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Yeah Apollo was obviously incredibly impressive but was sort of a technological dead-end. There was no path from that program to a permanent human presence on
by justrealist 3y ago
Yeah Apollo was obviously incredibly impressive but was sort of a technological dead-end. There was no path from that program to a permanent human presence on the moon.
If they can really get Starship and orbital refueling working, it's a step function forward.
- panick21_ 3y agoI tend to disagree. There was very much a evolutionary path forward. There were already programs like NERVA in development for an advanced nuclear upper stage. Once you have that, making the Upper Stage refuel-able, makes it basically into a multi-use space tug for cis-lunar. Then you could evolve Saturn 1B into a reusable Saturn 1C, just like Falcon 9. That gives you a reusable heavy lifter. And it would also safe a gigantic amount of money that was spend on Atlas/Titan/Delta in the next 40 years. The Apollo capsule was not reusable but continuously evolving a capsule design in that direct was certainty possible. But its not the most important part of the system in terms of cost. What really need more development is the lander itself. Making a large reusable lander would have been costly but not really out of reach. You can use an occasional Saturn V for large things like Skylab and special deep space mission. That was a much better path forward then Space Shuttle and ISS.
- cratermoon 3y ago> a technological dead-end. "The Apollo lunar base proposal saw an uncrewed Saturn V used to land a shelter based on the Apollo Command/Service Module (CSM) on the Moon." <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Applications_Program#AES_(Apollo_Extension_Series)_Lunar_Base https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Applications_Program#AE...>
- justrealist 3y agoI feel this somewhat glosses over the unsolved challenge of how to land a Saturn V rocket.
- jdminhbg 3y agoMuch easier to do on the moon than on Earth though at least, right? No atmosphere, fraction of the gravity.
- justrealist 3y agoYeah but there's still no precedent at all for re-ignition, stabilization, automatic landing, etc. It took SpaceX like 20 tries to do this using 2010's technology and computer automation, with a much smaller rocket.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- mulmen 3y agoNo? Grid fins don’t work in a vacuum. Lower gravity means your engines need a wider throttle range, which was already challenging at Earth gravity.
- XorNot 3y agoNo! Not at all! The Moon is harder to land on then Mars! Aerodynamic drag is amazing. It means fins and parachutes work. It means you can slow yourself down without propellant and with passive systems. Mars actually kind of sucks too because it has just enough atmosphere to interfere with rocket engine ignition but not enough to be able to land on chutes alone. But any amount of parachute and aerobraking is better then none. But the Moon is terrible: no atmosphere, so you're under engine power the whole way down. The propellant and mass demands are thus much higher.
- jdminhbg 3y agoThanks, good explanation. My thought on "no atmosphere" is that it eliminates the need for heat shielding to enter it, but I can see how that's not really an issue compared to all the benefits.
- psunavy03 3y ago
- lmm 3y agoOK, and then what? You can land the tiny capsule that you took back and forth to the moon and call it a permanent shelter, sure, but you're not going to be able to build any kind of substantial base at a rate of one giant rocket per tiny capsule.
- cratermoon 3y agohttp://www.astronautix.com/l/lesalunarbase.html http://www.astronautix.com/l/lesalunarbase.html