America’s Return To Space Proves The Success Of Privatization

Yep and we shall see in November how much America agrees. Seems approval is increasing. Not yet to the magic ratio but getting there.

 

It was never Hubble of nothing in fact we have sent up even more advanced telescopes.

"The world's first space telescope finally launched aboard space shuttle Discovery on April 24, 1990. The effort cost $1.5 billion, "
https://www.space.com/15892-hubble-space-telescope.html

The mission to repair it cost $2.2B
https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/b...als have put the,worn-out equipment on Hubble.

And it could have been lifted by a normal heavy lift rocket. The Hubbel is an example of exactly what I'm talking about. It doesn't require a human crew in LEO.

 

See above the original cost $1.5B but that includes all the design and development and testing and tooling then redesign retooling that would not have to be repeated.

The mission to repair it cost $2.2B. Just the parts almost $300 million.
https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/b...als have put the,worn-out equipment on Hubble.

Why would it have taken 6-10 years to build a new one? I bet they could have done it in a year all the design and engineer was a known item all they had to do was buy the parts and put it together following the procedures from the first. Build them and send them up on a Falcon. It they break and you can't send up a robot to fix it send another up. Technology has gotten better, optics have gotten better. Robotics have gotten better. It's still REAL expensive to have humans in space especially when there's not a lot coming from it.

 

Success motivates, failure enervates. It would definitely have slowed things down.

But it took people to fix it...

 

You have to bring it into Space, which added an other 500 million.

Those are handcrafted instrument, a Hubbell, one of a kind. Just a perfect mirror needs more than a year to grind and polish, every part of such a object is handcrafted, you do not go to the plumbing store.
Those parts have to last a decade, at least, in Space. 1 hour the are very warm, room temp, the next hour they are -150. Just welding the outer shell takes weeks and every weld has to be absolutely perfect, not just pipeline perfect absolute perfect and the surounding material can not be effected by the weld, or it will not endure for a decade and more the extreme temperature changes.
All that for everything in the telescope and it has to be tested over and over again, everything that is not 110% perfect has to be redone again. It was 1000 of a mm, which was wrong on the mirror, which became a real issue, because of the temps in space
You had this unique master piece of engineering and craftsmanship, one of a kind, which had been years in storage and it had a 1000 of mm flaw. It needed glasses. Only the Shuttle was able to deliver them. The glasses, are a supreme engineering feat.
Just because Hubble was hanging up there, short sighted, the 2.2 billion were possible. Nobody would have payed for a other Hubble and maybe get the same result and than waiting 6-10 years till it could be launched. They knew how to fix it, it already was up there and it was built to be serviced and everything except for the mirror worked.
The Shuttle and its Astronauts delivered as no other vehicle before. That was a mind blowing mission, like landing on the Moon.

NASA does science. Its not about the Teflon pan in Wal Mart. Science is about knowledge, which might serve us decades down the road.
Science is not allways practical, but gives a understanding what is around us.

But you want a practical, research in bone structure loss and how we can deal with it. They do hardcore medical research up there, which advances research into such medical problems on Earth.
They do material research which will maybe, lead to factoring in LEO. They are not doing this for today, no researcher does that, jus in very few cases, this is for tomorrow or maybe day after.
Knowledge has no price.

 

Exactly, without Hubble the idea of a Space Telescope would have been just a idea.
Hubble with its mind blowing pictures of our Universe blew the door wide open for the development of the next generation.
Not just scientist were blown away, but everybody else.
It is in my opinion the milestone of Space exploration. Moon was just a short fancy, exciting, spectacular, a stunt.
Hubble has shown us the Universe, as we have never seen it before, put us into place and wanting for more.
Without the Shuttle, no Hubble and its followers and the giants on Earth.
The pictures of Hubble made it al possible and without this magnificent, flawed and outdated tool the Shuttle we probably would have never seen those mind blowing pictures and the advancement of our knowledge.
Every Penny well spent.

 

Again no evidence it would have taken 6 years with all the design and engineering work and testing done. It was well within the payload limits of conventional launch vehicles from what I've read. From what I recall if was a "can we do it this way" not a "we have to do it this way".

 

Hubble was not the first not the last telescope ever launched. It was is a great mission even with it's flaw. But LOTS of telescopes have been launched and successful missions accomplished without manned space flight.