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Originally Posted by qnetjoe
When it comes to getting back to the moon and then off to Mars. I think we are going in the wrong direction. A couple of years ago, if asked, most of us could agree that the shuttle's 50,000 lb payload was a medium to heavy lift.
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Why does everyone think we have to go a SINGLE direction. I know the funding sways it that way, but there's a lot more complex things going on.
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Originally Posted by qnetjoe
What NASA needs is an extreme heavy lift shuttle (500,000 lb payload) leaving the small payloads to private industry.
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I would tend to agree here. Although shuttle (implying SSTO)? time will tell.
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Originally Posted by qnetjoe
The competition that would result would drive the price down for smaller payloads.
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I'm not sure what competition you're talking about. Competition for smaller payloads will primarily be smaller rockets since those would be the only commercially viable alternatives for some time.
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Originally Posted by qnetjoe
The EHLS would allow for the ISS to be built quickly and the next generation station planned/built. For instance, if the EHLS had a 60 W x 30 H x 240 L payload it would be able to store 10-15x the number of ISS modules that the current shuttle can.
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Unfortunately the ISS was designed to be lifted by shuttle. If there was an easy conversion, you would see deltaIV lifting the sections with suyuz lifting the workforce.
For the next gen... I would agree.
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Originally Posted by qnetjoe
Another great benefit of such a large platform is that it could easily be the platform that transports the future lunar landers to lunar orbit. Its capacity and payload alone allow it to function a make shift space station, which is ideal for lunar and future mars mission.
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Lift alot, do alot. My thought is to lift the fuel required to leave orbit (although not the HLV itself)
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Originally Posted by qnetjoe
As for the engineering challenges, just think of the Antonov AN225 and the Airbus A380. If we can make these beasts then we can certainly make the EHLS.
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Huh? I hate when people say "if we can... then". We're talking different technologies here.
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Originally Posted by qnetjoe
NASA has also shown that they can not handle the complexities of a rapid launch schedule (i.e Columbia and Challenger).
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I think it just proved that Shuttle didn't live up to its potential.