What will the next Space Vehicle for Nasa look like?

[AWMac]

Mac

[Hoarach]

Originally posted by RAIDER14
since the Shuttle fleet will retire in a few years what will NASA's next Space Vehicle look like? Have they revealed any pictures designs?

I have orderend Air & Space magazine for about a year and that last issue talked about this subject.  They gave pictures of the next NASA shuttles and passenger shuttles.  Companies are making shuttles to bring average people into space starting between 2007 and 2009.  Many of these shuttles will only carry 1-2 passengers and others will carry up to 10.  But most are not cheap.  Some will cost $150,000-$200,000 per person for the cheaper shuttles and others will cost up to $500,000.

[Chairboy]

Yep, we've been about "a year away" from commercial service to space for about 20 years now.  Don't put your ticket deposit in until they fire an engine test.

Commercial flight is the future, and I look forward to seeing what Rutan can do, but I have a couple of observations:

1. SpaceShipOne 're-entered' at a few hundred miles per hour because it was straight up and straight down.  There's nothing magical about that spacecraft, and the problems of hypersonic reentry still exist.  
2. Rutan's experience in high supersonic is limited.  I believe Scaled built the HyperX, but that was to spec.  I'd like to learn more about the expertise he has inhouse for highspeed regimes before going nutso about how he'll show NASA.

Don't get me wrong, I love Rutan's work, think the SS1 is super neat, and I don't know why everyone outside NASA's office is yelling 'Timberrrrrr!', but, reality check.

[Chairboy]

BTW, Drrrrragon!  That's a commercial contender from SpaceX.  It's a CEV class vehicle developed in secret and just announced.  SpaceX makes the Falcon rockets, they have a launch coming up real shortly of their Falcon I, and the Dragon is designed for their Falcon 9, an EELV class launcher.  Guy from PayPal is paying for it.

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=1095

[Goomba]

Can't dispute your observations, Chair, however...

I have no mystical illusions that Rutan will make magic, nor that SpaceshipOne was magic (and I know you used the term loosely) ...simply that his thinking arrived at a solution that was clean, elegant and reliable.  Not sure we'd get the same result from the NASA bureaucracy.

And the experience in high-energy flight dynamics may not be there, but I'm pretty sure that applying Rutan & Co. to the problems in this sphere will result in some really interesting and efficient solutions.

My point, really, is only that the track record is there.  Applying a proven intellect, a proven team, and a proven design methodology that stresses non-conventional solutions is a recipe for some success.  Sometimes we need to break the patterns of business-as-usual.

OTOH, he may find that the boys in the 60's were on the money, and there are limited improvements he can make.  Who knows?  I just like seeing what I think is the right guy for the job take a crack at it.

I wonder if NASA will go back to a traditional heavy-lift booster system for the next reusable re-entry vehicle?  At least, those systems are apparently more reliable than current configuration.

[Chairboy]

Oh, I agree with ya, Goomba, on every point you made.  I was just heading off some of the fanboy overenthusiasm I've read here before from others, some of which don't understand the magnitude of difference between SS1's reentry vs. orbital re-entry.

Don't forget, I'm actually BUILDING a Rutan aircraft right now.  Nat Puffer modified it, but it's still a Long-EZ at heart.

[Goomba]

Now I gotcha  

Didn't forget you were building a Long-EZ...didn't know in the first place!  

That's a beaut of an aircraft, and one that I've always dreamed of building.  A dream to fly, too, so I hear.

Best of Luck to ya'!

[RAIDER14]

Originally posted by Chairboy
BTW, Drrrrragon!  That's a commercial contender from SpaceX.  It's a CEV class vehicle developed in secret and just announced.  SpaceX makes the Falcon rockets, they have a launch coming up real shortly of their Falcon I, and the Dragon is designed for their Falcon 9, an EELV class launcher.  Guy from PayPal is paying for it.

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=1095

looks like a Apollo capsule

[Furball]

Originally posted by Goomba
Sorry...a bit touchy there, are we Furball?  

Oh, please forgive me...I seem to have missed your all-important post back there.  Oh, the shame of it...

Turn the heat down on the kettle there, bud...

Cripes.

i was only joking

[DREDIOCK]

Originally posted by Hoarach
Companies are making shuttles to bring average people into space starting between 2007 and 2009.  Many of these shuttles will only carry 1-2 passengers and others will carry up to 10.  But most are not cheap.  Some will cost $150,000-$200,000 per person for the cheaper shuttles and others will cost up to $500,000.

heh, if you can afford the price tag.
the one thing your NOT is average.

LOL I wish they'd stop saying that

[Masherbrum]

Originally posted by Debonair
Does anyine think it is possible that NASA will never again put people in space?

I read almost two month ago, that NASA has full intentions to revisit the moon (by 2012 IIRC).

Karaya

[RAIDER14]

Originally posted by DREDIOCK

maybe about 100 or 200 years from now they might have technology advanced enought to make Star Trek Type ships

[Chairboy]

How many years until you get a joke?

tee hee

[RAIDER14]

Originally posted by Chairboy
How many years until you get a joke?

tee hee

I'm stateing a fact I saw a special on Tv said that the U.S. Military/Goverment is experimenting with technology kinda like Star trek

[nirvana]

Originally posted by RAIDER14
I'm stateing a fact I saw a special on Tv said that the U.S. Military/Goverment is experimenting with technology kinda like Star trek

Don't you watch The History Channel?  William Shatner already said that EVERYONE copies Star Trek ideas.  Pffft:lol