From: Technotranscendence (neptune@mars.superlink.net)
Date: Sun Feb 02 2003 - 15:23:18 MST
On Sunday, February 02, 2003 4:45 PM Mike Lorrey mlorrey@yahoo.com
wrote:
> A new space shuttle cost to build, back in the
> 1980s, 1-1.5 billion dollars. I suspect the cost
> would be somewhere upwards of $4 billion
> today. A single flight, turnaround and
> refurbishment of the shuttle and its SRBs, plus
> replacing the main fuel tank, costs about $100 million.
Does this take into account the R & D costs which you did take into
account for Project Apollo?
> The Saturn - Apollo project cost $25 billion dollars
> (in 1966 dollars) by the time they put the first two
> men on the moon, and this counted the first several
> missions being only Saturn IB boosters, which could
> only put 19,000 lbs or so into orbit. Counting by
> Apollo missions, each mission cost $2.21 billion in
> 1966 dollars.
Whoa! First, you're combining Apollo and Saturn V costs. This would be
kind of like me adding in the ISS costs to the Shuttle program. I'm
only talking about using Saturn V boosters period -- not about a new
Project Apollo. I.e., just using such boosters as the workhorse -- not
attaching any specific mission to them. Also, the development costs are
already spent. (Okay, ditto for the Shuttle. Making a new Columbia
would not, ceterus paribus be as costly as making the original from
scratch, but the same goes for the Saturn V -- especially the Saturn V
sans Apollo. Of course, making a modernized Shuttle or Saturn V would
require more R & D dollars.)
Anyway, good try. I'll have to devote some time to researching the
numbers myself.
Cheers!
Dan
http://uweb.superlink.net/neptune/
See "For a Free Frontier: The Case for Space Colonization" at:
http://uweb.superlink.net/neptune/SpaceCol.html
See "Space: The Forgotten Frontier" at:
http://uweb.superlink.net/neptune/SpaceForgot.html
See "A Late Answer to Bob Black" [on space commercialization] at:
http://uweb.superlink.net/neptune/Black.html
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