Earliest Manned Mars Mission

From what I've read the radiation danger has been wildly exaggerated. Of course a three-year round trip to Mars is considerably more exposure than a few days around and on the moon, though.

How has it been exaggerated? My understanding is that the danger is from solar flares as background radiation isn't intense enough to do any harm and the spacecraft will fly through the Van Allen Belts in under an hour.
 

Thande

Donor
It could be six weeks round trip with Orion, though.
Well, yes - but as we're talking about the need for radiation shielding here, I hardly think Orion is a shining example of a means of avoiding that :D

How has it been exaggerated? My understanding is that the danger is from solar flares as background radiation isn't intense enough to do any harm and the spacecraft will fly through the Van Allen Belts in under an hour.
Flares, that's a point.
 
There hasn't been much mention of the Stephen Baxter scenario; ie. extended Saturn run, moon orbit Skylab, multi tank S2 trans-Mars stage, Venus flyby trajectory.

Well ,I was going to bring that up, but I felt it was already partially covered by a previous link I used. To be specific, this seems a fairly reasonable Saturn V extension:
Saturn V-23(L)
...Manufacturer: Von Braun. LEO Payload: 262,670 kg (579,080 lb). to: 185 km Orbit. at: 28.00 degrees. Payload: 99,850 kg (220,130 lb). to a: Translunar trajectory. Liftoff Thrust: 87,737.400 kN (19,724,152 lbf). Total Mass: 7,178,900 kg (15,826,700 lb). Core Diameter: 10.06 m (33.00 ft). Total Length: 115.00 m (377.00 ft).
Note the LEO payload - this compares rather well with a standard Saturn V payload:
...
LEO Payload
: 118,000 kg (260,000 lb). to: 185 km Orbit. at: 28.00 degrees. Payload: 47,000 kg (103,000 lb). to a: Translunar trajectory.
Hmm. 118 metric tons, vs 262 and a half. I know which would be more useful to assemble a Mars mission...
 
How much? I'm assuming that's not a typo, and they really did propose a programme costing $four hundred billion?

No politician, however much a space enthusiast they might be, is going to agree to that sort of figure. I think I have heard something about this before. Wasn't this where they essentially said 'well, we want to build a space station, and a space shuttle, and a moon-orbiting space station, and a moon lander, and a moon base, and a Mars mission, and...'

That was internal politics by NASA to scuttle the plan because signing on to that project would be admiting the shuttle program was a failure (as by any objective measure it was, it fulfilled almost none of what it promised), so they basically designed a ship the size of the Battlestar Galactica on the back of a cocktail napkin and said we couldn't get to Mars on less than $400 billion.

15 years later with alot of those responsible for the Shuttle fiasco retired, it became politically possible within NASA to contemplate getting rid of the shuttle and designing a manned Mars program.
 
That was internal politics by NASA to scuttle the plan because signing on to that project would be admiting the shuttle program was a failure (as by any objective measure it was, it fulfilled almost none of what it promised), so they basically designed a ship the size of the Battlestar Galactica on the back of a cocktail napkin and said we couldn't get to Mars on less than $400 billion.

15 years later with alot of those responsible for the Shuttle fiasco retired, it became politically possible within NASA to contemplate getting rid of the shuttle and designing a manned Mars program.

Ah, OK that's interesting, I hadn't thought of it that way before. The story I've heard was the one I posted before, about them basically asking for an absurdly diverse and wide-ranging programme. I didn't realise they jut wanted to keep the shuttle alive.
Any sources (online) for this?
 
I'm having trouble with links at the moment. A few of those Satrun suggestions involve raising the roof of the VAB, which I think drives the cost too high for the benefits. What is the LEO of the version with 4 Titan SRBs and a 1st stage stretch? I thought it was about 180T, compared to 118T.
 
LOL, thanks, its a great thread and left me none-the-wiser in the context of there being a division of views between it not being possible yet, and it being possible (if horrendously expensive) from the 1980s onwards...

Is the assumption of the nay-sayers that air-recycling and water-recycling degrades over time ? So, that after some months the ability to recycle is reduced in both the percentage that is handled, and in the quality of the output ? If so, then is it a fatal degredation ? For example, if the percentage recycled falls over time, can't the presumably toxic excess of non-recycled produce simply be filtered out and vented ? And, if the quality of the output falls over time, could not reserves be carried to intermittently be introduced into the recycler to put the purity level back up ?

Best Regards
Grey Wolf

Yes, and he makes a fair point. We don't have the technology for that stuff right now. He's also quite missing the point, though. Most of the money that goes to any space program is spent on research - those tin cans and toy airplanes we've been throwing up are a relatively small part of the budget. The reason we don't have a system of recycling fit for Mars is that designing a system like that requires an extended effort and a lot of money and man hours. It isn't as if anyone would build a system like that for anyother reason. So the reason we don't have the technology to feed and water a Mars mission is... we haven't started seriously preparing for a Mars mission.

Unfortunately it isn't really feasible to predict how much research time is required until the research is mostly finished. But... If someone had been throwing a lot of money at a lot of good scientists since WWII, we'd have had it within 30 years. Tops.
 
I'm having trouble with links at the moment. A few of those Satrun suggestions involve raising the roof of the VAB, which I think drives the cost too high for the benefits. What is the LEO of the version with 4 Titan SRBs and a 1st stage stretch? I thought it was about 180T, compared to 118T.

OK... I'm going with info from the astronautix.com site, which seems as good a source as any. This would appear to be the one you're talking about:
Saturn MLV-V-4(S)-A

MSFC study, 1965. 4 Titan UA1205 solid rocket boosters; Saturn IC stretched 337 inches with 6.0 million pounds propellant and 5 F-1 engines; S-II with 970,000 pounds propellant and 5 J-2 engines; S-IVB strengthened but with standard 230,000 lbs propellant, 1 J-2 engine.

Manufacturer: Von Braun. LEO Payload: 160,880 kg (354,670 lb). to: 185 km Orbit. at: 28.00 degrees. Payload: 57,500 kg (126,700 lb). to a: Translunar trajectory. Liftoff Thrust: 54,920.000 kN (12,346,500 lbf). Total Mass: 4,615,440 kg (10,175,300 lb). Core Diameter: 10.06 m (33.00 ft). Total Length: 113.00 m (370.00 ft). Flyaway Unit Cost $: 71.920 million. in: 1985 unit dollars.
 

Archibald

Banned
I really have to bump this thread!

landing is really, really, really difficult, and requires a whole quantum leap beyond the technology possessed by either superpower until, well, now.

But going by the strictly literal interpretation of the question, a flyby is much easier. A flyby would probably be achievable by 1975--if, of course, there were any compelling reason to go...

I vote for the flyby as a way of committing humanity to a landing later.

As said earlier in this thread, flyby has been planned various times (as early as 1965-1966.)
They even thought using a MOL station powered by three or four S-IVB. This would have been rather dangerous I agree.

Here's an atempt to build something viable in the 80's.

The vessel would be a Skylab follow-on, in the sense that its a Saturn stage change into a manned vessel.
(in this alt history Saturn V production did not stop).

But it is build from a S-II, not a S-IVB. This offer much more internal space than Skylab.

My own Saturn V favorite is the V-25 S.
Sounds most realistic Saturn V follow-on would have had
- F-1A
- J-2S
- 120 or 156 inch boosters.

All in all, such Saturn can lift up to 250 ton in LEO.
You just need two launchs

- the first send the S-II module in LEO. Weight : around 220 tons. Enough for supplies, radiation shelter if crew is around 3 to 5 people.

- the second send the PPM, Primary Propulsion Module into LEO.
This was the name of the NERVA-2 powered stage as planned by NASA. Weight : 248 tons.

Both big things dock.

Assembly can be made at Earth-Moon Lagrange L2 (not easy to send such masses there, but once they are there...)

As no landing is planned, two Viking-probes are carried (Viking 3 and 4).

Mission occure in 1986 or 1989.

Et voila!
 
SEI

Nope and just nope!

400BN$ stuff is sooo misinterpreted. In 1989. Bush Sr. announced the Space Exploration Initiative. NASA did a 90 day study, called "90 day study" :)

They gave Bush a program costing a bit over 400BN$. It included:

Large scale planetary probes for study of Moon and Mars in preparation for manned exploration. Space station Freedom, in its dual keel configuration in which it could be used to assemble and maintain Moon/Mars transfer vehicles. Orbital transfer vehicle used to ferry modules and cargo from LEO to GEO and to the Moon. A GEO manned station.

A improved space shuttle. And unmanned transport Shuttle C. And two new non reusable heavy lift booster to be used to launch Moon base and Mars ship components.

A series of Manned flights to the Moon, starting around 2002/3 and construction of a Moon base. Assembly of first Mars bound ships around 2015-2020 and subsequent first manned mission to Mars. And several following Mars expeditions of such type. Culminating with a non permanently manned Mars outpost around 2030.


All that, over almost 40 years, was estimated to cost ~400BN$ with a large reserve included in the number.

News reporters quickly rounded the number to 500BN$ and said that would be the price of a single Mars flight. In following years since, in its NASA bashing use in press, that numbers has been enlarged by inflation, and a arbitrary additional enlargement of price on the bias and opinion of the reporter witting the text.

Now, about the any possible mission. Yes the recycling systems we have or will have are nowhere near needed. So you just use a ship assembled in orbit over a year or two (so you have a start mass around 500 tons), you have a crew or 3-4, and you basically carry all food and watter you will need on the journey. Water and air recycling will be needed to be recycled as good as technology provides. Food you simply have to carry with you. You put crew area to be surrounded with watter tanks (and possibly fuel tanks) so they can act as radiation shield. And you carry only one really good shielded compartment to serve as storm shelter in case of CMEs and other solar flares.

Now, over 1969-1971 US launched how many? 7 Saturns V? Thats around 800 tons in LEO. If you launch food, watter and fuel last, you don't have to worry about shelf time and fuel evaporation, so assembly well can take 3 years or more.

If you use Venus for a slingshot, you need to go in ~1980. If you develop a nuclear engine you could go any two years, but time to develop them will prolong the project, and increase expenses. And developing a lander will take time. But its just a engineering challenge, therefore solvable with right amounts of time and money.

If you are deciding on a plan in 1969. you could cut Appolo at 14 or 15, and build additional 3-5 Saturns V and have a launch vehicle for a 600 ton Mars ship.
 
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