Newsgroups: sci.space
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: Heavy Lift Vehicle
Message-ID: <1989Feb10.192117.12447@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <4XwVpQy00Xc94aJ3IN@andrew.cmu.edu>
Date: Fri, 10 Feb 89 19:21:17 GMT

In article <4XwVpQy00Xc94aJ3IN@andrew.cmu.edu> kr0u+@andrew.cmu.edu (Kevin William Ryan) writes:
>... What are the possibilities of copying some big
>boosters from them?  Not necessarily Energia, but perhaps Proton?  I would
>think that it's in the same class as redoing the Saturn V...

Probably not quite, but it's not worth the bother either:  I don't think
Proton can do anything that the bigger Titans can't.  *Buying* Protons is
undoubtedly cheaper than buying Titans, if the Soviets were selling, but
copying it would drive the cost right back up again.  Energia might be
worth copying.

>   I would like to know if anyone has information about the Saturn launcher
>used for the early Apollo tests (the IIB?) - were the plans for that pitched
>as well?  Surely the capacity to orbit the mass of the LM/SM/CM combination
>would be useful.  Does anyone know if the plans for that are still around?

The Saturn IB is in pretty much the same boat as the Saturn V, I think:
tooling gone, launch sites gone, expertise gone, plans partly gone.  Not
quite as bad, and there was talk of reviving it at one point, but it doesn't
seem to have happened.

Also, if I'm not mistaken, the Saturn IB couldn't lift the LM and the CSM
together -- the Earth-orbit CSM/LM test, Apollo 9, used a Saturn V.
-- 
The Earth is our mother;       |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
our nine months are up.        | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
