On Thu, 03 Jul 2003 08:55:46 -0700, in a place far, far away, Hop
David made the phosphor on my monitor
glow in such a way as to indicate that:

I was surprised to see a figure as low as 30% quoted.

For only a doubling?

Besides gain in experience aren't costs of tools, dies etc.
amortized in quantities?

Please forgive some of my naive questions, I haven't been reading this
newsgroup long.

What kind of production runs are being hoped for? 100 units? 1000?

Not for Arianes

It's hoped that the satellite market plus space tourism would make this
sort of investment attractive?

No, those are separate markets, and they'll be served by different
vehicles. The satellite market will never be large enough to drive
the development of low-cost launchers, though it will take advantage
of them when they appear.

The economies of scale that we (or at least I) refer to are in
operations of a reusable space transport, not manufacturing quantities
of expendables.

I seem to recall a discussion that reusable space craft require huge,
massive fuel tanks. Is this a physics mandated expense that couldn't be
overcome by better business practices?

No, but large "massive" (not sure what that word means in this
context, other than that it isn't massless) fuel tanks aren't a
significant cost driver.

--
simberg.interglobal.org * 310 372-7963 (CA) 307 739-1296 (Jackson Hole)
interglobal space lines * 307 733-1715 (Fax) http://www.interglobal.org

"Extraordinary launch vehicles require extraordinary markets..."
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