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SLS and Orion

That Alternate Reality Without SLS

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
September 9, 2016
Filed under
That Alternate Reality Without SLS

How I learned to stop worrying and love the big $60B NASA rocket, Ars Technica
“So if NASA makes 20 SLS flights by the end of the 2030s, the rocket will roughly cost the agency a total of $60 billion, or $3 billion per flight. Now imagine NASA issuing a Request for Information for heavy lift in 2011. Say the agency was willing to pay a fixed-price sum of $10 billion to a private company to develop a 100-ton heavy lift launch vehicle and a per flight fee of $500 million. Either SpaceX, United Launch Alliance, or another company (Blue Origin, perhaps) certainly would have been capable of delivering a flight-ready rocket within a decade. After buying 20 launches, NASA would still have $40 billion left to spend on things other than rockets. During this decade, then, the agency could have focused on deep space habitats, landers, in-space propulsion, Mars gravity studies, and more. When the private rocket was ready to go in 2021, NASA would be prepared to fly meaningful missions. This isn’t a hypothetical, by the way. Back in the late 2000s, United Launch Alliance outlined a path of upgrades for its Delta IV Heavy rocket that included derivatives (based upon an innovative ACES upper stage and new engines) that could get 90 tons or more to low-Earth orbit. This could be flying today for less than $10 billion. This was common knowledge to NASA and the aerospace community at the time SLS came into existence, but Congress wasn’t interested.”

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

40 responses to “That Alternate Reality Without SLS”

  1. Brian Thorn says:
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    The ULA proposal was Atlas V Phase II, not Delta IV-Heavy, if memory serves. Which raises questions about what Sen. McCain would be saying about buying even more RD-180s about now.

      • Zed_WEASEL says:
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        Considering the BBQ fireball effect on every Delta IV Heavy launch. So some doubts on the feasibility of a seven core Delta IV variant. Never mind the issues with assembling a Delta CBC core with six strapped-on CBC boosters along with how to implement GSE interfaces.

        The Atlas V Phase II was a new vehicle design using the tooling from the Delta IV with 2 RD-180 engines. It morphed into the current Vulcan launcher with 2 Blue Origin BE-4 MethoLox engines. Think the Vulcan in theory can swap out the BE-4 with the higher impulse SpaceX Raptor engine, since their thrust output is about the same. In theory only since hell have to freeze over first before ULA uses SpaceX engines. 🙂

        The follow on Delta IV and Atlas V variants was from Boeing and Lockheed-Martin respectively before their ULA merger.

        • Matthew Black says:
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          With RS-68A the hydrogen flare up issue was greatly reduced. The Delta IV-H with the 6x GEM strap on solids was perhaps the easiest option for heavy lift for ULA – as the eventual RD-180 issue for Atlas V exposed. This configuration with aluminium-lithium tank structures and a stronger upper stage would have gotten more than 40 metric tons into LEO. This would be used with the existing launchpad. One possible configuration using another launchpad – such as an adapted Pad 39 – could use 12x GEM-60 solids, 6 on each side of the row of booster stages. This with propellant densification and the use of an advanced ‘AUS’ engine would get more than 50 metric tons into LEO. Hah! The possibilities were nearly endless – and many billions could’ve been saved. When it comes to Space Exploration visions, WHY is hindsight always 20/20?! But I concede even that Delta IV-H derivation would still be expensive – the business we’re all talking about often is…

          • Zed_WEASEL says:
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            AIUI the Delta IV heavy Hydrogen flare was not reduce by the RS-68A engines. The flare reduction is from stagger engine ignitions.

            Assembling 7 Delta IV CBC on a new MLP at the VAB is not that hard. It is just costly since you are dealing with deep cryogenic plumbing for the liquid Hydrogen. However don’t think GEM solid motor boosters can be added to this vehicle configuration. The GSE interfaces and umbilical lines needs to go somewhere on the CBC exterior. Which brings up how to connect the GSE interfaces and umbilical lines to the unique core CBC.

            Propellant densification for any launch vehicle requires a redesign of the vehicle. Also liquid Hydrogen can not be densify practically.

          • Matthew Black says:
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            I wasn’t saying multiple or 12x GEM solids for the 7x core Delta – I know that would not be possible – only for the 3x Delta IV-Heavy. 6x per side of the row of 3x main boosters would give you 12. This would give that configuration a liftoff thrust of 4.5 million pounds – less if the corestage’s launch in throttled-down mode to preserve propellant. Another configuration could have been a 5x liquid booster ‘cruciform’ layout, with each liquid strap-on booster also including 2x GEM-60s, yielding a liftoff thrust of 5 million pounds plus, thrust!!

            Keeping the corestage at minimum 55% percent throttle until all boosters were discarded would negate all need for propellant crossfeed complexity. The upper stage could have come in two flavors: either a 4x RL-10 ACES or a 5 meter Delta upper stage with stretched propellant tanks and a single RL-60 or MB-60 engine. With aluminium-lithium structures and densified LOX, I’d wager that this booster could place nearly 60 metric tons into Low Earth Orbit. Never a need for Shuttle derived then, eh…?

          • Zed_WEASEL says:
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            You can only add solid boosters to one side of the the CBC with the Delta IV Heavy currently. More is not possible without a new launch pad & new GSE along with redesigning the the 3 unique CBC variants in the Delta IV Heavy.

            A 5 core Delta IV variant have the same issues as the 7 core Delta IV variant with regard to the launch pad & GSE..

            The MB-60 aka RL-60 is dead and buried. You will be better off designing an upper stage with the 50k+ lbf BE-3U HydroLox engine from Blue Origin. AIUI a single BE-3U is cheaper than one of the four re-manufactured RL-10C required for the ACES upper stage.

          • Matthew Black says:
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            My friend – you are NOT reading my previous posts properly; I *ALREADY SAID* that to use 12x GEM solids my discussed configuration would have to use another pad, such as an altered Pad 39A. And as for the RL-60 – yes, it’s dead, but it’s not exactly the same engine as the MB-60, which *IS* going ahead, last I heard on the H-series of launchers. But you are also missing some other context of this whole thread – we are talking about *ALTERNATE HISTORY WITHOUT SLS* – in which case, the engine options/discussions of that past time would fit our alternate HISTORY. If I were talking about the present, I would be talking about the N.G.E, the Vinci or BE-3’s as we know them now.

            You KEEP pointing out or needling me about things I’ve already stated or are already WELL aware of – I’ve been following rocketry and Space Exploration in general for about 45 of my 51 years on this planet. I mostly know my stuff, Sir.

          • Zed_WEASEL says:
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            Sorry, I did mis-read your point on the Delta IV Heavy.

            FYI the JAXA H-series launchers will be using LE-5B engine. The upcoming H-3 launcher will be using a LE-5B upper stage engine in design specifications published in early 2016. IMO the upper stage engine selection is to avoid the development of a new engine. So further work on the MB-60 without an assoiated launvher seems unlikely.

      • Brian Thorn says:
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        I stand corrected. I only remembered Atlas V Phase II.
        But does anyone else find it amusing that Delta IV Heavy architecture was being proposed as a _cheaper_ alternative. Only compared to SLS is Delta IV lower-cost.

  2. RocketScientist327 says:
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    Oh Keith don’t you understand that Congress knows best?

    ANd the $60 BILLION you estimated doesn’t even include payload DDT&E. Hehe.

    We can only hope the private sector makes it. Some of us keep politely bringing it up that if NASA focused on the real things we need we would have something truly special.

    Seriously, I know there is the Europa mission but when we ask people about designing SMD missions with SLS we always get eyerolls.

    • Michael Spencer says:
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      Is a proper Europa mission kitted for SLS not possible with early FH (given the development of an upper stage -or even Centaur as it has flown on many different rockets?

      More broadly deep space missions are the ace in the hole for SLS proponents. But Isn’t it actually the case that even deep space sans circuitous flybys are possible with FH?

      • Zed_WEASEL says:
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        A fully expendable Falcon Heavy can do about half what the SLS Block 1B can do in high energy missions.

        With a MethoLox upper stage the fully expendable Falcon Heavy is about equal with the SLS Block 1B in high energy missions.

        Of course they have to start bending metal for the EUS upper stage if there is going to be a SLS Block 1B.

        The often quoted 130 metric tons capable SLS Block 2 requires more powerful strapped-on boosters that is still on the drawing boards.

      • Paul451 says:
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        Is a proper Europa mission kitted for SLS not possible with early FH (given the development of an upper stage -or even Centaur as it has flown on many different rockets?

        Using the original Merlin upper-stage on FH, you’d need two launches. One for the probe and one for an extra propulsion module which would dock to the payload and provide the kick out of Earth orbit.

        Once you throw in a methalox upper-stage, FH should match the “throw” of SLS. (Alternatively Vulcan-ACES.)

        But in a alternative history without Constellation and then SLS, you’d probably have already had another Jupiter mission by now. Several Jupiter proposals (including the nuclear JIMO) were amongst those shelved when the Griffin-monster sucked up science funding for Ares/Orion.

        Who cares if a probe has to weave through multiple gravitational slingshots to reach Jupiter, if our alternative means you have to wait an extra decade just for the launch. “But it’ll get there faster on SLS”, no, without SLS it could have already been there by now.

  3. Richard Brezinski says:
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    United Launch Alliance outlined a path of upgrades….This was common knowledge to NASA ….Congress wasn’t interested.

    Congress just wants to spend money, mainly each representative in their own districts.
    Congress has also determined that NASA will not be getting more money. The budget has been and will be flat-in fact if they continue to get so little for the money they spend, the budget will decline.

    I fault NASA for not having strategized getting the biggest bang for their buck. NASA has been needlessly wasting a lot of money on two things they do not need: Orion and SLS. Yet the cry we hear repeatedly, is that Congress has forced NASA’s hand.

    Too bad NASA doesn’t have anyone smart enough to figure out a better way.

    • rktsci says:
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      SLS was a creature of Congress. Their staff decided on the basic design. If Congress appropriates the money for X, NASA has to do X.

      • fcrary says:
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        There could have been alternative designs within the parameters certain Congressmen wanted. I think that was Mr Brezinski’s point.

      • Jeff2Space says:
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        To be fair, SLS didn’t come from nowhere. Former NASA Administrator Mike Griffin was the one pushing Ares I and Ares V instead of other options like evolving EELVs. SLS is little more than a tweaked Ares V. So I blame former NASA Administrator Mike Griffin for starting NASA down this failed path.

  4. Matthew Black says:
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    If Congress wanted to keep the pork flowing and retain the Shuttle infrastructure and workforce, but still have a launcher capable of placing more than 70 tons into Low Earth and more than 30 tons to Earth escape, then this Shuttle derived launcher would have sufficed handsomely: it also could have been developed and fielded for billions less than SLS and about five years quicker… http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/361

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wi

    • Shaw_Bob says:
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      ‘Five years quicker’ seems unrealistically slow! A first-generation unmanned STS derived HLV would surely have been much faster to deploy than that…

      • Matthew Black says:
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        I should have said about five years from initial authorization to actual deployment – the Orion and other payloads would have been the pacing items! SLS is a heck of a lot slower.

    • Paul451 says:
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      The budget and schedule estimates are as nonsensical for SDHLV as they were for Ares and SLS.

      Any Shuttle-derived launcher suffers from the same two problems:

      1)

      The Shuttle looks like a modular system, but it isn’t. The Shuttle concept was, in essence, technologically impossible. In order to make it work, the engineers — who had cut their teeth during the Apollo program — worked what amounts to engineering witchcraft. Each component was engineered in balance with the others, in order to achieve a capability the components by themselves were incapable of achieving. Highest level of hand-crafted custom engineering.

      [Contrast a Formula 1 engine vs a conventional race-car engine (let alone a commercial car engine.) F1 engines get over 300HP per litre of engine, reving to 20,000 RPM (yes, twenty thousand, not a typo), NASCAR engines get about 140HP/L at a more conventional 9000RPM or so. And NASCAR engines are an engineering marvel compared to what’s in your car.]

      Brilliant, but incredibly fragile. Change anything and you throw out the whole system. You see this every time even minor changes were made to the Shuttle stack, you have to ripple those changes through the rest of the system. You couldn’t just say, “Use material X to lighten the ET by 5%, thus adding 7% more payload…”, changing either the ET mass or payload changes the mass balance between the orbiter and the ET, which not only potentially affects every connection between them, but means you have to retune the SSME’s to cope with the new thrust-profile, because the orbiter has to carry its own mass, it can’t hang from the ET… etc etc. Same with uprating the SRBs.

      And major changes, like uprated SRBs, or liquid boosters, or Shuttle-C (which SDHLV derived from), or adding a tertiary payload to the ET, or changing the heat-shield material, or changing the ET insulation, or… was always proposed as a simple change, but always ended up (once people actually sat down and worked out the issues) costing as much as developing a clean-sheet launcher from scratch, and hence were never funded.

      SDHLV/Shuttle-C is trying to turn a Formula One car into a general-purpose farm-hauler. It might be possible, maybe, but the idea that starting with that F1 car is saving you time/money…

      2)

      For the 2010/11 budget that gave us SLS, the Shuttle had been out of development for thirty years. (For Constellation/Ares, around 25yrs.) No designer or engineer who worked on Shuttle development in the ’70s still worked at NASA or their contractor. They were long retired or dead.

      Most of the guys who came into the Shuttle program after it went operational are long retired. Ie, even the second generation of ops are retired. The current “experienced” Shuttle engineers are three or four generations removed from the original development. And none of them have ever developed a new launcher, until they were asked to design Ares then SLS.

      You can’t expect to cut’n’paste any technology after thirty years, the way you expect with the SDHLV (or SLS). You especially can’t expect to develop such a major system when you “experienced” engineers have never developed a new system before.

      But of all the systems to attempt it with, doing it with Shuttle technology is always, always going to be slow, expensive, dangerous, and inefficient.

      • Matthew Black says:
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        Which was why I thought Atlas V Phase II with ACES would have been a better approach. Nonetheless, I think you are exaggerating the SDHLV transition difficulties – the only major new part of it would be the cargo carrier: it was the Orbiter that was the truly fragile part of the STS system. The STS ‘stack’ could be prepared for flight safely up to six times per year during the peak Shuttle era – that would represent more than 400 metric tons of payload to L.E.O. per annum.

        In August at JSC I spoke to two engineers who had recently reviewed all the SDHLV’s documentation – they were former critics of Shannon’s beast and NOT fans of SLS. It was their contention that as far as Shuttle derived was concerned, John Shannon’s SDHLV was the way to go. As it is; they believe that ULA’s Vulcan and Falcon Heavy would give NASA all the heavy lift it needed, cost-wise.

        • Paul451 says:
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          Nonetheless, I think you are exaggerating the SDHLV transition difficulties – the only major new part of it would be the cargo carrier

          You are still treating the shuttle-stack as a modular system, it is not. You would need to reengineer every component.

          This isn’t hypothetical, you only need to look at actual upgrades, real and proposed. And the issues that arose once they actually sat down and worked out the flow-on effects of their changes.

          two engineers who had recently reviewed all the SDHLV’s documentation

          I’ve also spoken with former STS people who have been involved in policy decisions, and asked them why they ever thought that reusing Shuttle parts would save money/time. And they honestly don’t know. In the cold light of day, they can see how ridiculous it was, but it was just the group-think at the time.

          (The Russian copy was much more modular. It could be used in cargo-only mode. It could have variable number of boosters. Hence you could upgrade or change-out the boosters. Etc.

          If you were designing a Shuttle MkII in the late-’80s early ’90s, that’s what you would build. Instead, every time the idea of a shuttle replacement came up, NASA either jumped onto the SSTO group-think or the Shuttle-Derived group-think. Those were the only two factions at NASA with any political access.)

          Which was why I thought Atlas V Phase II with ACES would have been a better approach.

          One of the problem with Atlas V was that it was never intended for upgrades. Hence the design of the main stage is kind of kludgey. (That’s why the solid motors on the variants are asymmetrically clustered, producing off-centre thrust.)

          Designing a cleaner first stage, even if it used the same engines, would have been a necessary first step in any upgrade path.

          [And then of course there’s the engines. ULA had the rights to develop an RD-180 clone in the US, but apparently wanted the USAF to pay for it. The USAF believed that LM had made a promise to fund the clone, as part of getting permission to create the ULA merger. The result was a decade-plus staring contest.]

          • Matthew Black says:
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            I too think that the RD-180 manufactured domestically would have been the answer to a lot of planning prayers – but as I said; hindsight. A proper clean sheet corestage using the 5.4 meter Delta tooling is eerily similar to what Commercial space vendors are now proposing. Powerful, booster stages with LOX/RP-1 and hydrogen upper stages – echoes of Saturn V, only smaller and more manageable… 😉

          • Jeff2Space says:
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            Except a domestically produced RD-180 would surely have been more expensive than just buying them from Russia. That and the upfront costs of starting RD-180 production in the US wouldn’t have been trivial. ULA clearly didn’t want to invest in domestic production of RD-180 and the government didn’t press the issue.

          • Matthew Black says:
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            Yes – which is why it didn’t happen. If not for politics, the RD-180 supply could’ve continued in near-perpetuity. As it happens, with Blue Origin’s New Glenn project, Space X (when they iron out the remaining bugs) and ULA’s Vulcan; the US will have a formidable Launch Fleet – with OR without the SLS. Perhaps it’s all for the best, in the long run… And add U.S. allies’ Ariane 6 and the uprated Japanese H-II concepts (should they go ahead), then this would all add up to a considerable launch capacity.

      • Daniel Woodard says:
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        In addition the specialized servicing facilities including the VAB and crawlers must be maintained. Moreover most of the engineers who maintained the Shuttle (and I agree that they did the impossible) were not civil service, the worked for United Space Alliance and were laid off when the program ended without so much as an attempt to collect their experiences.

  5. TheBrett says:
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    I smiled at this part of that essay-

    My source views the agency’s payments on SLS and Orion as a “stupidity tax” that allows “good money” to be spent on commercial space.

    Was that you Keith? ;D

  6. Michael Spencer says:
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    I was disappointed after reading Eric’s piece which I took, if not a “sell out”, then something close to it. And from a respected science journalist.

    Here’s the thing: citizen push-back against dumb or wrong governmental policy is often the only tool we have. As a child of the (late) 60s the notion that we accept this nonsense is just…wrong. Where’s the outrage? Turn on the radio and hear music about umbrellas, bitches, and whores.

    Maybe it’s a small amount of money in the budget. Yea? There are people not 50 miles away from the little rich community of Naples florida who die for lack of proper health care. Just one example.

    Fight the good fight.

    • JadedObs says:
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      Most of the development money has been spent – time to move on.

      • Paul451 says:
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        I’ll stop complaining about SLS when proponents of SLS stop pretending it’s a good idea.

        • Michael Spencer says:
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          Well, at least in one sense it’s a “good” idea: it gives us the ability to life huge amounts of mass.

          Could the BFR do the same? Or SDHLV? Maybe and yes. Would they have been cheaper? No consensus on SDHLV, for reasons stated above, and BFR remains as far as anyone is concerned a figment.

          More to the point is such a heavy lifter even needed when multiple lifts by “smaller” (yet incredibly capable machines) can do the same? Is there hardware that requires by its nature lift in one go, not amendable to on orbit construction?

          Others here can answer that question. I realize that experience has shown on-orbit construction to be costly and more difficult than thought, but at some point on orbit construction will become standard practice. It’s one of dozens of enabling tech being ignored by NASA (long term radiation, artificially induced “gravity” come to mind).

          On the other hand I recall Saturn 5. It was one hell of a rocket and a joy to watch as it lifted slowly into the ether. SLS will put on the same show. It is a glorious rocket.

          • Jeff2Space says:
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            “Well, at least in one sense it’s a “good” idea: it gives us the ability to life huge amounts of mass.” Except it hasn’t flown yet. And when you factor in the low flight rate, the benefit just isn’t worth the cost. Better to send up hardware and assemble in LEO. Even factoring in extra mass for docking hardware and the like, you’d still save money on launch using existing vehicles like Delta IV Heavy (and it’s not considered inexpensive by any stretch).

          • Paul451 says:
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            Well, at least in one sense it’s a “good” idea: it gives us the ability to life huge amounts of mass.

            Not really. Maximum of five SLS flights between the program start in 2011 to 2027/28, the furthest we have information about. So a maximum of 350 tonnes to LEO, or equivalent.

            Which is about 7 FH launches, let’s say 10 because of the weaker upper-stage. Or 14 DIVH launches.

            Those five SLS flights will cost around $30 billion.

            14 DIVH flights would cost $14b at current low flight-rate prices. (Probably less since it would give a higher flight-rate.) So you could launch at least double the mass for the same price as SLS, or launch the same mass and leave half the funding available for… you know… developing the actual payloads.

            10 FH launches would cost at least a $1 billion. The worst case cost I can come up with (by multiplying the fully reusability price by 3 for full expendability) is still under $3 billion. So you could launch 10 times the mass for the same price, or launch the same mass and leave 90% of the funding available for developing the mission payloads.

            Still not seeing SLS’s selling point.

            [The same argument can be made for Orion. Even ignoring Commercial Crew. The cost of trying to cram all the necessary hardware into a single Orion capsule (plus the problems of launching humans on an SRB-boosted launcher, where your launch-escape system masses as much as the entire capsule) would be vastly reduced by developing a smaller version of Orion to be launched on Atlas, and developing an expendable habitat/propulsion module to launch on another system (Atlas/Delta/FH/Ariane). You’d be flying sooner, perhaps to ISS before the hab-module is developed. The hab-module would give you the seed hardware for a long-duration habitat system for deep-space missions. As well as providing a training tool for contractors to later develop the cis-lunar space-station.]

            Is there hardware that requires by its nature lift in one go, not amendable to on orbit construction?

            It’s irrelevant whether we can conceive of such hardware (of course we can). None of the proposed missions for SLS, including DRA 5.0 Mars mission, require components over 20 tonnes. And all larger missions (such as DRA5.0) require some kind orbital assembly.

            (By “orbital assembly”, we’re only taking about docking modules together, not astronauts doing EVAs with power-tools.)

  7. Mark Shackelford says:
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    “This isn’t a hypothetical, by the way.” Oh really? Please explain….

    “United Launch Alliance outlined a path of upgrades for its Delta IV Heavy rocket that included derivatives (based upon an innovative ACES upper stage and new engines)”. BZZZT!!! Wrong answer. That is exactly the definition of a hypothetical.

    So ULA outlined, or postulated, a path of upgrades which did not, and still do not, exist. Using a proposed new upper stage (ACES) that did not and still does not exist. Using new engines that also did not and still do not exist.

    Additionally, “This could be flying today for less than $10 billion.” Could be, might have been, theoretically, already flying. For less than some dollar figure that, hypothetically, someone pulled out of their nether regions. Does anyone really believe that ULA could have gone through 14 different upgrades to the DIVH in five years for less that $10 billion? When a single DIVH launch costs upwards of $350 million? Somehow, I don’t see that happening.

    Finally, “This was common knowledge to NASA and the aerospace community at the
    time SLS came into existence, but Congress wasn’t interested.” Perhaps Congress was more interested in their own hypothetical rocket. Which, as it is turning out before our eyes, is no longer so hypothetical. SLS Block-1B will greatly outperform the (hypothetical) DIVH upgrades, and the (even more hypothetical) DIVH derivatives, and even the (outright speculative) Next Generation Delta.

    I am eager to see the launch of SLS EM-1. It’s going to be amazing.
    Cheers!

    • JadedObs says:
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      An unbuilt ULA paper rocket is only surpassed in its “betterness” by the blind belief that if NASA would just get out of the way, Musk would fix everything!

  8. Vladislaw says:
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    It would be more than 40 billion .. without SLS and Orion NASA would have laid off another 4000 people .. another added funding stream.

  9. DiscipleY says:
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    “The true cost of SLS may therefore not be best measured in the billions
    of dollars NASA will spend to develop the rocket in-house, but rather in
    holding back the technologies that could enable lower-cost exploration
    and safer, faster transit to Mars. Because NASA now spends money to
    integrate 20th-century technology into a new rocket, it is not spending
    money developing 21st-century technologies to expand the human presence,
    permanently, into deep space.”

    Yep. People talk about the glory days of Apollo. Working new 21st-century tech to expand the human presence,
    permanently, into deep space. I think that would actually get us there.