HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: mario@cs.man.ac.uk (Mario Wolczko)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: QUERY Re: Pluto Direct/ options
Date: 11 Sep 92 14:43:01 GMT
Organization: Dept Computer Science, University of Manchester, U.K.

In article <BuC31F.2L5@zoo.toronto.edu>, henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes:
> It is extremely difficult to combine a reasonable payload and a manageably
> short trip time with an orbiter mission.  Pluto is *a long way away*; to
> get there in under a decade, the probe has to be fast.  Killing all that
> velocity is inordinately expensive in mass.

Given that there are two bodies (Pluto and Charon), would it be
possible to lose enough energy by sling-shotting around them
repeatedly (the opposite to what's been done by the Voyagers, Ulysses,
etc., at Jupiter)?  Or are they too small to have enough of a
gravitational effect?

   ______      Dept. of Computer Science   Internet:      mario@cs.man.ac.uk
 /~      ~\    The University              uucp:    mcsun!uknet!man.cs!mario
(    __    )   Manchester M13 9PL          JANET:         mario@uk.ac.man.cs
 `-':  :`-'    U.K.                        Tel: +44-61-275 6146  (FAX: 6236)
____;  ;_____________the mushroom project___________________________________
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: tkelso@afit.af.mil (TS Kelso)
Subject: Two-Line Orbital Element Set:  Space Shuttle
Keywords: Space Shuttle, Orbital Elements, Keplerian
Organization: Air Force Institute of Technology
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 1992 22:02:21 GMT

The most current orbital elements from the NORAD two-line element sets are
carried on the Celestial BBS, (513) 427-0674, and are updated daily (when
possible).  Documentation and tracking software are also available on this
system.  As a service to the satellite user community, the most current
elements for the current shuttle mission are provided below.  The Celestial
BBS may be accessed 24 hours/day at 300, 1200, 2400, 4800, or 9600 bps using
8 data bits, 1 stop bit, no parity.

Element sets (also updated daily), shuttle elements, and some documentation
and software are also available via anonymous ftp from archive.afit.af.mil
(129.92.1.66) in the directory pub/space.

STS 47     
1 22120U 92 61  A 92259.25000000  .00076222  00000-0  25599-3 0   105
2 22120  57.0001  95.3617 0008862 288.8795 137.8499 15.89469164   424
-- 
Dr TS Kelso                           Assistant Professor of Space Operations
tkelso@afit.af.mil                    Air Force Institute of Technology
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: aws@iti.org (Allen W. Sherzer)
Subject: Re: TSTO vs SSTO
Organization: Evil Geniuses for a Better Tomorrow
Distribution: sci
Date: Wed, 9 Sep 1992 13:11:49 GMT

In article <Bu9HFE.2Jw.1@cs.cmu.edu> PHARABOD@FRCPN11.IN2P3.FR writes:

>In article SECRET AIRCRAFT ENCOMPASSES QUALITIES OF HIGH-SPEED LAUNCHER
>FOR SPACECRAFT (Aviation Week & Space Technology, August 24, 1992)
>William B. Scott writes:...

>If this is not fiction, but reality, could this (or an improved
>version) be a rival of the SSTO ? 

Perhaps but my gut reaction is no. If nothing else, this violates
the KISS principle. With this you have two separate systems to develop
and then build and maintain.

>Have the U.S. enough money to make both the TSTO and the SSTO ?

Sure, depends on your priorities. I don't know about TSTO but SSTO
could be funded by the interest off an investment the size of a single
year NASA budget.

   Allen

-- 
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Allen W. Sherzer | "If they can put a man on the Moon, why can't they     |
|  aws@iti.org     |  put a man on the Moon?"                               |
+----------------------227 DAYS TO FIRST FLIGHT OF DCX----------------------+
Xref: sparky sci.space:12884 sci.astro:9654
From: higgins@fnala.fnal.gov (Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey)
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro
Subject: Nitpicking over Phobos Hopper (was Re: Soviet Rovers on Mars)
Date: 14 Sep 92 09:18:00 GMT
Followup-To: sci.space
Organization: Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory

In article <Btpvns.o1.1@cs.cmu.edu>, JDAVIS@GRIFFIN.UGA.EDU (Jerry Davis)
responds to me:
>>Date: 24 Aug 92 23:37:54 GMT
>>From: Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey <higgins@fnalf.fnal.gov>
>
>>(I'm not familiar with their instrument load). Phobos 2 and one of the
>>Soviet Mars landers carried tiny rovers, too.  Or do we only count
>>spacecraft that succeeded?  ^^^^
>                               ?
>Tiny?  I'm not sure about Phobos 2, but 2 weeks ago I saw a Soviet Mars
>rover at the Air Force Museum, Wright Patterson AFB and it was pretty
>big.  Probably at least as large as a 12 - 16 hp riding lawnmower with
>6 wheels and lots more mass.

Nice to hear that there's some serious Soviet stuff in Dayton. I'll
have to return to the AFM to look at it.  No, this is not what I
meant; Larry Klaes described it in a subsequent message.

In article <1992Sep1.165202.4401@nntpd.lkg.dec.com>, klaes@verga.enet.dec.com (Larry Klaes) writes:
>         The MARS 2 and 3 [...] landers
>     also carried several small rovers attached to the craft by fifteen
>     meter tethers.  [...] The landers were never used due to the apparent
>     crash landing of MARS 2 and the communications failure of MARS 3
>     after ninety seconds of transmission from the surface.

Okay, this clears up one of my examples.  But Phobos 2?

>         The PHOBOS 1-2 mission landers were not rovers, though one
>     lander was designed to hop across the moon's surface using metal
>     bars.  The other lander type was to be anchored into the ground
>     with a harpoon.  

Come on, Larry, this hopper gadget was intended to land on Phobos,
make some measurements, then move to another place on Phobos, make
some more, repeat as necessary.  I have asserted that this is a
"rover."  You assert that it is not.  You may believe in some more
restrictive definition of the word, but by what authority?

When we get tired of nitpicking over Phobos 2, we can argue about
whether the Mars 94 balloon is a "rover."  You go first. (-:

     O~~*           /_) ' / /   /_/ '  ,   ,  ' ,_  _           \|/
   - ~ -~~~~~~~~~~~/_) / / /   / / / (_) (_) / / / _\~~~~~~~~~~~zap!
 /       \                          (_) (_)                    / | \
 |       |     Bill Higgins   Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
 \       /     Bitnet:     HIGGINS@FNAL.BITNET
   -   -       Internet:  HIGGINS@FNAL.FNAL.GOV
     ~         SPAN/Hepnet:      43011::HIGGINS 
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: aws@iti.org (Allen W. Sherzer)
Subject: Re: 3 Booster Questions
Organization: Evil Geniuses for a Better Tomorrow
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 1992 15:02:39 GMT

In article <10SEP199219281842@judy.uh.edu> wingo%cspara.decnet@Fedex.Msfc.Nasa.Gov writes:

>It still costs less than an Altas to fly.  
>A Rockwell engineer I spoke with at the WSC thought
>the baby Saturn might be as low as 55 million per launch.

The cost of an Atlas includes the half a billion $$ GD spent on the design.
How do you plan to amortize the development cost of baby Saturn?

  Allen

-- 
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Allen W. Sherzer | "If they can put a man on the Moon, why can't they     |
|  aws@iti.org     |  put a man on the Moon?"                               |
+----------------------225 DAYS TO FIRST FLIGHT OF DCX----------------------+
From: dh4j+@andrew.cmu.edu (David O Hunt)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Ethics of Terraforming
Date: 13 Sep 92 11:21:25 GMT
Article-I.D.: andrew.kegtGpC00iUyE2Ut5f
Distribution: sci
Organization: Masters student, Mechanical Engineering, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA

Tom @ msu.edu
>Perhaps Mars has life already.  So what?  Anything we do will increase the
>amount of life on Mars, and probably won't even interfere with whatever is
>there, assuming we aren't toxic to each other, as it is doubtlessly better
>suited to living on Mars than anything we could bring, engineer, or evolve.
>Suppose we do hurt the indigenous life.  Again, so what?  We can predict that
>it's natural course would be to eventually grow more complex, through the
>mechanism of evolution.  But we would bring already-complex stuff along,
>speeding the process, to the enourmous benefit of life itself.

At the cost of possibly destroying a life form of which we know nothing,
thus costing science a golden possibility of examining, firsthand, an
extra-terrestrial life form.

>Unfortunately, electric cars depend on energy even more than fossil-fuel cars,
>as they are less efficient (from the orignal source) than oil-powered
cars now.
>To really get pollution-advantages from electric cars requires a new energy
>source, not a new way of using more coal and oil.

EXCUSE ME?  Please support this.  Every TECHNICAL article I've read on the
subject says the opposte - that seperating the power generation into a more
effecient (because car engines aren't) means of generating electricity, then
using an effecient electric motor would save energy.



David Hunt - Graduate Slave | My mind is my own.          | Towards both a
Mechanical Engineering      | So are my ideas & opinions. | Palestinian and
Carnegie Mellon University  | <<<Use Golden Rule v2.0>>>  | Jewish homeland!
============================================================================
Email:  dh4j@cmu.edu            Working towards my "Piled Higher and Deeper"

"Out there is a fortune waiting to be had; do you think I'd let it go you're
mad - you got another think coming!" -- Nazareth
From: Nick_Janow@mindlink.bc.ca (Nick Janow)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Terraforming
Date: 11 Sep 92 20:15:13 GMT
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Distribution: world

roberts@CMR.NCSL.NIST.GOV (John Roberts) writes:

> I believe that portion of the discussion involved a search for terrestrial
> organisms that could live on Mars unmodified. I believe the Viking tests
> found *no* organic material, and they should have found some from meteorite
> impacts.

The discussion wandered a bit, and I got the impression that the "Mars' surface
conditions would kill any Terran life" argument was being used to argue against
_any_ life able to exist there.  Viking scratched only the superoxidized
surface; would it have noticed silica fibres?

> There's a desert plant (related to cactus, I think) that's mainly
> underground, with a transparent upper coating to let light through. However,
> in that case, I'm pretty sure the transparent coating is living tissue.

That's the one I had in mind.  That plant merely proves the concept; another
plant could easily apply inorganic light pipes.  I could imagine bamboo
evolving something like that if surface conditions deteriorated.

--

Nick_Janow@mindlink.bc.ca
From: sichase@csa1.lbl.gov (SCOTT I CHASE)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Arstrong's Boots
Date: 11 Sep 92 21:12:14 GMT
Organization: Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory - Berkeley, CA, USA
Distribution: na
Reply-To: sichase@csa1.lbl.gov
NNTP-Posting-Host: 128.3.254.196
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.3-4   

In article <1992Sep11.192053.15875@vdoe386.vak12ed.edu>, ghasting@vdoe386.vak12ed.edu (George Hastings) writes...
>gkm@cc.uow.edu.au writes:  > I was aked today a question by
>someone who hadn't even thought of all of the useful things I
>know about the moon. A typical non scientist! He asked me "What
>material was used to make Neil Armstron's boots?" He needed the
>answer for a lecture on ?? and was serious in his request.  > >

Haven't you followed the "Heavy Boots" thread?  Your friend probably
thinks that Armstrong would have floated away when trying to walk on 
the moon if his boots weren't heavy enough.  That leads to the natural
question "What *were* his boots made of, anyway?"

-Scott
--------------------
Scott I. Chase			"The question seems to be of such a character
SICHASE@CSA2.LBL.GOV		that if I should come to life after my death
				and some mathematician were to tell me that it
				had been definitely settled, I think I would
				immediately drop dead again."      - Vandiver
From: irwin@juliet.caltech.edu (Horowitz, Irwin Kenneth)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: QUERY Re: Pluto Direct/ options
Date: 15 Sep 92 17:51:00 GMT
Organization: California Institute of Technology
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41

In article <1992Sep15.055145.15037@sq.sq.com>, msb@sq.sq.com (Mark Brader) writes...
>Several slingshot trajectories have been proposed as alternatives to the
>direct Pluto flight, but not the one that I would have thought obvious:
>a simple Jupiter slingshot.  Jupiter should be in the right position
>for a period of, I would guess, some weeks or months, at intervals of
>about 12 years.
> 
>Is it the case that, by the time a probe could be readied, we would have
>just missed the launch window?  Or is there some other objection to this
>method this time?
> 
Yes, it's too slow.  Also, windows for a Jupiter flyby are available every
13 months, but the trajectory through the Jovian system will depend on the
relative angle between the Earth-Jupiter line and the Jupiter-Pluto line,
and in some years would require a gravity assist manuever that would fly
into the Jovian atmosphere (which isn't the way to do it :-).  But basically,
the problem is that any gravity assist trajectories would be too slow for
this particular mission.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Irwin Horowitz                        |
Astronomy Department                  |"Whoever heard of a female astronomer?"
California Institute of Technology    |--Charlene Sinclair, "Dinosaurs"
irwin@iago.caltech.edu                |
ih@deimos.caltech.edu                 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: baalke@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov (Ron Baalke)
Subject: Re: Pluto Direct Propulsion Options
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.3-4   
Reply-To: baalke@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Distribution: sci
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 1992 05:13:41 GMT

In article <BuDKLJ.KKw.1@cs.cmu.edu>, pgf@srl03.cacs.usl.edu ("Phil G. Fraering") writes...
>Henry Spencer, net.authority, pontificates:
>/You really cannot do a Pluto
>\orbiter in a reasonable amount of time with 1960s propulsion technology,
>/which is what all currently-planned missions use.

>Just out of curiosity, is there a way to convince them to use post-early-
>1960's technology, like an ion drive of some sort?

JPL is currently studying the stationary plasma thrusters that the
Department of Defense recently obtained from the Soviets.  These plasma
thrusters perform better than ion thrusters and are in a small package about
10 times smaller, and they weigh only 4 kg.  The plan is to build scaled-up 
versions of the Soviet thrusters that would provide the primary propulsion for
spacecraft for transfer to geosynchronous orbit.   
     ___    _____     ___
    /_ /|  /____/ \  /_ /|     Ron Baalke         | baalke@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov
    | | | |  __ \ /| | | |     Jet Propulsion Lab |
 ___| | | | |__) |/  | | |__   M/S 525-3684 Telos | Anything is impossible if
/___| | | |  ___/    | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | you don't attempt it.
|_____|/  |_|/       |_____|/                     |
From: palmer@cco.caltech.edu (David Palmer)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Truax
Date: 9 Sep 92 02:59:16 GMT
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena

al@sys6626.bison.mb.ca (Haus Der Luge) writes:

> 
>Is there anybody using this sub-board who is at all familair with the 
>work of one Bob Truax ???
> 
>From what I've heard, he's quite the "space ranger".

A good book is 'Great Mambo Chicken and the Transhuman Condition' by
Ed Regis (Addison Wesley, ISBN 0-201-56751-2).  This is a book about
visionary scientists and engineers.  (The space people are among
the tamest of the lot.  Much of the book is devoted to nanotech, cryonics,
far edge parties, etc.)

-- 
		David Palmer		 palmer@tgrs.gsfc.nasa.gov
I am now at Goddard Space Flight Center/NASA, for whom I do not speak.
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: szabo@techbook.com (Nick Szabo)
Subject: Re: Is NASA really planning to Terraform Mars?
Organization: TECHbooks --- Public Access UNIX --- (503) 220-0636
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 1992 09:16:57 GMT

In article <BuD57x.MAs@trystro.uucp> rick@trystro.uucp (Richard Nickle) writes:
>Adding water requires small robot probes to go retrieve ice
>and move it to mars.  The robots would attach themselves to the appropriate
>piece of ice, and use the ice itself as reaction mass to move them from
>wherever you got them (Saturn, the belt) to Mars, whereupon they would
>fall onto mars and release tons of water.  You just set up your ice-retriever
>robot factory someplace convenient:  Lunar orbit? 

The general idea of moving ice to Mars is good, but this is really
the roundabout to go about it.  By the time we've moved the ice into
Earth orbit, then lunar orbit, then back to Mars, we will have used up
over 95% of the ice (cf. the rocket equation and 200-300 s. Isp for the
nuclear- or solar-thermal engines using water as reaction mass).
Also, we need to process the ice with robot plants before it
can be used for reaction mass, to remove the dust (which may be up to
50% of the content) and shape the ice into something dynamically
stable (my design uses a cylinder).

A better approach is to use the Jupiter-family comets.  These can
be nudged to intercept Mars with 1-2 km/s delta-v, using up less than 1/3 of
the ice mass as propellant, and delivering the other 2/3 to the surface
of Mars.  Even better, the ice can be captured into Earth and Mars
orbit and used for transportation between the two bodies instead of 
launching upper stages from Earth.  Best of all, the ice can be used
to transport even more robot plants to the comets, a bootstrapping
process that can reduce the cost of deep space transportation by five
orders of magnitude in two decades.  

The two big breakthroughs here are (a) the rocket engine can be very low 
power, thus low mass, and (b) the ice rockets have a near zero tankage 
factor, so that even if we use up 90% of the propellant the rest is payload.

Alas, access to currently known Jupiter-family comets is marginal with
chemical upper stages.  Titan IV/Centaur can deliver about 1,000 kg
to such a comet during a good launch window, but this is probably not
enough for robot plants with current technology to make ice rockets
of a sufficient size for these tasks.  Here is where the ion rocket
could come into play to open up the solar system; the nuclear-thermal rocket 
a la Timberwind would have a similar effect.  It would also be a
big breakthrough if we found ice closer, in the Apollo-Amor asteroids,
Phobos, or Deimos; finding such ice is the most important task of space 
exploration.  Process technology is also an important driver.


-- 
szabo@techbook.COM  	  Tuesday, November third  ##  Libertarian  $$  vote
Tuesday  ^^ Libertarian  --  change  **  choice && November 3rd @@Libertarian 
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: tholen@hale.ifa.hawaii.edu (Dave Tholen)
Subject: Re: QUERY Re: Pluto Direct/ options
Organization: University of Hawaii
Date: Sat, 12 Sep 1992 20:01:22 GMT

Ron Baalke writes:

> Pluto does have a 
> tentative atmosphere, but we know so little about it.  A flyby mission will 
> help to enlighten us.

I think you meant "tenuous", not "tentative".  The detection of the atmosphere
via the stellar occultation method was quite certain.  The surface pressure
is approximately 1 microbar, however, so aerobraking isn't very practical,
unless we plan to fly a feather to Pluto.
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: pgf@srl03.cacs.usl.edu ("Phil G. Fraering")
Subject: Re: Nasa's Apollo rerun vs. Zubrin
X-Added: Forwarded by Space Digest
Organization: [via International Space University]
Original-Sender: isu@VACATION.VENARI.CS.CMU.EDU
Distribution: sci
Date: Mon, 14 Sep 1992 18:29:11 GMT


In article <BuJKB5.E7v.1@cs.cmu.edu>, pgf@srl02.cacs.usl.edu ("Phil G. Fraering") writes:
>
>Nick, don't you think it's funny that they think they need a rocket
>1.5 times the size of the Saturn 5 to return to the moon?

>These guys couldn't even return to the moon if you gave them a
>full-size, fully operational moon rocket. They'd complain about
>how it was too small for the job.

Doug Mohney writes:

\They're also putting a LOT more mass up there too. Four people, lots
/of instruments, groceries for 15-30-45 days. Pilot projects. We're
\talking serious camping and roaming around.

I know, but they are deliberately setting up things so that
the pilot projects won't reduce weight, which is the opposite
of Zubrin's scheme. Please take a look at it.

/If you want to do serious exploration, you have to bring something
\more than duct tape, a screwdriver, and a copy of "The moon on $5 a
/day" by Shezer & Szabo.

I know. I was planning on adding some Monty Python movies on
videotape to the list, so the astronauts wouldn't care about
not keeping their sanity.

\                 Play in the intelluctual sandbox of Usenet 

That's it! Support UN military action against Usenet! Why didn't
I see that earlier?

Of course, they have yet to stop Doug from his vicious verbal
attacks on Canada...




-- 
Phil Fraering pgf@srl0x.cacs.usl.edu where the x is a number from 1-5.
Phone: 318/365-5418 SnailMail: 2408 Blue Haven Dr., New Iberia, La. 70560
"NOAH!"
"Yes Lord?"                          - Bill Cosby
"HOW LONG CAN YOU TREAD WATER?"
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: jbh55289@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Josh 'K' Hopkins)
Subject: Re: farthest Laser signal
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1992 02:20:40 GMT

henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes:

>In article <199209041812.AA18322@leibniz.cs.arizona.edu> rcs@CS.ARIZONA.EDU ("Richard Schroeppel") writes:
>>Note that radar signals have been bounced off Venus, and were
>>actually used for some mapping...

>I believe JPL has done interplanetary radar work as far as Jupiter.

As a matter of fact, I think someone has gone so far as to bounce radar off 
Titan in an attempt to guess what the surface was.  However, unless we're using
different definitions, radar and laser are acronyms for two different things.

>>Assuming the purpose of your question is to consider "How feasible
>>are lasers for high bandwidth, semi-private, space communication?"...

>Feasible.  There is intense interest in the idea, and some in-space
>experiments will fly in this decade.  (It's just possible that secret
>military systems might be operational already -- laser communications
>systems would have very tight beams that would be very difficult to
>eavesdrop on.)

There is a proposed experiment to be launched by the Japanese which would try to
talk to a European sattelite.  However, like almost all the payloads Japan is
planning, its rocket is still under development.

-- 
Josh Hopkins           "If you are sitting in an exit row and you cannot read
                       this card or cannot see well enough to follow these
		       instructions, please tell a crew member."
j-hopkins@uiuc.edu                       -United Airlines safety instructions
From: amon@elegabalus.cs.qub.ac.uk
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Clinton and Space Funding
Date: 14 Sep 92 11:29:54 GMT
Article-I.D.: cs.BuKFyH.7FH.1
Distribution: sci
Organization: [via International Space University]
X-Added: Forwarded by Space Digest
Original-Sender: isu@VACATION.VENARI.CS.CMU.EDU

> 	A non-vote is not a form of protest;
> 	it's a clear signal that you're happy with things
> 	just the way they are and you really don't care anyway.
> 


And if you find that Bush/Quayle also makes you want to throw up,  
there is Andre Marrou/Nancy Lord on the Libertarian ticket. Be  
anti-fascist and pro individual liberty.