SpaceX's Grasshopper VTVL takes a 40 meter hop

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Squeaky the Squirrel wrote: »

[/qoute]Actually the Russians used retro rockets on the first manned space flight.
There is a lot of re-inventing the wheel in US space flight

Anyone remember this from the 90's ?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JzXcTFfV3Ls

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonnell_Douglas_DC-X

Despite all the hype it was just a normal rocket with better electronics.



Why do we need a reusable rocket ?

The other way of making something cheap is to have long production runs so you get economies of scale and constant improvements.

With short production runs everything is more or less at what would have earlier been called the pre-production prototype stage , you don't get a chance to improve the design much.


In the West there is far too much engineering to add lightness on the bottom stages. Rocket fuel is cheap - it takes a lot of flights to save the fuel used in testing.

Reliability is key. And a simple way of adding reliability is to overengineer because the addition strength may prove useful for failure modes that aren't understood.


Yes a reusable rocket would be nice, but not if it costs more , or isn't reliable

it depends what you mean by costs more

if you mean cost more to launch then I agree, the shuttle was reuseable but in the end it was a waste of money because the launch cost was far too high

but if the reuseable rocket costs 10 times as much to build but gets used 1000 times then that would see launch costs fall far below what we have today, it needs to work like air travel, the rocket lands gets more fuel then launches again

even if spaceX can only make the first stage reuseable it will result in lower launch costs

the next falcon 9 launch should be interesting, its the new version of the falcon 9 and they are going to try to restart the first stage and land it at sea

AugustusMinimus wrote: »

What sort of savings are SpaceX expecting to be made ?

Have they stated how many teams they expect each first stage to be reused ?

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Here's the thing. Russia launch about half of all commercial satellites.

Half the US launches last year relied on Russian Engines or First Stage sections.
ULA / Atlas / RD180 / Zenith based stuff.

Space X don't rely on this stuff.

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

man rated means it has to be more reliable, costs go up exponentially

commercial satellite insurance premium is about 10% of the cost, for a manned launch you want more than 99% reliability

there is a feedback loop with satellites, there is no point in spending €100m to launch €10m worth of satellite , it's cheaper to spend €30m on a lighter satellite that can be launched from a €60m rocket.

If they can get to orbit for €10m then it gets very interesting, you can reduce the money spent per satellite too by the same factor. Of course then there may be the Kessler syndrome problem.

AugustusMinimus wrote: »

I guess it makes sense. The weight of the extra fuel wouldn't be that much greater than the parachutes and it will allow a soft landing in land.

Following last week's successful launch of six ORBCOMM satellites, the Falcon 9 rocket’s first stage reentered Earth’s atmosphere and soft landed in the Atlantic Ocean. This test confirms that the Falcon 9 booster is able consistently to reenter from space at hypersonic velocity, restart main engines twice, deploy landing legs and touch down at near zero velocity.

After landing, the vehicle tipped sideways as planned to its final water safing state in a nearly horizontal position. The water impact caused loss of hull integrity, but we received all the necessary data to achieve a successful landing on a future flight. Going forward, we are taking steps to minimize the build up of ice and spots on the camera housing in order to gather improved video on future launches.

At this point, we are highly confident of being able to land successfully on a floating launch pad or back at the launch site and refly the rocket with no required refurbishment. However, our next couple launches are for very high velocity geostationary satellite missions, which don’t allow enough residual propellant for landing. In the longer term, missions like that will fly on Falcon Heavy, but until then Falcon 9 will need to fly in expendable mode.

We will attempt our next water landing on flight 13 of Falcon 9, but with a low probability of success. Flights 14 and 15 will attempt to land on a solid surface with an improved probability of success.

New Zealand aerospace company Rocket Lab has unveiled a 10-tonne rocket capable of sending satellites into space for less than $6 million, a fraction of current costs.

At an unveiling in Auckland this morning, Rocket Lab chief executive Peter Beck said the 18-metre rocket, named Electron, would revolutionise the space game.

Electron would make space more accessible. The average cost of sending a satellite into space was about $155m, Beck said.

The Electron is significantly smaller than the average rocket length of 60m.

Electron would also reduce the time it took to launch a satellite from years to weeks, he said.

"This is the new way to access space."

The carbon-composite rocket could carry satellites weighing up to 120 kilograms and was expected to be launched next year, he said.

Rocket Lab would provide all the launching facilities to get customers' satellites into space. It already had commitments for more than 30 launches, he said.

Beck, who founded Rocket Lab in 2007, said a team of 25 staff had worked on the project for the past year.

The company was looking to add 30 staff to meet demand forecasts.

"We're looking to create a billion-dollar space industry down here."

Beck, 36, hoped to launch one rocket a week after the company started regular manufacturing of Electron rockets.

"If we can launch one rocket a week we are going to change the world."

Rocket Lab built Electron using a $25m government grant and funds from The Warehouse founder Sir Stephen Tindall and principal backer Silicon Valley venture capital company Khosla Ventures.

A former Nasa director and Florida Space Institute research associate Dr Alan Weston, who was at today's unveiling, said Rocket Lab was a global leader in aerospace technology and Electron was a game changer.

"It's revolutionary," Weston said. "This will address the cost of getting spacecraft into space."

Electron opened up opportunities for New Zealand to partner with international satellite and technology organisations, he said.

"This is not just cheap, it's responsive which means you can launch it when you want to. In the United States it can take over a year."

Beck said the rocket has 10 engines, named Rutherford, which burned the same amount of fuel an aircraft used to fly from Auckland to Christchurch.

Satellites launched by Electron could remain in orbit for five to seven years and could be used for purposes such as weather prediction, real-time mapping, high-speed internet and climate-change monitoring, Beck said.

A patent was pending on the technology for the rocket.

The unveiling attracted the interest of foreign media including the Wall Street Journal, Reuters and Wired.

Rocket Lab had scheduled a programme of three test flights to get the rocket into space, Beck said.

Since 2007 the company had launched about 80 rockets, only one of which went into orbit, he said.

That was in 2009 with the launch of Atea-1: a 6m-long, 60kg rocket from Great Mercury Island.

Beck said the first rocket would be launched from a yet to be confirmed New Zealand location.

"The great thing about New Zealand is it offers us a fantastic launch site which is a major issue for other countries."

Rocket launches worked well in New Zealand because it's isolated with a small population and light air and shipping traffic.

It also allows the rocket to be launched from a trajectory favourable angle, Beck said.