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The shuttle was amazing. Never has there been such a versatile space vehicle. It could repair satellites, act as a small space station and bring satellites back

The shuttle was amazing. Never has there been such a versatile space vehicle. It could repair satellites, act as a small space station and bring satellites back to Earth. Hubble wouldn't be a thing with out it. All the other solutions currently are just kind of space buses (for equipment and people). There are different estimates for the shuttle launch costs -- between $500m - $1.5b. However for LEO there couldn't be anything more useful. The SLS launch costs run between $2b - $4b. It hasn't done anything useful so far...

t344344 4y ago
Right, unless it breaks and Americans have to launch from Kazakhstan :) There were two spy satellites with the same mirror diameter as Hubble. Launched by normal rockets! Without spending money on shuttle, US could launch new Hubble every 5 years or so! > Both NRO space telescopes have a main mirror nearly 8 feet wide (2.4 meters), rivaling the Hubble Space Telescope, https://www.space.com/16000-spy-satellites-space-telescopes-nasa.html https://www.space.com/16000-spy-satellites-space-telescopes-...
outworlder 4y ago
> The shuttle was amazing. Never has there been such a versatile space vehicle. It could repair satellites, act as a small space station and bring satellites back to Earth. Hubble wouldn't be a thing with out it. I'll concede that NASA did an excellent job, all things considered. The Shuttle itself was terrible(although gorgeous) but that's not NASA's fault. They had to get money from the Air Force so they were subject to Air Force requirements, like the incredible cross range capabilities and the oversized cargo hold. Then there were other requirements – like having to build solid rocket boosters from far away locations and transport by train, purely to get political support – that caused further problems. NASA didn't even want to use solid rockets in the first place. The Soviet Buran copied the project (without SRBs) even though it made zero sense to them – but the US obviously had a reason to develop such a vehicle, so they wanted to be ready. Their Energia rocket worked better without an orbiter attached. What NASA actually wanted to build would have been incredible. Sure, maybe the cargo hold would have been smaller, but if it could have a lower turnaround time and cost less to refurbish after every launch, maybe it would still be operational. The SLS is also bogged down by politicians. And still uses the accursed SRBs.
Retric 4y ago
The shuttle worked, which was amazing considering everything it could do. But the program was a huge money pit because the shuttle had so much capability that went unused on most missions. You can quibble about the numbers, but a rough calculation puts the program at US$196 billion in 2011 or ~262B in 2023 dollars for 135 attempted flights. So 2B per flight in todays money. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_program SLS is aiming for 130t to LEO vs 27.5t to LEO for the Shuttle. 4B a launch would have less than half the shuttle’s cost per kg to LEO, if it’s roughly 2B that’s almost 5 times the cargo for the same budget. Granted the shuttle sent people up on every mission, but spending 60m/person to the ISS lets them stay in orbit for vastly less money / day. Essentially the shuttle launched and returned a large useful space into orbit, but then returned it at the end of every mission, which was extremely expensive. Both the SLS and shuttle have their advantages but the shuttle was only really useful for LEO as getting that much mass into higher orbits was untenable despite what various movies have suggested.

t344344 4y ago

Right, unless it breaks and Americans have to launch from Kazakhstan :) There were two spy satellites with the same mirror diameter as Hubble. Launched by normal rockets! Without spending money on shuttle, US could launch new Hubble every 5 years or so! > Both NRO space telescopes have a main mirror nearly 8 feet wide (2.4 meters), rivaling the Hubble Space Telescope, https://www.space.com/16000-spy-satellites-space-telescopes-nasa.html https://www.space.com/16000-spy-satellites-space-telescopes-...

outworlder 4y ago

> The shuttle was amazing. Never has there been such a versatile space vehicle. It could repair satellites, act as a small space station and bring satellites back to Earth. Hubble wouldn't be a thing with out it. I'll concede that NASA did an excellent job, all things considered. The Shuttle itself was terrible(although gorgeous) but that's not NASA's fault. They had to get money from the Air Force so they were subject to Air Force requirements, like the incredible cross range capabilities and the oversized cargo hold. Then there were other requirements – like having to build solid rocket boosters from far away locations and transport by train, purely to get political support – that caused further problems. NASA didn't even want to use solid rockets in the first place. The Soviet Buran copied the project (without SRBs) even though it made zero sense to them – but the US obviously had a reason to develop such a vehicle, so they wanted to be ready. Their Energia rocket worked better without an orbiter attached. What NASA actually wanted to build would have been incredible. Sure, maybe the cargo hold would have been smaller, but if it could have a lower turnaround time and cost less to refurbish after every launch, maybe it would still be operational. The SLS is also bogged down by politicians. And still uses the accursed SRBs.

Retric 4y ago

The shuttle worked, which was amazing considering everything it could do. But the program was a huge money pit because the shuttle had so much capability that went unused on most missions. You can quibble about the numbers, but a rough calculation puts the program at US$196 billion in 2011 or ~262B in 2023 dollars for 135 attempted flights. So 2B per flight in todays money. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_program SLS is aiming for 130t to LEO vs 27.5t to LEO for the Shuttle. 4B a launch would have less than half the shuttle’s cost per kg to LEO, if it’s roughly 2B that’s almost 5 times the cargo for the same budget. Granted the shuttle sent people up on every mission, but spending 60m/person to the ISS lets them stay in orbit for vastly less money / day. Essentially the shuttle launched and returned a large useful space into orbit, but then returned it at the end of every mission, which was extremely expensive. Both the SLS and shuttle have their advantages but the shuttle was only really useful for LEO as getting that much mass into higher orbits was untenable despite what various movies have suggested.