Space Shuttle, meet Skylab...

It's worth noting that you probably need some major butteflies in the Shuttle program to make this possible--Skylab will re-enter in late 1979 without a reboost, so if Shuttle isn't there to do it, Skylab's coming down. The plan was only viable when it was hoped Shuttle would be ready in '79, but issues with both the SSME and the TPS caused a two-year delay to 1981. Thus, you either need a different Shuttle development program to have Shuttle ready in time, or you need an earlier reboost mission--perhaps one of the proposed Skylab 4 flights, which were proposed to involve reboosting the station.

There was an unmanned version of the Skylab reboost module that would have been perfectly practical, though that gets things well into committing to additional hardware right when the Shuttle program is at its ugliest financially.

You probably also want to look very closely at ASTP if you're thinking about Skylab B. There was some definite talk about using that way, but the logistics weren't great and it was pretty clear ASTP was going to be a one shot from fairly early on. Nonetheless it's probably the best shot of getting the station flown without other major changes; if it docked with a Salyut things get very complicated very quickly, but I could pretty easily see ASTP being conducted as a pair of missions, with Apollo visiting a Salyut and a Soyuz visiting Skylab B (AFAIK the Russians couldn't have made Skylab A's orbit at all). You would probably even have enough delta v to get both stations on a single flight (Salyut 7 to Mir and back was done once, and Apollo had quite a lot of thrust to spare even with the partially fueled Saturn I launched orbital vehicles).
 
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My concern is with how ratshit Skylab is by 1979, things like 2 out of it's 3 gyrostabilisers were broken as was a lot of other stuff. Shuttle missions would spend a lot of time just patching Skylab up rather than getting useful work out of her.
 
My concern is with how ratshit Skylab is by 1979, things like 2 out of it's 3 gyrostabilisers were broken as was a lot of other stuff. Shuttle missions would spend a lot of time just patching Skylab up rather than getting useful work out of her.

not quite ratshit

two gyrostabilisers down, RCS fuel almost empty, a short-circuit in Solar Power system (bypassed by the last Crew)
the station was depressurized to 0,14 bars (normal hibernation Mode)
ATM had no more film-canister
onboard stored were:
Supply (no food) for a 22 day mission
2721 kg water (for 90 day mission)
775 kg oxygen (skylab atmosphere for 200 day)
1253 kg nitrogen (skylab atmosphere for 200 day)
272 kg RCS fuel (nitrogen gas)

the General plan to reactivate Skylab

Phase one 1979
the Shuttle had bring the TRS to Skylab
the Teleoperator retrieval System would dock with Skylab stabilize it and push it in higher Orbit

Phase two between 1979 and 1984
A Shuttle docks with help of interface module (IM) with Skylab for a Inspection/repair mission
this IM has 6 gyrostabilisers and new Communication system what use the TDRS Satellites
the crew will after inspection, made upgrade on various subsystem,
and refill oxygen and nitrogen tanks for skylab atmosphere

Phase Three 1984
a Space shuttle bring Syklab a new Power module with 25 KW solarpowercells
to give the Shuttle 30 day stay time on Skylab
the Shuttle will have Experiments in the cargobay, while Skylab serve as housing area for Shuttle crew and Depot

Phase Four after 1984
installation of new systems and resupply module (RM), put Skylab back into a full working space station
were the Crew (up to seven astronauts) stay for 90 day in orbit
the Shuttle would bring Crew, RM and Science Module (modified Spacelab module) and dock on Skylab
 

Archibald

Banned
That's pretty well ASB. The shuttle ultimately only got political support after it became THE Space Transportation System. This want about competing with Ariane per se remember, competing with Ariane was part of a hunt for payloads to keep the launch rate up, which was the only way to bring costs anywhere near what was claimed. Any time before Challenger abandoning satellite was tantamount to declaring the system a failure, at least as far as Congress was concerned.

Good reasonning, with a little flaw. It never happened to you that NASA arguments about flight rates might have been "dishonest" (rude word perhaps. Let's say "grossly inflated" instead) in order to obtain the shuttle - and secure the future of manned space flight after Apollo ?

Once NASA got the shuttle (January 5 1972) it could never be stopped. Not even Carter - and Mondale - managed to kill the project. Opposition to the shuttle in Congress pretty much collapsed after 1974.
 
Originally, of course, it did. But michel van is talking about a plan that involves massive fixes and upgrades and shuttle supply runs rather than apollo.

Exactly. Although Skylab could only support three astronauts OTL, it was very large, and there was no particular reason that, with upgrades and more importantly additional power and module space, it couldn't have supported more people.

Good reasonning, with a little flaw. It never happened to you that NASA arguments about flight rates might have been "dishonest" (rude word perhaps. Let's say "grossly inflated" instead) in order to obtain the shuttle - and secure the future of manned space flight after Apollo ?

The difficulty is that NASA management believed those figures...even if not quite to the 60/year level, until Challenger they wanted to at least reach 24/year, and 1986 was supposed to be "the" year for that (now, their schedule was pretty ridiculous, with turnaround times of a few weeks in some cases...but that's what they were aiming for). Anything more would have required an expansion of Michoud or new manufacturing facilities for the External Tanks, of course.
 
Originally, of course, it did. But michel van is talking about a plan that involves massive fixes and upgrades and shuttle supply runs rather than apollo.

yes, it needed massive upgrade in Skylab aging systems and a Logistic module (LM) in size used by Shuttle for ISS.
the Martin Marietta proposal LM had supplies for 480 man-days
for 7 astronaut crew, there were proposal to build additional floor in upper free volume of OWS.

By the way i forgot the source on this proposal i have mention
Skylab Reuse Study Final report, september 1978
Martin Marietta Corp.
NASA contract NAS8-32918
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19790075817_1979075817.pdf

But there is a better Report by McDonnell Douglas, the guys who build Skylab.
also offert it a in deep look on Skylab internal systems !
Skylab Reuse Study, Final Report and reference data, part 1. December 1, 1978
NAS8-32917
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19790011998_1979011998.pdf
Part 2
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19790011999_1979011999.pdf
 
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