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| Friday / 24 March 2006 | ||
NASA Fine-Tuning
VSE Launch Vehicles.
NASA's Constellation Systems Launch
Vehicles Project Office at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville
AL leads the Crew Launch Vehicle (CLV) effort for the Exploration
Systems Mission Directorate (ESMD) at NASA Headquarters in Washington
DC. As part of the Vision for Space Exploration (VSE), the CLV will
be responsible for lifting the Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV), with
Moon-bound astronauts aboard, into low Earth orbit. ESMD recently
issued a Request for Information concerning the second stage of the
CLV. Originally planned to use updated versions of the Space Shuttle
Main Engine (SSME), the CLV second stage is now expected to be propelled
by a J2X engine, similar to those that propelled the Apollo-era
Saturn rockets to the Moon. NASA is also
considering dropping the
SSME from the Heavy-Lift Cargo Launch Vehicle (CaLV) in favor
of the RS-68 engine. In the request, NASA seeks feedback and ideas
from the aerospace industry on anticipated technical and business
challenges, such as the possible benefits of "combining proposed
avionics or on-board electrical flight controls and guidance systems
into the procurement of overall upper-stage production support,"
according to the NASA
release. NASA stresses the request is intended
solely to obtain information that will "help NASA define its upper-stage
acquisition strategy development effort," and that no contracts will
be issued based on this request.
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