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Old 12-14-2017, 09:31 PM
luke strawwalker's Avatar
luke strawwalker luke strawwalker is offline
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Join Date: Dec 2007
Location: Needville and Shiner, TX
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Quote:
Originally Posted by blackshire
The relative lack of that simple--yet important--feature was one of the multiple reasons behind the Space Shuttle's failure to become "the DC-3 of space." One of the initial, in-the-moment cost-cutting features (which resulted in higher costs over time) in Rockwell's orbiter design was the elimination of many of the inspection doors, hatches, and borescope paths that are standard in aircraft. McDonnell Douglas and Martin Marietta had included these easy inspection & maintenance-enabling features in their orbiter designs, and they warned that their elimination in Rockwell's design would make the orbiter more difficult, slow, and expensive to service and maintain. I'm glad to read that this lesson has apparently not been lost on Blue Origin. (I have long thought that if I were to contract for the construction of a "clean-sheet design" reusable launch vehicle, I would prefer to have a *jet* engine manufacture produce its rocket engines [General Electric produced the Vanguard first stage's X405 engine], because easy inspection and maintenance is part of jet engine engineers' design philosophy.)What a "two-fer" visit that was, getting to visit a spaceship manufacturer *and* come away with such an historic "souvenir" (actually, two, counting the--I presume--Centuri spent C6-5 of 1971 vintage)!


Too bad car and truck manufacturers haven't learned that lesson... nowdays they make things as DIFFICULT to repair as possible... just to increase the amount they can charge at the dealer shops...

When Ford is building pickups that you have to REMOVE THE CAB to do engine service, it's gotten to the point of being ridiculous...

Later! OL J R
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