Keith gathers up internal criticism of The Shaft, and of its management. I hope that NASA folks feel free to do that here as well--as our troll(s) demonstrate almost daily, it is possible to post anonymously.

I still find it remarkable that NASA thought it was a good idea to take arguably the worst part of the whole Shuttle system and spin it up into the cornerstone of an interplanetary transportation system.

"take arguably the worst part of the whole Shuttle system"

The Orbiter itself?

No, the Orbiter is the best part of the Shuttle system (which is damning it with faint praise).

"the Orbiter is the best part of the Shuttle system"

An interesting position. How many Shuttle Derived Vehcile designs over the years have ditched the SRBs and the ET, but kept the Orbiter?

ET: Wholly expended.
Orbiter: wholly reused... but serves no purpose except to spend money (a reusable payload shroud. *Wow.*)
SRBs: Recovered and reused and *reasonably* inexpensive.

Scott,
Orbiter: wholly reused... but serves no purpose except to spend money

Some of us not blindered by a paycheck from ATK would say the same thing about the SRBs. Well, spend money and provide jobs in Utah for engineers who'd otherwise actually have to build a product that was competitive on the open market.

~Jon

"Some of us not blindered by a paycheck from ATK would say the same thing about the SRBs."

The SRB's in the STS stack could certainly be replaced by some other booster. But that other booster would merely replicate, perhaps somewhat improve upon, the role the SRB's serve. But if you replace the orbiter in the STS stack, you get a *very* different launch system.

Or are you just trying to be insulting?

So far, what we have are "rumors" that the Ares I is underperforming, and clear statements from NASA that it is not. Why do the rumors have credibility? They're not backed up by real documentation, are they?

(I'd add that this is a separate issue from whether or not the Stick is the right vehicle to build. People who claim that it is not may have a point that an EELV is a better choice. But if they're going to allege problems with the Stick's design, then they should produce evidence. So far all I see are bloggers citing other bloggers.)

I do enjoy the irony of NASAWatch once again wagging its finger at NASA and telling people how to behave professionally. That's a mighty high throne they've climbed up on. Is anybody at NASAWatch an actual engineer?