Better, Faster, Cheaper, Discuss..... Options

[lyford]

Can one paraphrase the quip about the "Holy Roman Empire" being neither holy, Roman nor an empire regarding this plan?

The idea, if I understood correctly, was this: By designing cheaper missions, NASA could launch more, and afford to lose a few more. The BIG MISSIONS were too expensive and put all the eggs in one basket. Why take a chance on any single failure points that could risk a program after bagillions of dollars were spent, such as Galileo's hi gain antenna?

Was this strategy successful?

To this outsider, it appeared that Dan Goldin drank too much of the 90's cyber-revolution kool aid and got swept up with the "irrational exuberance" of the dot.com boom. Everything will be possible and cheap in the digital age! Moore's Law notwithstanding, hi tech is only one piece of the puzzle when pulling off a successful interplanetary mission.

My opinion is that there is a baseline cost of doing business in space, even if sensors get smaller and cheaper, due to human support, testing, launch costs, etc. Even the "tech" components all have to be space rated, which is not the kind of consumer level mass production ultra cheap type tech with which most people are familiar. (I have had more than one conversation about why JPL couldn't have had bolted a cheap color digital camera on MER.....)

While adopting this plan may have allowed some missions that might not have seen the light of day before, each little failure seemed to hit NASA with more bad PR than the little successes could offset....

SO -

"Better Faster Cheaper : Golden Egg or Goldin's Goose?"

I would value all opinions, especially from those inside the org, natch.

[Guest_Richard Trigaux_*]

The size of the rocket makes much: the strongest the launch energy, the shortest the travel. And long travels are like shelf life: the risk for a failure increases with travel time. (although usually big failures appear during manoeuvers or landings).

Another inconvenience of long travels is that when the target is reached, it is observed with an outdated technology. When Pluto will be observed in 2018-20 by New Horizons, it will be with the year 1995 technologies (even not with 2005 technologies, which are not yet tested for space operation).

So I think powerful rockets are important. In a space mission, it is not the fuel which adds cost.

But large rockets are much more expensive than small ones, even if the basic cost (electronics, gyros, etc.) is the same than for small rockets. Perhaps there may exist means to make large rockets at lower prices.

Perhaps if some US long-range mission were launched with an Ariane or a Proton rocket, they would perform better. This may be possible, as cold war is finished.