An assembly line of Saturn 1B first stage rockets. An industrial capability rapidly disappearing?
A recent op-ed in Space News by Jim Cantrell makes an interesting point in regard to the ongoing change in (read: decline of) the American civil space program. Postulating that the government-funded aerospace industrial complex developed to fight and win World War II and the Cold War (an institution long criticized by leftist commentators) is now obsolete, he sees future space endeavors powered by private sector companies (somehow) collectively moving humanity into the Solar System. Interestingly, although the author seems to think that this is a positive development, he does not deny that the current program leaves something to be desired, describing the current state of the American aerospace industry as in a “malaise.”
The wedding of science and technology to warfare was not new when America entered the Second World War. Technology has always found its way into (as well as come out of) military uses and has included the successful participation of such past geniuses as Leonardo da Vinci and Sir Isaac Newton. The industrial infrastructure America developed and used to win the war was kept after Germany and Japan were defeated, primarily because of the threat from a well-armed and expansively belligerent Soviet Union. It was this technical and industrial base that was mobilized during the 1960’s “Space Race” – one that allowed us to rapidly advance new and uncertain technologies to operational status. This involved technologies that at the time had little commercial application but were needed to master the skills to venture off-planet.
In effect, the weapons of war gave us the Space Age (and with it, the driver of much of our economy and expanding tech industry). While experimental rocket engines had been built and flown on a small scale before the war, it required the societal impetus of military necessity to develop the V-2, the technical forerunner for intercontinental ballistic missiles. Whether it might have been developed otherwise is an interesting historical counter-factual, but I have seen no evidence to suggest that the industrial and human capital needed to make this technological leap could have been marshaled by the private sector alone, at least on the time-scales with which we are familiar. Similarly, human orbital flight (long known to be possible in theory) did not spontaneously arise from the IR&D efforts of a Boeing or a McDonnell-Douglas. It required a specific national imperative to be developed, politically recognized and funded as part of a broader effort to maintain a national strategic posture.
The need for this industrial capability continued throughout the Cold War. Long before the Cold War ended, some recognized this capability would dissipate in the absence of an evident strategic goal. To some, this was good news. The so-called “peace dividend” (money anticipated to become available after the collapse of the Soviet Union) was spent many times over in the minds of politicians whose power depends on increasing the budgets of new entitlement programs. On the other hand, responsible leaders recognized that the world remained a dangerous place and that America’s safety depended upon our ability to counter technological threats as well as mount an effective response to new threats not yet envisioned.
In part, I believe that the proposed 1989 Space Exploration Initiative (SEI) of President George H.W. Bush (Bush-41) reflected this calculus. With the end of the Cold War in sight, Bush (having lived recent history) understood that any drift toward a deterioration of our technical infrastructure would leave our nation exposed – unable to mount an effective response to future aggression. Students of history understand this well – scientists and engineers were already being laid-off and our technical, industrial sector was shrinking. The space program (long a proving ground for new technology and skill sets) was tapped to protect and keep these national capabilities operative and engaged.
SEI first faltered when NASA came up with an implementation that was deemed “unaffordable” (it wasn’t, although the architecture could have been improved upon and made cheaper). SEI died when Bill Clinton won the election of 1992 and the “Bush initiative” was considered politically obsolete. The space program was already shrinking when two new developments intervened. First, it was claimed that fossil bacteria had been found in a Mars meteorite, suggesting the possibility of ancient life on that planet. This claim re-oriented the robotic spaceflight program into a non-stop series of Mars orbiters, landers and rovers dedicated to the “Quest for Life Elsewhere.” Second, the troubled Space Station Freedom project was re-designed into a techno-political partnership between the USA and the former Soviet Union. The idea behind this initiative was to keep unemployed Soviet bomb-makers engaged with building a new space station. That “WPA in space” program survives to this day, although its great potential as an engineering research facility in space was (and in my opinion, still is) largely unrecognized.
Now, according to Cantrell, our aerospace industry is in a “malaise.” But if the “privatization” of the space program is such a success and the old World War II industrial model is now in the “dustbin of history,” why should this be? Part of the problem is that the so-called private sector space program is not really private, but rather, is a disguised and drastically scaled-down version of the “old” business ways. Most of the New Space companies take government funding, either through outright contracting, subsidy or via the award of “prizes” for innovation. Promoters have attempted to re-define the English language to encompass this new system of government funding – now, if you have any private funds invested in your business, you are “private and commercial” even if government funds more than 80% of your capitalization.
For all the propaganda about New Space being more “efficient” than government, almost 10 years after the winning of the Ansari X-Prize in 2004, we have yet to see the private sector launch a single human into space. Human flights to low Earth orbit, even those paid for by government, are said to be “imminent,” yet no one can provide a firm projected date for such. The common excuse for this uncertainty is that the tyranny of the “human-rating” requirements imposed by government for their space transportation systems causes endless delay and extra unnecessary expense. OK, let’s grant that. Why then are there no private flights to orbit? Advocates of prizes for innovation often cite their efficacy in generating new capabilities. Inflatable space station builder Bob Bigelow offered a prize in 2004 called “America’s Space Prize” that promised $50 million to the first company to develop a space transportation system capable of sending and returning a human crew to and from low Earth orbit. The prize offer quietly expired in 2010 –without a single attempt to win it.
The simple fact is, we live in a dangerous world. America needs a strong space program to project power, to protect its citizens and to maintain and advance its technological edge. The mindset that nurtured our technical industrial base since the end of World War II made a lot of sense – for a minimal investment (especially when balanced against the astronomical fiscal and human costs of the entitlement state), we have protected ourselves and the free world for more than 60 years. By attempting difficult but achievable goals in space, we maintained a collective capability that was, and is, vital to our national survival. By abandoning a reachable, long-range strategic goal in space (a human Mars mission – at least 30 years into the future – does not qualify), America has abandoned that capability and left our technical infrastructure to flounder about without purpose.
Random developments make progress, but not necessarily in directions that are optimum or with the utility for common needs. New Space is now in the place our civil space program was 50 years ago. They have yet to launch a human into orbit. And the hyped cost-effectiveness of their approach is dishonestly presented with accounting tricks that make it seem that they are “private” when in fact, they are simply government contractors in disguise. One day, we shall regret our turn down this “new” path, one that turns its back on the “old” path. By then though, it may be too late to do anything about it.
My interest is in seeing the solar system opened up in a sustainable way regardless of how that is done. My concern is that space advocates tend towards one bias or the other. Either they are for or against the new public-private partnershi approaches, and so the definitional arguments about the term “commercial”, for example.
We have largely done the large government space programs and I think that it is generally recognized that this is not a sustainable path. By sustainable, I mean getting to the point where the government doesn’t have to continually pour in billions into the space program for decades to come. For example, although the SLS can preserve part of the industrial base for heavy lift vehicles, really, practically noone is making the argument that this will result in a system that will transition to a point where the government can get that expense off their books.
However, the new public-private partnerships give reasonable people some expectation that cargo and crew to LEO can be handed off to the private sector to where government will eventually not have to pay exhorbitant $/kg prices to reach LEO. With a “Lunar COTS” approach, I am arguing that we can reasonably do the same thing but now for the government to help extend America’s commercial space to include the resources of the Moon (especially ice for propellant).
I believe that the high up-front costs necessary to develop any of this capacity is beyond commercial markets at this time. So, if we are to get to this sustainable capacity in space then government money to get over the initial hurdles is probably essential. NASA would benefit greatly by having such commercial services available so I think that it is justified for government money to help establish that commercial capacity.
If we can get in-space propellant at LEO at significantly lower cost than at present then this enables all sorts of things in space and indeed opens up the solar system in a sustainable manner. And I think that that is the smart path for America’s space program to pursue.
My interest is in seeing the solar system opened up in a sustainable way regardless of how that is done.
If it were done in such a way that you were not able to participate in it (for example, by a proprietary conglomerate or a totalitarian political entity that demanded total control over critical space properties), would you support that?
We have largely done the large government space programs
I do not agree, mostly because the world is still made up of multiple nation-states that (for the most part, excepting ourselves), look out for their own interests and not for the general benefit of humanity. Unless the federal government takes the lead in such issues as space property rights and mining technologies, it is not clear that some restrictive economic space developmental regime will not arise.
> If it were done in such a way that…a proprietary conglomerate or a totalitarian political entity…would you support that?
No, of course not. Do you believe that public-private programs (e.g. Lunar COTS) would inevitably lead to either? If so,why?
> “We have largely done the large government space programs” I do not agree.
Apollo, the Shuttle, the ISS – weren’t these large government space programs?
Would you mind directly addressing my point about the need for a sustainable space program that doesn’t require unending inputs from government? Are you saying that we can’t have sustainability and any private participation?
In re., government programs, I meant to say that we are not done with them, not that we haven’t had them in the past. I misread your comment.
In regard to “private” space (which I do not consider such) leading to a political or corporate oligarchy, the problem is that without national authority present and active on the frontier, the unfavorable development regime that I mention could (not would) happen. If such did occur, what is your recourse?
Would you mind directly addressing my point about the need for a sustainable space program that doesn’t require unending inputs from government? Are you saying that we can’t have sustainability and any private participation?
I have written on this nearly continuously for the last ten years. I believe that we need a strong government space program because of compelling national needs, including national security. It needs to lead in both technology development and physical presence on the frontier of space. Right now, that frontier is in cislunar, including the lunar surface, and government’s role should be to create a permanent space transportation system there. I am not now (and never have been) against private participation in any of this, but believe that it follows government trailblazing and does not lead it. I also think that many of the existing “commercial” entities are more hype, bluster and PR than they are real. I wish it were otherwise, but I don’t think that it is.
…without national authority…If such did occur, what is your recourse?
Companies launch from a nation and so would be under their national laws. Any commercial oligarcy trying to exclude others from resources would be countered by other nations and their space budgets. Treaties regulate the behavior of nations. Lunar polar claims by a rogue nation excluding access to large swaths would not be recognized by other nations.
Fears of hypothetical land grabs shouldn’t prevent us from recognizing the value that private-public partnerships (like we are seeing) can bring by establishing a cis-lunar transportation infrastructure that is relatively low-cost and sustainable.
Fears of hypothetical land grabs shouldn’t prevent us from recognizing the value that private-public partnerships (like we are seeing) can bring by establishing a cis-lunar transportation infrastructure that is relatively low-cost and sustainable.
I contend that it’s not “fear” but realism — and an appreciation for past historical precedents.
As for “low cost and sustainable,” that has yet to be shown. Again, history suggests otherwise.
“If it were done in such a way that you were not able to participate in it (for example, by a proprietary conglomerate or a totalitarian political entity that demanded total control over critical space properties), would you support that?”
You mean If China did it?”
“However, the new public-private partnerships give reasonable people some expectation that cargo and crew to LEO can be handed off to the private sector to where government will eventually not have to pay exhorbitant $/kg prices to reach LEO.”
That, I suppose, would depend on your definition of exorbitant.
– SpaceX used to claim that their Falcon 9/Dragon system would deliver 13,226 lbs. of up mass to the ISS for $54 Million/launch (about $4,000/lb.). That claim now seems to have been expunged from their website.
– When they signed their CRS contract it was to deliver 44,000 lbs. for $1.6 Billion (about $36,000/lb.) in 12 launches (an average cost per flight of about $133 Million).
– In actual performance to date the CRS-1 and CRS-2 missions have delivered (by SpaceX own metrics) about 2,000 lbs. (about $133,000/lb.).
Hi Joe, Yes I am aware of those numbers. The purpose of the public-private programs are to encourage the development of new commercial services. This is in recognition that, given the very large up-front investment it would cost to be able to develop the ability to deliver crew to LEO, commercial companies need support to get over that hurdle. So one should not expect the public-private phase to yield the low $/kg to LEO which is the end goal. I hope that this explanation is clear.
Likewise, establishing a cis-lunar transportation system based upon the harvesting of lunar polar ice would probably cost too much for current commercial markets to bear. This is why I advocate for Lunar COTS programs where NASA helps companies develop that capability. As with the current public-private programs, initially the $/kg to LEO may cost more than it would cost to deliver it from the Earth’s surface. But the goal would be that, in time, using reusable in-space transports and with an expanding, largely telerobotic mining workforce, competitors would be bringing lunar propellant to LEO at well below what it would cost to do SI from the Earth’s surface all the while gaining the surface operations experience of use for future missions as well as a growing manned lunar base to boot!
“I hope that this explanation is clear.”
The “explanation” is clear, but it is not the “explanation” used to sell COTS/CRS. That “explanation” said that the CRS would produce dramatically reduced cargo delivery to the ISS up front. It clearly has done anything but that.
The SpaceX numbers also do not bode well for commercial crew. Even if you assume that the crew carrying version of the Falcon/Dragon system will be no more expensive than the $133 Million/launch (an unlikely occurrence), fly on a more reliable schedule and will be able to carry the advertised 7 people (and SpaceX underperformance in up-mass so far in the CRS flights could give reasonable people cause for skepticism) that would still be about $20 Million/seat.
That is less than the Russians are charging, but not less than could theoretically be achieved doing things the “old” way (take a look at the OSP proposals from George W. Bush’s first term). The only way the “commercial” approach could reduce that cost is by achieving a higher flight rate with paying (nongovernment) customers. I have seen no evidence that there are a sufficient number of rich people willing to pay $20 Million + (and that probably a big plus) to cause that to happen.
The primary goal of NASA’s manned space program over the next 25 years should be to set up permanently manned outpost first on the lunar surface and then on the surface of Mars. Once these goals are made clear to the Congress and to the public– then NASA will be back on course with the appropriate amount of funding from Congress. A mere $3 billion increase in NASA’s annual manned spaceflight budget should probably be enough to get this done. $1.5 billion a year alone over the next six or seven years should be more than enough to finance the development of a reusable single stage Extraterrestrial Landing Vehicle capable of placing humans on the Moon and even on Mars (with the addition of a ballute and heat shield).
While Commercial Crew Vehicles could be an important part of this Federal space program in the long run, its doubtful that there would ever be enough demand for Commercial Crew flights for NASA purposes to sustain more than one company. The beauty of capitalism, of course, is that prices are kept low through competition amongst several companies.
I think its clear that the future of Commercial Crew flights will not be in big government programs but in private commercial programs such as space tourism for the super wealthy and for space lotto winners.
There are more than 50,000 individuals on our planet worth more than $100 million dollars: individuals who could easily afford a $25 million to $35 million dollar flight to a private space station. Even if private companies could only get less than 1% of those individuals every year to fly into space aboard their private space craft to their private space stations, that could still mean nearly 100 private space launches per year. Of course, such a high flight rate would probably dramatically lower the cost of flying into space which should increase the annual volume of wealthy people wanting to fly into space.
Plus there are billions of average people around the world who would probably be willing to risk a dollar or two every year for a chance to travel into space.
Private space companies need to stop whining about government contracts and development subsidies and focus on where– the real demand– in the future will be for their private manned space vehicles! And its not the government!
Marcel F. Williams
Marcel,
I read your post at your blog — good job. I mostly agree with it.
Private space companies need to stop whining about government contracts and development subsidies and focus on where– the real demand– in the future will be for their private manned space vehicles! And its not the government!
It kind of tells you something about them that they don’t do this. If these guys are so competent and so affordable and the private space launch market is so big, they should be raking money in hand over fist. And yet, their biggest preoccupation is with their next government increment.
Perhaps the emperor hath no clothes.
Thank you Dr. Spudis.
Maybe I’m naive, but I actually believe that private companies could be extremely profitable transporting wealthy people to private space stations if they’re willing to make the appropriate financial investment. And a government national and international space lotto system could substantially enhance the business case without the need for any tax payer dollars.
Yet the advocates of private space seem more obsessed with trying to paralyze NASA from doing anything rather than trying to create an environment where private companies can thrive in the New Frontier by doing their own thing while allowing NASA to do its own thing– which are likely to be mutually beneficial.
The reusable lunar lander that you and Lavoie proposed, for instance, with orbital space depots could also be used to give Commercial Crew companies, easy access to the lunar surface from LEO and back to low Earth orbit without private companies having to spend a dime on development cost. Without landing legs but with an aerobraking heat shield, such a vehicle could also be used as an OTV (Orbital Transfer Vehicle) between LEO and the Lagrange points or low lunar orbit.
This could allow private companies to expand the space tourism industry all the way to the lunar surface almost immediately after NASA uses these same reusable vehicles to return to the Moon. Why wouldn’t private industry want to expand their economic realm all the way to the lunar surface as soon as possible?
Developing a simple single stage reusable Extraterrestrial Landing Vehicle and a derived heavy cargo lunar lander for deploying a lunar outpost should be of great interest to both NASA and private space launch companies. Its the essential missing piece in SLS/MPCV development, IMO.
This should be the next big thing at NASA that Congress should appropriate significant funding for starting hopefully as early as 2015.
Marcel F. Williams
“Thank you Dr. Spudis.
Maybe I’m naive, but I actually believe that private companies could be extremely profitable transporting wealthy people to private space stations if they’re willing to make the appropriate financial investment. And a government national and international space lotto system could substantially enhance the business case without the need for any tax payer dollars. ”
Some think that a continuation of X-15 type program would have been the best way to go to space- so incremental improvement.
It seem in terms terms of transporting wealthy people, that suborbital travel might be realization of such a method getting to Earth orbit.
Virgin Galactic is saying they going to start flying people next year.
Which means within year they will have to be doing test flights- so by this time next year we could be seeing the beginning of this.
It seem in terms terms of transporting wealthy people, that suborbital travel might be realization of such a method getting to Earth orbit.
My crystal ball isn’t any better than yours, but I suspect that this might get old pretty quickly. I think that the real breakthrough will come if and when someone can develop a relatively cheap way to get people to orbit and back safely.
I won’t be holding my breath on that.
-It seem in terms of transporting wealthy people, that suborbital travel might be realization of such a method getting to Earth orbit.*
My crystal ball isn’t any better than yours, but I suspect that this might get old pretty quickly”
Well Virgin has said it has spent about 500 million on suborbital already. That seems like a problem to me.
To “work” suborbital must profitable, and that further investment will add to profits.
Virgin has 640 who are signed up. Simple math:
640 times 200,000 is 128 million.
I don’t think this is show stopper, but it’s possible as you say, get old.
They raised the price to 250,000 and it would going in wrong direction if they have to continue raise it.
Unless they can provide a better ride, and I would say going further could possibly be seen as a better ride.
And XCOR is still charging 100,000 as far as I know- but one could argue Virgin is possibly providing a better ride, and probably will be the first to provide it.
You’re not considering the possibility that Musk may be successful in making rockets fully reusable. That would be a real game changer if it succeeds. In that case, all bets are off!
Bob Clark
All bets might be off (depending on the number of paying flights/year – which takes us back to the subject of what are we using the hardware for?), but that is a big if.
If SpaceX plan for reusability is that represented by the GGI video they put out sometime ago, the first stage would have to: (1) Negate its down range momentum, (2) Fly (under power) back to the launch/landing site, (3) Perform a powered vertical landing (which would require landing gear).
The second stage (at a minimum) would have to adhere to (2) and (3).
All of that will cause significant increases in weight to the stages, which in turn must be subtracted from any payload.
It is not at all obvious that such a vehicle would be able to place any payload (no matter how small) into orbit.
Every time SpaceX underperforms on past promises as to schedule, cost, performance; they come out with a new set of ever more grandiose promises to change the subject.
They would be better off trying to fulfill their CRS contract commitments before “moving on”.
Elon Musk’s plan from the beginning was to cut the costs to spaceflight by making reusable rockets. If he fails even while making profitable expendable rockets I’m sure he will considered himself to have failed at his goal.
Bob Clark
If Musk’s expendable rockets turn out to be profitable it will not because they are better or even cheaper. It will be because their development cost were primarily paid by the American taxpayer and they have the government as an anchor tenant through the CRS program.
As to whether or not Musk, if he cannot produce a fully reusable multistage rocket whose piece parts fly back to the launch/landing site autonomously – while maintaining the capability to put a payload into orbit, will consider himself a failure. For his sake, we should all hope not.
I think focusing on the word ‘sustainable’ is the wrong track. Typically when people use this word, they think of something keeping itself going, usually in the sense of money – that is, it is paying for itself, or something is making more money than it costs to operate. I think it will be a long, long time before this kind of sustainability happens beyond low earth orbit, where satellite TV providers and others have shown that you can make more than you spend in delivering a product and turning a profit. I think the proper phrase to focus on is ‘politically sustainable’. McMurdo base in Antarctica is not ‘sustainable’ (it does not pay for itself), but it is ‘politically sustainable’ as our country feels we are getting our moneys worth down there, and we have continued to fund McMurdo at a politically sustainable rate for over 50 years. The challenge for NASA and this country is that NASA is only ‘politically sustainable’ at the $16 billion a year range, give or take a billion dollars depending on who is in charge of the government. It’s been that way for quite a while. NASA needs to come up with a plan that can use this ‘politically sustainable’ amount to best advantage, not building rockets or designing architectures that require $20-25 billion annually (that kind of taxpayer-supplied money will never show up, especially as this country gets deeper and deeper in debt). The best way to do this when it comes to the Moon is to invest in robotic missions to test technologies to try and prove out the use of lunar resources (another sustainability issue in it’s own right). These missions can be public-private partnerships where the government gets a commercial payload there, or vice versa. If things pan out, great, we jump to the next more expensive and complex arena of humans to the moon using lunar resources to reduce the burden. If lunar resources don’t turn out to be what people hoped for, then maybe we focus on robotic science missions while continuing to try and make lunar resources work as technologies advance. The point is, anything we plan needs to make sense in that ‘politically sustainable’ ball park of $16 billion a year.
The point is, anything we plan needs to make sense in that ‘politically sustainable’ ball park of $16 billion a year.
We can quibble about this number, but I certainly agree with the sentiment. This is a key point — we can address almost any space goal if the path to achieving that goal can be deconvolved into small, incremental pieces that can be operated as a single large system.
First, congratulations to Orbital Sciences for another successful launch.
I take the commercial space approach as a partnership between private and public entities in sharing the costs in developing space launchers and/or spacecraft. Even if it were, say, 80% government funded, if the additional private funding needed caused the expenditures to be made in a more fiscally responsible fashion that could still result in large costs savings to the government.
Remember that 80%, say, by the government, if it were that, would be of the total cost. Because of the large investment involved in space projects, the business and investors risking their own money have a vested interest in keeping costs low to minimize their expenditures even if it were a smaller proportion than the governments. The result is that both the total cost and the cost that has to be paid by government still remains lower than that of a fully government financed project.
However, in point of fact because the proportion paid by the businesses is so significant, in the range of 50% or more, and thus with an even greater need to control program costs, the costs to the government has been drastically reduced. The cost reduction in development costs paid by the government amount to about 90%(!) for both SpaceX and Orbital Sciences, for both launchers and spacecraft. Imaging then what we could accomplish if the commercial space approach were applied also to BEO flights.
Finally, someone at NASA has acknowledged the saving possible under commercial space:
The Commercial Leverage Model and Public/Private Partnerships.
Daniel J. Rasky
Director, Emerging Commercial Space Office
NASA Ames Research Center
Founder & Director, Space Portal
NASA Research Park
Moffett Field, CA 9403
September 11, 2013
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/47645641/AIAA_2013.pptx
Bob Clark
I take the commercial space approach as a partnership between private and public entities in sharing the costs in developing space launchers and/or spacecraft.
I know you do. And that was my point in the blog post about supporters of the existing program redefining the English language, especially the meaning of the word “commercial.” Why not go all the way and simply define a “great space program” as what we are now doing? Then we can all forget about it and go do something else.
NASA doesn’t have unlimited funds to accomplish things. It has a budget, and what it gets out of that budget is based upon how efficiently it can spend it. If it can spend the budget it gets more efficiently then it can get more space activity output out of its budget input. The commercial model programs offer a means to do this, but more specifically exploration architectures that take advantage of them. For instance, commercial launch options exist or will exist by the time we are ready to use them, in the EELVs and the SpaceX rockets being developed. If we had an exploration architecture that planned to utilize them predominately for the breadth of exploration, then NASA wouldn’t need to allocate so much funds to launch vehicle development and operation in their plans and could allocate that to payload development instead, and it would have a lower cost standard of launch to enable a more expansive space program to boot.
Back to the elephant in room that is ignored. NASA is spending its exploration budget on SLS and MPCV. The poor cost effectiveness of those programs are what result in “the malaise”. NASA isn’t spending 3 billion a year on commercial programs or an exploration architecture inclusive of them, it is spending 3 billion a year on SLS and MPCV and going nowhere because of it. Place whatever goal you want to achieve at the end, SLS and MPCV are only going to achieve it superficially and in the distant future at best.
Back to the elephant in room that is ignored. NASA is spending its exploration budget on SLS and MPCV. The poor cost effectiveness of those programs are what result in “the malaise”.
No, the real elephant in the room is the removal of an achievable strategic objective for the human spaceflight program. Instead, we get platitudes about human Mars missions (decades away) or silly “haul an asteroid” missions (make-work in space). Thus, we have a space program pursuing means (“commercial” spaceflight) with no ends (to go somewhere and do what?).
Orion and SLS are merely placeholder programs, designed by concerned Congressional observers to prevent the complete deterioration of our space faring capabilities.
Speaking of elephants in the room, here’s a, er, big one:
Manned mission to Mars an unlikely proposition.
Current limits on exposure to radiation make chances of flight in near future pretty slim.
Sep. 22, 2013
Written by Todd Halvorson FLORIDA TODAY
http://www.floridatoday.com/article/20130922/SPACE/309220026/Manned-mission-Mars-an-unlikely-proposition
A near term solution is already apparent: lunar derived propellant depots.
Bob Clark
No. There was more practical approach – NERVA nuclear fission 3rd stage, which was really developed in 60-70s. Saturn V + nuclear stage could do the trip to Mars – but Nixon cut both and NASA wasted 40 years to investigate microgravity and some useless reusable spacecraft.
Or I can mention a QED derived fusion rocket engine with its long development program. So you dont need any depots at all, just political will and plan to actually go anywhere. But NASA abandoned nuclear rocketry two times, and there is no real progress on solar sails, SEP, or nuclear reactor for ion engines. There is no new space transport technology like nuclear fission direct propulsion or beam/gun one.
Just old stupid idea of H2/O2 cryogenic fuel depots for hoffman`s low energy trajectories – not feasible at all. It has very high cost by Earth-Moon trasport tonage for practical mining/water electrolysis or current high cost of supply of fuel from Earth. All those depot bs is an excuse to dismiiss development of any nuclear propulsion, or hydrogen guns or solar sails or common HLV. It’s much more effective to go Zubrin`s way of two-four launches of HLV than construct hypothetical `new universe`.
At the same time there is endless reusability crap talk – with current flight rate its totally useless. Where do SpaceX find even 10-100 launch opportunity for each reusable craft? Do they really need these huge onsite engine/craft factory for current low flight rate with even 3-4 reusable craft? Why do they constantly talk about nonexisting future market or hypothetical 7million price when they already scrap Falcon 1 and get out of cheap and huge nanosatellite market? Cause they can’t deliver cheap nor fast for those customers, their goal wasnt real cost reduction for all, but migration to traditional GEO satellite/goverment DOD programs and lucrative CRC/crew contracts.
Much simpler approach – first develop cheap expandable big dumb booster with low reliability and simple manifacturing from already produced parts and launch it from ocean barge with small crew. Cut as much development (simplicity and open source), production (off shelf parts and simple metal wielding) and labor costs(automation,outsorcing, routine). Then if somehow low prices materialized and market will grow – a factory can be built and production experience give scale and more cost reduction.
But what did all those `not so new Space` do? SpaceX for example created ultrasofisticated turbomachinery rocket engines and spacecraft, hire huge pool of high cost workers, PR and managerial stuff, leased huge launching facilities from NASA, and all of that by NASA money and expertise. I dont see any difference with Locheed Martin or Boing except COTS contract scheme nor any cost reduction as mentioned in earlier posts.
Dutch Copenhagen Suborbitals or Romanian ARCA or Interorbital systems are much closer to innovative or commercial side of equation. And they are really trying to open frontier for everyone – not some big pocket millionaires or goverment astronauts. There are much more hidden new groups worldwide actually change status quo by simple solutions without much hype of SpaceX or American `exceptionalism` of Mojave `spaceport`…
“If it can spend the budget it gets more efficiently then it can get more space activity output out of its budget input. The commercial model programs offer a means to do this, but more specifically exploration architectures that take advantage of them.”
As previously stated:
– SpaceX used to claim that their Falcon 9/Dragon system would deliver 13,226 lbs. of up mass to the ISS for $54 Million/launch (about $4,000/lb.). That claim now seems to have been expunged from their website.
– When they signed their CRS contract it was to deliver 44,000 lbs. for $1.6 Billion (about $36,000/lb.) in 12 launches (an average cost per flight of about $133 Million).
– In actual performance to date the CRS-1 and CRS-2 missions have delivered (by SpaceX own metrics) about 2,000 lbs. (about $133,000/lb.).
So please define “efficiently”. How much is it going to cost to use these “new space” systems? Not SpaceX ever changing promises, but actual costs.
While I’m not a big fan of the MPCV, I’m pretty confident that the SLS will be one of the most essential architectural components for pioneering the solar system over the next 25 years.
The Obama administration may have difficulty figuring out how to use a heavy lift vehicle but most spaceflights advocates don’t have such limited imaginations.
The SLS should make it very easy to send large payloads (10 tonnes plus) to the lunar surface via a cargo version of an Extraterrestrial Landing Vehicle with a single launch.
The SLS should also be capable of placing large fuel depots and space habitats into Earth orbit and even to the Earth-Moon Lagrange points and Mars orbit with– a single launch.
Such pressurized habitats could be easily and cheaply derived from the hydrogen fuel tanks of the SLS upper stage such as the Skylab 2 concept which is estimated to cost only $1.5 billion in development cost: far cheaper than the ISS.
Skylab II
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20120016760_2012017550.pdf
http://spirit.as.utexas.edu/~fiso/telecon/Griffin_3-27-13/Griffin_3-27-13.pdf
“This is a key point — we can address almost any space goal if the path to achieving that goal can be deconvolved into small, incremental pieces that can be operated as a single large system.”
I follow you. I had to look up deconvolve though.
The first small incremental piece IMO is the launch vehicle that takes people into space. I believe a key point is the public considers the Saturn V as some extinct dinosaur from the past. The Moon rocket was built just big enough. In fact, because extra pounds on the Moon meant extra tons on the pad vast sums were spent in losing pounds because even larger sums would be necessary to build a bigger rocket. The bigger rocket was inevitable and the failure of our space program to effect human space flight beyond Earth and lunar orbit can be traced to the end of Apollo with no larger follow-on launcher.
The end result of a properly funded space program depends on one thing more than any other- how big the launcher is and how frequently it flies. 8 launches a year of a heavy lift vehicle with a payload of a couple hundred tons is probably the minimum if any spaceships or off-world bases are the goal.
The SLS is the very last hope of the U.S. space program. It is not nearly as powerful as it should be but it is something. In the early 60’s studies were done on launchers that used a pair of 325 inch solid rocket boosters; this kind of vehicle is really that first deconvolved incremental part of a space exploration plan. Wet workshops sent into lunar orbit are the next increment.
http://www.astronautix.com/engines/325solid.htm
“No, the real elephant in the room is the removal of an achievable strategic objective for the human spaceflight program.”
I think the first objective has to be a big launcher and the funding for a high flight rate. I do not see any achievable strategic goal without a way to get to the Moon. A base on the Moon is the first strategic goal because it enables all others.
Paul:
Cantrel’s enthusiasm for “New Space” is entirely understandable, considering that he was a co-founder of SpaceX who flew with Musk to Russia in search of used ICBMs and pays his bills by offering consulting services to inexperienced startups in that sector.
I have always felt that the national security argument for funding space exploration has never been well articulated, and have to wonder about the wisdon of Clinton’s support for the ex-Soviet military-industrial complex. Our reward has been the loss of much of our launch market to them, and it is no surprise that Russia is again confronting us, just as Germany did after it’s defeat in WW I.
Which is not to say that lowering launch costs is a bad idea. I am entirely in favor of any US firm that can capture launch market away from Russia, China, and the EU. And a privately-funded attempt to further reduce launch costs through incremental reusability of launch stages is a step in the right direction.
However, the reach of the private market will always by very limited by demand. The GEO launch market has excess capacity, is already saturated, and is not likely to expand dramatically from reductions is launch cost because your average GEO satellite will cost about $100M. There are not any businesses or corporations who will be able to pay their way to Mars or the Moon any time soon. That is something that only governments can undertake and sustain.
Nelson
Some familiar words in the last few paragraphs. What I am concerned with insofar as NASA and the space program is the lack of an external imperative to provide a basis for a politically sustainable strategic vision for human spaceflight. Just look at the last election. Few Presidential candidates spoke about the space program at any length. And the one notable person who spoke on space program was derided by the media, Democrats, and fellow Republicans alike. I have serious reservations about whether NASA can develop a space infrastructure with its existing budget. Ditto for commercial space.
I have argued that building more space stations, such as a fuel depot/transfer station, in low Earth orbit and at Lagrange coordinates would increase the number of human beings working and living in space. Thus creating demand for greater launch capabilities and spurring greater investments by both public and private sector. Then, we could see a more sustained effort to develop lunar resources. However, no one is really discussing additional space stations except the Chinese. You mentioned Bigelow Aerospace, who had developed cheaper space station modules, but apparently could not attract private or government business even after offering a prize. Bigelow was all but shut down until NASA agreed to launch an inflatable module to ISS. At this point, unless some event occurs that creates a new imperative, I don’t hold out much hope for the space program.
I’m not so taken with the novelty of New Space as most folks here, nor with it’s stupendous and heroic vindication of the triumphant free enterprise vision which is going to smash the tyrannical liberal state and open the entrepreneurial pathway to the stars. This seems a little … over-hyped.
What actually is going on seems to me to fit into a larger context: for over 50 years the people who run the American government have moaned and groaned about the high costs (and often low performance) of aerospace procurement — fighter aircraft, bombers, missiles, spacecraft, spy satellites, even blimps. For a variety of reasons, it’s just never been as simple and straightforward to buy high performance flight vehicles as walking into a drug store to get a bottle of aspirin.
People write books about this kind of thing, so I’m not going to try explaining it all in one paragraph. (Oh, all right, I will. Aerospace firms work on a narrow edge, trying to provide a maximum of capability in a risky environment while using a minimal amount of capital. Which inevitably leads to the “cost plus” contracts that enrage so many space buffs. If you really want aerospace firms to sell aircraft like candy bars, you have to have an industry structure like the candy bar manufacturers have — millions of customers, relatively steady demand over decades for unchanging products, much higher plant and machinery costs than are common in aerospace, and much higher consumer price-to-producer cost ratios. Do all this, and aerospace procurement problems will completely go away. We will all be so much happier. Of course, the airplanes will cost four times as much, but ….)
The point is, the government periodically jumps up and down and screams and tries to change the way it buys aircraft and space systems. Those of us with long memories will recall Robert McNamara’s efforts that led to the F-111 back in Kennedy days. Richard Nixon appointed a Presidential commission to make recommendations for improvement back in the early 1970s — most of which were never realized. Lockheed Aircraft had a “Skunk Works” operation out at Palmdale for many years which was intentionally allowed to ignore military procurement procedures. After the Challenger explosion, Ronald Reagan approved an Air Force scheme for quickly upgrading old-fashioned Atlas and Delta ICMBs into new-fangled Extended Expendable Launch Vehicles. Bill Clinton didn’t do so much, but military spending dropped about a third during his time in the White House, and about 4 out of 5 aerospace firms dropped dead or were bought up by competitors and it’s a fair bet that this had some impact on industry economics. It’s also a fair bet that we’ll see something similar in the post-Obama, with defense industry shrinkage inevitable under either Republican or Democratic administrations after the US bails out of the Middle East, and the Air Force’s transition from piloted aircraft to drones.
Meanwhile, the General Accounting Office periodically issues reports on what it sees as deficiencies, and Congressmen read them and sometimes try to act on them. We’ve had Office of Technology Assessment reports, We’ve had a report from The Commission on the Future of the United States Aerospace Industry. We had Al Seidel and Sean O’Keefe come into NASA in the first Bush Administration and try to switch the space agency to an industry-based “spiral development” plan for launcher development and procurement. Then we had Mike Griffin come into NASA in the second Bush Administration and dump spiral development so NASA could beef up its internal skills for spacecraft development. And now we’ve got COTS, which more or less is a NASA version of the clever Air Force program which led from the Atlas 4 to the Atlas 5 and from the Delta 3 to the Delta 4 in a mere 15 years. And it’s assuredly the pathway to the future!
Want a bet a nickel that by 2020 we’ll be discussing even more glorious procurement schemes?
Having seen what get’s procured over the years I am not a real fan of the wisdom behind this process. The shuttle not only looks bad in hindsight but one particularly damning article written beforehand-
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2001/8004.easterbrook-fulltext.html
-shows that at least someone knew what a bad decision was being made. I have seen tax dollars buy jet engines for tanks (bad idea), helicopters mutilated to fit inside cargo planes but then never transported that way (HH-60), the monstrosity that even Dick Cheney could not kill (V-22), airplanes with standard size hardware on the engines but metric on everything else so two sets of tools were required (H-65), and on and on.
I was excited about Sidemount and was disappointed but now I am onboard with the SLS and waiting for someone to build a lander. No lander, no Moon.
one particularly damning article written beforehand-
Easterbrook doesn’t know what he’s talking about. But that’s never stopped him from writing about space.
Agreed, I had the good fortune in the 1990’s to get to talk with the late lamented Max Hunter whose work Easterbrook continually misrepresented in spite of Hunters repeated attempts to get him to desist.
I would give you some quotes, but I suspect your language filter would reject them.
I just found the article a couple years ago and was amazed that someone had pointed out the main faults of the beast even before it flew, such as;
[extensive quotations from article excised]
I just told you that I do not consider Easterbrook a reliable reporter, so why do you insist on spamming my blog with his drivel? If anyone is interested, they can follow the link you put up. Enough.
I see in the skylab 2 presentation they show a water-filled stage as a radiation shield of some sort but do not say much about it. Just using an upper stage as a wet workshop to be filled with water for shielding is not enough. It has to be heavy enough to stop the heavy nuclei component of galactic cosmic radiation and the 2 meters they cite is not going to do that.
A stage at least 40 feet in diameter would be needed if it is to be used as a spaceship compartment. That’s only 7 feet more than the Saturn V if I remember.
That’s because there is a lot of debate and confusion about how much radiation shielding is required.
During the solar minimum, you’re going to be exposed to about 60 Rem of cosmic radiation per year. That exceeds the NASA limit of 50 Rem per year in order to reduce the occurrence of cancer at less than 3%. Major solar events can expose you to more than 80 Rem of radiation in just a few days: that not only exceeds NASA’s 50 Rem annual limit but far exceeds its 25 Rem monthly limit.
Studies that I’ve read suggest that just 0.5 meters of water should be enough to reduce exposure to a major solar event (80 Rem plus) to less than 20 Rem (below the NASA 25 Rem per month limit). This amount of water should also be enough to reduce annual exposure to cosmic radiation (including heavy nuclei) to about 20 Rem over the coarse of a year (Interplanetary journeys will probably take less than a year). You also have the additional shielding of the pressurized aluminum structure housing the astronauts which is not insignificant.
But once you arrive at your destination, there is really no excuse, IMO, for not fully protecting astronauts at levels experienced by radiation workers on Earth since there is no shortage of regolith on the Moon or on Mars to shield an outpost.
Because of the need for heavy radiation shielding, I also think its obvious that interplanetary flights are going to have to be fueled and launched from the Earth-Moon Lagrange points. And the Moon should be the best place to supply the fuel and the mass shielding needed for such interplanetary journeys.
Marcel F. Williams
“This amount of water should also be enough to reduce annual exposure to cosmic radiation (including heavy nuclei) to about 20 Rem over the coarse of a year (Interplanetary journeys will probably take less than a year). You also have the additional shielding of the pressurized aluminum structure housing the astronauts which is not insignificant.”
There is debate and confusion because most people do not understand (and do not want to understand) the nature of the problem. Secondary radiation is the result of heavy nuclei hitting a spaceship (or human brain) and if you use a little shielding you actually cause more secondary radiation and increase the exposure. The obfuscation and denial over this fact is one of the major stumbling blocks in explaining space travel to the public.
And the next time someone says they do not like a certain writer I will certainly pay attention.
“(Interplanetary journeys will probably take less than a year)”
Really? Even going to Mars in a year would be a trick. How about Neptune?
The fast trip requires extremely high propulsion efficiency and thrust and the slow trip requires the same propulsion efficiency and thrust to push the shield around. Only nuclear energy will work.
There is presently no such system on the drawing board and since such a project will take decades and would require a Moon base from which to launch I doubt we will be doing any year long trips in the near future. I do not think the unshielded fast trip is practical and IMO interplanetary journeys to the outer system will take 6 to 8 years round trip.
No it doesn’t.
If you’re interested in the delta-v requirements and the days required for journeys to Mars, you can take a look at the links to the following articles on the subject:
https://smartech.gatech.edu/bitstream/handle/1853/14747/HumanMarsMissionTrajectories.pdf?sequence=1
http://www.marsjournal.org/contents/2007/0002/files/wooster_mars_2007_0002.pdf
http://journalofcosmology.com/Mars143.html
I think Mars is dead rock and don’t want anything to do with it. But, it is interesting stuff, thanks. I wonder if there is anything out there on using the gas giants to slow down for a mission to those moons. The prospect of life in one of the warm subsurface oceans of the icy moons is far more exciting to me than a bleak desert. And if they are sterile oceans then maybe we can aqua-farm them or something. I am not a Mars advocate because without a Moon base from which to launch nuclear missions we are not going anywhere.
New Space is now in the place our civil space program was 50 years ago.
Well, if that’s the case, our civil space program is in the place of our civil space program 60 years ago! At least New Space is flying some rockets!
I’ll make a bet with you Paul: $5 will get you $250 that NASA/SPACEX/F9/DRAGON will launch a woman or man into orbit before NASA/ATK/SLS/ORION does.
How about it?
Like most of the New Space apologists, you continually want to make this about rockets. It’s not — it’s about having a long-range strategic goal so that our space efforts accomplish something. In addition, our civil space program is being systematically dismantled and much of the technical and industrial capability being destroyed is not likely to come back. You guys seem to be good with that — I’m not.
That’s because Obama refused to continue the Space Shuttle program. And he has done almost everything possible to delay the SLS heavy lift program.
NASA put a man into orbit just four years after its creation. Space X has yet to put a man into orbit, 11 years after its creation.
Boeing (CST-100)/ULA (Atlas V) will probably have the first humans into orbit by a private company, IMO, probably around 2015.
Marcel
“If these guys are so competent and so affordable and the private space launch market is so big, they should be raking money in hand over fist. And yet, their biggest preoccupation is with their next government increment.”
If they were competent they would have started with a far larger launch vehicle. Unless all they were really planning on doing was taking ultra-rich tourists on LEO vacations. But first they would at least need to get the government to pay for most of it. The taxpayer has paid for most of it directly or indirectly.
It will take a huge governmental commitment to fund a real space program that sends people to other worlds. The misrepresentation made by private space that I find so infuriating is their ridiculous clarion call for cheap lift. Physics and materials engineering are not likely to change in the next fifty years any more than they have in the last fifty. A half century ago rockets were expensive and they still are and will continue to be. We live at the bottom of a pretty deep gravity well and those are the hard facts of life on Earth.
I am so thankful for Dr. Spudis to allow me to express myself on his forum. I am fascinated by space travel and the opportunity to share my views is really appreciated. I am not a scientist or engineer and I base much of my interest on two slim works of exceptional quality, the first a short book and the second a magazine article a few pages long. The book was Project Orion by George Dyson and the article was Shielding Space Travelers by Eugene Parker. Having read widely on space I have found other concepts like Von Braun’s wet workshop and a spinning body realizing artificial gravity to be so ingenious and simple that I wonder why they were never and are not being built.
Like most people I consider myself to be occasionally clever and when I mention a 40 foot diameter rocket stage it concerns these half century old ingenious concepts and slightly newer ideas like pulse propulsion and a 15 foot water shield against space radiation. The building block that simplifies- that deconvolves everything- is the core stage of a notional Heavy Lift Vehicle. Very large SRB’s with a total thrust in the 30 million pound range would lift this 40 foot diameter single stage rocket. This stage would have a inner and outer tank space for liquid oxygen and hydrogen. Once empty, the outer tank can be filled with water and the inner-core tank with air to create a crew compartment shielded from space radiation, specifically heavy nuclei. As launched the core stage would be the main payload and would boost towards the Moon minus the weight of jettisoned engines as in the original Atlas.
Here I think it is interesting to speculate on the proposed hydrogen oxygen reusable lander operating from a lunar underground hangar. If this craft could sortie and meet this wet workshop coming from Earth it could dock and slow it down into lunar orbit. The lander would then return to it’s hangar to be serviced and eventually refueled before meeting another workshop. By joining these workshops end to end and forming a large ring, a habitat capable of both Earth gravity and radiation is constructed in lunar orbit. But it has to be partially filled with water from the Moon before it can be inhabited. Or it might be better to have a lander than can just bring them down and assemble the ship on the lunar surface. It can be assembled more easily in space perhaps and slowly filled with water from the Moon using the lander operated from an underground hangar to haul the water up a slug at a time. Or the empty space station can be fitted for powered flight and become a spaceship that can land on the Moon to fill it’s radiation shield and then take off. This assemble in space and land on the Moon for water is my favorite. The engine section and crew torus of the complete spaceship might then continue after liftoff into deep space on an exploratory or interdiction mission. Or the engine could jettison the space station into geosynchronous Earth orbit and return to the Moon for another. The manned geosynchronous water filled spinning torus could be used as a semi-permanent telecommunications platform and replace the existing system of satellites.
“Physics and materials engineering are not likely to change in the next fifty years any more than they have in the last fifty. A half century ago rockets were expensive and they still are and will continue to be.”
Computers were expensive 50 years ago. That means they still are and will continue to be.
Bob Clark
You might want to consider that rockets (and for that matter any other devices that require complex moving parts, high amounts of energy and thus heat dissipation) are not necessarily analogous to computers.
The entire world is not encapsulated in your I Pad.
People including the people that made them also thought computers would always be big and expensive. All that was needed for that to change was a large market that needed smaller cheaper computers.
We’ll have low cost space access if there is sufficient market to drive large numbers of launches and rockets.
Note, the number of moving parts in a rocket are actually lower than in a jet engine.
Bob Clark
No what caused the drastic reduction in the cost of computers was a technical breakthrough – the development of solid state circuitry that was partially driven by the Apollo Program.
If you want a similar reduction in the cost of Earth Surface to LEO transportation, you are looking for a similar technical breakthrough.
I do not think that is likely any time in the foreseeable future. But if you want to bet on it, you should stop looking to Musk, who is only building (so far marginally performing) conventional chemical rockets.
You’re real hero (if such exists) is some currently unknown theoretical physicists (probably not very well thought of by his main steam colleagues due to his eccentric ideas). It is unlikely it will ever happen, but some such individual might someday create the basis for a reactionless drive. That would give you what you want. SpaceX will not.
Joe has me figured out; my hero is Kevin Parkin, the guy that wants to build SSTO’s using beamed microwave energy.
And those guys that wrote the paper on a small black hole engine to power a close to the speed of light starship seemed pretty intelligent to me but that is mostly fictional because it would take a space solar energy infrastructure of thousands of square miles to manufacture a small black hole and it is thus many decades (at least) away.
Beam propulsion would work well from the Moon and could be set up in a ten or fifteen year time frame if there was a HLV flying there 8 times a year. But we have no HLV yet and the one on the way needs alot more thrust.
“No what caused the drastic reduction in the cost of computers was a technical breakthrough – the development of solid state circuitry that was partially driven by the Apollo Program.”
We do agree advances in technology can drive a great reduction in cost and size and availability. Not a change in the physics.
Bob Clark
All that was needed for that to change was a large market that needed smaller cheaper computers.
You have this backwards. Small computers (i.e., small volume, packaged electronics (integrated circuits), including circuitry for avionics and computers) were developed to accommodate the limited throw weights of the ICBMs of the 1950s and 1960s. Commercial markets for these products developed after they had been perfected for military and space applications.
This sequence is exactly the reverse of the “commercial space” paradigm of the current “flexible path” approach.
I’ll accept that. Keep in mind the success of the so-called “commercial space” approach has come from a public and private partnership.
In fact a more appropriate name for this instead of “commercial space” might be “public/private partnership” space, or “triple-P” space.
However, you describe it here is a discussion of how this approach can get us back to the Moon at low cost:
Saturday, September 28, 2013
Free your mind, and the rest will follow.
http://exoscientist.blogspot.com/2013/09/free-your-mind-and-rest-will-follow.html
Bob Clark
“- the number of moving parts in a rocket are actually lower than in a jet engine.”
This comparing of a turbopump to a turbofan is getting pretty old. Besides having blades that go in a circle a pump and a fan do not have much in common mechanically. I think it is a false comparison.
My father was a jet mechanic on carrier fighters and he was around when the radial reciprocating engines were still in service. He says when the jets took over everything changed. Jets might fail catastrophically but they did not degrade and wear out like a piston engine. It sounds like I could be comparing jets to rockets but I am not. As I just stated, I think that is a false comparison.
A rocket engine is really the opposite of jet engines which run for thousands of hours with very little wear and tear except for when they start up and cool off. A rocket engine is an explosion and the turbopump feeding that explosion is in a different reality of violence compared to the turbofan on a jetliner.
If you had some wishalloy that could run white hot there would be not problem- but there is no wishalloy.
There are important differences between rockets and jets but rocket combustion is not an explosion.
The key difference is that rocket combustion runs at much higher temperature and, usually, higher pressure than in jets. The reason for this is that there is pure oxidizer used in rocket engines. While in jets there is a large amount of nitrogen within the combustion chamber that does not contribute to combustion and in fact cools the burning.
I was surprised in reading about it that in fact rocket combustion occurs at higher temperature that the melting point of the combustion chamber material(!)
Why don’t the combustion chambers just melt then I wondered? The reason is because of an interesting fact in thermodynamics.
To have melting not only does the temperature have to be above the melting point but the amount of heat energy absorbed has to be above what’s called the “heat of fusion” (unrelated to nuclear fusion):
Enthalpy of fusion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enthalpy_of_fusion
So what’s done in rocket engines is to continually remove this heat energy along the walls, usually by circulating fuel around the combustion chamber.
It’s because of this high temperature and pressure that makes rocket engines harder to make reusable to the same degree as jets. Still rockets could be made reusable to the 100 uses range which could go a long way to reducing launch costs.
Bob Clark
http://gizmodo.com/5991212/the-worlds-biggest-jet-engine-is-brawnier-than-alan-shepards-orbital-rocket
125,000 pounds of thrust for the turbofan….
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RS-68
the RS-68A puts out 800,000 pounds of thrust
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merlin_%28rocket_engine_family%29
Merlin 1D has 180,000 pounds of thrust while the 5 segment SRB put’s out over 3,000,000 pounds of thrust.
I think chemical rocket propulsion is about like steam engines now in respect to performance; the numbers are in on thermodynamics and exhaust gas velocity and not going to change much.
The shuttle, for all it’s faults, used an excellent combination of powerful SRB’s and hydrogen oxygen engines. In comparison the Falcon is pretty pathetic with it’s cluster of low thrust engines using an obsolete propellent.
If Musk has invested in some kind of really big booster like a 260 inch monolithic solid I would be on his side. But the really small kerosene engines doomed any hope of large payloads or projects from the start.
Robert Clark says: September 28, 2013 at 12:39 pm
You seem to be trying to redefine what “New Space” means:
– Now it is not “commercial” space anymore but “triple-P” space.
– Now was never intended to reduce costs up front, but some time (somehow) in the future.
– Now it was not a “large market that needed smaller cheaper computers” that drove the computer advances but technological advances caused by government spending on government run military/space programs.
But that is alright, back to the lecture on the greatness of commercial (whoops I mean triple-P) space.
If you are allowed to regularly change the goal posts to your immediate advantage it is easy to rig the game so you always appear to win. But “winning” that way is meaningless.
It’s not changing the goal posts. That what is called “commercial” space has cut the costs of producing both launchers and spacecraft by an order of magnitude is fact that has now been acknowledged by NASA. I would not care if it were 90% funded by government if the development costs happened to be cut by a factor of 10 over what a fully NASA funded development would normally cost. You can call it something else in that or even this scenario. Heck, call it “corporate scam artists” space if you want when it reduced the amount NASA had to pay from $3 billion to $300 million. Perfectly fine with me. What’s important to me are the results.
Read this report for how public/private partnership has cut the cost of space development projects:
The Commercial Leverage Model and Public/Private Partnerships.
Daniel J. Rasky
Director, Emerging Commercial Space Office
NASA Ames Research Center
Founder & Director, Space Portal
NASA Research Park
Moffett Field, CA 9403
September 11, 2013
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/47645641/AIAA_2013.pptx
Bob Clark
I do not care what a report tied to the COTS/CRS program says.
I have my own experiences.
I remember exponents of new space (or whatever you now want to call it) telling me that the Space Shuttle was “unsustainable” because it cost $71,000/kg to deliver cargo to the ISS.
Now SpaceX (after receiving hundreds of millions of dollars of the taxpayer’s money) signs a contract to deliver cargo to the ISS for $36,000/lb. ($79,200/kg.) an increase in cost of 12%. And they are having trouble meeting even that. Yet somehow I am supposed to believe that is a bargain.
Just for the record this will be my last post in this series with you. You seem to go by the internet rule “he who posts last wins”. I do not. If you think another post makes you win, enjoy your “victory”.
“Now SpaceX (after receiving hundreds of millions of dollars of the taxpayer’s money) signs a contract to deliver cargo to the ISS for $36,000/lb. ($79,200/kg.) an increase in cost of 12%. And they are having trouble meeting even that. Yet somehow I am supposed to believe that is a bargain.”
NASA has smaller budget, is building 70 ton rocket, and is getting crew
and cargo to ISS.
Problem with Shuttle in terms of costs is if flew couple times a year it
costs more per lb compared to 3 or 4 times a year.
This same problem SLS will have, btw.
For shuttle program NASA was spending 3 billion a year- if just one flight per year it was still 3 billion, if 4 or 5 flight it’s bit more than 3 billion.
And currently SLS and Orion are about 3 billion per year.
If you wanted to increase the size of ISS, then it would nice to have the shuttle.
One flight of shuttle per year provide more than enough cargo.
If want to use Shuttle as tanker for ISS reboost then one gets lots cargo and reboost fuel, and 14 crew in one year.
But shuttle should get more flights then 2 per year. For two flights is 1.5 billion per flight- 25,000 kg is $60,000 per kg.
And Russian sell seats for 70 million each, and SpaceX will probably
sell them for less per seat.
Probably NASA will only buy 1 or 2 SpaceX crew trips per year- and seems more likely it work out to one per year.
With Dragon giving same number of crew as Shuttle.
Of course the problem with shuttle was it was old and dangerous- though one could spend money improving the shuttle. Or build a replacement. And either would probably more than all money spend on SpaceX and etc.
And then how long is NASA going just do ISS?
President Bush and Congress agreed that NASA should starting going the Moon and beyond.
Of course the problem with shuttle was it was old and dangerous
Spaceflight is inherently dangerous and always will be. At the time that the Shuttle was retired, it was probably safer than at any other point in its history. Soyuz has also had its problems; we know nothing at this time about the safety/reliability of Dragon.
It could be boil down to, did NASA want to make another orbiter.
They decided years ago, not to continue the infrastructure that’s needed to make another orbiter in order to save costs.
The last orbiter was somewhere around 2 billion, and infrastructure was still available.
Congress is directing NASA to go to the Moon, and
would congress agree to buying another orbiter?
Perhaps if NASA had already made the Shuttle C, it would made more sense to continue Shuttle program indefinitely- you transition to doing more Shuttle C launches and less Orbiter launches.
But it was President Bush’s call- though Obama did agreed with it.
“-we know nothing at this time about the safety/reliability of Dragon-”
We know one thing about the Dragon- it is relying on carrying toxic propellents to fuel an underpowered escape system that is really made for tourist space station-keeping. The CST has the same system- Boeing never should have went that route.
The LAS solid rocket escape tower is one of those ideas that cannot be improved on. Decreasing safety by going cheap on escape systems to improve performance is THE worst mistake of the shuttle program. That we fooled ourselves into thinking we could fly a spacecraft and not have any accidents is amazing and I see it happening again with the whole private space scam though in a different way; the shuttle claimed airliner safety and thus no need for escape systems while private space is now claiming they can stockpile everything they need in orbital depots and travel to Mars from there. Neither claim is credible.
What is so frustrating about the shuttle losses is that standard military ejection seats may have saved the crews. Even the Columbia crew could have “bailed out” with a few hundred pounds of extra equipment per passenger. Woven metal decelerator parachutes have been suggested for orbital reentry by multiple parachute.
Lest we forget, a paratrooper landing in a farm field is how Yuri Gagarin came back to Earth.
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/moose.htm
“The LAS solid rocket escape tower is one of those ideas that cannot be improved on.”
In terms of thrust, you are going get better than solid rockets.
Whether you need such high acceleration could be a point of dispute.
Speaking of improvement. I suppose rockets are still carrying self-destruct explosives?
I wonder if you could leave the blowing up of the rocket to ground assets?
Railguns, Phalanx gun, quick missiles or whatever.
“Problem with Shuttle in terms of costs is…”
The problem with SpaceX is that they are currently not meeting the requirements of their own CRS contract. They are approximately one year into the contract that calls for 12 flight in 3 years at an average cargo delivery of 3,667 lbs. /flight.
That means on average they should have flown 4 flights and delivered about 14,668 lbs. of cargo by now.
Instead they have flown twice (and their next flight is not yet even scheduled – due to problems with the Dragon vehicle RCS system) and delivered about 2,000 lbs. of cargo.
Unless you think this is no problem and they can simply fly more (with greater cargo) to make up the difference, you should note that NASA is now having to pressure Orbital Sciences to accelerate their launch schedule to make up for SpaceX shortfalls.
http://www.spacenews.com/article/launch-report/37077pressure-mounts-on-orbital-sciences-with-spacex-likely-unavailable-for
“Joe says:
September 30, 2013 at 12:30 pm
“Problem with Shuttle in terms of costs is…”
The problem with SpaceX is that they are currently not meeting the requirements of their own CRS contract. They are approximately one year into the contract that calls for 12 flight in 3 years at an average cargo delivery of 3,667 lbs. /flight.”
It would seem to be SpaceX problem, if this were the case.
As far as I know Spacex gets paid when they fulfill their contract.
It could situation where both NASA and SpaceX wish to delay launching, or it could be that NASA has delayed it.
After all Spacex just launch Falcon 9 rocket yesterday, and they have two more Non-NASA launches coming up. And Orbital’s Cygnus just arrived at ISS.
So SpaceX seems to working on making a re-usable first stage of Falcon 9 and apparently they going to Launch Falcon Heavy next year. I think if NASA was actually in dire need for SpaceX to delivery cargo, they could get it.
It seems if anything NASA has too many parties willing to deliver cargo to ISS. Russia, Japan, Europe, SpaceX, and now Orbital. And others want to be given the opportunity.
Keep in mind that Orbital Sciences’ Antares/Cygnus was also developed under the “commercial” space program.
I regard that as a wise decision on NASA’s part to have developed at least two carriers to deliver cargo to the ISS. I also regard it as wise for them to be supporting two or more crew delivery systems. I hope Congress does not change that decision on them
Bob Clark
gbaikie says: September 30, 2013 at 8:05 pm
“It would seem to be SpaceX problem, if this were the case.”
It is not “if” it is a fact and it is not SpaceX problem.
When SpaceX (under COTS) promises to deliver cargo to the ISS beginning in November of 2009 for $4,000/lb., but when it comes time sign a contract signs up to deliver beginning in October 2012 (three years late) for $36,000/lb. (an increase of a factor of 9) that is not SpaceX problem. That is the American taxpayer’s problem.
When SpaceX (by the terms of the contract) is expected to deliver 4 flights a year each carrying an average of 3,667 lbs. and then flies only twice in the first year delivering only 1,000 lbs. per flight that is not SpaceX problem. That is NASA and the ISS’s problem.
“As far as I know Spacex gets paid when they fulfill their contract.”
When you actually know how SpaceX is getting paid, get back to me on that one
“It could situation where both NASA and SpaceX wish to delay launching, or it could be that NASA has delayed it.”
I can only suggest that you re-read the linked article. NASA is requesting Orbital Sciences accelerate their launch schedule to make up for SpaceX under performance. To deduce that NASA wanted the flights delayed is (and there is no polite way to put this) bizarre.
“It seems if anything NASA has too many parties willing to deliver cargo to ISS. Russia, Japan, Europe, SpaceX, and now Orbital. And others want to be given the opportunity.”
Like I said bizarre.
Robert Clark says: September 30, 2013 at 8:42 pm
“Keep in mind that Orbital Sciences’ Antares/Cygnus was also developed under the “commercial” space program.
I regard that as a wise decision on NASA’s part to have developed at least two carriers to deliver cargo to the ISS. I also regard it as wise for them to be supporting two or more crew delivery systems. I hope Congress does not change that decision on them”
That is certainly one way to put a positive spin on the situation; unfortunately it will not bear up under scrutiny. The Orbital Sciences contract is not intended as a backup to SpaceX (as much as that may be assumed by a lot of Musk’s fans on the internet) both need to perform as advertised.
Orbital Sciences may (and it should be emphasized may) be able to make up the current shortfall for a while, but not for the entire term of the two contracts.
-“As far as I know Spacex gets paid when they fulfill their contract.”
“When you actually know how SpaceX is getting paid, get back to me on that one”-
According to this article of June 1, 2011, at 12:46 pm-
So it’s two years old.
“according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO).
The key findings of the report, which was presented to a House committee last week, include:
SpaceX has completed 18 of 22 original milestones to date, including two Falcon 9 launches and the initial demonstration flight of the Dragon capsule;
NASA has paid SpaceX $298 million out of $396 million allocated for meeting 18 original milestones and seven additional risk reduction milestones added to the program last year;”
http://www.parabolicarc.com/2011/06/01/spacex-milestone-progress-payments-delays/
Another:
“NASA’s commercial cargo program involves two different arrangements with the two competitors, Orbital and Space X. One is COTS, which uses Space Act Agreements for development of the space transportation systems (Antares/Cygnus for Orbital, Falcon 9/Dragon for Space X). The other, CRS, is a Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR)-based fixed-price contract. Though neither company had launched their systems at the time, in 2008 NASA awarded $1.6 billion to SpaceX for 12 CRS missions and $1.9 billion to Orbital for 8 CRS missions. (Cygnus can accommodate more mass than Dragon so can deliver a fixed quantity of cargo to the ISS in fewer launches.) The agency began making payments to both companies for the CRS flights before the companies demonstrated that their systems worked.”
http://www.spacepolicyonline.com/news/nasa-criticized-for-excessive-pre-payments-to-orbital-for-cargo-flights-to-iss
And:
“The report says that NASA paid Orbital $910 million, and SpaceX $858 million, under both COTS and CRS as of the end of FY2012. ”
NASA has paid Orbital more money by end of 2012.
And Orbital just finished it’s first demo delivering to ISS. So by end 2012, orbital had not delivered anything to ISS. Where Dragon first docked in spring of 2012 it’s demo, and in that summer started the CRS contract, completed first CRS resupply before end of 2012 and did another in spring of 2013.
So $858 million would probably included all costs of completed demonstration program, plus one flight of CRS being completed before the end of the year. So $858 minus 396 is 469 million.
So as of end of 2012, NASA paid somewhere around 469 of 1.6 billion CRS.
And as of now, NASA has got 2 of the 12 flights.
And I assume the 469 million includes what NASA has paid to towards parts of crew development as of end 2012 and probably initial payments towards the 2013 launch.
“When SpaceX (by the terms of the contract) is expected to deliver 4 flights a year each carrying an average of 3,667 lbs. and then flies only twice in the first year delivering only 1,000 lbs. per flight that is not SpaceX problem. That is NASA and the ISS’s problem.”
According to wiki:
“On 23 December 2008, NASA awarded a $1.6 billion Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) contract to SpaceX, with contract options that could potentially increase the maximum contract value to $3.1 billion. The contract called for 12 flights to the ISS, with a minimum of 20,000 kg (44,000 lb) of cargo carried to the ISS.”
So a minimum of 44,000 lbs for 12 flights, this averages 3666.6 lbs.
This isn’t demo part.
SpaceX COTS Demo Flight 1. Didn’t go to ISS.
“SpaceX COTS Demo Flight 1 in 2010 was the unmanned first spaceflight of the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft, the Dragon C1, which orbited the Earth, and the second overall flight of the SpaceX Falcon 9. It was also the first demonstration flight for NASA’s Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program for which SpaceX was selected. The primary mission objectives were to test the orbital maneuvering and reentry of the Dragon capsule. ”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COTS_Demo_Flight_1
SpaceX COTS Demo Flight 2 (COTS 2) did go to ISS:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COTS_Demo_Flight_2
“The pressurized section carried 525 kg (1,157 lb) of cargo to the ISS, which included food, water, clothing, cargo bags, computer hardware, the NanoRacks Module 9 (student experiments and scientific gear) and other miscellaneous cargo.No unpressurized cargo was delivered on this mission.”
“When launched the CRS-1 Dragon was filled with about 1,995 lb (905 kg) of cargo”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_CRS-1
“When launched the CRS-2 Dragon was filled with about 1,493 lb (677 kg) of cargo”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_CRS-2
Both returned payload to earth:
CRS-1: “The Dragon will return 1,995 lb (905 kg) of cargo”
CRS-2: “The Dragon returned 3,020 lb (1,370 kg) of cargo”
And dragon can carry:
“The CRS Dragon’s capsule can transport 3,310 kg (7,300 lb) of cargo, which can be all pressurized, all unpressurized or anywhere in between. It can return to Earth 3,310 kg (7,300 lb), which can be all unpressurized disposal mass or up to 2,500 kg of return pressurized cargo, driven by parachute limitations.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_%28spacecraft%29
And CRS-3:
” SpaceX CRS-3, SpaceX’s third CRS mission, is scheduled for no earlier than November, 2013.”
Regarding it’s future payload:
“NASA has contracted for the CRS-3 mission and therefore determines the primary payload. Among other NASA cargo, the SpaceX CRS-3 mission will be carrying an instrument to the Space Station called Optical PAyload for Lasercomm Science (OPALS), which will demonstrate high-bandwidth space to ground laser communications.The second external payload launching on SpX-3 is the High Definition Earth Viewing (HDEV) package, which consists of four commercial HD video cameras which will film the Earth from multiple different angles from the vantage” And:
“In addition to the primary payload, a Dragon cargo capsule resupply space transport mission to the ISS, the CRS-3 Falcon 9 mission will deploy the KickSat CubeSat which will further deploy 250 cracker-sized Sprite picosatellites.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_CRS-3
gbaikie says: October 1, 2013 at 4:39 pm
Your first link is a description of the COTS program which subsidized the development of the vehicles and is unrelated to the CRS program in terms of payments.
I have tried (unsuccessfully) to find out how (and how much) SpaceX is being paid on the CRS contract and find the quote you gave for the second article (which is about the CRS contract) interesting:
“The agency began making payments to both companies for the CRS flights before the companies demonstrated that their systems worked.”
So SpaceX was getting paid under the CRS contract before they even proved their system worked, much less before they delivered any cargo.
How does that line up with “Spacex gets paid when they fulfill their contract”?
Commercial space got to love it.
“- this high temperature and pressure that makes rocket engines harder to make reusable to the same degree as jets. Still rockets could be made reusable to the 100 uses range-”
The lesson of the shuttle says no. If we learn by past mistakes we advance, even if it is two steps forward, one step back. Right now the most efficient rocket architecture is probably a pair of very large SRB’s and a liquid hydrogen/oxygen core stage. The largest such examples we have are the 5 segment SRB and the RS-68A. If reusing the SRB’s can be justified by the examination it allows and the resulting perfect record then a single large expendable liquid hydrogen/oxygen engine for the core stage that is jettisoned is probably more economical than recovery and overhaul. If the SLS is going to use 4 expendable SSME’s then it might be cheaper to use a single 3 million pound thrust range expendable engine scaled up from the RS-68.
However, I really like the photo the good Doctor used; that 8 engine configuration is beautiful if the cluster of redstone fuel tanks is not so elegant. A successor to the might F-1 should be found in a 3 million pound liquid hydrogen/oxygen engine and 8 of them mounted on a super rocket with 4 or more of those 5 segment SRB’s attached. Or much bigger monolithic SRB’s.
Actually the model that is the current business plan of aerospace companies is NOT the WWII/Cold War model, which was the traditional American vertically integrated enterprise (think the Ford Rouge plant in Michigan). The current and failing business plan is the POST Cold War model of a few large contractors who are not vertically integrated. In the 1990’s the large aerospace companies knew that carrying the overhead of all of their subsystems work would make them non competitive so they shed all of these assets that turned into tier 2, 3, and 4 contractors.
That model worked as long as there was still a lot of programs but it was horrendously expensive as you traded on set of overhead for the overheads (and fees) of all of the tiers leading up to the primes.
SpaceX is shattering this model by going back to the OLD ways, the ways that made Hughes the largest defense contractor in the world in the 60’s/70’s until Hughes died.
During the WW II/Cold War era, we had dozens of big aeronautical/aerospace manufacturing companies and also a myriad of small high-technology vendor shops, which led to both an incredible industrial capability as well as an efficacious way to maximize the rapid introduction of new technical innovation. During the development of the Clementine spacecraft in 1992-1994, we had multiple choices for new vendors to turn to when one didn’t come through. In contrast, when we built the Mini-RF radar instruments in 2005-2008, we had great difficulty getting the parts and subsystems we needed because with the contraction of the aerospace industry, there are now very few vendors for the critical technical pieces.
My concern is not with whether a company is vertically or horizontally integrated (whatever works, works), but with the general deterioration and contraction of the aerospace industrial base.
Those who hate government space programs or even space programs in general (public or private) might think its great that America is spending less money on aerospace so that more money can be spent on the continuously growing welfare state. But a contracting aerospace industrial base is bad for the US economy and for the long term security of this country. The US military has been warning us about our lack of appropriate investment in space for more than a decade.
Since its inception, NASA has been the goose that’s laid the golden eggs for private industry. There would be no private commercial satellite industry in the Western world if it weren’t for NASA. And NASA is doing it again by helping private companies develop their own private manned launch capability so that they can pursue their own– private– agenda’s in space.
We need a strong and adequately funded Federal space program in this country. And we also need strong private space programs in this country. Both are mutually beneficial to each other and to the long term safety and economic growth of our nation.
Marcel F. Williams
Hi Dennis,
I do not mean to give you a hard time (and I realize that I am being redundant – but nobody ever addresses these points, so I have to keep saying it over and over again).
As previously stated:
– SpaceX used to claim that their Falcon 9/Dragon system would deliver 13,226 lbs. of up mass to the ISS for $54 Million/launch (about $4,000/lb.). That claim now seems to have been expunged from their website.
– When they signed their CRS contract it was to deliver 44,000 lbs. for $1.6 Billion (about $36,000/lb.) in 12 launches (an average cost per flight of about $133 Million).
– In actual performance to date the CRS-1 and CRS-2 missions have delivered (by SpaceX own metrics) about 2,000 lbs. (about $133,000/lb.).
Additionally:
SpaceX is currently not meeting the requirements of their own CRS contract. They are approximately one year into the contract that calls for 12 flight in 3 years at an average cargo delivery of 3,667 lbs. /flight.
That means on average they should have flown 4 flights and delivered about 14,668 lbs. of cargo by now.
Instead they have flown twice (and their next flight is not yet even scheduled – due to problems with the Dragon vehicle RCS system) and delivered about 2,000 lbs. of cargo.
This has caused NASA to pressure Orbital Sciences to accelerate their launch schedule to make up for SpaceX shortfalls.
http://www.spacenews.com/article/launch-report/37077pressure-mounts-on-orbital-sciences-with-spacex-likely-unavailable-for
Instead of talking about horizontal/vertical integration or SAA’s/FAR’s, would you please address these SpaceX deficiencies and how you believe they should be addressed.
“-nobody ever addresses these points, so I have to keep saying it over and over again-”
Thank you for exposing the facade Joe.
Their sign says cheap but they are far from it. They advertised 4 thousand a pound, Musk talked about getting it down to 5 hundred a pound, but in reality they are selling at 133 thousand dollars a pound.
As for the statement, “SpaceX is shattering this model by going back to the OLD ways,-”
I take it the old way being the way that worked; the example would be Apollo. And Apollo was about big rockets going far away, not inferior lift vehicles transporting tourists to their space station vacation.
” October 1, 2013 at 2:06 pm
“-nobody ever addresses these points, so I have to keep saying it over and over again-”
Thank you for exposing the facade Joe.
Their sign says cheap but they are far from it. They advertised 4 thousand a pound, Musk talked about getting it down to 5 hundred a pound, but in reality they are selling at 133 thousand dollars a pound.”
Launch cost to LEO 28 inclination is 56.5 million divided by 28,991 lbs which is $1948.88 per lb.
If the destination is GEO, Falcon 9 gets a payload to GTO for
56.5 million divided by 10,692 lbs which is $5284.32 per lb.
GTO is not GEO- one needs rocket propulsion to circularize the orbit- SpaceX doesn’t do this.
I doubt Mush said $4000 per lb to LEO, that about the standard price, he might have said $4000 per kg.
This has been the standard way assess launch costs- before Musk was born.
Now, ISS is not at 28 inclination, it’s at 51 degree inclination was is the lowest inclination Russia launch site can launch to.
One can launch to higher inclination but from 51 latitude one can’t easily launch to say 28 inclination [could do what’s called dog leg, which is essential fly the rocket to lower latitude location in kind of sub-orbital hop, then go to orbit to 28 inclination]. Anyhow, we decided to put ISS into a orbit which was accessible to Russians, and it cost a bit more from KSC to get to 51 inclination. But for American launchers, 28 inclination is the standard way to express launch costs.
Musk imagines he will get lower cost, when he re-uses the Falcon’s first stage.
He also estimates the Falcon Heavy will be a lower cost per lb. And he also thinks he can lower the Dragon capsule cost, if he reuses them. Which probably will do particularly for non-NASA crew launch. NASA probably rather have new capsules but perhaps will be willing to use re-used Dragons.
“As previously stated:
– SpaceX used to claim that their Falcon 9/Dragon system would deliver 13,226 lbs. of up mass to the ISS for $54 Million/launch (about $4,000/lb.). That claim now seems to have been expunged from their website.”
The Falcon 9 first and second stage gets 13,150kg to LEO:
http://www.spacex.com/falcon9
And F-9 launch vehicle price is listed as 56.5 which delivers 13,150kg payload to LEO or 4850 kg to GTO.
http://www.spacex.com/about/capabilities
If want the dragon capsule, it have to be part of this 13,150kg payload.
The dry weight of dragon is 4,200 kg. So 13,150kg minus 4,200 kg.
Then if want dragon to maneuver, one needs to add the propellent weight to the dry weight.
So the 54 or 56.5 million is just get a payload to LEO or GTO.
So you wanted to put a tank of water which tank weight and water
weight totalled 13,150kg, that could put into LEO or the elliptical GTO orbit for 56.5 million So tank and water might cost $1000, so 56.5 million plus $1000.
Or if you want a Dragon [or capsule made by different company] or satellite, you need to buy it also.
gbaikie says: October 1, 2013 at 8:22 pm
gbaikie says: October 1, 2013 at 7:33 pm
These are two rather redundant posts in less than an hour. I will attempt to save band width by responding to any salient points with one post.
“Launch cost to LEO 28 inclination is 56.5 million divided by 28,991 lbs which is $1948.88 per lb.
If the destination is GEO, Falcon 9 gets a payload to GTO for56.5 million divided by 10,692 lbs which is $5284.32 per lb.”
I am not sure where you are getting these figures, but if the source (even indirectly) is SpaceX keep in mind they used to promise ISS cargo flights for $54 million, but when they signed a contract the figure became $133 Million. Based on that alone it would be prudent to adjust your launch cost figure ($56.5 Million) by a factor of 2.5.
Additionally you are assuming that the entire lift capacity of the vehicle translates in to useful payload. That is also not the case. As a good example (to anyone who is actually interested in how things really work) the now defunct Titan IV used to advertise that it could deliver 50,000 lbs. to a 28.5 degree inclination LEO. But when a team I worked with delved in to the details with the actual technical team that worked the vehicle we discovered that 15,000 lbs. of that was payload faring and assorted pyrotechnics. SpaceX is playing similar games here.
“I doubt Mush said $4000 per lb to LEO, that about the standard price, he might have said $4000 per kg.”
No, Musk’s SpaceX website did say precisely that for years. They listed the cost of a Falcon 9 launch as $54 Million and the up-mass (meaning cargo) to the ISS 13,226 lbs. If you want greater precision (rounded up to the nearest whole digit) that is $4,083/lb. Those references have only been removed from the website in the last 2 weeks.
Then when they signed a contract they agreed to (again all figures rounded up to the nearest whole digit) 3,667 lbs. for $133 Million/launch. That is $36,269/lb. (a cost increase by a factor of 9).
“This has been the standard way assess launch costs- before Musk was born.”
No it is not. As stated above that is incorrect you do not calculate cost/lb. by simply dividing a launch cost by a vehicle lift capacity (however questionable those figures – in this case – may be). It was/is not done that way by professionals before Musk was born or now.
“The Falcon 9 first and second stage gets 13,150kg to LEO”
That is the alleged payload capability of the current Falcon 9. The actual payload to be delivered to the ISS (for the I do not know how many times) was to be 13,226 lbs. Then it became 3,667 lbs. In actual practice so far it has been at most 1,000 lbs.
The rest of your post bluntly makes no sense. This will be the last I have to say about this subject with you as it has become either redundant or totally incomprehensible.
“-with the contraction of the aerospace industry, there are now very few vendors-”
The argument could be made that this loss of capability really began in the 60’s when the use of very large solid rocket boosters was proposed and a factory even built but never manufactured. These boosters were made with nuclear submarine hull technology and dwarfed the SRB’s on the shuttle in size and thrust.
There is just no substitute for heavy lift. The public has been conditioned to think the Saturn V was a one off but to open the solar system up for humans we will need much larger launch vehicles of the kind being studied a half a century ago with twin SRB’s and a combined thrust in the 30 million pound thrust range.
It is really not so discouraging if the wailing and gnashing of teeth from the private space mob can be ignored. There are a number of reasons to justify establishing a base on the Moon. Sooner or later the public is going to realize there is nothing happening and want some progress.
The argument could be made that this loss of capability really began in the 60′s when the use of very large solid rocket boosters was proposed and a factory even built but never manufactured.
I am not speaking about rockets here — I am talking about the technology industry of this country. We had a large robust one for the 50 years following the end of WW II. We no longer have that and its remnants are rapidly deteriorating.
Part of the problem also comes when NASA refused to listen to ideas provided by it’s contractors.
A good example can be found here, with the developement of the CEV: http://www.astronautix.com/craft/cev.htm
Good ideas were thrown out, in favor of NASA’s own “in-house” design.
I find the SLS to be another example; bloated to duplicate the original Ares V design, when a design more like DIRECT 3.0 would’ve been sufficent.
Or even the side-mount design.
The asteroid redirection mission appeares to be yet another case of this senerio, rejecting good plans like the L2 gateway.
If NASA would listen more to ideas by it’s contractors, then we could have a healthier enviroment for the model described here.
“A spaceship is always the best space station and anything else is a waste of resources.”
However, this maxim becomes confusing if the space station is built separate from the engine and when joined they become a “spaceship.”
Dr. Spudis advocates a cislunar infrastructure and what better replacement for our current existing system of geostationary telecommunications satellites than manned platforms, fully shielded and with artificial gravity? By sending HLV wet workshops to lunar orbit to be assembled these compartments form a ring or torus that can be spun for artificial gravity as well as interior cells filled with water. Once the ship is assembled it can be landed and the radiation shields filled with water. Upon leaving the Moon with a full radiation shield they can be inserted into Earth geostationary orbit to act as telecommunications stations.
So the geostationary platforms might not be “a waste of resources.” The spinning shielded crew torus, though very large, becomes comparatively light when the shield is drained before landing on low gravity icy moons. This means the torus can again be separated from the engine and left on the moon to be used as part of a base. On low gravity icy moons the torus can be lowered into a circular trench and then roofed over. With the dry torus shielded by the ice roof it can be spun in the low gravity to provide Earth gravity.
We cannot just add an engine on the ISS and turn it into a spaceship. In fact, this speculation on using a water shielded spinning torus as a geostationary manned platform might may prove to be impossible in reality due to the only way to move the torus being a nuclear propulsion system that is not allowed to operate in the Earth’s magnetosphere. Perhaps there may be a way to insert and leave a polar orbit with a minimum of nuclear contamination but I do not know if you can avoid it with a geostationary “burn.”
NTR’s are being investigated again and it may be the necessary next step even though I think there are more promising propulsion options.
http://gizmodo.com/5992441/how-nasas-nuclear-rockets-will-take-us-way-beyond-mars
“As a good example (to anyone who is actually interested in how things really work) the now defunct Titan IV used to advertise that it could deliver 50,000 lbs. to a 28.5 degree inclination LEO. But when a team I worked with delved in to the details with the actual technical team that worked the vehicle we discovered that 15,000 lbs. of that was payload faring and assorted pyrotechnics. SpaceX is playing similar games here.”
Thanks for that Joe. I am very interested in the way things work. False advertising seems to be rampant when it comes to the aerospace industry. I remember the NASP. What a dream-come-true that was!
You are welcome.
Unfortunately sales pitches overstating the performance of a product is not limited to any one industry. The specific problem here is that SpaceX has taken that questionable practice, exaggerated it to the point of parody and a number of people (at least on the internet) still take their grandiose claims seriously.
I will make a distinction between this kind of thing and the NASP. As far as I know, no one there was being intentionally misleading. Some theoretical types got carried away and made some overly optimistic assumptions. The DoD is still working (with mixed success) on Scram Jet technology. It may succeed someday and NASP type vehicles might still become a reality (obviously a good thing – if it happens), just not at the cost and within the time frame the NASP program predicted.
“Some theoretical types got carried away and made some overly optimistic assumptions.”
1.7 billion dollars of optimism.
I wonder if I added up all the cancelled projects how much it would come to? The trick is to choose which technology will succeed. Big corporations leave it to the military to see if they can make some of these toys work because they would never intentionally spend money on such high risk projects. That’s how you go out of business.
The first commercial jet had rather squarish windows and when they started falling out of the sky it was discovered the pressurized fuselage was cracking at the corners of the windows and the plane popping almost like a balloon at high altitude. But that did not stop the airline industry. However the technical problems that can sink a good idea sometimes cannot be solved. I am always amazed at the private space crowd taking it for granted that cryogenic propellents can be stored and transferred in space. SSTO is another holy grail that people never seem to lose faith in despite the numbers.
If I recall, the most powerful device ever created by humankind, the nuclear weapon, was not originally being pursued by the United States because somebodies science adviser said it would not work. It took a letter from Einstein, who never would have wrote it if two other scientists had not been humiliated when they talked to military intelligence about the danger of a Nazi atom bomb. They appealed to the most famous scientist on Earth. Meanwhile, a fortune was being spent on the Norden bombsight and it never worked as advertised. Most people would bet on the bombsight instead of some fantastic superbomb but that is not what changed history.
If I had to gamble I would go big and put all the chips on the HLV and nuclear propulsion. Solid rocket technology and liquid hydrogen technology are mature enough to build very large launchers. Nuclear propulsion when used in a lunar venue and moon water for shielding is the narrow path that leads to the opening up of the solar system IMO.
It was not my intention to get into a debate about the practicality of the NASP program; if I did not make that clear I apologize.
My intention was to make a distinction between someone making an honest mistake (in my opinion) NASP and someone (in my opinion) SpaceX making intentionally misleading assertions. Both can be damaging, but there is a moral/ethical difference.
Hi Paul – Interesting to see how much controversy my article has stirred up in various places. I have had a fairly even split of people who hate the opinion piece and those who love. A few in the minority think that my “ideas are dangerous”. I must admit to liking the idea that I harbor “dangerous ideas” but what I was really trying to do with this piece was not to suggest that private companies will replace government funded exploration, or should it. Rather, to me, the essence of what I am observing is that the debt crisis combined with private industry’s inherently 10x more efficient method to deploy capital (not necessarily the cost of doing business on an on going basis) is fundamentally altering the way that the government will conduct its affairs into the future. There can be little argument that for 1B$, regardless of where it came from, was more efficiently put to use by SpaceX than by Lockheed and NASA for Orion and Constellation in general. Being someone who spent most of my career working in the dark recesses of DoD space away from the public eye, trust me when I say I understand the national security importance of a strong space presence. Its just that the government’s inefficient capital deployment model dooms its future as the primary source of innovation and more than likely exploration hardware.
Jim,
Thank you for your comment. The point of my piece was that regardless of the efficacy of government technology programs, we are compelled to pursue them because we still have critical national needs in space, needs for which no commercial market nor capability yet exists but whose timely pursuit requires immediate action.
I do not concede that SpaceX is more “efficient” than Lockheed. The two companies are pursuing totally different objectives — one is developing routine Earth to LEO capabilities while the other is working on partly undefined trans-LEO missions. Moreover, I contend that it does matter “where the [$1 billion] came from” in that whatever SpaceX has accomplished to date (and I believe it to be much less than most apparently do), it would not have been possible without the contribution of substantial government funding. That hardly makes the case for the superiority of “private” sector spaceflight.
“There can be little argument that for 1B$, regardless of where it came from, was more efficiently put to use by SpaceX than by Lockheed and NASA for Orion and Constellation in general.”
First I will apologize to regular readers of this site as you have heard these facts many times. However since these erroneous assertions as to how efficient SpaceX is keep being made, here we go again.
The only measure of cost effectiveness we have to compare SpaceX with the more traditional methods is the CRS contract: SpaceX CRS contract is to deliver 20 Metric Tons to the ISS for $1.6 Billion ($80,000/kg)
Until that contract was signed, I was told that the Space Shuttle rate of $71,000/kg was “unsustainable”. Additionally the Shuttle could carry seven crew (round trip) and provided EVA services to assist in ISS maintenance, the Dragon vehicle can do neither
Moreover both SpaceX is so far behind in their launch schedule for CRS that NASA has had to extend the contract time frame by two years to allow SpaceX to appear to be meeting the terms of the contract
http://www.spacenews.com/article/civil-space/40059nasa-says-it-will-extend-private-iss-cargo-delivery-contracts-through-2017
Also NASA has had to extend the length of the commercial crew contract for SpaceX because they cannot meet their original schedules (Note that “bad” old fashioned space company – Boeing – did not require a contract extension).
http://www.spacenews.com/article/civil-space/41043commercial-crew-partners-get-extension
With all due respect to Mr. Cantrell, his attempted preemptive “There can be little argument” statement is counterfactual. Based on the actual facts to date there can be a very vigorous (and successful) argument against SpaceX supposed efficiency.
Perhaps someday Musk’s claims that he will be flying Falcon 9 first stages 1,000 times each with only a one day turnaround between each flight will become true. Perhaps, but the empirical evidence to date does not support such a conclusion; in fact it supports the opposite conclusion.
“First I will apologize to regular readers of this site as you have heard these facts many times. However since these erroneous assertions as to how efficient SpaceX is keep being made, here we go again.”
Don’t apologize Joe. Dr. Spudis allows you to keep stating the facts so why be sorry? He even allows me to opine on nuclear propulsion. What matters is exactly what you so precisely specified; erroneous assertions.
Science allows anyone to assert an opinion and anyone else to assert that opinion as error-ridden as long as there are numbers to go along with the argument. For the most part hindsight of various programs like the shuttle have shown that rocket equations are more trustworthy than think tanks.
The “advertising as argument” technique of Space X is snake oil and quackery. The list of false witness statements much of the public takes as fact because of Space X is now long and growing tiresome. My first experience with this when I first started commenting on space blogs several years ago was the constant hyping of kerosene as somehow being superior to hydrogen as a propellent. Questioning this private space dogma was blasphemy as was criticism of the use of so many low thrust engines. Re-branding obsolete technology from the 60’s and recreating the original major difficulty of low thrust, Space X has somehow convinced many of the existence of an alternate reality where the problems of the past are the advantages of the present.
The beauty of the New Space fantasy is that any problem can be miraculously solved with locating fuel depots everywhere. Just like having gas stations for your spaceship. The ugly truth is that LEO is a dead end.
The Moon is the next stop. The Moon is where they will launch that first atomic spaceship.