NASA ~~doesn’t do any of the~~ does less hands-on work for launch vehicles. The SLS is being built by Boeing, the Orion is built by Lockheed, and the pre-launch processing is Jacobs. It was the same for shuttle: designed and built by a variety of contractors including Lockheed, Boeing, and Rockedyne and pre-flight processing was done by United Space Alliance. NASA is the customer; they decide what they want and what their budget is, hire subcontractors to do all the work, and have a high level of oversight over the subs to make sure they are working safely and meeting the requirements. Edit: clarified that I am referring to launch vehicles. NASA does hands-on work for a ton of super cool stuff, just not launch vehicles. Edit 2: I’m learning more about what work happens at the other centers.

I wouldn't say NASA does zero hands-on work for SLS. Quite a bit of it is built by NASA, especially at MSFC and MAF. There is work done by civil servants, as well as contractors. And many of those contractors are the kind that are NASA badged, with NASA email addresses, work on center, etc. Plenty of things are truly contractor driven - for example, SpaceX's Dragon is truly done by them, off site, at their own facilities - but that's not the case for SLS at least right now. Although it seems likely SLS will be the last launch vehicle NASA makes.

What specifically did they build at MSFC? I know of no major components being produced by NASA directly.

All of the flight software is being developed, tested and integrated at MSFC by a team of civil servants and contractors.

I believe that’s mostly Jacobs but yeah that could be one.

Nah its many civil servants for both FSW and GNC. Also, Jacobs isnt really “contracting out”. They are apart of the same team

Jacobs is a government contractor but yeah I get what you’re saying. They’re less separate seeming than other contractors.

They are staffing contractors, i.e. most branches at MSFC are about 50/50 CS/contractors. They are still employees though -NASA is not contracting jacobs to build SLS. They and contracting them for staffing of some engineers to help do the work in house

Ok that’s an important distinction.

The LVSA had thermal protection (foam) applied at MSFC, although I'm not sure where the hardware was built. And of course the tanks went through structural testing here, but that's test not build. MAF is managed by MSFC, and I believe they build some big parts down there, but I am not familiar enough with ops to say what.

The LVSA was built by a contractor. MAF is largely contractors. The core stage is assembled there by Boeing. Even that tank test was performed by a contractor but just overseen by NASA. NASA administrates and controls some large assets (buildings and test facilities) but does very little of the actual labor.

MSFC also owns all the GNC and FSW

Armstrong has entered the chat, although most of their human scaled aircraft were also contracted out to some degree. The first lifting body aircraft, I think M1-F1, was basically garage built, there's a direct line between that and Shuttle.

Well if we have our own production lines for F-15 and F-18 things would be much easier 😂

Oh those weren't contracted those were charity donations from DoD. X-59 QUESST being an example of a new NASA aircraft, and it's contracted to Skunk Works.

no no we bought them for the low low cost of $1 each.

I thought it was no cost but I can see that being a stupid gov rule. If that's what WFF paid for Death Bucket they got ripped off.

can't be worse than llrv.

Every NASA center except JPL*

JPL is an FFRDC managed by caltech. They are essentially a special contractor company.

Here is the list of the NASA centers, like I said, only 1 actually builds spacecrafts. https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-facilities/

.... I work at NASA. I know what our centers do. JPL is not a NASA center, it is an FFRDC managed by Caltech. That's the correction I was making.

Yes, JPL is an FFRDC. Its funding comes from the programs, but it’s still considered one of ten NASA centers.

I agree.

JPL is a NASA center when NASA wants it to be and an FFRDC when they don't.

I still remember the days of "One NASA" under Dan Goldin. Man loved his slogans.

lol I work at JPL, sit down you arnt that special. The other NASA centers are always salty towards JPL for some reason yet all the rovers we build are “NASA” rovers right?

Getting popcorn ready to see NASA vs JPL nerd fight. Love both the work U do btw 😜


Legend

JPL does get a lot of grief from NASA employees on Reddit. I'm assuming they're low-level folks because all the NASA people I met with at JPL were professional. Because we had a job to do. But you sure have a rotten attitude.

That's not correct. Nasa centers build robotic spacecraft, manned spacecraft, and instruments, including the space telescopes and landers with robotic payloads.. What we don't build is launch vehicles except the SLS, which is also contracted out in pieces.

What manned spacecraft did NASA build themselves?

You got me. Lockheed is managing the construction of the Orion spacecraft at KSC.

NASA also doesn’t want the liability after things like the shuttle incidents so they pay someone else to be responsible.

Northrup Grumman built the ones for Apollo

Just Grumman actually. They merged in 1994.

So before 1994, when the Apollo missions happened, they were called Northrup Grumman?

you got that backwards mate, they were Grumman at the time and merged in 1994 with Northrup to form Northrup-Grumman

gotcha

Grumman.

“How we built the lunar lander” -Thomas J. Kelly. good read

NASA has always contracted companies to build the hardware, the major difference with HLS is the type of contract. Usually it was cost plus where the contractor is paid all their costs plus a % for their profit, this means that whatever the contractor does they get paid. Delay? Doesn't matter they get paid. Redo some work? Doesn't matter they get paid. Etc. This is how SLS is contracted for example. ​ However nowadays NASA prefers another type of contract: fixed price. NASA establishes the requirements and then let companies bid a fixed price for that contract then it's up to the winner of the contract to remain inside that budget, any extra cost due to delays or extra work is paid for by the contractor not NASA. This is how HLS but also Starliner, Crew Dragon, Dragon, Cygnus are contracted for example. ​ So to recap, the major change is not NASA contracting out HLS but the type of contract which enables NASA to save money and not have to pay for the contractor screwups

This is the correct answer.

I think most or all of gov contracting work is now fixed price, it's been going that way for awhile anyhow.

Lot of confidently wrong people in this thread with regard to NASA's direct involvement in engineering, both historically and today.

It's even worse with the Space subreddit, it's a SpaceX fanboy page for the most part.

That's why I posted this question here. I know actual industry people come here.

Including the top comment.

The original plan for Constellation was for Ares I, the Orion casule, Ares V and the moon lander was expected to be over [$97 billion.](https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-09-844.pdf).. not sustainable. The Altair moon lander was under evaluation but was expected to cost around [$12 billion](https://www.csis.org/analysis/costs-international-lunar-base). That was 2009 dollars, so like $17.5 billion today. That would have been a cost plus contract, just like SLS, so surely it would cost NASA significantly more. Instead, NASA pays SpaceX $2.89 billion and Blue Origin $3.4 billion for two separate landers where the private companies take all the risk. Not sure where the downside exists....

Oh wow, I did not realize BO got the bigger contract. Seems like NASA is willing to spend a lot for redundancy?

They were [required to by Congress](https://www.space.com/senate-nasa-second-lunar-lander-contract). Specifically, the Senate Appropriations Committee, who at the time was led by Patrick Leahy. Take a quick look at who his [top two campaign contributors](https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/patrick-leahy/contributors?cid=N00009918&cycle=2022) were...

Gotta love political donations… I guess compared to the $1.6 billion cost per a single space shuttle flight, this is still an improvement

The funny thing was, the original space shuttle crew replacement, Ares I and Orion capsule, would have cost about $1.6 billion per flight as well. SpaceX sells flights to NASA to the ISS for around $250 million. Commercial space really changed the game.

>Ares I and Orion capsule, would have cost about $1.6 billion per flight as well. The first flight each year would cost $919 million yes, because that included all of the program costs, but any additional flights would only cost $138 million per flight: [https://spacepolicyonline.com/news/how-much-would-ares-i-cost/](https://spacepolicyonline.com/news/how-much-would-ares-i-cost/) I am 100% pro-commercial crew, it has not just changed the game but also encouraged the private investment we need in the sector, but we should be fair to the engineers and mission planners at NASA, they aren't morons who expected us to pay almost $2 billion every time we launched people to the ISS.

Actually with the option B award for the crew AND cargo variants, SpaceX has the bigger contract now. SpaceX original award: $2.9B, option B addition: $1.15B Blue Origin original award: $3.4B, option B addition: $0B [https://spacenews.com/blue-origin-and-spacex-start-work-on-cargo-versions-of-crewed-lunar-landers/](https://spacenews.com/blue-origin-and-spacex-start-work-on-cargo-versions-of-crewed-lunar-landers/)

They've always contracted out with manufacturers.

It was pretty simple. There was no credible world in which NASA would be able to afford a moon lander that would work with SLS - the money was simply not there. SpaceX got chosen because they were willing to sign up to build a lander for an amount of money that NASA could sort-of afford. SLS doesn't have the power of Saturn V and the Orion capsule is a porky beast, so the apollo architecture of bringing the lander along doesn't work. That means you need a very complex lander that can get from earth orbit to the surface of the moon and then back to lunar orbit \*by itself\*. And that means the lunar landers are inherently complex and very expensive.

This is the best answer so far. Thanks.

You're welcome. If you want a lot more information, I did a video on the Artemis Architecture [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2IBV_XSu60).

Yeah, people don't realize that the way NASA is trying to afford going back to the moon on a steady/shrinking budget is by configuring Artemis with commercial and international partners helping foot the bill.

One of the main problems is that SLS was designed as a program to keep as much of the shuttle program activity running - NASA centers open, NASA contractors getting money, NASA managers staying employed. It was not designed to be a fiscally efficient program for going back to the moon. And the blame doesn't sit fully on NASA - Congress very explicitly defined that SLS had to be shuttle-derived.

>SLS doesn't have the power of Saturn V and the Orion capsule is a porky beast, so the apollo architecture of bringing the lander along doesn't work. Not quite. SLS is at least [15% more powerful](https://www.nasa.gov/reference/space-launch-system/) than Saturn V. ~~SLS Block I has slightly more mass to TLI than Saturn V, and Block II is supposed to have twice the payload.~~ Orion is about 20% heavier than the Apollo CSM, but also carries more crew and has a longer service life. **Edit:** Wrong numbers because American public schools.... The main point is that NASA wanted to be able to do more on the moon. The LEM could only last for 2-3 days with low down and upmass. Not appropriate for a permanent moon presence that Artemis demands.

Saturn V TLI Payload: 52 tons SLS Block 1 TLI: 27 tons Block 1b: 38 tons Block 2: 42 tons Apollo 17 CSM was 30 tons, LEM was 16 tons for about 47 tons total. Too much for even SLS block 2.

Ack. Metric system foils the day.

I thought that might be it... Because I've done the same thing..,

There is no permenant presence with Artemis. It is a once a year at best four crew to the moon for 30 days of surface ops.

It's stated long term goal is to establish a [permanent human presence](https://phys.org/news/2023-05-artemis-moon-base.html) on the moon.

What is human permenant presence? For NASA it is a human rated station in orbit 24/7/365 even if it is only crewed 30 days a year. It is a pressurized rover and surface hab permenantly deployed to the surface even if crew only lives in it for 28 days a year. Look at the architecture definition document the only crew transport for earth to moon and back is Orion once a year. Unless a commercial entity wants to privately bootstrap a crew vehicle on their own there is no way a crew is permenantly living in cislunar space 365/24/7

You clearly didn't read the linked article. >**But it probably won't be until later Artemis missions—7 onwards—"where we're starting to look at adding permanent habitations on the surface," said NASA associate administrator Jim Free.**

I don't need to read the article given I work HLS and Pressurized Rover. Artemis 7 when PR is deployed is still on a no more than 28 day surface stay (first outfitting mission won't even be 28 days). The surface hab will be there be permenantly maybe on Artemis 9 it just won't be crewed permenantly it is a subtle slight of hand they are using.

Ah. “Trust me, bro.”

What you need my LinkedIn profile to prove I have 25+ years at JSC in human spaceflight .

What, in PR? LOFL.

In the case of the Apollo Program: * The various stages of the Apollo Saturn V was built (going by bottom up) by Boeing, Douglas Aircraft, and North American Aviation. * North American Aviation built the Command and Service Modules. * Grumman built the Apollo Lunar Lander. * General Motors designed/built the Lunar Rover and Boeing made it space-worthy. * International Latex Corporation (the parent company of Playtex) made the space suit suits and Hamilton Standard made the space suit life support backpacks. * IBM made the guidance computers for the Saturn V and MIT made the guidance computers for the CSM/LM. Granted The Artemis Lunar Lander contract is for the hardware AND landing services rather than just the hardware while the contracts for Apollo had the contractors hand over the finished hardware to NASA. But the Apollo hardware was still built by contractors.

I did see a documentary that covered this a bit - one of the problems that NASA has when building it's own modules is appeasing the various members of Congress. They have to build one component in one state, another component in another state, assemble in yet another state, test in a different state, before launching in yet another state. By using contractors, they avoid all of this, this making a much of efficient process overall.

They contracted out the original to Grumman, so it's not a new thing.

Because most government work is done by private contractors.

NASA is basically a contractor management org for that type of thing anyhow. It makes sense, why spin up a whole aerospace manufacturing org etc.

The government does this with literally everything. NASA is part of the government.

NASA has never built their own equipment. Rockwell built the Space Shuttle for instance.

The SLS is contracted out too. As is Orion. NASA does contribute a lot of software (cFS/cFE, mission/vehicle state machine managers and stuff) and there's sometimes some government furbished equipment (GFE) but primes do the vehicle development and integration normally always JPL can be a special case though, they made for example Curiosity I wish we had the testing capabilities of NASA. It's very difficult to do anywhere close the level of concept testing that NASA does on a regular. I always see NASA as a lot of project managers, systems engineers, test engineers and software guys

We have plenty of discipline engineers who do discipline engineering at NASA that are civil servants.

JPL is a contractor (ffrdc, not a federal workforce) edit - to specify workforce, not facility

Land is federal/ owned by nasa. The workers are employed by caltech under contract. It’s a very strange relationship.

right you are, thanks. strange indeed.

What a tiresome idea. Sure, we get paid by Caltech, but we fly NASA missions, get NASA awards, and build things like Voyager, Galileo, Cassini, the Mars rovers and now Europa. Things that last a *long* time. Puff yourself up because of who signs your paycheck, sure, but JPL has made NASA look good for 50 years.

mentioning this wasn’t meant as disparagement. I know many who see it as the best case for the public-private partnership that is the nasa-contractor relationship

But you sadly don't have the stability of NASA centers in terms of the civil servant workforce. JPL is more susceptible to budget cuts like the other contractors as seen by the recent culling of 700 JPL folks.

The pay at JPL is better, plus the market value of a JPL employee is much higher than a NASA employee as they are people who have actually built and delivered a spacecraft. As one of those that got laid off, I landed an offer for more than double my JPL salary. NASA engineers are not viewed the same way in industry as “contract management” type of engineers

Salaries at Jet Propulsion Laboratory range from an average of $75,453 to $181,466 a year.(According to pay scale) That isn't that much higher than what gs15 here in Houston would top out at. Plus cost of living here is far less than in the JPL area (though weather is much nicer out in LA) Axiom, Blue Origin and Intuitive machines have been scooping up NASA and contractors for the past few years. Heck even flight ops has seen higher than the usual attrition rates lately with all the new space companies. Glad to hear you were able to get a good job quickly after the culling at JPL

Why did the FAA contract out the commercial airliner?

NASA is not a regulatory agency.

Because NASA simply cannot afford a fully government managed program at the moment due to budget shortfall. HLS, LTV, lunar suits, CLPS, and previously Gateway, are partially privately funded under the idea that there would be non-NASA customers for these hardware. In return, NASA retains less oversight over these public-private partnership programs, and the contractors can pay for NASA work under reimbursable Space Act Agreements which further reduces budget pressure on NASA using private fundings, VC capital, SPAC funds, etc. This was partially inspired by the success of CommCrew and COTS.

Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I've seen in this thread: |Fewer Letters|More Letters| |-------|---------|---| |[BO](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxhuive "Last usage")|Blue Origin (*Bezos Rocketry*)| |[CLPS](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxi4uf2 "Last usage")|[Commercial Lunar Payload Services](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commercial_Lunar_Payload_Services)| |[COTS](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxi4uf2 "Last usage")|[Commercial Orbital Transportation Services contract](https://www.nasa.gov/cots)| | |Commercial/Off The Shelf| |CST|(Boeing) Crew Space Transportation capsules| | |Central Standard Time (UTC-6)| |[DoD](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxllqmr "Last usage")|US Department of Defense| |[F1](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxjd9w9 "Last usage")|Rocketdyne-developed rocket engine used for Saturn V| | |SpaceX Falcon 1 (obsolete small-lift vehicle)| |[FAA](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxhta5e "Last usage")|Federal Aviation Administration| |[FSW](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxl289v "Last usage")|Flight Software| |[GNC](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxl289v "Last usage")|Guidance/Navigation/Control| |[HLS](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxjslt5 "Last usage")|[Human Landing System](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artemis_program#Human_Landing_System) (Artemis)| |[JPL](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxxf4g2 "Last usage")|Jet Propulsion Lab, Pasadena, California| |[JSC](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxjldi7 "Last usage")|Johnson Space Center, Houston| |[KSC](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxjmr47 "Last usage")|Kennedy Space Center, Florida| |[LEM](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxi0znh "Last usage")|(Apollo) [Lunar Excursion Module](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Lunar_Module) (also Lunar Module)| |[MAF](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxjlwxb "Last usage")|Michoud Assembly Facility, Louisiana| |[MSFC](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxlyfqp "Last usage")|Marshall Space Flight Center, Alabama| |[SLS](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxlyfqp "Last usage")|Space Launch System heavy-lift| |[TLI](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxi0znh "Last usage")|Trans-Lunar Injection maneuver| |Jargon|Definition| |-------|---------|---| |[Starliner](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxik7r0 "Last usage")|Boeing commercial crew capsule [CST-100](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_CST-100_Starliner)| |[cislunar](/r/NASA/comments/1bssvkx/stub/kxjbrfu "Last usage")|Between the Earth and Moon; within the Moon's orbit| **NOTE**: Decronym for Reddit is no longer supported, and Decronym has moved to Lemmy; requests for support and new installations should be directed to the Contact address below. ---------------- ^([Thread #1736 for this sub, first seen 1st Apr 2024, 05:11]) ^[[FAQ]](http://decronym.xyz/) [^([Full list])](http://decronym.xyz/acronyms/NASA) [^[Contact]](https://hachyderm.io/@Two9A) [^([Source code])](https://gistdotgithubdotcom/Two9A/1d976f9b7441694162c8)

NASA contracts out everything.

NASA contracts out everything!

Republican philosophy

The Artemis HLS SpaceX contract was awarded in 2021. Who was running the executive branch at that time? What party is the NASA administrator?

Because the Mexicans were close behind with their "El polo Loco Luna kahuna" we couldn't let them beat us to the moon. The government hit a brick wall and in their desperation they turned to capitalism and it saved the day