Author Topic: Reorganization at ULA  (Read 37641 times)

Online meekGee

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Re: Reorganization at ULA
« Reply #80 on: 09/11/2015 07:35 pm »
A good ELV is all that ULA require in the immediate future to meet DOD and NASA missions. The govt is still their main customer and they will not be demanding RLVs anytime soon, especially for their more expensive payloads. When comes to commercial customers, Vulcan only needs to be more competitive than the ELV competition eg Ariane 5or6 and Proton.

Just note that the first Vulcan flight (scheduled for 2019) is about as far into the future as F9 is into the past. 


(JG:  For sure.  Refueling, comsat constellations, maybe manned tourism - those I can see happening on a fast turn around basis.  But painting yourself into a corner where you're only doing the expensive one-off launches is just a recipe for getting even more expensive due to low volume, and eventually losing that bit of market as well.  I think NV was being sarcastic, btw)
« Last Edit: 09/11/2015 07:37 pm by meekGee »
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Offline jongoff

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Re: Reorganization at ULA
« Reply #81 on: 09/11/2015 07:41 pm »
A good ELV is all that ULA require in the immediate future to meet DOD and NASA missions. The govt is still their main customer and they will not be demanding RLVs anytime soon, especially for their more expensive payloads. When comes to commercial customers, Vulcan only needs to be more competitive than the ELV competition eg Ariane 5or6 and Proton.

I wouldn't go that far--I think they should be aiming for a path that eventually leads to economic complete reusability. And Tory has even indicated in Twitter conversation that that's where they want to go long term. It's just in the near-term, with the market the size it is, they think taking a more cautious approach first makes sense.

As a former founder of a company still pushing gas-n-go fully reusable vehicles, I'm definitely more sympathetic to SpaceX's approach, but it's not obvious that with the market the size it likely is for F9R and Vulcan class vehicles that ULA is making a mistake. SMART reuse looks solidly achievable, and will make a big improvement over a fully expendable booster, but ULA can still adapt if SpaceX has more luck with powered landings or if it looks like the market is big enough to justify a higher reusability approach sooner.

~Jon

Online Coastal Ron

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Re: Reorganization at ULA
« Reply #82 on: 09/11/2015 07:44 pm »
Yeah, 2hr turn times will require a much more advanced vehicle than what SpaceX is doing, and the right kind of payload. A $1B satellite with <1day turn around time? Doubtful anytime soon.

I think a lot of people conflate the statement that Musk has made about "gas-n-go" with the assumption that somehow a market will appear for reusable launch vehicles right after SpaceX proves they can reuse their 1st stages.

What is more likely to happen is that a reusable launch vehicle will attract new users that require far lower launch prices than what exist today, and they are willing to accept the risk that goes with them.  And who knows when that market will appear, or how big it will be.

In the meantime, SpaceX has stated that they will continue to build expendable launch vehicles for those customers that want them, so I would agree that $1B payloads would stick with the least riskiest launcher, which would be assumed to be the expendable version.

But at some point, depending on how much demand there is for reusable launchers, reusable launchers may be able to demonstrate a low amount of risk.  They do have the advantage of being able to be inspected after each launch, so trends can be found in their designs that can't be found in expendable ones.

So for ULA, the question is not so much that they need a reusable launcher on day one, but that their next launcher, which will likely be around for a decade or more, should be capable of keeping up with what their direct competition is doing - which for government payloads is SpaceX.  Does the Vulcan SMART concept do that?  It doesn't look like it.  Which is why I too think ULA is missing a big opportunity here, even if Vulcan is a very innovative design.
If we don't continuously lower the cost to access space, how are we ever going to afford to expand humanity out into space?

Offline Space Ghost 1962

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Re: Reorganization at ULA
« Reply #83 on: 09/11/2015 07:45 pm »
The limitation will simply be "payloads" to increased flight frequency. As always. Big or small, smart or "dumb".

If/then, expect volume of smaller to rise as the need to "share" the power/comm/launch becomes less, and then one can afford more speculative less deliberate, meaning much less costly end-to-end sats.

There's where (in theory) an threshold event might happen to change things. But we're past "over the top" then.

Online MP99

Re: Reorganization at ULA
« Reply #84 on: 09/12/2015 09:08 am »
ISTM that hundreds of sat launches to LEO every year would end up with LEO being very crowded. Not sure if that puts us in any danger of Kessler Syndrome?

IVF and using residuals to deorbit becomes a valuable feature.

But ISTM (and I hope) the big growth area is people, with their spacecraft that clear themselves out of LEO when they're done. Plus their t-shirts, toilet paper and tang, of course.

It may be a big growth area, but also a slow one - a fair bit of time to accommodate it.

Cheers, Martin

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