I think the full roll out is still planned for the Space Symposium next month.
13 thoughts on “ULA’s New Rocket”
So they have two choices for main engine using different propellants and two choices for second stage engine. The second stage is supposed to be LOX/LH2. Well XCOR are probably the best liquid rocket engine experts among the Newspace companies but AFAIK they have never worked with LH2. So I wouldn’t be surprised if it ends up taking longer than expected to be developed. As for the Bezos engine, like I said before, it seems like a couple of steps too far for someone like Blue Origin.
As for Aerojet without serious funding i.e. 1 billion USD per engine design are they really going to get anything done? I suspect Aerojet in the end may not deliver anything at all unless say the USAF drops a boatload of cash on them.
Until the engine choice is finalized there isn’t a lot you can do regarding the rest of the rocket so in practice the rocket design isn’t fixed yet. Kind of reminds me of that other vapourware rocket (SLS). How long is the development for this thing going to take? 7 years? 10?
For all I know by then there will be 2-3 commercial space stations in operation. Angara and Long March 5 will be available. Also SpaceX is going to be flying something two generations removed from Falcon 9. If you think at what they had two generations ago (Falcon 1) then the picture looks fairly grim for ULA.
As for Orbital they seem to be headed to be an all solid rocket family so they are playing on a wholly different ballpark. More prompt launch national security payloads and less comsat market.
XCOR test fired a 2500 pound thrust liquid hydrogen engine in November 2013.
The piston pump engine? Well good then. I guess the risk factor in that case for this engine is quite low.
The second stage is supposed to be LOX/LH2. Well XCOR are probably the best liquid rocket engine experts among the Newspace companies but AFAIK they have never worked with LH2.
They don’t have an operational engine, but in fact they’ve worked with it a lot, on ULA’s tab. I was up there last week to check out their test stand. Reportedly, all are happy.
That article doesn’t seem all that informative:
It doesn’t describe the BE-4, its thrust (2400kN), its fuel (methane) and it doesn’t describe the range of the capabilities of the rockets to be replaced.
Lots of people here would have a better idea of what to expect than me, but if I have a stab at a methane 1st stage with 2 BE-4 engines, the ability to strap on various numbers of boosters of a configuration similar to the first stage core, and a hydrogen fueled upper stage similar to the Centaur, with PL to LEO around 20 ton plus and GTO of 10 tons plus does that sound about right?
ULA wants to replace the full range of capabilities of both the Atlas V and Delta IV including the Heavy with a single rocket. It’s basically the same idea as what the Russians are doing with their new Angara rocket family even though ULA will likely use a very different approach. Their base rocket will likely be somewhat more powerful than the Atlas V 401. They’ll probably have a range of solid rocket strap on configurations to increase capacity to that of the Delta IV Heavy. That would be cheaper than using multiple cores.
The EELVs already were like Angara. Both Atlas V and Delta IV used modular architectures based on common booster cores…
There was supposed to be an Atlas V Heavy with 3 cores as well but it got cancelled as there were not enough DoD payloads to make it economically viable to have two Heavy EELVs.
This is basically a redesign of Atlas V with 100% US content. I say “basically” because the engine performance parameters, plus maybe the propellants, will end up not being the same. But the basic concept of LOX/Hydrocarbon staged combustion powered 1st stage and LOX/LH2 second stage is the same.
I doubt it will be as cheap as Falcon 9 because it will use more parts (staged combustion engines are more complicated) and it uses different fuels and engines on both stages. But it should cost more or less the same as Atlas V. Maybe.
If they can go with a more economical upper stage engine than the RL-10, they can save a lot of money. the RL-10 is a very good engine but it’s hideously expensive because it’s largely hand made. If XCOR succeeds with their engine development, ULA can likely save many millions of dollars per flight.
ULA is reportedly getting a very good price on the RD-180 so it’ll be hard to make the first stage much less expensive. New manufacturing technologies like 3D printing may help. Those solid-rocket strap-on boosters aren’t cheap, either.
I’d bet that XCOR’s engine will largely be printed.
I’d bet that XCOR’s engine will largely be printed.
That wouldn’t surprise me in the least. XCOR is doing some very interesting things.
I think 3D printing has its uses. If you are going to do low volume production and prototyping then it can be extremely cost effective. However once production is large enough then it starts losing in cost to more traditional manufacturing methods like say casting. But if you are going to use casting you can still use 3D printing to manufacture the molds so even in that case it will still reduce cost.
What 3D printing will also allow, and that is also an important bit, is metamaterials. Where you have multiple ‘printing’ materials and can combine them into the same object and get some added benefit out of the metamaterial. This is something not easily reproduced with more conventional manufacturing techniques and the amount of applications of this is still reduced but will certainly increase in the future.
Then again at the amounts usually manufactured for current rockets (tens or hundreds, only rarely thousands) I wouldn’t be surprised if 3D printing was always cheaper.
No, actually, 3-D printing allows you to make parts that aren’t possible to manufacture any other way (for example, a hollow seamless sphere). Up at XCOR on Monday, I saw a design for a part that couldn’t be built by conventional casting or machining, that significantly (by a factor of two) reduced the weight. Also, it turns conventional design on its head. In a machined part, you want to minimize complexity to reduce manufacturing cost. With additive manufacturing, complexity is good, because you can build lightweight parts with less material.
So they have two choices for main engine using different propellants and two choices for second stage engine. The second stage is supposed to be LOX/LH2. Well XCOR are probably the best liquid rocket engine experts among the Newspace companies but AFAIK they have never worked with LH2. So I wouldn’t be surprised if it ends up taking longer than expected to be developed. As for the Bezos engine, like I said before, it seems like a couple of steps too far for someone like Blue Origin.
As for Aerojet without serious funding i.e. 1 billion USD per engine design are they really going to get anything done? I suspect Aerojet in the end may not deliver anything at all unless say the USAF drops a boatload of cash on them.
Until the engine choice is finalized there isn’t a lot you can do regarding the rest of the rocket so in practice the rocket design isn’t fixed yet. Kind of reminds me of that other vapourware rocket (SLS). How long is the development for this thing going to take? 7 years? 10?
For all I know by then there will be 2-3 commercial space stations in operation. Angara and Long March 5 will be available. Also SpaceX is going to be flying something two generations removed from Falcon 9. If you think at what they had two generations ago (Falcon 1) then the picture looks fairly grim for ULA.
As for Orbital they seem to be headed to be an all solid rocket family so they are playing on a wholly different ballpark. More prompt launch national security payloads and less comsat market.
XCOR test fired a 2500 pound thrust liquid hydrogen engine in November 2013.
The piston pump engine? Well good then. I guess the risk factor in that case for this engine is quite low.
The second stage is supposed to be LOX/LH2. Well XCOR are probably the best liquid rocket engine experts among the Newspace companies but AFAIK they have never worked with LH2.
They don’t have an operational engine, but in fact they’ve worked with it a lot, on ULA’s tab. I was up there last week to check out their test stand. Reportedly, all are happy.
That article doesn’t seem all that informative:
It doesn’t describe the BE-4, its thrust (2400kN), its fuel (methane) and it doesn’t describe the range of the capabilities of the rockets to be replaced.
Lots of people here would have a better idea of what to expect than me, but if I have a stab at a methane 1st stage with 2 BE-4 engines, the ability to strap on various numbers of boosters of a configuration similar to the first stage core, and a hydrogen fueled upper stage similar to the Centaur, with PL to LEO around 20 ton plus and GTO of 10 tons plus does that sound about right?
ULA wants to replace the full range of capabilities of both the Atlas V and Delta IV including the Heavy with a single rocket. It’s basically the same idea as what the Russians are doing with their new Angara rocket family even though ULA will likely use a very different approach. Their base rocket will likely be somewhat more powerful than the Atlas V 401. They’ll probably have a range of solid rocket strap on configurations to increase capacity to that of the Delta IV Heavy. That would be cheaper than using multiple cores.
The EELVs already were like Angara. Both Atlas V and Delta IV used modular architectures based on common booster cores…
There was supposed to be an Atlas V Heavy with 3 cores as well but it got cancelled as there were not enough DoD payloads to make it economically viable to have two Heavy EELVs.
This is basically a redesign of Atlas V with 100% US content. I say “basically” because the engine performance parameters, plus maybe the propellants, will end up not being the same. But the basic concept of LOX/Hydrocarbon staged combustion powered 1st stage and LOX/LH2 second stage is the same.
I doubt it will be as cheap as Falcon 9 because it will use more parts (staged combustion engines are more complicated) and it uses different fuels and engines on both stages. But it should cost more or less the same as Atlas V. Maybe.
If they can go with a more economical upper stage engine than the RL-10, they can save a lot of money. the RL-10 is a very good engine but it’s hideously expensive because it’s largely hand made. If XCOR succeeds with their engine development, ULA can likely save many millions of dollars per flight.
ULA is reportedly getting a very good price on the RD-180 so it’ll be hard to make the first stage much less expensive. New manufacturing technologies like 3D printing may help. Those solid-rocket strap-on boosters aren’t cheap, either.
I’d bet that XCOR’s engine will largely be printed.
I’d bet that XCOR’s engine will largely be printed.
That wouldn’t surprise me in the least. XCOR is doing some very interesting things.
I think 3D printing has its uses. If you are going to do low volume production and prototyping then it can be extremely cost effective. However once production is large enough then it starts losing in cost to more traditional manufacturing methods like say casting. But if you are going to use casting you can still use 3D printing to manufacture the molds so even in that case it will still reduce cost.
What 3D printing will also allow, and that is also an important bit, is metamaterials. Where you have multiple ‘printing’ materials and can combine them into the same object and get some added benefit out of the metamaterial. This is something not easily reproduced with more conventional manufacturing techniques and the amount of applications of this is still reduced but will certainly increase in the future.
Then again at the amounts usually manufactured for current rockets (tens or hundreds, only rarely thousands) I wouldn’t be surprised if 3D printing was always cheaper.
No, actually, 3-D printing allows you to make parts that aren’t possible to manufacture any other way (for example, a hollow seamless sphere). Up at XCOR on Monday, I saw a design for a part that couldn’t be built by conventional casting or machining, that significantly (by a factor of two) reduced the weight. Also, it turns conventional design on its head. In a machined part, you want to minimize complexity to reduce manufacturing cost. With additive manufacturing, complexity is good, because you can build lightweight parts with less material.