Europe's Moon Shot

[Weaver]

Hobbes' thread about range instrumentation aircraft got me thinking: what if Britain and France, with other European nations roped in, had spent the money that in reality got spent on Concorde (and then some) on a full-bloodied space program to rival NASAs instead?

What would Europe's moon-shot have looked like? What would the approach be?

My feeling is that maybe, being allied to the Yanks and not having the sheer zillions to throw at being first, Europe would have gone for the longer-term approach, building the slower but more sustainable route into space and to the moon in order to follow on from America's pioneering.

The basic approach would be to design a usefully big, but not Saturn V-sized launcher, and then use it to launch and assemble a small LEO space station by the late 1960s in order to support the construction in orbit of a moon ship by the mid 1970s. The resultant ship would look very different to Apollo. Only the individual components would have to fit on the launch vehicle: the whole ship could be much larger, with a much greater mass and no overall dimensional limits. It could have an accomodation/science module for a crew of four (one payload) a lander for three (one payload) and a service module (one payload). The rest of the ship would be pre-fuelled boosters (one payload each), added last, to take it out of LEO and to the moon. There'd be no need to carry it's own re-entry capsule: on return to Earth orbit, it could dock with the space station, the moon crew then using the normal Soyuz-style "taxi" ships to return to Earth.

An alternative approach, with a flatter cost curve, might be to send the lander and science modules ahead, independently and unmanned and on slow, fuel-efficient trajectories, with the faster crew vehicle (faster to reduce the need for consumables) following last and rendezvousing with them in lunar orbit.

[lenny100]

using a version of the SLAVE (Satellite LAunch VEhicle) info from here http://www.spaceuk.org/ba/siddeley.htm which was a super black arrow with smiler performance to the early delta c rockets this would have given Europe a handy launcher for station and ship components and a good design for future upgrades towards the manned missions

[frank2056]

Do you mean something like a 1960s version of Ministry of Space?

[Hobbes]

The real-life history of European space activity:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europa_rocket

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ariane_%28rocket_family%29

The Salyut space stations weighed around 20 tons, let's use that as the design goal for the rocket. As it happens   the Ariane 5 can launch around 20t into low Earth orbit.

The Europa project was abandoned, but its first stage (derived from the Blue Streak ballistic missile project) performed well.

If the Europa project had succeeded, a logical next step would be a larger rocket, using maybe 4-5 RZ2 engines in the first stage. Similarly to Ariane, strap-on boosters could be added, weight to LEO maybe 7.5 -10 tons. The next step up would be a new first stage and larger boosters to get 20t to LEO. With more funding, this could have happened by the early '80s.

An earth rendezvous when returning from the moon has one problem: you have to brake considerably to slow down to orbital speed. It's easier to let the atmosphere do the braking for you.

PS I see I'll have to buy Vertical Empires...

[Weaver]

An earth rendezvous when returning from the moon has one problem: you have to brake considerably to slow down to orbital speed. It's easier to let the atmosphere do the braking for you.

Is that conditioned by Lunar orbit escape velocity or by limited endurance requiring a fast return? If the former, then it's a fixed problem, if the latter, then a slower return in a more generous vehicle might be an answer. Even if it's inescapable, then an aero-braking-to-orbital-rendezvous facility on the crew vehicle should still be lighter (heat shield) than a straight re-entry (heat shield on a separate re-entry module). Interesting trade-offs....

[Hobbes]

It's a speed problem. Lunar escape velocity is 8500 km/h, but then the spacecraft is accelerated by Earth's gravity to about 39000 km/h (in Apollo's case). Earth orbital speed is about 25000 km/h. 

[The Rat]

Oooh, I've just had a vision that's better than Viagra - a Vulcan converted to a space shuttle.

[pyro-manic]

That's awesome, if slightly insane! Switch the bomb bay to the top, to make the payload bay, and have big ramps that seal off the intakes for re-entry. Needs some little manoeuvering thrusters as well.

[The Rat]

There's a 1/200th Vulcan at a store here, by some company I've never heard of. Just might pick it up and have a go.

[Weaver]

Okay, rough numbers, based on Apollo tech and rough assumptions/extrapolations:

Multi-stage moon mission based on 4 crew and 20 tonne-to-LEO booster.

Trans Lunar Booster (TLB): 20 tonnes. Launched unfired as payload.

Crew Module: 20 tonnes (Apollo CM + escape tower: 10 tonnes). This has working space, airlock, some consumables and a re-entry capsule for 4 crew. This is the minimum go-up-come-down package should every docking fail.

Lunar Orbit Module: 20 tonnes (Apollo SM: 23 tonnes). This contains consumables for an extended stay in lunar orbit plus science facilities for studying the moon.

Return Module: 20 tonnes (Apollo SM: 23 tonnes). This has the Trans-Earth rocket engine plus some additional consumables. The Return Module and the Crew Module are the only craft to come back from the moon and have just enough consumables between them to go straight there and straight back.

Lunar Landing Vehicle: 20 tonnes (Apollo LM: 15 tonnes). Has a proper airlock so one of 3 crew can remain inside while 2 go EVA. Upper stage is ascent vehcle for return to lunar orbit.

Each 20 tonne module needs two TLBs to get it to the moon, so a total of twelve big-launcher launches, plus a regular space station "ferry" launch would be needed. The launch sequence would be as follows:

1. TLB
2. TLB. Mates with previous TLB.
3. Lunar Orbit Module (unmanned). LOM docks with 2xTLB cluster then uses them to head for the moon.
4. TLB
5. TLB. Mates with previous TLB.
6. Lunar Landing Vehicle (unmanned). LLV docks with 2xTLB cluster then uses them to head for the moon.
7. TLB
8. TLB
9. TLB
10. TLB. All four TLBs mate up.
11. Return Module. RM docks with 4xTLB cluster.
12. Crew Module (unmanned). CM docks with RM in orbit.
13. Lunar crew launch to space-station as passengers on a regular spaceplane/supply capsule launch, then board the combined CM/RM/TLB stack and set off for the moon.

In lunar orbit, CM+RM dock with LOM first then LLV. After surface mission, LLV ascent stage docks with LOM, crew transfer to CM+RM, which then undocks.

RM burns Trans-Earth motor to leave lunar orbit. LOM is left in lunar orbit for potential re-use by next mission (it would need re-stocking, but all the science hardware and structure wouldn't need to be launched again.

On approach to Earth, crew board re-entry capsule and jettison rest of CM+RM.

[rallymodeller]

Or you could just go the easy way and, like Ministry of Space, have Von Braun in England. And he builds his Man In Space rocket, as illustrated by Bonestell. 

[Weaver]

The problem with building a Saturn V equivalent is that it's too big to be used as a commercial satellite launcher. The European effort wouldn't be able to sustain a Saturn V analogue AND a Titan/Thor/Atlas equivalent, so with an eye to possible cancellation/scaling back of the moon/space-station effort, it would be based around a practical satellite launcher from the first. It might well be the case that the core rocket would only have a 10 tonne to LEO capacity, increased to 20 tonnes by the addition of strap-on boosters. That would also give some flexibility in payload dimensions, allowing tall, thin payloads (TLBs) and short, fat (crewed modules) to be launched.

Another interesting question would be space-station access. A simple ferry craft would be needed to take personnel and small stores back and forth to it, so what would it be? A one-shot capsule along Soyuz lines, a semi-reuseable capsule, or a small space plane carried atop the standard launcher (an early version of Hermes, effectively). The spaceplane is most attractive (from a 1960s POV) but probably the most diffcult to develop given it's re-entry temperature issues. Maybe Europe could get access to the cancelled Dyna-Soar project as a quid-pro-quo for supporting the American "fast" moonshot rather than directly competing with it?

[Alvis 3.14159]

Gosh, I hope they didn't run into Cybermen on the moon!

Ok, so that dates me a tad, but in my defence, I didn't learn aboot that particular Dr Who serial until the late 80s!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Moonbase

You can always use rockets to slow your approach to earth enough so that it equals the orbital velocity of an space station, but that means hauling the fuel all the way to the moon and back. If you've got the ability to loft that into orbit, and aren't looking at beating the Russians to the moon, then it's an achievable option. Apollo wound up doing what it did due to time constraints. Had they enough time to take a leisurely approach, they most likely would have gone with a different configuration.

Weaver has posted what is the most liely and achievable approach, using 1960s technology. Add in a larger TLB and you could do the return to orbit option.

Von Braun also looked at using the atmosphere as a brake, by skipping a spaceplane-like vehicle off the atmosphere until it had burned off enough energy to do a re-entry.  It would approach very high and very shallow, and flying inverted, use the lift from the wings to hold it in the atmosphere until it had slowed down anough to descend like a glider. I don't think it would be achievable using the tech of the day however. A blunt, Apollo-type capsule could also use a series of skips in and out until it had slowed down enough, but that would entail a large degree of danger in my opinion, as one small deviation would lead to disaster. I think the retrofiring to orbit option would make the most sense if you want to keep the space station in play as a return mode.

Alvis Pi

[Hobbes]

I agree that von Braun could be a key player.

What if Operation Paperclip had gone awry: someone finds out that von Braun and others are in the US with papers falsified by Operation Paperclip, and either the American public or Soviet diplomatic pressure forces the US to return the scientists to (West) Germany.
Von Braun starts advocating space travel; he sees that Germany is in no position to pay for his plans, so he involves other nations, and starts selling this as a pan-European project, in the same vein as the early efforts that led to the EU.

[Hobbes]

Another interesting question would be space-station access. A simple ferry craft would be needed to take personnel and small stores back and forth to it, so what would it be? A one-shot capsule along Soyuz lines, a semi-reuseable capsule, or a small space plane carried atop the standard launcher (an early version of Hermes, effectively). The spaceplane is most attractive (from a 1960s POV) but probably the most diffcult to develop given it's re-entry temperature issues. Maybe Europe could get access to the cancelled Dyna-Soar project as a quid-pro-quo for supporting the American "fast" moonshot rather than directly competing with it?

I think the initial effort would use single-use spacecraft.