SS1 flight set for June 21

Herb Schaltegger wrote:

Good points; on the other hand, don't the two passengers sit
side-by-side behind the center/forward pilot's seat?

I assume that's the case; you wouldn't want the passengers interfering
with his field-of-view out all the circular windows.

The NO2
tank, however, appears to be situated very damn nearly at the center of
lift of the wing or perhaps a bit forward of that point, probably right
at the CG as well.

It would make sense if the whole oxidizer tank/ fuel cylinder assembly
was as close to the CG as possible, so that propellant depletion
wouldn't shift the CG at all during ascent; since the oxidizer tank is
in front; I assumed the cylinder full of the fuel material would be
mounted in back of the CG to keep the propellant weights consumed during
motor burn in front and back of the CG similer...if it was going to be
off-balence, then you would want it nose-heavy during ascent, to add to
it's "arrow stability" as it accelerates toward the supersonic regime;
once it goes supersonic, the center of lift should move aft of the CG,
and stability increase.
snip

Thus, if they have a rocket failure of some type and
terminate boost, the CG won't change too much. Note that Scaled has
already demonstrated cold-flowing the oxidizer in-flight; I would
suspect that with the tank where it is, it has little impact on vehicle
stability either full or empty. I also see from Scaled's data sheet
that in addition to elevators on the tail for pitch and roll control,
the entire horizontal tail surface is electro-servo actuated for
supersonic flight control and overall vehicle trim. I would suspect
that that control surface, as far back as it is, can do very well at
trimming out the effects of two passengers (total weight of what? 350
pounds?) just a few feet forward of the CG.

You could certainly do this; but you are going to pay a price for it-
this means keeping the horizontal control surfaces at a angle of attack
different from the wing, and that's going to generate drag (you are also
going to have to adjust the angle that they are at at varying speeds).
During the early non-powered Spaceship One tests it once tumbled out of
control during a test drop at full aft CG limit; this was probably
related to the pilot only/pilot-passengers flight profile options- I
assume the design was optimized to fly with the pilot and weight of
passengers as it's normal flight condition, as that is what is needed to
win the prize.


Hmmmm . . . this very much sounds like something for Mary to comment on.


You know what _she'll_ want to know.....'Does it have extensible "Dog
Peckers" on it?'

Pat

Derek Lyons wrote:
From http://xprize.com/teams/guidelines.html :
6. Entrants must specify and provide the ANSARI X PRIZE Rules
Committee with their take-off and landing location, and the date of
their launch, not less than 30 days prior to any flight attempt.

So, unless the X-Prize commitee has kept the notification secret, they
don't meet the requirements.

Also, the press release does not mention whether or not ballast will
be carried as required by the rules.

Also, the press release states that "Based on the success of the June
space flight attempt, SpaceShipOne will later compete for the Ansari X
Prize,", leading me to conclude that this flight is not part of the
competition.

That settles it then, it's not an X-Prize flight. My
mistake.

Herb Schaltegger writes:
the risk to reputation and career is being borne by Burt Rutan (who's
already soiled it somewhat by publicly stating his beliefs that the
Pyramids of Egypt are somehow connected with extraterrestrials)

Sounds nutty indeed, but I think it's perfectly OK to have a few silly
beliefs when they aren't directly connected with one's field; everybody
needs to spaz out occasionally. God knows there seem to always be
scientists that do brilliant while at the same time professing to be the
reincarnation of Zorg the Conqueror... :-/

-Miles
--
Run away! Run away!

Hop David wrote in message ...
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches...te_040602.html

Regarding X-Prize requirements to post the attempt date 30 days in
advance, and the statement regarding this as a "pre X-prize test
flight", and the historical importance of this event, I will propose
the following:

The first attemp at X-Prize will be made on July 20th 2004, on the
35th anniversary of landing a man on the moon.

I'd bet a 100 on this date... If all goes well on June 21st, they
announce right there and now that they'll launch -exactly- 30 days
later...

My 2 cents (actualy, $100.02)

Joann Evans wrote:


But if they asked me to be one of the passenger 'masses,' I'd chance
it...


Some ejection capsule tests back in the 1950's were done with live
adolescent black bears; let's stick a couple of those on board, just to
give the pilot some _real_ excitement during the flight. :-)

Pat

On Fri, 04 Jun 2004 01:03:07 -0500, Pat Flannery
wrote:

Some ejection capsule tests back in the 1950's were done with live
adolescent black bears;

"G-g-gee, P-p-Pooh! D-d'ya think this plane of M-m-mr. Rutan's is
safe?"

"Oh bother..."


OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

Hot damn! The X-Prize will be won in less than three weeks.

Or they will be dead. Riding a chemical rocket is always dangerous and
should not be viewed as a fun project.

BTW, X-prize has little to do with space. First the altitiude is a
little low, 100 km instead of 110 km and they only have 5% of orbital
energy.

In article ,
(Remy Villeneuve) wrote:

The first attemp at X-Prize will be made on July 20th 2004, on the
35th anniversary of landing a man on the moon.

I'd bet a 100 on this date... If all goes well on June 21st, they
announce right there and now that they'll launch -exactly- 30 days
later...

That make a certain amount of sense .. but I think equally plausable is
that the first flight of the two required is this June 21 one, and the
second (and winning) one has already been notified to the appropriate
people and will be 13 days later, on July 4th.

-- Bruce

In article ,
Bruce Hoult wrote:
That make a certain amount of sense .. but I think equally plausable is
that the first flight of the two required is this June 21 one...

No, the required notification has not been given, and in any case Rutan
has explicitly stated that this is *not* a prize flight.
--
"Think outside the box -- the box isn't our friend." | Henry Spencer
-- George Herbert |

In article ,
Tamas Feher wrote:
BTW, X-prize has little to do with space. First the altitiude is a
little low, 100 km instead of 110 km...

100km is the international definition of the beginning of space, subscribed
to by essentially everyone except the US government.

and they only have 5% of orbital energy.

"Space" and "orbit" are two different things.
--
"Think outside the box -- the box isn't our friend." | Henry Spencer
-- George Herbert |