Alan Boyle has a roundup. I found this intriguing:
You don’t hear much from New Space’s most secretive player, but it’s virtually certain that the venture – backed by Amazon.com billionaire Jeff Bezos – will start commercial spaceflights by 2010 as originally envisioned. In February, Bezos told talk-show host Charlie Rose that Blue Origin was working on its second test vehicle, and that there would be at least one more test vehicle after that.
“Virtually certain”? Because Bezos says so? Maybe, but they’ll have to do a lot more test flights than they have been to meet that schedule, I would think. If true, it looks like a race between them and XCOR to see who gets there first. Virgin won’t be first to market, but there’s not necessarily anything wrong with that.
On a related note, the latest Lurio Report is out, for those who subscribe (and if you don’t, you should, if you want to stay on top of this kind of stuff). Clark Lindsey has a summary of the contents.
It is a fascinating thing. Forty years ago two guys landed on the Moon. Where are the destination resorts in orbit?
There are none. Sad.
Blue Origin doesn’t need to file any paperwork to do tethered flights on their Texas property, do they? If not there’s really no telling how many engine-hours worth of flight tests they have. If they’re smart they’ll have learned from Armadillo’s approach.
“Virtually certain”? Because Bezos says so?
Oh what could have happened to make you such a skeptic?! 😉
Blue Origin doesn’t need to file any paperwork to do tethered flights on their Texas property, do they? If not there’s really no telling how many engine-hours worth of flight tests they have. If they’re smart they’ll have learned from Armadillo’s approach.
Tethered flights are helpful, but at some point, you have to start doing serious test flights.
Just getting off the ground is a serious milestone (especially if the fuel load is a really high ratio.) I hope Bezos goal is greater than suborbital.
Someone really needs to build a nuclear SSTO.
“Blue Origin doesn’t need to file any paperwork to do tethered flights on their Texas property, do they?”
Amazingly, unbelievably, the answer is — yes, they do. AST claims this was a ruling imposed on FAA/AST by the FAA General Counsel. (If they were a helicopter, tethering doesn’t count as a flight.)
It is just one more example of regulatory overreach. We were born with the ability to most things not forbidden by law; today, we are increasingly forbidden from acting without permission.
Fear for the Republic.
I hope Bezos goal is greater than suborbital.
Ultimately it is, but certainly not initially.
The rules have changed recently, if they stay under 200K lb/sec of total impuse and stay in class G airspace ZERO paperwork is required, just a ATC notification.
Tethered flights with total impulse over 200K would require a waiver, permit, or license from AST.
Paul
In Blue Origin’s case, even more than usual, everything hangs around engine development. So until we hear some more about engine development, I wouldn’t put much weight into the effort. The kind of engines they used in Goddard is not exactly what I would see powering a space launch vehicle, even a suborbital one.
I’m surprised he made no mention whatsoever of Spacex. They are working hard on a manned orbital vehicle which will, I’m sure, have broad applications. Indeed, with the way things are going, with the shuttle being cancelled and, quite possibly, the Orion too, the Dragon may turn out to be the only way the U.S. has to launch people into space. I hope not, but wouldn’t that be something?
I strongly suspect that they are working on a Turbopump fed engine.
They advertised for turbo pump engineers.
Read their Jobs postings and you get an idea where they want to go and its not suborbital.
They also have a significant test stand in Seattle with concrete and dirt berms protecting nearby facilities.
47 deg 27′ 28″ N and 122 deg 14′ 13″ N
I’m surprised he made no mention whatsoever of Spacex.
SpaceX isn’t suborbital. At least not deliberately…
Someone really needs to build a nuclear SSTO.
The late Dr. Max Hunter worked on a nuclear SSTO design several decades back.
Later, he pointed out that this was just about the hardest way to build an SSTO since the propellant (reaction mass) is entirely hydrogen. Even though the Isp is high, the low density means the propellant tank is huge, and the weight of the tank scales with the volume of the propellant. LOX/LH2 will have lower Isp and a greater weight of propellants but lower volume; LOX/hydrocarbon has even lower Isp and greater weight but even lower volume.
Then, of course, there are the political and regulatory problems of anything with “nuclear” in the name.
the propellant (reaction mass) is entirely hydrogen
Looking at the website, it seems they want to use LOX to augment the nuclear engine. That might help some.
The statements about the “launch cost estimate” being lower “if developed and operated by the U.S. government” shows that the author does not understand the difference between price and cost. Sigh.
I wonder if he’s considering the cost of money? This is a proposal he’s making to the US Air Force, and DoD rules require that.
The fineness ratio is much greater than any other SSTO I’ve ever seen, so I wonder how much analysis he’s done on the structure and aerodynamics.
Most significantly, the launch cost estimates still seem to be dominated by development and other capital costs, rather than propellant costs. As long as that’s true, capital costs are what we need to minimize, and whatever benefits nuclear engines may have, minimizing capital costs are probably not one of them!
Very true, but I haven’t seen any other designs for a SSTO-RLV. As Rand likes to say, average costs/kg of payload are most strongly dominated by flight rate (even more than capital costs). The ability to launch thousands of tons into orbit on a daily or weekly schedule (assuming a market for that volume of traffic) would likely do far more benefit to launch costs than the increased development costs would do to harm it.
Further, as detailed here[1], a nuclear rocket has so much margin relative to liquid fueled rockets that you don’t have to use crazy-expensive materials or technology when heavier (but much cheaper) versions can be used. You can also use sturdier parts that don’t need to be replaced as frequently. Both of those would cut down a lot on the cost of development, maintenance and manufacture.
[1] http://nextbigfuture.com/2007/07/gaseous-core-nuclear-design-liberty.html
Very true, but I haven’t seen any other designs for a SSTO-RLV.
Then you obviously haven’t looked very hard.
The ability to launch thousands of tons into orbit on a daily or weekly schedule (assuming a market for that volume of traffic) would likely do far more benefit to launch costs than the increased development costs would do to harm it.
No, nothing that’s launched on a “weekly schedule” is going to be affordable.
Even a “daily schedule” isn’t really sufficient. Given that you need a fleet of vehicles, for reliability reasons, you need multiple flights per day to keep the fleet busy.
Launching a thousand tons on one vehicle is an extraordinarily bad idea.
as detailed here[1], a nuclear rocket has so much margin relative to liquid fueled rockets that you don’t have to use crazy-expensive materials or technology
Talk to engineers who build vehicles, not just reactors (or websites).
Again, Max Hunter found that nuclear propulsion was the hardest way to build an SSTO, with the least margin. Higher Isp does not always translate into greater margin. He coined the term “Isp on the brain” for that belief.
Nuclear rockets are a bust for first stages because their thrust-to-weight ratio is too low. Except for nuclear pulse propulsion of course, but you will not find many people willing to accept a vehicle that uses nuclear bombs for propellant.
Just because something has high ISP does not mean it is good for propulsion in general. You do not see anyone using ion engines in first stages for example. Why? The thrust is in order of tens of millinewtons. Think something with the force of a sheet of paper on your hand. Even if you built a huge ion engine with more thrust, it couldn’t lift itself in the air at earth gravity.
The RD-180 LOX/Kerosene first stage engine has a thrust-to-weight ratio of over 78. This means it generates enough force to lift 78 times its own weight. The Merlin LOX/Kerosene first stage has a thrust-to-weight ratio of 94, similar to the F-1 engine.
No, nothing that’s launched on a “weekly schedule” is going to be affordable.
Even a “daily schedule” isn’t really sufficient. Given that you need a fleet of vehicles, for reliability reasons, you need multiple flights per day to keep the fleet busy.
Launching a thousand tons on one vehicle is an extraordinarily bad idea.
For me the “extraordinarily bad idea” is the assumption that somehow, if you build such a rocket, that it will somehow find 1000 tons per week (or per day) to launch. Maybe a few decades from now, it will. But that’s a huge assumption to make for an unproven design. Reminds me of the initial assumptions that went into the Space Shuttle. They assumed that they could find enough to launch to fly 40 launches a year.
When I was interviewed for a job at Blue a couple years ago they said they were 18 months away from suborbital tests, and 3 years from orbital tests and suborbital commercial.
They seem late. And this does not seem consistent with the stated “start commercial spaceflights by 2010 as originally envisioned” comment.
>…I haven’t seen any other designs for a SSTO-RLV….
8o
Have you considered entering ssto rlv into google?
>.. The ability to launch thousands of tons into orbit on a
> daily or weekly schedule (assuming a market for that
> volume of traffic) would likely do far more benefit to
> launch costs than the increased development costs
> would do to harm it…
To put a 1000 tons a day into perspective. In its 30 year service life, shutle has lifted 1500 tons of cargo to orbit, and this represented a damn big share of all mass ever lifted to orbit.
The only thing I ever heard of that would need over a 1,000 tons a a day was the DOEs massive SSPS program concept studied in the ’70’s. Yes, the advanced launches proposed by industry (especially the StarRaker) could do this with a reasonably sized fleet, and with cost per pound to orbit in the low tens of $ a pound. But its the starting anything like the 1000+ ton a day market thats the bear.
>…Reminds me of the initial assumptions that went into the
> Space Shuttle. They assumed that they could find enough
> to launch to fly 40 launches a year…
I was in the program in the early ’80’s. They were talking about launching virtually everything launched in the free world to get to those 50 flight a year numbers. Ok, if they could have launched 50 times a year the per flight costs might have attracted a lot of that — but ALL?!!
SpaceX isn’t suborbital. At least not deliberately…
I do love that dry humor of yours. You crack me up.
It got me thinking if others do develop a suborbital market, how long before Elon builds a suborbit tourist capsule (I’m thinking a big clear gerbil ball for humans) to put on top of an F!? The parachute and water ride at the end are all part of the fun (you want to get home, do the hamster run up the side of the ball faster!!!)