR-129 was never even demoed successfully how's a contract being given already?
(I'm curious because OTL the only thing Rocketdyne got on the XLR was some of the data and they determined that it was a dead-end the same and P&W had due to the complexity of the XLR-129)
My point since the program was canceled by the Air Force and wrapped up in 1971 without a tested (or even complete) engine?
I"m sensing an AF "hit-piece" article here
Specifically since the exact same "argument" applies to the Titan-IIIYa know just to get it out there one of the possible TLs I've been doing research and notes on is one where the Air Force in the late 1950s gets EXACTLY what they wanted and all missile development and deployment goes to the Army
The more history I learn the more I think the AF was seriously "mental" about space launch and missile capability. They seemed to have this perpetual issue with the fact they could never "justify" putting military personnel into space so they hated NASA because they were putting civilians into space Nice shout outs
But the J-2S was supposed to hit 250,000lbs same as the XLR-129 so "pushing" an engine that hasn't even been tested seems a bit to much hype. (On the other hand, as I noted, I get the feeling that's the whole "point" isn't it? )Just an FYI here but that's not right. The XLR-129 was supposed to be used to power an air-launched, hypersonic, manned rocket spy vehicle, (ISINGLASS) so it WAS supposed to be "air-startable" from the get go.
And all the little "hammering" hints of any "new" LV being a step towards the Shuttle that OMB, Congress, and the White House have all already rejected... Subtle... Not
PERSONAL NOTE: that part was fun to write because it is crammed with hints to OTL projects - Kudos to those who identify all the references
And fun to read too
Randy
First off on Dennis' Op-Ed...
His revelation is a bit off because it's not "just" the political aspects involved but the public in general had the same attitude. Apollo was a "one-goal" program by the time it ramped up but it didn't start out that way. It turned into that when pretty much the whole "free-world" started freaking out over how "ahead" the Soviets were in space exploration. That in itself was fed by politicians like Eisenhower who it seemed simply didn't "understand" why anyone was in a tizzy over the Soviet space accomplishments. He constantly and very openly did not seem to "care" that the Soviets appeared to be out-doing the US in all aspects of space and missile development and missed every opportunity to respond effectively.
In hind site WE can understand a lot of this as he "knew" more than the average person on what was really going on and even though he had directly contributed to many of the firsts the Soviets got by NOT responding in a timely or efficient manner, (specifically commenting on Von Brauns past and having someone go to Florida and "sit" on the team to prevent them from "opps" launching the first orbital satellite is a good example) he seemed to continually refuse to step up to the "challenge".
When the US finally got started it was very soon obvious that we were doing more and more than the Soviets but not obvious enough that the general panic died down so it fell to Kennedy to make the "obvious" response. And frankly Von Braun didn't help when he kept suggesting that Kennedy "pick-a-goal" and let everything else fall to the side in order to reach that goal.
We ended up with Apollo being solely focused on getting to the Moon and back first and NOTHING else. Apollo hardware wasn't designed or intended for extended exploration and economic use and it showed in the various studies and proposals for APP and after-Apollo but in truth it COULD have been the basis for more. But by that time we'd been indoctrinated to the model of how a space program should work and frankly we've never been able to move beyond that model.
The adage it true in that just because you CAN do something it doesn't follow that you actually SHOULD do that thing and the Moon was not what we should have focused on.
(Dang! How did this soapbox get so damn high? I'm gonna need a parachute to get off this thing.. Wish me luck! )
Randy
His revelation is a bit off because it's not "just" the political aspects involved but the public in general had the same attitude. Apollo was a "one-goal" program by the time it ramped up but it didn't start out that way. It turned into that when pretty much the whole "free-world" started freaking out over how "ahead" the Soviets were in space exploration. That in itself was fed by politicians like Eisenhower who it seemed simply didn't "understand" why anyone was in a tizzy over the Soviet space accomplishments. He constantly and very openly did not seem to "care" that the Soviets appeared to be out-doing the US in all aspects of space and missile development and missed every opportunity to respond effectively.
In hind site WE can understand a lot of this as he "knew" more than the average person on what was really going on and even though he had directly contributed to many of the firsts the Soviets got by NOT responding in a timely or efficient manner, (specifically commenting on Von Brauns past and having someone go to Florida and "sit" on the team to prevent them from "opps" launching the first orbital satellite is a good example) he seemed to continually refuse to step up to the "challenge".
When the US finally got started it was very soon obvious that we were doing more and more than the Soviets but not obvious enough that the general panic died down so it fell to Kennedy to make the "obvious" response. And frankly Von Braun didn't help when he kept suggesting that Kennedy "pick-a-goal" and let everything else fall to the side in order to reach that goal.
We ended up with Apollo being solely focused on getting to the Moon and back first and NOTHING else. Apollo hardware wasn't designed or intended for extended exploration and economic use and it showed in the various studies and proposals for APP and after-Apollo but in truth it COULD have been the basis for more. But by that time we'd been indoctrinated to the model of how a space program should work and frankly we've never been able to move beyond that model.
The adage it true in that just because you CAN do something it doesn't follow that you actually SHOULD do that thing and the Moon was not what we should have focused on.
(Dang! How did this soapbox get so damn high? I'm gonna need a parachute to get off this thing.. Wish me luck!
)Randy
I'm eagerly awaiting to see where this goes but while the Shuttle is dead does that mean everything is dead? Manned space flight has to have something to "go" on if only to justify the budget for it. The Shuttle was going to lower the cost of access which was seen to have a huge amount of utility. But no one is buying that hype because the economics and numbers don't "work" as advertised.
Apollo is over and most of it's hardware is only some left overs and really given the scenario it's not likely anyone is going to justify re-starting production no matter what the numbers say.
You can launch some kind of capsule on the Titan and put people into orbit but its been pretty conclusively shown that doing so is far less efficient and cost effective than using automation. (The efforts of the Air Force to justify putting people into space nailed that coffin shut) So you are left with telling the politicians and public that straight up your ONLY reason for continuing Manned Space Flight is simply to continue manned space flight...
Yes NASA and the rest of us Space Cadets don't see an "issue" with this but both the politicians and public have other priorities now that we've beaten the Russians and proved the USA rules.
"Interesting" in the Chinese sense actually
Because at this point NASA really has "nothing" to justify a big-budget "S" program and has been steadily putting everything OTHER than getting to the Moon on the back burner and starving for funding in every other area.Like I said I'm eager to see where this goes.
Randy
1972: NASA hell of a year (6)
Archibald
Banned
the empire strike back
February 6 1972
“William, I need you in my office, right now. You really have to read some documents I’ve found”
Walter Mondale called his Committee on banking, housing and urban affairs colleague William Proxmire.
“Tell me what you think about this” he threw a thick report on his desk.
“Jesus. So that’s the famed Mathematica study ?”
“It is. William, as you know eighteen months ago on July 6, 1970, NASA awarded a cost-plus-fixed-fee contract to the Mathematica Institute, Princeton, Virginia, for an independent analysis of the economic benefits of the shuttle.
"Three alternative space transportation systems were considered in this analysis: current expendables, new expendables, and space shuttle systems - originally a two-stage, fully reusable system. The first part of Mathematica's analysis was summarized in a report dated May 31, 1971, to no avail.
"Thus NASA extended the analysis to include an evaluation of alternative space shuttle configurations--i.e., space shuttle configurations that could be developed within the peak-year funding constraints anticipated through the coming decade.
“Yes, that was after Nixon Bureau of Budget capped their annual budget to $3 billion per year – of which the shuttle swallowed $1 billion.”
“Well, the second part has been issued last week – January 31, despite cancellation of the shuttle project.”
“So, what is the point ? As of today NASA is on the way to Big Gemini, and they try their hand at a space station. The shuttle belong to the past no ?”
“Well, I fear no. And that’s the point I want to make: I want to demonstrate that the Mathematica study is unrealistic. This should bury the shuttle for the next ten years. I will request that the General Accounting Office (GAO) review the cost-benefit-analysis used by NASA in support of the Space Shuttle Program. I want to ask them to review the cost estimates for Mathematica’s shuttle and Big Gemini / Titan III-M.
"What bother me most in this Mathematica report are some assumptions and other areas that might have significantly influenced the estimated cost of the Space Shuttle Program. Those critical areas are Launch system cost, Number of flights, Cost per launch, Payload retrieval and Range of contractors estimates.”
Proxmire, too, had had doubts
“NASA never answered clearly to some questions I had on the shuttle – notably the estimated number of times that the orbiter could be reused and the estimated time between flights. And what about the estimated booster engine recovery and refurbishment costs ?
Mathematica talks about dropping boosters on salt-water, under parachutes. They also talked about retrieving, refurbishing and re-launching broken satellites. Is this really worth the price ? “
Mondale smiled.
“William, imagine I show you an article criticizing the shuttle as early as 1969. Imagine that the article was written by a NASA engineer, a high-ranking one, a veteran of NACA days.”
“Are you kidding ?”
“Thrust me I’m not. Look at this.” Mondale handed Proxmire a small folder. Proxmire red avidly, commenting.
…There are two obvious ways to get low-cost space transportation systems. One of these is to reduce substantially the cost of expendable launch-vehicle stages. The other way is to quit throwing the system parts away i.e. design and perfect recoverable and reusable space transports.
“Hmmm, sounds like Titan vs Shuttle.” Proxmire nodded.
The first drives the system concepts towards simple (minimum test and checkout) stages in which engineering refinement is secondary to production cost.
The reusable system, on the other hand, capitalizes on the ability of the aerospace industry to develop and produce refined high-performance equipment. Because of the need for carrying recovery gear, which chews a large bite out of payload capability, performance and mechanical refinement take precedence over production cost. In theory, however, as only a few units would service the requirements of the nation, unit production cost does not become a dominant factor. In this approach design and development investment are high; operating costs are low. High launch rates favor this approach.
“Yeah, 600 flights over twelve years sounds enough, as Mathematica told us.” Proxmire grinned.
I believe a recoverable launch-vehicle system must come as soon as the technological state of the art will permit developing it without defeating the primary purpose of low cost. For this, two conditions must first be met. The space program must develop a traffic rate that will amortize the initial investment in reasonable time and a sound base in technology and in precursor flight and operating experience must be created to assure straight forward development.
“Ouch. This guy know his NASA better than any of us.“
I have the opinion that even in this era of unprecedented technological progress, too large an attempted technological leap can cause us to stub our toes by forestalling the availability of the new system, increasing its costs at the expense of other parts of the total
space program... A proper transportation system can not be selected in the absence of a definitive picture of payloads in each mass class, their orbit or trajectory path, and their rate of launch. Such a survey of mission requirements must include all prospective DOD as well as NASA uses. The idea that a reusable launch-vehicle system will serve a single purpose is preposterous.
“Darn !”
“Well, read what follows” Mondale had visibly enjoyed the paper a lot
The desire of the aerospace industry, which includes members of government agencies, to build exquisite and innovative equipment does not of itself justify spending the taxpayer's money.
“Sweet Jesus.”
“...either of these recoverable systems is very sensitive to degradation of performance, either in the engine specific impulse or stage mass-fraction (amount of useful propellant they can carry relative to total mass). For example, a 5% degradation in engine performance knocks out ***all*** of the payload capability of a fully recoverable two-stage vehicle.
Under these circumstances, particularly since we have inadequate experimental proof of the validity of present design extrapolations, there is a real hazard that the already-low payload fraction, which is only 1.5% of takeoff mass, may become so small as to make use of such systems questionable in terms of economy, or it may even disappear altogether. This situation is analogous to the supersonic transport problem. If you fall short of the design requirements, you have the option of flying part of your passengers all of the way, or all of your passengers part of the way across the ocean.”
Proxmire was visibly stunned by the last sentence.
“That should remind you of a certain Boeing project which got canned last year, thanks to you”
Mondale talked about the Boeing supersonic transport (SST). Back in march 1971 Congress had refused to fund the program further. Proxmire had led the successful battle against the SST.
Proxmire continued reading rapidly through the folder
“...the relatively low design and development investment in modifications of existing launch-vehicle equipment or in adoption of simple expendable stages largely offsets their high recurring cost and makes such transportation systems attractive for a small total of flights.
“… Economic studies say that the break-even point between expendables and reusables comes somewhere between 100 and 200 flights. But if my assessments of the costs of the more advanced systems are wrong by a factor of two, the break-even point goes out beyond 600 flights !
“The justification of recoverable launch-vehicle development resides in the idea that the traffic rate will build up as the cost comes down. Of this there is really little doubt, but mundane problems of funding, developing, building and preparing payloads are likely to pace the use of space transportation.”
Proxmire concluded on this sentence, hold his breath for some seconds, and turned again toward Mondale.
“Please, tell me who is the author of that. And when did he drop such bombshell !”
“His name is Adelbert Tischler.”
“Albert what ?
“A-del-bert Ti-schler.” Mondale spelled “Mind you, he has impressive records. A veteran of NACA days, he worked on the F-1 engine, and early Saturn concepts. You certainly heard of George Mueller didn’t you ?”
“Of course. He’s the man who forged the concept of the space shuttle four years ago. Damn him !”
“Well, James Webb hired Mueller in 1963 as top manager of the Apollo program, which at the time was questioned. First move of Mueller in September 1963 was to commit a study on Apollo cost and management.
He asked two veterans the following question: in the actual shape of things, can we land a man on the Moon before the decade is out – in other words, accomplish what Kennedy asked us. “
“And Tischler was one of these two veterans.”
“Exactly ! His answer was quick, loud and clear – NO !
In response to that Mueller moved to all up testing of Saturns – dummy stages were scrapped. The rockets would fly with all functioning stages. First Saturn V worked perfectly, the second flight was a near disaster, and despite that, the third Saturn V flight carried the first men around the Moon."
“So, what Tischler did of remarkable other than that ?”
“Mueller was happy with him, and send him to Headquarters, in Washington. For eight years he was in OART – NASA Office of Advanced Research and Technology. Thanks to this position, his excellent evaluation on Apollo, and early works on the F-1, he had a global vision of the shuttle program in domains as different as economics, technical and propulsion matters. Hence the excellent essay you red.”
“Which was published when ?”
“On August 25, 1969.”
“Jesus. At the very early planning stages. Shuttle phase A contracts had been barely issued to contractors at that time ! Talk about a visionary. Walter, we have to find this guy, meet him and discuss. He could be a precious ally; he could testify for the GAO study I mentioned earlier.” Proxmire said.
"I already did my little inquiry. Back in the 1960s, Del had assembled his own handpicked dream team of propulsion experts at NASA to monitor the Apollo propulsion effort. No NASA field center, not even von Braun's highly acclaimed Marshall SFC, could match them man for man.
"There was no way those people could snow my people, either technically or managerially." That what he said.
Sadly, von Braun & co. resented this and managed to convince the incoming Director for Manned Space Flight (George Mueller) to break up Tischler's team.
In return, Del was transferred to the OART where he promptly assembled a new, equally talented team that managed to make further significant contributions to Apollo engine development. Unfortunately, lack of support in his own organization meant Tischler was unable to keep his team together."
"What's OART, anyway ?"
"The Office of Advanced Research and Technology. The aeronautic side of NASA, what's left of the old NACA the space agency replaced in 1958. For obvious reasons they are much less obsessive than the manned spaceflight centers such as Marshall, houston and KSC.. They have all kind of interesting studies there."
February 6 1972
“William, I need you in my office, right now. You really have to read some documents I’ve found”
Walter Mondale called his Committee on banking, housing and urban affairs colleague William Proxmire.
“Tell me what you think about this” he threw a thick report on his desk.
“Jesus. So that’s the famed Mathematica study ?”
“It is. William, as you know eighteen months ago on July 6, 1970, NASA awarded a cost-plus-fixed-fee contract to the Mathematica Institute, Princeton, Virginia, for an independent analysis of the economic benefits of the shuttle.
"Three alternative space transportation systems were considered in this analysis: current expendables, new expendables, and space shuttle systems - originally a two-stage, fully reusable system. The first part of Mathematica's analysis was summarized in a report dated May 31, 1971, to no avail.
"Thus NASA extended the analysis to include an evaluation of alternative space shuttle configurations--i.e., space shuttle configurations that could be developed within the peak-year funding constraints anticipated through the coming decade.
“Yes, that was after Nixon Bureau of Budget capped their annual budget to $3 billion per year – of which the shuttle swallowed $1 billion.”
“Well, the second part has been issued last week – January 31, despite cancellation of the shuttle project.”
“So, what is the point ? As of today NASA is on the way to Big Gemini, and they try their hand at a space station. The shuttle belong to the past no ?”
“Well, I fear no. And that’s the point I want to make: I want to demonstrate that the Mathematica study is unrealistic. This should bury the shuttle for the next ten years. I will request that the General Accounting Office (GAO) review the cost-benefit-analysis used by NASA in support of the Space Shuttle Program. I want to ask them to review the cost estimates for Mathematica’s shuttle and Big Gemini / Titan III-M.
"What bother me most in this Mathematica report are some assumptions and other areas that might have significantly influenced the estimated cost of the Space Shuttle Program. Those critical areas are Launch system cost, Number of flights, Cost per launch, Payload retrieval and Range of contractors estimates.”
Proxmire, too, had had doubts
“NASA never answered clearly to some questions I had on the shuttle – notably the estimated number of times that the orbiter could be reused and the estimated time between flights. And what about the estimated booster engine recovery and refurbishment costs ?
Mathematica talks about dropping boosters on salt-water, under parachutes. They also talked about retrieving, refurbishing and re-launching broken satellites. Is this really worth the price ? “
Mondale smiled.
“William, imagine I show you an article criticizing the shuttle as early as 1969. Imagine that the article was written by a NASA engineer, a high-ranking one, a veteran of NACA days.”
“Are you kidding ?”
“Thrust me I’m not. Look at this.” Mondale handed Proxmire a small folder. Proxmire red avidly, commenting.
…There are two obvious ways to get low-cost space transportation systems. One of these is to reduce substantially the cost of expendable launch-vehicle stages. The other way is to quit throwing the system parts away i.e. design and perfect recoverable and reusable space transports.
“Hmmm, sounds like Titan vs Shuttle.” Proxmire nodded.
The first drives the system concepts towards simple (minimum test and checkout) stages in which engineering refinement is secondary to production cost.
The reusable system, on the other hand, capitalizes on the ability of the aerospace industry to develop and produce refined high-performance equipment. Because of the need for carrying recovery gear, which chews a large bite out of payload capability, performance and mechanical refinement take precedence over production cost. In theory, however, as only a few units would service the requirements of the nation, unit production cost does not become a dominant factor. In this approach design and development investment are high; operating costs are low. High launch rates favor this approach.
“Yeah, 600 flights over twelve years sounds enough, as Mathematica told us.” Proxmire grinned.
I believe a recoverable launch-vehicle system must come as soon as the technological state of the art will permit developing it without defeating the primary purpose of low cost. For this, two conditions must first be met. The space program must develop a traffic rate that will amortize the initial investment in reasonable time and a sound base in technology and in precursor flight and operating experience must be created to assure straight forward development.
“Ouch. This guy know his NASA better than any of us.“
I have the opinion that even in this era of unprecedented technological progress, too large an attempted technological leap can cause us to stub our toes by forestalling the availability of the new system, increasing its costs at the expense of other parts of the total
space program... A proper transportation system can not be selected in the absence of a definitive picture of payloads in each mass class, their orbit or trajectory path, and their rate of launch. Such a survey of mission requirements must include all prospective DOD as well as NASA uses. The idea that a reusable launch-vehicle system will serve a single purpose is preposterous.
“Darn !”
“Well, read what follows” Mondale had visibly enjoyed the paper a lot
The desire of the aerospace industry, which includes members of government agencies, to build exquisite and innovative equipment does not of itself justify spending the taxpayer's money.
“Sweet Jesus.”
“...either of these recoverable systems is very sensitive to degradation of performance, either in the engine specific impulse or stage mass-fraction (amount of useful propellant they can carry relative to total mass). For example, a 5% degradation in engine performance knocks out ***all*** of the payload capability of a fully recoverable two-stage vehicle.
Under these circumstances, particularly since we have inadequate experimental proof of the validity of present design extrapolations, there is a real hazard that the already-low payload fraction, which is only 1.5% of takeoff mass, may become so small as to make use of such systems questionable in terms of economy, or it may even disappear altogether. This situation is analogous to the supersonic transport problem. If you fall short of the design requirements, you have the option of flying part of your passengers all of the way, or all of your passengers part of the way across the ocean.”
Proxmire was visibly stunned by the last sentence.
“That should remind you of a certain Boeing project which got canned last year, thanks to you”
Mondale talked about the Boeing supersonic transport (SST). Back in march 1971 Congress had refused to fund the program further. Proxmire had led the successful battle against the SST.
Proxmire continued reading rapidly through the folder
“...the relatively low design and development investment in modifications of existing launch-vehicle equipment or in adoption of simple expendable stages largely offsets their high recurring cost and makes such transportation systems attractive for a small total of flights.
“… Economic studies say that the break-even point between expendables and reusables comes somewhere between 100 and 200 flights. But if my assessments of the costs of the more advanced systems are wrong by a factor of two, the break-even point goes out beyond 600 flights !
“The justification of recoverable launch-vehicle development resides in the idea that the traffic rate will build up as the cost comes down. Of this there is really little doubt, but mundane problems of funding, developing, building and preparing payloads are likely to pace the use of space transportation.”
Proxmire concluded on this sentence, hold his breath for some seconds, and turned again toward Mondale.
“Please, tell me who is the author of that. And when did he drop such bombshell !”
“His name is Adelbert Tischler.”
“Albert what ?
“A-del-bert Ti-schler.” Mondale spelled “Mind you, he has impressive records. A veteran of NACA days, he worked on the F-1 engine, and early Saturn concepts. You certainly heard of George Mueller didn’t you ?”
“Of course. He’s the man who forged the concept of the space shuttle four years ago. Damn him !”
“Well, James Webb hired Mueller in 1963 as top manager of the Apollo program, which at the time was questioned. First move of Mueller in September 1963 was to commit a study on Apollo cost and management.
He asked two veterans the following question: in the actual shape of things, can we land a man on the Moon before the decade is out – in other words, accomplish what Kennedy asked us. “
“And Tischler was one of these two veterans.”
“Exactly ! His answer was quick, loud and clear – NO !
In response to that Mueller moved to all up testing of Saturns – dummy stages were scrapped. The rockets would fly with all functioning stages. First Saturn V worked perfectly, the second flight was a near disaster, and despite that, the third Saturn V flight carried the first men around the Moon."
“So, what Tischler did of remarkable other than that ?”
“Mueller was happy with him, and send him to Headquarters, in Washington. For eight years he was in OART – NASA Office of Advanced Research and Technology. Thanks to this position, his excellent evaluation on Apollo, and early works on the F-1, he had a global vision of the shuttle program in domains as different as economics, technical and propulsion matters. Hence the excellent essay you red.”
“Which was published when ?”
“On August 25, 1969.”
“Jesus. At the very early planning stages. Shuttle phase A contracts had been barely issued to contractors at that time ! Talk about a visionary. Walter, we have to find this guy, meet him and discuss. He could be a precious ally; he could testify for the GAO study I mentioned earlier.” Proxmire said.
"I already did my little inquiry. Back in the 1960s, Del had assembled his own handpicked dream team of propulsion experts at NASA to monitor the Apollo propulsion effort. No NASA field center, not even von Braun's highly acclaimed Marshall SFC, could match them man for man.
"There was no way those people could snow my people, either technically or managerially." That what he said.
Sadly, von Braun & co. resented this and managed to convince the incoming Director for Manned Space Flight (George Mueller) to break up Tischler's team.
In return, Del was transferred to the OART where he promptly assembled a new, equally talented team that managed to make further significant contributions to Apollo engine development. Unfortunately, lack of support in his own organization meant Tischler was unable to keep his team together."
"What's OART, anyway ?"
"The Office of Advanced Research and Technology. The aeronautic side of NASA, what's left of the old NACA the space agency replaced in 1958. For obvious reasons they are much less obsessive than the manned spaceflight centers such as Marshall, houston and KSC.. They have all kind of interesting studies there."
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1972: NASA hell of a year (7)
Archibald
Banned
February 10, 1972
"George, we have a problem." James Beggs said. "It looks as if Proxmire and Mondale are recruting NASA insiders to grill us over the shuttle debacle. They have set their attention on an engineer, Del Tischler."
"I heard this name before, but can't remember exactly who he is."
"I know him from my days at the head of NASA aeronautic branch, the OART. He was the head of the chemical propulsion division there, and one heck of an engineer, although a little abrasive at times. Oh, and he also assessed the Apollo program for George Mueller a decade ago."
"Now I remember him. Damn, his estimation was we had one chance out of ten to accomplish Kennedy deadline. The report was so explosive Mueller ordered it was destroyed so it never leaked to the outside world - and, more intelligently Mueller also ordered a huge shakedown. That included all-up testing of the Saturn without any dummy stages, to von Braun dismay. You say Tischler did that ?"
"Yes, with another veteran, John Disher. Well, we have to take him under control fast." Beggs said.
"Don't worry. He is extremely loyal, although he ruffled a lot of feathers with his shuttle criticism. He supported it but never minced words about it.
Whatever, today he is somewhat out of job since he was director of the OART shuttle technology office. I wanted him to direct a task force over possible standardization of satellite components to drop their costs.
Tischler rightly noted the low-cost shuttle would be of no use if the payload themselves were not cheap (thus standardized). I felt he was right, and planned to made him the director of a Low Cost Systems Office. Of course without the shuttle all this become moot."
"Sure. Now we need to find a job for that Tischler, and in a hurry. He is too much of a loud mouth."
February 13, 1972
George Low knew Del Tischler from a long time; after all they were both veterans from Apollo and even from the NACA days, before a space agency ever existed. The meeting promised to be memorable.
Tischler had a lot of things to say over the shuttle failure, and he did not minced his words.
Low let him blew his stack, then the two went to the reason of their meeting.
"When working at the OART last year I heard of a peculiar study that may be of interest for you now that the shuttle is dead. A very interesting study of a serie of Skylabs running until 1987 and serviced by modified Apollos. I did a short summary of it."
Tischler paused.
"A year ago on 6 April 1971, eight engineers at the OART (most of them from Ames Research Center) completed a blueprint of NASA’s future." he started.
"That date" Low noted. "Exactly two weeks before the Soviet launch of Salyut 1. Is that a coincidence ? I don't think so. The Soviets have made known publicly - most notably in an October 1969 speech by Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev - their intention to establish Earth-orbiting stations. In fact last year the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency completed a report in which it suggested that the Soviets might construct a series of stations, each larger and more capable than the last, culminating, perhaps, in a $5-billion, 150-ton station between 1976 and 1980."
"The OART engineers did not, however, mention the Soviet space program in their report. Whatever the reason behind their study they proposed the ISS..."
"The what ?" George Low interrupted. For some reason he couldn't explain that accronym rang a bell.
"The Interim Space Station program. It is in effect, an evolutionary extension of Skylab.
"Why interim, anyway ?"
"The OART engineers applied the term interim to their eight-and-half-year program because they intend for it to lead from Skylab to a permanent Space Station through evolutionary, gradual, and step-wise spacecraft systems development.
"Beginning about three years after the third and final Skylab crew returned to Earth, a new interim station would reach LEO every two and a half years. Each would be staffed continuously for from 360 to 420 days." Low had a mixed expression on his face.
"Gimme a break. You are talking about, what, four more Skylabs ? With what Saturn V ?"
"Hum, well, their solution was to end U.S. lunar exploration with Apollo 15 so that the Saturn V rockets earmarked for missions 16, 17, 18, and 19 could be used to launch all these Skylabs."
To Tischler surprise Low was not upset. "Those guys are visionnary." he sighed. "I can tell you Nixon advisors intended to do that - stop Apollo after Apollo 15. Me and Fletcher fought that decision to the very end. At the expense of the shuttle and Fletcher himself." Tischler was aghast. Though bargaining, he thought.
"And now the best part." he continued, smiling. "They went so far as to acknowledge that the Station/Shuttle Program might be delayed or abandoned in favor of some new space goal before the interim station program ran its course."
Low face as Tischler spoke those words was memorable. "For planning purposes, however, they offered a timeline in which NASA’s permanent Station became operational in late 1987, about six years after the Shuttle’s maiden flight and a little more than three years after the last interim station crew returned to Earth."
"Wait a minute, they said the shuttle would fly only in 1981 ?" Low had a bizarre feeling that once again he could not explain.
"Yes. Based on their own NASA flight schedule, the reusable Space Shuttle would begin flights in late 1981 only.
In keeping with this year budget, the OART engineers assumed a steady NASA annual budget of $3.3 billion throughout the interim station program. They estimated that each interim station would cost $2 billion, of which about $330 million would be spent on hardware development, $500 million on experiments, and $1.6 billion on spacecraft hardware. Their program would cost an average of about $500 million annually"
"Fine calculations. Skylab cost $2.5 billion and a production run, even small, would have unit cost drop. How many Skylab did they foresaw ?"
"Four of them - called Interim Space Station -A, -B, -C and -D.
"ISS-A would operate in a a 245-nautical-mile orbit inclined 28.5° relative to Earth’s equator. In fact it would be built from Skylab B itself. There would be no Apollo Telescope mount and it would weight 57 tons plus a 30-ton growth allowance."
"What would the logistic vehicle be without the shuttle ?"
"Apollo command and service modules."
"What launchers ? Titan IIIM or Saturn IB ?"
"None of them, rather an hybrid of the two - three Titan solids with a Saturn S-IVB above them. They say it would cost $80 million to develop, to launch as much as 28.7-ton to a 245-nm orbit at 28.5° of inclination. As for the Apollo its service module would be transformed. Forget the six fuel tanks grouped around a big engine; a couple of smaller tanks and engine borrowed from the Lunar Module would do the job. With only two tanks four bays would be available for cargo. The Apollo would be capable of transporting a total of about 10 tons of supplies and equipment."
"10 tons" Low said, surprised. "How about that." It stroke him as the shuttle original payload before the Air Force come into the program.
"Yeah. And it would cost $100 million to develop. Cargo items as large as 3.5 feet wide by 12 feet long could be removed from the Service Module bays and moved into the space station.
The issue however is that cargo could only be transfered by spacewalking astronauts. Or perhaps they could use a robotic arm ?"
Low nodded. Test of the shuttle robotic arm on an Apollo had been proposed.
"I suppose that, as usual without a shuttle the only items retrieved from orbit would have to be small enough to fit into the Apollo along the astronauts." Low sighed.
"Spot on. And now the schedule and missions.
"ISS-A would be launched early 1976 and dedicated to biotechnology research - a centrifuge and a behavioural laboratory. Three missions would man it for a year after what much like Skylab it would be worn out and abandonned in favour of ISS-B.
"The first three-man ISS-B crew would arrive for a 90-day stint beginning in July 1978, then a second three-man crew would reach the station a month later (August 1978).
The resulting six-man crew would work together for 60 days (September - October), then the first three-man crew would return to Earth.
A third three-man crew would arrive almost immediately (early November) to replace them. Thirty days later, the second crew would return to Earth and a fourth would replace them.
The station main mission would be to perform experimental Earth surveys - agriculture, forestry, geography; geology/mineralogy; hydrology/water resources; oceanography and meteorology. The station would revolve around the Earth in an orbit inclined 50° relative to the equator, so that it could pass over the “most populated and agriculturally productive areas of the Earth. Aboard would be 19 experimental sensors covering the spectrum from ultraviolet through visible light to infrared and microwave. The crews would also continue biomedical experiments.
The seventh three-man ISS-B crew would return to Earth in July 1979 and not be replaced, and the eighth and last three-man crew would splash down a month later, about 390 days after ISS-B reached space."
"So ISS-B would be over in, what, September 1979 ?"
"Yes. Replaced by ISS-C, scheduled for launch in January 1981 with ISS-D following it in orbit in July 1983."
"On what would be the last Saturn V rocket." Low gruntled.
"That's it. ISS -C and -D are pretty similar. Each would have a full crew complement of nine, making more challenging NASA’s reliance on the three-man Apollo for crew rotation and resupply."
"Still no Shuttle ?" Low asked. "I thought those pessimistics had it fly in 1981. Or perhaps in their universe it was also abandonned." he said dryly.
"Nope. Aparently they elected - in their own words, for the sake of simplicity - not to consider using it for ISS-C and ISS-D crew rotation and resupply.
Which results in monthly Apollo launches in January, February, and March 1981 to bring the station population to nine.
Only a month after its third crew arrived, its first crew would complete its 90-day stint on board the station and would return to Earth. NASA would immediately launch a fourth crew to replace them. ISS-C and ISS-D would each receive 12 three-man crews. The stations would support nine men for 360 of the 420 days each was occupied."
Low made rapid calculations. "36 Apollos over a decade. Pretty hefty flight rate."
Tischler nodded.
"So we have an ISS-A for biotechnology research and ISS-B for Earth survey. What about the other two ?"
"ISS-C - materials processing and manufacture. Taking advantage of weightlessness and nearly pure vacuum, the astronauts would manufacture large crystals, exotic composite materials, and biological compounds impossible (or at least very difficult) to create under terrestrial conditions. Oh, and they would also try artificial gravity by spinning the spent S-II. There would also have some Isotope Brayton nuclear power units aboard to boost the station electrical power by six to fifteen kilowatt.
"ISS-D then ?"
"Astronomy, with a trio of free-flying astronomy modules as well as instruments mounted on the station - cosmic rays, solar and stellar astronomy with some big 3 meter mirror."
"And all this end in 1987, in fifteen years. That's impressive. An interesting blueprint for the future"
"Surely. NASA would have accrued the equivalent of more than two years of permanent Space Station biomedical data and operations experience from its four interim stations. This would, they concluded, constitute the interim station program’s chief benefit to U.S. spaceflight."
Tischler did not knew what to say. But Low had taken notes, and obviously his brain was already at work.
"Thank you Adelbert. Tell those OART guys they did an excellent work, somewhat prescient at times. Their schedule may be pertinent." Tischler approved and left the room.
Now alone, for a couple of minutes George Low stood near his office window, staring at the Washington landscape outside. Two months before - the day the shuttle had died - James Fletcher had stood there, too, trying to guess what future of NASA would be.
Low felt the OART plan was a good start - a serie of evolutionary space station, Salyut-style.
Skylab however had two major flaws. It had deliberately be designed as a very short life space station. That issue could be solved.
There was a bigger problem, however.
Skylab was born at Marshall, and that was not acceptable in Houston. Low knew that Faget and his clique had little consideration for Skylab - it fact they had thrown that bone to Marshall only because they were extremely busy with Apollo (and hopefully, with the shuttle).
If NASA next great thing was to be a space station, there was no way Houston wouldn't be at least lead center of that program.
Then if the station was also a derivative of Skylab, there was no way Marshall wouldn't be lead center either !
Low sighed. The last thing NASA needed after the shuttle debacle was a sterile inter-center knife fight. He was not sure Beggs clearly realised how serious the situation was. They HAD to keep Marshall and Houston under control at any cost.
"George, we have a problem." James Beggs said. "It looks as if Proxmire and Mondale are recruting NASA insiders to grill us over the shuttle debacle. They have set their attention on an engineer, Del Tischler."
"I heard this name before, but can't remember exactly who he is."
"I know him from my days at the head of NASA aeronautic branch, the OART. He was the head of the chemical propulsion division there, and one heck of an engineer, although a little abrasive at times. Oh, and he also assessed the Apollo program for George Mueller a decade ago."
"Now I remember him. Damn, his estimation was we had one chance out of ten to accomplish Kennedy deadline. The report was so explosive Mueller ordered it was destroyed so it never leaked to the outside world - and, more intelligently Mueller also ordered a huge shakedown. That included all-up testing of the Saturn without any dummy stages, to von Braun dismay. You say Tischler did that ?"
"Yes, with another veteran, John Disher. Well, we have to take him under control fast." Beggs said.
"Don't worry. He is extremely loyal, although he ruffled a lot of feathers with his shuttle criticism. He supported it but never minced words about it.
Whatever, today he is somewhat out of job since he was director of the OART shuttle technology office. I wanted him to direct a task force over possible standardization of satellite components to drop their costs.
Tischler rightly noted the low-cost shuttle would be of no use if the payload themselves were not cheap (thus standardized). I felt he was right, and planned to made him the director of a Low Cost Systems Office. Of course without the shuttle all this become moot."
"Sure. Now we need to find a job for that Tischler, and in a hurry. He is too much of a loud mouth."
February 13, 1972
George Low knew Del Tischler from a long time; after all they were both veterans from Apollo and even from the NACA days, before a space agency ever existed. The meeting promised to be memorable.
Tischler had a lot of things to say over the shuttle failure, and he did not minced his words.
Low let him blew his stack, then the two went to the reason of their meeting.
"When working at the OART last year I heard of a peculiar study that may be of interest for you now that the shuttle is dead. A very interesting study of a serie of Skylabs running until 1987 and serviced by modified Apollos. I did a short summary of it."
Tischler paused.
"A year ago on 6 April 1971, eight engineers at the OART (most of them from Ames Research Center) completed a blueprint of NASA’s future." he started.
"That date" Low noted. "Exactly two weeks before the Soviet launch of Salyut 1. Is that a coincidence ? I don't think so. The Soviets have made known publicly - most notably in an October 1969 speech by Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev - their intention to establish Earth-orbiting stations. In fact last year the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency completed a report in which it suggested that the Soviets might construct a series of stations, each larger and more capable than the last, culminating, perhaps, in a $5-billion, 150-ton station between 1976 and 1980."
"The OART engineers did not, however, mention the Soviet space program in their report. Whatever the reason behind their study they proposed the ISS..."
"The what ?" George Low interrupted. For some reason he couldn't explain that accronym rang a bell.
"The Interim Space Station program. It is in effect, an evolutionary extension of Skylab.
"Why interim, anyway ?"
"The OART engineers applied the term interim to their eight-and-half-year program because they intend for it to lead from Skylab to a permanent Space Station through evolutionary, gradual, and step-wise spacecraft systems development.
"Beginning about three years after the third and final Skylab crew returned to Earth, a new interim station would reach LEO every two and a half years. Each would be staffed continuously for from 360 to 420 days." Low had a mixed expression on his face.
"Gimme a break. You are talking about, what, four more Skylabs ? With what Saturn V ?"
"Hum, well, their solution was to end U.S. lunar exploration with Apollo 15 so that the Saturn V rockets earmarked for missions 16, 17, 18, and 19 could be used to launch all these Skylabs."
To Tischler surprise Low was not upset. "Those guys are visionnary." he sighed. "I can tell you Nixon advisors intended to do that - stop Apollo after Apollo 15. Me and Fletcher fought that decision to the very end. At the expense of the shuttle and Fletcher himself." Tischler was aghast. Though bargaining, he thought.
"And now the best part." he continued, smiling. "They went so far as to acknowledge that the Station/Shuttle Program might be delayed or abandoned in favor of some new space goal before the interim station program ran its course."
Low face as Tischler spoke those words was memorable. "For planning purposes, however, they offered a timeline in which NASA’s permanent Station became operational in late 1987, about six years after the Shuttle’s maiden flight and a little more than three years after the last interim station crew returned to Earth."
"Wait a minute, they said the shuttle would fly only in 1981 ?" Low had a bizarre feeling that once again he could not explain.
"Yes. Based on their own NASA flight schedule, the reusable Space Shuttle would begin flights in late 1981 only.
In keeping with this year budget, the OART engineers assumed a steady NASA annual budget of $3.3 billion throughout the interim station program. They estimated that each interim station would cost $2 billion, of which about $330 million would be spent on hardware development, $500 million on experiments, and $1.6 billion on spacecraft hardware. Their program would cost an average of about $500 million annually"
"Fine calculations. Skylab cost $2.5 billion and a production run, even small, would have unit cost drop. How many Skylab did they foresaw ?"
"Four of them - called Interim Space Station -A, -B, -C and -D.
"ISS-A would operate in a a 245-nautical-mile orbit inclined 28.5° relative to Earth’s equator. In fact it would be built from Skylab B itself. There would be no Apollo Telescope mount and it would weight 57 tons plus a 30-ton growth allowance."
"What would the logistic vehicle be without the shuttle ?"
"Apollo command and service modules."
"What launchers ? Titan IIIM or Saturn IB ?"
"None of them, rather an hybrid of the two - three Titan solids with a Saturn S-IVB above them. They say it would cost $80 million to develop, to launch as much as 28.7-ton to a 245-nm orbit at 28.5° of inclination. As for the Apollo its service module would be transformed. Forget the six fuel tanks grouped around a big engine; a couple of smaller tanks and engine borrowed from the Lunar Module would do the job. With only two tanks four bays would be available for cargo. The Apollo would be capable of transporting a total of about 10 tons of supplies and equipment."
"10 tons" Low said, surprised. "How about that." It stroke him as the shuttle original payload before the Air Force come into the program.
"Yeah. And it would cost $100 million to develop. Cargo items as large as 3.5 feet wide by 12 feet long could be removed from the Service Module bays and moved into the space station.
The issue however is that cargo could only be transfered by spacewalking astronauts. Or perhaps they could use a robotic arm ?"
Low nodded. Test of the shuttle robotic arm on an Apollo had been proposed.
"I suppose that, as usual without a shuttle the only items retrieved from orbit would have to be small enough to fit into the Apollo along the astronauts." Low sighed.
"Spot on. And now the schedule and missions.
"ISS-A would be launched early 1976 and dedicated to biotechnology research - a centrifuge and a behavioural laboratory. Three missions would man it for a year after what much like Skylab it would be worn out and abandonned in favour of ISS-B.
"The first three-man ISS-B crew would arrive for a 90-day stint beginning in July 1978, then a second three-man crew would reach the station a month later (August 1978).
The resulting six-man crew would work together for 60 days (September - October), then the first three-man crew would return to Earth.
A third three-man crew would arrive almost immediately (early November) to replace them. Thirty days later, the second crew would return to Earth and a fourth would replace them.
The station main mission would be to perform experimental Earth surveys - agriculture, forestry, geography; geology/mineralogy; hydrology/water resources; oceanography and meteorology. The station would revolve around the Earth in an orbit inclined 50° relative to the equator, so that it could pass over the “most populated and agriculturally productive areas of the Earth. Aboard would be 19 experimental sensors covering the spectrum from ultraviolet through visible light to infrared and microwave. The crews would also continue biomedical experiments.
The seventh three-man ISS-B crew would return to Earth in July 1979 and not be replaced, and the eighth and last three-man crew would splash down a month later, about 390 days after ISS-B reached space."
"So ISS-B would be over in, what, September 1979 ?"
"Yes. Replaced by ISS-C, scheduled for launch in January 1981 with ISS-D following it in orbit in July 1983."
"On what would be the last Saturn V rocket." Low gruntled.
"That's it. ISS -C and -D are pretty similar. Each would have a full crew complement of nine, making more challenging NASA’s reliance on the three-man Apollo for crew rotation and resupply."
"Still no Shuttle ?" Low asked. "I thought those pessimistics had it fly in 1981. Or perhaps in their universe it was also abandonned." he said dryly.
"Nope. Aparently they elected - in their own words, for the sake of simplicity - not to consider using it for ISS-C and ISS-D crew rotation and resupply.
Which results in monthly Apollo launches in January, February, and March 1981 to bring the station population to nine.
Only a month after its third crew arrived, its first crew would complete its 90-day stint on board the station and would return to Earth. NASA would immediately launch a fourth crew to replace them. ISS-C and ISS-D would each receive 12 three-man crews. The stations would support nine men for 360 of the 420 days each was occupied."
Low made rapid calculations. "36 Apollos over a decade. Pretty hefty flight rate."
Tischler nodded.
"So we have an ISS-A for biotechnology research and ISS-B for Earth survey. What about the other two ?"
"ISS-C - materials processing and manufacture. Taking advantage of weightlessness and nearly pure vacuum, the astronauts would manufacture large crystals, exotic composite materials, and biological compounds impossible (or at least very difficult) to create under terrestrial conditions. Oh, and they would also try artificial gravity by spinning the spent S-II. There would also have some Isotope Brayton nuclear power units aboard to boost the station electrical power by six to fifteen kilowatt.
"ISS-D then ?"
"Astronomy, with a trio of free-flying astronomy modules as well as instruments mounted on the station - cosmic rays, solar and stellar astronomy with some big 3 meter mirror."
"And all this end in 1987, in fifteen years. That's impressive. An interesting blueprint for the future"
"Surely. NASA would have accrued the equivalent of more than two years of permanent Space Station biomedical data and operations experience from its four interim stations. This would, they concluded, constitute the interim station program’s chief benefit to U.S. spaceflight."
Tischler did not knew what to say. But Low had taken notes, and obviously his brain was already at work.
"Thank you Adelbert. Tell those OART guys they did an excellent work, somewhat prescient at times. Their schedule may be pertinent." Tischler approved and left the room.
Now alone, for a couple of minutes George Low stood near his office window, staring at the Washington landscape outside. Two months before - the day the shuttle had died - James Fletcher had stood there, too, trying to guess what future of NASA would be.
Low felt the OART plan was a good start - a serie of evolutionary space station, Salyut-style.
Skylab however had two major flaws. It had deliberately be designed as a very short life space station. That issue could be solved.
There was a bigger problem, however.
Skylab was born at Marshall, and that was not acceptable in Houston. Low knew that Faget and his clique had little consideration for Skylab - it fact they had thrown that bone to Marshall only because they were extremely busy with Apollo (and hopefully, with the shuttle).
If NASA next great thing was to be a space station, there was no way Houston wouldn't be at least lead center of that program.
Then if the station was also a derivative of Skylab, there was no way Marshall wouldn't be lead center either !
Low sighed. The last thing NASA needed after the shuttle debacle was a sterile inter-center knife fight. He was not sure Beggs clearly realised how serious the situation was. They HAD to keep Marshall and Houston under control at any cost.
Nota Bene: this is adapted from David Portree WIRED blog entry here
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Now that NASA try to get Del Tischler & John Disher under there control, before the evils ones get them.
They will have a price to pay: Interim Space Station and with Apollo 15 end of that program.
big joker in this game is: how react JSC and MSFC on that and can Beggs keep them under Control?
best thing is for Beggs
to keep MSFC as builder of flight manned Hardware & there rockets and JSC as the one how run them in Orbit.
They will have a price to pay: Interim Space Station and with Apollo 15 end of that program.
big joker in this game is: how react JSC and MSFC on that and can Beggs keep them under Control?
best thing is for Beggs
to keep MSFC as builder of flight manned Hardware & there rockets and JSC as the one how run them in Orbit.
Archibald
Banned
For many years I've learned my lessons from NASAspaceflight.com forum. One of the biggest roadblock is that NASA has become a job program in Congress. See the SLS boondoggle.
So my aim with that TL is to clean the mess BEFORE (and WITHOUT) the shuttle (not after 40 years, read, in 2011)
Be warned that NASA will suffer greatly ITTL 70's - worse than OTL. That's the price to pay for better efficiency
NASA renowned space historian John Logsdon said in 2010
"It is the most confused situation I have seen in more than forty years of close observation of the U.S. space program.”
One of the biggest roadblock is that NASA has become a job program in Congress. See the SLS boondoggle.So my aim with that TL is to clean the mess BEFORE (and WITHOUT) the shuttle (not after 40 years, read, in 2011)
Be warned that NASA will suffer greatly ITTL 70's - worse than OTL. That's the price to pay for better efficiency
NASA renowned space historian John Logsdon said in 2010
"It is the most confused situation I have seen in more than forty years of close observation of the U.S. space program.”
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Oh Yes, i learn my lessons from reading this "Explorers" TL.
In TL 2001: A Space Time Odyssey NASA face same problem to become a job program for US Aerospace and Capitol Hill.
it's diabolic mixture of Lobbyist from US Aerospace industry, congress men and senators from US states were NASA got centers or there supply industry.
In TL 2001: A Space Time Odyssey NASA face same problem to become a job program for US Aerospace and Capitol Hill.
it's diabolic mixture of Lobbyist from US Aerospace industry, congress men and senators from US states were NASA got centers or there supply industry.
1972: NASA hell of a year (8)
Archibald
Banned
February 28, 1972
Back to Williamsburg – here we go again. Another round in NASA human spaceflight program fight for survival, started in 1968.
For Jim Gordon it was the second trip to Virginia in exactly a year. Twelve months before a similar big meeting had been held, with NASA, contractors and Air Force guys debating for two days.
One year ago we were struggling to define a fully-reusable Shuttle – twelve months later, all left are capsules and lifting bodies riding Titan IIIs.
Time is flying.
The conference had just begun, and would last all the day.
Another conference would happen the next day. USAF was absent, leaving NASA facing worried contractors alone.
James Beggs had been just confirmed as administrator of NASA.
“…NASA will fly Apollo with required upgrades until 1975, for Skylab and a joint flight with a the soviets.
Work on a proposed first-generation reusable launch vehicle has been put on the backburner, with activities limited to research, in a major change to our agency's earlier Space Transportation System.
“NASA will now push ahead with the development of six-men Crew Transfer Vehicle, launched on a Titan expendable booster to act as Space Station taxi within eight years. This will also have the potential to act as the permanent Crew Rescue Vehicle (CRV).
NASA considers ordering some more Apollo to fill the gap with the CTV. As an alternative Apollo flight schedule to Skylab could be stretched to 1975 and beyond.
"I understand that, you, contractors, have been worried about the Office off Management and Budget decision to scrap the shuttle. The Crew Transportation Vehicle is set to enter service in 1976, launched to low-Earth-orbit manned with a crew of four.
By 1980, the spacecraft will ferry six crew members to a new space station. Work on a the Shuttle will continue under the Next Generation Launch Technology programme, with a decision on development delayed until 1978 at best.
“The CTV requirements are driven by the need to increase the science performed on Skylab and to improve the safety of crews compared to Apollo.
We set up the following criteria.
The Launch vehicle should be an uprated Titan III; bidders must derived their vehicle from existing vehicles or proven shapes such as Corona or Apollo; land-landing is mandatory; on orbit duration of sixty days when docked to a space station; payload is housed in an expendable cargo module.
A crew of four is mandatory, with higher safety-levels than current Apollo, notably a two gas atmosphere. Initial operational capacity should be 1975. An upgrade to a circumlunar mission mode with a Centaur Earth departure stage would be highly desirable. This day will be dedicated to bidders entries for the CTV."
Martin Marietta representatives went first on the scene. Martin was the big winner of shuttle cancellation – its Titan had not only ousted the shuttle, it also bet the pants of the Saturn IB.
Martin lifting bodies, by contrast were fresh concepts with very little flight experience. At a time when NASA was pressed by time lifting bodies stood little chances of being chosen.
Then it was Northrop, Martin competitor for lifting bodies with their HL-10 and M2F2. Both had had agitated development paths.
The M2F2 had suffered an horrendous landing crash in May 1967, injuring test pilot Bruce Peterson “also known as the six billion dollar men”. Gordon smiled.
Lifting bodies were hard to control at landing speeds; they were even draggier than shuttle shapes, themselves known as “turkey” or “flying bricks” by aerodynamicists.
On the stage, the brave Northrop guy continued its presentation.
“…we decided to go with the more stable HL-10. As of today it is considered by Edwards test-pilots as the best lifting-body in the serie. [FONT=serif, 'Times New Roman']Our proposal called HL-20, is a scaled-up variant of the HL-10.
During launch the spacecraft would have had solid rocket motors for launch abort, with parachutes for a tail-down water landing. The space available inside for the crew and passengers would be more than found in today's small corporate business jets…"
"Lifting bodies can certainly sustain reentry at interplanetary speed." To back their claims the lifting body crowd cited project LUNEX, the Air Force moon plan that had lost to Apollo ten years before. The Northrop guy dug out a view of an ungainly aircraft with a huge conical propulsion module on the back.
Boeing and Grumman proposals were vague; Boeing presentation focused on an enlarged DynaSoar, the mythical USAF spaceplane cancelled in December 1963, eighteen months away from its first glided flight.
DynaSoar was a black, delta-shaped dart with twin tail fins and skids for landing. Unlike the cancelled shuttle, and much like old X-15s, DynaSoar did not used a heatshield.
The structure was build from inconel and titanium, and actually absorbed heat. The pilot, payload and other sensitive pieces were housed in water-cooled compartments.
Boeing and Grumman also had a study of a subscale variant of their joint H-33 shuttle design, a delta-winged orbiter with internal liquid oxygen tankage and one throwaway liquid hydrogen tank over each wing. The CTV got ride of any internal propulsion system outside small attitude thrusters.
"At the time of the shuttle cancellation studies were on the way of lunar mission for the space shuttle" they told the crowd. Their first slide entitled Cislunar Application of the Space Shuttle Orbiter showed a glowing-red shuttle reentering from interplanetary space.
Grumman and Boeing representatives also had a subscale shuttle model: an airplane shape, with a chunky body and an elegant, curved delta wing.
"We plan to add ablative heatshield over the silica tiles, or split the reentry in phases." they added. "The orbiter would perform a braking burn halfway to Earth to reduce its atmosphere entry velocity to about 31,000 feet per second.
Upon reaching Earth, the cislunar orbiter will perform an aerobraking manoeuvre high in the atmosphere to further reduce its speed and capture into orbit. First, the orbiter will descend at a constant velocity to an altitude no lower than 250,000 feet, taking care not to exceed its maximum allowable heating rate. Next, it will maintain a constant altitude as it slows. After that, it will pull up and enter a 100-mile-high circular orbit about the Earth finally firing its braking rockets to begin a normal Shuttle reentry."
The whole concept looked dubious to Gordon.
Now its time for backward capsules to size their revenge Gordon thought, as the Lockheed representative come on the scene.
“Our CTV vehicle - internally known as CXV- is a simple capsule design based on the Corona reentry vehicles used by the American intelligence community to return film from orbit. The aerodynamics and flight characteristics of the capsule are well known, with more than 50 reentries having taken place over a period of more than 12 years.”
Early spy satellites dropped their precious photos of USSR into Corona capsules, which after reentry were snapped in midair by large aircrafts. Had NASA not taken over the manned spaceflight business in 1958, USAF may had flown manned Coronas with military astronauts.
“The CXV's shape provide for carefree reentry of the capsule. Similar to a badminton shuttlecock, the spacecraft automatically rights itself as it descend into the atmosphere regardless of its initial orientation due to the aerodynamic loads. As a result, neither human nor computer intervention is needed to stabilize the vehicle in the event that the vehicle is not perfectly aligned for reentry..."
Gordon liked the concept, but remembered a problem common with the use of a Discoverer-type capsule for crew re-entry. The direction of G-forces during launch and re-entry areopposite. The Lockheed proposal solved this through use of an innovative seat design - a type of suspended semi-rigid hammock - that could rotate 180 degrees within two seconds in order to keep the astronaut correctly oriented regardless of g-force direction.
Another dubious concept – it can certainly works, but it will take time, of which NASA has not. By the way we have better capsule than Corona.
On top of that was Lockheed dire situation, near bankruptcy. Over the last decade every program started by the firm had backfired or failed, to the point it was on the verge of sinking.
Tristars airliners did not sold, and their turbofans had nearly sunk Rolls Royce.
The Cheyenne, YF-12 and D-21 cutting edge marvels had been plagued by technical problems. The Galaxy scandal was raging – cracks on wings and immense cost overruns plagued USAF big cargo plane.
In an unprecedented move Lockheed had been kept on life-support by the Nixon administration - only because their Poseidonsubmarine launched missile represented a vital asset against the Soviet Union.
To this point, Lockheed proposal is certainly the most interesting.But here come the big boys, entering the arena. Rockwell and us - McDonnell Douglas.
Gordon somersaulted when he saw Rockwell representative.
My god - they have called Harrison Storms back, he thought. They really want this contract.
Stormy was a legend, the father of an impressive number of superb flying machines and rocketships. The Apollo program, however had nearly carbonised him. Having brought both the S-II and Apollo contracts to Rockwell, he had worked a gruelling eighty hours a week for a decade, facing immense pressure from NASA, two heart attacks and a wife attempting her life.
Storms looked battered, but he fought with energy. It was obvious he would do his best to bring the CTV to Rockwell, in the form of a Block III Apollo.
“We are the most experienced bidders. We prevails experience from the Apollo program, and we were a strong contender for the Shuttle orbiter contract. North American studied 6-men, ground-landing Apollo spacecrafts as early as 1963. These studies were grouped under the designation of MODAP. Six-man, land-landing Apollo studies continued into Apollo Extension Series (AES) in 1966, then Apollo Application Program (AAP) in 1968. They included steerable parachutes.
“As of today retrorockets sounds the most efficient system to cushion ground impact, but consideration should be given to air bags. Apollo CM shape, as Corona, has been proven over and over. It offers a lift-to-drag ratio of 0.25, enough for a cross-reentry of 18km. Truth be told, since 1968 Apollo crews have landed closer and closer from their recovery ships, to the point that NASA recently worried about possible collisions !
We recently modified an old block.1 CSM into a mockup of the new internal layout. To access the cargo compartment we first considered the option of a hatch trough the heatshield. This option was rejected on safety grounds, but also because the six-men crew Block III is too cramped for a second hatch. Our vessel will have three sections, fore to aft.
First, a six-man Command Module with modern avionics, lighter heatshield and a land-landing system.
Then a new, very light Service Module.
Third, a so-called MultiPurpose Logistic Module (MPLM).
Just after orbital injection, Apollo will detach, makes a 180° turn and pick up the MPLM very much like the Lunar Module.
The logistic module has a hatch at each end. Apollo will dock via the MPLM, the astronauts crossing the cargo module to enter the station.
We consider our option as the cheaper and easier to achieve - Apollo will fly to a space station as early as 1973. The Command and Service Module is NASA current manned spacecraft, and proved its worth”
According to the Rand Corp "THE SPACE SHUTTLE AS AN ELEMENT IN THE NATIONAL SPACE PROGRAM" dated October 18 1970,
"for those alternative space plans in which the shuttle operation would be delayed or in which there would be no shuttle, a six-man modified Apollo spacecraft would be used.
This vehicle would have a gross weight of 20,000 Ib, a development cost of $1billion, a first-unit cost of $300 million, and a launch-operations cost of $73 million." Storms quoted.
"A Titan III-M with the 7-seg segment solids can orbit can orbit 37 000 pounds - which mean the MPLM could mass as much as 17 000 pounds." he concluded.
Yeah, but Apollo has been tailored for lunar missions, not as a space station ferry, Gordon thought as he went to the stage. That service module - even trimmed down to the bones - is just unuseful. Now was perhaps the most important moment in his life.
He stared at the audience, a sea of engineers and heavyweight past and present NASA officials – former administrators James Webb and Thomas Paine, Robert Seamans, Werner Von Braun, George Low, and many others.
“The Big Gemini spacecraft is a scaled-up Gemini with a crew of three to nine. Big Gemini itself appeared for the first time late 1967. It had grown from a logical need outside Apollo – the need for a twelve-man ferry to a space station in the early 70’s. Apollo maximum capacity is six men without cargo, while the shuttle promised lot of technical uncertainties, making it unlikely before 1977 at best.
Let me quote a document
"Our existing spacecraft, being two- or three-man size, cannot economically meet space station logistic needs. Lower operational costs are essential for the future. The Gemini structure itself being an aircraft type construction readily lends itself to this add-on passenger compartment. The spacecraft was designed for low earth orbits.
To describe it in a little more depth, about 75 percent of the Gemini B flight hardware is used in the Big G spacecraft.
We have studied the development time for the Big G and we have compared it to the projected Apollo Applications Program and to a potential future space station.
Based on a 1971 beginning of operations for the workshop, and a possible followup at a later date with either additional wet or dry workshops, and sometime in the mid seventies a major new station we see that the Big G can be available in late 1972 if we assume a hardware go-ahead in 1970.
We feel the Big G is an optimum way to proceed quickly and at low development cost to a new spacecraft. It will introduce lower cost per passenger in orbit than we have seen before.
This date back from 1970, and remain pertinent today.
To house 12 men, McDonnell changed Gemini service module into a kind of passenger section – a fixed extension of the two-man original capsule.
"Two-man-Gemini’s ejection seats and hatches have been deleted. The crew enters Big Gemini crew module through two large hatches set above the passenger section.
"A cargo propulsion module is attached to the crew module for up cargo and orbital operations. Orbital transfer, rendezvous and docking, attitude control and deorbit propulsion functions are all performed by a single liquid propellant system.
The cargo block is a large, pressurised cylindrical section. It is dropped at the end of the mission, and usually burns in the atmosphere. At the aft end a pilot's station is equipped with controls and windows for manual docking with the space station.
"Although the launcher is now a stock Titan III, we made studies of Big Gemini riding atop a Saturn INT-20. It gives Big Gemini a payload and flexibility similar to the defunct shuttle through the Space Shuttle Cargo Delivery Module. The SSCDM is nothing more than an expendable shuttle cargo bay left in orbit after Big Gemini reentry module goes back to Earth.
Morphologically Big Gemini is closest from the shuttle than any proposals seen this day. A six man crew cockpit flanked by a large cargo section results in high flexibility for space station resupply.
"We studied several recovery options such as externally deployed parawing and bicycle landing gear supplemented by outriggers. Despite the paraglider fiasco we continued our research in gliding parachutes. We understood that a rigid delta wing was too difficult to deploy at landing. Flexible, lift chutes were the way to go.
“Difference between a paraglider, a parasail and a parafoil is not always easy to grasp. The paraglider as consider for Gemini was an inflatable, rigid delta wing as patented by Francis Rogallo. It had a mettalic, rigid structure - which was nearly impossible to deploy rapidly during flight.
A Parasail is a round chute - only made of cloth, without any metallic structure. It is thus much easier to deploy, with some aerodynamic tricks that give the pilot limited control; it can be steered to a precise landing area.
A parafoil is a mix of the two. Like the paraglider, it is a winged-shape, although a much different design that makes it easier to deploy. Like a parasail a parafoil is essentially made of cloth and is inflated by ambient air.
Final selection opposed a parasail with retrorockets to a parafoil with skids or undercarriage. Parasail can land a capsule on every ground; skids limit it to flat land; undercarriage obviously mean runway.
"Recovery of the crew module is by parafoil and a three skid landing gear extends from the bottom of the crew module. Design and analysis of the parafoil and landing mode were accomplished by Northrop-Ventura under a subcontract. Launch escape is provided by an Apollo-type solid rocket escape tower mounted on the spacecraft nose.
"A flight test Min-Mod vehicle could be launched 37 months from go-ahead and first operational vehicle could be launched 43 months from go-ahead. The Advanced Big G schedule add three months to these figures.
"Cost estimations are $1.5 billion for developing the Big Gemini capsule and its launcher, along with approximately $2.25 billion in recurring operational costs, for a total of $3.75 billion. Late 1969 the Bureau of Budget agreed that Big Gemini reduced development cost allowed the parallel build-up of a space station in the year 1980, even if NASA budget was cut to $2.5 billion per year over the next decade…”
Gordon had noted some nervous laughs in the assistance, and he knew why. The name Big Gemini really sounded bad – fat Castor, big Pollux ! He had the answer to that. He had found it late December, in a chat with Chamberlin.
“Jim, now that we have a spaceship to replace Apollo, we’re going to need a new name. Something to link this ship to former capsules – Mercury, Gemini, Apollo.We just can’t really stand with Big Gemini – or else some day some facetious journalist will call it fat Castor !
“So, how did the capsules names came about ?”
“Mercury and Apollo were picked up by Abe Silverstein in 1958 and 1960. At the time early Apollo blocks were to succeed Mercury – Gemini come later, after Kennedy trumpeted the Moon as NASA great endeavour for the decade. The name Gemini was picked up by some obscure McDonnell technician, on the ground that Gemini was a two-men Mercury.”
“What were the reasons driving Silverstein choices then ?”
“Well, Abe dabbled on classical myths. Plus the fact that Von Braun named its rockets Jupiter and Saturn”.
“But Von Braun chose those names from planets, not because of Greek gods.”
“Yep, you’re right. And Silverstein missed this point. Mercury was the son of Zeus and grandson of Atlas.
It had winged sandals and helmet and caduceus. Had a mythologist been consulted, perhaps the additional associations of Mercury with masterful thievery, the patronage of traders, and the divinity of commerce would have proven too humorous for NASA.”
“Indeed. What about Apollo ?”
“In Silverstein own words the image of the god Apollo riding his chariot across the sun gave the best representation of the grand scale of the proposed program." So Apollo it was. Now, what alternate names do we have ?”
“Well, if we ever go back to the Moon, Artemis might be appropriate, as goddess of Earth satellite.
And if we reach Mars, the name Ares just fits like a glove to any ship going there.
But we are not going to any of those destinations, not now.
So, what other Greek deity may fit to our ship ? We can’t seriously call it Dionysus, nor Aphrodite !”
Gordon looked at the assistance.
With the shuttle dead, the future of manned spaceflight hanged to the proposals made this day. Because of that, even Boeing or Grumman dubious, vague projects were of interest.
He took a deep breath and concluded its presentation.
“I’m very aware that Big Gemini sounds bad. So we checked the Greek mythology to find a better name.
Once upon a time was a god. The son of a Titan, he was closely identified with Apollo. Each day he drove the chariot of the sun across the sky, circling Earth.
Not only he drove the chariot, he was identified with the sun itself. Thanks to his location right in the middle of the sky he had an eye on everything happening on Earth.”
"Gentlemen, we will name our ship Helios.” He had finished with his presentation.
The room was noisy; everyone thought the day was over, but there were still a last presentation to be heard. Gordon was surprised when he heard that General Electric was also in the race. Their presentation was brief, although intriguing; it dealt with an original ship that consisted of three modules latched together.
"Unlike aircrafts rockets makes large use of expendable stages. It has been found that the optimal number of rocket stages is three to four; this max performance. Well, not only rockets benefits from staging; for a manned spaceship it give the crew more volume for an overall lower weigh. Our D-2 consists, fore to aft, of a large orbital living module, a small reentry bell-shaped capsule, and a service and propulsion unit."
What the hell ? Gordon thought this thing's a Soyuz !
He was stricken by the weight summary data, and tried to ran some maths in his head. Others contractors were deriding the concept.
How do you abort with a massive module above the astronaut heads ?The more separation or staging events, the higher risk of failure. We don't want to fly American astronauts aboard a clunky Soyuz. Leave that for the joint flight, ha ha !
Gordon took rapid notes.
The launch abort system stood on top of the rocket payload shroud, and the shroud was linked to the three-module ship, from top to bottom: a roomy orbital module, the astronaut can, and an unmanned service module located at the base.
During an abort the escape tower would pull the shroud - and the two upward modules linked to it - out of the failing rocket. Then once at a safe distance the astronaut tin can would literally separate and fall like a rock through the shroud open base - before deploying the landing chutes and retrorockets.
And then everything else - the orbital module, shroud and escape tower - would be left crashing into the ground.
It was a clever, if not complicated, abort system. Gordon had never heard of anything like that before.
The day was over. James Beggs had a kind word for everyone, and a brief elocution that concluded the first round. For contractors a hellish bidding race had now started, although it was rather obvious that Apollo and Big Gemini were over the rest of the pack.
Back to Williamsburg – here we go again. Another round in NASA human spaceflight program fight for survival, started in 1968.
For Jim Gordon it was the second trip to Virginia in exactly a year. Twelve months before a similar big meeting had been held, with NASA, contractors and Air Force guys debating for two days.
One year ago we were struggling to define a fully-reusable Shuttle – twelve months later, all left are capsules and lifting bodies riding Titan IIIs.
Time is flying.
The conference had just begun, and would last all the day.
Another conference would happen the next day. USAF was absent, leaving NASA facing worried contractors alone.
James Beggs had been just confirmed as administrator of NASA.
“…NASA will fly Apollo with required upgrades until 1975, for Skylab and a joint flight with a the soviets.
Work on a proposed first-generation reusable launch vehicle has been put on the backburner, with activities limited to research, in a major change to our agency's earlier Space Transportation System.
“NASA will now push ahead with the development of six-men Crew Transfer Vehicle, launched on a Titan expendable booster to act as Space Station taxi within eight years. This will also have the potential to act as the permanent Crew Rescue Vehicle (CRV).
NASA considers ordering some more Apollo to fill the gap with the CTV. As an alternative Apollo flight schedule to Skylab could be stretched to 1975 and beyond.
"I understand that, you, contractors, have been worried about the Office off Management and Budget decision to scrap the shuttle. The Crew Transportation Vehicle is set to enter service in 1976, launched to low-Earth-orbit manned with a crew of four.
By 1980, the spacecraft will ferry six crew members to a new space station. Work on a the Shuttle will continue under the Next Generation Launch Technology programme, with a decision on development delayed until 1978 at best.
“The CTV requirements are driven by the need to increase the science performed on Skylab and to improve the safety of crews compared to Apollo.
We set up the following criteria.
The Launch vehicle should be an uprated Titan III; bidders must derived their vehicle from existing vehicles or proven shapes such as Corona or Apollo; land-landing is mandatory; on orbit duration of sixty days when docked to a space station; payload is housed in an expendable cargo module.
A crew of four is mandatory, with higher safety-levels than current Apollo, notably a two gas atmosphere. Initial operational capacity should be 1975. An upgrade to a circumlunar mission mode with a Centaur Earth departure stage would be highly desirable. This day will be dedicated to bidders entries for the CTV."
Martin Marietta representatives went first on the scene. Martin was the big winner of shuttle cancellation – its Titan had not only ousted the shuttle, it also bet the pants of the Saturn IB.
Martin lifting bodies, by contrast were fresh concepts with very little flight experience. At a time when NASA was pressed by time lifting bodies stood little chances of being chosen.
Then it was Northrop, Martin competitor for lifting bodies with their HL-10 and M2F2. Both had had agitated development paths.
The M2F2 had suffered an horrendous landing crash in May 1967, injuring test pilot Bruce Peterson “also known as the six billion dollar men”. Gordon smiled.
Lifting bodies were hard to control at landing speeds; they were even draggier than shuttle shapes, themselves known as “turkey” or “flying bricks” by aerodynamicists.
On the stage, the brave Northrop guy continued its presentation.
“…we decided to go with the more stable HL-10. As of today it is considered by Edwards test-pilots as the best lifting-body in the serie. [FONT=serif, 'Times New Roman']Our proposal called HL-20, is a scaled-up variant of the HL-10.
During launch the spacecraft would have had solid rocket motors for launch abort, with parachutes for a tail-down water landing. The space available inside for the crew and passengers would be more than found in today's small corporate business jets…"
"Lifting bodies can certainly sustain reentry at interplanetary speed." To back their claims the lifting body crowd cited project LUNEX, the Air Force moon plan that had lost to Apollo ten years before. The Northrop guy dug out a view of an ungainly aircraft with a huge conical propulsion module on the back.
Boeing and Grumman proposals were vague; Boeing presentation focused on an enlarged DynaSoar, the mythical USAF spaceplane cancelled in December 1963, eighteen months away from its first glided flight.
DynaSoar was a black, delta-shaped dart with twin tail fins and skids for landing. Unlike the cancelled shuttle, and much like old X-15s, DynaSoar did not used a heatshield.
The structure was build from inconel and titanium, and actually absorbed heat. The pilot, payload and other sensitive pieces were housed in water-cooled compartments.
Boeing and Grumman also had a study of a subscale variant of their joint H-33 shuttle design, a delta-winged orbiter with internal liquid oxygen tankage and one throwaway liquid hydrogen tank over each wing. The CTV got ride of any internal propulsion system outside small attitude thrusters.
"At the time of the shuttle cancellation studies were on the way of lunar mission for the space shuttle" they told the crowd. Their first slide entitled Cislunar Application of the Space Shuttle Orbiter showed a glowing-red shuttle reentering from interplanetary space.
Grumman and Boeing representatives also had a subscale shuttle model: an airplane shape, with a chunky body and an elegant, curved delta wing.
"We plan to add ablative heatshield over the silica tiles, or split the reentry in phases." they added. "The orbiter would perform a braking burn halfway to Earth to reduce its atmosphere entry velocity to about 31,000 feet per second.
Upon reaching Earth, the cislunar orbiter will perform an aerobraking manoeuvre high in the atmosphere to further reduce its speed and capture into orbit. First, the orbiter will descend at a constant velocity to an altitude no lower than 250,000 feet, taking care not to exceed its maximum allowable heating rate. Next, it will maintain a constant altitude as it slows. After that, it will pull up and enter a 100-mile-high circular orbit about the Earth finally firing its braking rockets to begin a normal Shuttle reentry."
The whole concept looked dubious to Gordon.
Now its time for backward capsules to size their revenge Gordon thought, as the Lockheed representative come on the scene.
“Our CTV vehicle - internally known as CXV- is a simple capsule design based on the Corona reentry vehicles used by the American intelligence community to return film from orbit. The aerodynamics and flight characteristics of the capsule are well known, with more than 50 reentries having taken place over a period of more than 12 years.”
Early spy satellites dropped their precious photos of USSR into Corona capsules, which after reentry were snapped in midair by large aircrafts. Had NASA not taken over the manned spaceflight business in 1958, USAF may had flown manned Coronas with military astronauts.
“The CXV's shape provide for carefree reentry of the capsule. Similar to a badminton shuttlecock, the spacecraft automatically rights itself as it descend into the atmosphere regardless of its initial orientation due to the aerodynamic loads. As a result, neither human nor computer intervention is needed to stabilize the vehicle in the event that the vehicle is not perfectly aligned for reentry..."
Gordon liked the concept, but remembered a problem common with the use of a Discoverer-type capsule for crew re-entry. The direction of G-forces during launch and re-entry areopposite. The Lockheed proposal solved this through use of an innovative seat design - a type of suspended semi-rigid hammock - that could rotate 180 degrees within two seconds in order to keep the astronaut correctly oriented regardless of g-force direction.
Another dubious concept – it can certainly works, but it will take time, of which NASA has not. By the way we have better capsule than Corona.
On top of that was Lockheed dire situation, near bankruptcy. Over the last decade every program started by the firm had backfired or failed, to the point it was on the verge of sinking.
Tristars airliners did not sold, and their turbofans had nearly sunk Rolls Royce.
The Cheyenne, YF-12 and D-21 cutting edge marvels had been plagued by technical problems. The Galaxy scandal was raging – cracks on wings and immense cost overruns plagued USAF big cargo plane.
In an unprecedented move Lockheed had been kept on life-support by the Nixon administration - only because their Poseidonsubmarine launched missile represented a vital asset against the Soviet Union.
To this point, Lockheed proposal is certainly the most interesting.But here come the big boys, entering the arena. Rockwell and us - McDonnell Douglas.
Gordon somersaulted when he saw Rockwell representative.
My god - they have called Harrison Storms back, he thought. They really want this contract.
Stormy was a legend, the father of an impressive number of superb flying machines and rocketships. The Apollo program, however had nearly carbonised him. Having brought both the S-II and Apollo contracts to Rockwell, he had worked a gruelling eighty hours a week for a decade, facing immense pressure from NASA, two heart attacks and a wife attempting her life.
Storms looked battered, but he fought with energy. It was obvious he would do his best to bring the CTV to Rockwell, in the form of a Block III Apollo.
“We are the most experienced bidders. We prevails experience from the Apollo program, and we were a strong contender for the Shuttle orbiter contract. North American studied 6-men, ground-landing Apollo spacecrafts as early as 1963. These studies were grouped under the designation of MODAP. Six-man, land-landing Apollo studies continued into Apollo Extension Series (AES) in 1966, then Apollo Application Program (AAP) in 1968. They included steerable parachutes.
“As of today retrorockets sounds the most efficient system to cushion ground impact, but consideration should be given to air bags. Apollo CM shape, as Corona, has been proven over and over. It offers a lift-to-drag ratio of 0.25, enough for a cross-reentry of 18km. Truth be told, since 1968 Apollo crews have landed closer and closer from their recovery ships, to the point that NASA recently worried about possible collisions !
We recently modified an old block.1 CSM into a mockup of the new internal layout. To access the cargo compartment we first considered the option of a hatch trough the heatshield. This option was rejected on safety grounds, but also because the six-men crew Block III is too cramped for a second hatch. Our vessel will have three sections, fore to aft.
First, a six-man Command Module with modern avionics, lighter heatshield and a land-landing system.
Then a new, very light Service Module.
Third, a so-called MultiPurpose Logistic Module (MPLM).
Just after orbital injection, Apollo will detach, makes a 180° turn and pick up the MPLM very much like the Lunar Module.
The logistic module has a hatch at each end. Apollo will dock via the MPLM, the astronauts crossing the cargo module to enter the station.
We consider our option as the cheaper and easier to achieve - Apollo will fly to a space station as early as 1973. The Command and Service Module is NASA current manned spacecraft, and proved its worth”
According to the Rand Corp "THE SPACE SHUTTLE AS AN ELEMENT IN THE NATIONAL SPACE PROGRAM" dated October 18 1970,
"for those alternative space plans in which the shuttle operation would be delayed or in which there would be no shuttle, a six-man modified Apollo spacecraft would be used.
This vehicle would have a gross weight of 20,000 Ib, a development cost of $1billion, a first-unit cost of $300 million, and a launch-operations cost of $73 million." Storms quoted.
"A Titan III-M with the 7-seg segment solids can orbit can orbit 37 000 pounds - which mean the MPLM could mass as much as 17 000 pounds." he concluded.
Yeah, but Apollo has been tailored for lunar missions, not as a space station ferry, Gordon thought as he went to the stage. That service module - even trimmed down to the bones - is just unuseful. Now was perhaps the most important moment in his life.
He stared at the audience, a sea of engineers and heavyweight past and present NASA officials – former administrators James Webb and Thomas Paine, Robert Seamans, Werner Von Braun, George Low, and many others.
“The Big Gemini spacecraft is a scaled-up Gemini with a crew of three to nine. Big Gemini itself appeared for the first time late 1967. It had grown from a logical need outside Apollo – the need for a twelve-man ferry to a space station in the early 70’s. Apollo maximum capacity is six men without cargo, while the shuttle promised lot of technical uncertainties, making it unlikely before 1977 at best.
Let me quote a document
"Our existing spacecraft, being two- or three-man size, cannot economically meet space station logistic needs. Lower operational costs are essential for the future. The Gemini structure itself being an aircraft type construction readily lends itself to this add-on passenger compartment. The spacecraft was designed for low earth orbits.
To describe it in a little more depth, about 75 percent of the Gemini B flight hardware is used in the Big G spacecraft.
We have studied the development time for the Big G and we have compared it to the projected Apollo Applications Program and to a potential future space station.
Based on a 1971 beginning of operations for the workshop, and a possible followup at a later date with either additional wet or dry workshops, and sometime in the mid seventies a major new station we see that the Big G can be available in late 1972 if we assume a hardware go-ahead in 1970.
We feel the Big G is an optimum way to proceed quickly and at low development cost to a new spacecraft. It will introduce lower cost per passenger in orbit than we have seen before.
This date back from 1970, and remain pertinent today.
To house 12 men, McDonnell changed Gemini service module into a kind of passenger section – a fixed extension of the two-man original capsule.
"Two-man-Gemini’s ejection seats and hatches have been deleted. The crew enters Big Gemini crew module through two large hatches set above the passenger section.
"A cargo propulsion module is attached to the crew module for up cargo and orbital operations. Orbital transfer, rendezvous and docking, attitude control and deorbit propulsion functions are all performed by a single liquid propellant system.
The cargo block is a large, pressurised cylindrical section. It is dropped at the end of the mission, and usually burns in the atmosphere. At the aft end a pilot's station is equipped with controls and windows for manual docking with the space station.
"Although the launcher is now a stock Titan III, we made studies of Big Gemini riding atop a Saturn INT-20. It gives Big Gemini a payload and flexibility similar to the defunct shuttle through the Space Shuttle Cargo Delivery Module. The SSCDM is nothing more than an expendable shuttle cargo bay left in orbit after Big Gemini reentry module goes back to Earth.
Morphologically Big Gemini is closest from the shuttle than any proposals seen this day. A six man crew cockpit flanked by a large cargo section results in high flexibility for space station resupply.
"We studied several recovery options such as externally deployed parawing and bicycle landing gear supplemented by outriggers. Despite the paraglider fiasco we continued our research in gliding parachutes. We understood that a rigid delta wing was too difficult to deploy at landing. Flexible, lift chutes were the way to go.
“Difference between a paraglider, a parasail and a parafoil is not always easy to grasp. The paraglider as consider for Gemini was an inflatable, rigid delta wing as patented by Francis Rogallo. It had a mettalic, rigid structure - which was nearly impossible to deploy rapidly during flight.
A Parasail is a round chute - only made of cloth, without any metallic structure. It is thus much easier to deploy, with some aerodynamic tricks that give the pilot limited control; it can be steered to a precise landing area.
A parafoil is a mix of the two. Like the paraglider, it is a winged-shape, although a much different design that makes it easier to deploy. Like a parasail a parafoil is essentially made of cloth and is inflated by ambient air.
Final selection opposed a parasail with retrorockets to a parafoil with skids or undercarriage. Parasail can land a capsule on every ground; skids limit it to flat land; undercarriage obviously mean runway.
"Recovery of the crew module is by parafoil and a three skid landing gear extends from the bottom of the crew module. Design and analysis of the parafoil and landing mode were accomplished by Northrop-Ventura under a subcontract. Launch escape is provided by an Apollo-type solid rocket escape tower mounted on the spacecraft nose.
"A flight test Min-Mod vehicle could be launched 37 months from go-ahead and first operational vehicle could be launched 43 months from go-ahead. The Advanced Big G schedule add three months to these figures.
"Cost estimations are $1.5 billion for developing the Big Gemini capsule and its launcher, along with approximately $2.25 billion in recurring operational costs, for a total of $3.75 billion. Late 1969 the Bureau of Budget agreed that Big Gemini reduced development cost allowed the parallel build-up of a space station in the year 1980, even if NASA budget was cut to $2.5 billion per year over the next decade…”
Gordon had noted some nervous laughs in the assistance, and he knew why. The name Big Gemini really sounded bad – fat Castor, big Pollux ! He had the answer to that. He had found it late December, in a chat with Chamberlin.
“Jim, now that we have a spaceship to replace Apollo, we’re going to need a new name. Something to link this ship to former capsules – Mercury, Gemini, Apollo.We just can’t really stand with Big Gemini – or else some day some facetious journalist will call it fat Castor !
“So, how did the capsules names came about ?”
“Mercury and Apollo were picked up by Abe Silverstein in 1958 and 1960. At the time early Apollo blocks were to succeed Mercury – Gemini come later, after Kennedy trumpeted the Moon as NASA great endeavour for the decade. The name Gemini was picked up by some obscure McDonnell technician, on the ground that Gemini was a two-men Mercury.”
“What were the reasons driving Silverstein choices then ?”
“Well, Abe dabbled on classical myths. Plus the fact that Von Braun named its rockets Jupiter and Saturn”.
“But Von Braun chose those names from planets, not because of Greek gods.”
“Yep, you’re right. And Silverstein missed this point. Mercury was the son of Zeus and grandson of Atlas.
It had winged sandals and helmet and caduceus. Had a mythologist been consulted, perhaps the additional associations of Mercury with masterful thievery, the patronage of traders, and the divinity of commerce would have proven too humorous for NASA.”
“Indeed. What about Apollo ?”
“In Silverstein own words the image of the god Apollo riding his chariot across the sun gave the best representation of the grand scale of the proposed program." So Apollo it was. Now, what alternate names do we have ?”
“Well, if we ever go back to the Moon, Artemis might be appropriate, as goddess of Earth satellite.
And if we reach Mars, the name Ares just fits like a glove to any ship going there.
But we are not going to any of those destinations, not now.
So, what other Greek deity may fit to our ship ? We can’t seriously call it Dionysus, nor Aphrodite !”
Gordon looked at the assistance.
With the shuttle dead, the future of manned spaceflight hanged to the proposals made this day. Because of that, even Boeing or Grumman dubious, vague projects were of interest.
He took a deep breath and concluded its presentation.
“I’m very aware that Big Gemini sounds bad. So we checked the Greek mythology to find a better name.
Once upon a time was a god. The son of a Titan, he was closely identified with Apollo. Each day he drove the chariot of the sun across the sky, circling Earth.
Not only he drove the chariot, he was identified with the sun itself. Thanks to his location right in the middle of the sky he had an eye on everything happening on Earth.”
"Gentlemen, we will name our ship Helios.” He had finished with his presentation.
The room was noisy; everyone thought the day was over, but there were still a last presentation to be heard. Gordon was surprised when he heard that General Electric was also in the race. Their presentation was brief, although intriguing; it dealt with an original ship that consisted of three modules latched together.
"Unlike aircrafts rockets makes large use of expendable stages. It has been found that the optimal number of rocket stages is three to four; this max performance. Well, not only rockets benefits from staging; for a manned spaceship it give the crew more volume for an overall lower weigh. Our D-2 consists, fore to aft, of a large orbital living module, a small reentry bell-shaped capsule, and a service and propulsion unit."
What the hell ? Gordon thought this thing's a Soyuz !
He was stricken by the weight summary data, and tried to ran some maths in his head. Others contractors were deriding the concept.
How do you abort with a massive module above the astronaut heads ?The more separation or staging events, the higher risk of failure. We don't want to fly American astronauts aboard a clunky Soyuz. Leave that for the joint flight, ha ha !
Gordon took rapid notes.
The launch abort system stood on top of the rocket payload shroud, and the shroud was linked to the three-module ship, from top to bottom: a roomy orbital module, the astronaut can, and an unmanned service module located at the base.
During an abort the escape tower would pull the shroud - and the two upward modules linked to it - out of the failing rocket. Then once at a safe distance the astronaut tin can would literally separate and fall like a rock through the shroud open base - before deploying the landing chutes and retrorockets.
And then everything else - the orbital module, shroud and escape tower - would be left crashing into the ground.
It was a clever, if not complicated, abort system. Gordon had never heard of anything like that before.
The day was over. James Beggs had a kind word for everyone, and a brief elocution that concluded the first round. For contractors a hellish bidding race had now started, although it was rather obvious that Apollo and Big Gemini were over the rest of the pack.