Return-path: X-Andrew-Authenticated-as: 7997;andrew.cmu.edu;Ted Anderson Received: from hogtown.andrew.cmu.edu via trymail for +dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr11/tm2b/space/space.dl@andrew.cmu.edu (->+dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr11/tm2b/space/space.dl) (->ota+space.digests) ID ; Sun, 21 Apr 91 01:23:23 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: Precedence: junk Reply-To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU From: space-request+@Andrew.CMU.EDU To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU Date: Sun, 21 Apr 91 01:23:16 -0400 (EDT) Subject: SPACE Digest V13 #433 SPACE Digest Volume 13 : Issue 433 Today's Topics: Commercial Space News ( 3 of 6) Commercial Space News (6 of 6) Why the space station? Re: Why the space station? Re: Government vs. Commercial R&D Re: NASA & Executive branch Re: Laser launchers Voyager pic's on the CD-ROMS at ames.archives Administrivia: Submissions to the SPACE Digest/sci.space should be mailed to space+@andrew.cmu.edu. Other mail, esp. [un]subscription requests, should be sent to space-request+@andrew.cmu.edu, or, if urgent, to tm2b+@andrew.cmu.edu ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 20 Apr 91 06:05:24 GMT From: agate!bionet!uwm.edu!caen!sdd.hp.com!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!zardoz.cpd.com!dhw68k!ofa123!Wales.Larrison@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (Wales Larrison) Subject: Commercial Space News ( 3 of 6) LOCKHEED WINS CONSTRUCTION CONTRACT FOR IRIDIUM SATELLITE SYSTEM It was officially announced Lockheed Missiles & Space Co. will build the Iridium satellites for Motorola. Apparently, Motorola had selected LMSC back in January, but the letter of intent leading to a formal arrangement to build the satellites was not signed until a week or so ago. This delay in the signing of a letter of intent was reportedly driven by intense negotiations between the two firms to establish relative roles and the LMSC participation in the program. LMSC will send a team of designers to Motorola's Satellite Communications site in Chandler, AZ to begin the Iridium spacecraft design and start planning for the production of the system. LMSC has committed to a new facility to be co-located in Chandler to support the Iridium program, and which will work like a "skunkworks" in developing the satellite. While conflicting data has been reported, it is believed the baseline Iridium satellite bus will be produced at LMSC's existing facility in Sunnyvale, CA and the Chandler facility will be used to do final assembly of modular satellite components - including parts produced by Motorola and a yet-unnamed communications payload subcontractor. Key factors for the LMSC win of this contract were given to be Lockheed experience in rapid product development from the company "skunkworks" operations, modular construction and other manufacturing techniques developed for the LMSC "Frugal-sat" spacecraft bus, and a willing of LMSC to act more as a partner than a traditional subcontractor. Lockheed will commit at least $50 M to this venture, but will share in any future profits. At the Lockheed annual shareholder meeting, Lockheed Chairman Daniel Tellep claimed participation could bring in up to $1 B in 1994-1999 revenues. [Commentary: The first shoe has dropped on the Iridium deal. As was rumored, LMSC got the satellite construction contract. Next will be the satellite antenna contractor, then the launch contractor for launch of the 77 satellites in the Iridium constellation. Rumor is McDonnell-Douglas will get the initial launch contract, but this is on hold until the LMSC/Motorola contract is finalized. OSC has been claiming they think they won this contract, but the betting money is on McDonnell-Douglas for their ability to launch multiple Iridium satellites with a single launch. As I've previously stated, this is a big win for LMSC, since it gets Lockheed into the commercial satellite business in a big way. The significance Tellup placed upon the venture at the Lockheed shareholders meeting and in later discussions with financial analysts surprised me. He claims Iridium alone increases the percentage of Lockheed's non-defense revenues from about 25% to almost 42% by the end of the decade. A big impact on Lockheed. LMSC is also pushing for the Small ELV contract with a system derived from their experience with ICBMs. If they succeed there as well, they can offer a "one stop" service for small satellites and launch services - with a very strong market position to offer this service to their existing DoD customers. But the Iridium program still has a lot of risk in it - primarily from the need to still get the required compatible frequencies and get operating licenses for a global cellular communications system - and the establishment of an international consortium or organization to fund and operate the constellation. I have not seen any recent activities here, and this is the most difficult and critical area for the Iridium concept. Actions at the upcoming WARC will be critical and should provide more insight into the viability of the Iridium venture.] -- Wales Larrison Internet: Wales.Larrison@ofa123.fidonet.org Compuserve: >internet:Wales.Larrison@ofa123.fidonet.org -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ Date: 20 Apr 91 06:09:43 GMT From: agate!bionet!uwm.edu!wuarchive!sdd.hp.com!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!zardoz.cpd.com!dhw68k!ofa123!Wales.Larrison@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (Wales Larrison) Subject: Commercial Space News (6 of 6) NOTES TO READERS (THANKS FOR COMMENTS!) Many thanks to the folks who responded to my request for suggestions on how to improve these postings. I got 25-30 replies, which I figure is about 2500-3000 readers (at a typical readership poll response rate of 1%). I'm trying to incorporate as many suggestions as feasible. (If I don't incorporate it, I'm probably still trying to figure out a way to do it easily...) The comments included: "Add a blank Line between paragraphs to improve readability" - will try to comply - within message length limits. "Make it shorter (more info, fewer words)" - Agree. Unfortunately, I may plead Mark Twain's comment here ("I apologize I didn't have the time to make it shorter...") "Fewer, but longer postings (multiple articles in each posting)" "More posts, with shorter topics (single articles in each posting)" - Hmm.... will try to limit number of postings at any one time to a half-dozen or less. Am also investigating ways of getting around the 60 line limit at my tie-in node. If I can get around this, then I will post one medium-length single posting with news. If I can't get around this, I'm forced to stick with a half-dozen or so postings at one time. Still working on this. For a short term fix, the message tagged "1 of N" has an index - and if it is read first, it gives a map to the rest of the messages. "More info on microgravity and materials research - need to find other markets" - Agree. I'll try to dig up more information on topics other than comsats and launchers. But they are 90% of the current market and much of the available info only covers these... I'll see what I can do. "More focus on investment and finances" - I'll try. This is an area I've been struggling with due to my limited available time to dig out, grind the numbers, and come up with a coherent analysis. "Try not to spilt paragraphs and sentences across message pieces" - Agree. Will try to comply, but may still have do it occasionally, if I can't lick the 60 line per message limit. Thanks to all those who responded. (:D) ------------------------------------------------------------------- Wales Larrison Space Technology Investor grosse tete et peu de sens -- Wales Larrison Internet: Wales.Larrison@ofa123.fidonet.org Compuserve: >internet:Wales.Larrison@ofa123.fidonet.org -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ Date: 21 Apr 91 00:04:36 GMT From: sdd.hp.com!news.cs.indiana.edu!ariel.unm.edu!triton.unm.edu!prentice@ucsd.edu (John Prentice) Subject: Why the space station? Below is a cut down version of the weekly "What's New" column from the American Physical Society. > WHAT'S NEW, Friday, 19 April 1991 Washington, DC > > 2. PRIORITY SETTING WAS THE THEME OF A SENATE HEARING ON THE SSC. > Senator Wendell Ford (D-KY) mercilessly browbeat Allan Bromley, > the White House Science Advisor, in an attempt to elicit relative > priorities among science initiatives. Bromley never flinched; he > insisted that all Administration programs should be fully funded. > Nico Bloembergen was under no such restraint. Testifying for the > APS, he reaffirmed the APS position that SSC funding should not > come at the expense of individual investigator support--but then > he went on to propose how both could be funded: take it from the > manned space station. That, he said, would not be a setback for > science. [additional stuff deleted (not relevant to this)] > > 3. SPACE STATION FREEDOM WAS DESCRIBED AS "A GIANT STEP NOWHERE," > by Bruce Murray of the Planetary Society, which supports manned > space exploration. In a Senate hearing, he said Freedom puts > humans at risk for mundane purposes, fails to meet user goals and > portends financial disaster for the US civil space program. > > Robert L. Park (202) 232-0189 The American Physical Society. The American Physical Society is the main professional organization for physicists in the U.S. and is not exactly a minor player. Judging from the reactions to the space station that I have heard out of physicists, I would have to say that there is a wide spread feeling that the space station is a boondoggle (alot of them feel the same way about the SSC by the way). The segment from the Planetary Society suggests the same thing. I am curious what arguments supporters of the space station have to counter these objections. To expand on the comments in the "What's New" segment, some of the objections of the scientific community are 1) the space station serves no significant scientific purpose and 2) at a time that scientific researchers are experiencing severe funding shortfalls, while American science and technology continues to slip is relation to our trading partners, and while education in the U.S. is an uncontested failure, why are we willing to spend enormous sums on a space station which will not address these problems except in the most oblique of ways? I have wrapped a bunch of objections together in the second statement, but these are the sorts of comments one hears. So, comments? John P.S. - I would prefer people post their comments. I don't really want to get into e-mail debates. Besides, I don't wish to *debate* the merits of the space station at all, I just want to hear arguments in support of the space station which talk specifically to the concerns of the scientific community (such as those I have paraphrased here). I apologize if this hashs old ground, I don't regularly follow this newsgroup. If it is old ground, just ignore the posting. -- John K. Prentice john@unmfys.unm.edu (Internet) Dept. of Physics and Astronomy, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM, USA Computational Physics Group, Amparo Corporation, Albuquerque, NM, USA ------------------------------ Date: 21 Apr 91 02:20:03 GMT From: usc!rpi!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!utzoo!henry@ucsd.edu (Henry Spencer) Subject: Re: Why the space station? In article <1991Apr21.000436.13677@ariel.unm.edu> prentice@triton.unm.edu (John Prentice) writes: >> 3. SPACE STATION FREEDOM WAS DESCRIBED AS "A GIANT STEP NOWHERE," >> by Bruce Murray of the Planetary Society, which supports manned >> space exploration... "Supports" is a thundering half-truth if there ever was one. The Planetary Society supports unmanned exploration very strongly, but the only manned project it likes is Mars Or Bust. (Actually, Mars And Bust would be a better description.) -- And the bean-counter replied, | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology "beans are more important". | henry@zoo.toronto.edu utzoo!henry ------------------------------ Date: 18 Apr 91 15:13:41 GMT From: wuarchive!sdd.hp.com!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!unix.cis.pitt.edu!pitt!nss!Paul.Blase@psuvax1.cs.psu.edu (Paul Blase) Subject: Re: Government vs. Commercial R&D To: hrubin@pop.stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin) >> >> NS> If understand your point, it is that government money is >> >> NS> needed, not necessarily government lab work. >> >> >> >>More than just government money, rather a market for the first product >> >>from a technology. HR> There is a third source, which USED to be very important. HR> Private research efforts, and non-government non-profit HR> funding, constituted a major part of the research effort in HR> this country before WWII, and this should be done again. We HR> must get rid of governmental control of research, and HR> government funding has provided government control in too many HR> areas. The basic problem is that the development costs are so high that no private sector agency can afford or (more realistically) desires to take the risk. Private sector operations prefer to operate with known technologies, or at least with those technologies that promise a fairly quick commercial payoff. Look at superconductors as a good example. For years, nobody did much work on them, they were too expensive to use. Now that the new ceramic compounds promise large commercial payoffs, there is a lot of private-sector work going on (as well as a lot of government-funded work). HR> Instead, we are getting government limitation and government HR> disincentives into the private sector, and government direction HR> of research. I do not even think the government should do much HR> interfering with development, but neither government HR> bureaucrats nor anyone else should try to direct research. -- Please don't forget that I was distinguishing between basic research and the application of that research to a usable product. BTW, why shouldn't government agencies direct research? They are the ones that will be paying for the results. (I think that what you meant is that they shouldn't be interfering in research with which they are not directly associated, either as a client or a sponser - and I do not see very much of this, except in the areas of environmental and safety regulation). --- via Silver Xpress V2.26 [NR] -- Paul Blase - via FidoNet node 1:129/104 UUCP: ...!pitt!nss!Paul.Blase INTERNET: Paul.Blase@nss.FIDONET.ORG ------------------------------ Date: 19 Apr 91 17:42:55 GMT From: mintaka!think.com!linus!philabs!ttidca!reid%ttidcb.tti.com@bloom-beacon.mit.edu (Reid Kneeland) Subject: Re: NASA & Executive branch Of course I know how our government works. We have a system of "checks" and "balances". This means that the government can write huge "checks" against negative "balances". Ob-Space: The pertinence to this newsgroup should be obvious. ===================================================================== Reid Kneeland reid@ttidca.tti.com (that's MISTER reid@ttidca.tti.com to you!) {csun,retix,philabs,psivax,pyramid}!ttidca!reid Transaction Technology Inc., Santa Monica, CA (213) 450-9111 x2499 The opinions expressed above do not necessarily etc etc... Never trust a man who can count to 1,023 on his fingers. ------------------------------ Date: 20 Apr 91 07:22:37 GMT From: wuarchive!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!linac!unixhub!slacvm!doctorj@g.ms.uky.edu (Jon J Thaler) Subject: Re: Laser launchers In article <2706@ke4zv.UUCP> gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman) writes: >* Rocket fuel is primarily used to lift rocket fuel, not payload. > Given this, rocket fuel turns out to be much less than 10% efficient. I don't think this is correct. Over a big range of payload mass fractions about 50% of the chemical energy is turned into final payload kinetic energy. ------------------------------ Date: 20 Apr 91 15:26:38 GMT From: swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!ub!ubvmsc.cc.buffalo.edu!v096my2q@ucsd.edu (Mark A Wieczorek) Subject: Voyager pic's on the CD-ROMS at ames.archives Has anyone been viewing the pictures on the CD-ROMS in ames.arc.nasa.gov? I'm trying to find out how to convert the format of the browse pictures (which is .IBG) to GIF. Has anyone been able to do this. One of the posts to this news group said to uncompress the full resolution pictures into FITS format and then convert this to whatever you want using pbmplus. Well how do you uncompress these pictures to FITS. If anyone has the source code, knows where to get it, or has any ideas on getting IGB to GIF please Email me. Thanks, Mark Wieczorek v096my2q@ubvms ------------------------------ End of SPACE Digest V13 #433 *******************