Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sunybcs!boulder!tramp!serre
From: serre@tramp.Colorado.EDU (SERRE GLENN)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: Shuttle Vandenburg Lauch Site
Message-ID: <15067@boulder.Colorado.EDU>
Date: 20 Dec 89 05:22:32 GMT
References: <1586@rodan.acs.syr.edu>
Sender: news@boulder.Colorado.EDU
Reply-To: serre@tramp.Colorado.EDU (SERRE GLENN)
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder
Lines: 45

In article <1586@rodan.acs.syr.edu> amichiel@rodan.acs.syr.edu (A. Michielsen) writes:
>>1) SLC-6 (Shuttle Launch Pad) was indeed mostly, if not completely, finished. 
>>
>  Finished Steel structures & Concrete LOOK but don't MAKE a Completed site

- Maybe not, but SLC-6 was more than just steel and cocrete.  For example, there
  was a lot of AGE installed.   

>   Vandenberg is nearly the optimal launch site for Security Missions, but 
>   more importantly; for the orbital angle desired for many of the security
>   missions, (i.e. most classes of semi-polar orbital spy sat's like keyholes)
>   vandenberg offers the best launch angle. Ground security, nearby overflight

- Only the best continental U.S. launch site; trajectories still need to "steer"
around Southern California. 

>   IF HOWEVER, Vandenberg is considered as a REPLACEMENT for the Cape, & the
>   typical (desired) traffic of commercial sat equip., THEN Vandenberg is 
>   'virtually' useless with out GROSSLY more powerful SRB's.  Even the  1 time

- No one (well, no one I know about) considered Vandenberg as a replacement for 
the Cape.  

>   Vandenberg HOWEVER has GREAT problems that weren't properly evaluated 
>   BEFORE great GOB's of money were dumped there.
>1. The environment is HOSTILE. Sand storms, Oxidation (rust), Solar damage
>   (UV ray intensity, tenperature, etc.), and the intense lack of relative
>   humidity; combine to cause GREAT AMOUNTS OF FANTASTIC DAMAGE to all kinds

- Cape environment is just as hostile: T-storms, everything rusts (salt and 
humidity), high temperatures, high humidity. (BTW, why would UV be especially
high at Vandenberg?)

>   SO, WHEN the USAF wanted $$$ to build a Titan site (for III's today, and
>   IV's later). Congress Dumped on them, converting vandenberg to a titan site

- The USAF has no more Titan IIIs, they only have Titan IVs.  The Commercial 
Titan is a Titan III, but will not launch out of Vandenberg.  
- Vandenberg is already a Titan site (it has SLC-4), it is SLC-6 
(which is located on Vandenberg AFB) which would be converted to  a Titan site. 

SLC-7 was to be the new Titan launch complex at Vandenberg.  

--Glenn Serre
serre@tramp.colorado.edu