I don't want to sound like a "mean" person, but DIRECT has zero traction with any credible person in a position to influence U.S. space policy. There is not currently, nor has there ever been, serious official discussion about abandoning the current architecture of Constellation.

"Unrealistic" was the key word used by Doug Cooke. That's all that needs to be said. This DIRECT scheme may work in daydreams, but it is not a go in reality. We are not talking about design changes here, we are talking about changing to a completely different launch system. Legally, you can't just rollover the Ares contracts into Jupiter development.

If shortening the post-Shuttle gap is a prime justification for going DIRECT, then the whole idea is self-defeating. A new competitive bid process would be required. NASA would have to go back to 2004 and write and RFP all over again.

Now, the next U.S. President might kill NASA human spaceflight outright, but he will certainly not order NASA to switch to Direct. It is not going to happen simply because there is no way to fiscally, politically, or even practically justify such a move.

The Sentinel article is great publicity for the DIRECT conspiracy-theory galley, but the Beta format also got some great publicity before VHS won the video cassette war in the 1970s. Beta was technically better than VHS, but VHS still carried the day. There is a lot more to success than being technically superior. That's just the way things are. Always has been, always will be. Humans are political creatures.

On a more substantive foundation than politics, a key advantage for Ares I and Ares V is that the dual space vehicle system has superior scalability and versatility than one big booster. The inherent economic advantages are obvious.

It is not true that changing to Jupiter-120 would or could eliminate or shorten the unfortunate gap between the Shuttle and Ares launches. The anticipated gap was more the result of choosing a strategy of managing near-level NASA budget appropriations during the Constellation R&D, and it had nothing intrinsically to do with the choice of a particular booster system. I can not think of a single human booster system that did not encounter schedule setbacks. Ares I and Ares V will not be exceptions to this pattern. Jupiter-120 is a beauty, but she will suffer the same issues if the USA decided to build it.

The space advocacy community might be better served if we focus on uniting against those who want to kill NASA human spaceflight and shift NASA funding to the budgets of other federal agencies. DIRECT is at best a distraction, at worst a new wedge that enemies of space exploration will use against NASA in the ongoing public relations war on space.

The space advocacy community might be better served if we focus on uniting against those who want to kill NASA human spaceflight and shift NASA funding to the budgets of other federal agencies. DIRECT is at best a distraction, at worst a new wedge that enemies of space exploration will use against NASA in the ongoing public relations war on space.

We've heard this line time and time again. I remember it being used to rally and maintain support for Space Station. Now, at least according to the current Administrator, we have a White Elephant that is of little value to the nation. How do we know that Ares I isn't also a White Elephant. I have a sneaky suspicion that 10 years from now, many will be decrying our wasting vast resources on developing a capability that already existed at the time.

Jim,
I'm not much of a fan of DIRECT per se (though I still think it would be better than Constellation will turn out), but I wanted to comment on your last paragraph.

It's simple--if NASA wants my respect for their manned spaceflight efforts, they need to go about it in a way that's respectable. I'm not going to support a broken, flawed, and wasteful approach just because it's the approach NASA has chosen. If they ever get around to finding an approach that is actually beneficial to people outside the current shuttle workforce, and a handful of congresspeople who are hoping to keep votes from that workforce, then I might change my mind.

~Jon

You have picked up on a very important point Keith - Federal Employees withholding information either deliberately to protect some agenda, or negligently. Neither option is a good thing.

It does lend further weight to the calls for an independent review of this whole situation.

If DIRECT is such a bad idea, how come it got all the way through PRD before, when it was the NLS? DIRECT is based entirely on the NLS that NASA itself tried very hard to get funded, twice, but because of the costs of continuing to fly Shuttle, Congress wouldn't allocate the additional funds for it. Even the United States Air Force got in on the game and tried to get it thru Congress.

DIRECT is fundamentally NASA's own design, conceived and designed by NASA engineers at MSFC, proven by NASA engineers at MSFC and presented to Congress by NASA for funding, simply updated to use the newer, and more powerful engines that are available today. If it was good enough for NASA then, twice before, what's different now? Was NASA trying to pull a fast one on us back then, or now?

First they deny that they spent any significant time looking at it. Then they present this in-depth analysis document. And just like before, they are shooting down a version of DIRECT that was long abandoned as inefficient.

What does it take to get a credible answer from them?

As a lawyer, I make arguments grounded solely on "authority" all the time while my brother (a scientist) is disdainful of arguments premised on "authority" - - based on that experience it is obvious to me that Jim McDade is arguing from authority without offering any of the engineering detail needed to verify those arguments.

Being a history major I am not qualified to review that detail myself, but as a taxpayer and a voter I can say that Jim McDade's comments leave me even more convinced than ever that an independent review board of qualified professionals must get to the bottom of the actual data on:

ESAS;
DIRECT; &
EELV options

I also believe that BOTH John McCain (freeze & review) and Barack Obama (who shows an inclination to favor robotic exploration) shall demand that data.

Therefore, if Jim McDade truly desires to rally space advocates he will assist in getting all of the FOIA requests answered so that answers to the DIRECT challenge can be met AFTER ALL OF THE NUMBERS ARE IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN.

Release ALL the numbers and let the engineers debate in public.

Then, if Jim McDade is correct concerning ESAS / DIRECT we can then band together concerning "freeze & review" (McCain) or "robots are cheaper/safer than people" (Obama).

= = =

And to the extent this is true, then political changes may well be called for:

" . . . DIRECT has zero traction with any credible person in a position to influence U.S. space policy . . . "

After all, at the end of the day, it is Congress that matters most, with POTUS in close second place.

I find it very interesting that in the NASA response, they never provide any references to the documentation of the formal analysis for either concept nor do they suggest there was any formal comparative tradeoff data. Probably though the most critical item that can drive any of these "conclusions" are the asusmptions made and one can certainly shape the results and conclusions by judiciously picking those that are favorable to one's pre-conceived notion and unfavorable to a competing concept.

Does the timing of this release, smell funny to anyone? Was this release ready last week, last month?

Remember Nasa's release of the aircraft data? When did NASA post it? Right before a holiday so non-one would notice and to give no-one a chance to look at it and comment.

Observer,

They state the tools that they use (which rocket designers should be very familiar with), and give the MEL for the entire vehicle. That's pretty standard w/o giving away SBU or proprietary info...

In addition, they list all of the assumptions. You can pick those apart if you want to, but if it's the same they use for the Ares V - then it's still an apples to apples comparison.

Let's face it folks, ESA was grounded on overly optimistic assumptions. Of course, you could also say that the outcome was wired from the start once Griffin came on board. No one will dispute that this is his baby, as demonstrated by the study he led with Owen Garriott for the Planetary Society in 2004.

The very fact that the Ares I has morphed from what was a somewhat easy-to-develop vehicle (4-segment stage and expendable SSME-powered upper stage with non-conformal tanks) to the current practically clean-sheet design says it all. Wait until we get beyond all the PDRs and Delta-PDRs scheduled for the rest of this year. The cost overuns/schedule slips will be mind boggling. And if no one believes me, just look at its predecessors, Shuttle and Space Station Freedom/ISS.

A time-out for a deliberate examination for a Shuttle replacement is definitely warranted. Those cheering 'full speed ahead' and 'we're already too far along' do not appreciate how unbelievably damaging it would be to pick a system that is not carefully assessed and ends up being a sink-hole for NASA's future budget.

I've got to agree with most of the other posts on here in support of an independent study of all launch architectures. If we had done our homework right the first time, we would have Space Station Freedom instead of the International Space Station...at a lower cost!

I am not by any means an expert on either architecture, but what I do feel qualified to speak on is the amount of concern expressed over the current architecture. Perhaps, while we are still in the preliminary design phases, we should take a first (or second) look at alternatives. I understand that designs go through multiple iterations, but if we can't satisfy the basic mass requirements, we are in serious trouble.

We need to get away from this culture of "NASA knows best" and start opening the playing field to others. NASA wants the support of the public...show them you are aware of their concerns!

A follow up comment for Jim McDade

If POTUS John McCain does a "freeze and review" in early 2009 NASA shall be far better off if the ESAS numbers and the DIRECT 2.0 numbers were fully reviewed by neutral third parties before the end of 2008.

To have "DIRECT versus ESAS" an open issue during a "freeze & review process" will be a potential train wreck for the Agency and I very much doubt assertions that "NASA knows best!" or "Don't look behind the curtain" (from the Wizard of Oz) will win the debate in Spring 2009.

And of course, if the numbers are what Jim McDade say they are, ESAS supporters have NOTHING TO FEAR from this process.

This interested party finds it more than a little interesting that not only NASA but the peanut gallery here has not addressed the fundamental issue that drives a launch architecture technically speaking, which is: What is the mission that we doing and what is the launch vehicle requirement for that mission?

NASA still to this date, does not know what it wants to do on the Moon. Many knowledgeable observers indicate that the reason for this is that NASA is still in the "touch and go" on the Moon mentality with their real focus on Mars. The arguments made by Mr. McDade in the first response here only makes sense in that context. The other posters are right that DIRECT is at least an outgrowth of the NLS design and the 2 launch architecture that they advocate is perfectly fine for the development of a robust lunar outpost/base.

The biggest problem related to the DIRECT is handling the major issue of workforce retention as Mr. McDade did accurately state that according to federal acquisition rules all of the contracts would have to be re-competed. The DIRECT team has stated that since these are SRB's the contract can just be modified but this is not the case or NASA would have never had to have a separate contract for the Ares booster development to start with.

Any option to switch gears early next year will have to solve the political problem of workforce retention, narrowing the gap, and developing a solid rational for lunar exploration. These solutions do exist, the gap can be closed, and the Moon will be the first true outpost of humanity, ONLY if the goal is clearly developed by NASA or outside authority (NASA Ignored the president and his science advisor) with the ability to see it through.

All of these papers like this considering how big of a rocket can sit on the head of a pin are side shows to the real issue of our reason to go.

In recent weeks, opinion posts here on NasaWatch regarding the DIRECT vs. Ares conversation, as well as continuous calls from members of the aerospace community, have apparently gotten the attention of the NASA head shed, and Mike Griffin.

The free press still works.

It sadly amuses me that when the heat on a bureaucrat is increased, the volume of information being sought increases, as well.

I am relatively certain in physics there is some correlation between thermal cause and effect on sound, and if my intuition is correct, I believe increasing the temperature on Mike Griffin is warranted.

The issue is about historically-proven use of common sense. I never hear, read, or experience, federal government civil servants tying effective use common sense to resolving any set of problems.

Now is the time to do so. As Bill White so accurately states, there is NOTHING TO FEAR from an independent review of the merits of both approaches with a healthy dose of common sense thrown in.

In a time of national leadership failure and congressional grid lock, Griffin has an opportunity to show effective leadership by supporting an independent review of DIRECT vs Ares, making a choice on the final independent recommendations, and then moving our manned space program forward.

Our country DOES NOT NEED another ISS and Saturn launch vehicle debacle. We DO NOT NEED to throw away the work, the enormous tax payer investment, and hard-won infrastructure as so many have done in the past.

Dr. Griffin is likely toast after the next election; so, instead of playing politics to safely ride out his remaining days at NASA, he should do the right thing, DEMONSTRATE TRUE LEADERSHIP, and prevent our ships from being burned in the harbor of history.

PHILLIP GEORGE asked:
Does the timing of this release, smell funny to anyone? Was this release ready last week, last month?

The study was completed in October 2007, approximately 1 month after the DIRECT v2 AIAA paper was published, and is based, in part, on that document. NASA sat on the report sense then. However, as was stated in the AIAA paper, the paper was a snapshot in time on an evolving work, and it was clearly stated at that time that there were changes in the works that would improve the performance of the launch vehicle. Subsequently, the specifications for the Jupiter rocket have changed considerably sense that time, but the NASA study was not updated. Several key elements of the NASA study are aimed at elements of the Jupiter system that the DIRECT team itself abandoned long ago, such as the propellant transfer and the mass of a single J-2XD engine.

In summary, while it represents a fairly detailed look at the Jupiter capabilities, it does so against a rocket configuration that is no longer valid. The current configuration either meets or exceeds all of the ESAS requirements for both LEO operations and the lunar mission.

My question is why did they sit on this report for so long, and why did they publish a study on an old, long outdated design?

But my MAIN concern is why did top NASA officials claim they were not doing any such study, and then produce this, clearly showing, for all the world to see, that they were being dishonest with the public, and perhaps also with the Congress, who had asked them if they were doing this?

I may be wrong, but I don't think a 1-month review and subsequent critique of the Direct v2 concept as presented in the NASA study constitutes an in-depth analysis of the architecture and there is no information to suggest this was a result of a longer term, more involved effort. It doesn't take a lot of time to throw together the type of brief that was released that has more qualitative assessments than quantitative ones. The relatively few "analysis" charts look to be fairly simple EXCEL trade design worksheets that take a fairly high-level view of the design and are more "what-if" types of analyses.

Keith, from your earlier post: "Editor's note: When I asked Steve Cook if any of his employees were working on the "Direct" or "Jupiter" project he said that he was not aware of that anyone was. When asked if this would be allowed during or after hours, he said that it would not and that this would be "unapproved" work.""

- Working on the Direct or Jupiter "Project" (my emphasis) is not the same as performing a critique of a concept presented at an AIAA conference and there is no evidence provided that a full-up design evaluation ever took place. This would have entailed a detailed look at all of the required subsystems to assess performance against stated requirements, performance goals, development needs, schedules, logistics, etc.

While not trying to defend Cook, NASA, or ESAS, technically speaking, I don't think his response was incorrect. Is it potentially a less than totally complete and honest response? Not really. He could have clarified that NASA continues to critique other approaches (including Direct) as part of their normal day-to-day business. And clearly, given Griffin's position on ESAS, their is likely pressure to point out the negatives of other concepts as they arise so as not to give Congress ammunition to kick-off repeated re-evaluation studies everytime Direct (or anyone else for that matter) update their respective concepts based on NASA or third party critiques. That only leads to endless rounds of concepts studies that never result in hardware. Just my $0.02.

I don't know how many laypeople watch this site, but the acronymns cited with no explanation to what they are really confuse whatever issue the poster is presenting.

Could we have some explanation of these acronymns?

To Guess Who

Keith's questions to Doug Cook about NASA people working on DIRECT was in response to specific claims by the DIRECT group that NASA people were working on the project and helping them to develop and refine their idea. This became evident to me when looking at one of the very involved documents posted at their fan site. To me this constituted a serious breech of professional ethics as the claim was that the NASA engineers were using the same software and systems that NASA uses for Ares to validate the DIRECT idea. Indeed there was a thread on NASA Watch a few months ago on this where this breech of professional ethics (if indeed it did exist as was claimed by the DIRECT proponents).

Keith asked Doug Cook specifically about this activity within the context given in the previous paragraph. Doug's reply was also in that context. For NASA engineers at MSFC or other centers to be using NASA computers, software, and systems (presumably time as well) would be a serious breech of ethics and if for some reason the DIRECT approach was picked up by NASA it would potentially lead to protests (and lawsuits) by the incumbent contractors for the Ares system that NASA personnel were helping to undermine the very system that was their day job to successfully execute. If employees of Apple for example were working to develop code to make Windows a more palatable product for the MacIntosh I think that the issue of conflict of interest would be more clearly seen.

Interested Party writes:

The biggest problem related to the DIRECT is handling the major issue of workforce retention as Mr. McDade did accurately state that according to federal acquisition rules all of the contracts would have to be re-competed. The DIRECT team has stated that since these are SRB's the contract can just be modified but this is not the case or NASA would have never had to have a separate contract for the Ares booster development to start with.

Congress can fix all of this with a single comprehensive piece of legislation, if it so desired even if that solution would require Congress or POTUS #44 to show genuine leadership.

And given this other passage (on which I agree 100%) genuine leadership from Congress and/or POTUS #44 would be a feature rather than a bug:

What is the mission that we doing and what is the launch vehicle requirement for that mission? -- NASA still to this date, does not know what it wants to do on the Moon. Many knowledgeable observers indicate that the reason for this is that NASA is still in the "touch and go" on the Moon mentality with their real focus on Mars. The arguments made by Mr. McDade in the first response here only makes sense in that context.

I would refuse to make engineering decision based on some PowerPoint presentation alone, although this one does contain an unusually large amount of numerical data. I should expect a detailed technical report stands behind these charts and this report should also be made openly available.

Max Q of Ares-1 should be compared to that of Direct, and a thorough cost accounting of how much it will cost to overcome ascent environments (via test and analyses) should be provided for each system. This was not addressed in the charts.

"For NASA engineers at MSFC or other centers to be using NASA computers, software, and systems (presumably time as well) would be a serious breech of ethics and if for some reason the DIRECT approach was picked up by NASA it would potentially lead to protests (and lawsuits) by the incumbent contractors for the Ares system that NASA personnel were helping to undermine the very system that was their day job to successfully execute."

This not a breech of ethics. For example, this would no different that someone looking to see if Atlas would be better launch vehicle for a given spacecraft than let's say a Delta II which has already been contracted. If the people have no financial interest in either party, there is no breech. If the switch were made to Atlas, Delta would entitled to some compensation. This is similar to what happened on LRO.

I'd have to agree with "me" that Dennis Wingo's claim of a breech of ethics doesn't necessarily apply here. There's not enough information to make such an accusation, and I'd have thought Wingo would have known better. IF gov't computers were being used (particularly during work hours) to take part in a study of DIRECT and IF that study was not sanctioned by their supervisors, THEN a COI may have occurred. However, since it appears that the study was officially undertaken, I don't see where unethical behavior has taken place.

I truly like some of the blogs Dennis Wango has written about space. Breach of ethics?

Let's see where we are today in comparision with the ESAS.
'Safe, Simple, Soon" has grown into what:

1. Safe- features out of Orion.
2. Simple--No Shuttle main engines, no 4 segment SRB, etc.
3. Soon--No earlier than 2016. If you believe that.

If Dennis was on the desk of the Titanic, would he be against engineers looking at better life rafts since the company said it did not need them and you may use some company time? If so, then it is time to put ethics aside and try and start saving people's lives.

The ESAS is in a load of trouble. Does Dennis think Ares V/VI will ever get built? Can NASA afford it, if it ever gets built? Remember how fast Apollo got cancelled since it cost too much. Does Dennis really think Ares I/V is the way to go?

All the Direct and other people have been asking for is an "honest" assessment of the program and if found wanting to change course. Change now in the planning will be alot cheaper than doing in the future, ask any software engineer. Does Dennis think that the EELV and Direct got a fair shot in the ESAS scheme of things? I think all of us would like to those Appenidixs that have NEVER been released. Then we could see how fair NASA has been to everone? How fair is an assisment, if you rule one LV out since it does not have an upper stage and cannot move enough weight though TLI, while you rule another in with an upper stage? I may be wrong, but it looks to me, that NASA changes the rules/assumptions to suit their needs and rule out other architures.

At the end of the day, what do we all want? A health US manned space program. How believes that the present course will get as there and will survive another 2 presidential administrations. If you do, please give me the odds, since I would LOVE to bet against you. Ares as planned will not be flying for the next 20 years.

I think Dennis' comment was that it is a breech of ethics for anyone in the employ of NASA to be using their time and effort to support the DIRECT project efforts. It seems that was the tone of the questions asked of Mike Griffin and Doug and or Steve Cook. This presentation looks like a NASA analysis was done on the DIRECT architecture around the time of the AIAA publication nothing more looks like a surface critique of the paper and some quick concept sizing analysis. There are some management buzz words in the front of the presentation so I would assume that this was a known by the management effort. Doesn't seem to be in support of the DIRECT architecture, rather seems to point to a few architectural issues that may or may not be relevant to the current incarnation of the Direct vehicle. It appears after looking at what is in the presentation that the Direct vehicles will need to use some 5 segment SRBs or a three launch architecture if they size themselves to the NASA concept design standards.

I'm not a fan of DIRECT, and always thought that it sounded "too good to be true". However, there is something quite disturbing about the NASA study. They could not find a _single_ benefit of DIRECT vs. Ares. In my book, when a comparison study or trade comes out 100% in favor of one option, it indicates that the study was biased to begin with. I would expect such a trade to perhaps strongly point to one solution, but identify one or two areas where the alternative has an advantage. This study does not do that, and therefore in my mind is of questionable value.

I'd have to agree with "me" that Dennis Wingo's claim of a breech of ethics doesn't necessarily apply here. There's not enough information to make such an accusation, and I'd have thought Wingo would have known better. IF gov't computers were being used (particularly during work hours) to take part in a study of DIRECT and IF that study was not sanctioned by their supervisors, THEN a COI may have occurred. However, since it appears that the study was officially undertaken, I don't see where unethical behavior has taken place.

********

This all started when claims were made by certain of the DIRECT promoters that NASA people at multiple centers were actively working with the DIRECT team. Now the DIRECT team people could have been misrepresenting that NASA support, which is as likely as not, but that was where this all began. Keith Cowing had read this on another site where this claim was made and then investigated it.

It does not matter one whit that DIRECT may be a better solution than Ares and as many know I have promoted a Shuttle C variant system myself, but there is a huge difference between taking 20 year old documents (whether Shuttle C or NLS) and running a few calculations and putting together an architecture with zero support from NASA, and what the DIRECT team have been actively alleging, which is inside support from the engineering cadres at the agency.

Notice that I said CLAIM by the DIRECT team. There are only two solution sets here. Either the DIRECT team is strongly overstating their case here and actively misrepresenting that NASA people are working on the DIRECT idea. Or, NASA people are actively working on the project using NASA Software, computers, even if it is on their off hours, which would constitute that breech of ethics and is specifically what Keith Cowing asked. Now Doug Cook specifically said that this was not happening, therefore this casts doubt on the claims of the DIRECT team concerning the level of technical support from agency engineers that they have been receiving.

After spending some time perusing the presentation, I would be hesitant to call it a trade study. The summary seems to have some qualitative NASA management thump the chest but the analysis doesn't have any Ares vs Direct numbers. Looks like some of the Direct vehicles were put through NASA groundrules and assumptions and assessed vs what I assume is the current payload mission. Most of it looks like a critique or what it says an assessment of Direct. The white paper however seems fairly defensive and has quite a bit of 'Ares is the best rah rah flavor'.

Keith,

Why do you insist on calling anyone who has a remote interest in Direct or thought this may be a better launch vehicle "fanboys"? After all, this design is essentially NLS, which has been pursued by NASA for around 25 or so years.

With your most recent editor's update, you criticize both NASA and Direct personnel. You accuse NASA of bad rocket design and call Direct folks by derogatory names. To me, this seems safe and gives you the benefit of not taking a side while being able to lash out at everyone.

So which is it? Who is better? If none, what design do you prescribe?

Editor's note: Please tell me Mr. Snyder, what is it with you DIRECT Fan Boys? Why do I need to "take a side"? Why should I? My concern is that the process is broken and that neither side is being honest, open, or logical. If DIRECT is so dependent upon NASA for its heritage and development why do they disavow it so vigorously?