Author Topic: NASA Selects Partners for U.S. Commercial Lander Capabilities  (Read 5528 times)

Offline jacqmans

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April 30, 2014

NASA Selects Partners for U.S. Commercial Lander Capabilities

NASA announced Wednesday the selection of three U.S. companies to negotiate no-funds exchanged partnership agreements with the agency to advance lander capabilities that will enable delivery of payloads to the surface of the moon, as well as new science and exploration missions of interest to NASA and scientific and academic communities.

The selected companies are:
 -- Astrobotic Technology, Inc., Pittsburgh
 -- Masten Space System, Inc., Mojave, Calif.
 -- Moon Express, Inc., Moffett Field, Calif.

NASA made the selections following a January solicitation for proposals. The agency now will negotiate no-funds exchanged Space Act Agreements with the companies as part of the agency's Lunar Cargo Transportation and Landing by Soft Touchdown (Lunar CATALYST) initiative. NASA's contributions for an estimated three-year period may include technical expertise, access to agency test facilities, equipment loans and/or software for lander development and testing.

"NASA is making advances to push the boundaries of human exploration farther into the solar system, including to an asteroid and Mars, and continues to spur development in the commercial space sector," said Jason Crusan, director of the Advanced Exploration Systems Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "Robotic missions to the moon have revealed the existence of local resources, including oxygen and water, which may be highly valuable for exploration of the solar system. The potential to use the lunar surface in partnership with our international and commercial partners may allow these resources to be characterized and used to enable future exploration and pioneering."

Commercial lunar transportation capabilities could support science and exploration objectives such as sample returns, geophysical network deployment, resource prospecting, and technology advancements.

The Advanced Exploration Systems Division of NASA's Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate manages Lunar CATALYST. Advanced Exploration Systems pioneers new approaches for rapidly developing prototype systems, demonstrating key capabilities and validating operational concepts for future human missions beyond Earth orbit.

As NASA works with U.S. industry to develop the next generation of U.S. spaceflight services, the agency also is developing the Orion spacecraft and Space Launch System (SLS), a crew capsule and heavy-lift rocket to provide an entirely new capability for human exploration. Designed for launching spacecraft for crew and cargo missions, SLS and Orion will expand human presence beyond low-Earth orbit and enable new missions of exploration across the solar system, including to a near-Earth asteroid and Mars.
 For more information about the Lunar CATALYST initiative, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/lunarcatalyst

Offline manboy

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I'm very proud of the amount of support NASA is giving to private space.
"Cheese has been sent into space before. But the same cheese has never been sent into space twice." - StephenB

Offline Lar

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I'm very proud of the amount of support NASA is giving to private space.

No funds exchanged but at least they're not stopping them.
"I think it would be great to be born on Earth and to die on Mars. Just hopefully not at the point of impact." -Elon Musk
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Offline manboy

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I'm very proud of the amount of support NASA is giving to private space.

No funds exchanged but at least they're not stopping them.
They are providing some assistance (just not financially). It's very common for NASA to provide technical expertise along with access to their testing facilities. In a number of other programs NASA has helped fund development or served as an anchor customer/early adopter.

Some examples of these are listed below
- COTS/CRS
- Commercial Crew Development program (CCDev) - Funding of companies with ambitions of flying commercial human spaceflights for non-NASA customers. NASA will also serve as an anchor customer for one of these companies.
- Lunar Lander Challenge
- Innovative Lunar Demonstrations Data
- The Flight Opportunities Program
- Developing and becoming one of the first users of the International Docking System Standard (IDSS).
- Providing funding for the Bigelow Aerospace Activity Module which will help legitimize the company and the technology.
« Last Edit: 05/01/2014 07:32 am by manboy »
"Cheese has been sent into space before. But the same cheese has never been sent into space twice." - StephenB

Offline TrevorMonty

They will use one of these companies' landers for the RESOLVE mission if they can't find an international partner.

http://www.spacenews.com/article/civil-space/39307nasa-planning-for-mission-to-mine-water-on-the-moon

All three companies will benefit from the Morpheus lander work.

Offline TrevorMonty

Done a bit more research on these companies.

Moon Express has a small lander that can be launched to GTO as secondary payload from where it can deliver its self to moon surface.

Astrobotic Technology have a medium lander that can deliver small rovers(250Kg) to lunar surface, can be launched by F9 class LV.

Masten Space System are working on heavy lander (Xeus) which can deliver 14t(one way) or 5t (reusable) to lunar surface. Will most likely need the SLS. 
This lander comes from a ULA design based on Centaur upper stage. Sounds like this is joint venture between ULA and Masten.
Original ULA Design
http://www.ulalaunch.com/site/docs/publications/DualThrustAxisLander(DTAL)2009.pdf

Masten Xeus



Offline Steven Pietrobon

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The link to the DTAL paper is not working for me. Here's another link

https://info.aiaa.org/tac/SMG/STTC/White%20Papers/DualThrustAxisLander(DTAL)2009.pdf
Akin's Laws of Spacecraft Design #1:  Engineering is done with numbers.  Analysis without numbers is only an opinion.

Offline russianhalo117

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BUMP:
Moon Express to start flight tests at KSC SLF for its lunar lander vehicle.

An Interview with Bob Richards, Moon Express Inc. founder and CEO
NASAKennedy
Published on 21 Apr 2015
Bob Richards talks about Moon Express Inc. and the partnership with Kennedy Space Center to flight test its lunar lander vehicle. For more information, visit http://kscpartnerships.ksc.nasa.gov.
Category: Science & Technology
Licence: Standard YouTube Licence


Offline JasonAW3

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As for commercial landers; are we talking strictly unmanned vehicles or possibly manned landers as well?
My God!  It's full of universes!

Offline redliox

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As for commercial landers; are we talking strictly unmanned vehicles or possibly manned landers as well?

For the moment I'm pretty sure it's unmanned, but it could easily evolve to medium-size and finally the heavier crew-sized landers, the later if the Moon gains interest from the next administration.
"Let the trails lead where they may, I will follow."
-Tigatron

Offline daveklingler

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Moon Express moved into SLC 36 in January.

Now, SLC 36 has been offered to Blue Origin as an alternative to Shiloh to get them up and running more quickly.

Does anybody know how this development would affect Moon Express?  Would they share the complex with Blue, or is Florida peremptorily kicking them out in favor of the possible 300 jobs Blue would bring if they choose Florida?

Offline sghill

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Moon Express moved into SLC 36 in January.

Now, SLC 36 has been offered to Blue Origin as an alternative to Shiloh to get them up and running more quickly.

Does anybody know how this development would affect Moon Express?  Would they share the complex with Blue, or is Florida peremptorily kicking them out in favor of the possible 300 jobs Blue would bring if they choose Florida?

A super basic Google search would have given you some background before making that comment.

http://www.spaceflorida.gov/why-florida/facilities/launch-complex-36
http://spaceflightnow.com/2015/01/24/former-atlas-launch-pad-gets-a-new-tenant/

It's intended to be a multi-use facility. and Moon Express is going to be doing lander development so one can presume their facility needs are different than BO's, and the landing facilities may be complementary.


« Last Edit: 05/01/2015 05:06 pm by sghill »
Bring the thunder!

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