NASA engineers today test fired a major component of a refurbished Saturn 5 engine.
Back to the future: NASA engineers today test fired a major component of a refurbished Saturn 5 engine.
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Back to the future: NASA engineers today test fired a major component of a refurbished Saturn 5 engine.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
I like this.
Basically dropping back and punting.
They know they have an engine that will do the job. In case they have to use it it will be finally be available.
Rebuilding and then redesigning the engine using modern computer modeling and materials.
The only problem I see the HUGE amount of fuel needed by these engines to reach their intended altitude. These engines were not intended to reach orbit. Different engines were used to do that.
I still think multiple, improved and upgraded solid rockets like we already have, is the way to go for first stage thrust.
But there could be a problem with that idea with the huge payloads they want to lift. Thrust might back-up into the engine(what ever its called to engineers) and could cause the engines to explode.
I would also like to see a plan for an eventual linear accelerator for first stage lift. Something re-usable and all electric.
The sheer audacity of it all, that engine burns through fuel almost like the federal government burns through cash!