SS1 flight set for June 21

OM wrote:

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


The one I read about in this regard was the pod off of a B-58; I always
imagined wind blowing the pod outside the test area during descent, and
some good hearted passerby thinking their might be an injured crewman in
it, so he pries it open...then comes a true epiphany about touching
things he doesn't know about, and many, many stitches.

Pat

Herb Schaltegger wrote:

The use of "we" by the poster to whom I was responding seemed to
indicate a fuzzy-headed personal and emotional connection to Rutan's
project. Actually, that sort of fuzzy-headed emotional nonsense is
often demonstrated by people who think winning the X-Prize will somehow
magically and mystically make space "affordable" by repealing the laws
of physics and economics.


Not to mention velocity; Rutan's ship is basically a recoverable manned
sounding rocket; not anything that can be put into orbit.
Like his Voyager aircraft that circled the globe unrefueled, the whole
design is optimized to perform one task only.
In fact, the design is inferior in performance to the X-15 of over 40
years ago.

Pat

Andi Kleen wrote:

Pat Flannery writes:

Like his Voyager aircraft that circled the globe unrefueled, the whole
design is optimized to perform one task only.

"Optimizing for" usually implies a single goal as target. If you try
to do many different things at once you end up with a inefficient
design. Good example is the shuttle.

Um, no. You can try to be too many things at one time (the Shuttle),
but it's quite possible for one basic design to accomplish many
things.

In fact, the design is inferior in performance to the X-15 of over 40
years ago.

Just done in a small fraction of the cost of the X15 and able
to carry more people.

ROTFL. I *love* how everytime someone points out the low performance
of the SS1 as compared to the X-15, or how it only spends a couple of
minutes in 'space' as compared to the Russian 'tourist' flights....
Someone else always parrots the 'its cheaper though! and privately
built! and carries people!" as though that changes things.

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

(Henry Spencer) wrote:
In article ,
and they only have 5% of orbital energy.

"Space" and "orbit" are two different things.

Only to those with low goals and willingness to delude themselves that
a sub orbital ballistic trajectory constitutes 'going to space'.

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

Andi Kleen wrote:

"Optimizing for" usually implies a single goal as target. If you try
to do many different things at once you end up with a inefficient
design. Good example is the shuttle.

Still, it's hard to figure out what exactly else it can do besides the
little "hop up into space" type flight.




In fact, the design is inferior in performance to the X-15 of over 40
years ago.



Just done in a small fraction of the cost of the X15 and able
to carry more people.


....but it exists for the sake of ego as much as anything else; let's see
it try to go Mach 6 in the atmosphere sometime....

Pat

In article ,
Andi Kleen writes:
(Derek Lyons) writes:

Just done in a small fraction of the cost of the X15 and able
to carry more people.

ROTFL. I *love* how everytime someone points out the low performance
of the SS1 as compared to the X-15, or how it only spends a couple of
minutes in 'space' as compared to the Russian 'tourist' flights....
Someone else always parrots the 'its cheaper though! and privately
built! and carries people!" as though that changes things.

It depends on your metrics. If your main metric is how many people the
craft is able to carry then the SS1 is at least three times better
than the X-15.

That's not necessarily so. Part of teh original specification for the
X-15 proposals was that there be a 2-seat version. (Pilot & FTE) In
the event, it wasn't deemed necesssary, but...
The X-15 also carried 1200 lbs (550+ Kg) of test instrumentation in a
pressurized, air conditioned bay behind the cockpit. If playing
"X-15/X-Prize) games are what you're ecter, there was certainly enough
payload margin and volume available to make X-Prize legal provisions.
(The view wouldn't be much, but nobody said anything about windows.)

And price/performance is an important metric too, even if people
used to the industrial military complex are not always aware of that.

My bet is that the price/performance of the SS1 is significantly
better than that of the X-15.

Price for altitude performance, most likely yes. But the X-15 wasn't
built to a limited specification - it was a research vehicle, intended
to put itself into unexplored, and extremely hazardous flight regimes,
collect data, and return. The information collected did much to
enhance not merely the Upper Left Corner of the Envelope stuff, but
also provided very real advances in aerodynamics, structures, control
systems, and aeromedical data. The triple-adaptive flight control
system was the foundation on which today's FBW control systems was
built.

SpaceShip 1 is an impressive project. Make no mistake about that.
But it's a very limited system, for a very limited purpose. While I'd
be more than happy to bet that they'll win the X-Prize, it's not going
to advance the State of the Art. White Knight, on the other hand, may
end up with a useful post X-Prize career hauling payloads to high
altitudes, for purposes such as Atmospheric Sampling or UV Astronomy.

--
Pete Stickney
A strong conviction that something must be done is the parent of many
bad measures. -- Daniel Webster

In article ,
says...
In fact, the design is inferior in performance to the X-15 of over 40
years ago.

Yes. But. There hasn't been an X-15 flight in this decade. Nor the
previous decade. Nor the decade before that. Nor ....
--
Kevin Willoughby lid

Imagine that, a FROG ON-OFF switch, hardly the work
for test pilots. -- Mike Collins

In article , says...
SpaceShip 1 is an impressive project. Make no mistake about that.
But it's a very limited system, for a very limited purpose.

True. But the very fact that it is named Space Ship *One* implies there
will be a Space Ship Two...
--
Kevin Willoughby lid

Imagine that, a FROG ON-OFF switch, hardly the work
for test pilots. -- Mike Collins

In article , says...
SpaceShip 1 is an impressive project. Make no mistake about that.
But it's a very limited system, for a very limited purpose. While I'd
be more than happy to bet that they'll win the X-Prize, it's not going
to advance the State of the Art.

hmm... If "state of the art" includes concepts like "cost
effectiveness" then SS1 does advance the SOTA.
--
Kevin Willoughby lid

Imagine that, a FROG ON-OFF switch, hardly the work
for test pilots. -- Mike Collins

Andi Kleen wrote:

(Derek Lyons) writes:

Just done in a small fraction of the cost of the X15 and able
to carry more people.

ROTFL. I *love* how everytime someone points out the low performance
of the SS1 as compared to the X-15, or how it only spends a couple of
minutes in 'space' as compared to the Russian 'tourist' flights....
Someone else always parrots the 'its cheaper though! and privately
built! and carries people!" as though that changes things.

And price/performance is an important metric too, even if people
used to the industrial military complex are not always aware of that.

Absolute performance is an *extremely* important metric. Somebody who
insists on comparing very dissimilar craft on price/performance is
someone trying to hide something.

My bet is that the price/performance of the SS1 is significantly
better than that of the X-15.

Which, as I noted above, obscures the lower performance of the SS1.

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