If Proton cannot be returned to reliability in five years, then maybe this is an opportunity for Vulcan to enter the mix. If Ses and Eutelsat are successful at restoring Proton, then the hurdles get tougher for Vulcan because they'll never beat Proton's price. This one is a two-edged sword.
Quote from: AncientU on 06/13/2015 12:21 pmIf Proton cannot be returned to reliability in five years, then maybe this is an opportunity for Vulcan to enter the mix. If Ses and Eutelsat are successful at restoring Proton, then the hurdles get tougher for Vulcan because they'll never beat Proton's price. This one is a two-edged sword.Given that the most recent failure uncovered the cause of 3 or 4 failures Proton had in the past, this should be a good sign. Proton has a 89-90% record so far and eliminating that one cause alone should improve it to about 93%. That's still a roughly 50% chance of at least one failure in the next 10 launches. So you better do have insurance.Reliability is the price you pay for the low launch price.
Reliability is the price you pay for the low launch price.
Given that the most recent failure uncovered the cause of 3 or 4 failures Proton had in the past, this should be a good sign. Proton has a 89-90% record so far and eliminating that one cause alone should improve it to about 93%. That's still a roughly 50% chance of at least one failure in the next 10 launches. So you better do have insurance.
Another InfoG from Tory, ULA seem to produce a few of these InfoG.I hope they are not turning into another PowerPoint rocket company. This is second InfoG showing the Vulcan Heavy (3 core) which wasn't part of the original Vulcan announcements. 10t and 15t to GSO is impressive. Tory Bruno (@torybruno) tweeted at 3:23 AM on Fri, Aug 28, 2015:Interesting InfoG on capability to Geosynchronous orbit. #VulcanRocket #MUOS http://t.co/ItHTX1jVDu(https://twitter.com/torybruno/status/636922026209361921)
Hah, that is rich. This graph is a textbook case of to abuse and mislead data: Bars on the outside are very exaggerated, FH is missing, F9 has no data, I'm not sure why ULA feels the need to be so misleading. I guess they are feeling desperate? (or?)
Quote from: TrevorMonty on 08/27/2015 05:33 pmAnother InfoG from Tory, ULA seem to produce a few of these InfoG.I hope they are not turning into another PowerPoint rocket company. This is second InfoG showing the Vulcan Heavy (3 core) which wasn't part of the original Vulcan announcements. 10t and 15t to GSO is impressive. Tory Bruno (@torybruno) tweeted at 3:23 AM on Fri, Aug 28, 2015:Interesting InfoG on capability to Geosynchronous orbit. #VulcanRocket #MUOS http://t.co/ItHTX1jVDu(https://twitter.com/torybruno/status/636922026209361921)Hah, that is rich. This graph is a textbook case of to abuse and mislead data: Bars on the outside are very exaggerated, FH is missing, F9 has no data, I'm not sure why ULA feels the need to be so misleading. I guess they are feeling desperate? (or?)
Quote from: Lars-J on 08/27/2015 05:39 pmQuote from: TrevorMonty on 08/27/2015 05:33 pmAnother InfoG from Tory, ULA seem to produce a few of these InfoG.I hope they are not turning into another PowerPoint rocket company. This is second InfoG showing the Vulcan Heavy (3 core) which wasn't part of the original Vulcan announcements. 10t and 15t to GSO is impressive. Tory Bruno (@torybruno) tweeted at 3:23 AM on Fri, Aug 28, 2015:Interesting InfoG on capability to Geosynchronous orbit. #VulcanRocket #MUOS http://t.co/ItHTX1jVDu(https://twitter.com/torybruno/status/636922026209361921)Hah, that is rich. This graph is a textbook case of to abuse and mislead data: Bars on the outside are very exaggerated, FH is missing, F9 has no data, I'm not sure why ULA feels the need to be so misleading. I guess they are feeling desperate? (or?)Not misleading to point out that your company offers a capability that your competitors don't even if it is not a commonly used capability. That is just advertising and advertizing is not in of itself a desperate action. Ariane 5 can't do a direct injection with out the ME upgrades. Falcon may be able to but SpaceX doesn't offer this capability. Were they to start it would likely be in the range between Proton and Soyuz. Falcon Heavy's ability to do so is unknown.
Tory Bruno has twice said in Congress hearings that Falcon Heavy will not be able to fly to GSO. Both times he was corrected by SpaceX witness that Falcon Heavy can and will. So it is not like they don't know it.
I thought originally "Vulcan Heavy" was referring to the full vehicle with six SRBs & ACES, not some unfunded (and at the moment unneeded) triple-core configuration?
But the circular graph is certainly misleading. And one could make a reasonable bet that FH could make a direct GSO insertion mission before Vulcan does, which is what is misleading. Vulcan isn't close to flying, yet already is projected (in this graph) capability in far excess of competitors closer to flying. (or already flying)
I believe he said they can't fly a specific GSO (can't meet that mission's requirements) with the current proposed FH. The question is: What is the payload capability to a standard 0 inclination GSO?
When you say "it's not like they don't know it", who is "they"?
Seems like ULA is just finally playing at the same level SpaceX set the bar at years ago.