Orion spacecraft prepares for first test flight.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Am I right in remembering that one of the display "lawn ornaments" was actual flight hardware? <sigh>

Yup, the one laid out sideways out front of Cape Canaveral (IIRC) is made up from Apollo 18 and 19's launchers.

[HMS Sophia]

I would say that the potential for Asian economies like China and India becoming much, much bigger than the US means good things for unmanned and manned space exploration alike.

This. I'd be exceedingly happy whether the US, India or China reach the moon next. I don't particularly care where they're from, as long as human's are doing insane, crazy things in space.

[Irbis]

To expand on my earlier point: just because we've done something incredible before doesn't make it any less awesome that we're doing it again. We've been driving cars for, what 120 odd years now? People still get excited over another new Ferrari. We've been building planes since 1903, we still get excited by a new fighter jet, or the 787, or the A380.

Well, to be fair, most of that is quality game change. Stealth fighters, double deck aircrafts, hybrid engines. Orion is just... what should have been built 30 years ago if certain geriatric actor didn't decide to piss away money on arms race and arming whacko fundies everywhere.

I love space, but while this is nice you will excuse my yawn and waiting for something actually new, plasma/ion space engines, mass driver launchers, or some sort of space elevator/loop design. Not that 'this engine will turn whatever it moves into stuff thrice as expensive as gold' crap we have today

And your choice of examples underlines my point. In order for something to get our attention in a field that has been so greatly exploited it has to be beyond what we thought was possible, or at least reasonable. That's why the 787, PS4 and stuff like that get attention but the million minor aircraft designs for regional jet liners and knockoff consoles from Hong Kong don't even make an appearance on yahoo news.

Um, PS4 is just rebadged 2010 level PC. Something beyond reasonable, you say? Well...

And the very fact that the US is throwing its hat back into the ring is significant in itself, considering the past few decades of apathy it's had toward spaceflight. These are good times we live in, and I for one cannot wait to see how the next couple of decades will pan out for space exploration.

One teabagger or uncaring Republican president and you can kiss that hope goodbye.

[Beowulf]

The shuttle was far enough along in development that it's first flight was April 1981. There's nothing a geriatric actor could have done to change it.

[Simon_Jester]

Yeah. The decision not to have Orion or something like it goes to Nixon, and frankly Nixon wasn't a conservative in the modern sense of the word (see rapproachement with China, see universal health care plan, et cetera)

[HMS Sophia]

Yeah. The decision not to have Orion or something like it goes to Nixon, and frankly Nixon wasn't a conservative in the modern sense of the word (see rapproachement with China, see universal health care plan, et cetera)

Nixon picked the Shuttle mainly because it promised large numbers of launches per year with a low cost due to that. Course... the USAF decided they didn't want it after they screwed the design all to hell with their rather insane demands like massive cross-range. So it barely launched. It was supposed to fly, oh... 4 times a month? We got 10 a year at best, iirc.

[SpottedKitty]

It was supposed to fly, oh... 4 times a month? We got 10 a year at best, iirc.

Don't forget the Shuttle only managed that as often as it did because of playing "musical chairs" with engines and other vital parts. IIRC when Challenger was lost she was flying with parts from at least one of the other shuttles, which was a problem in itself when putting the whole STS program back together again in the aftermath.

[Purple]

Um, PS4 is just rebadged 2010 level PC. Something beyond reasonable, you say? Well...

And you would call that reasonable?

[Irbis]

The shuttle was far enough along in development that it's first flight was April 1981. There's nothing a geriatric actor could have done to change it.

He was the first US president (after Nixon's ill informed decision to put all eggs in Shuttle) to allocate bigger money to space program as a part of Strategic Defense Initiative. They had enough resources to bring Saturns back, instead more good money was thrown after bad in the Shuttles and the resulting rush ended in Challenger explosion in 1986.

He was also last president with Cold War era space budgets and had he invested it in big rocket it would be available and used for ISS, potentially extending the production run into 2000s. Meaning, we wouldn't need to reinvent the wheel today. So yes, if there was one person that could have stopped space exploration crash, it's him and I'd blame his decisions first.

[TimothyC]

He was the first US president (after Nixon's ill informed decision to put all eggs in Shuttle) to allocate bigger money to space program as a part of Strategic Defense Initiative. They had enough resources to bring Saturns back, instead more good money was thrown after bad in the Shuttles and the resulting rush ended in Challenger explosion in 1986.

He was also last president with Cold War era space budgets and had he invested it in big rocket it would be available and used for ISS, potentially extending the production run into 2000s. Meaning, we wouldn't need to reinvent the wheel today. So yes, if there was one person that could have stopped space exploration crash, it's him and I'd blame his decisions first.

You really don't have a feel for the history of the politics of US Space Access do you?

A significant amount of SDI funding went toward the development of low cost space launch designs that were cut by congress over the period of 1988-1995. The truth was that restoring the Saturns to production would have been even more expensive than a new launcher based on Shuttle technology that was ultimately too costly for congress to fund. Now, a case could have been made for using F-1A engines in the 1990s - and that would have been cost effective over the development of the RS-25(Expendable), but that can be blamed on the NASA administrators in the late 80s and early 90s, not on Reagan. How about you actually read up on the top before you shoot your mouth off again?

Heck, if you must have someone to blame, I've got an absolutely abhorrent person you can blame. Senator Edward William Proxmire. He's the lack of brain behind the excessive NASA budget cuts in the

1970s that led to the decisions that precluded the shuttle flight rates that were originally projected. But he was a democrat so it can't be his fault.

Yeah. The decision not to have Orion or something like it goes to Nixon, and frankly Nixon wasn't a conservative in the modern sense of the word (see rapproachement with China, see universal health care plan, et cetera)

Given the options that Nixon was presented with

• Restart Saturn Production, and develop a replacement for the Saturn 1B using S-IVB derived tankage and an F-1A main engine

or

• Develop a shuttle that would offer a lower cost per flight

Nixon picked the latter. It wasn't his fault that Congress refused to increase the budget for the shuttle development to keep pace with inflation. No, that can be blamed on the Democratic leadership of the time. If you want to blame anyone for the lack of a good shuttle replacement, you can blame the decisions that came out of the Clinton Administration in the mid 1990s.

NASA had three options:
1. Evolutionary Development of the Space Shuttle, including new, lower mass orbiters. Seen as the lowest upfront cost, and would have kept shuttles running into the 2030s. Similar cost reduction measures with the ELV fleet would also be needed.

2. Replacement of the medium part of the ELV fleet spectrum with an RD-180 powered EELV (IE ATALS III/V), and the high end (Titan IV) with a three-engined RD-180 powered booster [TJ's Note: I can't help but notice that three RD-180s has about the same thrust as a pair of F-1s. Hmmmm]. The Shuttle would be retired around 2005, and the crew missions would be completed with an HL-42 riding atop the new heavy booster. This was seen as not offering a lot of improvements in cost, but it would have been a lot safer than option one, even with the shuttle improvements as it offers a continuous abort sequence.

3. Replacement of the Shuttle and heavy ELVs in the 2008 time frame with an advanded SSTO craft. Early on, rocket powered VTHL (Vertical Take-off, Horizontal Landing), Airbreathing HTHL (Horizontal Take-off Horizontal Landing), and Airbreathing HTHL TSTO (Two Stage To Orbit) craft were evaluated. What is most interesting is that after the VTHL system was selected (sound familiar?), the fuel system was also selected - Tripropellant engines (RP-1/LOX switching to LH2/LOX at high altitudes). This, for me, explains why the Rockwell entry for the X-33 looked like a very fat shuttle - it did not need the large LH2 tank that the shuttle had.

Obviously the third was selected, and then Lockheed was picked for the X-33. That Lockheed couldn't get the tank to work until about 2008 is why the program died when it did.

[TimothyC]

To amend my post above, the link to the 1994 study/report that lead to the X-33 program is here.