Business, Space

And Then There Was One

39 Comments

With the (at least temporary) departure of Armadillo from the stage, the only VTVL passenger flight vehicles in development appears to be Blue Origin, with no stated schedule for first flight. In the horizontal world, we still have the Virgin versus XCOR race. At this point, given that Virgin said they’d have another powered flight in June, and it’s now August, my money, if not the smart money, would be on XCOR.

Can’t anyone play this game? It’s just suborbital, folks.

39 thoughts on “And Then There Was One”

  1. It’s just suborbital, folks.

    I remember in early 2004 when Carmack claimed that Armadillo still had an outside shot at winning the X-prize. At the time it sounded like false bravado to keep his team’s spirits up but now, 10 years later, it just sounds out of touch with reality.

    1. Looks like Armadillo is also another victim of NASA “helping” New Space.

      [[[Two years ago, Carmack pushed to develop a suborbital resuable rocket—and told the Dallas crowd that he had thought the company was within “striking distance of the suborbital cargo markets, the [NASA Commercial Reusable Suborbital Research] payloads.”

      “I wouldn’t have made the bet two years ago if I didn’t think there was a good chance—instead I spent maybe $2.5 million and didn’t quite make it,” he told Ars. “I’m obviously disappointed about it. While I could personally scare up another $2 million and have another go at it, there’s my wife who keeps me from making bad decisions.”]]]

      Another example of why NASA and New Space just doesn’t mix…

      This is also interesting, as this is a far more viable path to developing successful space commerce models than the decades that have been wasted on CATS.

      [[[“I’m more excited about the virtual reality work that’s going on and software stuff than rocketry,” he admitted.]]]

      Once revenue generating markets emerge the technology will follow… That is how it has been throughout history. Its only because of the legacy of Apollo that folks see space as being different.

      1. This argument gets trotted out every time some wannabe space venture folds. Its ALWAYS NASA involvement that is to blame. And there is probably some truth here – chasing that market probably was one of the factors that got AA too sidetracked from actually getting to space – but how is that NASA’s fault in this case ? Carmack made that call, NASA didnt pull out of anything – they have been more than supportive, they are even still flying a ghost of Pixel around.

        So did Elon – and look at their booming commercial business, you cant count the comsats that are all buzzing around above, lofted by Falcon’s ..

  3. I first went on ballistic sub-orbital flight at a railroad crossing in a ’68 Camaro SS.

    Just thought I’d throw that out there.

    2. There’s a service road by my house affectionately called the, “WEEE! road!”. There’s a hump in the road that a ’95 Mustang GT is capable of getting ballistic on.

  4. There is someone else working on VTVL. SpaceX Grasshopper.

    I have never thought Armadillo Aerospace was anything more than a hobby for John Carmack. I never expected much of anything. He wasted a long time trying to get peroxide monoprop to work. Then he worked with LOX/ethanol. We waste time and again on pressure fed rockets. To me it all seemed like pointless monkeying around with different technology without any sort of clear technical vision. None of those technologies were viable for orbital and debatable for suborbital.

    1. BTW I apply much the same criticism to Bezo’s Blue Origin. The only difference between the two is Bezo’s pocket book is quite a lot more hefty than John Carmack’s. Elon Musk totally different. He put a substantial part of his own personal fortune in it and he actually had a plan. Namely to launch orbital satellites. Not to mention that he was able to develop a clear technology vision, technical roadmap, and pick the right people.

      2. Blue Origin is in fact serious, and they do have talented and technically competent people working there. (I’ve had the opportunity to join them, but over the years it’s become clear that I like working on airplanes better than working on rockets.) What’s not clear is if they still view suborbital passengers as important to their longer range goals, which may go well beyond suborbital.

        That being said, one of the other reasons I’m not working there is that their timeline to making money was unclear, and no matter how rich Bezos is, I was a bit nervous about betting the rest of my career on how long he would stay interested…

    2. I only consider two more companies in Newspace, besides SpaceX, to have the potential to be relevant. One is XCOR and the other is Sierra Nevada Corporation. Both have substantial in house knowledge of relevant propulsion technology. Both however also have poor knowledge of aerostructures, incomprehensible business models, and limited funding.

      1. Godzilla,

        Sierra Nevada Corporation has a business model. Its doing what it has been doing since the 1980’s, being a successful women-owned government contractor. Once you know their history their business model is easy to see….

        http://www.sncorp.com/about_snc.php

        [[[SNC is a privately held company under the leadership of Chief Executive Officer, Fatih Ozmen and President, Eren Ozmen. Over the last 30 years under the Ozmen’s leadership, SNC has remained focused on providing its customers the very best in diversified technologies to meet their needs and has a strong and proven track record of success. Headquartered in Sparks, Nevada, SNC is the Top Woman-Owned Federal Contractor in the United States.]]]

        1. Gah. That sounds like a sure fire recipe for disaster. Not that its got a women running it but the fact that they extoll that like it should matter. But the truth is they do get some things done at least hybrid rocket engines to name one.

          2. SpaceShipOne did fly so I counted that one. As for SpaceShipTwo it remains to be seen. I never quite figured out why they were building the aircraft before having an engine considering the engine is installed *inside* the plane but perhaps that is just me.

            As for DreamChaser they are managing to do quite a bit with the limited funding they received from NASA but they seem to be wasting it by paying lots of contractors instead of getting more technology in house. So it smells slightly like fail to me.

          3. A question popped up in my mind. Was there any issue in the transition from SpaceDev to Sierra Nevada Corporation? I know Jim Benson died and he was one of the main drivers of SpaceDev. Did that plus the acquisition cause any impact to their operations?

          4. Neither SpaceDev or SNC developed the SS1 engine. It was integrated by Orion. I doubt if Benson’s departure had any effect on their ability, or lack thereof, to develop a hybrid engine.

          5. Godzilla,

            [[[As for DreamChaser they are managing to do quite a bit with the limited funding they received from NASA but they seem to be wasting it by paying lots of contractors instead of getting more technology in house.]]]

            You are not thinking like a government contractor. Its not waste, its an investment. The more subcontractors they have, in more Congressional Districts, means more Congress Critters have an personal stake in the pork NASA is giving out 🙂

            Why do you think they were one of the three down selected for CCP?

    3. Basically both companies seem to offer consulting services in their relevant areas. But they need to make the jump from consulting to entire products they can either sell, lease or operate.

    4. It’s not true pressure-fed is unsuitable for orbital applications. There have been successful orbital launches with pressure-fed rockets. There have also been serious plans for pressure-fed rockets and boosters. For instance, NASA studied pressure-fed replacements for the SRBs, and the only real worry was with the required level of thrust, which had not been demonstrated with pressured fed engines. Scorpius and Aquarius also come to mind.

      1. I do not remember Scorpius ever launching an orbital payload to LEO let alone to GEO. As for Aquarius AFAIK it never went past the paper stage. OTRAG also tried to launch N2O4/Kerosene pressure fed rockets with steel construction.

        You are trading off the difficulty of making a turbopump, or piston like XCOR is using, for the difficulty of making high pressure tanks plus you lose ISP in the process. Remember how many tanks Carmack et co. bursted trying to get their suborbital rockets going? IMO if they wanted to go for pressure fed they should have done tank manufacturing in house. Instead they tried things like fiberglass tanks on a pressure fed… ridiculous.

        From what I have heard it is pointless to go for pressure fed unless you don’t need a lot of engine power but high reliability e.g. second stages. However Carmack never went past single stage vehicles.

        Pumps do not need to be expensive. XCOR with their piston engine show this and there are other proposals I have seen over the years.

          1. Got a quote on that? I cannot find information regarding it. In my experience most post WWII liquid rocketry efforts were based on the V2 rocket and that had turbopumps.

    1. I havne’t been with Masten in almost two years but the company is still there. Xaero B plans on flying soon and they have customers. They’re still a “no passengers” VTVL company but don’t count them out.

      1. Yeah, I was going to note the same thing… Masten is still here, an unlike Armadillo they have not tired of VTVL.

  6. If I had a fortune, I’d buy a chunk of West Texas and start building replica V-2s. After all, we know the V-2 works, and it’s technically so simple that it can be built by half-starved slaves living in a cave. (Of course, I’d be using well-fed, well-paid engineering grad students and retired aerospace workers instead of slaves, and they’d work in an air-conditioned steel building instead of a cave.) There must be a market for a rocket that can push a ton of stuff up to 80 miles, right? I’d omit any kind of recovery system: instead of recovering these V-2s, I’d just let them auger in, then sell the scrap for cash.

    After I’d built and flown a dozen of so “classic” V-2s, I’d start engineering an improved V-2: same engine, but lightweight carbon-fiber shell instead of heavy metal — basically, something like the defunct Canadian Arrow. More payload, higher apogee.

    I think going for orbital flight right away is a mistake. There’s money to be made in suborbital rocket flight. Given success in this venture, I’d license SpaceX’s Grasshopper design, add wings and fins, and start testing. Ultimate goal: a point-to-point VTVL ballistic passenger transport, straight out of Heinlein. Orbital flight would come later after my clandestine engineering team in Mexico finished building the highly-dangerous, experimental gas-core nuclear engine after further technical development.

    But I don’t have a fortune, alas. Wealth is often wasted on the wealthy.

    1. If I have a fortune I would work on developing markets. Technical innovations always follow market demand. That is why steam engines were developed in 18th Century England and not ancient Rome.

      1. In the Roman’s defense they did have water mills so it is not like they just relied on their slaves every time all the time.

  7. Copenhagen Suborbital seems to be going ok, as is ARCA. There is more to the commercial spaceflight industry than just the USA.

  8. You also seem to be ignoring UP Aerospace, probably because they don’t belong to the suborbital HSF cult. Unlike the rest of the pack they are actually doing revenue generating flights 🙂

      1. Rand,

        Yes, the cult of suborbital HSF, which is focused on the smallest of the suborbital market segments…

      2. Sure, but how many years had it been since Armadillo expressed interest in the passenger market? A looong time.

    1. Thanks. It can be fairly difficult to find information on the early pre ESA European launch vehicles. Other rockets in which I have a particular interest are the British Black Knight and the German OTRAG.

  10. Meanwhile the state of Hawaii is doing well with its space program, planning on placing its first satellite, built by UH, into orbit next year:-)

    http://www.honolulumagazine.com/Honolulu-Magazine/August-2013/Hawaii-Space-Exploration-UH-Students-Reach-for-the-Sky/

    Hawaii Space Exploration: UH Students Reach for the Sky

    Once UH students fling their Hiaka Satellite into space, this place might never again be the same.

    Yes, the real space frontier is rapidly moving beyond NASA, hopefully space advocates will also 🙂

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