23 thoughts on “A Wet Workshop”

  1. Great idea and your point about working with life support is one I’ve made myself (with reference to finishing a mars habitat of course.)

  2. A Centaur upper stage is 10 feet in diameter and about 42 feel long counting the Centaur engines. Sealing the tanks would likely be the easy part. Adding the berthing adapter, crew access, electrical, and all of the other necessary subsystems would be the hard part. You could possibly install the wiring harness before launch but modifications like that would have to be qualified as design changes. You’d need to add insulation to keep the temps under control and a host of other things to make a Centaur into a usable space station module. You’d also be limited to those Centaurs going into a compatible LEO, most likely the ones launching the Boeing CST-100 to the ISS.

    1. Sounds like it wont be a stock Centaur but will be modified to some extent on the ground by adding a docking adapter. The MECO link below has some good quotes. They want a module between the Centaur and a Cygnus that would make the final remodeling much simpler.

  3. Seems like its wasting those engines. The volume of the fuel tank is a great opportunity but so are those engines. But I guess since there isn’t a way to refuel in orbit yet, might as well use what they can.

    How hard would it be to put a docking port on it?

  4. Serious question, why wouldn’t you just put a second stage in orbit with a larger fuel payload and then just mate that with an already orbiting piece of hardware?

    You would have a number of spares (yes, and a mass penalty as well) but I think there would be value in retaining those engines as opposed to aiming them at the bottom of the Pacific…

    The only limit on engines would be the ability to relight them in orbit (and if they could be relit).

    Have there been long term studies on the ability to maintain RP-1 in an orbital environment?

    1. I think you’re right. But the first known use of the word “specious” was in 1513, so I’m imagining that ye olde wet workshoppe was converted from a giant oaken barrel.

  5. Life support issues need not be a show stopper, if the “wet workshop” is to be a module on an existing platform. It wouldn’t need its own life support, any more than every module on ISS needs its own life support.

    What you do need, though, is a docking/berthing ability and air lock. You also need enough air tank capacity somewhere to fill the volume. You’ll also need to install things like a sun shield/meteoroid shield.

    I don’t see a wet workshop approach as being viable for module that needs a lot of equipment, but as living space, a workshop area, storage space, etc, it seems a good way to attain inexpensive livable space. Theoretically. The issue in my mind is, would the needed preflight modifications to the upper stage end up being so costly as to make it impractical?

  6. “Working in space hasn’t gotten any easier, of course, in the last 50 years.”

    This is sadly true. That’s the inexcusable part.

  7. Rand: I had trouble posting this. If duplicates appear please remove. Thanks…

    I had suggested once some time back (not here) that perhaps a really handy early F9H SpaceX orbital article would be an airlock module with arm that could dock with a Dragon V2. EVA pres/de-pres cycles would then not tax the Dragon, but rather the refillable (via Dragon trunk) tanks on the airlock module. Could serve as an extended stay space lab/hab or for in orbit assembly with or without EVA. Could even use the on-board stored air for limited orbital maneuvers. Back in the go-go days of the 60’s a wet lab was an engineering optimum. Today I’m not as sure it would save as much over a custom or semi-custom design using Bigelow modules that don’t require conversion and have less throw away mass.

    1. From the MECO link,

      When we started working on the proposal for NASA, we saw that there were some additional requirements: they wanted additional docking ports, some form of airlock that could be used for crew EVAs, and an equipment airlock. You can’t really put all of this on the Centaur without affecting its ability as an upper stage, so what we decided to do was put another module between the Centaur and the Cygnus: there’s enough room under the Atlas V fairing to stack all this stuff up.

      1. I saw that. My FH variation on that theme is the arm. It isn’t necessary to have an arm to have a working airlock module or a space hab. But so helpful if you want to do on-orbit assembly. And thanks to NASA and Canada et al. we have tons of experience working with arms in orbit. With an arm you have the beginnings of an assembler. In fact if I were Elon, that’s exactly what I’d call it….

    1. Well, keep it completely wet – make the whole workshop a swimming pool, so that it becomes a second Neutral Buoyancy Lab (NBL). What better time and place to practice EVA assembly techniques that when you are already in space? Maybe spin it, so that it better approximates Houston’s NBL.

      1. Ummm why would you need the water and the “neutral bouyancy”?

        In orbit you are already weightless

  8. This all points to how to re-use upper stages. They are already there, so re-use them in space. Wet workshops, tugs, etc. Learn how to re-fuel on orbit. Park side by side, dock with arm. Connect tanks with hoses, rotate whole assembly around mutual center of mass. Until half full you don’t even need pumps.

  9. Here is an idea, but maybe better just launched as its own module.

    In space, they could construct a bay in the tank. Frame around it like they do with container houses to keep the structural integrity. Then they could construct larger things in space while not wearing suits, open the doors, and either assemble into something larger or release into wild.

    Since they have access to several, they could do a lot of different things. Still seems like the best way to go is just refuel them. Having a fleet of orbital vehicles could be just as profitable as having a fleet of reusable F9’s.

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