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From: space@ucbvax.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.space
Subject: Re: Shuttle Program
Message-ID: <8602211720.AA13425@pesnta.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 21-Feb-86 11:20:35 EST
Article-I.D.: pesnta.8602211720.AA13425
Posted: Fri Feb 21 11:20:35 1986
Date-Received: Mon, 24-Feb-86 07:02:00 EST
References: <8602180507.AA06619@s1-b.arpa>
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Organization: CONCURRENT Computer Corporation
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In article <8602180507.AA06619@s1-b.arpa> you write:
>The discussion of the farther future has been somewhat divorced from
>reality.  A Transatmospheric Vehicle (TAV, Orient Express) will barely be
>available to the military in 10 years.  Shuttle quality service is probably
>much farther away.  Consequently if a new shuttle is built, it will see
>plenty of use before something better comes along.  Those discussing
>teleoperators might want to wander down to the lab some day and look at the
>manipulators available, and the current rate of progress.  People are going
>to be needed for a good long time for many tasks.  On almost every SpaceLab
>mission, equipment repairs were necessary.  On the last mission, the JPL
>scientist doing some suspended fluid experiments in equipment he designed
>had to spend the better part of a day upside down inside the machine fixing
                                       ^^^^^^^^^^^
Did you really mean that or was it a Freudian slip?  I mean after all, how
does one determine up or down without gravity?

>it.  It is silly to talk about manned versus unmanned as an either/or
>proposition.  Both have their good and bad points.  Machines are cheap but
>not too flexible.  They can handle all the simple tasks.  Men are expensive
>but very flexible.  They can handle the messy cases, which are unfortunately
>not all that rare.  As I pointed out in a New York Times letter a while ago,
>one reason for having a space station is the cost of launches.  It might
>be cheaper over the long run to have a space station with infrequent
>launches compared to no space station and more frequent launches.

Kim Althoff
ihnp4!pesnta!kima