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  1. Victor_D

    Updates James Webb Space Telescope updates

    Wait, isn't ESA a partner on this project? Are the Americans giving refunds? :facepalm:
  2. Victor_D

    Discussion The Ultimate Chinese Space Discussion Thread!

    BDBs :P They could do it with LM-5 if they wanted to. I am not talking about large stations housing dozens of people, which is why I wrote outpost.
  3. Victor_D

    Discussion The Ultimate Chinese Space Discussion Thread!

    From what I read, the Chinese are pursuing slow, deliberate approach to space. They are slowly building up experience and capability: 1999 - unmanned spacecraft launch 2003 - manned spaceflight 2007 - lunar probes 2008 - spacewalks 2011 - interplanetary probes 2011/12 - in-space...
  4. Victor_D

    Discussion The next 100 years..

    This argument could have held some water 50 years ago. It doesn't now. We've been launching things to space for many decades, building big dumb rockets isn't anything new. In any case, as I said - even if Zubrin's estimate was an order of magnitude off, it would still result in a price of about...
  5. Victor_D

    Discussion The next 100 years..

    Lords of Kobol, give me strength... Let me quote Zubrin, OK? Then he goes on describing how the lack of competition among the large US aerospace companies and government restrictions keep the prices artificially high. I didn't check his numbers, but I assume he knows what he's talking about...
  6. Victor_D

    Discussion The next 100 years..

    I just skimmed through "Space 2030: Exploring the Future of Space Applications" (a 2004 report by OECD). It's a sober, realistic assessment that uses three scenarios (one optimistic and two pessimistic ones) to predict how space development may look like in the next 20 years (30 at the time it...
  7. Victor_D

    Discussion The next 100 years..

    Resist, resist, resist... I can't :tiphat: No, sorry, this is starting to feel like a conversation with a broken gramophone. You're a pessimist, I get it and I am done trying to change your mind.
  8. Victor_D

    Discussion The next 100 years..

    Hence why some people believe that NASA human spaceflight has been just a glorified jobs programme since Apollo ended. Shuttle was a way to keep the army of engineers and aerospace workers busy. It's obviously easy to criticize it from the hindsight, but there were some clear thinking people...
  9. Victor_D

    Discussion The next 100 years..

    Don't be so surprised. Skylon will be more expensive than a large commercial airliner, but not necessarily as complicated. When you look at it, it's a pretty straightforward design, the most complicated thing on it are the engines. I wouldn't be surprised if it required much fewer parts than...
  10. Victor_D

    News WSJ: Europe Ends Independent Pursuit of Manned Space Travel

    Yeah, the "only" thing missing is a destination for these flights :) This is not the way to do it. Mass producing ATV/Ariane-5 derivatives in not what comes to mind when I hear "pushing the limits of technology". Your proposal is akin to your government telling BMW "ok, he's the deal - we'll...
  11. Victor_D

    News WSJ: Europe Ends Independent Pursuit of Manned Space Travel

    This is funny. As I see it, NASA doesn't know what to do, because NASA has no real leadership. The various factions within it keep fighting about what is it that the agency should do, and I don't see any consensus arising there. Even if there was one, the politicians would pull it apart...
  12. Victor_D

    News WSJ: Europe Ends Independent Pursuit of Manned Space Travel

    Even though it's just a thought experiment, I don't like the results. It's what I'd call a brute force approach to space development, and as in most cases where it is applied, it would fail (and probably also break the thing you're trying to fix). Not to mention the glaring unrealism. 17...
  13. Victor_D

    Discussion The next 100 years..

    It's practically common knowledge that even after NASA had realized that with all the design compromises made it wouldn't be able to stick to those numbers, it continued flaunting them in order to keep the Shuttle programme alive. Anyway, STS is practically a cautionary tale of how NOT to do a...
  14. Victor_D

    News WSJ: Europe Ends Independent Pursuit of Manned Space Travel

    Yes, that's exactly what I said /sarcasm :rolleyes: IF they can deliver a competitive product (and that's a big if, I fully agree with that sentiment), then let's buy from them. If not, there are always the Russians. Nah. Unless we're flying often enough, it makes no sense to have too many...
  15. Victor_D

    News WSJ: Europe Ends Independent Pursuit of Manned Space Travel

    It was never about money, not directly. Europe (ESA, the EU, whatever) could easily afford manned spaceflight, if there was a strong political backing behind it. But it isn't - that's the reality. Personally, I see no point in that either. It was different a few years ago, when turning ATV...
  16. Victor_D

    News WSJ: Europe Ends Independent Pursuit of Manned Space Travel

    Good. As much as I'd like an independent European manned spaceflight capability, there is currently no reason to waste billions of Euros on developing another uncreative tin can capsule to be launched on a super-expensive rocket that will become obsolete years before it makes it first flight...
  17. Victor_D

    Discussion The next 100 years..

    That's what quality control is for. Unless you screw up big time (like Toyota), you should be able to guarantee the quality of your product, otherwise you're out of business. Articles like space station modules can be mass produced, there is absolutely no reason to believe they can't be. Of...
  18. Victor_D

    Discussion The next 100 years..

    Of course, I totally agree with you that one should maintain a healthy sceptical posture. On the other hand, Skylon has given me a reason to be hopeful. As I understand it (I may be wrong here), the costs are driven up by the fact that pretty much every spacecraft launched today is built as a...
  19. Victor_D

    Discussion The next 100 years..

    I won't even try to reply to this on a quote-by-quote basis, because the resulting post would be a kilometre long. Furthermore, quoting a sentence just so that you can add a jibe isn't really a debating strategy I appreciate (although I am being a bit hypocritical here, I'll give you that)...
  20. Victor_D

    Discussion The next 100 years..

    (bolding in the quoted parts is mine) Well, duh. Unless we cheat the Universe and somehow crack FTL travel in this century, which I think is extremely unlikely, then yes, humanity's expansion into space is going to take centuries, millennia, millions of years. I am talking about the near...
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