Eyes Turned Skywards

Good stuff.

Question, though - did Soyuz 11 end as OTL? The citation seems to imply a different accident...

I would doubt it. The Soyuz 11 spent 23 days in space mostly attached to the Salyut 1 Space Station, which I suspect is the same ITTL as OTL. The crew was killed when a faulty valve failed at - reentry module habitation/service module seperation - dumping all the 1 Bar atmosphere inside the reentry capsule, killing the crew before they hit the upper atmosphere. They were already Dead On Arrival.

Cause of Death. They were not wearing pressure suits since the Soyuz Spacecraft as it existed then could not accomodate three cosmonauts with pressure suits worn. An act conducted since Voskhod 1.

A direct result from this - not including weakening the already fatally weakened position of Vasily Palvovich Mishin and deal a further blow to crippled Soviet Morale - was to force cosmonauts to have pressure suits in ALL future flights. Meaning that until the early 1980s OTL, they could only carry two cosmonauts in each Soyuz Spacecraft - until further redesigns allowed crews of three again.

It should also be noted that a fire broke out in the Salyut 1 Station towards the end, filling it with smoke, forcing the crew to evacuate to their Soyuz Capsule and leave the station. A near-fatal accident that could have cost them their lives there and then.
 
I would doubt it. The Soyuz 11 spent 23 days in space mostly attached to the Salyut 1 Space Station, which I suspect is the same ITTL as OTL. The crew was killed when a faulty valve failed at - reentry module habitation/service module seperation - dumping all the 1 Bar atmosphere inside the reentry capsule, killing the crew before they hit the upper atmosphere. They were already Dead On Arrival.

Exactly. The thing was that the US didn't have any of the details at that time, so there was a certain degree of "oh noes, 23 days in space and you die" going around. It looks silly now, but obviously it would be important for NASA ITTL to dispel that feeling.

And to deal with your earlier question, the TKS heat-shield hatch probably wouldn't have been a big problem (I have to admit that despite being fingered by e of pi as an "expert," I am really not that knowledgeable about the Russian end of things, hardware wise--I'm more on the internal politics). In addition to what e of pi pointed out with the Shuttle hatches (not only the landing-gear ones, but also the crew hatch!), Gemini-B was tested with a similar design as part of the MOL program and apparently performed just fine. It sounds crazy, maybe, but apparently it does work in the real world.
 
That does explain a few things. So that means the 17,500Kg TKS is likely going to work. Since IIRC, Chelomei - with his instructions to build military hardware, was required to build his goods to a higher standard than the Soviet Average at the time - could make his equipment better with OKB-52 than Mishin in OKB-1. That might have some butterfly effects later on, since Chelomei and Glushko were on better terms at that point. TKS should also have some greater flexibility, with it's considerably greater internal habitable volume - 45m3 vs 9m3 - and a delta-v budget of 700m/s vs ~300m/s. There's a major proverbial can of worms to be opened there.

BTW Truth-Is-Life. What are your thoughts on this and this?
 
BTW Truth-Is-Life. What are your thoughts on this and this?

I'll get back to you on it, but I can tell you that I have never heard of the latter difficulty before. You can assume that it went much as OTL (and the general redesign of the heat shield for the second mission would avoid that problem, since it would not rip off in the first place...)
 
I'll get back to you on it, but I can tell you that I have never heard of the latter difficulty before. You can assume that it went much as OTL (and the general redesign of the heat shield for the second mission would avoid that problem, since it would not rip off in the first place...)

Right. And I found a few links: Here, here & here.

None are the first one I found some months back. But you may find it by Google'ing this "Skylab Interstage Problems" and looking.
 
The peak mass of the Lunar CSM was about 30,300Kg, of which about 18,500Kg was N2O4/A50 propellant - giving you up to 2700 m/s delta-v based on the 314s Isp of the 10,000Kgf SPS engine. Far more than would really be needed for an LEO flight. OTL Soyuz manages - just - with 390 m/s. I'd say you only really need about 1,000 m/s tops for an LEO Apollo once it's in orbit.

One thing that could be considered is using Apollo as it's own third stage, where the Saturn 1C puts it into a ballistic profile where SPS failure sends it straight towards safe reentry. That could allow for some increase in payload. Although, I only see this happening for high inclination and/or high altitude orbits. i.e. 800 Km at 51.6 degrees.

Okay, I promised an answer on this, here it is. Truth and I have had plans for an expanded Apollo or Apollo successor for a while, planned to be started around '80ish, coming online about three or four years later. However, this was based on looking at the Skylab launch masses an deciding that the 20 ton mass of those launches roughly filled our Saturn 1C, so that any revisions needed either a substantial lightening program to achieve the margin to expand the size or a new booster to provide the capability.

In short, thanks for making us look at this again, it was a nice catch. We're now considering other options to continue incremental evolution to the Apollo system on a possible shorter timescale, we'll see what that outcome is.
 
Right. And I found a few links: Here, *snip for length* & here.

None are the first one I found some months back. But you may find it by Google'ing this "Skylab Interstage Problems" and looking.

I didn't doubt you (also, the second link doesn't really work, for me anyways--it just says "hey, you can't read this"). I just hadn't come across it, although that's probably because I was mostly relying on the official NASA history (which doesn't mention the problem you're talking about at all, probably because it had no effect on the mission) and the Homesteading Space, which--well, it was written by a journalist and it shows.

Anyways, the reasoning on most of the Skylab stuff was that the basic idea for NASA would be the same--to show that humans could live and work in space. Most of the basic Skylab ideas had been built up over several years, with or without space stations becoming the main focus. The biggest difference here is that the success or failure of Skylab is much more important for NASA since obviously they want to build follow-ons, but the underlying scientific and engineering goals are largely identical, so this Skylab is basically very similar to the OTL Skylab aside from some small details. There's also some justification for this--a deployment failure (misdeployment/positive failure) of the micrometeroid/solar shield was not, for instance, considered a LOCV item in the Skylab development process! It sounds incredible considering what actually happened, but they simply hadn't looked at the deployment mechanism and shield to make sure they would work properly!

Anyways, the big changes (and there will be big changes, of course) won't appear until Spacelab and beyond. Right now, there's a lot of Apollo inertia; even IOTL, Apollo hardware was still flying, or had very recently flown, and NASA was still working with a lot of that sort of stuff. As time moves on, and the Apollo influence dies away (less than IOTL, but still falls off), then you'll see bigger changes. Of course, other people are seeing bigger changes, both in Kourou and a certain place in Kazakhstan (but you'll have to wait a while for that!)

I can also tell you that I had thought of using the Apollo as a third stage before, but never went anywhere with it for some reason or another. It seemed more reasonable to cut it down (mostly the SM) to work better with a pure LEO role and to put in extensions to work with that than to use the overpowered Block II design.
 
Of course, other people are seeing bigger changes, both in Kourou and a certain place in Kazakhstan (but you'll have to wait a while for that!)

I can also tell you that I had thought of using the Apollo as a third stage before, but never went anywhere with it for some reason or another. It seemed more reasonable to cut it down (mostly the SM) to work better with a pure LEO role and to put in extensions to work with that than to use the overpowered Block II design.

Okay, I promised an answer on this, here it is. Truth and I have had plans for an expanded Apollo or Apollo successor for a while, planned to be started around '80ish, coming online about three or four years later. However, this was based on looking at the Skylab launch masses an deciding that the 20 ton mass of those launches roughly filled our Saturn 1C, so that any revisions needed either a substantial lightening program to achieve the margin to expand the size or a new booster to provide the capability.

In short, thanks for making us look at this again, it was a nice catch. We're now considering other options to continue incremental evolution to the Apollo system on a possible shorter timescale, we'll see what that outcome is.

Okay then. But it does make you wonder how they can upgrade the design without increasing the spacecraft mass.

I suppose using an alloy/composite design would allow them to keep the strength up - possibly more so - while shedding some mass which can then be redirected towards more equipment and/or propellant is one way to achieve this. More efficient SM engines is another possibility - more burn time, more delta-v.

Though to get the Saturn IC payload up more - if you go down that line - you'll need to think about uprating the engines on the Saturn 1C. The 270s Isp(sl) of the Rocketdyne F-1A and 436s Isp(vac) of the J-2S isn't all that impressive. At this point - both OTL & ITTL - the Soviets had the NK-33 with its 298s Isp(SL) and the RD-56 with 462s Isp(vac). Though they did have more experience with liquid fueled engines than the US, so it's to be expected.

I suppose the S-IVB will the the easiest stage to upgrade seeing that it had some overdesign IRRC to support the Manned Lunar Programme, so cutting some weight there is possible, which directly translates into extra payload on a 1:1 basis IMHO.

Quite a lot to play with there. And we're not even into the 1980's yet. Personally, I'm in favour of the S-IVB engine upgrade and lightening programme for more payload. Even if I'm more into Baikonour Cosmodrone and Kourou Launch Centre than Cape Canaveral.

Edit: I remember that during the ill-fated N1 programme. They designed some LOX/LH2 stages, known as the Block S, Block R and Block SR - of which only the Block R saw flight tests in 1976 and 1977, with its RD-56 engine in use on the Indian GSLV OTL. It would, IMO, make sense for them to go with it and put it into use to replace the Block D - the only part of the N1 that had survived the whole thing. A four-stage UR-500 with Block R would improve their GTO, TLI, TMI, TVI and TJI payloads a good deal. Definately worth looking into.
 
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Post 11: Preparations and Conversions, Skylab-B Becomes Spacelab
Well, once again Wednesday has rolled around. This week, we turn our attention to the preparations for Spacelab and take an in-depth look at the modifications made to it in preparation for its flight.

Eyes Turned Skyward, Post #11:

Assembly work on Spacelab resumed at an almost indecent haste once it became clear that Skylab had been repaired and therefore there was no longer any potential need for a Skylab B to replace the wounded station. Since construction had been stopped at an early stage--little more had been done than removing the engine and most of the hardware needed for it--a considerable amount of work would be needed for completion, and it was obvious it would be at least several years before launch. However, despite this and the lack of data from Skylab to support particular designs, the engineers and designers working on the project already had clear ideas about the most major changes needed for Spacelab compared to Skylab.

First and foremost, of course, was correcting the failure of the micrometeroid/solar shield deployment mechanism that had nearly caused the loss of Skylab. Since the same basic shield idea would be used on Spacelab, this was obviously a very high priority. Further, since the failure had been the result of what had been believed to be a non-safety-critical part, a thorough program of safety scrubbing--rigorously analyzing the entire spacecraft for potential failure modes in all components--was begun. While this energetic approach to ensuring the correct and safe functioning of the station did divert resources from the main program, the legacy of nearly a decade of highly successful service indicates that this diversion paid off handsomely.

Next was expanding the available pressurized volume. While the hydrogen tank that had been used by Skylab for the vast majority of its pressurized volume was very large and more than adequate for that station, NASA believed that Spacelab might be in use (indeed much more active use) for considerably longer. A permanently manned duration of at least several years was believed likely, and in conjunction with the ASTP II program more volume was desired for habitation. Adding additional volume would allow the gradual extension of Spacelab capabilities as necessary, whether that was more habitat volume for extra crew or more laboratory space for materials science experiments. The most obvious way to increase the pressurized volume of the station was to use the SIVB’s oxygen tank, with over 2,500 cubic feet of volume (similar to a 40-foot shipping container). Doing so would increase the pressurized volume of the Orbital Workshop section of the station by over 25%, and would be relatively easy to accomplish on the ground. Skylab and previous "wet workshop" studies had left the tank open to vacuum due to limited resources and planned to use of the tank as a kind of "dumpster" to store garbage, but the newly developed AARDVark could supply whatever might be needed to use the tank over time and be used for trash disposal by incineration during reentry.

Another aspect of Skylab's design considered decidedly inferior by most of the engineers working on Spacelab was the arrangement for the airlock "module". Inserted between the Orbital Workshop and Multiple Docking Adapter, use of the airlock prevented anyone inside the Orbital Workshop from reaching the CSM in case of an emergency, forcing anyone not going on a spacewalk to wait it out inside the CSM. Engineers on Spacelab had designed a new Airlock Module, fitted to the emergency docking port for use. At this point, however, the politics of the station began to interfere in the design process. One of the major goals of Spacelab and a significant factor in maintaining the station's development funding through the decade was the ASTP II mission with the Soviet Union. However, the Soyuz spacecraft used by the Soviets naturally used a very different (and completely incompatible) docking system from the Apollo spacecraft, in addition to having a different internal pressure and atmospheric composition, mandating the use of a docking adapter from Soyuz to Spacelab to allow cosmonauts to pass from one to another, much like on ASTP I. Since the emergency docking port was the only one free for mounting of this adapter, and since the adapter could neither be launched on a later Apollo flight (not the last time the probe-and-drogue system would cause operational difficulties for NASA) nor with the Soyuz (the weight would prevent the Soyuz from being able to reach Spacelab at all) and thus had to be launched with Spacelab, the airlock module could not be launched with Spacelab itself. If it was, the resulting airlock-docking module stack would protrude beyond the edge of the aerodynamic fairing covering the Multiple Docking Adapter. Instead, it would have to be launched with the third Spacelab flight, after the ASTP II flight. Until then, the CSM could be temporarily used as an airlock "module"; since there were no scheduled spacewalks before the third flight, this was considered an acceptable emergency substitute.

The development of the airlock module opened up a new line of thought about how to expand Spacelab's pressurized volume--perhaps some kind of similar but larger module could be launched and maneuvered into place with the AARDV? European scientists and engineers suggested the creation of a Research Module--a small "add on," massing perhaps 14-15 metric tons, which could be launched and docked to the station in the same fashion as an AARDVark. Such a module might be able to add additional capabilities to the station even better than AARDVark flights could, and might be useful to gather information about future modular constructions (which seemed increasingly likely with the demise of US heavy lift capability). After significant study, development of the Research Module was approved by NASA to be carried out by the ESA, with a launch sometime after ASTP II. This meant that a basically European project was being subjected to the whims of the US political process, one of the first whiffs of the conflict that would slowly build between the two agencies and indeed between the United States and Europe on the subject of space flight.

Finally, near the end of the design and development process, the first elements of actual use data from Skylab began filtering in. In the main, this data confirmed the direction taken--Skylab was quite usable and most of its systems functioned well, and Spacelab would be more of the same--but it did lead to some small changes around the edges. For example, the bicycle ergometer design, with its elaborate (and as events proved, entirely counterproductive) tether system was completely changed, while a treadmill (useful both for aerobic exercise and, more importantly, for maintaining lower body strength) was added. The shower, which had proved largely useless and superfluous in orbit, where sponge baths were both easier and just as good for getting clean, would be removed. And, in a move which would be much lamented by the Astronaut Corps, the freezer (which had allowed Skylab astronauts to enjoy such delicacies as real ice cream and filet mignon) would be removed. Supplying frozen or refrigerated food would impose too large a payload penalty on the AARDVarks carrying the food, and the capability was removed early in the design process.

However, not every change to Spacelab was adding capabilities over Skylab. In a controversial move, the Apollo Telescope Mount, one of the scientific centerpieces of Skylab and a highly productive instrument, had been totally deleted from Spacelab's design. Due to the need to accommodate CSM, AARDVark, and Soyuz capsules simultaneously, Spacelab required at least three docking ports. Even in routine operations, it would be normal to have a CSM and AARDVark docked at least some of the time, and a third port was desired for emergency operations. Given a Multiple Docking Adapter design similar to Skylab's (in order to save on development costs), the only way to accommodate three ports was to delete the ATM. Since Spacelab had been sustained partially on the need to accommodate ASTP II, and with the beginnings of significant European involvement in the station, retaining the ATM was never seriously considered as an option, despite the pleas from solar physicists. Observations would simply have to revert to automated and ground-based platforms, whether or not Skylab had been more effective.
 
Okay then. But it does make you wonder how they can upgrade the design without increasing the spacecraft mass.
Well, as you pointed out, they have almost four tons of margin to play with. The Apollo capsule's pressure vessel was only 5 tons. They have plenty of margin to add an orbital module for extra capacity on-orbit. There's no need to upgrade without increasing mass if you can just add mass. :)

Though to get the Saturn IC payload up more - if you go down that line - you'll need to think about uprating the engines on the Saturn 1C. The 270s Isp(sl) of the Rocketdyne F-1A and 436s Isp(vac) of the J-2S isn't all that impressive. At this point - both OTL & ITTL - the Soviets had the NK-33 with its 298s Isp(SL) and the RD-56 with 462s Isp(vac). Though they did have more experience with liquid fueled engines than the US, so it's to be expected.
The ISP may not be incredible on either engine, but the thrust is and for sea level launch thrust beats ISP every time. The usual first mod to any rocket with more thrust than it needs is a tank stretch, allowing it to carry more fuel. It depends on the precise situation, but often for a first stage it's better to carry more fuel than to use the same amount more efficiently. However, this isn't an option for the Saturn 1C, not even with the mighty F-1A (little known fact: it is illegal to refer to the F-1 or any derivative by any other adjective than "mighty") since it only has a thrust-to-weight ratio off the pad of about 1.2, close to the minimum. ISP increases might boost the payload by a ton or two, but honestly the issue NASA has isn't that they need a 25 ton launcher instead of the 22 ton one they have, it's that they need a heavy.

I suppose the S-IVB will the the easiest stage to upgrade seeing that it had some overdesign IRRC to support the Manned Lunar Programme, so cutting some weight there is possible, which directly translates into extra payload on a 1:1 basis IMHO.
The SIVB was actually pretty light. It carries 11 kg of fuel per kg of empty mass, which is pretty incredible. Centaur D/E carried only about 6 kg per kg of empty mass. They could lighten it up some more, or increase ISP (best way would be switching to an RL-10 cluster instead of the J2S), but that's not really going to make a huge difference. It's a kg added payload per kg saved, but they don't need kilograms, they need tons.
 
So far so good. Using Skylab experience to influence the design of Spacelab. What goes in, what gets improved, and what goes out. Though I suspect some parts will look poor with the benefit of hindsight. i.e. Only having three docking modules.

I noticed you made references to NASA/ESA frictions developing, something I strongly suspected happened OTL - which aided in the development of the Ariane Launch Vehicles. This, I suppose, will be necessary to enable ESA to develop an Ariane 5-esque LV later on, to keep some real independance in it's spacefaring capabilities.



Well, as you pointed out, they have almost four tons of margin to play with. The Apollo capsule's pressure vessel was only 5 tons. They have plenty of margin to add an orbital module for extra capacity on-orbit. There's no need to upgrade without increasing mass if you can just add mass.

I always though it was 5,800Kg. Though that's for the Block II design, not the Block III variant. Say, up to 10,000Kg SM mass, and you should get 3,000-4,000Kg of N2O4/A50 propellant. That should mean 650-940m/s of delta-v with no orbital modules.



The ISP may not be incredible on either engine, but the thrust is and for sea level launch thrust beats ISP every time. The usual first mod to any rocket with more thrust than it needs is a tank stretch, allowing it to carry more fuel. It depends on the precise situation, but often for a first stage it's better to carry more fuel than to use the same amount more efficiently. However, this isn't an option for the Saturn 1C, not even with the mighty F-1A (little known fact: it is illegal to refer to the F-1 or any derivative by any other adjective than "mighty") since it only has a thrust-to-weight ratio off the pad of about 1.2, close to the minimum. ISP increases might boost the payload by a ton or two, but honestly the issue NASA has isn't that they need a 25 ton launcher instead of the 22 ton one they have, it's that they need a heavy.

810,000Kgf IIRC. And they'd be hard pressed to raise the combustion chamber pressure much further - the RD-170/171 only achieved 740,000Kgf thrust through splitting that thrust into 4 chambers per engine.

I'm well aware of the Saturn 1Bs/1Cs/Vs low T/M ratios. From 1.2 to 1.26 the instant all the first stage engines were ignited. In fact. The Ariane 40 - Ariane 4 core stages only - was unable to get itself off the pad when fully fueled and needed its 1st & 2nd stages partially drained just to get off the launch pad. And without booster stages (solid or liquid) for Saturn 1C to give it a better T/M ratio in the first 40 seconds or so, it's not going to see much improvement.

Now that fact I never knew. And I doubt many others know it either.



The SIVB was actually pretty light. It carries 11 kg of fuel per kg of empty mass, which is pretty incredible. Centaur D/E carried only about 6 kg per kg of empty mass. They could lighten it up some more, or increase ISP (best way would be switching to an RL-10 cluster instead of the J2S), but that's not really going to make a huge difference. It's a kg added payload per kg saved, but they don't need kilograms, they need tons.

Mind me asking where the bulk of your information comes from? Because for the S-IVB, I get dry mass ratios of 9%-13% depending on the source, and I was operating on the 13% basis. That's why I felt Saturn 1C upgrades could work best there, on account of the S-IVB taking not only the payload, but itself into orbit as well.

OTL, the J2X in development has the 448s Isp I feel to be achievable, but masses about double that of the J2S, so even with an increase in thrust - 112,500Kgf - 135,000Kgf - all the payload gain is gone IMHO.

None of which can change the fact that at this point, 22,000Kg is all NASA can do on a regular basis. BTW, what is that 22,000Kg payload for? In both orbital altitude and inclination.
 
I always though it was 5,800Kg. Though that's for the Block II design, not the Block III variant. Say, up to 10,000Kg SM mass, and you should get 3,000-4,000Kg of N2O4/A50 propellant. That should mean 650-940m/s of delta-v with no orbital modules.
The Comand module is 5,800 kg, my mental math truncated instead of rounding. Though I'll point out that the SM dry mass in turn is only 6,400 kg in the Block II form, and if anything it'll be lighter in Block III. Thus, with 600 m/s of delta-v (to just pick a number from thin air) and a 20 ton total mass, there's room for 4.26 tons of orbital module.

In your numbers, your 10,000 kg SM was including about 4,000 kg of fuel, so you were double-counting your entire fuel load.

little known fact: it is illegal to refer to the F-1 or any derivative by any other adjective than "mighty"

Now that fact I never knew. And I doubt many others know it either.
You might be surprised. I don't think I've seen a single non-technical description of a Saturn V launch that didn't mention "mighty" when referring to the F-1, and even in a few technical ones. If there's not a law, there's a stunning lack of creativity (or thesauruses?) among the space writing community. Surely this implies it must be a law! ;)

Mind me asking where the bulk of your information comes from? Because for the S-IVB, I get dry mass ratios of 9%-13% depending on the source, and I was operating on the 13% basis. That's why I felt Saturn 1C upgrades could work best there, on account of the S-IVB taking not only the payload, but itself into orbit as well.
When I did the calculation that yielded a 9% mass fraction, it came from Wikipedia's article on the SIVB and this part of the Apollo Flight Journal about Apollo 7. However, whether there a couple kg of extra payload to be found in SIVB reductions or not, it roughly boils down to what you said:

None of which can change the fact that at this point, 22,000Kg is all NASA can do on a regular basis. BTW, what is that 22,000Kg payload for? In both orbital altitude and inclination.

From calculations on Silverbird:
24,550 kg to 185x185 circular orbit at 28.5 degree inclination from Canaveral
22,880 kg to ASTP orbit (~237 km circular orbit at 51.6 degrees)
20,600 kg to Skylab orbit (~430 km circular orbit at 51.6 degrees)

I'm not sure which orbit Spacelab will initially be in, whether it'll be the same as Skylab or ASTP. It may initially be parked at the lower ASTP orbit for ASTP II then later boosted to 440 km for drag reduction afterwards.
 
The Comand module is 5,800 kg, my mental math truncated instead of rounding. Though I'll point out that the SM dry mass in turn is only 6,400 kg in the Block II form, and if anything it'll be lighter in Block III. Thus, with 600 m/s of delta-v (to just pick a number from thin air) and a 20 ton total mass, there's room for 4.26 tons of orbital module.

In your numbers, your 10,000 kg SM was including about 4,000 kg of fuel, so you were double-counting your entire fuel load.

No I didn't. I included the 3,000-4000Kg of N2O4/A50 propellant as part of the SM mass, and based the delta-v budget on that. Which gave me the 650-940 m/s I showed you. Adding a 4,000Kg Orbital Module will cut it to 570-810 m/s - if using the numbers I gave.



From calculations on Silverbird:
24,550 kg to 185x185 circular orbit at 28.5 degree inclination from Canaveral
22,880 kg to ASTP orbit (~237 km circular orbit at 51.6 degrees)
20,600 kg to Skylab orbit (~430 km circular orbit at 51.6 degrees)

I'm not sure which orbit Spacelab will initially be in, whether it'll be the same as Skylab or ASTP. It may initially be parked at the lower ASTP orbit for ASTP II then later boosted to 440 km for drag reduction afterwards.

Well that will all depend on whether or not TKS is in service by that point. If it's in service in time, you can put it in the higher orbit since TKS should have the delta-v budget necessary for reaching that orbit. If not, it will have to go in the ASTP I orbit to be reached by Soyuz.
 
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No I didn't. I included the 3,000-4000Kg of N2O4/A50 propellant* as part of the SM mass, and based the delta-v budget on that. Which gave me the 650-940 m/s I showed you. Adding a 4,000Kg Orbital Module will cut it to 570-810 m/s - if using the numbers I gave.
Ah, mis-interpreted how you'd done your calculations. 500 m/s should be plenty.
Well that will all depend on how whether or not TKS is in service by that point. If it's in service in time, you can put it in the higher orbit since TKS should have the delta-v budget necessary for reaching that orbit. If not, it will have to go in the ASTP I orbit to be reached by Soyuz.
TKS won't be into service until about '80, and ASTP II is in '78, so it's Soyuz. Sounds like Spacelab will initially launch to 230x230 at 51.6 degrees.
 
So far so good. Using Skylab experience to influence the design of Spacelab. What goes in, what gets improved, and what goes out. Though I suspect some parts will look poor with the benefit of hindsight. i.e. Only having three docking modules.

Well, of course--there are plenty of things wrong with Skylab, too. But this is more right, which I think people will focus on.

I noticed you made references to NASA/ESA frictions developing, something I strongly suspected happened OTL - which aided in the development of the Ariane Launch Vehicles. This, I suppose, will be necessary to enable ESA to develop an Ariane 5-esque LV later on, to keep some real independance in it's spacefaring capabilities.

Very much so. The ESA and NASA had a great deal of (quiet, behind-closed-doors) fighting during the late 1970s and early 1980s because NASA tended to treat the Europeans like little children who should just follow mummy and be happy about what they got. They weren't getting much because the Shuttle program was sucking all the oxygen out the room, but they should be happy with it! The attitude isn't much different here...
 
OTL in the classic "Space Race" days of the 1960s, did no one in the USA establishments consider the wisdom of pooling the efforts of systematic space development between the NATO allies? And did no one in Europe seek to persuade the Americans to internationalize (within the Western alliance, not say via the UN) the programs as way of leveraging their assets by "buying in" to the an expanded American program and making it a Euro-American one?

I can see all the reasons why such efforts might be futile of course. Space tech and military tech are closely related for one thing; insofar as DoD was a driver and enabler, their brass would not want to be more encumbered politically than they already were by domestic US politics; Europeans in the expanded program would lead to some European scrutiny and interference with US military programs.

Then there would be reasons of sentiment, on both sides--the Apollo effort was among other things meant to showcase that the USA could do; drawing in European nations would dilute that message. Vice versa, Europeans had been under US tutelage and direction for some decades and many must have resented this and would want a Euro program to show they didn't need to follow some Yankee program to succeed.

And of course the US program, being a crash effort at a successful moonshot, wasn't really carefully considering the future and looking ahead to a sustained effort to follow up, which is where consolidation of the programs would come in handy.

Still, I think in retrospect it's odd I can't associate a single voice on either side of the Atlantic proposing a union of efforts.

With the international rivalries, we get the potential for alternate systems being developed, which is good. But OTL we also had a lot of abortive effort that meant the potentials often weren't developed.

Hence the cheering for a more rapidly successful and more ambitious Euro-program.

It's too late to warp your timeline into a collective Atlantic one (Atlantic/Pacific if Japan gets dealt in) nor would I want you to go that way, at least not yet!
 
OTL in the classic "Space Race" days of the 1960s, did no one in the USA establishments consider the wisdom of pooling the efforts of systematic space development between the NATO allies? And did no one in Europe seek to persuade the Americans to internationalize (within the Western alliance, not say via the UN) the programs as way of leveraging their assets by "buying in" to the an expanded American program and making it a Euro-American one?

Nope. The dynamics didn't lean that way. Now, that's not to say that the Europeans weren't building satellites for the Americans to launch on American rockets...but there was never any contemplated program merger. The Americans would (rightfully, I think) see that as essentially the Europeans trying to ride their coattails, and the Europeans anyways were in the tail end of imperialism and wouldn't have really gotten anything from being formally a part of NASA that they didn't anyways from being relatively close allies of the US and later developing their own capabilities--in fact, given OTL American behavior and the great success of the Ariane, they would have given up quite a lot.

I can see all the reasons why such efforts might be futile of course. Space tech and military tech are closely related for one thing; insofar as DoD was a driver and enabler, their brass would not want to be more encumbered politically than they already were by domestic US politics; Europeans in the expanded program would lead to some European scrutiny and interference with US military programs.

True. There was also a surprising level of paranoia about the Germans, even as late as the '70s and '80s (look up OTRAG sometime).

Then there would be reasons of sentiment, on both sides--the Apollo effort was among other things meant to showcase that the USA could do; drawing in European nations would dilute that message. Vice versa, Europeans had been under US tutelage and direction for some decades and many must have resented this and would want a Euro program to show they didn't need to follow some Yankee program to succeed.

And of course the US program, being a crash effort at a successful moonshot, wasn't really carefully considering the future and looking ahead to a sustained effort to follow up, which is where consolidation of the programs would come in handy.

Even then...not really. Internationalizing the whole program means that it becomes jeopardized by any one country not going along (witness the Eurozone lately). Admittedly, given the relative level of resources (in terms of money) supplied, this would be less of a concern for your agency. But it would still be a problem.

Still, I think in retrospect it's odd I can't associate a single voice on either side of the Atlantic proposing a union of efforts.

With the international rivalries, we get the potential for alternate systems being developed, which is good. But OTL we also had a lot of abortive effort that meant the potentials often weren't developed.

Well, a lot of that was due to the end of the Cold War. ESA was just gearing up to do awesome stuff when the wall fell and they suddenly had to spend a bunch of money (especially Germany, one of the Big Three contributors at that time) integrating and dealing with Eastern Europe.
 
Post 12: European Involvement in Spacelab and Europa Improvements
Having touched on Skylab mods and prep last week, we return to the European program for this week's Eye's Turned Skyward update. Sorry this one ended up a bit on the short side, a lot of what was to be in it has ended up in other updates.

Eyes Turned Skyward, Post #12:

Over the two years following the foundation of the ESA, some business continued on track from its predecessors, ELDO and ESRO. Payloads originally developed by ESRO began to be transitioned to Europa 2, launching from France’s Kourou launch site in French Guiana. A newly unified engineering team began work on exploring further options for Europa evolution, continuing to expand its capabilities. Additionally, options for cooperation with the United States on their Spacelab station were explored.

The Spacelab station was always intended to serve an international role, serving as a site for the second Apollo-Soyuz Test Project. In this second phase, Soyuz capsules would dock to the Spacelab station, and the combined crews--US and Soviet, would work together for a total of 90 days between two missions, making use of the new station’s expanded lab volume in the new annex constructed inside the original S-IVB stage’s liquid oxygen tank. European space agencies had been in discussion with NASA about becoming part of this effort almost since the founding of the ESA, and by 1975, they had been allowed to join as a junior partner. In exchange for support including developing the European Research Module, a small 15-ton supplemental lab space intended to add (among other things) telescopes and other astronomical instruments and demonstrate modular assembly techniques for possible use in future stations, the ESA would be allowed to send several astronauts to the station on post-ASTP II flight as third-seat scientist-pilots as well as send up experiments on the AARDV supply flights to be used on-orbit. The ESA was interested in doing more, but NASA wasn’t sure it could offer anything else during the first years of the station’s life.

The reason for this was simple: Spacelab’s schedule was already stressed by the ASTP project. Adding other international partners created additional pressures on crew transport, cargo supply, and ground-side elements like training, since the ESA’s astronaut selections would do as much if not more training with NASA alongside American astronauts than they would in their home countries. Partially this was because NASA facilities had equipment and simulators the ESA couldn’t afford to build for just a few astronauts. It was also a way for NASA to ensure that ESA’s astronauts would mesh well with their American colleagues and potential crewmates, part of a goal of minimizing culture clash.

Partly in response to their nascent manned program, the ESA was also exploring ways to expand the capabilities of the Europa launch vehicle. After its troublesome start, the vehicle had settled in and built up a decent list of launch successes, including several ESA science missions that might otherwise have had to fly on other nation’s launchers. However, even the Europa 2 variant was only capable of placing 1200 kg into LEO or placing 360 kg on its way to GEO. European engineers hoped to continue to expand Europe’s capabilities, and began work on a new revision, Europa 2-TA which would add two French Black Diamant solid rocket boosters on either side of the Blue Streak first stage, allowing an increase in payload to just under 2 tons with similar increases in capability to geosynchronous orbits. However, Europa 3 would have to see much larger changes. In order for more substantial increases to be possible, either a new first stage would have to be developed or far more powerful boosters would have to be added. The debate over the direction to take the Europa 3 evolution would bitterly divide the ESA even as the agency’s first astronauts were training for their role in the American’s Spacelab “International Outreach Program.”
 
Ah, internal politics. Don't you just love it? The kind of stuff that makes you say:

"I know! I'll ditch this experienced designer and hire a total amatuer instead! Then I'll use sub-standard systems to keep everything good! After that, I'll kick the bucket, leaving this boozer to clean up the mess!" :p:p


As for Europa upgrades. I took another look at it. The Blue Streak 1st stage had a serious problem with it that would make substantial upgrades at best, extremely difficult. It was pressure stabalised with tank walls of 0.48mm thickness. This means that even small solid rockets on the sides could be too much for it, while larger solid and liquid boosters are a definate no. This is one serious issue that they'll have to face, and a major potential friction point for them.

Still, I'm very much under the impression that things will work out mostly better for ESA ITTL - or at least, they do more. Future updates can't come soon enough.
 
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