Robert Bigelow to announce $50 million orbital space prize; inflatable modules

"Jeff Findley" wrote in message
...

"BitBanger" wrote in message
...

$50 million for a spaceship carrying 5-7 passengers into orbit and
bring them back safely? What a joke. There's no way someone
will be able to claim that prize for a long time.

While what you say is true, what's to stop other people, companies,
governments, and etc. from donating more money to the prize? I'd
personally like to see the US Government donate a few hundred
million dollars each year to the pot. The longer the prize is
unclaimed, the bigger the pot grows.

Roton, Millenium Express, etc., were looking at around $300 million five
years back. I think we have come along way since then. I expect it is
doable for $200 million, perhaps doable for $100 million, with an
outside possibility that a really well conceived low cost development
approach unpressured by time could do it for $50 million. Space-X is
not the cheapest prospect out there, but how much do you think it would
cost them? Or someone else using their rockets?

We are not starting from scratch any more, we have the X-Prize almost
behind us with a lot of institutional knowledge, infrastructure,
publicity and inertia thereby gained. A lot of the beginner's mistakes
are now behind us and people have a far clearer idea of what is
required. X-Prize level technology can probably be incrementally
developed to orbital performance, with scaling and staging, though
reentry will require something more.

I think the prize is big enough, and indeed should not get any bigger,
otherwise it will not be low cost. Extra money would be better spent on
other prizes. This prize should be enough to induce a number of
competitors to have a go at developing vehicles that are commercially
viable. Many were already close to having a go on their own. I am not
sure when the prize will be claimed, though I expect by 2010. To be
honest, I would not be surprised if it was claimed within three years of
assured funding. The ability and intent is there.

Pete.

"George William Herbert" wrote in message
. ..

SpaceX is selling their Falcon V (which hasn't flown yet, to be fair)
for $12 million plus range fees per flight, if you order the flight
this year.

That leaves you $38 million for combined R&D on capsule and
eventual profit, if you care to do the accounting in that manner.

A question that has been bugging me, what are the advantages and
disadvantages of combining such a capsule with the Falcon V upper stage?
Assuming the upper stage is to be reusable anyway.

Pete.

"Pete Lynn" wrote in news:1096688357.351813
@kyle.snap.net.nz:

"George William Herbert" wrote in message
. ..

SpaceX is selling their Falcon V (which hasn't flown yet, to be fair)
for $12 million plus range fees per flight, if you order the flight
this year.

That leaves you $38 million for combined R&D on capsule and
eventual profit, if you care to do the accounting in that manner.

A question that has been bugging me, what are the advantages and
disadvantages of combining such a capsule with the Falcon V upper stage?
Assuming the upper stage is to be reusable anyway.

Pete.




I don't think the upper stage is going to be re-usable on the Falcon 5 (or
on the Falcon 1 for that matter). This is the stage that is basically in
orbit, it would have to go through de-orbit maneuvers to be re-used....not
really worth it.
Tom

Pete Lynn wrote:
"George William Herbert" wrote:
SpaceX is selling their Falcon V (which hasn't flown yet, to be fair)
for $12 million plus range fees per flight, if you order the flight
this year.

That leaves you $38 million for combined R&D on capsule and
eventual profit, if you care to do the accounting in that manner.

A question that has been bugging me, what are the advantages and
disadvantages of combining such a capsule with the Falcon V upper stage?
Assuming the upper stage is to be reusable anyway.

I confidently posit that the R&D cost for doing such a large
integration will exceed the $2-3 million in hardware saved
by making an integrated stage, multiplied by the number of
flights likely in the next 5-8 years.

Probably even worse if you include ROI on the R&D.

Several people here will object. That's fine. They can chase
the prize their way.

In my opinion, the cost of entry of reusable stuff is
one major barrier to manned orbital operations including
orbital tourism, and if someone gets the startup financing,
they will likely not recover the capital costs within any
reasonable timeframe. The cheap way to do the early phases
is expendable. When the market expands, reusables and their
higher R&D costs but lower operational costs will be the
better solution. But from here to there is too far to
take in one jump.


-george william herbert

"Tom Kent" wrote in message
. 30.42...

I don't think the upper stage is going to be re-usable on the Falcon
5 (or on the Falcon 1 for that matter). This is the stage that is
basically in orbit, it would have to go through de-orbit maneuvers to
be re-used....not really worth it.

Indeed, only the lower stage is reusable at this stage. I was getting
ahead of myself.


Pete.

"Pete Lynn" :

"Jeff Findley" wrote in message
...

"BitBanger" wrote in message
...

$50 million for a spaceship carrying 5-7 passengers into orbit and
bring them back safely? What a joke. There's no way someone
will be able to claim that prize for a long time.

While what you say is true, what's to stop other people, companies,
governments, and etc. from donating more money to the prize? I'd
personally like to see the US Government donate a few hundred
million dollars each year to the pot. The longer the prize is
unclaimed, the bigger the pot grows.

Roton, Millenium Express, etc., were looking at around $300 million five
years back. I think we have come along way since then. I expect it is
doable for $200 million, perhaps doable for $100 million, with an
outside possibility that a really well conceived low cost development
approach unpressured by time could do it for $50 million. Space-X is
not the cheapest prospect out there, but how much do you think it would
cost them? Or someone else using their rockets?

As has been point out already, the craft designed to win the prize does not
have to be the final commerial design. And looking at Armadillo's
development cycles and cost I think making a winner for less than $50 million
maybe possible.

We are not starting from scratch any more, we have the X-Prize almost
behind us with a lot of institutional knowledge, infrastructure,
publicity and inertia thereby gained. A lot of the beginner's mistakes
are now behind us and people have a far clearer idea of what is
required. X-Prize level technology can probably be incrementally
developed to orbital performance, with scaling and staging, though
reentry will require something more.

And year standard off the shelf parts get cheaper and cheaper - any notice
how there is a lt more things available in stainless steel nowadays compare
to ten years ago? Also custom one-off design of parts can be farmed out more
easyierly than years ago. At one time if you were not ordering a thousand
unit of something, forget about it. Now you can order 1,2,3,... items
without paying the cost of a thousand unit run.

I think the prize is big enough, and indeed should not get any bigger,
otherwise it will not be low cost. Extra money would be better spent on
other prizes. This prize should be enough to induce a number of
competitors to have a go at developing vehicles that are commercially
viable. Many were already close to having a go on their own. I am not
sure when the prize will be claimed, though I expect by 2010. To be
honest, I would not be surprised if it was claimed within three years of
assured funding. The ability and intent is there.

If the prize was bigger tha it is unlikely that a winner would be CATS in
design.

Earl Colby Pottinger
--
I make public email sent to me! Hydrogen Peroxide Rockets, OpenBeos,
SerialTransfer 3.0, RAMDISK, BoatBuilding, DIY TabletPC. What happened to
the time? http://webhome.idirect.com/~earlcp

"George William Herbert" wrote in message
. ..

I confidently posit that the R&D cost for doing such a large
integration will exceed the $2-3 million in hardware saved
by making an integrated stage, multiplied by the number of
flights likely in the next 5-8 years.

Probably even worse if you include ROI on the R&D.

Several people here will object. That's fine. They can chase
the prize their way.

In my opinion, the cost of entry of reusable stuff is
one major barrier to manned orbital operations including
orbital tourism, and if someone gets the startup financing,
they will likely not recover the capital costs within any
reasonable timeframe. The cheap way to do the early phases
is expendable. When the market expands, reusables and their
higher R&D costs but lower operational costs will be the
better solution. But from here to there is too far to
take in one jump.

Yes, a capsule and Falcon V upper stage integration would have to assume
a rather high flight rate. A flight rate that I hope might start to
become possible in 5-8 years time. But I do wonder if this is a useful
evolutionary pathway, whether this would be easier than developing a
completely new reusable vehicle from scratch at that time.

Say,
- Develop a capsule.
- Develop it towards reusability.
- Integrate it with an upper stage.
- Develop a version to go beyond LEO.

This might be a fairly natural progression.

Pete.

Earl Colby Pottinger wrote:

A) What does big have to do with safe? Safety comes from good designs not
size. Remember the Titanic?

Titanic was properly designed. What killed her was faulty
construction and improper operation.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

George William Herbert wrote:
Paul Allen put about twice the X-prize value into Scaled Composites'
project for SpaceShip One. They are *not* making money off the project
as a whole. They may well make money off followon business.

Which project? The "X-Prize attempt project"? Or the
Space Ship 1 project? If you mean the X-Prize attempt
alone you'd be right. But considering how Richard
Branson will be licensing their know-how for
approximately $20 mil, it looks like the X-Prize money
will end up being gravy over and above the cost of the
project.

(George William Herbert) wrote:
I don't think you are really aware of what private commercial
enterprise's capabilities are at this time, if you weren't
aware of who all responded to CEV and Moon/Mars.

With all due respect George, when it comes to orbital capsules, the
proven capability of private enterprise is limited to generating
powerpoints. (To be fair, the dinosaurs aren't any better off.)

The sucess of Scaled is due to the confluence of several external and
internal factors. I'd be very hesitant in generalizing that to all
private commercial (IE. non-dinosaur) space development.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.