Author Topic: Space Access '11 Live Blog  (Read 35364 times)

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #60 on: 04/09/2011 01:07 am »
Rich Pournelle on NanoRacks

Developed as racks for experiments on ISS. 4x4 Cubesat form factor. $25 k for 30 days on station, without return. More for return. Flys in space-qualified camera bag. About 50 payloads so far. 1U, 3U and 4U sizes. All-commercial system; great relationship with NASA. Open source standard.

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #61 on: 04/09/2011 01:20 am »
Rick Tumlinson on the Texas Space Alliance and Space Diver

Change the conversation about space in Texas. Make Texas world leader in spaceflight, and just of a single federal facility. Armadillo, Blue Origin and others, but state does not recognize it. 501C4 lobbying organization. Texas is late to the game. Get to learn from other's mistakes. Worked with Blue Origin on a liability law, that has passed state senate. Crown jewel is spaceports.


Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #62 on: 04/09/2011 03:47 am »
Bruce Pittman on NASA Ames Space Portal

For helping commercial space. Strong legal background for doing that. Moving from Apollo model to Commercial Leverage model. CRuSR: Commercial Reusable Suborbital Research -> NASA as a customer. Two contracts, one each to Armadillo and Masten. Commercial and Government Responsive Access to Space Technology Exchange: NASA, AFRL, and FAA sponsored.

Did propellant depot analysis after HEFT1 rejected it, and thus they are now at least in play.

Six Innovative Lunar Demonstration Data contracts to share data with GLXP teams. Lunar Orphan (instrument) Flight Test program. International Lunar Research Park discussion with Japanese (Pacific International Space Alliance).

Preparing for the Lunar Wet Gold Rush...

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #63 on: 04/09/2011 04:18 am »
Dave Masten on Masten Space Systems

A lot of building up the business over last year. Making more like a business rather than a hobby.

Signed Letter of Intent with Space Florida. Florida going to be hungry pretty soon; pick of litter. Also, most friendly for scheduling and range.

Scimatar engine: LOX/Isopropal, 1800 lbf, 9:1 throttling, 225 sec Isp, pintle injector. Isoprop best in terms of operations.

Xaero capable of reaching reaching 30 km. 5 km in Q2 2011. Drag brakes on nose. Katana next engine, Xogdor next vehicle.

Rant: "Senate Launch System" in not going to fly. And could give ammunition to really cut NASA budgets.

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #64 on: 04/09/2011 04:42 am »
Ian Kluft on StratoFox

Volunteer tracking team; stratospheric foxhunt. Mostly hams interested in space. Combination of ARPS and directional. Mostly at Black Rock (Class G airspace) and northern California. Most famous recovery was CSXT's all-volunteer space shot in 2004 to 72 miles. Black Rock can be much cheaper than federal launch ranges.

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #65 on: 04/09/2011 05:04 am »
Keith Henson on High Volume/Low Cost Bases On New Semiconductor Lasers

Huge valley of death between comm sats and power sats. Launching 3-4 Skylons per hour to launch power sats. Beamed energy propulsion to make cheaper, using high-power diode lasers.

"Couple of problems with this design": understatement of the conference...

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #66 on: 04/09/2011 05:31 am »
Donovan Chipman on Mars To Go: A Minimal Manned Mars Sample Return Mission

Minimal technology mission. Falcon or Delta Heavy launch. Solar plus VASMIR. One-man Corona-based capsule. Bigelow Galaxy. MSL aeroshell and Skycrane. One man open-cockpit ascent vehicle. Good for day or two on surface. MSL-based manned rover. Total mass to LEO: <53 tonnes. Aerobrake (not aerocapture) to low Mars orbit.

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #67 on: 04/09/2011 04:50 pm »
Roger Longstaff on Reaction Engines

Very busy past year. C1 could be completed with existing technology, assuming testing goes to plan. NASA and ESA reviews. SABRE demo in Q3 2011. Precooler is only really new component in SABRE.

First HOTOL wouldn't have worked. About $30 million spent on second HOTOL (mostly BAe private funding). Very unstable, complex launch trolley. 50 people working at Skylon today.

Carry a tank of water to force shutdown in abort case. Mechanical compression. Much lighter to control than HOTOL. Payload of 10.2 tonnes to LEO for C1, 7 tonnes to ISS, 3 tonnes to sun-synchronous. Max temp 1900 K on nose/tail. Takes in >1000 tonnes of air, >250 tonnes of O2 during ascent. In air, Isp is halfway between turbojet and pure rocket. Takeoff at Mach 0.84. Most mass lost after switch to pure rocket. Subsonic L/D is same as Shuttle. 5 km runway at moment, Korou could work.

Working on D1 design with target of 15 tonnes to LEO. Allows launch of GEO sat with reusable upper stage. 50 tonnes heavier, but still half the mass of a A380. SABRE 4 engine.

Nacelle test vehicle programme in plan. Ready for full development by prime contractor by 2014. Could fly by 2018, operational by 2020. Once operational, $4-5 million per flight. If it works, very disruptive. But, need $15 billion to get working, comparable to A380.

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #68 on: 04/09/2011 05:18 pm »
Timothy Bendel on Frontier Astronautics

Offers hard-get goods and services to entrepreneurial space companies. Converted Atlas E silo to test stand. Three-axis movement test stand. Structural design services. Software ACS flight simulator with Simulink. Offers space for companies to establish Wyoming residency.

XL systems making H2O2. SpeedUp, Luna City. Stone Aerospace working on Europa sub. CU-Boulder. Open Source Launch Vehicle.

Darma South Korean CH4 10-ton engine (descended from KSLV engine). $3 million per engine (1/10 the cost of RL-10).

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #69 on: 04/09/2011 05:32 pm »
Bob Steinke on SpeedUp

Hybrid peroxide-polyethylene engine for upper stages. Full-scale is 6-inch motor. Had failure with 2 inch rocket: engine unlit and the relit with hard start, blew injector off. Lesson: hybrids are not explosion proof. Laramie Rose Lunar X Prize entry: too late, but still want get flying. New, non-pryo valve actuator: self-contained pneumatic ball-valve actuator powered by CO2 cartridge.

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #70 on: 04/09/2011 06:56 pm »
Jim Muncy

Not in a pure "fly at your own risk" environment, but regulations officially have to be based on real data. Current commercial space act expires soon, as 8-year period allocated for collecting data. Since not as fast as expected, requesting an extension to have 8 years from the first revenue-generating manned flight.

Orion is not in competition with commercial. LM bought OFT-1 Delta IV with their money. NASA doesn't have enough money to launch Orion to ISS. Orion plus Falcon-launched injection stage could do lunar flyby. Hope is that SLS is delayed enough to allow for commercial systems to replace Shuttle Derived. Seems absurd that KSC and JSC want to wait for MSFC to design a rocket, rather than just use commercial systems. Shuttle Derived is a short-term politically-expedient solution. Do you want a jobs program or a space program? Only 5% of DoD cares about solid-rocket industrial base.

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #71 on: 04/09/2011 09:04 pm »
Russ Blink on Armadillo Aerospace

Working with Rocket Racing; 55 tonnes of propellant. You know you're doing a lot of rocket testing when it gets annoying.

Worked with JSC to build the Super Quad. JSC finishing up testing; fly it in Houston by early May. Really good collaboration, going both ways. Two-stage film cooling.

Stig is 29 feet tall; Mod with different tanks. First tether test with Stig had fixed engine and still "hovered" for a bit. Use leftover Helium to eject nose. First 29 km down on drogue, last 1 km on mains. Issues with New Mexico Spaceport getting used to liquid rockets. Actually much easier to hover than Pixel or Texel. Planning 100,000 ft on first flight, going to 100 km later. Lots of improvements planned for Stig. Issues with LOX freezing the alcohol.

Manned vehicle (Hyperion) about size of Gemini: 8-ft diameter, 8 engines (4 pairs). Next vehicle after Stig, ready to start.

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #72 on: 04/09/2011 09:34 pm »
Paul Breed on Unreasonable Rocket

Unreasonably Lazy Year. 100g IMU project. Old electronic box is 1 kg, and that's too big. Eventual 100 km and orbital goals.

3D printing rocket nozzles in stainless steel. Plastic in process filled cooling channels -> use multiple pieces, but welding destroys stainless coating. So, direct metal sintering: more expensive, but works much better.

About 20 flights with new IMU. Low-cost IMUs really don't like rocket vibrations. Analog Devices IMU works well. None of the commercial GPS systems could keep lock. So, building GPS integrated IMU with open source hardware and software. COTS GPS front-end with FPGA back-end. Can use IMU to narrow parameter space for GPS.

Working with Microcosom on adapting mass-ratio=82 LOX tanks; finding compatible resin and fiber. Industrial resin and Kevlar.

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #73 on: 04/09/2011 11:58 pm »
Rand Simberg on Competitive Space Task Force

Attempting to organize to political conservatives to support commercial space.  Current model is Cold War legacy. Apollo was a state-socialist model in response to Soviet state-socialist model. Created a NASA that wasn't pro-enterprise. Focus on safety over cost. Ecological niches are a function of technology. One billion dollars will get you 2/3 of a Shuttle launch, or three SpaceXs. Don't spend billions having evacuation systems for South Pole station. Move NASA/FAA/DoD space to "Space Guard", based on Coast Guard model.

Online robertross

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #74 on: 04/10/2011 12:03 am »
Paul Breed on Unreasonable Rocket
...
3D printing rocket nozzles in stainless steel. Plastic in process filled cooling channels -> use multiple pieces, but welding destroys stainless coating. So, direct metal sintering: more expensive, but works much better.

That sounds really interesting!

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #75 on: 04/10/2011 12:26 am »
Rick Maschek on Sugar Shot To Space

Great stories of launching rockets with kids. :)

Sugar Shot: launch a Sugar-Potassium Nitrate rocket to space. Parts built all over the world. Next step is 100,000 ft rocket. Single stage solid rocket that burns twice; boost, coast, reignite. Reignition difficult.

Offline WulfTheSaxon

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #76 on: 04/10/2011 12:34 am »
Rand Simberg on Competitive Space Task Force
[snip]
Focus on safety over cost[…] Don't spend billions having evacuation systems for South Pole station.

Is he saying that cost is more important than safety? If not, those 2 statements seem to be rather contradictory. (Then again, a lot of what he says never seems to make any sense.)

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #77 on: 04/10/2011 12:46 am »
Joe Lee on An Open Source Launch Vehicle Project

Amateur racetrack mentality: share strategy, but openly compete. Products and services for "small space". Need common and open tools and methods. Work on tools collaboratively. Approach the market as a cooperative -> needs a cerntain type of investor.

Offline simonbp

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #78 on: 04/10/2011 12:51 am »
Rand Simberg on Competitive Space Task Force
[snip]
Focus on safety over cost[…] Don't spend billions having evacuation systems for South Pole station.

Is he saying that cost is more important than safety? If not, those 2 statements seem to be rather contradictory. (Then again, a lot of what he says never seems to make any sense.)

No, he was saying that NASA, being a government program, focuses on putting a lot of money into adding only a modicum of safety. Echoing an argument made earlier in the conference, companies don't make money killing people (especially if they are a start-up), so the free market does tend towards efficient (rather than showy) safety systems.

Offline Jorge

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Re: Space Access '11 Live Blog
« Reply #79 on: 04/10/2011 12:51 am »
Rand Simberg on Competitive Space Task Force
[snip]
Focus on safety over cost[…] Don't spend billions having evacuation systems for South Pole station.

Is he saying that cost is more important than safety? If not, those 2 statements seem to be rather contradictory. (Then again, a lot of what he says never seems to make any sense.)

Dude, you're taking shorthand notes from simonbp (already short of context) and snipping out the parts that could have provided you that context, namely:

"Created a NASA that wasn't pro-enterprise. Focus on safety over cost."

shows that "Focus on safety over cost" clearly refers to NASA, and "Don't spend billions having evacuation systems for South Pole station" refers to a non-NASA practice (and the model he thinks NASA should be following).

I don't agree with Rand on many issues, but your post is ridiculous.
JRF

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