Quote from: CameronD on 11/21/2016 05:25 amQuote from: t43562 on 11/21/2016 04:27 amQuote from: Coastal Ron on 11/21/2016 03:44 amThey won competitively bid contracts for services. That would not, in any definition, be "state supported". Let's not make up definitions when real ones exist.Just to nibble at that, was the contract open to non-US companies?No.. but then there was no requirement for it to be either. In any open market anywhere on the planet, a buyer, State or Private, is free to set whatever restrictions they feel are important to them. After all, it's their money.That's a red herring. It doesn't matter what the requirements are or are not or whose money it is. It's a way for the state to support one of it's own industries.
Quote from: t43562 on 11/21/2016 04:27 amQuote from: Coastal Ron on 11/21/2016 03:44 amThey won competitively bid contracts for services. That would not, in any definition, be "state supported". Let's not make up definitions when real ones exist.Just to nibble at that, was the contract open to non-US companies?No.. but then there was no requirement for it to be either. In any open market anywhere on the planet, a buyer, State or Private, is free to set whatever restrictions they feel are important to them. After all, it's their money.
Quote from: Coastal Ron on 11/21/2016 03:44 amThey won competitively bid contracts for services. That would not, in any definition, be "state supported". Let's not make up definitions when real ones exist.Just to nibble at that, was the contract open to non-US companies?
They won competitively bid contracts for services. That would not, in any definition, be "state supported". Let's not make up definitions when real ones exist.
I understand what you're saying, and agree with much. What I'm trying to say (in a cack-handed way) is that the current methods are too slow, inflexible and prone to exploding to ever end up with a significant human space presence. Even Space X with a partially reusable rocket will take weeks (if not months) to reintegrate for a second launch.
It's a vicious circle: no destinations, no market; no market, no demand; no demand, no destinations. Until someone/something comes along to break that, it feels like we will be forever stuck in LEO for manned missions, GEO for communications, and the occasional splurge for scientific robotic observation BEO. So those of us dreaming of Moon/Mars colonies, orbital space stations, or research bases on Europa, will just keep on dreaming.
But after a 400 flight test programme (which is factored into the budget) they will know very well.
Some general comments and replies:Oddball wrote:QuoteI understand what you're saying, and agree with much. What I'm trying to say (in a cack-handed way) is that the current methods are too slow, inflexible and prone to exploding to ever end up with a significant human space presence. Even Space X with a partially reusable rocket will take weeks (if not months) to reintegrate for a second launch.Our "current methods" are in fact easily and fully capable of handling a much higher rate of traffic and payload-to-orbit than we currently have. Inflexible? Far from it actually as we've moved to a very flexible and rather 'containerized' mode of operations and did so in space launch LONG before most terrestrial transportation did so despite the rather obvious operational and economic incentives to do so. "Prone to exploding"? More to the point they are in fact no more 'prone' to not delivering cargo to the destination as most other transport systems historically. We don't generally put life jackets or parachutes on cargo containers "just in case" the ship goes down of the airplane crashes either.
Oh and before I forget, the ISS is really an example of what you WANT yet you argue like it's a 'bad' thing. After all we COULD use a Saturn-V or SLS to put up the whole thing in ONE flight and then send ONE other flight to carry all the supplies it will need for it's life time which gets you TWO (2) flights of a massively expensive system that you won't need/can't afford to do again for the life time of the station. Or you can fly dozens to hundreds of flights over the same lifetime with a more economic system.In theory you can put up a lot of other payloads that go far beyond LEO with the latter than the former, (note the "s" there) with much greater flexibility and utility. But it greatly depends on what your (or whoever's paying the bills) actual goal is now doesn't it? Randy
[So you've singularly failed to answer the actual question, so I'm going to have to guess at your implied answers.
You think state backed launch service providers will stick with indigenously developed launchers even if a reusable SSTO was for sale for nationalistic reasons.
...the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation will buy some just to take apart and reverse engineer...
Misconstrued word choice, two nations divided by a language.
I didn't mean Space Program in that narrow national sense but in the sense of having a space Industry that puts things in orbit and gets things done there, public/private is irrelevant to what I meant.
Thus when I talk about having a space industry vis à via an indigenously built one I'm implicitly not talking about developing Skylon I'm saying any space company choosing to operate launches from here would be good and produce economic gains for the national economy...
as studies of Skylon show it would
And that's state support. The state paid for something and then gave it away free to SpaceX.
The UK has invested $90million in REL, which was held up for two years while it was evaluated over whether it was illegal state aid, while NASA has spent $3144.6million on SpaceX over the same period...
I think you might be under the illusion that state support is bad...
I think this is very encouraging for REL:https://www.theengineer.co.uk/where-winners-can-emerge-and-grow/Hopefully it/something similar to this initiative can be delivered.I can see this (if it ever happens) manifesting itself in UK defence projects and I think that would be the best outcome for REL. I noticed a few months ago that the RAF launched a competition for 16-18 year olds to "design" a SABRE engine based long distance transport aircraft. if the UK can fund it's own Small launcher craft through the UKSA (MPs have been determined to create a larger scale national space programme) and an RAF funded large military transport craft in the mould of the 2 platforms on RELs new website, that would be a great strategy. the manufacturer, most likely a BAE (and possibly an additional partner) could simply commercialise the platforms for a fraction of the cost that developing the commercial platforms from scratch would cost. Also, point 5 in the extremely well written article below would seem to suggest that May is thinking along these lines too:http://www.politico.eu/article/5-takeaways-from-theresa-mays-speech-to-business-leaders/As a Brit very excited about RELs tech, I really hope that is how it pans out.
QuoteI think you might be under the illusion that state support is bad...No. I just like to keep the lines clear on what is state aid and what is payment for services rendered.
Quote from: Coastal Ron on 11/21/2016 11:46 pmQuoteI think you might be under the illusion that state support is bad...No. I just like to keep the lines clear on what is state aid and what is payment for services rendered.I think you mean keeping the line unclear. However you weasel around it, the state is helping an industrial sector to compete against foreigners - for whatever reasons and with whatever justification. Whether or not they have a right to is completely beside the point - I don't care about that and I can't see anyone else here who does. It only matters in as much as it seems improbable at this time that one might survive without such arrangements.
Nah. They'll just steal the designs and documents, which is far better than trying to reverse engineer something.
Building Skylon would provide an economic benefit, wouldn't it? Because once they sell a Skylon, I would imagine chances are it won't launch from the UK, so the only economic benefit would be from the building and selling of Skylon vehicles. That would be my observation.
Uh, anyone could come up with a study to "prove" something will happen. However no one really knows until it becomes reality. Just saying...
No one can 'break' a circle that in fact does NOT exist. Note that there IS a "demand" and a "market" in existence, the fact that it is not as large or extensive as some would like and that it does not in fact 'service' a market that does not exist but which some want to exist is totally beside the point.
The fallacy here is "we" need to "make" destinations and markets for reusable SSTO, (and yes that's the main argument FOR SSTO by the way) by building an extensive LEO orbital infrastructure for them to service.
Not so obviously does this apply to SSTO vehicles mostly for the fact that MOST SSTO concepts have never managed to reach a comparable operational payload to an ELV or multistage reusable vehicle. Note I wrote "operational payload" rather than just 'payload' because in fact while Skylon is an SSTO it does in fact require a second stage to allow getting the 'payload' to the most in-demand destinations despite that fact. But at least REL was realistic about that and therefore designed the Skylon with more capacity than the average SSTO concept.
Are there any other SSTO concepts out there in development? No, for the most part they have been found to be lacking in both economy and utility as has been pointed out. (Note though; in fact neither Musk or Beezos did much 'due-diligence' work on anything OTHER than the concepts they went forward with. Neither considered for example any type of air-breathing or horizontal take off/landing concepts as they did not consider them 'viable' BEFORE they began design trade studies. They already had made up their minds on what would and would not be included in the 'trades' of the designs) Pure-rocket powered VTOL SSTO's have in fact been suggested and pushed for decades but none have reached even prototype flight status. (No the DC-X was NOT a flight prototype but a very limited VTOL demonstrator) And for good reason as they suffer from a lack of payload in comparison to any multistage design and normally require much more complex and expensive technology to achieve.
And lastly on which is the better 'strategy' of builder/operator or builder to owner/operator for the most part the differing sides seem bound and determined to ignore history and reality to make their point The latter ALWAYS takes over from the former once a certain level of traffic is reached as the builders can no longer afford to do both they inevitably form partnerships/consortiums to "buy" the vehicles and then own and operate them while they then concentrate on design and manufacture of new and improved vehicles. REL is simply assuming that the traffic levels will hit the levels that both SpaceX and BO are PLANNING on reaching and planning accordingly while SpaceX and BO are currently not looking to that point. Yet.
Just to nit-pick one thing. I did specify that the exploding thing was a hindrance to human presence, not cargo. Annual rocket failures seem to be bumping around in the 5% area, so 1 in 20 flights frequently has a fiery, premature end. Go to Heathrow and tell all those business and tourist travelers that every flight has a 1 in 20 chance of catastrophic failure, killing everyone aboard. Excluding the mentally ill, suicidal and people under extreme duress, I'll take a wild stab in the dark that zero people would choose to fly. Even if they were, there'd be no pilots or cabin staff willing to roll that D20-of-death every time they did their job. Hopefully the abort system in the SpaceX Dragon module will at least mean that it's just very expensive, instead of tragic.
I don't think I criticised the end result. Just the cost, the time it took to construct, and the fact we don't/can't use it as a staging point.
The ISS mass is supposed to be 420 metric tonnes. The Saturn V could lift 140 metric tonnes, but only half way to the height the ISS is currently stationed. I expect that mass figure to be lower due to the inclination, and the extra height required. So just on mass it's going to be 4 or more flights + 1 for supplies. I don't have a sense of how many components could be launched on a single rocket though, as there are no wikipedia details of the Saturn V's payload dimensions.
Quote from: lkm on 11/21/2016 12:29 pm[So you've singularly failed to answer the actual question, so I'm going to have to guess at your implied answers.Lots of issues here, so I'm not knowingly not answering whatever question you thought was the actual question. Especially since I was the one that started the conversation...
Quote from: lkm on 11/21/2016 12:29 pmYou think state backed launch service providers will stick with indigenously developed launchers even if a reusable SSTO was for sale for nationalistic reasons.Yep.
Quote from: lkm on 11/21/2016 12:29 pmThus when I talk about having a space industry vis à via an indigenously built one I'm implicitly not talking about developing Skylon I'm saying any space company choosing to operate launches from here would be good and produce economic gains for the national economy...Building Skylon would provide an economic benefit, wouldn't it? Because once they sell a Skylon, I would imagine chances are it won't launch from the UK, so the only economic benefit would be from the building and selling of Skylon vehicles. That would be my observation.Quoteas studies of Skylon show it wouldUh, anyone could come up with a study to "prove" something will happen. However no one really knows until it becomes reality. Just saying...
SABRE could potentially create 21,000 high value engineering and manufacturing jobs and maximise the UK’s access to a conservatively estimated £13.8bn launcher market over the next thirty years as well as provide economic benefits from spillovers. London Economics estimated the socio‐economic impacts for Europe of a SKYLON‐based European Launch Service Operator at €20‐24bn in Net Present Value terms (2014 prices, nominally 30 years)
Quote from: lkm on 11/21/2016 12:29 pmAnd that's state support. The state paid for something and then gave it away free to SpaceX.No, U.S. Taxpayers (individuals and companies) paid for it. And by law, NASA must share their research with U.S. companies.
Quote from: lkm on 11/21/2016 12:29 pmThe UK has invested $90million in REL, which was held up for two years while it was evaluated over whether it was illegal state aid, while NASA has spent $3144.6million on SpaceX over the same period...NASA paid SpaceX to perform services for NASA. So that is not the same as what you are describing. Apples & oranges.QuoteI think you might be under the illusion that state support is bad...No. I just like to keep the lines clear on what is state aid and what is payment for services rendered.
In November 2005, Dr. Griffin articulated that:With the advent of the ISS, there will exist for the first time a strong, identifiable market for "routine" transportation service to and from LEO, and that this will be only the first step in what will be a huge opportunity for truly commercial space enterprise. We believe that when we engage the engine of competition, these services will be provided in a more cost-effective fashion than when the government has to do it.[7]
Something I'd like people to keep in mind. Let's just repeat that for people who think either of them looked at Skylon:neither Musk or Beezos did much 'due-diligence' work on anything OTHER than the concepts they went forward with.
Quote from: DM27 on 11/21/2016 02:28 pmI think this is very encouraging for REL:https://www.theengineer.co.uk/where-winners-can-emerge-and-grow/Hopefully it/something similar to this initiative can be delivered.I can see this (if it ever happens) manifesting itself in UK defence projects and I think that would be the best outcome for REL. I noticed a few months ago that the RAF launched a competition for 16-18 year olds to "design" a SABRE engine based long distance transport aircraft. if the UK can fund it's own Small launcher craft through the UKSA (MPs have been determined to create a larger scale national space programme) and an RAF funded large military transport craft in the mould of the 2 platforms on RELs new website, that would be a great strategy. the manufacturer, most likely a BAE (and possibly an additional partner) could simply commercialise the platforms for a fraction of the cost that developing the commercial platforms from scratch would cost. Also, point 5 in the extremely well written article below would seem to suggest that May is thinking along these lines too:http://www.politico.eu/article/5-takeaways-from-theresa-mays-speech-to-business-leaders/As a Brit very excited about RELs tech, I really hope that is how it pans out.Well you're going to be disappointed then with the predicted huge budget shortfall which I expect we'll hear more of at the autumn statement this just isn't going to happen.After all the argument could be made as to why should the British taxpayer fund this when hopefully BAE will be able to get the USAF sufficiently interested in the technology that they will pick up the tab to develop it further.
Quote from: john smith 19 on 11/22/2016 08:31 amSomething I'd like people to keep in mind. Let's just repeat that for people who think either of them looked at Skylon:neither Musk or Beezos did much 'due-diligence' work on anything OTHER than the concepts they went forward with. Repeating such an assertion does not make it any more true.