Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT/SPACEDIG/V15_6/V15NO604.TXT

Internet Message Format | 1993-07-13 | 33KB

Date: Tue, 29 Dec 92 05:00:06
From: Space Digest maintainer <[e-mail]>
Reply-To: [e-mail]
Subject: Space Digest V15 #604
To: Space Digest Readers
Precedence: bulk


Space Digest                Tue, 29 Dec 92       Volume 15 : Issue 604

Today's Topics:
               "Moonraker" -- fact or fiction? (5 msgs)
                       Aluminum as rocket fuel?
                     Galileo GIF Images Available
                GEO satellites as electrical vehicles
             Justification for the Space Program (2 msgs)
                   Mars Observer Update - 12/28/92
                         NASA's role in space
                             Planet Earth
                     Stupid Shut Cost arguements
   Stupid Shut Cost arguements (was Re: Terminal Velocity (2 msgs)

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----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 28 Dec 92 10:36:55 GMT
From: Dean Adams <[e-mail]>
Subject: "Moonraker" -- fact or fiction?
Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy,talk.politics.misc,sci.space.shuttle,sci.space,sci.astro

[e-mail] writes:

 >>Doesn't this remind you of a plot from a James Bond movie?  Moonraker?
 >>Shuttle takes off from transport 747 causing the 747 to crash...

I guess the SCA crew in this conspiracy also had to be "replicated".  :->

 >Glad you guys brought it up.  I just happen to have a piece from Dr. Beter
 >Audio Letter #56 that you might find interesting with regard to "Moonraker"
 >and the rest of the James Bond adventures, and the background of their
 >author, the late Ian Fleming.

Sorry... it's all moot, since Ian Fleming did not write "Moonraker".
They had already run out of his stories by that time...  But I would
not put it past your Dr. Beter to imagine Fleming having some "inside"
MI-5/SIS information on the "Space Shuttle conspiracy", even though it
was back in the 1960s. (what does time matter to people who know? :)

{Beware!  David Rockefeller is watching YOU! (and he wants your GOLD!)}

------------------------------

Date: 28 Dec 92 13:10:51 GMT
From: Jon Luckey <[e-mail]>
Subject: "Moonraker" -- fact or fiction?
Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy,talk.politics.misc,sci.space.shuttle,sci.space,sci.astro

[e-mail] (Dean Adams) writes:

>[e-mail] writes:

> >>Doesn't this remind you of a plot from a James Bond movie?  Moonraker?
> >>Shuttle takes off from transport 747 causing the 747 to crash...

>Sorry... it's all moot, since Ian Fleming did not write "Moonraker".
>They had already run out of his stories by that time...  But I would
>not put it past your Dr. Beter to imagine Fleming having some "inside"
>MI-5/SIS information on the "Space Shuttle conspiracy", even though it
>was back in the 1960s. (what does time matter to people who know? :)

Gee, when was the date for Audio Letter #64 again?  Maybe now we
know where the James Bond movie writers get their ideas from.  They
get the latest on what Specter (and other megavillians) are doing
by subscribing to Peter Beter's Audio letter.

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 28 Dec 92 13:54:19 GMT
From: JKF <[e-mail]>
Subject: "Moonraker" -- fact or fiction?
Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy,talk.politics.misc,sci.space.shuttle,sci.space,sci.astro

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Dean Adams) writes:
>
>[e-mail] writes:
>
> >>Doesn't this remind you of a plot from a James Bond movie?  Moonraker?
> >>Shuttle takes off from transport 747 causing the 747 to crash...
>
>I guess the SCA crew in this conspiracy also had to be "replicated".  :->
>
> >Glad you guys brought it up.  I just happen to have a piece from Dr. Beter
> >Audio Letter #56 that you might find interesting with regard to "Moonraker"
> >and the rest of the James Bond adventures, and the background of their
> >author, the late Ian Fleming.
>
>Sorry... it's all moot, since Ian Fleming did not write "Moonraker".

Ian Fleming *did* write "Moonraker."  However, _his_ "Moonraker" was about
a _missile_ being built in Britain by Sir Hugo Drax, who, unbeknownst to
the public, was actually a German Nazi.  Drax's missile, built with public
funds and all that, was actually intended to destroy London.  Such a
missile seemed interesting at the time Fleming wrote the book, but by the
time they got around to making a movie, it was old stuff.  Hence they kept
Drax's name and changed virtually all other details when they made the
movie, "Moonraker."

------------------------------

Date: 28 Dec 92 13:52:32 GMT
From: Steve Lamont <[e-mail]>
Subject: "Moonraker" -- fact or fiction?
Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy,talk.politics.misc,sci.space.shuttle,sci.space,sci.astro

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Dean Adams) writes:
>Sorry... it's all moot, since Ian Fleming did not write "Moonraker".
>They had already run out of his stories by that time... ...

Actually, Fleming did (or at least his clone).  It was one of the
original thirteen or so James Bond books.  Kingsley Amis (??) took
over the series sometime in the 1970s with, I think, _License
Renewed_.  I'm a little hazy on the exact dates and titles of the
ersatz Bond books since I was well beyond puberty at the time. :->

Of course, the movies after, say, "Thunderball" (which, in the book
form was probably the most plausible plotline the Fleming ever
hatched), bore only skant resemblance to the stories in the books, so
_Moonraker_, the book, shared only the title with "Moonraker," the
film.

Somehow, I suspect that the sci.* folk are tiring of all this blather,
so followups to rec.arts.movies.

                            spl
--
Steve Lamont, SciViGuy -- [phone] -- [e-mail]
UCSD Microscopy and Imaging Resource/UCSD Med School/La Jolla, CA 92093-0608
"Living alone is living in perpetual irony and thinking, more and more
frequently, Why not."   - Joyce Carol Oates, "The Boyfriend"

------------------------------

Date: 28 Dec 92 14:36:41 GMT
From: "Allen W. Sherzer" <[e-mail]>
Subject: "Moonraker" -- fact or fiction?
Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy,talk.politics.misc,sci.space.shuttle,sci.space,sci.astro

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Dean Adams) writes:

>But I would
>not put it past your Dr. Beter to imagine Fleming having some "inside"
>MI-5/SIS information on the "Space Shuttle conspiracy", even though it
>was back in the 1960s. (what does time matter to people who know? :)

Just shows what you know! Remember that TV show back in the 60's called
"The Time Tunnel" created by Irwin Allen? Well, Mr. Allen was working
for the SSA (I can't tell you what that stands for or they will kill me)
and was responsible for announcing to the public the time travel technology
which MJ-12 received from the aliens.

The show flopped so SSA decided that the public wasn't ready to know
about the newly acquired time travel technology (much less the source).
However, Flemming managed to use the system (he was the MI-5/SSA liaison)
to travel to the present day and uncover the conspiracy. To protect HIS
sources he wrote Moonraker under a false name and arranged for it not
to be published until after his death.

That is how it was done. Pretty obvious when you think about it.

  Allen

PS: (just in case) :-)

--
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Allen W. Sherzer | "A great man is one who does nothing but leaves        |
|  [e-mail]     |  nothing undone"                                       |
+----------------------117 DAYS TO FIRST FLIGHT OF DCX----------------------+

------------------------------

Date: 28 Dec 92 14:36:43 GMT
From: John Thompson Reynolds <[e-mail]>
Subject: Aluminum as rocket fuel?
Newsgroups: sci.space

I've seen references in the past which suggest using Lunar O2 and Aluminum
as rocket fuels.  Have there been any fairly detailed designs of how such
a beast would be constructed?  Perhaps a hollow cylinder of packed Aluminum
dust into which LOX is pumped?

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 28 Dec 1992 17:22:00 GMT
From: Ron Baalke <[e-mail]>
Subject: Galileo GIF Images Available
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro,alt.sci.planetary,sci.geo.geology

                          =======================
                             GALILEO GIF IMAGES
                             December 28, 1992
                          =======================

     Five Galileo images released at last week's press conference are now
available in GIF format (GIF89a).  The images were scanned in from photographs
and are not the raw data.  Caption files accompanying each image are attached
below, and the caption files are also embedded in the image.  Make sure
you are in binary mode when downloading the images, and in ascii mode when
downloading the caption files.  The Galileo images are available using
anonymous ftp to:

        ftp:    ames.arc.nasa.gov (128.102.18.3)
        user:   anonymous
        cd:     pub/SPACE/GIF
        files:
                andes.gif    - False color mosaic of the Andes Mountains
                andes.txt    - caption file
                earthmo2.gif - Color image of the Earth and Moon
                earthmo2.txt - caption file
                mideast.gif  - Color image of the Middle East including Somalia
                mideast.txt  - caption file
                moonfals.gif - False color mosaic of the northern regions of
                               the Moon
                moonfals.txt - caption file
                moongrid.gif - Gray scale Moon image with overlayed grid
                moongrid.txt - caption file

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
andes.txt

PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109.  TELEPHONE [phone]

PHOTO CAPTION                                     GALILEO
December 22, 1992                                 P-41493
                              TOP                 GLL/EM21


This false-color mosaic of the central part of the Andes
mountains of South America (70W, 19S) is made up of 42 images
taken by the Galileo spacecraft from an altitude of about 25,000
kilometers (15,000 miles).  The combination of visible and near-
infrared filters (green, 0.76 micron and 1.0 micron) was chosen
for this picture to separate regions with distinct vegetation and
soil types.  The mosaic shows the area where Chile, Peru, and
Bolivia meet.  North is to the left, and the Pacific coast
(bottom of picture) is in the foreground.  Lakes Titicaca and
Poopo are nearly black patches left to right; a large light blue
area below and left of Lake Poopo is Salar de Uyuni, a dry salt
lake some 120 kilometers (75 miles) across.  These lakes lie in
the Altiplano, a region between the western and eastern Andes,
which are covered by clouds.  The water/ice content of the clouds
is indicated by their shade of pink.  The vegetated Gran Chaco
plains east of the Andes are pale green (top of picture).  Light
blue patches in the mountains to the north (left) are glaciers.
The Galileo project, whose primary mission is the exploration of
the Jupiter system in 1995-97, is managed for NASA's Office of
Space Science and Applications by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
earthmo2.txt

PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109.
TELEPHONE [phone]

PHOTO CAPTION                                     GALILEO
December 22, 1992                                 P-41508
                              TOP                 GLL/EM23


Eight days after its encounter with the Earth, the Galileo
spacecraft was able to look back and capture this view of the
Moon in orbit about the Earth, taken from a distance of about 6.2
million kilometers (3.9 million miles), on December 16.  The
picture was constructed from images take through the violet, red,
and 1.0-micron infrared filters.  The Moon is in the foreground,
moving from left to right.  The brightly-colored Earth contrasts
strongly with the Moon, which reflects only about one-third as
much sunlight as Earth.  Contrast and color have been computer-
enhanced for both objects to improve visibility.  Antarctica is
visible through clouds (bottom).  The Moon's far side is seen;
the shadowy indentation in the dawn terminator is the south-
Pole/Aitken Basin, one of the largest and oldest lunar impact
features, extensively studied from Galileo during the first Earth
flyby in December 1990.  The Galileo project, whose primary
mission is the exploration of the Jupiter system in 1995-97, is
managed for NASA's Office of Space Science and Applications by
the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
mideast.txt

PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109.
TELEPHONE [phone]

PHOTO CAPTION                                     GALILEO
December 22, 1992                                 P-41474

                              TOP                 GLL/EM22

This color image of  North-East Africa and Arabia was taken from
an altitude of about 500,000 kilometers (300,000 miles) by the
Galileo spacecraft on December 9, 1992, as it left the Earth enroute
to Jupiter.  Most of Egypt (center left) including the Nile
Valley, the Red Sea (slightly above center), Israel, Jordan, and
the Arabian peninsula are cloud-free.  In the center, below the
cloud on the coast, is Khartoum, at the confluence of the Blue
Nile and the White Nile.  Somalia (lower right) is partly cloud-
covered.  The Galileo project, whose primary mission is the
exploration of the Jupiter system in 1995-97, is managed for
NASAy's Office of Space Science and Applications by the Jet
Propulsion Laboratory.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
moonfals.txt

PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109.  TELEPHONE [phone]

PHOTO CAPTION                 (TOP)                       P-41490
                                                         GLL/EM17
                                                December 22, 1992

This false-color mosaic was constructed from a series of 53
images taken through three spectral filters by Galileo'simaging
system as the spacecraft flew over the northern regions of the
Moon on December 7, 1992.  The part of the Moon visible from
Earth is on the left side in this view.  The color mosaic shows
compositional variations in parts of the Moon's northern
hemisphere.  Bright pinkish areas are highlands materials, such
as those surrounding the oval lava-filled Crisium impact basin
toward the bottom of the picture.  Blue to orange shades indicate
volcanic lava flows.  To the left of Crisium, the dark blue Mare
Tranquillitatis is richer in titanium than the green and orange
maria above it.  Thin mineral-rich soils associated with
relatively recent impacts are represented by light blue colors;
the youngest craters have prominent blue rays extending from
them.  The Galileo project, whose primary mission is the
exploration of the Jupiter system in 1995-97, is managed for
NASA's Office of Space Science and Applications by the Jet
Propulsion Laboratory.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
moongrid.txt

PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109.  TELEPHONE [phone]

PHOTO CAPTION                 (TOP)                       P-41475
                                                         GLL/EM15
                                                December 22, 1992

This mosaic picture of the Moon was compiled from 18 images taken
with a green filter by Galileo's imaging system during the
spacecraft's flyby on December 7, 1992, some 11 hours before its
Earth flyby at 1509 UTC (7:09 a.m. Pacific Standard Time)
December 8.  The north polar region is near the top part of the
mosaic, which also shows Mare Imbrium, the dark area on the left;
Mare Serenitatis at center; and Mare Crisium, the circular dark
area to the right.  Bright crater rim and ray deposits are from
Copernicus, an impact crater 96 kilometers (60 miles) in
diameter.  Computer processing has exaggerated the brightness of
poorly illuminated features near the day/night terminator in the
polar regions, giving a false impression of high reflectivity
there.  The digital image processing was done by DLR, the German
aerospace research establishment near Munich, an international
collaborator in the Galileo mission.  The Galileo project, whose
primary mission is the exploration of the Jupiter system in 1995-
97, is managed for NASA's Office of Space Science and
Applications by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

                             #####
     ___    _____     ___
    /_ /|  /____/ \  /_ /|     Ron Baalke         | [e-mail]
    | | | |  __ \ /| | | |     Jet Propulsion Lab |
 ___| | | | |__) |/  | | |__   M/S 525-3684 Telos | Choose a job you love, and
/___| | | |  ___/    | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | you'll never have to work
|_____|/  |_|/       |_____|/                     | a day in your life.

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 28 Dec 92 08:14:06 EST
From: John Roberts <[e-mail]>
Subject: GEO satellites as electrical vehicles

-From: [e-mail] (Bruce Dunn)
-Subject: GEO satellites as electrical vehicles
-Date: 28 Dec 92 01:10:31 GMT
-Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada

-        An interesting idea.  Modern comsats have several kilowatts of power,
-enough to run an ion or arcjet engine.  An electric engine running off a few
-kilowatts has a mass of only a few kg, so could easily be carried on the
-vehicle.
-...
-A major problem would probably be radiation damage due to having to spend
-some months in the Van Allen belts as the satellite spirals down to LEO.

Question: what is the radiation profile of the Van Allen belts? This is
of interest because GEO is in the outer portions of the outer belt.
In particular, what is the ratio between the peak radiation level in
the belts and the level at GEO?

John Roberts
[e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 28 Dec 1992 15:22:58 GMT
From: "Dr. Norman J. LaFave" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Justification for the Space Program
Newsgroups: sci.space,talk.politics.space

In article <[e-mail]> Paul Dietz,
[e-mail] writes:
>Perhaps after remarks like this, Herman will be less strident in his
>criticisms of the innumerate.

I hope Paul that this isn't your idea of a substantive rebuttal.

Herman's posting was right on the money. All you have to do is
apply historical precedence to the arguement to see the importance
of the "exploration of the unknown" to the health of a society.
Small, resource-poor countries like England and Portugal became
world powers because they dared to reach for the unknown.
Although they did so in hopes of monetary and political gain, they
had no idea of the magnitude of the benefits they would accrue....
nor could they have known.
Indeed the decline of these societies has come on the heal of
their complacency.

Forget about spin-offs...any spin-offs that result are "icing on the
cake". Forget about mining and solar power satellites....this is just
what we can concieve of at present. History teaches
us that the true gains in cutting-edge science and space and ocean
exploration have yet to be discovered.

Norman

Dr. Norman J. LaFave
Senior Engineer
Lockheed Engineering and Sciences Company




When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro
                               Hunter Thompson

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 28 Dec 1992 17:24:19 GMT
From: Paul Dietz <[e-mail]>
Subject: Justification for the Space Program
Newsgroups: sci.space,talk.politics.space

In article <[e-mail]> Dr. Norman J. LaFave <[e-mail]> writes:
>In article <[e-mail]> Paul Dietz,
>[e-mail] writes:

>> Perhaps after remarks like this, Herman will be less strident in his
>> criticisms of the innumerate.

> I hope Paul that this isn't your idea of a substantive rebuttal.

No, but I am allowed to point out nonsensical statements, aren't I?


> Herman's posting was right on the money. All you have to do is
> apply historical precedence to the arguement to see the importance
> of the "exploration of the unknown" to the health of a society.
> Small, resource-poor countries like England and Portugal became
> world powers because they dared to reach for the unknown.
> Although they did so in hopes of monetary and political gain, they
> had no idea of the magnitude of the benefits they would accrue....
> nor could they have known.
> Indeed the decline of these societies has come on the heal of
> their complacency.


The differences between the age of exploration and today are
considerable.  The raw mineral and agricultural products (and slaves)
that profited the explorers of that age are a much smaller fraction of
GDPs today.

More generally, arguments by analogy are essentially circular.  You
have to assume that the analogy is valid to believe the argument.  I
don't see any reason to do that here.  There are contrary analogies:
for example, exploration of Antarctica has been of little practical
benefit to the exploring countries (although it has been of scientific
benefit to humanity as a whole).

    Paul F. Dietz
    [e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 28 Dec 92 17:47:00 GMT
From: Ron Baalke <[e-mail]>
Subject: Mars Observer Update - 12/28/92
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro,alt.sci.planetary

Forwarded from the Mars Observer Project

                         MARS OBSERVER STATUS REPORT
                              December 28, 1992
                                10:00 AM PST
                              Launch +94 Days

The Spacecraft Team reports that spacecraft subsystems and instruments
are performing nominally.  The spacecraft is in Array Normal Spin state;
the downlink data rate is at 250 bps while the uplink data rate is 125 bps.

C5 A execution began on December 19.  C5 is the outer cruise transition
sequence which is marked by the spacecraft attitude being changed from
an off sun orientation to direct pointing at Earth.  The planned C5 execution
completion date is January 4, 1993.

Stored sequence activities are at a minimum for the next several days.
The Inner/Outer Cruise transition star catalog/ephemeris is scheduled to
be uplinked January 2.  The Flight Sequence C5 B load will be uploaded on
January 3.  The High Gain Antenna "Use" command is scheduled to be sent
on January 4.

Mission Operations is planning to send interactive commands to power on
and power off several subsystem heaters this week; no instrument
commanding is involved.  This is being done to dissipate an excessive
power build up which resulted from last week's sun-coning.  The acting
Mission Manager and Spacecraft Team are meeting this morning to review
this strategy and to plan command approval meetings as necessary.

The MOC (Mars Observer Camera) "bakeout", which was earlier scheduled to
end today, is now planned to continue into C6 through January 14.  The
MOC Instrument Team agreed to this Spacecraft Team requested change to help
with excess power dissipation.  The January 14 MOC heater power off date
allows 4 days for the instrument to return to equilibrium for the scheduled
January 18 focus test.

Today the spacecraft is 36,744,962 km (22,832,261 miles) from Earth,
traveling at a velocity of 9.0877 kilometers per second (20,328 miles per
hour) with respect to Earth.  One way light time is approximately 123
seconds.
     ___    _____     ___
    /_ /|  /____/ \  /_ /|     Ron Baalke         | [e-mail]
    | | | |  __ \ /| | | |     Jet Propulsion Lab |
 ___| | | | |__) |/  | | |__   M/S 525-3684 Telos | Choose a job you love, and
/___| | | |  ___/    | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | you'll never have to work
|_____|/  |_|/       |_____|/                     | a day in your life.

------------------------------

Date: 28 Dec 92 13:59:32 GMT
From: [e-mail]
Subject: NASA's role in space
Newsgroups: sci.space

The Tethered Satellite System should be a case that fits NASA's role perfectly
- a research program in a new field. However, even that program was frought
with the burden of the "old" NASA. The current program managers probably
couldn't even name the program managers who were responsible for the original
design.

Howver, there is a big difference between NASA engaging in basic science, and
NASA operating a launch system.

--- Maximus 2.01wb

------------------------------

Date: 28 Dec 92 16:54:01 GMT
From: Joe Cain <[e-mail]>
Subject: Planet Earth
Newsgroups: sci.geo.geology,alt.sci.planetology,sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Andy Michael USGS Guest) writes:
>>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Joe Cain) writes:
>>>    Has anyone more than perused the new book "Planet Earth" by
>>>Cesare Emiliani? It seems to be an interesting tome, but at first
>>>glance seems like written by a nut and/or a flamboyant Italian. It
>>>has material all the way from science and religion, basic physics,
>>>meteorology, and geology (planetary, historical...) to biological
>>>evolution. 107 of the 718 pages are tables.  (Cambridge U. Press,
>>>1992)
(many lines deleted)
>  This report makes a very
>persuasive case for the importance of earth system science which I had
>previously considered to be the latest buzzword to sell stuff to
>congress.  So while a lot of other people are talking about the
>importance of this Cesare has gone and written the textbook for it.  My
>hat is off to him.

Two hats at least..


Joseph Cain        [e-mail]
[e-mail]        scri::cain

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 28 Dec 92 10:35:52 CST
From: ssi![e-mail] (Louis F. Adornato)
Subject: Stupid Shut Cost arguements

"Allen W. Sherzer" <[e-mail]> writes:

>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Gary Coffman) wri
>tes:
>
>>In military procurement, the development costs are charged against
>>the prototypes, X, Y, etc, and the operational vehicles of the procurement
>>are charged at "flyaway" cost.
>
>Which I suspect is done largely to hide the true cost. I point out that if
>the contractors in question ran their accounts this way they would all be
>in jail and out of buisness.

Wrong.  Many major corporations consider research and/or development a
"sunk" cost - it's something that's considered part of the cost of
staying in business, and, since it's paid for in cash that's generated
by the current product line, it doesn't _have_ to be amortized against
the new product lines, and so it isn't.  This allows much more
flexibility in developing a pricing strategy for the new line.  The
only concern in this case is the rate of return on investment and
the total return on investment (one is the derivative of the profits to
be generated by the new product line, the other is the integral of
profits over the life of the product line).

Of course, a start up business, with no existing product line and no
cash flow, has to borrow money to cover initial R&D, and that borrowed
money has to be paid back over the life of the loan, therefore the R&D
cost has to be amortized against the cost of the (eventual) product.
ROI and rate of RIO are still important (if the ROI is less than your
startup financing, or if the rate is less than the maturation rate
of your financing, you're in BIG trouble).

>
>>Following this model, Enterprise ate the
>>development costs, and it's retired. Current Orbiters are only liable for
>>their $1.5 billion flyaway cost and their operational costs.
>
>But why should we follow that model?

Because NASA paid for the design and development work (and precious
little research) up front, and doesn't have to pay anyone back for
those costs.  The fact that the Federal government itself borrowed that
money doesn't enter into it, it's still a sunk cost paid out of current
funds.

>                                     Hiding costs like you advocate only
>encourages waste and inefficiency.

On the contrary, by keeping development and operational costs separate,
there's less opportunity for waste and inefficency in one phase to get
buried in the lifecycle costs.  Besides, development and operations are
two completely different kinds of costs, so drawing a clean line
between the two also provides better historical information for
budgeting, forecasting, and cost control on the next project.

>                                    How can we possibly make access to space
>cheap if we make it impossible to identify those costs and reduce them?

How do you figure that limiting design and development costs to the
prototype makes it impossible to identify them?  Seems to me that it's
the other way around; the amortization you propose leads to much more
blurring of where the real costs where incurred.  Attempting to
amortize a sunk cost artificially inflates the per-flight cost, and
will also probably swamp out many meaningful variations

Of course, amortizing the development costs does have one real
advantage; it ensures that the shuttle's per-flight costs will always
be astronomical, while allowing the DC program to hide it's own
development costs behind a vaporware figure of useful lifespan.  I
think this is not only unethical and deceptive, it's also unnecessary
and self-defeating.  Developing a new spacecraft is expensive,
especially when you want to design it for a long and cost-effective
life, and we shouldn't try to hide this.  We're not going to do anyone
any favors by selling the American public on another grandiose
"space-truck" that can't live up to inflated expectations (I once saw a
1974 vintage (awful) movie that had Columbia flying _three times_ in
one day).

Lou Adornato                 |    "Sure, the cow may have jumped over the
Supercomputer Systems, Inc   |      moon, but she burned up on reentry"
Eau Claire, WI               | The secretary (and the rest of the company)
uunet!ssi!lfa or [e-mail] | have disavowed any knowledge of my actions.

------------------------------

Date: 28 Dec 92 15:46:24 GMT
From: "Allen W. Sherzer" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Stupid Shut Cost arguements (was Re: Terminal Velocity
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Brian Stuart Thorn) writes:

>  You seem to have two sets of measuring systems at work. One which you
>  use for DC, Titan, Delta et al, and one which you use for Shuttle.

I disagree; I feel I am working very hard to account for both the same
way.

However, if you disagree, please post your own numbers. State the rules
you want to use and apply to both systems fairly. Then show that Shuttle
is better.

I await your reply.

  allen

--
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Allen W. Sherzer | "A great man is one who does nothing but leaves        |
|  [e-mail]     |  nothing undone"                                       |
+----------------------117 DAYS TO FIRST FLIGHT OF DCX----------------------+

------------------------------

Date: 28 Dec 92 13:57:44 GMT
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Stupid Shut Cost arguements (was Re: Terminal Velocity
Newsgroups: sci.space

The cost of shuttle operations is so high that regardless of whether the
flight rate is 4 or 6 or 8 per year that the cost compares unfavorably with
private launch services (or a successful DC-1).

The Space Shuttle is simply the highest cost (per pound) launch vehicle ever
operated.

--- Maximus 2.01wb

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End of Space Digest Volume 15 : Issue 604
------------------------------