Space

Lies, Damned Lies, And Launch Costs

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I gave my talk about 10 AM. The briefing can be downloaded here. Clark Lindsey and Henry Cate blogged it.

I should note (and I appreciate that he was in a hurry) that when Clark writes:

EELV- drop in number of commercial flights expected raised marginal costs because of low flight rate.
— Wiped out savings from hardware improvements.
– Expendables have high marginal costs
– Reusables have low marginal cost IF they have high flight rates.

The drop in the commercial flight rate didn’t increase EELV marginal costs, it increased average costs (which are what the price has to be based on, other than loss leaders for marketing). If you price below your average cost, you’ll lose money. Increasing rate doesn’t help, because you can’t make it up in volume.

Similarly, reusables have low marginal cost regardless of flight rate. Increasing flight rate reduces average cost per flight, allowing it to approach the marginal cost as the rate increases.

Popular Culture, Space

New Space Libertarian In The Blogosphere

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I first met Terry Savage almost thirty years ago when I first drove out to California, looking for jobs in the aerospace industry as I was on the verge of graduating from Michigan. He was one of the founders of OASIS (Organization for the Advancement of Space Industrialization and Settlement), the Los Angeles chapter of the L-5 Society (now National Space Society), and offered me a place to crash while in Redondo Beach. I’ve kept up with him, on and off, ever since.

He’s finally decided to dip his toe into the blogosphere, and started a new blog associated with his first (but hopefully not last) SF novel. Go check it out.

Humor, Political Commentary, Satire

You Know They’ve Gone Too Far

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…when they’ve nationalized Iowahawk:

The legislative charter of the TWRA, established by Congress and the President, specifies its principle goal as the preservation of jobs in the critically important blogging sector of the American economy. Thus the board invited Mr. Burge to present a formal proposal on March 11. After a brief negotiation period, Mr. Burge’s initial request of $6.3 billion was lowered to a mutually agreeable $750 and cab fare to the Greyhound station. In exchange, Mr. Burge agreed to (1) regularly submit the financial records of Iowahawk to TWRA oversight regulators, (2) cease outsourcing joke production to foreign subcontractors, and (3) implement a rigorous program of personal hygiene.

Well, at least they didn’t force a merger with Saturday Night Live.

Business, Space

The Road To Suborbit

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Henry Spencer is describing the technical issues of the realm between low suborbit and orbit. His bottom line (which which I agree): there’s not a lot of market to justify investment for mid-range performance, including ballistic trajectories, because they need almost as much performance as orbit.

Thinks that there may be a role for suborbitals as a first stage for nanosats, and it may be possible to make some money on it, but they’re not going to be willing to pay a lot for a launch, particularly considering that piggybacking on orbital launches isn’t that expensive. Not a lot of utility to cubesats to date, most of them “solar arrays with radios.”

[Update a while later]

Sorry, there was a whole lot of other discussion, but it wasn’t completely jointed, and I was distracted. I saw Clark Lindsey taking notes, though, so I’ll bet he’ll have something posted later this evening.

Sure enough, here it is. He also has some notes from the later afternoon sessions.

Administrative, Space

Off To Phoenix

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I’m driving over from LA this morning, and hope to arrive in time for conference start. I’ll blog from there as possible.

Oh, and the title of my talk will be “Lies, Damned Lies, and Launch Costs.”

OK, I’m at the conference, listening to Henry Spencer describe the technical route from suborbit to orbit.

[Bumped]

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!