Thoughts about Stephen Baxters Novels "Voyage" and "Titan"

I came to thinking about the Books Voyage and Titan, both written by Stephen Baxter as part of the "Nasa-Trilogy", because of this 3-year-old thread: https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/stephen-baxter’s-“voyage”-thoughts-on-the-aftermath.468023/#post-23208730 (Again: sorry for pulling it out of it´s grave instead of opening a new discussion in the first place). While the original discussion was meant primarily for the earlier novel i think that Baxter should have made a real connection between those novels, not only naming those stand-alone-books as part of the NASA-Trilogy. Personally i will not include "Moonseed" into my thought out of multple reasons: 1st: There was no Apollo 18 in Voyage, 2nd i didn´t read that novel in full and knowing it´s basic story isn´t enough to go into a discussion about it and 3rd: Destroying a whole Planet or two by somekind of nanites feels to far off the scale of events we see in the first two novels (excluding the end of Titan). The following text will be largely a rewrite of my comment on the older thread. And: I am not a native speaker so i like to apologize for possible large mistakes.

Voyage wasn´t such a bad novel in the first place if you ask me, but Stephen Baxter presented (in my eyes) some pretty bad habbits that still existed in novels written decades later: Describing technology and science in a very basic way... especially when you work with Apollo- / post-Apollo technology you really should describe what you are using, just because there were so many ideas, concepts and actual build hardware in existence back then. But still he established a pretty powerfull NASA that never lost it´s Superheavy-Lifters. He really should have presented at least some guidance for the future after the Ares-flight.... programs that would follow on or even surprise funding for another mission to mars. Landing some people on the red planet should give a huge PR-Boost for the program. Yes: The Apollos and the Shuttle became "boring routine" for the public pretty fast until desaster struck, but there were no landings on another planet. I really think this should have been played out in a better way. And i really like the idea to use the MEM-family as a replacement for Apollo (As used by @Ronpur in his https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/beyond-ares-a-sequel-to-baxters-voyage.407337/). I like Apollo, especially how it was upgraded in Eyes Turned Skywards, but let´s be serious: When you go interplanetary it´s not a bad thing to have a lot more Volume for your crew.. and possibly a larger crew anyways. In Short: Something in the size of Starliner (Just the size, not that exact flawed capsule) or Orion.

And i really think that Stephen Baxter should have used this Universe he build there for his later novel. I read and heard a lot of times since i read Titan that it would be the worst Novel by Baxter to this day.... and i have to agree. That thing was a shitshow (sorry for that language) that could have been prevented if he would have used the NASA he build in Voyage. Instead he wrote a "Nasa-Trilogy" that´s not a trilogy and i am not interested in buying and reading the third book, just because the second was so bad. He even used the Saturn V in Titan... the original ones that layed rusting in the rain for over 30 years when the new program came online. What did he think? I am no engineer but to me that pretty much looks like one of the worst possible ideas you could have regarding to spaceflight. I know they fired up some F-1 and J-2 engines when the Constellation-Project and the transition towards SLS were a thing, but if i am recalling it correctly those were a) engines that were stored in a much better way then the Saturn V´s and b) that they were completely overhauled before firing. When they designed the "Minor Upgrade" to the "21st Century J-2X" they ended up with something closer to a clean sheet design than the original engine. That leads me to asking: It it even possible to rebuilt those old systems? Especially the electronics would have to be replaced by a completely new design if there isn´t a miracle and the originals are still fixeable.

Using the "Voyage-NASA / V-NASA" he could have taken Saturn VB´s or a much safer version with LRB´s to propel a more or less purpose build deep space vehicle to orbit. And he could have given the NERVA a second (or in the case of the Voyage-Novel even third) chance, at least for a heavy cargo mission that brings a base and/ or enough fuel towards Titan for the return trip of the crew. And if there is a need to keep with the attempted killing of the Titan-Spacecraft-Crew while they ride to orbit i would just swap out that modified X-15 with a hypersonic missile or a uncrewed test vehicle.

Someone could ask: What´up with reusable technology? In Voyage the Shuttle was ( In my eyes rightfully) dumped based on to many unproven novel technologys. So they evolved the Saturns, okay: That´s exactly what should have been done in my eyes for the next 20-30 years after Apollo. The discussion about a Shuttle or Shuttle-like System should have come back into full swing by the time the Ares Crew was on it´s way... technology doesn´t stops and many things that were a bad idea earlier could become great ones with the knowledge we have 20 years later. And even when there is a Shuttle, the need for balistic capsules doesn´t have to get lost that way, they still remain a good choice for traveling beyond low earth orbit. In my eyes getting somekind of a fully reusable shuttle or reusable first stages for the Saturn´s / a partly reusable Saturn-replacement would be the right thing to go forward after the known and reliably technology used in Saturn VB has done it´s service to bring the first humans to mars. The F-1 engine would likely have to go away or at least would have to be aided by smaller, less powerfull engines when it goes towards building a flyback-booster that lands "SpaceX- or DC-X-style". Falcon 9 uses just 1 of it´s 9 engines and even then there has to be a suicide burn because the throttled down engine still has to much power to just come down in a slow and soft way without getting up again. So it needs either an additional set of landing engines or a replacement of the F-1´s with a larger number of much less powerfull engines.

And regarding to the soviets: I agree with some saying in the original discussion that they need further descriptions and further missions, finally leading to a much greater involvement into the Titan-Project than basically just selling some Topaz-reactors. I like that he included them in the way he did in Voyage, but i am not a fan of the fact that they were left alone sometime in the novel. The N1, N11 and the whole project should have been used in a better way. And i really think a follow on should have included further cooperations, perhaps a Ares 2-mission that includes a Cosmonaut and somekind of a pre-delivered science plattform launched by the UDSSR or Russian Federation to the surface of the planet. A really small base if you like to name it as one. Space travel is something that needs cooperation if you like to go further then to LEO in a sustainable way and it can connect different nationalitys in giving them a common goal: Building a space program that keeps your own space travelers and the ones of your partners alive and get a lot more knowledge out of their missions than you could do by doing everything alone. In short: You have to learn to work together and you can use spacetravel as a highly usefull diplomatic tool.

I really think that Ares should have been made into an ongoing project instead of this expensive one-and-done thing Baxter delivered to us. It was right to do that in the first place, but not to keep with that... and this brings me to another final bad habbit of him as a writer:
He likes to cut storys in a way that you feel like a guillautine fell off the roof and killed a living story that still has a few more pages incomming. There was no "First human on another planet´s surface"-speech, no description of their surface activities, no safe return, no parades... just NOTHING. That wasn´t even a good cliffhanger, that´s just unfinished business. He did much better regarding to that in Titan then he did in Voyage.

So what do you think about this and how would you evolve NASA, politics etc. build in Voyage to use inplace of the many crazy ideas presented in Titan? How should we bring characters out of both novels together and which one should just be gone? (In my eyes the president in Titan was one of the many things going to much over the top of the wildness-scale so he should be rewritten. Forcing 21st century society back into the middle age (in the way it was) while keeping at least some parts of a space program just doesn´t goes together in my mind).

This is NOT meant to become a copy of Ronpurs story (https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/beyond-ares-a-sequel-to-baxters-voyage.407337/), it includes things i couldn´t imagine to do in a largely different way if i would write a timeline connecting and rewriting both novels, especially the evolution of the Saturn´s.... despite that i would like to replace his Saturn IC with the one from the Eyes Turned Skywards-timeline (I am not a fan of putting a human onto a solid rocket motor if it´s preventable in any way).

Finally: What do you think about my thoughts and how would you go along when you could rewrite both books into a "real" consistent book-series?
 
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So i thought a bit about the Saturn´s and how to go forward with it:

At first i will get to the Saturn IB, as it was done in Eyes Turned Skywards and as it would probably have been done if Von Braun would have gotten the Greenlight to do it: This tanks Cluster and the 8 engines just have to go away and be replaced with a single F-1, so we basically would get the ETS Saturn IC as a Core. I say Core because i would use that thing in conjuction with options to use up to 4 Booster which could either be 1205´s or some H-1 driven Liquid fueled boosters (Basically shortened Delta I tankage with one or two H-1 deirvatives, i don´t use the RS-27 because it seems to be unclear if there was a Delta II-family in Voyage. But this possible H-1E would basically be the RS-27). This would give some flexibility and it would lessen the need of Saturn VB´s or Ronpurs VA (his variant without the SRB´s) and it would give an option to launcher really heavy crewed vehicles into orbit without SRB-usage right away. (And it get´s the same J-2S Block II i will describe later)

Next comes the Saturn V-family represented by the "official" VB and Ronpurs VA. Both of the would be upgraded to something of a Block II-standard that does the following things:
-Refresh the electronics to get better performance, loose even more weight and bring in better energy efficiency to lessen the need for cooling systems and to bring down costs with COTS components where possible.
-Introduce weight reduction by the usage of aluminium-lithium alloys where possible (mostly into the MS-II and MS-IVB stages)
-Give the J-2S a Block II upgrade that´s meant to reduce part count further and introduce new alloys and refresh the production process.
-Design something like an "Voyage F-1B" that get´s the same simplyfications regarding to part count, and a simpler combustion chamber, and it will use the then standard knowledge in material sciences. Don´t forget: The basic F-1 design is over 20 years old when the Ares-Crew lands on the Martian Surface). This project should go better then OTL F-1B has because of two reasons: The knowledge about the original design is still fresh and in use instead of beeing out of use for more then 30 years and there just isn´t something like the RS-25 laying around that could be used instead... together with a completely different first stage that isn´t even able to launch itself from the pad... yes i am talking about you SLS.

Even when this Voyage-F-1B looses some performance while getting MUCH cheaper to be built, the performance of the refreshed vehicle overall should stay basically the same because of the weight reductions. The solids should stay the same as on the Block I version, just because they seemed to work out after the first VB´s RUD (which wasn´t an SRB-failure but a design flaw in the launch sequencing). When it goes to solids i say: Never change a running system unless you really really need to.

And later on i would go with basically the Saturn-Shuttle proposal: Using a somewhat smaller Buran-Style Shuttle without Ascent-Engines on it and hanging it Buran-Style onto a reworked and stretched Saturn VB Block II first stage. This Saturn VS would have only 4 of the new F-1B´s and this ones would be moved off the center axis of the first stage to stay under the center of mass for the whole stack and there would be just an aerodynamic cone housing the electronic brains of the launcher.

Later the VS would get it´s own Block II upgrade to become a flyback booster but i haven´t really thought about that yet.
 
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With Titan, the whole "let's use all the Saturn V's lying around and launch them" is one of the most "are you actually serious" moments, but is indicative of the rest of the book, the space shuttle is dead from Columbia (crash landing), the International Space Station is a disaster, as delays caused construction to be pushed back to the point where it gets abandoned, while NASA tries to form a mission that will reignite public interest in space.......

By sending people to Saturn's moon Titan, a place where the tonnage in fuel just to get there is ridiculous, even more so with a shuttle

The whole point of using the Saturn V's is due to the fact that

  1. The Saturn V is one of the only heavy lift vehicles actually built by the states still around
  2. The hardware is BUILT and proven
  3. The cost of developing and the political will to develop a new booster is basically non-existent
  4. There's more than 1 left lying around, (SA-514,515,500D,500F), the latter two being harder to bring up to spec, but it theoretically could be done.
  5. No More Space Shuttles
  6. The F-1 can be improved as it pushes the LEO payload per flight to the point where the required fuel for the Discovery stack can be launched.
And don't forget that they basically convert the fleet into Shuttle-C's (Enterprise, Atlantis, plus the STA Pathfinder, and the MPTA)

I think what I'm trying to say is, using old Saturn V's is a hair-brained scheme to be sure, the whole book is a hair-brained scheme, due to the fact that is a crash program, NASA does not have the resources or the political capital to fire nuclear rocket stages into space (Cassini had protests due to the RTG on board, same with apollo 13), they do it with what they have on hand.
As a character in the book says"going to titan on chemicals is stupid"
Oh, and they have to launch before the next president so funding for resupply and retrieval missions go through, as he hates NASA and plans on putting the Ptolemy solar system in use, teaching creationism in schools, and turning the immoral united states back into the light of god.

Oh, Wait.................
the guy wins
take a guess what he does




The book left me with one question though, did Endeavour come back to earth or abandoned in orbit, as the crew gets to Discovery on it, and doesn't get mentioned after



Also just me but it being called "The NASA trilogy" doesn't bother me too much, as its more of a show of what NASA could do, especially under ridiculous circumstances across multiple situations
 
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With Titan, the whole "let's use all the Saturn V's lying around and launch them" is one of the most "are you actually serious" moments, but is indicative of the rest of the book, the space shuttle is dead from Columbia (crash landing), the International Space Station is a disaster, as delays caused construction to be pushed back to the point where it gets abandoned, while NASA tries to form a mission that will reignite public interest in space.......

By sending people to Saturn's moon Titan, a place where the tonnage in fuel just to get there is ridiculous, even more so with a shuttle

The whole point of using the Saturn V's is due to the fact that

  1. The Saturn V is one of the only heavy lift vehicles actually built by the states still around
  2. The hardware is BUILT and proven
  3. The cost of developing and the political will to develop a new booster is basically non-existent
  4. There's more than 1 left lying around, (SA-514,515,500D,500F), the latter two being harder to bring up to spec, but it theoretically could be done.
  5. No More Space Shuttles
  6. The F-1 can be improved as it pushes the LEO payload per flight to the point where the required fuel for the Discovery stack can be launched.
And don't forget that they basically convert the fleet into Shuttle-C's (Enterprise, Atlantis, plus the STA Pathfinder, and the MPTA)

I think what I'm trying to say is, using old Saturn V's is a hair-brained scheme to be sure, the whole book is a hair-brained scheme, due to the fact that is a crash program, NASA does not have the resources or the political capital to fire nuclear rocket stages into space (Cassini had protests due to the RTG on board, same with apollo 13), they do it with what they have on hand.
As a character in the book says"going to titan on chemicals is stupid"
Oh, and they have to launch before the next president so funding for resupply and retrieval missions go through, as he hates NASA and plans on putting the Ptolemy solar system in use, teaching creationism in schools, and turning the immoral united states back into the light of god.

Oh, Wait.................
the guy wins
take a guess what he does




The book left me with one question though, did Endeavour come back to earth or abandoned in orbit, as the crew gets to Discovery on it, and doesn't get mentioned after



Also just me but it being called "The NASA trilogy" doesn't bother me too much, as its more of a show of what NASA could do, especially under ridiculous circumstances across multiple situations
There’s a mention of something like “we’ll see it (Endeavour) back here soon” that I took to imply Endeavour returned to Earth. I can’t remember if the Titan crew was the only crew or whether Endeavour had others. I would assume a dedicated CDR,PLT,and MS2,with the Titan crew as passengers.
 
With Titan, the whole "let's use all the Saturn V's lying around and launch them" is one of the most "are you actually serious" moments, but is indicative of the rest of the book, the space shuttle is dead from Columbia (crash landing), the International Space Station is a disaster, as delays caused construction to be pushed back to the point where it gets abandoned, while NASA tries to form a mission that will reignite public interest in space.......
Exactly, not even NASA alone but international Spaceflight as a whole isn´t more then a big mess (okay, you could say this about a lot of things in our actual space industry to but at least we have two working space stations in orbit and (finally) somekind of a manned-lunar-project spooling up.
The whole point of using the Saturn V's is due to the fact that

  1. The Saturn V is one of the only heavy lift vehicles actually built by the states still around
  2. The hardware is BUILT and proven
  3. The cost of developing and the political will to develop a new booster is basically non-existent
  4. There's more than 1 left lying around, (SA-514,515,500D,500F), the latter two being harder to bring up to spec, but it theoretically could be done.
  5. No More Space Shuttles
  6. The F-1 can be improved as it pushes the LEO payload per flight to the point where the required fuel for the Discovery stack can be launched.
And don't forget that they basically convert the fleet into Shuttle-C's (Enterprise, Atlantis, plus the STA Pathfinder, and the MPTA)
Oh i know that and as crazy as that thought is: Out of the situation Baxter has build up before that decision was made, i really think it was a logic idea.... if there really is a need for the mission to titan.
I think what I'm trying to say is, using old Saturn V's is a hair-brained scheme to be sure, the whole book is a hair-brained scheme, due to the fact that is a crash program, NASA does not have the resources or the political capital to fire nuclear rocket stages into space (Cassini had protests due to the RTG on board, same with apollo 13), they do it with what they have on hand.
Exactly but i still like the idea of a crewed mission to titan itself... but i hate what happened to NASA and US and global politics. As you said: It was hair-brained. He did a great job with the earlier "Voyage" (besides the fact that i still think he cut it too short). And that NASA is what´s needed to get to Titan.
Oh, and they have to launch before the next president so funding for resupply and retrieval missions go through, as he hates NASA and plans on putting the Ptolemy solar system in use, teaching creationism in schools, and turning the immoral united states back into the light of god.
Yes, that´s absolute crap.... i really don´t know how he thought that this is a good idea AND how he came to not even write in some discussion about resupply-missions by OTHER countrys. Spaceflight is a human adventure and getting to Titan and back would have been a huge success for humankind.
Also just me but it being called "The NASA trilogy" doesn't bother me too much, as its more of a show of what NASA could do, especially under ridiculous circumstances across multiple situations
Yeah, i can understand that point of view too. It´s just that to me a trilogy has to have continuity threw the whole book series. If it would be known just as "NASA-series" i wouldn´t see a problem.
There’s a mention of something like “we’ll see it (Endeavour) back here soon” that I took to imply Endeavour returned to Earth. I can’t remember if the Titan crew was the only crew or whether Endeavour had others. I would assume a dedicated CDR,PLT,and MS2,with the Titan crew as passengers.
Exactly, that Shuttle brought them up there before becoming the (most likely) last crewed NASA-mission to return to our planet.
 
I will say my favorite part of Titan, is the loss of interest in space, as it kind of makes sense, at the beginning, people are cautious about any subject that will get media attention, the mission initially gains the public imagination, until it launches and there's 7 years just to get to Saturn, and by then the world is too sad for people to care.
One of the characters even talks about the press conference before launch and how questioning took a dark turn, as a reporter asked something about the gravity assist from the earth and how it might affect its orbit, to which the panel joked, instead of giving a good answer, then questioning gets into shooting down discovery if it will impact the earth due to the nuclear reactors.

I don't know but it stuck with me for some reason, I think due to the fact that the public is largely in the "I don't care" section, any positive engagement is good, but with NASA and other space agencies being "out there scientists" in the public image, and the accessibility of the information to the public is Steep, Landing on the Moon is one thing, but putting more men to learn about the moon on the moon is boring as hell. And most of the time, the person explaining any important space discovery will often be overspoken by a news anchor due to the fact that their explanation is way too complicated.
This is why I have a hard time believing the space alternate histories like scientific America, (there's a good one that ends with Pete Conrad in a Lunar Lava Tunnel but I forget the name), yes its amazing, yes apollo continued but no, I believe the public would have gotten bored and NASA defunded like OTL, it would take longer but eventually funding for all the "next steps" will dry out, yes well have more lunar missions, maybe even a base if the soviets say they will, but any next step will be constantly delayed due to penny-pinching and operating costs.
In OTL NERVA wasn't canceled because it was bad, but because 1. it's political suicide, even more so if it fails, and 2. because it was a next-step program that is made to go to mars.
There's a reason why for the last 40 years space policy has been "we'll be to mars in 20 years" after SEI
 
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I will say my favorite part of Titan, is the loss of interest in space, as it kind of makes sense, at the beginning, people are cautious about any subject that will get media attention, the mission initially gains the public imagination, until it launches and there's 7 years just to get to Saturn, and by then the world is too sad for people to care.
I agress, that´s an aspect i can agree to, just because it´s what already happened multiple times. It happened while the later Apollos still flew to the moon, it happened after the early Shuttle-Missions and it defenitely happened between the late 90´s and the middle of the last decade.
as a reporter asked something about the gravity assist from the earth and how it might affect its orbit, to which the panel joked, instead of giving a good answer, then questioning gets into shooting down discovery if it will impact the earth due to the nuclear reactors.
Yeah, that pretty much reflects the failures in the PR-culture that are only corrected now.
I believe the public would have gotten bored and NASA defunded like OTL, it would take longer but eventually funding for all the "next steps" will dry out, yes well have more lunar missions, maybe even a base if the soviets say they will, but any next step will be constantly delayed due to penny-pinching and operating costs.
Yeah you are probably right.... as long as there isn´t really good PR that shows off what spaceflight can do for humanity and what it can do with the support of the people. In my opinion there hasn´t been done nearly enough to tell the people what a big evolution Comsats really were for human culture and for human economy... and how much humand space programms have done and could to for medicine here on earth.
1. it's political suicide, even more so if it fails, and 2. because it was a next-step program that is made to go to mars.
There's a reason why for the last 40 years space policy has been "we'll be to mars in 20 years" after SEI
Exactly what i am thinking too and in my eyes the real reason for cancelling the Constellation-project in favor of SLS layed NOT in the extended dev-cycle, nor in the technological difficulties but in the fact that it would have given NASA as real option to fly to mars. SLS could do it in theorie (If they really get the Block II-version AND enough money to launch multiple vehicles per year) but it´s just not as practical as it would have been with the Ares V. To me the SLS was designed to shove NASA a big sign into the face that says: Don´t dare to really use that thing to start a program that could force us to fund it for more then 1 or 2 presidential-terms before we cancel it again to give the contractors another new dev-project with which they can make money without really flying so much.

But despite all those difficulties: How should the "Voyage-NASA" be used to make the Titan-trip much, much better?
 
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He really should have presented at least some guidance for the future after the Ares-flight.... programs that would follow on or even surprise funding for another mission to mars.
There's a lot that you say that I broadly agree with, but for the sake of my time (and yours), I'm just going to address this one point.
The reason why Baxter never introduces a follow-on program to Ares is that he is reflecting our reality. Baxter, throughout Voyage, notes how much like NASA did in OTL Apollo, the NASA of Voyage focuses on the Ares Program at the cost of all other programs. He notes how scientific probes, Shuttle technology and even follow-on missions, were sacrificed to maintain the 'here and now' dream of landing a person on Mars, much like how NASA sacrificed the Prospector and Lunar Orbiter missions and any Apollo Applications to focus on Apollo 11. He often (through Natalie York) commiserates on how, from some perspectives, that humanity simply wasn't ready for such a leap, and should've done a slow expansion outwards, which would've lasted.
Anyway, point is that Baxter has NASA sacrifice all future plans past Ares because he is trying to reflect the dark reality of OTL Apollo, a program which left almost no physical foundation in space for future advancements, and which sacrificed a lot of science for engineering (a key conflict in the story).
 
I agress, that´s an aspect i can agree to, just because it´s what already happened multiple times. It happened while the later Apollos still flew to the moon, it happened after the early Shuttle-Missions and it defenitely happened between the late 90´s and the middle of the last decade.

Yeah, that pretty much reflects the failures in the PR-culture that are only corrected now.

Yeah you are probably right.... as long as there isn´t really good PR that shows off what spaceflight can do for humanity and what it can do with the support of the people. In my opinion there hasn´t been done nearly enough to tell the people what a big evolution Comsats really were for human culture and for human economy... and how much humand space programms have done and could to for medicine here on earth.

Exactly what i am thinking too and in my eyes the real reason for cancelling the Constellation-project in favor of SLS layed NOT in the extended dev-cycle, nor in the technological difficulties but in the fact that it would have given NASA as real option to fly to mars. SLS could do it in theorie (If they really get the Block II-version AND enough money to launch multiple vehicles per year) but it´s just not as practical as it would have been with the Ares V. To me the SLS was designed to shove NASA a big sign into the face that says: Don´t dare to really use that thing to start a program that could force us to fund it for more then 1 or 2 presidential-terms before we cancel it again to give the contractors another new dev-project with which they can make money without really flying so much.

But despite all those difficulties: How should the "Voyage-NASA" be used to make the Titan-trip much, much better?
Jeez this got long fast lol
(this was made before the previous post (good points btw) and to the post before that, SLS is a waste, should have developed a shuttle-C vehicle if your going to do the shuttle-derived rabbit hole, making a horizontally reinforced stress tank into a verticle stress tank and keep the same dimensions is stupid.
don't get me started on the whole EUS thing, if you're going to develop a rocket, develop it, don't give it a ridiculously overpowered first stage and a bad second stage.
And I remember for a little while when it was floated that SLS would do crew rotations to the ISS, not construction or modules, just bringing Orion.

And I should address, I love the Space alternate histories on this forum, my favorite being the one with Pete Conrad exploring lunar caves, they fall into the "let's go to x" problem, the amount of continued apollo TL's is mindboggling, even with a soviet landing (after apollo 11 not before, with a soviet first landing, I get the continued apollo program), I don't see NASA being refunded on steroids, and having the apollo applications program become the next step,
moonbase? maybe depending on the soviets
New space stations? depends on the soviets/congress willingness to fund both a lunar and skylab program
Mars? unless the Soviets explicitly state they are going to Mars, no way in hell.
Manned Planetary flybys? maybe

Voyage Nasa was kinda stupid, it Might be easier (with payload, getting down will be a nightmare), with the experience of Ares, but due to the Mars-focused nature of NASA, along with the drawdown in planetary probes, as Voyager never launched, Pioneer might and I mean might have been launched, but a Casini style mission with a dedicated lander is probably a decade delayed from OTL/Titan due to the knowledge of the outer planets being basically "there's stuff there, we don't know what said stuff is or what its made of, but there's stuff there".

Let's say that Cassini does happen in the OTL/Titan timeframe, so in 2004 JPL discovers that there might be life on Titan, Yada yada yade, Let's Send People.
Same situation as the book

NASA might have an easier time with the payload-to-orbit problem IF they kept the Saturn V/Vb's flying, (which I do not see happening), with these 200 Ton Super-Heavy Lifters, it could be at least a half dozen launches to get the payload into orbit (I'm guessing tbh). In Voyage, it took like 11 flights of the Vb for the Ares mission, but on that Ares flight, they had the fuel to get home, which skyrockets the needed fuel just to get that "return fuel" to where you need to go, Titan doesn't have this so I am assuming the total fuel requirements is less to send it to Saturn in a Cassini style gravity slingshot(s).

So in Voyage NASA has some different vehicles due to not having the shuttle
  • CSM block whatever
  • MEM's left over (there's another forum post from years ago that suggests that NASA used these for Earth orbit/Lunar missions, its overkill)
  • Skylab, Skylab-B, Moonlab (if it decayed)
  • Saturn V's
  • Saturn Vb's
  • Saturn 1b's
  • no clue about the commercial market
  • NERVA is built and tested but due to Apollo-N, it will not be used due to the whole "radiation" "it has a positive coefficient [holy smokes if you know what that means]" "it killed astronauts on a flight" so its politically and publicly nonviable

Now I personally think that post-Ares NASA gets defunded like OTL due to the goal of landing on mars. But let's say they have enough Saturns and stuff lying around that they do basically what Titan NASA did. an Ares-style mission module, CSM, and Titan-capable landers get sent to Titan.
they are going to waste a lot, unlike Titan NASA.
(Titan MEMS, will be modified by having the Ascent Stages removed and replaced with more living space
  1. Titan has a shuttle that can bring what they brought down to the surface (maybe leave the artificial gravity spinny portion in orbit), here they use capsules, which are harder to get on target and are at the mercy of Titan weather, Parafoil be damned.
  2. the whole living space issue is a problem, does the mission module come down, or stay in orbit
  3. Titan used 2 Command Modules to get the crew down (crashing a shuttle isn't safe), if you bring the 2 MEMs that are definitively stated as existing in Voyage that aren't used, an accurate landing isn't guaranteed (they could use a parafoil but due to the sheer size of the MEM's it would need parachutes on top of it) and if a gust blows one off course now you have a freezing march to get to the other base.
  4. While all this might not sound bad, in Titan Discovery is sent down and sends a signal for the other 2 Command Modules to home in on reentry, while not definitively stated in the book, these don't exactly land next to one another, so the more things send down separately, the riskier it is to have the, our food is 15 km over there problem.
If the other assumption is taken, and NASA then sticks to LEO ops and doesn't have enough if any Vb's left, there's no chance of the mission happening, the upmass of a 1b is tiny for the needs.
And I believe the Vbs would be discontinued, unless there's another moonlab and/or another skylab, the Saturn V's are useless (not useless per se, just expensive), and with the drawdown in budget after Ares, NASA is not going anywhere, so likely just skylab-B (the only station mention as existing by 86, as Moonlab hasn't been mentioned since Apollo-N, I assume it decayed. if not, maybe enough expeditions to use up the remaining Saturn V's/Vb's if congress is nice.
but otherwise, LEO is now where NASA is stuck

also, i posed this in its own thread (it's dead) so here I go

The one thing in Voyage that grinds my gears with the whole Multi-Purpose Lunar Module, I get that Moonlab needs resupply, but bringing the ascent stage all the way to Lunar orbit seems like a waste to me, why not have a mission-capable Lunar Module and bringing it to Moonlabs orbit and land and Rendevous with Moonlab (i.e conduct a normal lunar mission and then go to moonlab)

I can't imagine Moonlab as being in anything other than equatorial Lunar orbit, and the fuel capability on the LM is tight, but using a J mission LM, with added fuel sacrificing time on the surface might be able to return to Moonlab, analyze any samples, conduct experiments and research (learning how things behave on the moon)

It just seems like a waste, like how the soviets built the N-1 just to do Moonlab-Soyuz around the moon, and doesn't mention lunar missions, I get he has to cover a lot and has to time jump often, but even throwaway mention of Soviets landing on the moon would go a long way.
 
He notes how scientific probes, Shuttle technology and even follow-on missions, were sacrificed to maintain the 'here and now' dream of landing a person on Mars, much like how NASA sacrificed the Prospector and Lunar Orbiter missions and any Apollo Applications to focus on Apollo 11. He often (through Natalie York) commiserates on how, from some perspectives, that humanity simply wasn't ready for such a leap, and should've done a slow expansion outwards, which would've lasted.
Oh i agree to that, but despite that i think that they could keep on with crewed mars missions, despite a lower budget.... because the RnD for Ares ist done now, the systems are there and they "just" need to be build. Yes: Bringing in NERVA or Solar Thermal, or other Nuclear-based engines is a thing for the future, but propulsion isn´t a thing that benefits only the human flights, but every type of interplanetary mission.
Anyway, point is that Baxter has NASA sacrifice all future plans past Ares because he is trying to reflect the dark reality of OTL Apollo, a program which left almost no physical foundation in space for future advancements, and which sacrificed a lot of science for engineering (a key conflict in the story).
Yeah, as sadly as it is you are right.... :( even the Surveyor-missions were too much concentrated on the engineering-side if you ask me.
SLS is a waste, should have developed a shuttle-C vehicle if your going to do the shuttle-derived rabbit hole, making a horizontally reinforced stress tank into a verticle stress tank and keep the same dimensions is stupid.
Oh i think the idead wasn´t so bad on the first look, but in my eyes it became crap in the exact same moment where they decided to keep the RS-25. Using that thing in an expandable role is just stupid, how the heck could ANYONE have thought that the final vehicle could be cost effective? That will never work out, so i am with you: Shuttle C or something like that with recovery of the Main Engines would have been a much better way.
don't get me started on the whole EUS thing, if you're going to develop a rocket, develop it, don't give it a ridiculously overpowered first stage and a bad second stage.
Oh i think the EUS was a good decision when that decision was done. They had a situation where they thought: Okay, the SRB´s and the Core stage should be ready around 2017, the final upper stage needs at least until the early 2020´s, so we need a replacement until then. Deriving it from the largest upper stage they could find at that point was logical... but using the RL-10 and not the european Vinci-Engine is the thing that i would critizise. They could have used the same efficiency but with about 60-70% more thrust.
And I remember for a little while when it was floated that SLS would do crew rotations to the ISS, not construction or modules, just bringing Orion.
That idea was a dead end from the start and i think that was nothing more then political play: Presenting something so obviously stupid that it will be the first thing to be cut from the project when there comes a need to bring down the costs.
And I should address, I love the Space alternate histories on this forum, my favorite being the one with Pete Conrad exploring lunar caves, they fall into the "let's go to x" problem, the amount of continued apollo TL's is mindboggling, even with a soviet landing (after apollo 11 not before, with a soviet first landing, I get the continued apollo program), I don't see NASA being refunded on steroids, and having the apollo applications program become the next step,
moonbase? maybe depending on the soviets
New space stations? depends on the soviets/congress willingness to fund both a lunar and skylab program
Mars? unless the Soviets explicitly state they are going to Mars, no way in hell.
Manned Planetary flybys? maybe
Yes, it defenitely comes down to the soviets. Sadly as it is. But what i would like to see is that they work together instead to do all those things but without breaking the bank.... using it as a political tool to keep the peace. Basically what Shuttle-Mir and the ISS became later.
  • CSM block whatever
  • MEM's left over (there's another forum post from years ago that suggests that NASA used these for Earth orbit/Lunar missions, its overkill)
  • Skylab, Skylab-B, Moonlab (if it decayed)
  • Saturn V's
  • Saturn Vb's
  • Saturn 1b's
  • no clue about the commercial market
  • NERVA is built and tested but due to Apollo-N, it will not be used due to the whole "radiation" "it has a positive coefficient [holy smokes if you know what that means]" "it killed astronauts on a flight" so its politically and publicly nonviable
Yeah i think they called the Ares-CSM a Block V, but i really don´t know what they did with it exactly. Is it solar powered? Is it fully digital? i don´t know.
And i know that post from years ago and i like the Idea to use the MEM for Lunar missions, because it has enough room to be used as a temporary base. I think that it should be relatively simple to rework that thing in a manner that keeps a crew alive for 3 to 6 months on the lunar surface. Getting the science output of 6 months surface time for a single Saturn VB launch sounds good to me.

Yes Moonlab decayed in the Voyage-Book IIRC, Skylab itself is down, but Skylab-B should be in orbit.

And yes the lack of description for the commercial market is another thing that bothers me about that book. That´s why i haven´t used the RS-27 designation in my second post: We just can´t know if there is a Delta II-family out there.

And yes: NERVA was crazy, but despite that desaster i don´t think that the idea of using a nuclear reactor as part of the propulsion system is something that should remain dead. The benefits remain. And if we good by that: We had a single desaster, so we stop using it, then there woulnd´t have been any shuttle flights after Challenger, no Apollo after the Apollo 1 fire etc.
Now I personally think that post-Ares NASA gets defunded like OTL due to the goal of landing on mars. But let's say they have enough Saturns and stuff lying around that they do basically what Titan NASA did. an Ares-style mission module, CSM, and Titan-capable landers get sent to Titan.
they are going to waste a lot, unlike Titan NASA.
(Titan MEMS, will be modified by having the Ascent Stages removed and replaced with more living space
Oh that sounds like a way to do it, yeah.
the whole living space issue is a problem, does the mission module come down, or stay in orbit
I would say: let it stay on orbit and reduce the surface time accordingly. Bringing the whole living-area back to space is just to fuel intensive. And the MEM´s itself should give enought living space, supplies and live support to keep the people in it alive, even when they are too far away from each other. The worst Case-scenario would be that you have two short missions at two landing site, but everyone survives.
the upmass of a 1b is tiny for the needs.
Yes it is, when the V´s and VB´s are gone, same goes for most BEO missions. And the 1B needs to be replaced, that thing isn´t cost effective enough.
And I believe the Vbs would be discontinued, unless there's another moonlab and/or another skylab, the Saturn V's are useless (not useless per se, just expensive), and with the drawdown in budget after Ares, NASA is not going anywhere, so likely just skylab-B (the only station mention as existing by 86, as Moonlab hasn't been mentioned since Apollo-N, I assume it decayed. if not, maybe enough expeditions to use up the remaining Saturn V's/Vb's if congress is nice.
Yeah, i am too thinking that finally at least the VB´s have to go, i am not so shure about that for the upgraded Saturn V´s. I really think that an INT-21-version of the Saturn V Block II with only 4 F-1A could remaind pretty usefull for Space-Station and Lunar stuff. And i think it could be secured by promoting it for international missions. The american public might loos interest in space, but giving european countries or the sowjets and option to bring people to the moon or to launch their own big stations: That could work out i think.

And there is a need for the Saturn IB replacement, and i think it should be as modular as the Delta IV has been, using multiple options for upper stages, SRB´s and multiple first stages. In that manner it can be cost effective for LEO´s missions and it could be used for freight launches to supplement or replace the INT-21 if needed.
The one thing in Voyage that grinds my gears with the whole Multi-Purpose Lunar Module, I get that Moonlab needs resupply, but bringing the ascent stage all the way to Lunar orbit seems like a waste to me, why not have a mission-capable Lunar Module and bringing it to Moonlabs orbit and land and Rendevous with Moonlab (i.e conduct a normal lunar mission and then go to moonlab)
Yes, that was pretty dump. That decision wasn´t logic.
I can't imagine Moonlab as being in anything other than equatorial Lunar orbit, and the fuel capability on the LM is tight, but using a J mission LM, with added fuel sacrificing time on the surface might be able to return to Moonlab, analyze any samples, conduct experiments and research (learning how things behave on the moon)
Yes, same thought here. And if they replace Moonlab with a new station in the same orbit, it would be a worthy project to design a sustainable LM-replacement that can be used for multiple landings from the Moonlab as it´s home base.
It just seems like a waste, like how the soviets built the N-1 just to do Moonlab-Soyuz around the moon, and doesn't mention lunar missions, I get he has to cover a lot and has to time jump often, but even throwaway mention of Soviets landing on the moon would go a long way.
That bothers me too. I liked the presentation of the sovjets at first, but i felt bad when he just stopped updating us about their doings at some point. And this: They didn´t really use the N1 / N11-family-thing is one of the things i would really like to change. And giving them a lunar landing (for which they basically have the hardware) would be absolutely gold for NASA, because it would be something that forces Washington to release some more funding to counter that landing project. How the answer should be giving is a thing we can discuss: Would it be another series of moon-landings, or another Ares-Mission? Personally i would say that they should do Ares, just because it´s something the Sovjets can´t do by themself yet.
 
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mspence

Banned
So, Titan: space beetles end up colonizing other planets.

Voyage: Mars or bust with Saturn Vs.
 
Pete Conrad exploring lunar lava caves


Space beetles made by mankind

Oh and for my titan mission, I never said they were coming back, like in Titan, that's why there's the mission module problem, to quote ftettm
"getting there is easy"
"relatively easy"
"the problem is getting them back"


The Voyage Titan mission with a RETURN would be like at minimum 16-18 Vb flights (guessing again but think, in voyage its 11 flights, 9 fueling, and 2 assembly missions (I'm pretty sure the side tanks were launched partially fueled), let's say 5 assembly flights (1 is kinda similar to the final Ares launch with MEM, CSM, and Mission Module, 1 has additional landing modules plus food/water/plants the third has tankage for Titan to earth, 4th is the Earth to "just how many gravity assists can you think of" tankage. and the last is the ascent vehicle, it wouldn't be a desperate mission like in the book
Also with a Mars Landing, the Titan mission might arouse even less public interest, as "we've already been to another planet, flybyed another 20 years ago, what's so special about Titan".
If you're not bringing the fuel to get back and trying to make a Titan Colony like in the book, with resupply and retrieval coming after launch, having the mission module stay in orbit is a waste of the weight to get it there.
And yes: NERVA was crazy, but despite that desaster i don´t think that the idea of using a nuclear reactor as part of the propulsion system is something that should remain dead. The benefits remain. And if we good by that: We had a single desaster, so we stop using it, then there woulnd´t have been any shuttle flights after Challenger, no Apollo after the Apollo 1 fire etc.

I would say: let it stay on orbit and reduce the surface time accordingly. Bringing the whole living-area back to space is just to fuel intensive. And the MEM´s itself should give enought living space, supplies and live support to keep the people in it alive, even when they are too far away from each other. The worst Case-scenario would be that you have two short missions at two landing site, but everyone survives.

That bothers me too. I liked the presentation of the sovjets at first, but i felt bad when he just stopped updating us about their doings at some point. And this: They didn´t really use the N1 / N11-family-thing is one of the things i would really like to change. And giving them a lunar landing (for which they basically have the hardware) would be absolutely gold for NASA, because it would be something that forces Washington to release some more funding to counter that landing project. How the answer should be giving is a thing we can discuss: Would it be another series of moon-landings, or another Ares-Mission? Personally i would say that they should do Ares, just because it´s something the Sovjets can´t do by themself yet.
I'm still new to the forum so quoting is wonky for me sorry
oh and for Ares V, the SLS but slightly better design, it was originally proposed to use the RS-68 engine from the Delta IV series of rockets, but the heat from the SRBs would wear them out too fast, as the RS-68 engine is an ablative one that wears off over time. the heat from the congressionally mandated SRBs would literally melt the engines, so go to the engine that the RS-68 engine was developed from, the RS-25 SSME. the SLS could be better if designed normally but with the whole, use space shuttle parts rule being enforced by congress, there's give and take.
  1. Apollo-N wasn't just a disaster, it showed a flaw with the design that was fatal, it's not something that can be switched and flown on the next flight, it's something that has to be redesigned from the drawing boards, it's the positive coefficient, it was developed with this in mind to improve the delta-V and produce more powerful thrust, while this doesn't sound bad, it means that the hotter the core gets, the higher the reactivity goes, and the higher reactivity goes the hotter the core gets, vs the usual the hotter the core gets, the reactivity decreases, the decreased reactivity cools the core. It's a death trap. The shuttle kept flying because there was no choice, it had to launch payloads, both NASA and DOD, Apollo flew because it had to. Apollo-N doesn't have this security of necessity, it had one goal, to go to mars, we got there, but it's unneeded. yes, it could be used as an orbital tug, but politically speaking its suicide, like why the asteroid redirect mission sent the asteroid to the moon and not earth orbit, having a nuclear reactor in orbit was fine when its a super secret spy sat, but publicly good luck with that. as for the asteroid redirect mission, image peoples reaction when the headline is "NASA PUTS ASTEROID IN EARTH'S ORBIT"
  2. A Titan mission with a return will be way heavier than my estimate as titan has twice the atmosphere with less gravity, any liftoff from the surface will deal with cold starts on engines, and the brittleness cold brings, a 200km ascent just to get too thin atmosphere. and most of the crew died before even hitting atmosphere, one girl died from a solar storm, and her girlfriend (not being coy they are in a relationship, for people who haven't read the book)died when her Command Module hit the surface and the windows broke, allowing the cold and liquid to fill the cabin, as she wasn't wearing a suit, she died instantly from extreme hypothermia/drowning, one guy went crazy and I'm pretty sure got hit in the head or something. the Nerd who had the idea in the first place suddenly gets Vitamin poisoning due to the crop issues they have. and the last lady, kills herself while dumping the bacteria that makes the much-derided space beetles, she's very likely to be the last human alive in the universe, so she takes off her helmet
  3. If Voyage had a Soviet Landing, you bet your ass that the US would relaunch moon landings, but it would be a detriment to the Ares program, as the funding for Ares was pretty thin already, relying on DOD funds to get the Chemical Ares off the ground. The US congress is penny pinchers, especially with cuttable programs, a soviet landing would only result in a continued presence in Lunar Orbit, and maybe a few more flag and footprint missions, but the funding for this will come from the Ares program, probably delaying the 86 landing to 88 or 90, or it never happening in the first place.
  4. IF they ignore it, it will likely be the same result as the book, 1 Ares landing and yay we beat the dirty commies to Mars, yada yada yada. during the scene in the white house where they dismantle the follow-on missions and programs, they cut everything. I could see them instead keeping a lunar program after Ares 1, along the lines of "Let's kick their ass to Mars and back", they had 2 MEM's left over, so it is reasonable to assume they could be modified to make a Lunar landing, and each has a stay time of at least a month or use the leftover LM's if they haven't been used yet (they mention 16's ascent stage being at Moonlab in the 79 to 80's timeframe, so assuming 17's LM is kicking around somewhere they could use it (if it even got built as in OTL 19 and 20's LM was never built). I'm assuming though that there aren't much more LM's around, especially if they use the ascent stage telescope idea. But I do not see an expansion into the solar system type situation, just a keep up with the soviets until they quit when the Soviet Union collapses, and funding for lunar missions will dry up, and the US might do a screw you mission and make a record for lunar endurance or something and then quit.
 
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Yeah i think they called the Ares-CSM a Block V, but i really don´t know what they did with it exactly. Is it solar powered? Is it fully digital? i don´t know.
I think it's supposed to be battery powered, as it links to the Ares cluster generally, with some extra upgrades for life support and propulsion, and upgrades for long-duration flight that the Block III and IV did not have. However, it's suggested that it still isn't digital, with all the mentions of the 50s style interior.
Yes, that was pretty dump. That decision wasn´t logic.
Yeah, the Moonlab section was pretty dumb overall. I get the idea of testing different systems, but the choice of the Moon was a little weird, and the fact they never landed is far weirder.
Yeah, as sadly as it is you are right.... :( even the Surveyor-missions were too much concentrated on the engineering-side if you ask me.
Agreed. Apollo was extraordinary, but it sacrificed a lot (as I think Baxter tries to point out with his epilogue, stating the Ares landing was glorious, but questioning whether it was worth it).
Oh i agree to that, but despite that i think that they could keep on with crewed mars missions, despite a lower budget.... because the RnD for Ares ist done now, the systems are there and they "just" need to be build.
I guess? But this is the same thing as Apollo, Ares required a mammoth effort for a single shot, and would anyone really be willing to repeat that? I don't think so.
 
I think it's supposed to be battery powered, as it links to the Ares cluster generally, with some extra upgrades for life support and propulsion, and upgrades for long-duration flight that the Block III and IV did not have. However, it's suggested that it still isn't digital, with all the mentions of the 50s style interior.
Yeah, i think that too. And i think that leads us to one thing that has to be done in timeline that goes forward from the 80s: Designing a completely rebuilt Block VI with modern controls.
Agreed. Apollo was extraordinary, but it sacrificed a lot (as I think Baxter tries to point out with his epilogue, stating the Ares landing was glorious, but questioning whether it was worth it).
Yeah and i can understand that, but still: Doing only a single flight? And i think it´s different then it was after Apollo: A lot of the Apollo-tech was in the: "We can use this for other things" too-area, but incase of Ares there is just no need for some of the tech, especially the large transfer stages and tanks. We don´t need such gigantism for lunar missions. Incase of Apollo it was on the: We could have reused a lot of it, but the US CHOOSE to not do it, with Ares it´s more on the: We can´t reuse that stuff, even if we would like to. They build so much tech, so much tooling under the knowledge that it will we used only a single time. That´s such a waste...
I guess? But this is the same thing as Apollo, Ares required a mammoth effort for a single shot, and would anyone really be willing to repeat that? I don't think so.
But it would be a lot cheaper then the first mission and yes: The effort is gigantic, but the costs could be split if they let international partners in. You can be shure: The russians and the Europeans will be ready to funnel a lot of money into that if they get a spot in the second or third landing crew in return. Here is an example: In the 80´s or 90´s there were at least two shuttle flight´s that were practically funded by my homecountry, the federal republic of germany IIRC.
 
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Yeah, i think that too. And i think that leads us to one thing that has to be done in timeline that goes forward from the 80s: Designing a completely rebuilt Block VI with modern controls.
depends on if it is needed, I can see that happening in the 90s or early 2000s
Yeah and i can understand that, but still: Doing only a single flight? And i think it´s different then it was after Apollo: A lot of the Apollo-tech was in the: "We can use this for other things" too-area, but incase of Ares there is just no need for some of the tech, especially the large transfer stages and tanks. We don´t need such gigantism for lunar missions. Incase of Apollo it was on the: We could have reused a lot of it, but the US CHOOSE to not do it, with Ares it´s more on the: We can´t reuse that stuff, even if we would like to. They build so much tech, so much tooling under the knowledge that it will we used only a single time. That´s such a waste...
the problem is the long as-heck travel time delays the second mission by a few years, by the time Ares returns, Mars is "been there, done that", any second mission will have a Far less public following and more vocal critics, and more politicians gunning for that budget money
the whole point of the Ares Cluster/Stack was the Apollo-N disaster, after three-mile island and Apollo-N any future mission with a nuclear payload would face severe criticism.
Apollo-N also had a huge design flaw, a positive coefficient (as the temperature rises, reactivity skyrockets), which would require the reactor to be redeveloped, then necessitating partly redeveloping the NERVA engine
NASA knew it would lose that political battle, which is why they used the MS-II and ETs and an S-IVb for the transfer stages

due to the Apollo-N disaster, the future after Ares returns is likely the same as OTL, a return to LEO ops, maybe another Moonlab mission if it is still around, but other then that, not much else is politically viable
But it would be a lot cheaper then the first mission and yes: The effort is gigantic, but the costs could be split if they let international partners in. You can be shure: The russians and the Europeans will be ready to funnel a lot of money into that if they get a spot in the second or third landing crew in return. Here is an example: In the 80´s or 90´s there were at least two shuttle flight´s that were practically funded by my homecountry, the federal republic of germany IIRC.
there's a difference between one shuttle mission and an Ares mars mission, 1 billion (average), vs an estimated 23 billion for the mission in todays money (say 15 billion back then) (10 Saturn Vbs costing 2 billion each, 20 billion, mission module, CSM, and MEM costing the other 3 billion

if any country can afford a part of that cost, it would get that seat, the problem is the production of Vb's were likely already stopped before Ares flew, and any leftovers will not be enough to launch the tankage and fuel, to say nothing about the MEM line, which would probably have a Spare, but any follow on mission would require restarting the line
Does anyone know when in 2008 the Titan crew would’ve launched?
the launch before the presidential election and long enough that resupply hasn't been launched yet, I would guesstimate around May of that year.


I think it's supposed to be battery powered, as it links to the Ares cluster generally, with some extra upgrades for life support and propulsion, and upgrades for long-duration flight that the Block III and IV did not have. However, it's suggested that it still isn't digital, with all the mentions of the 50s style interior.
it is still the same panels in the CSM in the book, it is definitely battery-powered, and recharged by solar panels, and fuel cells would be wasteful and inactive for LONG periods of time
Yeah, the Moonlab section was pretty dumb overall. I get the idea of testing different systems, but the choice of the Moon was a little weird, and the fact they never landed is far weirder.
he wanted to have a section outside of LEO, Moonlab would be a good place to study Deep Space operations as a stepping stone to mars (EVA, communication, and stuff)
Agreed. Apollo was extraordinary, but it sacrificed a lot (as I think Baxter tries to point out with his epilogue, stating the Ares landing was glorious, but questioning whether it was worth it).
no probes to anything but mars is sad, especially since the Voyagers were canceled
I guess? But this is the same thing as Apollo, Ares required a mammoth effort for a single shot, and would anyone really be willing to repeat that? I don't think so.
Nope, too expensive and dangerous, estimated cost of the mission would be 15 billion, and modern would be around 23 billion, political will and public attention after Ares returns would view a follow on mission as downright wasteful
 
Does anyone know when in 2008 the Titan crew would’ve launched?
No idea, the book is very sparse with specific dates

Although I do find it hilarious that the DOD hates NASA so much that they barely even let the Titan crew have a comm dish to communicate

And six months later Titan is still the best NASA book imo
especially with how the public views NASA and space, (mostly bored)
 
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