This author--an Army man with good sense no less, says otherwise:
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/150/1

EELVs at most will carry 20 tons at a time. A good bit of each load will be dedicated to automated assembly. Remember the Darpa Challenge? That puts into question just what robots can do. Large, monolithic structures have their advantages.

Please... :grin: Heavy-lift allows large tankage to be placed in space--perhaps in polar orbits--in one shot.

http://www.thespacereview.com/article/150/1

You don't need me to tell you how green cadets can be. They are going to learn a hard lesson about how space is not appreciated. Ask those under General Medaris from Countdown to decision. Actually I am thrilled that we have at least some AF people interested in space. You know as well as I that the pilots lord it over people. You call it name dropping if you want, but I make it my business to know what is going on. The father of the super-guppy was self-educated, and there was a time before the AIAA when people were experimenting with flight.

As far as the notion of a heavy-lift forum--I doubt that more than a handful of people know what heavy-lift is. That is the problem. Most people are ignorant of heavy-lift and it needs to be put before them--same as popular discussions of space-elevators, much of which you will have to innovate since there is no book on the one true established proceedure of just how you make a space elevator. That will take people who are generalists.

As far as my dig at pilots, I am sure that Lance Lord and esp. Pete Worden would agree with me as to how pilots who run the AF like Jumper are going to be a big problem for space.

Let me ask you something. If someone in the NAVY even--wanted a space elevator--who would you think the NAVY would listen to--you....or someone trying to sell the DDX whatsit.

It is time for a separate space service that has its own budget. If you don't think heavy-lift is needed, go talk to Hu Davis and Bill Eoff yourself, if you doubt what I have to say.

I find that rather sad, esp. with the latest Aldr. commission report stressing heavy-lift. I just spoke with Gary Martin at NASA and he tells me that there is no Space Architect position anymore--with it now under exploration.

 He tells me that all the current Administration cares about now is hypersonics. Once again, the blue-suit prima-donnas get everything they want, where the rest of us have to sit here in our closets and rot. True even with F-35, for instance. Nothing "Joint" about that fighter. The NAVY had to compromise and do without an extra engine. Now the Marines are told to accept the standard model and just put their own coat of paint on it and make do.

I understand some wet-behind-the-ears Air Force cadets are with Lift Port. It is all just a bunch of make-work to keep the few pro-space people in the AF occupied and off to one side, while the fighter jocks run the show.

 It is very simple. If you want a space elevator or anything else of size--you will make waves and support heavy-lift.   If not, you won't.

Just because we have those vehicles doen't mean they are right for the job. We have sounding rockets too-after all. Existing EELVs are no better than Titan IV, which can deposit only a fraction of its 20 tons to LEO at geosynch.

It is something that may be useful in select applications to save weight--it is worth playing around with as a concept.

It was from an article in Nature a few moons ago. I am not making this up. I just can't remember the issue right off the bat. There was a photo on the page.

I'm just kicking the ball around a bit. I have heard quite a bit about the use of oil platforms and the like--and think that the Sea Launch platform may be of some use. There have been some who wanted huge 70 km structures as a base, others who want something more modest--and some who want something like the Synchrodyne that was in Acta Astronautica 45 (1999) pp. 143-153. etc.

I think it is worth talking about other possibilities. There are those who know heavy lift to be valuable. Neville Marzwell at JPL would support heavy-lift. Bill Eoff formerly of Marshall threw up his hands and walked away with Marshall moving away from it heavy lift mandate. His concept, the Magnum, was considered unneeded even though it would have allowed faster station assembly. Bob (yeah--he creeps me out too) Zubrin and Buzz Aldrin support heavy-lift, as does Hu Davis of the Magnum-like Aquila concept--so I am not alone in seeing the value of heavy-lift.  

Not everybody agrees with the Simberg/Jeff Bell approach to things.

On page nine of your mill-creek/HighLift site you yourself also list Shuttle-C as a possibility:

1. Construction of Shuttle-C
2. Development of large Centaur or alternative upperstage
3. Increase climber's power

1. 40% larger initial cable
2. 18 months to deploy first cable
3. Eliminates risk of critical meteor damage
4. Faster transport to orbit

To respond to challenges

1. Launch vehicle development cost (this will be needed anyway for monolithic nuclear stages, as hydrogen boil-off will still be a problem in elevator rides)

2. Thermal and locomotion impacts on climber (good trajectory will eliminate this--any rocket can have such effects)

The biggest reason the Space Elevator has been suggested is as a end run around heavy lift. But if HLLVs allow 40% greater cables and faster transport to orbit--then that should be a priority--not a possibility, or extravagance.

A knot behind a series of welds, then...perhaps. This will need experimentation. If braided to form cables of useful size--you are going to face some friction anyway.

I have heard a lot about "tensegrity" which could be applicable here:

http://www.frontiernet.net/~imaging/tenseg1.html
http://www.dogpile.com/info.dogpl/search/web/tensegrity

Can't say that I have--but I have heard of lots of deaths by people standing next to trees. If the ribbon is non-metal--there could very well be a side flash. A skyskraper is much more massive than a thin space elevator cable. If you were touching the lightning protection system on a skyscraper--most people aren't--you would receive quite the shock.

True, this tether will be motionless--but sprites nned no fast motion like the shuttle-deployed tether. Any large strike will occur as the first cable nears the ground.

Only time will tell.

You know me as Publiusr ( Publius Rex)
aka Jeff Wright

pro-HLLV gadfly and general pest. :-?
Very big Energiya Buran fan. Largely self-educated and a bit of a launch vehicle historian.

Any model kits, pehaps forced perspective dioramas?

Just make sure you have plenty of surface to air missiles in case some Osama type tries to fly an A-380 into it.

I remember one abandoned oil platform used as some type of tax shelter was pretty much its own country. If you have the thing on a Sea Launch platform, do as you will. I believe there was a Norm Nixon who wanted that mile-long supership with the NAVY wanting a superaircraft carry logistical base assembled of platforms linked in a row to form a very long strip.

Nixon's super-ship FREEDOM was to be a duty free commerce zone. Perhaps the same approach could be adopted here. Or, to stir up a can of worms, the UN could 'allow' only elevators to serve such roles to make life easier on you.

Perhaps a line of toys is in order. Over at the thread where I normally post www.starshipmodeler.net ,there is a young man who works for ESTES rockets who is doing an X-Prize line. A space elevator platform toy (Beanstalk one?) just may capture the imagination. Beats NASCAR crap.

BTW Just when did Discovery Channel go to the motorheads, anyway?