Rocket Lab Mars Sample Return Mission Proposal

[Robotbeat]

Personally I am quite puzzled by RL's insistent on pursuing this. JPL already did a trade study on storable Delphin 10 years ago for MAV and all of that is published. I'm sure Rutherford is more reliable than Delphin but a lot of this proposal reads like retreading the same work that was already done 10 years ago. That's not a recipe for a more efficient program, just feels like doing it for the sake of doing it.

'Somebody studied something similar in the past but did not pursue it further, therefore the idea must be worthless' has not played out well thus far (e.g. booster stage re-use, full-flow staged combustion, methane-LOX cycle engines, electric pumped engines, etc).

Yup. Just like cryogenic composite tanks were tried by X-33 and “didn’t work,” RocketLab (like SpaceX) has perfected some technologies that had been dismissed by traditional aerospace players in the past.

[sanman]

Somebody studied something similar in the past but did not pursue it further, therefore the idea must be worthless' has not played out well thus far (e.g. booster stage re-use, full-flow staged combustion, methane-LOX cycle engines, electric pumped engines, etc).

Yup. Just like cryogenic composite tanks were tried by X-33 and “didn’t work,” RocketLab (like SpaceX) has perfected some technologies that had been dismissed by traditional aerospace players in the past.

Yeah, like Soviet N1 tried the many-engines thing and failed, but Musk & Starship are now succeeding.
Beck's and Rocket Lab's continued desire to get the MSR contract makes me think there's some deeper vision/goal in mind, even if he's not coming out and saying so.
But could something like that tech proposal be used for a Lunar Sample Return? Maybe they could settle for something like that, if it was available, even if they can't get MSR. Or what about Titan Sample Return?

[Robotbeat]

Well, MSR is an absolutely enormous contract for the size of company that RocketLab is, and it’d catapult RL to a first tier spacecraft provider equal to (or surpassing?) Lockheed Martin. It also plays to RL’s strengths in terms of sophisticated small spacecraft, reentry capsules, storable propellant stages, etc.

In terms of contract value, it could be comparable to Starship being selected for Artemis ($3B for Artemis 3, with $1B for the follow-on Artemis 4). Remember, MSR was $11B before it was reconfigured/rethought.

Even if it was just $1.5 billion, that’s equivalent to 200 Electron launches (!).

[Robotbeat]

And yeah, if selected for MSR, it opens the door up for other planetary missions. MSR is like the mother of all robotic missions.

[pilottim]

Personally I am quite puzzled by RL's insistent on pursuing this. JPL already did a trade study on storable Delphin 10 years ago for MAV and all of that is published. I'm sure Rutherford is more reliable than Delphin but a lot of this proposal reads like retreading the same work that was already done 10 years ago. That's not a recipe for a more efficient program, just feels like doing it for the sake of doing it.

'Somebody studied something similar in the past but did not pursue it further, therefore the idea must be worthless' has not played out well thus far (e.g. booster stage re-use, full-flow staged combustion, methane-LOX cycle engines, electric pumped engines, etc).

I highly doubt the physics of storable versus SRM being stored on Mars has changed in the last ten years. I know the Delphin study still get passed around now. Objectively speaking RL has very little experience in this area and stakeholders have no reason to place trust on RL delivering. This is a VERY reasonable viewpoint. To me, when JPL at one point was looking at Astra and other startups for MAV propulsion it is hard to make the argument that they weren't looking at non traditional trade spaces at the time. MSR stakeholders want things to work, not a startup funding program. If RL wants to demonstrate their competency they are free to self fund a mission, but going on podcasts to talk about how they were wronged because NASA is unwilling to put taxpayer dollars into RL at this moment is not great.

[JEF_300]

I highly doubt the physics of storable versus SRM being stored on Mars has changed in the last ten years. I know the Delphin study still get passed around now.

We gotta remember that losing a trade study doesn't make something a bad option, just not the best option. Trade studies are also a product of and for their environment. The trade study is probably right, and an SRM is probably the better option compared to a storable electrically pumped engine... for NASA. For Rocket Lab, not having to learn an entirely different type of propulsion technology might tilt the scales a bit, don't you think?

Granted, I haven't read this study, so maybe the specific of electrically pumped storables are uniquely damning for whatever reason. But I doubt it.

[TrevorMonty]

I highly doubt the physics of storable versus SRM being stored on Mars has changed in the last ten years. I know the Delphin study still get passed around now.

There are 100s of satellites that have ben operating for years and decades in some cases using storable propellants. Why shouldn't the same propellants last for a few months on Mars?

We gotta remember that losing a trade study doesn't make something a bad option, just not the best option. Trade studies are also a product of and for their environment. The trade study is probably right, and an SRM is probably the better option compared to a storable electrically pumped engine... for NASA. For Rocket Lab, not having to learn an entirely different type of propulsion technology might tilt the scales a bit, don't you think?

Granted, I haven't read this study, so maybe the specific of electrically pumped storables are uniquely damning for whatever reason. But I doubt it.

[armchairfan]

There are 100s of satellites that have ben operating for years and decades in some cases using storable propellants. Why shouldn't the same propellants last for a few months on Mars?

The thermal environment and available power are different for satellites vs. landers. For example, one challenge is keeping traditional storables (say, MMH and NTO) from freezing during the night.

That said, I don't know what storable propellants RocketLab uses for their Curie or Hyper Curie engines -- much less what they'd use for a Mars Ascent Vehicle engine(s).

[edzieba]

A link to (or even cite for) this "Delphin study" would be helpful. NTRS turns up nothing from JPL for 'Delphin'.

[pilottim]

I highly doubt the physics of storable versus SRM being stored on Mars has changed in the last ten years. I know the Delphin study still get passed around now.

We gotta remember that losing a trade study doesn't make something a bad option, just not the best option. Trade studies are also a product of and for their environment. The trade study is probably right, and an SRM is probably the better option compared to a storable electrically pumped engine... for NASA. For Rocket Lab, not having to learn an entirely different type of propulsion technology might tilt the scales a bit, don't you think?

Granted, I haven't read this study, so maybe the specific of electrically pumped storables are uniquely damning for whatever reason. But I doubt it.

Sure, you can read them here. I am only using Delphin because it's the engine most similar to Rutherford that has already been studied by JPL for MAV, but you can find other studies for other options.

https://dataverse.jpl.nasa.gov/dataset.xhtml?persistentId=hdl:2014/48568

This is a NASA mission, not an RL mission. The science drives the engineering, not the other way around. If RL is so inclined, they are free to self fund their own mission. There is zero reason for stakeholders to choose RL with electric pump experience over AJ with more matured SRM experience.

[Robotbeat]

On the contrary, (the relevant part of) MSR is basically entirely an engineering mission, as the samples are being selected and cached by another (part of the) mission (Perseverance).

The RL team has experience with RL hardware, so there obviously is tons of rationale why they wouldn’t just automatically pick a part from some vendor that they are not familiar with, even if JPL might do it differently.