Author Topic: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.  (Read 72160 times)

Offline mr. mark

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Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« on: 10/16/2014 03:27 am »
« Last Edit: 10/16/2014 03:53 am by mr. mark »

Offline Danderman

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #1 on: 10/16/2014 03:52 am »
Another pitch for ESA funding.

I don't remember the last time a big Euro aerospace firm developed a project (apart from GEO comsats) without first seeking Euros from ESA. It's kind of like our Boeing and Lockheed problem in this country, the concept of risking capital on markets is foreign, so no new markets get developed.

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #2 on: 10/16/2014 03:56 am »
Its a step in the right direction, even if they are only recovering the engines.

Offline Eric Hedman

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #3 on: 10/16/2014 03:59 am »
It would be interesting to see a comparison of the mass penalty for this concept versus the stage reuse for Falcon.  I'm sure there has to be some fairly significant structures to allow the engines to seperate from the tanks and be aerodynamic enough for flight back to a runway and the weight of jet engines and fuel.

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #4 on: 10/16/2014 07:48 am »
Its only a patent and they call it basic research, I wouldn't get my hopes up.

Kind of reminds me of ULA's plans to recover the engine section. Interesting tidbit: Apparently engines, electronics, etc. make up 80% of the stage's value.

It would be interesting to see a comparison of the mass penalty for this concept versus the stage reuse for Falcon.  I'm sure there has to be some fairly significant structures to allow the engines to seperate from the tanks and be aerodynamic enough for flight back to a runway and the weight of jet engines and fuel.

The mass penalty is certainly a lot lower than with boost-back. Its no secret that flyback is more efficient. Whether its cheaper overall is another question.
« Last Edit: 10/16/2014 07:50 am by Oli »

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #6 on: 06/05/2015 02:28 pm »
Some photos from Aviation Week Twitter

https://twitter.com/avweekparis




Offline Borklund

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #7 on: 06/05/2015 02:36 pm »
Neat. Any chance this will morph into Ariane 7?

Edit: Looks like they're trying to sell this as an Ariane 6 evolution.
« Last Edit: 06/05/2015 03:03 pm by Borklund »

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #8 on: 06/05/2015 02:57 pm »
I think the version below is just a demonstrator that will fly some time in 2018 with a 500kn CH4 engine called "Romeo".

Interesting that they use turboprops for fly back.

They need a new CH4 engine for replacing Vulcain 2 on A6 around 2025, who's going to pay for that?
« Last Edit: 06/05/2015 03:15 pm by Oli »

Offline RonM

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #9 on: 06/05/2015 03:19 pm »
Interesting idea. It could be used on Ariane 6 if it works.

Now we have three reuse concepts: SpaceX land the whole first stage using the engine, ULA catch the engine module with a helicopter, Airbus fly the engine module back like an airplane. Each plan has benefits and tradeoffs. It will be interesting to see how economics plays out. I'm sure they can all be made to work, but which one results in the lowest reuse costs. Only time will tell.

Offline ChrisWilson68

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #10 on: 06/05/2015 04:11 pm »
Interesting idea. It could be used on Ariane 6 if it works.

Now we have three reuse concepts: SpaceX land the whole first stage using the engine, ULA catch the engine module with a helicopter, Airbus fly the engine module back like an airplane. Each plan has benefits and tradeoffs. It will be interesting to see how economics plays out. I'm sure they can all be made to work, but which one results in the lowest reuse costs. Only time will tell.

The big difference is that SpaceX has already built its system and is in the midst of a test program for the full-fledged system.  The other two are slideware only, with no commitment for funding.

Offline ChrisWilson68

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #11 on: 06/05/2015 04:13 pm »
The mass penalty is certainly a lot lower than with boost-back. Its no secret that flyback is more efficient.

Neither of those is a given.  Whether they are true depends on the details of the design.  Nobody can answer that question with certainty until both design ideas have working implementations, and even then we'll only know for sure about those particular implementations.

Offline RonM

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #12 on: 06/05/2015 04:31 pm »
Interesting idea. It could be used on Ariane 6 if it works.

Now we have three reuse concepts: SpaceX land the whole first stage using the engine, ULA catch the engine module with a helicopter, Airbus fly the engine module back like an airplane. Each plan has benefits and tradeoffs. It will be interesting to see how economics plays out. I'm sure they can all be made to work, but which one results in the lowest reuse costs. Only time will tell.

The big difference is that SpaceX has already built its system and is in the midst of a test program for the full-fledged system.  The other two are slideware only, with no commitment for funding.

That's why we see ULA and Airbus coming up with reuse designs. They probably believe SpaceX will be successful and their expendable launch vehicles will not be able to compete on the open market. The big question is whether or not they'll get the funding to try to compete.

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #13 on: 06/05/2015 04:55 pm »
The mass penalty is certainly a lot lower than with boost-back. Its no secret that flyback is more efficient.

Neither of those is a given.  Whether they are true depends on the details of the design.

It's pretty much a given, unless the fly back designers are utterly incompetent. As I said, economics is a completely different question.
« Last Edit: 06/05/2015 04:56 pm by Oli »

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #14 on: 06/05/2015 06:19 pm »
BBC article Airbus unveils 'Adeline' re-usable rocket concept

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-33006056

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Offline baldusi

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #15 on: 06/05/2015 06:23 pm »
I find it very interesting that they used the Soyuz ELS pad for the video, even using the tulip! I see that and I see a small plane, with heavy TPS, with wings that need heat protection, plus it's own tank and pressurization system, and a critical design for the downcomers. Plus two turboprops with foldable blades. And then the landing gears that need to damp the high speed of approach. And in the end they'll have to still integrate it again. I still don't see this as easy as they put it now. I keep thinking of the STS concept and what it ended up being.
All because they don't want to do supersonic retropropulsion nor an engine with lots of restarts. It would seem more like what you would do if you wanted to return the Vulcain 3, but are not willing to risk the ULA approach (which has a 6% of payload penalty, btw).

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #16 on: 06/05/2015 06:33 pm »
Interesting that the project has been going since 2010 and they've flown a sub scale prototype. But another 10 years of development, if funded, feels like it'll be a bit late to the party (unless SoaceX fail to get 1st stage reusability working).

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #17 on: 06/05/2015 06:43 pm »
I find it very interesting that they used the Soyuz ELS pad for the video, even using the tulip! I see that and I see a small plane, with heavy TPS, with wings that need heat protection, plus it's own tank and pressurization system, and a critical design for the downcomers. Plus two turboprops with foldable blades. And then the landing gears that need to damp the high speed of approach. And in the end they'll have to still integrate it again. I still don't see this as easy as they put it now. I keep thinking of the STS concept and what it ended up being.

Oh come on, now you're exaggerating. The thing reenters ballistically by the way, so it will probably switch to flying at subsonic speeds.

The real issue is who's going to pay for it and whether the cost savings are as high as advocated, which is doubtful. I see it more as a backup plan similar to ULAs.


Offline Rebel44

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #18 on: 06/05/2015 06:52 pm »
The mass penalty is certainly a lot lower than with boost-back. Its no secret that flyback is more efficient.

Neither of those is a given.  Whether they are true depends on the details of the design.

It's pretty much a given, unless the fly back designers are utterly incompetent. As I said, economics is a completely different question.

Its likely, but question is, how much more efficient it would be, compared to SpaceX apprach.

SpaceX penalty is based on:
extra fuel for boostback and landing
legs

Airbus penalty is based on:
extra fuel for flyback and landing (but much less than SpaceX approach)
wings
engines
landing gear
mechanism for clean separation from rest of 1st stage

So, Airbus needs less extra fuel, but has extra components, so efficiency (in favor of Airbus) difference might be relatively small.
« Last Edit: 06/05/2015 06:53 pm by Rebel44 »

Offline Borklund

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #19 on: 06/05/2015 07:06 pm »
Concept video


Offline meekGee

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #20 on: 06/05/2015 07:18 pm »
These concepts are viable for today-ish flight rates,  but utterly fail in comparison with a rapidly reusable rocket that flies on a day-ish rate.
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Offline JasonAW3

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #21 on: 06/05/2015 07:38 pm »
While I realize that the tank is a relatively cheap item, should (more like when) SpaceX get the first stage recovery down pat, Airbus will STILL not be quite as competative as SpaceX will be.

     Flat out, between SpaceX, Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin, we are now in the "Barn Storming" era of space flight.  Yes, there will be losses, and yes, people WILL die, but, as much as I hate to say it, this is the cost of new frontiers.

     Lives, money and resources will be spent, no matter what.

     Airbus' idea SEEMS clever at first, but the cost of all the tanks they'll be building will ad up FAST!
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Offline friendly3

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #22 on: 06/05/2015 07:39 pm »


Sorry, couldn't resist.
« Last Edit: 07/17/2017 02:34 pm by friendly3 »

Offline RonM

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #23 on: 06/05/2015 08:06 pm »
These concepts are viable for today-ish flight rates,  but utterly fail in comparison with a rapidly reusable rocket that flies on a day-ish rate.

I don't think that is important in the near future. There are fewer than 100 flights per year worldwide. Aiming for a one month turnaround would be sufficient for the next generation of rockets. SpaceX is getting into the satellite business to drive up the number of launches and they won't be booking any flights with ULA or Ariane.

Anyway, if you have to launch everyday then 8 to 10 launch vehicles with about a week turnaround will keep you flying everyday.

Offline ChrisWilson68

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #24 on: 06/05/2015 08:23 pm »
The mass penalty is certainly a lot lower than with boost-back. Its no secret that flyback is more efficient.

Neither of those is a given.  Whether they are true depends on the details of the design.

It's pretty much a given, unless the fly back designers are utterly incompetent. As I said, economics is a completely different question.

You're just repeating a claim without providing even a shred of evidence.  Surely you can come up with something to back that up.

Offline ChrisWilson68

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #25 on: 06/05/2015 08:30 pm »
These concepts are viable for today-ish flight rates,  but utterly fail in comparison with a rapidly reusable rocket that flies on a day-ish rate.

I don't think that is important in the near future. There are fewer than 100 flights per year worldwide. Aiming for a one month turnaround would be sufficient for the next generation of rockets. SpaceX is getting into the satellite business to drive up the number of launches and they won't be booking any flights with ULA or Ariane.

Anyway, if you have to launch everyday then 8 to 10 launch vehicles with about a week turnaround will keep you flying everyday.

The point is that if you have to build a new tank for every launch it's very expensive to launch every day.

Offline RonM

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #26 on: 06/05/2015 08:44 pm »
These concepts are viable for today-ish flight rates,  but utterly fail in comparison with a rapidly reusable rocket that flies on a day-ish rate.

I don't think that is important in the near future. There are fewer than 100 flights per year worldwide. Aiming for a one month turnaround would be sufficient for the next generation of rockets. SpaceX is getting into the satellite business to drive up the number of launches and they won't be booking any flights with ULA or Ariane.

Anyway, if you have to launch everyday then 8 to 10 launch vehicles with about a week turnaround will keep you flying everyday.

The point is that if you have to build a new tank for every launch it's very expensive to launch every day.

True, but we'll have to see how cheap the SpaceX approach is really going to be. They are having to fire some of the engines multiple times, requiring more maintenance. The landing procedure is also risky with the possibility of loosing vehicles. You can't reuse a rocket that blew up on landing.

SpaceX is trying to maximize reuse and that's a good thing. However, it is not given that it will be an economic success. Now if it is a success than ULA and Airbus are in trouble because their systems require new tanks. If SpaceX turns out to be spending too much money to recover the tanks than ULA and Airbus have good plans.

We won't know until SpaceX is actually flying used cores and adding up the costs.

Offline ChrisWilson68

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #27 on: 06/05/2015 08:50 pm »
These concepts are viable for today-ish flight rates,  but utterly fail in comparison with a rapidly reusable rocket that flies on a day-ish rate.

I don't think that is important in the near future. There are fewer than 100 flights per year worldwide. Aiming for a one month turnaround would be sufficient for the next generation of rockets. SpaceX is getting into the satellite business to drive up the number of launches and they won't be booking any flights with ULA or Ariane.

Anyway, if you have to launch everyday then 8 to 10 launch vehicles with about a week turnaround will keep you flying everyday.

The point is that if you have to build a new tank for every launch it's very expensive to launch every day.

True, but we'll have to see how cheap the SpaceX approach is really going to be. They are having to fire some of the engines multiple times, requiring more maintenance. The landing procedure is also risky with the possibility of loosing vehicles. You can't reuse a rocket that blew up on landing.

SpaceX is trying to maximize reuse and that's a good thing. However, it is not given that it will be an economic success. Now if it is a success than ULA and Airbus are in trouble because their systems require new tanks. If SpaceX turns out to be spending too much money to recover the tanks than ULA and Airbus have good plans.

We won't know until SpaceX is actually flying used cores and adding up the costs.

I agree it's not yet certain SpaceX will be able to make high-volume launch very cheap.

But at least with SpaceX's approach very cheap launch is one of the possible outcomes.  With the ULA and Airbus concepts, it's not one of the possible outcomes.

Offline ChrisWilson68

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #28 on: 06/05/2015 08:55 pm »
In other words, Airbus and ULA are betting their companies on SpaceX failing.  Even their most ambitious advanced concepts that they might have ready in 10 years at the earliest can't compete if SpaceX succeeds at what SpaceX is all-in on trying to do.

Offline baldusi

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #29 on: 06/05/2015 09:14 pm »
I find it very interesting that they used the Soyuz ELS pad for the video, even using the tulip! I see that and I see a small plane, with heavy TPS, with wings that need heat protection, plus it's own tank and pressurization system, and a critical design for the downcomers. Plus two turboprops with foldable blades. And then the landing gears that need to damp the high speed of approach. And in the end they'll have to still integrate it again. I still don't see this as easy as they put it now. I keep thinking of the STS concept and what it ended up being.

Oh come on, now you're exaggerating. The thing reenters ballistically by the way, so it will probably switch to flying at subsonic speeds.

The real issue is who's going to pay for it and whether the cost savings are as high as advocated, which is doubtful. I see it more as a backup plan similar to ULAs.
I never said that it had to work the engines at supersonic speeds. But since their concept is a high energy stage augmented by solids, the stage won't be staging low and slow like Falcon 9's (for a very relative "low and slow"). It means more heat and thus more weight. And then a lot of complexity and cost to get according to them "just a 20% to 25% penalty on payload". ULA's model has 6% of penalty, SpaceX has the only chance at "gas-and-go" and is just 30%, 15% if they used the ASDS. I really don't see the trade, it seems complex and expensive to develop and operate, and still gives them not good economics.
Look what ULA did: negligible impact on performance for a 30% cost reduction.
Look at what SpaceX did: 30% payload for a cheap to develop and potential >50% price reduction. With the option of 15% hit in performance for 30% price reduction.
And Airbus is proposing: most complex system, 20% hit on payload, for a 30% cost reduction.
Do you see what I mean? Besides the fact that adding complexity is generally not a good idea for cost, overhead, nor reliability?

Offline JasonAW3

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #30 on: 06/05/2015 09:22 pm »
In other words, Airbus and ULA are betting their companies on SpaceX failing.  Even their most ambitious advanced concepts that they might have ready in 10 years at the earliest can't compete if SpaceX succeeds at what SpaceX is all-in on trying to do.

Another way of saying that Airbus and the ESA aren't willing to fully commit to reusable systems.
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Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #31 on: 06/05/2015 09:31 pm »
I find it very interesting that they used the Soyuz ELS pad for the video, even using the tulip! I see that and I see a small plane, with heavy TPS, with wings that need heat protection, plus it's own tank and pressurization system, and a critical design for the downcomers. Plus two turboprops with foldable blades. And then the landing gears that need to damp the high speed of approach. And in the end they'll have to still integrate it again. I still don't see this as easy as they put it now. I keep thinking of the STS concept and what it ended up being.

Oh come on, now you're exaggerating. The thing reenters ballistically by the way, so it will probably switch to flying at subsonic speeds.

The real issue is who's going to pay for it and whether the cost savings are as high as advocated, which is doubtful. I see it more as a backup plan similar to ULAs.
I never said that it had to work the engines at supersonic speeds. But since their concept is a high energy stage augmented by solids, the stage won't be staging low and slow like Falcon 9's (for a very relative "low and slow"). It means more heat and thus more weight. And then a lot of complexity and cost to get according to them "just a 20% to 25% penalty on payload". ULA's model has 6% of penalty, SpaceX has the only chance at "gas-and-go" and is just 30%, 15% if they used the ASDS. I really don't see the trade, it seems complex and expensive to develop and operate, and still gives them not good economics.
Look what ULA did: negligible impact on performance for a 30% cost reduction.
Look at what SpaceX did: 30% payload for a cheap to develop and potential >50% price reduction. With the option of 15% hit in performance for 30% price reduction.
And Airbus is proposing: most complex system, 20% hit on payload, for a 30% cost reduction.
Do you see what I mean? Besides the fact that adding complexity is generally not a good idea for cost, overhead, nor reliability?

I think you put far too much trust in some numbers you heard somewhere which are far from definite. ULA's model does reentry at high speed as well (but far form orbital speed) and comes with some other issues. I really don't think Airbus' solution it somehow more complex than the other 2 all things considered.

In other words, Airbus and ULA are betting their companies on SpaceX failing.

The world is not black and white. If anything we'll end up with a variety of solutions with slight differences in cost under different market circumstances. Thinking in categories like "failure" and "success" is silly, since it presumes that some engineers are complete idiots while the others aren't.
 

Offline ChrisWilson68

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #32 on: 06/05/2015 09:51 pm »
In other words, Airbus and ULA are betting their companies on SpaceX failing.

The world is not black and white. If anything we'll end up with a variety of solutions with slight differences in cost under different market circumstances. Thinking in categories like "failure" and "success" is silly, since it presumes that some engineers are complete idiots while the others aren't.

Not everything in the world is black and white, but some things are.  There is such a thing as success or failure.

SpaceX has set a goal to rapidly, cheaply reuse its first stages.  It will either succeed or fail at that.  In 10 years we'll know for sure which it was.

That doesn't mean some engineers are complete idiots.  Smart engineers can still fail.

I stand 100% behind my claim that ULA and Airbus are betting their launch businesses on SpaceX failing.  They wouldn't have to bet their companies on SpaceX succeeding either, they could plan for and invest in being able to compete whether SpaceX succeeds or not.  But they are not making that investment.  They have no plan for the contingency that SpaceX succeeds.

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #33 on: 06/05/2015 09:58 pm »
ULA system is lower risk and if recovery fails they lose 5% performance, a inflatable heat shield and parachute. The big plus is it could be applied to their upper stage.
Failure of the Airbus systems costs them an expensively modified lower booster section and %15 performance. Unlike ULA they don't need ground systems ie barge/ship and a helicopter.
 
It is doubtful either system will get it right first time and more complex it is the more attempts it will take. Look how long it has taken SpaceX, still haven't got it right yet.

The good news is the RLV future looks good and this partial/ piecemeal approach to reusability is more likely to succeed. The previous big budget attempts at reusable SSTO LVs ended badly.


Offline friendly3

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #34 on: 06/05/2015 10:15 pm »
Look how long it has taken SpaceX, still haven't got it right yet.

What? Their first attempt to propulsively land a first stage in the sea was less than two years ago (CASSIOPE in september 2013).
Since then they've added landing legs, grid fins, software codes, they've built an ASDS and are building two other ones (not couting the two landing pads at the Cape and at Vandenberg), they are working on fairing recovery, they will soon have more powerful engines, chilled propellant, a stretched second stage, etc...
The guys at ULA and ESA have plans to recover the engines of their first stage in... ten years !
« Last Edit: 06/06/2015 02:26 am by friendly3 »

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #35 on: 06/05/2015 10:16 pm »
There is this nice thread by georgesowers on the reuse business case here: http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=37390.0.

According to this they expect around 10% reduction in $/kg to orbit with reusability.

We don't really have numbers for Airbus, they say "as little as" 10% performance hit and 20-30% lower cost (form the bbc article), which probably depends on fuel choice and rocket configuration etc., suggesting a similar reduction in $/kg.

A 40% loss of performance to GTO is almost certain for SpaceX because of the low staging velocity.

All in all its really impossible to draw any conclusions for laymen like us  :).
« Last Edit: 06/05/2015 10:21 pm by Oli »

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #36 on: 06/05/2015 10:41 pm »
nice to see the SpaceX amazing peoples move on from ULA to another company ;D

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Offline friendly3

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #37 on: 06/05/2015 10:48 pm »
Nice to see the SpaceX bashers still in denial ;D
And I'll tell you a secret : we don't like bashing, we would all like to see ULA, ESA and all the others doing what SpaceX is doing.
« Last Edit: 06/05/2015 10:56 pm by friendly3 »

Offline meekGee

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #38 on: 06/05/2015 11:10 pm »
These concepts are viable for today-ish flight rates,  but utterly fail in comparison with a rapidly reusable rocket that flies on a day-ish rate.

I don't think that is important in the near future. There are fewer than 100 flights per year worldwide. Aiming for a one month turnaround would be sufficient for the next generation of rockets. SpaceX is getting into the satellite business to drive up the number of launches and they won't be booking any flights with ULA or Ariane.

Anyway, if you have to launch everyday then 8 to 10 launch vehicles with about a week turnaround will keep you flying everyday.

In 5 years, just SpaceX's comm constellation will eat up an F9 launch per week. And at that point, SpaceX's price point will reflect their flight rate.

These "piecemeal" concepts will only be ready about then.  They're basically aiming to be, 5 years from now, behind where SpaceX is today.

This is what happens when you wait for things to be "proven" to you before you get your butt in gear.
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Offline RonM

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #39 on: 06/05/2015 11:38 pm »
These concepts are viable for today-ish flight rates,  but utterly fail in comparison with a rapidly reusable rocket that flies on a day-ish rate.

I don't think that is important in the near future. There are fewer than 100 flights per year worldwide. Aiming for a one month turnaround would be sufficient for the next generation of rockets. SpaceX is getting into the satellite business to drive up the number of launches and they won't be booking any flights with ULA or Ariane.

Anyway, if you have to launch everyday then 8 to 10 launch vehicles with about a week turnaround will keep you flying everyday.

In 5 years, just SpaceX's comm constellation will eat up an F9 launch per week. And at that point, SpaceX's price point will reflect their flight rate.

These "piecemeal" concepts will only be ready about then.  They're basically aiming to be, 5 years from now, behind where SpaceX is today.

This is what happens when you wait for things to be "proven" to you before you get your butt in gear.

Yes, if SpaceX can economically sustain a launch per week for their satellites, then ULA and Ariane will regret waiting.

Ariane could survive if Europe wants to maintain its own launch capability, but ULA will be in trouble.

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #40 on: 06/06/2015 05:31 am »
Here my estimates on price to GTO.

F9 7 $65m = <$10m/t.
F9R 4t $45m  = >$10m/t. (Guesses on unknowns)
Vulcan 8t $99m= $12m/t. (Price could be lot less eg $80m)
VulcanR 7.5t $84m = <$12m/t (5% payload penalty, $15m saving/discount)
Ariane64 11t $99m (90eur) = $9m/t
Ariane64R 9.4t $84m =$9.3m/t (15% payload penalty, $15m discount)
Ariane 62 5t $83m = $16m/t
Ariane 62 4.25t $68m = $16m/t.

In every case reusability doesn't seem to reduce kg to GTO price.


Offline M_Puckett

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #41 on: 06/06/2015 05:47 am »
Its only a patent and they call it basic research, I wouldn't get my hopes up.

Kind of reminds me of ULA's plans to recover the engine section. Interesting tidbit: Apparently engines, electronics, etc. make up 80% of the stage's value.

It would be interesting to see a comparison of the mass penalty for this concept versus the stage reuse for Falcon.  I'm sure there has to be some fairly significant structures to allow the engines to seperate from the tanks and be aerodynamic enough for flight back to a runway and the weight of jet engines and fuel.

The mass penalty is certainly a lot lower than with boost-back. Its no secret that flyback is more efficient. Whether its cheaper overall is another question.

That was the whole point of the Shuttle, you were recovering the Main Engines, the Fairing and the Avionics.

Offline ChrisWilson68

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #42 on: 06/06/2015 05:54 am »
Here my estimates on price to GTO.

F9 7 $65m = <$10m/t.
F9R 4t $45m  = >$10m/t. (Guesses on unknowns)
Vulcan 8t $99m= $12m/t. (Price could be lot less eg $80m)
VulcanR 7.5t $84m = <$12m/t (5% payload penalty, $15m saving/discount)
Ariane64 11t $99m (90eur) = $9m/t
Ariane64R 9.4t $84m =$9.3m/t (15% payload penalty, $15m discount)
Ariane 62 5t $83m = $16m/t
Ariane 62 4.25t $68m = $16m/t.

In every case reusability doesn't seem to reduce kg to GTO price.

If you're hauling large volumes of coal, you care about price per ton.

If you have a satellite of a specific size, you don't care about price per ton, you only care about the price to get that satellite where it's going.  Extra tons don't matter.

And you left off Falcon Heavy reusable, which will certainly be flying before any version of Vulcan or Ariane and will have a lower price per ton than anything on your list.

And the $45 million for F9R is only for the early days, when volumes are low.  If and when volumes get high, the price will be much lower.  SpaceX quoted $5-$7 million per launch as the long-term price for GEO satellite launches to a satellite industry conference.

SpaceX is designing reusability with the goal of enabling much higher volumes than today.  It doesn't make much sense to analyze it with today's volumes and say it doesn't give a benefit.

Offline Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #43 on: 06/06/2015 06:01 am »
That was the whole point of the Shuttle, you were recovering the Main Engines, the Fairing and the Avionics.

No, the point was to recover the entire orbiter and be able to just "gas and go" shortly after an orbiter returned from space.  The only thing disposed of was just the external tank, since the SRM's were recovered and reused too.

Of course it didn't quite work out that way, and that's the challenge with any complex system that is hoped to be reusable.  It could take a while to work out the kinks, so you have to be able to do that in parallel with revenue launches - like what SpaceX is doing.
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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #44 on: 06/06/2015 07:55 am »
They have no plan for the contingency that SpaceX succeeds.

I think in that case their hope is that the market will pay for a second launch provider (ie not want all its eggs in the one SpaceX basket) and thus both ULA and Airbus would be aiming to be number 2. European politics being what it is I'd expect ULA to have the edge there, although number 2 might just emerge elsewhere (eg Blue Origin, India, ...).

Offline kato

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #45 on: 06/06/2015 10:58 am »
If you have a satellite of a specific size, you don't care about price per ton, you only care about the price to get that satellite where it's going.  Extra tons don't matter.
You need to think in market sections then. 4.0-5.5 tons satellites to GTO make up the majority in commercial payloads, and that's what a Ariane 64R would aim for (India is also positioning GSLV Mk III in that section). SPX FHR rather aims for the 5.5-6.5 ton double-launch market (that Ariane 5 currently dominates), Vulcan R would be aiming for the 6.5-7.5 ton single-launch market (which is mostly US-institutional). The smaller 2.5-4.0 ton market is covered by rideshare for a Ariane 64R with a 5.5-6.5 ton sat and by SPX through F9R.

SPX' quoted future intended prices for F9R are inconsequential because that's a limited market share. Their projected prices for FH are so high (85 million per sat) that they'll actually need to lower them by at least 50-60% for FHR to stay in the running against its competition.

I see the Ariane 64R proposal - with a 30% price reduction over 15% payload loss - not even aimed specifically towards SPX (outside PR) since A64 underbids FH anyway, but towards other competitors instead.

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #46 on: 06/06/2015 12:40 pm »
BBC article Airbus unveils 'Adeline' re-usable rocket concept

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-33006056
Airbus are also looking into a reusable space tug/ fuel depot concept. This is similar to what ULA are proposing with ACES upper stage. It is only an idea at present but at least they are thinking about it.


Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #47 on: 06/06/2015 01:36 pm »
BBC article Airbus unveils 'Adeline' re-usable rocket concept

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-33006056
Airbus are also looking into a reusable space tug/ fuel depot concept. This is similar to what ULA are proposing with ACES upper stage. It is only an idea at present but at least they are thinking about it.

Not really, it's an SEP tug for bringing satellites from LEO to GEO. But I suppose that's very long term. Requires a lot of power for reasonable transfer times.


Offline Comga

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #48 on: 06/06/2015 04:31 pm »
Concept video

[youtube]tV29pEvZvZw[/youtube]

There is some serious "artistic license" in this video.
At 0:27 the 1st/2nd interstage is shown as being attached to the second stage, like the Saturn V, but then the second stage engine shuts off?
It shows the first stage tank being pushed off the reusable section with a center mounted rocket.  No piping is visible.
It says "No Need For Extra Rocket Fuel" and "Simple Ballistic Flight" as it shows the main engine burning at altitude. 
The video show the main engine burning while pointing back, although the motion seems to be going in the "RTLS" direction.
As has been said, after a solid rocket assisted launch, the staging will be far downrange and at pretty high velocity.
Hard to imagine doing all that with aerodynamic surfaces. It won't even touch the atmosphere until several hundred km downrange.  That would seem to demand a braking burn, which needs fuel. 
It says "Low consumption return propulsion" just before the folded props deploy. 
Perhaps they are just planning to fly the hundreds of km using the props.
Given the mass of a reasonable engine, can we estimate how much fuel that would take?
Maybe all the engine firings post-boost are "artistic license"[/size]
What kind of wastrels would dump a perfectly good booster in the ocean after just one use?

Offline Borklund

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #49 on: 06/06/2015 06:00 pm »
Concept video

-snip-
There is some serious "artistic license" in this video.
There always is. Think of it as a rough but pretty visualization of the idea and don't look too closely at it.

Offline rcoppola

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #50 on: 06/06/2015 06:19 pm »
So...This "Adeline" video is for Industry viewing and as such, is crafted to relay some very specific messages. Most of which are directed at SpaceX's chosen reusability path. Let's take a look:

1. "Reusable Launcher Solutions" - Well, not really, no. This should be titled "Reusable Propulsion Solutions"

2. "No Need For Extra Rocket Fuel" - Hm. We'll see. Regardless, it's a "It makes no sense to sacrifice that much mass to orbit just to get the first stage back. It's just not economical in the long term and will need to be abandoned. Rest assured, we'll be ready when that day happens."

3. "Simple Ballistic Flight" & "Rocket Engine Protected In The Back" - "Those crazy folks in Hawthorne are doing engine first retropropulsive burns, stressing the hell out of their engines, indeed the entire stage. Wouldn't want to reuse that thing."

4. "Safe Flight Back" & "Less Risky For Final Approach" Less risky then what? Oh, of course. "Ours is less risky then flying an entire 140ft stage, bass-ackwards to the landing site. Lot's of risk of an accident that could shut them down for a while, leaving your precious cargo in storage."

Ok, some creative license on my part but it remains that each line is a direct answer to the current SpaceX plans. (You could say some of their return comments are for ULA too but that's a stretch for many reasons IMO)

But here's the thing:

-SpaceX doesn't even need reusability to compete today, let alone when any of these efforts would likely come on-line.

-3 F9 versions in almost as many years. Forgetting reuse, is anybody foolish enough to think they won't continue to advance and modify their plans, squeezing every bit of efficiency out of their designs and manufacturing with a pace no competitor I currently see can match? After all...10 years before you'll recover...the engines? Ok, good luck with that. We'll check back in 2025. (insert BlackBerry case study here)

-Even though SpaceX may be the closest, ironically, it's their competitors that may wind up needing it the most.

-And the funniest, most ironic point that continues to be made, especially early on by Tory (Whom I have great respect for and hope he succeeds) and now Airbus, is how much extra mass (fuel, legs, etc.)  SpaceX is using to realize their dream of reuse. The problem is, they build all these extras into their designs and are STILL cheaper then their competitors.

-As Ms. Shotwell correctly point out, because they are designing for the incredible stresses of return, the F9 is overbuilt for the ride up. Translation? - This is one tough rocket.

Now, like most, I love all this activity and support the notion there are many ways to get to a radical reduction of launch costs. So I'm not trying to be overly negative. But come on, 10-15 years? Do you really think you've got that long?
« Last Edit: 06/06/2015 06:23 pm by rcoppola »
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Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #51 on: 06/06/2015 06:59 pm »

^

Can you post that "spacex is awesome and everybody else is doomed" nonsense somewhere else, please?


There is some serious "artistic license" in this video.

Yeah the video makes no sense.

As for the fly back fuel, they say 2t of kerosene.

Offline rcoppola

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #52 on: 06/06/2015 07:13 pm »

^

Can you post that "spacex is awesome and everybody else is doomed" nonsense somewhere else, please?


There is some serious "artistic license" in this video.

Yeah the video makes no sense.

As for the fly back fuel, they say 2t of kerosene.
Respectfully, no, since that is in no way what I said. You summed it up as "yeh that video makes no sense" Ok that's fine, and I agree. I just took it one step further and actually listed out, in my opinion, why it didn't make any sense.

And no, everyone else is not doomed but they sure do act like it sometimes.
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Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #53 on: 06/06/2015 07:24 pm »

^

Can you post that "spacex is awesome and everybody else is doomed" nonsense somewhere else, please?


There is some serious "artistic license" in this video.

Yeah the video makes no sense.

As for the fly back fuel, they say 2t of kerosene.
Respectfully, no, since that is in no way what I said. You summed it up as "yeh that video makes no sense" Ok that's fine, and I agree. I just took it one step further and actually listed out, in my opinion, why it didn't make any sense.

And no, everyone else is not doomed but they sure do act like it sometimes.

I was addressing the visual representation in the video. And yes, this is pretty much what you said, building your entire post around it, spiced with lots of unfounded assumptions and speculation about the future and questionable economics. I just think we have enough of that in other threads.


Offline rcoppola

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #54 on: 06/06/2015 07:32 pm »

^

Can you post that "spacex is awesome and everybody else is doomed" nonsense somewhere else, please?


There is some serious "artistic license" in this video.

Yeah the video makes no sense.

As for the fly back fuel, they say 2t of kerosene.
Respectfully, no, since that is in no way what I said. You summed it up as "yeh that video makes no sense" Ok that's fine, and I agree. I just took it one step further and actually listed out, in my opinion, why it didn't make any sense.

And no, everyone else is not doomed but they sure do act like it sometimes.

I was addressing the visual representation in the video. And yes, this is pretty much what you said, building your entire post around it, spiced with lots of unfounded assumptions and speculation about the future and questionable economics. I just think we have enough of that in other threads.
Yes, the visual representation is quite embarrassing. Very amateur looking.
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Offline Comga

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #55 on: 06/06/2015 07:38 pm »
There is some serious "artistic license" in this video.

Yeah the video makes no sense.

As for the fly back fuel, they say 2t of kerosene.

Where did you see that fuel mass?
Does that seem reasonable for flying several hundred kilometers with what looks to be a highly loaded wing (significant mass, not much wingspan) ?
What kind of wastrels would dump a perfectly good booster in the ocean after just one use?

Offline gosnold

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #56 on: 06/06/2015 07:46 pm »
Some thoughts on the Airbus way of doing things:
Flying the engines back makes a lot of sense if you use heritage engines. Boost-back puts heavy requirements on the engines:
-You need to restart them (twice!)
-You need to be able to use them as heat shield
-You need to throttle them (quickly and accurately)

Once you have those engines, you need to solve the control problem of actually landing the stage, which is hard as SpaceX's attempts have shown. 
Separating the engines is comparatively much easier. The main problem is reentry. Once you are past that, it becomes an aeronautics problem and not an aerospace problem: you can test you engine recovery scheme just by dropping it from an aircraft (vs Grasshopper + ASDS landings).

Flying the engine nacelle back instead of catching them mid-air probably reduces the operational cost of the solution too, so it looks like a better idea.

All in all, it makes sense, which is why it is a shame it is not part of the Ariane 6 design: if modifications have to be made to the design (and to the rocket integration and pad operations) later on, it will be more expensive than if they are taken into account from the start.

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #57 on: 06/06/2015 10:11 pm »
They may not be able to do reusability with Ariane 6 currently being designed but they can allow for it in the design. Design engine section so all critical/expensive parts are contained in it. Hopefully in a layout that will not need changing for reuse.
« Last Edit: 06/06/2015 10:12 pm by TrevorMonty »

Offline Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #58 on: 06/06/2015 10:27 pm »
Some thoughts on the Airbus way of doing things:
Flying the engines back makes a lot of sense if you use heritage engines. Boost-back puts heavy requirements on the engines:
-You need to restart them (twice!)
-You need to be able to use them as heat shield
-You need to throttle them (quickly and accurately)

True.  But if you can come up with a design that can do that with up to 10 flights of reuse, then the result is a significant decrease in costs and a potential increase in launch tempo.

For instance, imagine after each commercial air flight you had to discard the fuselage and landing gear because of the stress of the flight, but you saved the wings and engines.  Still not very economical.  Reusing the entire stage as one system may be the holy grail, but it sure looks like SpaceX is close to achieving it.

In contrast, while both ULA and Airbus on focused on reusing only the most expensive part of the rocket, it means that neither of them can ever achieve the ultimate goal of "gas & go" like what SpaceX is planning.  And if we want to expand humanity out into space, we need dramatic reductions in the cost to access space, and I'm not sure the approach ULA and Airbus are taking can do that.  Theirs is more of an evolutionary approach, not a revolutionary one.

Quote
All in all, it makes sense, which is why it is a shame it is not part of the Ariane 6 design: if modifications have to be made to the design (and to the rocket integration and pad operations) later on, it will be more expensive than if they are taken into account from the start.

If Airbus thinks it's such a great idea then they should be making it part of Ariane 6, especially since Ariane 6 still won't be competitive enough with SpaceX launch services that use expendable rockets, and will stand little chance of clawing back any commercial marketshare if SpaceX is able to perfect any version of reusability.
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Offline dante2308

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #59 on: 06/06/2015 11:29 pm »
Concept video

-snip-
There is some serious "artistic license" in this video.
There always is. Think of it as a rough but pretty visualization of the idea and don't look too closely at it.

I'm just not sure I understand their concept. They show two engines on the first stage. Ok, sure that can't be.  But there is also an aeroshell between the outer engine and the rest of the stage that would surely need to also have a heat shield. So fuel and oxidizer is routed through the heatshield to the engine? Can someone give a guess as to how they actually plan to make this work?

I'm worried about those wings too. That is NOT the ballistic re-entry shape I was taught in school.
« Last Edit: 06/06/2015 11:35 pm by dante2308 »

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #60 on: 06/07/2015 12:07 am »
In contrast, while both ULA and Airbus on focused on reusing only the most expensive part of the rocket, it means that neither of them can ever achieve the ultimate goal of "gas & go" like what SpaceX is planning. 
SX's plans are unlikely to deliver that goal before the BFR.
Quote
And if we want to expand humanity out into space, we need dramatic reductions in the cost to access space, and I'm not sure the approach ULA and Airbus are taking can do that.  Theirs is more of an evolutionary approach, not a revolutionary one.
True but it's very doubtful any of those approaches will deliver the reduction needed.
Quote
If Airbus thinks it's such a great idea then they should be making it part of Ariane 6, especially since Ariane 6 still won't be competitive enough with SpaceX launch services that use expendable rockets, and will stand little chance of clawing back any commercial marketshare if SpaceX is able to perfect any version of reusability.
The situation is nowhere near as cut and dried as  you seem to think.
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Offline Space Ghost 1962

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #61 on: 06/07/2015 03:07 am »
I find it very interesting that they used the Soyuz ELS pad for the video, even using the tulip!
Me too. Well, it'll be available soon, so why not toy around with reuse in theory?
I see that and I see a small plane, with heavy TPS, with wings that need heat protection, plus it's own tank and pressurization system, and a critical design for the downcomers. Plus two turboprops with foldable blades. And then the landing gears that need to damp the high speed of approach. And in the end they'll have to still integrate it again. I still don't see this as easy as they put it now. I keep thinking of the STS concept and what it ended up being.

I broke out with a belly laugh when the props popped out. First though was - is this  somebody's marketing department's idea of how a reusable vehicle works?

Oh come on, now you're exaggerating. The thing reenters ballistically by the way, so it will probably switch to flying at subsonic speeds.
No, it's the costs and the failure modes that I'm struck by.

The real issue is who's going to pay for it and whether the cost savings are as high as advocated, which is doubtful. I see it more as a backup plan similar to ULAs.
Not like Atlas/Vulcan reuse by a long shot.
I never said that it had to work the engines at supersonic speeds. But since their concept is a high energy stage augmented by solids, the stage won't be staging low and slow like Falcon 9's (for a very relative "low and slow"). It means more heat and thus more weight. And then a lot of complexity and cost to get according to them "just a 20% to 25% penalty on payload". ULA's model has 6% of penalty, SpaceX has the only chance at "gas-and-go" and is just 30%, 15% if they used the ASDS. I really don't see the trade, it seems complex and expensive to develop and operate, and still gives them not good economics.
Look what ULA did: negligible impact on performance for a 30% cost reduction.
Look at what SpaceX did: 30% payload for a cheap to develop and potential >50% price reduction. With the option of 15% hit in performance for 30% price reduction.
And Airbus is proposing: most complex system, 20% hit on payload, for a 30% cost reduction.
Do you see what I mean? Besides the fact that adding complexity is generally not a good idea for cost, overhead, nor reliability?
Agreed in full.

It's like a melange of half complete ideas competing for attention. I can buy doing a ballistic/winged RV for a high Mach staged Ariane-like vehicle, but in that case wouldn't you have a separation event, long downrange coast, and terminal guidance glide to attach to a tow UAV for return to a final glide landing. If TPS insufficient, handle with retroburn before seperation with partial fuel load.

Its as if there's an attempt to claim no fuel from main tankage with burn from supplementary tanks in main propulsion section, as if that's some kind of advantage (smoke and mirrors?).

I also found the post recovery stage processing cartoon a bit hard to believe, and the implication of rapid flow for re-flight highly disingenuous, as integration and test of the stage (ignoring propulsion aeroshell handling as well) aren't likely to be anything less than weeks. Having it shown as a fraction of a minute in concept was a little to magical.

Also, the CG for such a recovery system is all wrong, it would be tail heavy and difficult to land without damaging the nozzle with pitch/yaw excursions - notice no landing flare.

It looks like its a design intended to be cancelled as soon as possible "look, we tried to do reuse, it didn't work out, too bad, bye". An elaborate PR move?

I've seen much better reuse designs out of ESA et al - this one it's hard to be polite about. I'd like to see a good concept for recovery here instead of addressing embarrassment in this apparent manner.

Mind you, I have issues with SX/ULA concepts too. But they look better now to those that matter.

Offline Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #62 on: 06/07/2015 03:40 am »
In contrast, while both ULA and Airbus on focused on reusing only the most expensive part of the rocket, it means that neither of them can ever achieve the ultimate goal of "gas & go" like what SpaceX is planning. 
SX's plans are unlikely to deliver that goal before the BFR.

Have you not been watching their progress with recovering the Falcon 9 1st stage?  They are very close, and they have plenty of potential attempts to refine their processes and procedures.  We could see success this year, not next decade.  And there are indications that the market is already anticipating the potential lower prices a reusable 1st stage brings.

Quote
Quote
And if we want to expand humanity out into space, we need dramatic reductions in the cost to access space, and I'm not sure the approach ULA and Airbus are taking can do that.  Theirs is more of an evolutionary approach, not a revolutionary one.
True but it's very doubtful any of those approaches will deliver the reduction needed.

If their plans turn out that way, SpaceX has already stated that launch costs could drop to below $10M per flight.  Compared to an expendable Falcon 9 that is 1/6 the price, but compared to a ULA flight that is 1/16 the price.

My opinion is that will be enough to allow the testing of new business models, or allow for self-funded expeditions.  Not immediately of course, but before the anticipated BFR can spur the same interest.

Quote
Quote
If Airbus thinks it's such a great idea then they should be making it part of Ariane 6, especially since Ariane 6 still won't be competitive enough with SpaceX launch services that use expendable rockets, and will stand little chance of clawing back any commercial marketshare if SpaceX is able to perfect any version of reusability.
The situation is nowhere near as cut and dried as  you seem to think.

Maybe, but only because they make it complicated.  That is the problem whenever you have subsidized or government-controlled transportation systems, they don't respond to market conditions well.

SpaceX will continue to drive down prices - this is a given.  So the only question is when ESA and Airbus finally decide that inaction is more costly than action.
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 TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #63 on: 06/07/2015 04:33 am »
I was surprised by turboprop engines, a couple of jets engines could have added boost from pad to about 50,000ft.

Offline Lars-J

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #64 on: 06/07/2015 07:22 am »

I was surprised by turboprop engines, a couple of jets engines could have added boost from pad to about 50,000ft.

You shouldn't be surprised they did not show that, because such a thing would only make practical sense using looney tunes physics. It is a terrible idea, but there is a thread for it in the "advanced concepts" section.

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #65 on: 06/07/2015 08:08 am »
Where did you see that fuel mass?
Does that seem reasonable for flying several hundred kilometers with what looks to be a highly loaded wing (significant mass, not much wingspan) ?

For example here. Cannot find an English source.

It doesn't seem unrealistic, I don't know how many "hundreds of kilometers" though.

I'm just not sure I understand their concept. They show two engines on the first stage. Ok, sure that can't be.  But there is also an aeroshell between the outer engine and the rest of the stage that would surely need to also have a heat shield. So fuel and oxidizer is routed through the heatshield to the engine? Can someone give a guess as to how they actually plan to make this work?

Look at articles and pictures provided in this thread, not at the video. Also the patent application has lots of technical details, explaining why they chose that particular design.
« Last Edit: 06/07/2015 08:11 am by Oli »

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #66 on: 06/07/2015 08:31 am »

I was surprised by turboprop engines, a couple of jets engines could have added boost from pad to about 50,000ft.

You shouldn't be surprised they did not show that, because such a thing would only make practical sense using looney tunes physics. It is a terrible idea, but there is a thread for it in the "advanced concepts" section.
If you are going rubbish an idea you need to back up you criticism with facts. Up to about 50,000ft a jet is considerably more efficient than rocket.

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #67 on: 06/07/2015 08:55 am »

I was surprised by turboprop engines, a couple of jets engines could have added boost from pad to about 50,000ft.

You shouldn't be surprised they did not show that, because such a thing would only make practical sense using looney tunes physics. It is a terrible idea, but there is a thread for it in the "advanced concepts" section.
If you are going rubbish an idea you need to back up you criticism with facts. Up to about 50,000ft a jet is considerably more efficient than rocket.

The max. thrust of A6 with 2 boosters if probably around 8000kn. A typical business jet engine has around 30kn. Not worth the trouble.


Online Semmel

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #68 on: 06/07/2015 09:09 am »
If you are going rubbish an idea you need to back up you criticism with facts. Up to about 50,000ft a jet is considerably more efficient than rocket.

Except that a jet engine it self is heavy like a tanker and cant get fast enough plus it would overheat if it was.

Also I wouldnt be so sure about the impracticallity of the proposed system. Give the stuff some time to develop and advance. SpaceX recovery plan was also crazy when they proposed it for the first time. At  moment, I wouldnt put a bet on the Adeline concept, but that might change with enough advancement and if they are serious about the concept. It looks a bit desperate though.

Offline Rocket Science

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #69 on: 06/07/2015 12:30 pm »
I commend them for trying; however if you are going to add wings engines and gear etc... Why not go all the way and add forward swing wings and return the entire stage or are they still waiting for Falcon to “stick” the landing?
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Online guckyfan

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #70 on: 06/07/2015 01:03 pm »
I commend them for trying; however if you are going to add wings engines and gear etc... Why not go all the way and add forward swing wings and return the entire stage or are they still waiting for Falcon to “stick” the landing?

That would require whole new load paths for the tanks, making them much heavier. A small unit containing just the thrust structure with engines is much easier to handle. Not a bad idea at all. If competetive with SpaceX bringing the whole stage back vertical we will see.

Offline Rocket Science

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #71 on: 06/07/2015 01:13 pm »
I commend them for trying; however if you are going to add wings engines and gear etc... Why not go all the way and add forward swing wings and return the entire stage or are they still waiting for Falcon to “stick” the landing?

That would require whole new load paths for the tanks, making them much heavier. A small unit containing just the thrust structure with engines is much easier to handle. Not a bad idea at all. If competetive with SpaceX bringing the whole stage back vertical we will see.
Nice stating of the obvious; so please don’t preach structures and load factors as I happen to be a pilot who teaches Physics... Thanks.
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Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #72 on: 06/07/2015 01:40 pm »
I commend them for trying; however if you are going to add wings engines and gear etc... Why not go all the way and add forward swing wings and return the entire stage or are they still waiting for Falcon to “stick” the landing?

The patent provides lots of information on what they think are the advantages (don't shoot the messenger). A selection of paragraphs:

Quote
[0007] This launcher has the advantage of making it possible to completely recover the entire first stage. (they refer to a reusable fly back first stage).

[0008] However, such a construction has several drawbacks. Firstly, during separation from the first stage, the tanks of the intermediate part are empty and therefore represent a very large volume with a very low mass. Consequently the mean density of the first stage is low, which makes the first stage very difficult to recover. Moreover, it requires the use of a large wing unit attached to the casing of the launcher, in particular at the tanks, which is generally not very rigid. It is therefore necessary to make provision for stiffening the attachment area. The addition of this wing area and reinforcements represents an additional mass that it is necessary to propel, therefore involving an increase in the size of the tanks and therefore a substantial increase in the cost of the launcher. Consequently the gain obtained by entirely recovering the first stage is partially lost in the modifications involved for enabling this recovery. Moreover, this type of launcher is very different from known launchers.

[0012] In other words, provision is made for reusing the components having a high cost, and for this purpose a detachable module is produced equipped with a airfoil surface and an aircraft engine enabling it to land on a conventional runway. Non-recovery of the tanks makes the recovered part much more easily recoverable, because of its increased density. The bearing surface comprising fixed fins and stabilisers, which makes its implementation and control very simple.

[0027] The launcher according to the invention may be from the nanolauncher type up to a super-heavy launcher. The invention can apply to the central body or to the lateral acceleration stages added to the central body, also referred to as boosters, as in the rocket of the Ariane V type.

[0075] The module 14 also comprises landing gear 30. Since the module is very short, it is not necessary to have a very high landing gear. A fixed or semi-fixed landing gear can therefore advantageously be provided, projecting from the surface of the launcher permanently. It can therefore be very simple and robust in design. Naturally a module provided with a retractable landing gear does not depart from the scope of the present invention.

[0094] The module 14 has great intrinsic passive stability, i.e. between supersonic flight and Mach 0.8, the module 14 is automatically positioned with nose forwards in the direction of fall. Thus, in the case where the module and the non-recovered part separate in a non-conventional manner, the module would automatically and naturally resume its stable position without its being necessary to provide specific means for ensuring such repositioning.

[0113] By separating the lift and stabilisation functions, the module dispenses with the drawbacks relating to flying wings.
[0114] The fins of the launcher according to the invention forming the lift surface of the module according to the invention do not have any twist, which is generally a problem during the launch of the launcher and the re-entry of the module into the atmosphere.
[0115] Moreover, these are of simpler and less expensive designs.

[0124] In addition, the development cost of the module 14 is significantly reduced compared with the development cost of a completely reusable first stage, by approximately 35%.

[0134] The module according to the present invention has been described in the case of a two-stage launcher but it can also apply to a vehicle with a single stage in order to form a demonstrator or as a flying test bench for experiments in flight, or to a launcher having at least two stages, the module being situated in the bottom stage or in one of the upper stages.

http://www.faqs.org/patents/app/20130087659

What seems a bit crazy at first is the "vertical" ballistic reentry with wings, however I'm not sure whether the  temperature at the front of the wing will be higher/lower than at the blunt nose of the vehicle.
« Last Edit: 06/07/2015 01:52 pm by Oli »

Offline Torbjorn Larsson, OM

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #73 on: 06/07/2015 01:52 pm »
I commend them for trying; however if you are going to add wings engines and gear etc... Why not go all the way and add forward swing wings and return the entire stage or are they still waiting for Falcon to “stick” the landing?

That doesn't seem to make sense in their overall strategy. According to what ESA representatives state in the BBC article they started reusability tests 2010 and are not finished to show feasibility and finalized design yet (or at least have more tests to perform). At the same time they had to start working on Ariane 6 in order to protect their space industry.

The intention is, as with the much more loose trial balloon of a space tug, to retrofit this back into the Ariane 6, if it is economical. (Or perhaps more simply, to have more putative saving plans to wave under the nose of politicians that decide how to best spend tax money to protect their industry basis. The ESA people also did mention the industry restructuring as a saving.)

As with everything else ESA related, I wait until it is finished before I expect tangible results. (Except Ariane 6, which will now be built no matter what.) And I am an interested European.  :-\

Speaking of feasibility, I didn't see anyone check the other thread's reusability models against reusable (vs expendable) airplanes. Are the two technologies too different to get a feel for if the model is consistent with known reusability cases? (Maybe one could put the upper stages as airplane "cargo", and see if stage 1 reuse matches airframe reuse.)

Offline Torbjorn Larsson, OM

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #74 on: 06/07/2015 02:00 pm »
Quote
[0094] The module 14 has great intrinsic passive stability, i.e. between supersonic flight and Mach 0.8, the module 14 is automatically positioned with nose forwards in the direction of fall. Thus, in the case where the module and the non-recovered part separate in a non-conventional manner, the module would automatically and naturally resume its stable position without its being necessary to provide specific means for ensuring such repositioning.

So the engine center of gravity would automatically be forward as the UAV part is covering the whole engine? That would be a neat design, I guess.

[Edited for clarity]
« Last Edit: 06/07/2015 02:03 pm by Torbjorn Larsson, OM »

Offline Rocket Science

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #75 on: 06/07/2015 02:07 pm »
I commend them for trying; however if you are going to add wings engines and gear etc... Why not go all the way and add forward swing wings and return the entire stage or are they still waiting for Falcon to “stick” the landing?

The patent provides lots of information on what they think are the advantages (don't shoot the messenger). A selection of paragraphs:

Quote
[0007] This launcher has the advantage of making it possible to completely recover the entire first stage. (they refer to a reusable fly back first stage).

[0008] However, such a construction has several drawbacks. Firstly, during separation from the first stage, the tanks of the intermediate part are empty and therefore represent a very large volume with a very low mass. Consequently the mean density of the first stage is low, which makes the first stage very difficult to recover. Moreover, it requires the use of a large wing unit attached to the casing of the launcher, in particular at the tanks, which is generally not very rigid. It is therefore necessary to make provision for stiffening the attachment area. The addition of this wing area and reinforcements represents an additional mass that it is necessary to propel, therefore involving an increase in the size of the tanks and therefore a substantial increase in the cost of the launcher. Consequently the gain obtained by entirely recovering the first stage is partially lost in the modifications involved for enabling this recovery. Moreover, this type of launcher is very different from known launchers.

[0012] In other words, provision is made for reusing the components having a high cost, and for this purpose a detachable module is produced equipped with a airfoil surface and an aircraft engine enabling it to land on a conventional runway. Non-recovery of the tanks makes the recovered part much more easily recoverable, because of its increased density. The bearing surface comprising fixed fins and stabilisers, which makes its implementation and control very simple.

[0027] The launcher according to the invention may be from the nanolauncher type up to a super-heavy launcher. The invention can apply to the central body or to the lateral acceleration stages added to the central body, also referred to as boosters, as in the rocket of the Ariane V type.

[0075] The module 14 also comprises landing gear 30. Since the module is very short, it is not necessary to have a very high landing gear. A fixed or semi-fixed landing gear can therefore advantageously be provided, projecting from the surface of the launcher permanently. It can therefore be very simple and robust in design. Naturally a module provided with a retractable landing gear does not depart from the scope of the present invention.

[0094] The module 14 has great intrinsic passive stability, i.e. between supersonic flight and Mach 0.8, the module 14 is automatically positioned with nose forwards in the direction of fall. Thus, in the case where the module and the non-recovered part separate in a non-conventional manner, the module would automatically and naturally resume its stable position without its being necessary to provide specific means for ensuring such repositioning.

[0113] By separating the lift and stabilisation functions, the module dispenses with the drawbacks relating to flying wings.
[0114] The fins of the launcher according to the invention forming the lift surface of the module according to the invention do not have any twist, which is generally a problem during the launch of the launcher and
the re-entry of the module into the atmosphere.
[0115] Moreover, these are of simpler and less expensive designs.

[0124] In addition, the development cost of the module 14 is significantly reduced compared with the development cost of a completely reusable first stage, by approximately 35%.

[0134] The module according to the present invention has been described in the case of a two-stage launcher but it can also apply to a vehicle with a single stage in order to form a demonstrator or as a flying test bench for experiments in flight, or to a launcher having at least two stages, the module being situated in the bottom stage or in one of the upper stages.

http://www.faqs.org/patents/app/20130087659

What seems a bit crazy at first is the "vertical" ballistic reentry with wings, however I'm not sure whether the  temperature at the front of the wing will be higher/lower than at the blunt nose of the vehicle.
No shooting required Oli! :) What strikes me is that a couple of years ago the only “so called “crazy was Elon Musk and SpaceX. Now the competitors including ULA are trying to rush out their own flavor of crazy reuse... Ironic... Note, that I still take a ”show me “ approach with SpaceX and so far so good... We’ll see how the next attempt goes...
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Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #76 on: 06/07/2015 02:13 pm »
As with everything else ESA related, I wait until it is finished before I expect tangible results.

Pretty much. This is after all not the first reusable rocket design coming from ESA/CNES or Airbus in the last 20 years.

I'm a bit more confident this time however since this solution seems relatively low cost compared to those in the past and there's SpaceX which the industry can use as a bait.

There's a reason after all why they leaked information about the project now after working on it for 5 years.

Offline Im_Utrecht

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #77 on: 06/07/2015 02:25 pm »
I remember Elon Musk talking about rapid and fully reusability.
That to use an aircraft just one time would make flying very expensive.

I also read somewere (sorry i can ot recall where exactly) that Airbus considered reusability as a no go. They added wings engines and it turned out to be impossibele.

So now Airbus decides not to throw the whole rocket.... just a part....
By the time they are done Raptor and MCT are already operational.

As an European i feel ashamed....
The Netherlands spends 74,7 million per year on ESA.....


Offline kch

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #78 on: 06/07/2015 02:50 pm »
I remember Elon Musk talking about rapid and fully reusability.
That to use an aircraft just one time would make flying very expensive.

I also read somewere (sorry i can ot recall where exactly) that Airbus considered reusability as a no go. They added wings engines and it turned out to be impossibele.

So now Airbus decides not to throw the whole rocket.... just a part....
By the time they are done Raptor and MCT are already operational.

As an European i feel ashamed....
The Netherlands spends 74,7 million per year on ESA.....

Nothing wrong with trying something different -- ULA isn't planning to get the whole rocket back, either.  It's a lot like the first few decades of heavier-than-air flight ... many different designs, some of which worked (and some of those better than others).  It'll all sort itself out, but it will take time.  No shame in that!  :)

Offline Alpha_Centauri

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #79 on: 06/07/2015 04:03 pm »
The intention is, as with the much more loose trial balloon of a space tug, to retrofit this back into the Ariane 6, if it is economical.

Which is of course nonsense since there is no economically reusable first-stage hydrolox engine to use it with, and developing one would be a very expensive gamble. While it may be feasible to develop a methane alternative, this vehicle would obviously no longer be Ariane 6.

Offline rcoppola

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #80 on: 06/07/2015 04:06 pm »
I've thought about this a bit more, read about it a bit more and....still not seeing it. They discuss their reasoning for not bringing back the entire stage in both technical and monetary terms. But most of it boils down to this approach being simpler, less expensive with much less development costs and therefore easier to reduce launch costs at some point in the future. Except, it's difficult to predict what the launch market will look like 10 years from now and if this particular approach is best suited.

I just don't see the evolution, the next step. This doesn't seem to be a reuse concept that extends beyond its' focussed intent; To return the engines with the goal of reducing the cost of launches by x dollars. But then what?
And is it enough in the long term? I'm just looking for where this could go that would make a convincing future case. Maybe there doesn't need to be.

When I look at full stage retro-propulsive returns, I see an evolutionary roadmap. Complete reusable architecture, advanced engine, materials and avionics designs, planetary cargo and human landing of substantial mass, etc.. I can see where it could lead. How it could be scaled and evolved.

I guess I'm just not seeing it and would love for someone to offer a real evolutionary roadmap where this kind of one-off engine pod return evolves beyond what it is. Then again, maybe it doesn't have to, but personally, I think it does. Or at least, it should.
« Last Edit: 06/07/2015 04:08 pm by rcoppola »
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Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #81 on: 06/07/2015 05:13 pm »
Have you not been watching their progress with recovering the Falcon 9 1st stage?  They are very close, and they have plenty of potential attempts to refine their processes and procedures.  We could see success this year, not next decade.  And there are indications that the market is already anticipating the potential lower prices a reusable 1st stage brings.
I have. But the problem is in three parts.
Recovering the 1st stage
Refurbishing the 1st stage
Making a profit doing it.

Only the first stage is anywhere close to delivering this.

Quote
If their plans turn out that way, SpaceX has already stated that launch costs could drop to below $10M per flight.  Compared to an expendable Falcon 9 that is 1/6 the price, but compared to a ULA flight that is 1/16 the price.
Now your behind the times.  :(

That was the position  before Sept 25th 2014, when Musk announced it was "Uneconomic" and full reuse would have to wait for the BFR. "Optimistically" (and SX are always optimistic) that's 5-6 years away, so more likely 8-10 years.

The prices you're talking about where the sort of prices Shotwell was talking about back when they thought they could do a whole reusable F9.
Quote
My opinion is that will be enough to allow the testing of new business models, or allow for self-funded expeditions.  Not immediately of course, but before the anticipated BFR can spur the same interest.
The man who started the idea of "Big Dumb Boosters" (or more accurately "cost optimized") was told by his boss at the projects inception "Cutting costs by 1/2 or 2/3 is not enough, as (launch services) price inflation will wipe out any savings). EELV has demonstrated exactly that effect.
Quote
Maybe, but only because they make it complicated.  That is the problem whenever you have subsidized or government-controlled transportation systems, they don't respond to market conditions well.
True.
Quote
SpaceX will continue to drive down prices - this is a given. 
No.  That is a presumption. Any 1st year MBA would tell you the way to maximize profit is to gain effective control of the market and then start raising prices, having effectively destroyed all opposition and made the barriers too high (in terms of risk) for new entrants.   :(

We must hope Musks stated policy of SX never hire MBA's will continue.  :)
Quote
So the only question is when ESA and Airbus finally decide that inaction is more costly than action.
A6 is a recognition that there are more competitive suppliers in the market.

I commend them for trying; however if you are going to add wings engines and gear etc... Why not go all the way and add forward swing wings and return the entire stage or are they still waiting for Falcon to “stick” the landing?
They estimate this approach will be 35% of the cost of developing a reusable stage from scratch.

IOW Money.
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Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #82 on: 06/07/2015 05:42 pm »
Some key numbers from the patent.

Unit is designed to decelerate the engine module at 2.5g down to M0.85 at 10Km, eventually going down to 2.5Km.

Cruise to be at 3.5Km at M0.3.

Patent claims
Use of (possibly rechargeable) thermal batteries to give fast start up of propeller driving engine(s). ??
Module recovers 80% of the value of the LV.
Module recovers 60% of stage dry mass.
Development cost of module about 35% of developing complete reusable 1st stage.
10 reuses --> 2000 secs of engine running.
But somewhere they are talking about 100 flights to give 1/4 of the engine costs of 100 flights.

I looked at the patents and I kept thinking of Virgin Galactics SpaceShip 2 design with the "Shuttlecock" tail fins, although these are meant to be for stability, not to slow down.

Ask yourself the following question.
If you were asked to find a way to recover the engines on the 1st stage with minimum technical risk and cost how would you do it?



MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline SkyPL

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #83 on: 06/07/2015 07:02 pm »
The whole thing is quite simple. I see lots of confusion from SpaceX boys, but really: what Airbus does is just taking all of the expensive parts, returning them back for refurbishment and discarding the metal can - fuel  tank.

It's by far safer method than returning entire first stage (which is inherently unstable due to billing narrow but very tall design using powered vertical landing), by this also more reliable, and at the same time gives you all of the most expensive components ready for reuse.

If you were asked to find a way to recover the engines on the 1st stage with minimum technical risk and cost how would you do it?
I would do exactly what Airbus Defence and Space does. Actually - I came up with similar idea myself 2-3 years ago when having chat with other guys about reusability. I'm most glad to see someone actually got the same idea and is about to implement it.

More competition on a market is only better - if ESA funds any of these ideas it might be great factor in pushing innovation forward on both sides of the ocean.

The amount of complains and denial from posters traditionally very pro-SpaceX seems to suggest that Adeline is in deed a nice plan for future that might put pressure on SpaceX. Or at least our local SpaceX propaganda team ;).

Offline Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #84 on: 06/07/2015 07:27 pm »
Have you not been watching their progress with recovering the Falcon 9 1st stage?  They are very close, and they have plenty of potential attempts to refine their processes and procedures.  We could see success this year, not next decade.  And there are indications that the market is already anticipating the potential lower prices a reusable 1st stage brings.
I have. But the problem is in three parts.
Recovering the 1st stage
Refurbishing the 1st stage
Making a profit doing it.

Only the first stage is anywhere close to delivering this.

Yes, only the 1st stage, but that is the largest cost segment of a Falcon 9.  And you're forgetting the economics of the Falcon Heavy, which has 3ea 1st stage cores and only one upper stage.

As to your three parts:
- Recovering the 1st stage - Yes, recovery does come with it's own costs, but if they can perfect land landings those costs will be pretty low.

- Refurbishing the 1st stage - They have designed the 1st stage to be reusable without refurbishment.  Post recovery testing will validate that, but it's not hard to believe they can accomplish that considering the engine and airframe reuse the Shuttles had.

- Making a profit doing it - Inherently there aren't many costs that accumulate due to reusability, so I'm not sure how the cost of recovery could ever be a significant portion of the new-build cost.

Quote
The man who started the idea of "Big Dumb Boosters" (or more accurately "cost optimized") was told by his boss at the projects inception "Cutting costs by 1/2 or 2/3 is not enough, as (launch services) price inflation will wipe out any savings). EELV has demonstrated exactly that effect.

No, the EELV program has only shown what happens when you have a monopoly with one well-funded customer.

But you do make my point that what Airbus has proposed is not really that big of a savings, so while they may think that an incremental decrease makes sense, compared to where the market is going they are shooting well behind their target...
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 TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #85 on: 06/07/2015 07:36 pm »


Some key numbers from the patent.

Unit is designed to decelerate the engine module at 2.5g down to M0.85 at 10Km, eventually going down to 2.5Km.

Cruise to be at 3.5Km at M0.3.

Patent claims
Use of (possibly rechargeable) thermal batteries to give fast start up of propeller driving engine(s). ??

Module recovers 80% of the value of the LV.

Ask yourself the following question.
If you were asked to find a way to recover the engines on the 1st stage with minimum technical risk and cost how would you do it?

Its that meant to be 80% of stage cost or LV. For Ariane 6 LV consists of 2-4 SRBs +1sts stage + 2nd stage.



Offline Im_Utrecht

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #86 on: 06/07/2015 08:58 pm »
I remember Elon Musk talking about rapid and fully reusability.
That to use an aircraft just one time would make flying very expensive.

I also read somewere (sorry i can ot recall where exactly) that Airbus considered reusability as a no go. They added wings engines and it turned out to be impossibele.

So now Airbus decides not to throw the whole rocket.... just a part....
By the time they are done Raptor and MCT are already operational.

As an European i feel ashamed....
The Netherlands spends 74,7 million per year on ESA.....

Nothing wrong with trying something different -- ULA isn't planning to get the whole rocket back, either.  It's a lot like the first few decades of heavier-than-air flight ... many different designs, some of which worked (and some of those better than others).  It'll all sort itself out, but it will take time.  No shame in that!  :)

I agree with that. ULA's plan makes a bit more sense to me. Rocketry exits more then 50 years.
This is more a political move. You spend a couple of million and then you can tell that you seriously tried.
Remember that the Germans are not very happy with their French counterparts. They ordered a launch from SpaceX saying we don't need Ariane...

Offline RanulfC

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #87 on: 06/07/2015 10:02 pm »

I was surprised by turboprop engines, a couple of jets engines could have added boost from pad to about 50,000ft.

You shouldn't be surprised they did not show that, because such a thing would only make practical sense using looney tunes physics. It is a terrible idea, but there is a thread for it in the "advanced concepts" section.
If you are going rubbish an idea you need to back up you criticism with facts. Up to about 50,000ft a jet is considerably more efficient than rocket.

Jet-LAP proponent here so take this in context;

1) The number of jet engines required to actually provide a thrust boost from launch to 50kft far exceeds the needed engines for flyback return by a significant margin. Jet engine efficiency means they normally have far lower thrust-to-weight than a rocket. Their main claim to efficiency/economics in this case is they (specifically the turboprops) have a very low maintenance requirement per hour of flight time. Rockets are very inefficient/un-economical by comparison. (Before the SX-fans try comparisons they need to keep in mind that a jet engine is capable of hundreds or hours before extensive maintenance comparable to the what a rocket engine requires after every flight. The current leader in "no-maintenance" flight time is the RL-10 which can only operate for around ONE hour or thereabouts. Meanwhile the Merlin can "operate" for around 4 hours total before it needs "major" maintenance or replacement)
2) Said engines then have to be capable of SURVIVING the launch conditions while running full-out and to be effective are going to require ACTIVE inlet and exhaust systems (mass) that will NOT be used during recovery.
3) Turboprops and props in general are the most efficient aero-propulsion system at low Mach numbers

I commend them for trying; however if you are going to add wings engines and gear etc... Why not go all the way and add forward swing wings and return the entire stage or are they still waiting for Falcon to “stick” the landing?

That would require whole new load paths for the tanks, making them much heavier. A small unit containing just the thrust structure with engines is much easier to handle. Not a bad idea at all. If competitive with SpaceX bringing the whole stage back vertical we will see.
Nice stating of the obvious; so please don’t preach structures and load factors as I happen to be a pilot who teaches Physics... Thanks.

You asked, he answered and you're upset that he stated the "obvious" you asked about?

Load paths are important and they add mass and detract from payload which is stated in the patent so if you are a pilot and you teach physics why ask the obvious as if you don't know? :)

Truth is I think both ULA and AirBus can and will bring the technology to use faster than stated as the majority of the systems are pretty much off the shelf at this point its just the (Hard Part) combining them into a single, workable system (and finding the funding which I suspect it the major reason this is being announced now, they have to prep the investors for the switch having heavily downplayed SpaceX's achievements) is still required.

It had already been pointed out that most of the other "flyback" or RTLS schemes won't work well for Guiana as nominal staging point is too far downrange for glide-back and boost-back would impact payload significantly so using a sub-sonic, high efficiency, (turboprop) propulsion system to get the engines and main thrust structure back to the launch site makes sense in this case.

Speaking of feasibility, I didn't see anyone check the other thread's reusability models against reusable (vs expendable) airplanes. Are the two technologies too different to get a feel for if the model is consistent with known reusability cases? (Maybe one could put the upper stages as airplane "cargo", and see if stage 1 reuse matches airframe reuse.)

"Airplanes are not Rocket/Launch Vehicles" and vice-versa. Aircraft NEVER had to face the situation that rockets/LVs do and therefore no model will allow feasible (that's the important bit) comparisons. The only 'comparable' expendable airplanes would be cargo-gliders which were, at that point in time, economically and operationally feasible for the purpose of pin-point, consolidated cargo/personnel delivery but were made obsolete by advances in aircraft and parachutes.

The closest you can come is comparing the propulsion systems which still falls short as NO propulsion system OTHER than rockets are capable of being used to deliver a payload to orbit as of our current understanding.

Randy
From The Amazing Catstronaut on the Black Arrow LV:
British physics, old chap. It's undignified to belch flames and effluvia all over the pad, what. A true gentlemen's orbital conveyance lifts itself into the air unostentatiously, with the minimum of spectacle and a modicum of grace. Not like our American cousins' launch vehicles, eh?

Offline RanulfC

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #88 on: 06/07/2015 10:35 pm »
Have you not been watching their progress with recovering the Falcon 9 1st stage?  They are very close, and they have plenty of potential attempts to refine their processes and procedures.  We could see success this year, not next decade.  And there are indications that the market is already anticipating the potential lower prices a reusable 1st stage brings.
I have. But the problem is in three parts.
Recovering the 1st stage
Refurbishing the 1st stage
Making a profit doing it.

Only the first stage is anywhere close to delivering this.

Yes, only the 1st stage, but that is the largest cost segment of a Falcon 9. And you're forgetting the economics of the Falcon Heavy, which has 3ea 1st stage cores and only one upper stage.

At one-third again the cost which should point out that the cost of the LV isn't the main driver for launch costs as we're already aware. (And it should be noted that the recovery and refurbishments costs will be anywhere from two to three times higher than a single stage recovery WHEN they happen.)

Quote
As to your three parts:
- Recovering the 1st stage - Yes, recovery does come with it's own costs, but if they can perfect land landings those costs will be pretty low.

Assumed, there is no way to know until recovery and refurbishment has been accomplished more than once.

Quote
- Refurbishing the 1st stage - They have designed the 1st stage to be reusable without refurbishment. Post recovery testing will validate that, but it's not hard to believe they can accomplish that considering the engine and airframe reuse the Shuttles had.

They have designed the stage to be RECOVERED not to be reusable without refurbishment. They have a margin but it is unclear at this time if the margin is enough to allow reuse until they recover and study a stage that has actually flown. The Shuttle had MUCH higher margins and very robust airframe to accomplish what it did.

Quote
- Making a profit doing it - Inherently there aren't many costs that accumulate due to reusability, so I'm not sure how the cost of recovery could ever be a significant portion of the new-build cost.

Unfortunately history shows that's not always the case. The Shuttle was not economical compared to ELV costs due in part to the high amount of costs associated with its reusability. In the other hand the H1 engine which was not specifically designed or built for reuse was found to be refurbish-able including recovery costs of about 5% of a new-build engine. Add in the ULA data showing the engine/thrust-structure is around 80% of the cost of the stage you have both less hinging on the ability to expend-or-reuse the tankage and a good possibility that if the tankage doesn't survive as well as the engines/thrust structure you economics of full stage recovery no longer look so cut and dried.
(And that's a very real possibility)

ULA and Airbus have investors and not a billionaire backer willing to spend what it takes, so obviously they have to approach the problem differently. It would be a very different world if reusability (other than the Shuttle) had been pursued  along multiple lines for the last 30 years but it wasn't because no one could justify it economically then. Technically, most manufacturers STILL can't as there is a required minimum flight rate which is still in doubt at this time.

One thing that has been pointed out previously is that if the basis of the current market "changes" significantly (which SpaceX is aiming for with the LEO constellation plan) then most of the assumptions which are the basis of current thinking also change.

Randy
From The Amazing Catstronaut on the Black Arrow LV:
British physics, old chap. It's undignified to belch flames and effluvia all over the pad, what. A true gentlemen's orbital conveyance lifts itself into the air unostentatiously, with the minimum of spectacle and a modicum of grace. Not like our American cousins' launch vehicles, eh?

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #89 on: 06/07/2015 11:10 pm »
Thanks Randy for an educational and intelligent answer to by question regarding using jet engines. 

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #90 on: 06/07/2015 11:18 pm »
Its that meant to be 80% of stage cost or LV. For Ariane 6 LV consists of 2-4 SRBs +1sts stage + 2nd stage.
This is what the patent says.
Quote
[0123] The module 14 according to the present invention represents more than 80% of the value of the launcher and approximately 60% of the inert mass of the first stage. Naturally the percentage represented by the module with respect to the total cost of the launcher depends on the number of engines 20 in the propulsion system. Consequently the use of the module substantially reduces the operating cost of a new launcher.
I've no idea if "launcher" includes the SRB's.  I don't think so as SRB's are built by someone else but I cannot confirm it one way or the other.
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline Kryten

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #91 on: 06/08/2015 12:48 am »
Its that meant to be 80% of stage cost or LV. For Ariane 6 LV consists of 2-4 SRBs +1sts stage + 2nd stage.
This is what the patent says.
Quote
[0123] The module 14 according to the present invention represents more than 80% of the value of the launcher and approximately 60% of the inert mass of the first stage. Naturally the percentage represented by the module with respect to the total cost of the launcher depends on the number of engines 20 in the propulsion system. Consequently the use of the module substantially reduces the operating cost of a new launcher.
I've no idea if "launcher" includes the SRB's.  I don't think so as SRB's are built by someone else but I cannot confirm it one way or the other.
The patent predates the current Ariane 6 by at least a year, and makes no mention of boosters. It seems to assume an all-liquid two stage LV.

Offline Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #92 on: 06/08/2015 04:02 am »
They have designed the stage to be RECOVERED not to be reusable without refurbishment.

Not what SpaceX has stated publicly.  From a SpaceNews article last year:

“At this point, we are highly confident of being able to land successfully on a floating launch pad or back at the launch site and refly the rocket with no required refurbishment,” SpaceX said in its statement.

Musk has stated that they designed the Falcon 9 so that they could "gas & go".  The airline model, not the Shuttle refurbishment model.

Quote
They have a margin but it is unclear at this time if the margin is enough to allow reuse until they recover and study a stage that has actually flown. The Shuttle had MUCH higher margins and very robust airframe to accomplish what it did.

The profit margin is determined by the price paid for the customers for reuse, so there are multiple unknowns still.  However there are indications that there is customer demand for reused stages, so that is the first indication that this could be a profitable effort for them.

Quote
The Shuttle had MUCH higher margins and very robust airframe to accomplish what it did.

Well yes, but the Shuttle was also designed to fly far more missions and do so much more than what a Falcon 9 stage is asked to do.  My point is that reusability for things that go to space, like engines and structures, has been proven - now it just needs to be refined.

Quote
Quote
- Making a profit doing it - Inherently there aren't many costs that accumulate due to reusability, so I'm not sure how the cost of recovery could ever be a significant portion of the new-build cost.

Unfortunately history shows that's not always the case. The Shuttle was not economical compared to ELV costs due in part to the high amount of costs associated with its reusability.

The Shuttle was a failed experiment for a reusable VTHL vehicle, and not a good indicator for a reusable VTVL vehicle. And while looking to history for lessons is good, you have to make sure you're taking the right lessons away.

Quote
ULA and Airbus have investors and not a billionaire backer willing to spend what it takes, so obviously they have to approach the problem differently.

Boeing and Lockheed Martin are the top two U.S. Government contractors, and between them they generate $150B in revenue per year.  SpaceX spent $300M to develop the initial version of the Falcon 9.  I think Boeing and Lockheed Martin can afford to do what SpaceX has done and is doing.  Airbus too.
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 TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #93 on: 06/08/2015 04:36 am »
Greg Meholic was on Spaceshow talking about advanced propulsion systems and reusable LVs (last third). He is involved with DARPA XS1 project.

http://www.thespaceshow.com/detail.asp?q=2487

Offline sanman

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #94 on: 06/08/2015 06:40 am »
Okay, so this idea looks cool - sort of comparable to ULA's reusability idea - but I wanted to ask about the turboprop thing

3) Turboprops and props in general are the most efficient aero-propulsion system at low Mach numbers

Wow, why not just a glide landing? Why powered flight? I read somewhere that it's a rotary engine and not a turboprop. Anyway, what's wrong with just gliding in?

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #95 on: 06/08/2015 06:50 am »
It will re enter 100s km downrange.

Offline sanman

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #96 on: 06/08/2015 06:56 am »
Wow, these are crazy cool times to be living in  :D

A wankel-rotary powered propeller on a re-entering stage! It almost feels Steampunk.

So I guess a scramjet would have been too complex?

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #97 on: 06/08/2015 09:14 am »
Quote
They have a margin but it is unclear at this time if the margin is enough to allow reuse until they recover and study a stage that has actually flown. The Shuttle had MUCH higher margins and very robust airframe to accomplish what it did.

The profit margin is determined by the price paid for the customers for reuse, so there are multiple unknowns still.  However there are indications that there is customer demand for reused stages, so that is the first indication that this could be a profitable effort for them.
He's talking about structural and thermal safety margins, not profit margins.
Quote
Quote
The Shuttle had MUCH higher margins and very robust airframe to accomplish what it did.
Well yes, but the Shuttle was also designed to fly far more missions and do so much more than what a Falcon 9 stage is asked to do.  My point is that reusability for things that go to space, like engines and structures, has been proven - now it just needs to be refined.
Have SX state how many flights they expect their F9SR to do? Where was this? I can put that in the model and from there.

The trouble is F9 was designed to be an ELV, while avoiding design choices that would prevent it (hopefully) being turned into an RLV one day. Shuttle was (originally) conceived from day 1 to be an RLV.

Interestingly they have both would up as being semi-reusable designs that will discard large parts of the architecture to get the payload to orbit.
Quote
Quote
Unfortunately history shows that's not always the case. The Shuttle was not economical compared to ELV costs due in part to the high amount of costs associated with its reusability.
The Shuttle was a failed experiment for a reusable VTHL vehicle, and not a good indicator for a reusable VTVL vehicle. And while looking to history for lessons is good, you have to make sure you're taking the right lessons away.
That's a fair point.

Despite the fact that H2O2 and NTO (oxidizers, not fuels) have been used as chamber coolants (available, cheap, no coking) and LOX cooling experiments going back to the early 90's SX's Merlin engineers didn't use it. It's the obvious way to eliminate coking.

BTW if you think coking is a peripheral issue think again. Coke build up inside the tubes cuts the ability to remove heat from the inner chamber wall. Chamber wall temp rises to failure faster, so either throttle up the GG to drive the fuel turbo pump harder, throttle down main engine (less thrust), run fuel richer (rockets run fuel rich as SOP) or (like Agena) add something in the fuel to create a dynamic protective wall coating.

LOX/LH2 engines don't suffer from coking.  :)
Quote
ULA and Airbus have investors and not a billionaire backer willing to spend what it takes, so obviously they have to approach the problem differently.

Boeing and Lockheed Martin are the top two U.S. Government contractors, and between them they generate $150B in revenue per year.  SpaceX spent $300M to develop the initial version of the Falcon 9.  I think Boeing and Lockheed Martin can afford to do what SpaceX has done and is doing.  Airbus too.
[/quote]
True.

But you're not thinking like a government contractor, and that mindset is very important in this context.

ULA <> Boeing and ULA <> Lockheed Martin.

It's a subsidiary they expect to get a steady cash flow from, not one they plan to send money to.

The (long term) USG GC view is basically "If the government wants it they can pay us to do it, otherwise we don't spend a cent."

Should ULA's parents invest in their subsidaries product line so it can continue (or at least let it retain enough cash to do the investment itself) like normal business do. Yes.

Will they?

However this is OT for Airbus. Although it must be admitted this part of EADS is much more government contractor like (with ESA being the USAF and the EU being the ultimate paymaster) than the part that builds passenger aircraft for world wide sale.

Time will tell if this concept gets enough internal support to be in the A6 "evolution".  :(
« Last Edit: 06/08/2015 09:16 am by john smith 19 »
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline tp1024

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #98 on: 06/08/2015 01:17 pm »

Time will tell if this concept gets enough internal support to be in the A6 "evolution".  :(

That is the main point. It will need a lot of internal support to pull it off, and it will need a hell of a lot more support than even Falcon 9 reusability. It's not about putting fins and legs on a working rocket stage. It's about developing a whole new engine compartment that must be integrated into the whole structure of the rocket. You need to create a whole new separation sequence. The wings will introduce a whole new set of aerodynamic problems during launch.

The effort involved with all that is much larger than anything SpaceX ever did. it's not an incremental approach at all. You will find that putting absolutely everything into the rocket to test it is the only way to go. You're not doing a regular rocket launch and then use the regular RCS to turn the rocketstage aroound and re-ignite a regular engine in a regular engine compartment to see what happens and then go back, using this data to modify the rocket a little more.

If you develop and use the new detachable engine compartment. You're essentially buildung a whole new structure including a whole range of new weak points in a place where AFAIK the solid boosters are attached - which is the very last place where you'd like to create potential weaknesses, just to see if something works. Then you'll need the wings, the engines and the landing gear, all of which are essential to the whole deal. (Might do without the landing gear. But that is the least of it.)

I doubt there would have been enough internal (and external!) support even at SpaceX to pull all of this off. It does seem to be more elegant, yes. But you can't evolve it out of an existing rocket, which is the real genius with the Falcon 9.

On top of that, the Falcon 9 is cheaper even without reusablity and all that the reusability proposed here might accomplish, is to catch up with that!

Ariane 64 at 85mio Euro is supposed to be 20mio Euro more expensive than Ariane 62. So, the boosters of Ariane 64 alone cost about 40mio Euro or half the launch cost. Launch etc. should cost about 5-15mio Euro, leaving 30-40mio Euro for the first *and* second stage. So how much is recovering the 1st stage worth? And is any of the pricing even remotely realistic? (Hint: Probably not.)

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #99 on: 06/08/2015 04:50 pm »
The wings will introduce a whole new set of aerodynamic problems during launch.

Then you'll need the wings, the engines and the landing gear, all of which are essential to the whole deal. (Might do without the landing gear. But that is the least of it.)

On top of that, the Falcon 9 is cheaper even without reusablity and all that the reusability proposed here might accomplish, is to catch up with that!

Ariane 64 at 85mio Euro is supposed to be 20mio Euro more expensive than Ariane 62. So, the boosters of Ariane 64 alone cost about 40mio Euro or half the launch cost.

- They claim the wings won't cause problems during launch like other fly back designs. Something to do with no twist in the wing, not an expert.

- Well it's Airbus, they know how to do that.

- Says who? Falcon 9 performance is around 3.75t to an Ariane-equivalent GTO orbit. With A5 at 9.6t for dual launch, that makes approx. $16k/kg for F9 and $20.8k/kg for A5.

- A64 is supposed to cost 90m euros which is roughly $100m for 10t dual launch, which is $10k/kg. So if we believe in the 90m euro cost (which I do not), A6 will be almost 40% cheaper than F9 on a per kg basis. Just saying, its nowhere near as clear-cut as you think it is.

- The price for A62 is what governments will pay, not the actual cost which will be higher. I.e. A64 subsidizes A62.

I agree with one thing however, to get the advertised benefit of reusability (which overall is small to begin with) I think A6 needs a high-thrust first stage. So Adeline will almost certainly mean a new engine program, IMO.


« Last Edit: 06/08/2015 05:10 pm by Oli »

Offline notsorandom

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #100 on: 06/08/2015 05:25 pm »
I can't find any figures for the Ariane 6's staging velocities so this recovery method may or may not make sense. Since it has been in development for the last 5 years we know that it was not started with the Ariane 6 in mind as the new rocket was started more recently. Ariane 5's Vulcain 2 along with the rest of the core comes down in the pacific. This winged recovery pod may have to fly a significant distance before it can find a place to land. The entry environment could also be too hot and stressful for the design to cope with. When we think of entry from near orbital speeds the Shuttle and IXV come to mind which look much different.

There were many pre-SLS SDHLV designs which recovered the SSMEs down range in the pacific via a detachable reentry vehicle. The IXV gave the ESA experience in the technologies necessary to make this recovery scenario work. This scheme would be very sensitive to the mass of the recovery system because every kg it is almost an even trade from the payload capability. A down range recovery in the Pacific Ocean may be the only way to get the Vulcain engine and avionics of the Ariane 6 back. The Adeline concept may make much more sense for a new liquid booster system to replace the solid boosters currently envisioned.

Offline sanman

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #101 on: 06/08/2015 05:44 pm »
Just for clarity - will that be wankel rotary engines instead of a turboprop? Why would that be better?

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #102 on: 06/08/2015 06:18 pm »

Ariane 64 at 85mio Euro is supposed to be 20mio Euro more expensive than Ariane 62. So, the boosters of Ariane 64 alone cost about 40mio Euro or half the launch cost. Launch etc. should cost about 5-15mio Euro, leaving 30-40mio Euro for the first *and* second stage. So how much is recovering the 1st stage worth? And is any of the pricing even remotely realistic? (Hint: Probably not.)
So that makes each SRB about 10m Euros.

We could go with the idea that the 1st stage is 70% of the main hardware.
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Offline AncientU

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #103 on: 06/08/2015 08:40 pm »
Is there a European engine that is capable of 10 (or 100) launches without extensive (a la STS) refurbishment?
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Offline Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #104 on: 06/08/2015 09:57 pm »
He's talking about structural and thermal safety margins, not profit margins.

Ah, missed that.  Thanks.

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Have SX state how many flights they expect their F9SR to do? Where was this? I can put that in the model and from there.

I don't recall an exact number, but the Merlin 1D qualification program required 10 missions worth of use, and the comments I recall is that they don't know the upper end of use yet of the engine.  As to the structure, they wouldn't have any data on that yet, which is why they plan to do a test program on their first recovered stage.

However, back in 2012 Elon Musk stated about the Falcon Heavy:

"What does it imply for flight rate? "Multiple flights per day for first stage and side boosters," Musk says."

Now that assumed a reusable 2nd stage, which is not being worked on right now, but Airbus would have more of a challenge trying to match that rate since SpaceX right now would only have to build new the 2nd stage, whereas Airbus would have to new build the 1st stage tank structure too.

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The trouble is F9 was designed to be an ELV, while avoiding design choices that would prevent it (hopefully) being turned into an RLV one day. Shuttle was (originally) conceived from day 1 to be an RLV.

Not sure why you think this.  Since the beginning SpaceX has publicly stated their goal was to recover and reuse the 1st stage.  Their initial plans used cork insulation and parachutes, which didn't work, but it showed their design from the start anticipated recovery and reuse.

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BTW if you think coking is a peripheral issue think again. Coke build up inside the tubes cuts the ability to remove heat from the inner chamber wall.

Luckily I don't have to think about it at all, since the designer of the Merlin 1D, Tom Mueller, is an expert on rocket engine design.  And as long as their design keeps the cooling loop below the coking level, it is not supposed to be a problem.

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LOX/LH2 engines don't suffer from coking.  :)

It's all about trade-offs.  Delta IV is arguably the most modern LOX/LH2 powered rocket, and ULA feels it's unaffordable to compete against other expendable launchers, much less partially reusable ones.

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But you're not thinking like a government contractor, and that mindset is very important in this context.

ULA <> Boeing and ULA <> Lockheed Martin.

It's a subsidiary they expect to get a steady cash flow from, not one they plan to send money to.

I've worked for a number of large government contractors, so I do know how they think and operate.

But the bottom line is this - you're either investing in your future to stay in business, or you're deciding to lose business to your competitors that are investing in their future while you're not.

There are plenty of businesses that make massive investments in their future all the time, and Airbus has the wherewithal to make such an investment.  Boeing and Lockheed Martin have that ability too.  It's just a question of whether they want to be competitive over the long run, and so far they haven't decided that yet.
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Offline tp1024

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #105 on: 06/09/2015 08:50 am »
The wings will introduce a whole new set of aerodynamic problems during launch.

Then you'll need the wings, the engines and the landing gear, all of which are essential to the whole deal. (Might do without the landing gear. But that is the least of it.)

On top of that, the Falcon 9 is cheaper even without reusablity and all that the reusability proposed here might accomplish, is to catch up with that!

Ariane 64 at 85mio Euro is supposed to be 20mio Euro more expensive than Ariane 62. So, the boosters of Ariane 64 alone cost about 40mio Euro or half the launch cost.

- Says who? Falcon 9 performance is around 3.75t to an Ariane-equivalent GTO orbit. With A5 at 9.6t for dual launch, that makes approx. $16k/kg for F9 and $20.8k/kg for A5.

- A64 is supposed to cost 90m euros which is roughly $100m for 10t dual launch, which is $10k/kg. So if we believe in the 90m euro cost (which I do not), A6 will be almost 40% cheaper than F9 on a per kg basis. Just saying, its nowhere near as clear-cut as you think it is.

- The price for A62 is what governments will pay, not the actual cost which will be higher. I.e. A64 subsidizes A62.

I agree with one thing however, to get the advertised benefit of reusability (which overall is small to begin with) I think A6 needs a high-thrust first stage. So Adeline will almost certainly mean a new engine program, IMO.

Using a 1:1.11 exchange ratio for euro <-> $ isn't realistic, it's the lowest in over a decade. Historically a 1:1.3 ratio was typical, with peaks around 1:1.5. So the assumption in the long run should be a launch price of $115-135mio. You should also take this year's update of F9 into account, which should increase payload to Ariane-equivalent orbit by about 30%.

Each of those assumptions is enough to make a real F9 cheaper than a fictional Ariane 64. And I'm not even talking about Falcon Heavy, which is clearly going to be ready by the time Ariane 64 goes anywhere beyond power point presentations. (BTW you've also left out my main point that reusability cannot be evolved from A6, but only be done in one great big leap of faith.)

As for A6 prices, it did occur to me that the 4bn Euro for development of Ariane 6 may allow some creative accounting. Let's assume for the sake of argument that 1bn is the true development cost for an A5 derived rocket.
3bn Euro are only used as a kind of subsidy and spread over 100 launches (typical totals for both Ariane 4 and Ariane 5), it would lower the launch cost by 30mio each. So each rocket may in fact cost 120mio euro per launch but sold at 90mio.

You could get down to 120mio from 150mio by making some modest improvements. The P80 derived P120 booster shouldn't cost much to develop. The development cost of the P80 was 76mio Euro. Most of the work on Vinci and the upper stage is already done. Leaving some 900mio Euro to improve the Vulcain engine and account for the fact that rockets aren't quite legos.

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #106 on: 06/09/2015 09:40 am »
Now that assumed a reusable 2nd stage, which is not being worked on right now, but Airbus would have more of a challenge trying to match that rate since SpaceX right now would only have to build new the 2nd stage, whereas Airbus would have to new build the 1st stage tank structure too.
Yes and no. Needing both keeps the 2 stage production lines in synch. Not sure if that helps or hinders Airbus's operation.
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Not sure why you think this.  Since the beginning SpaceX has publicly stated their goal was to recover and reuse the 1st stage.  Their initial plans used cork insulation and parachutes, which didn't work, but it showed their design from the start anticipated recovery and reuse.
Now you're really moving the goal posts. Musk made it quite clear that it he would consider he had failed if the company did not produce a fully reusable rocket in all stages.

That's what their video showed. in 2011. Nothing less.

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Luckily I don't have to think about it at all, since the designer of the Merlin 1D, Tom Mueller, is an expert on rocket engine design.  And as long as their design keeps the cooling loop below the coking level, it is not supposed to be a problem.
It's a problem insofar as every  solution that uses the fuel as the coolant will trade something in terms of Isp, mass flow, turbine power etc, to deal with it.
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It's all about trade-offs.  Delta IV is arguably the most modern LOX/LH2 powered rocket, and ULA feels it's unaffordable to compete against other expendable launchers, much less partially reusable ones.
True. However Vulcaine 2 is not the RS68.

I will note that further discussion of ULA's approach is probably better done on the Vulcan threat.
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #107 on: 06/09/2015 10:51 am »
Using a 1:1.11 exchange ratio for euro <-> $ isn't realistic, it's the lowest in over a decade. Historically a 1:1.3 ratio was typical, with peaks around 1:1.5. So the assumption in the long run should be a launch price of $115-135mio. You should also take this year's update of F9 into account, which should increase payload to Ariane-equivalent orbit by about 30%.

Says who? You make very speculative assumptions. You could argue I do as well, but remember my point was it's far from clear-cut whether F9 will be more competitive. Its a wild guess and unfortunately SpaceX fans have a tendency to sell their amateurish speculations as facts.

Offline tp1024

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #108 on: 06/09/2015 01:46 pm »
Using a 1:1.11 exchange ratio for euro <-> $ isn't realistic, it's the lowest in over a decade. Historically a 1:1.3 ratio was typical, with peaks around 1:1.5. So the assumption in the long run should be a launch price of $115-135mio. You should also take this year's update of F9 into account, which should increase payload to Ariane-equivalent orbit by about 30%.

Says who? You make very speculative assumptions. You could argue I do as well, but remember my point was it's far from clear-cut whether F9 will be more competitive. Its a wild guess and unfortunately SpaceX fans have a tendency to sell their amateurish speculations as facts.

The update of F9 is not speculation at all. The incremental approach to development is also not speculation. That was my main point.

Given the concept presented here, there is no such thing as an incremental development for Ariane 6. The very first steps to implement the reusability concept involve major changes in hardware. Unless a detachable engine compartment is part of the rocket right from the start. Nothing of the kind is being talked about. Reusability is planned as an option that might be implemented some time later. All of this is very much unlike the development process for Falcon 9.

Those are facts and not speculation. All speculation is introduced on the side of the Ariane 6. I didn't talk about Falcon Heavy for the very reason that it would be speculation, even though it is a much better comparison to either Ariane 5 or Ariane 6.
« Last Edit: 06/09/2015 04:48 pm by tp1024 »

Offline RanulfC

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #109 on: 06/09/2015 03:37 pm »
Okay, so this idea looks cool - sort of comparable to ULA's reusability idea - but I wanted to ask about the turboprop thing

3) Turboprops and props in general are the most efficient aero-propulsion system at low Mach numbers

Wow, why not just a glide landing? Why powered flight? I read somewhere that it's a rotary engine and not a turboprop. Anyway, what's wrong with just gliding in?

Distance between the reentry point and the landing area requires some form of propulsion to enable recovery. It's simply to far to "just" glide back :) Hadn't heard anything about rotary engines as the patent and video both note the engines are turboprops. Rotary would technically be a bit more robust while being technically more complex but I understand that there has been substantial progress in rotary aviation engines in the past 20 years so there may be economic effects from using it in lieu of a turboprop.

Wow, these are crazy cool times to be living in  :D

A wankel-rotary powered propeller on a re-entering stage! It almost feels Steampunk.

So I guess a scramjet would have been too complex?

SCramjets need to be over Mach-4 to even start operation, ramjets in general need to be over Mach-1 to operate efficiently so neither would be 'economic' and the fact is that SCramjets as of yet don't actually work effectively at all :)

Subsonic cruise would be best with either a high-bypass turbofan, but that requires a very large diameter fan which would be problematical to package, or turboprop which is actually pretty easy to package with folding props which themselves are well understood technology. Hence props win out despite LOOKING like something you'd never put on a rocket :)

Similarly let me address another side-line note, a concept for returning the "whole-stage" by glide back;

I once saw a concept which I can't find again that addressed the real issue with gliding back a full size first stage with all the 'parts' attached. It was noted that by this point in the flight the majority of your "mass" was now exactly opposite of what it was going up with the propellant tanks nearly or completely empty. So really the stage dynamics WANT to switch to engine first for reentry and flight which most designs 'fight' in some way. This concept didn't in that a light weight TPS section covered the engines for reentry and then at a point two semi-rigid-flexible wings open along the sides of the stage. (These are fixed to the "return" CG/CP which is very near the aft end of the booster) Additionally flexible control surfaces were opened from the "inter-stage" area to provide controlled flight back to the launch site. The overall design was a "tail-dragger" with the main gear installed where the main thrust structure was a much lighter set of gear in the inter-stage area.

Models were flown and overall results looked good but no one pursued the concept.

In one sub-set of the concept a small turbojet was installed in the "inter-stage" area that would allow propulsive return to the launch site, my thoughts were that a much larger "fan" with a tip-turbine burning residual gaseous propellants would be effective also. But again nobody's looking in this direction at the moment :)

Randy
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British physics, old chap. It's undignified to belch flames and effluvia all over the pad, what. A true gentlemen's orbital conveyance lifts itself into the air unostentatiously, with the minimum of spectacle and a modicum of grace. Not like our American cousins' launch vehicles, eh?

Offline nadreck

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #110 on: 06/09/2015 03:59 pm »
Using a 1:1.11 exchange ratio for euro <-> $ isn't realistic, it's the lowest in over a decade. Historically a 1:1.3 ratio was typical, with peaks around 1:1.5. So the assumption in the long run should be a launch price of $115-135mio. You should also take this year's update of F9 into account, which should increase payload to Ariane-equivalent orbit by about 30%.

Says who? You make very speculative assumptions. You could argue I do as well, but remember my point was it's far from clear-cut whether F9 will be more competitive. Its a wild guess and unfortunately SpaceX space technology fans on this and other discussion forums have a tendency to sell their amateurish speculations as facts.

There, fixed that for you ...

Now the FACT is that other than fans, you have the pronouncements of organizations like SpaceX, ULA, and Arienespace about: the future cost of a future product; the future capabilities of a future product; the development and delivery schedule of a future product. Those pronouncements are not accurate and the eventual facts are different from the stated projections for a variety of reasons (including, but not limited to, the fluctuation of currencies and commodities).   Fans take the pronouncements as facts or sometimes (like wall street and whisper numbers) even expect that the pronouncements are conservative projections and have even higher expectations.  Critics point out every time that company, that fan, other fans, other companies have been wrong whether it was because they exaggerated or some other condition totally unrelated to them and their projections changed.

If you want to only dwell on facts then SpaceX today offers a service cheaper than Arienespace with equipment that had far less subsidies in developing than Arienespace. Arienespace has announced a project that is at least 3 years behind 3 of SpaceX's well publicized plans that success on any of which would cut its own prices to well below the prices Arienespace is expected to meet with its new project.
It is all well and good to quote those things that made it past your confirmation bias that other people wrote, but this is a discussion board damnit! Let us know what you think! And why!

Offline RanulfC

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #111 on: 06/09/2015 04:07 pm »
They have designed the stage to be RECOVERED not to be reusable without refurbishment.

Not what SpaceX has stated publicly.  From a SpaceNews article last year:

“At this point, we are highly confident of being able to land successfully on a floating launch pad or back at the launch site and refly the rocket with no required refurbishment,” SpaceX said in its statement.

Musk has stated that they designed the Falcon 9 so that they could "gas & go".  The airline model, not the Shuttle refurbishment model.

Musk "wants" gas-n-go, unfortunately he's not going to get it with the F9 architecture and they have acknowledged this. While they would LIKE to be confident that the rocket will require no "refurbishment" it is highly unlikely as the ENGINES at least require a good amount of work to be ready for the next flight. There are parts that need replacement which they have shown with test firings which is not even close to fully flight regime. By "refurbishment" they are meaning major maintenance and they are "confident" but do not as of yet actually KNOW they can do so.
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They have a margin but it is unclear at this time if the margin is enough to allow reuse until they recover and study a stage that has actually flown. The Shuttle had MUCH higher margins and very robust airframe to accomplish what it did.

The profit margin is determined by the price paid for the customers for reuse, so there are multiple unknowns still.  However there are indications that there is customer demand for reused stages, so that is the first indication that this could be a profitable effort for them.

I was talking structural and maintenance margins which is not at all "profit" margin and it is still not a definite that customers will be willing nor how much of a 'cost' savings reuse will allow. So far customer "acceptance" of reuse is predicated on an assumed significant cost reduction of launch costs on a "re-flown" stage. Part of the reason that SpaceX hasn't given even a hint of what that price may be is because they don't know how much it will cost TO re-fly a stage and they won't know that until they have a stage recovered and examined.
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The Shuttle had MUCH higher margins and very robust airframe to accomplish what it did.

Well yes, but the Shuttle was also designed to fly far more missions and do so much more than what a Falcon 9 stage is asked to do.  My point is that reusability for things that go to space, like engines and structures, has been proven - now it just needs to be refined.

Far less of the former and only so much of the latter actually and it was a fully different system than that of the F9. Which was my point. The Shuttle's engines and structure underwent a very different regime than the F9 is supposed to undertake and was engineered and its margins were quite different due to that. SpaceX HAS to recover FIRST before they can "refine" the systems and the way they are doing it is different enough that they will and have had different issues than those of the Shuttle. It really isn't THAT clear cut that you have any large carry over. On the other hand the Airbus design COULD include many of the Shuttle lessons and techniques because it IS very similar to the Shuttle operations and maintenance modes.
(Getting back on-topic :) )

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ULA and Airbus have investors and not a billionaire backer willing to spend what it takes, so obviously they have to approach the problem differently.

Boeing and Lockheed Martin are the top two U.S. Government contractors, and between them they generate $150B in revenue per year. SpaceX spent $300M to develop the initial version of the Falcon 9. I think Boeing and Lockheed Martin can afford to do what SpaceX has done and is doing. Airbus too.

You would therefore be "thinking" wrong I'm afraid. SpaceX is quite lucky because Musk requires no board of directors confidence and has no public trading so no pool of investors/stockholders to satisfy and therefore has much greater degree of ability to push money around within the company without "oversight" by anyone who might have conflicts with his ultimate goal.

Boeing, LM and Airbus do not have that luxury as they are beholden to others who see ANY reduction in profit as a "bad" thing. It's not that "smart" investors/shareholders wouldn't see and agree to such diversions as a needed and necessary part of keeping competitive either though there would be some who would not. Being majorly traded companies they all have a significant amount of "investors" who have really small amounts of stock but are set up to automatically sell said stock at a set price point if "profits" go below a certain threshold. This is an automatic thing and unfortunately as part of that same automatic system once stock begins selling OTHER automatic criteria kicks in and MORE stock gets sold, and this continues automatically. Once you get to a point where this comes to an actual humans attention the "conservative" decision is to pressure the company in question to stop what it's doing and increase profits again and while this CAN be explained and PEOPLE can be made to understand the need this doesn't stop the initial process. So any of the larger aforementioned companies HAVE to lay a lot of ground work and preparation to make major policy shifts or begin new, costly projects and there is a general inflexibility and resistance to doing so unless there is a "proven" need to do so.

ULA has barely gotten "permission" to begin such a process, (and probably would not have if they hadn't NEEDED to begin development of a new booster in the first place) while Airbus is still "floating" a concept and as of yet doesn't seem to have the support to do so.

Mind you IF any of them get enough support to actually move forward in an aggressive manner you will suddenly see VERY different concepts coming forward as all the "players" here have done numerous studies on reusable vehicles with significantly better performance than the F9 architecture but in general they probably won't get enough support to make that aggressive of a transition.

Randy
From The Amazing Catstronaut on the Black Arrow LV:
British physics, old chap. It's undignified to belch flames and effluvia all over the pad, what. A true gentlemen's orbital conveyance lifts itself into the air unostentatiously, with the minimum of spectacle and a modicum of grace. Not like our American cousins' launch vehicles, eh?

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #112 on: 06/09/2015 04:07 pm »
The Russian concept had jet engine in nose of stage for fly back. I think Arianespace or ESA might of had some input to this design.
The Russians also had designs for mid air recovery of booster.
The small size of Angara boosters should make this possible.
« Last Edit: 06/09/2015 04:11 pm by TrevorMonty »

Offline RanulfC

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #113 on: 06/09/2015 05:05 pm »
The Russian concept had jet engine in nose of stage for fly back. I think Arianespace or ESA might of had some input to this design.
The Russians also had designs for mid air recovery of booster.
The small size of Angara boosters should make this possible.

The Russians had a LOT of concepts for recovery, none of which were actually used :) The Buran engineers swore up an down they'd designed in and were going to use recovery on the booster which was not true in either case.

"Best laid plans of mice and men..." and all that :)

Really there are dozens of concepts in just the last 20 years for reusable launch vehicle segments/parts/pieces and even more the further back you look so its never been that there was a lack of ideas only economy/requirement to do so. SpaceX is helping push that but in the end there needs to be an expanded market in general for this to keep moving forward.

Randy
From The Amazing Catstronaut on the Black Arrow LV:
British physics, old chap. It's undignified to belch flames and effluvia all over the pad, what. A true gentlemen's orbital conveyance lifts itself into the air unostentatiously, with the minimum of spectacle and a modicum of grace. Not like our American cousins' launch vehicles, eh?

Offline rcoppola

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #114 on: 06/09/2015 05:21 pm »
I'm still curious as to why this wasn't integrated as part of the A6 presentation/announcement? It could have been detailed as a possible future upgrade path, as ULA did with their Vulcan presentation. It would have made this a more cohesive, credible plan. IMO.

(I'm assuming it was more of a political issue considering how difficult it was just to get the current A6 configurations agreed to)
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Offline RanulfC

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #115 on: 06/09/2015 05:30 pm »
The wings will introduce a whole new set of aerodynamic problems during launch.

Then you'll need the wings, the engines and the landing gear, all of which are essential to the whole deal. (Might do without the landing gear. But that is the least of it.)

On top of that, the Falcon 9 is cheaper even without reusablity and all that the reusability proposed here might accomplish, is to catch up with that!*

Ariane 64 at 85mio Euro is supposed to be 20mio Euro more expensive than Ariane 62. So, the boosters of Ariane 64 alone cost about 40mio Euro or half the launch cost.

- They claim the wings won't cause problems during launch like other fly back designs. Something to do with no twist in the wing, not an expert.

Main point is the wings are tied into the heaviest part of the vehicle ie the thrust structure and since its at the aft end of the "stack" you don't have the loading on the tankage which means they can stay lighter. Overall aerodynamics are simpler if the lifting portion is further aft.

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- Well it's Airbus, they know how to do that.

The wings, landing gear, and engines all (according to Airbus) add up to less than the propellant and mass margins needed for propulsive RTLS by the Falcon-9. It's a nit really on HOW you get the stage back as until you get to the point where THAT is your long-pole in flight rate it's mainly a concern with operational and maintenance costs and those are pretty well established in most cases.

For the folks who keep insisting that boost-back RTLS is "obviously" the way to go and everything else sucks I will point out that while SpaceX tried and "failed" with TPS, parachutes, and ocean recovery they NEVER actually got as far as doing any of it but INSTEAD went with the current method. The reason the former failed is because the stage was aerodynamically unstable on entry and broke up before they could open the parachutes and even attempt recovery. Had they added 'grid-fins' capable of withstanding reentry they would have been able to recovery their stages earlier on but they chose to do it this way.

Ocean recovery is NOT that scary as we proved we could do it (albeit in testing rather than actual flight cycle) with a non-optimized, not designed for recovery engine at 5% (including estimated recovery costs and actual refurbishment costs) of a new-build engine. That equates to around 20 flights per "engine" regardless of stage recovery and refurbishment costs and that works to flight rates up to about 10X current flight rates.

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- Says who? Falcon 9 performance is around 3.75t to an Ariane-equivalent GTO orbit. With A5 at 9.6t for dual launch, that makes approx. $16k/kg for F9 and $20.8k/kg for A5.

Going to point out that everyone seems to be on the same page that recovery and reuse is a LOT easier if you don't have to go all the way to GTO/GEO with your rocket and more so with the first stage of ANY launch vehicle. The main take away would seem to be (and what has been suggested by numerous companies at this point) that if you can divide your "flight" up into getting to LEO and then getting your cargo to GTO/GEO from there, everything is a lot easier. Actually getting to that point is the key issues as it's NOT cheaper if you are only flying infrequently (current launch rate) and economics is the driving factor. It is much cheaper to launch directly to GTO/GEO than establish and maintain the on-orbit infrastructure for a second system that moves cargo from LEO to GEO unless you delivery prices for LEO are really, really low.

There seems to be a renewed interest in the idea (as the concept is anything but new itself) but the stalling point is the economics still don't seem to be there and while SpaceX talks depots and on-orbit refueling they don't seem inclined to actually pursue that direction with any of the F9 family and its plain why that is because it won't help the economics under the current demand. So that's another thing that gets put off till the BFR along with second stage reusability.

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- A64 is supposed to cost 90m euros which is roughly $100m for 10t dual launch, which is $10k/kg. So if we believe in the 90m euro cost (which I do not), A6 will be almost 40% cheaper than F9 on a per kg basis. Just saying, its nowhere near as clear-cut as you think it is.

- The price for A62 is what governments will pay, not the actual cost which will be higher. I.e. A64 subsidizes A62.

"Price" is debatable because of who is defining it and how much they actual costs are or are not included or assumed.

Commercial launch costs give me a headache, government ones give me a migraine :)

Randy
From The Amazing Catstronaut on the Black Arrow LV:
British physics, old chap. It's undignified to belch flames and effluvia all over the pad, what. A true gentlemen's orbital conveyance lifts itself into the air unostentatiously, with the minimum of spectacle and a modicum of grace. Not like our American cousins' launch vehicles, eh?

Offline rcoppola

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #116 on: 06/09/2015 06:18 pm »
Hey Randy, I love the last line of your post.

While I'm certainly not of the mind that except for RTLS, everything else sucks, I do believe that designing, building, testing and putting RTLS into an operational tempo, will have a more profound impact on the future of spaceflight.

The good news is that over the next 12 months, we'll actually get to see if RTLS and subsequent re-use, starts to become what we think it will become. And that is indeed very gratifying. Everything else will remain an intellectual exercise for us to banter about. Which is also very interesting. Just not nearly as gratifying.

And let's not forget that there is another company doing RTLS, albeit from sub-orbital. So that makes 2 companies actually doing RTLS and 2 companies studying Propulsion Pod returns. Interesting now that I think about it that way.
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Offline RanulfC

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #117 on: 06/09/2015 06:56 pm »
Have SX state how many flights they expect their F9SR to do? Where was this? I can put that in the model and from there.

I don't recall an exact number, but the Merlin 1D qualification program required 10 missions worth of use, and the comments I recall is that they don't know the upper end of use yet of the engine.  As to the structure, they wouldn't have any data on that yet, which is why they plan to do a test program on their first recovered stage.

Depending on who you listen to it could vary between 10 to 40 "flights" per engine with some (obviously) taking the higher or lower number depending on their degree of belief in the system :)

Musk is noted as stating that after 40 firings (not flights) that some parts needs to be replaced due to stress. Then engines are going to have to be "maintenance" and inspected between flights which is going to be several hours work at least if not more. (I fully understand WHY SpaceX hasn't done the obvious thing and just keep cycling and engine till it fails catastrophically given the amount of focus directed at them but they really need to do so at some point)

Given the H1 of the 50s was shown to be refurbishable indefinitely I suspect that SpaceX could confidently be able to fly a Merlin till it was literally to the point where they had replaced everything. But I suspect it will be more likely to have the engines fly to a set number of flights (not firings) when the cost of refurbishment is too high.

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However, back in 2012 Elon Musk stated about the Falcon Heavy:

"What does it imply for flight rate? "Multiple flights per day for first stage and side boosters," Musk says."

Unfortunately this is Musk talking without anything to base it on. He's got even less data to support this now as they at least know some of the maintenance and refurbishment required is going to take several hours if not a day or two to "re-qualify" a stage for launch let along actually stack, load a payload and launch.

Multiple flights OF multiple vehicles per day is possible but not multiple flights of the SAME stage and boosters.

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Now that assumed a reusable 2nd stage, which is not being worked on right now, but Airbus would have more of a challenge trying to match that rate since SpaceX right now would only have to build new the 2nd stage, whereas Airbus would have to new build the 1st stage tank structure too.

Not really as noted above the "flight-rate" Elon was talking about wasn't even considering the second stage it was specifically "first stage and boosters" which is not going to be as rapid a turn around as Elon would like to believe. And the tankage production can be ramped up with a back-stock to allow a pretty reasonable flight rate to be achieved. In the same manner as SpaceX Airbus could have multiple flights per day with multiple vehicles and about the same turn around rate of re-qualified vehicles as SpaceX. Operations costs would probably be slightly more due to having to basically build a new stage on the propulsion module but streamlining and experience would be pretty easy to build into the system so in the end the costs and time would be on par with full stage reuse AND possibly somewhat better if stage full stage reuse is limited as could still prove true.
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The trouble is F9 was designed to be an ELV, while avoiding design choices that would prevent it (hopefully) being turned into an RLV one day. Shuttle was (originally) conceived from day 1 to be an RLV.

Not sure why you think this. Since the beginning SpaceX has publicly stated their goal was to recover and reuse the 1st stage. Their initial plans used cork insulation and parachutes, which didn't work, but it showed their design from the start anticipated recovery and reuse.

Recovery actually NOT reuse. Musk originally stated they wanted to recovery to see how the parts had worn during use and that they "might" salvage parts but while their end goal was reuse they initially JUST wanted to recover. Since recovery proved problematical (aerodynamics) the decision was made to go from attempted recovery to a fully reusable design with enough margin to withstand the proposed recovery method. The F9 DID start out as an ELV with the possibility of recovery, however once the decision was made for reuse the stage was redesigned to allow enough margin for recovery and reuse which DID impact payload capability as was anticipated. Since they didn't actually recover any of the "sea-landed" stages they still don't know if that margin is enough to actually allow reusability. They won't know if its enough until and unless they actually get a stage back to examine.
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BTW if you think coking is a peripheral issue think again. Coke build up inside the tubes cuts the ability to remove heat from the inner chamber wall.

Luckily I don't have to think about it at all, since the designer of the Merlin 1D, Tom Mueller, is an expert on rocket engine design.  And as long as their design keeps the cooling loop below the coking level, it is not supposed to be a problem.

"Supposed" to be which does not in any way mean it won't. While I agree it PROBABLY isn't an issue (it wasn't for the H1 for example) and RP1 is specifically designed to be a low coking as possible, no one has run an rocket engine over and over again in a reusable manner such as SpaceX so it's a learning experience.

As an off the top of my head example, residual RP1 in the engine during zero-g coast could be vaporized by retained heat of the engines and leave some coking in the cooling tubes. This would never show up in ground testing however so would not be a "known" issue until engines have been recovered and examined. This may require more "maintenance" between flights or a shorter engine overall lifetime.
Again I doubt it, but you have to recover to know for sure.
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LOX/LH2 engines don't suffer from coking.  :)

It's all about trade-offs. Delta IV is arguably the most modern LOX/LH2 powered rocket, and ULA feels it's unaffordable to compete against other expendable launchers, much less partially reusable ones.

JS19: Neither do LOX/Sub-Cooled Propane, or LOX/Methane or "technically" any modern LOX/RP1 (or Kerosene) engines if they are designed right. Coking is very much NOT as much an issue as it once was and is NOT a reason for deciding which propellant to use in a reusable LV. As we are all aware (or should be by now anyway) you avoid even THAT minor issue by using your LOX as a coolant instead of your fuel which is what every H2O2 engine did and is pretty much proven to be effective and pretty damn simple these days.

CR: The Delta-IV suffers from the main problem of all LOX/LH2 rockets; it's a pretty crappy combination of propellants for the FIRST STAGE of a launch vehicle. You really want higher density/thrust rather than higher ISP and lower of both. Hence Delta-IV is more "economical" if it's fitted with SRBs which get it off the pad and moving sooner than just relying on the main engines. My main take on the Delta-IV was simply that Boeing got paid to develop the RS-68 under the EELV contract and therefore base a launcher around it rather than trying to leverage any design "advantage" out of the contract. It doesn't seem that it was EVER going to be commercially viable versus the competition of similar ELVs let alone anyone building a semi-or-fully RLV.

Similarly the F9 "suffers" from the lack of an efficient upper stage and could be FAR more effective (but more costly) with anything OTHER than an LOX/RP1 propellant. Here the driver would be engine development since you could use the present tankage with various adaptions for the propellant. (But to my mind it would behoove SpaceX to consider it more seriously because I don't see it being cost prohibitive especially as they are planning on building a new-build methalox engine ANYWAY)
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But you're not thinking like a government contractor, and that mindset is very important in this context.

ULA <> Boeing and ULA <> Lockheed Martin.

It's a subsidiary they expect to get a steady cash flow from, not one they plan to send money to.

I've worked for a number of large government contractors, so I do know how they think and operate.

Think/Operate are not the same thing and if you weren't "upper-management" where "engineering" is one of those "minor details" you probably really do NOT "know" how they think as its very often not as intuitive as you'd assume :)

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But the bottom line is this - you're either investing in your future to stay in business, or you're deciding to lose business to your competitors that are investing in their future while you're not.

Which is something the you GENERALLY do at a low level with a constant stream of your profit flow which is quite different when said "investment" suddenly requires a major influx of cash flow enough that your "profits" drop substantially.

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There are plenty of businesses that make massive investments in their future all the time, and Airbus has the wherewithal to make such an investment.  Boeing and Lockheed Martin have that ability too.  It's just a question of whether they want to be competitive over the long run, and so far they haven't decided that yet.

I addressed this up-thread a bit but in order to do this "properly" (ie you don't get canned as a result or cause a major investor panic) you need to lay the groundwork and preparer the market and investors for the effort. This is Boeing building the 787 with several years of ramp-up time and not something you throw in a couple of billion dollars to achieve unless you have NO choice. And the thing is this has become a lot more 'immediate' than anyone in upper management was planning on.

Currently Airbus, Boeing, et-al are scrambling (without looking like they are because that also invites investor panic) to address a situation they were pretty confident that would never come up without a LOT more notice. It was clear, (and Boeing/LM, etc all were pointing out the numbers showing they were right) that RLV versus ELV was a question of economics that the ELV was the answer to. And it all had to do with the flight rate and projected market. Some "crazy" billionaire intent on spending himself into the poor house to prove a point and reach a fully personal goal with no hope of repayment economically is just not something you THINK about when your a CEO of something like Airbus, etc.

They are treating this as an exercise in "updating" the business model which makes perfect sense understanding where this is coming from, they still expect SpaceX to fail and go back to "just" being a slightly cheaper competitor. However it's pretty clear that while SpaceX may still "fail" to fully achieve all its goals it will still be below the current competitive price point they can achieve with any LV they currently have. So this is a way to prepare the relevant people with the idea that changes will need to be made and that they can (under this plan) come in at a slightly higher cost than "just" the normal upgrade and competitive costs that are currently planned.

Since "the" market is still considered GTO/GEO services and the average flight rate will still remain small enough that this sort of operations will remain economical there is no rush to try and beat SpaceX at a game that still looks economically unfeasible. Should however the market significantly change at least this is prepping the way for significant changes in policy should those be required. NOT taking those steps at this point is a gamble but you can't really argue that history and market is not on their side from their point of view.

Randy

From The Amazing Catstronaut on the Black Arrow LV:
British physics, old chap. It's undignified to belch flames and effluvia all over the pad, what. A true gentlemen's orbital conveyance lifts itself into the air unostentatiously, with the minimum of spectacle and a modicum of grace. Not like our American cousins' launch vehicles, eh?

Offline Comga

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #118 on: 06/09/2015 08:58 pm »
It will re enter 100s km downrange.

Under the assumption that this vehicle would have solid rocket boosters, it's flight might follow a trajectory like the Ariane 5.  That rocket's users manual includes the attached map.  The first stage reenters off the coast of Africa!  That's not just "100s km".  More like 5700 km. 
(51 deg = 0.89 Rad * 6378 km equatorial radius of the Earth = 5677 km)
That would be one awfully long flight back at "M 0.3 @ 3.5 km".

The velocity and altitutde profiles have also been attached.  (Staging is at the point marked "H2")
The fomer says the velocity is just under 7 km/sec.  At that speed that the engine pod would need a nearly full fledged heat shield, and wings would be problematic. 

That may mean that the original assumption of solids boosters is incorrect. 
(edit) Perhaps the solid boosters in the video are more artistic license.
« Last Edit: 06/09/2015 10:07 pm by Comga »
What kind of wastrels would dump a perfectly good booster in the ocean after just one use?

Offline jg

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #119 on: 06/09/2015 09:31 pm »
There is no evidence that F9 merlin engines need anything other than refueling and more igniter fluid and he like loaded between flights. What we do not know is how frequently other maintenance, particularly the center engine which fires multiple time's/launch is needed.  Remember the upper stage merlin fires for much longer than the first stage. So asserting lots of maintenance is required every flight is not based on any data; to the contrary, we have evidence gas and go is in fact feasible but not the maintenance interval or total life time, beyond what SpaceX has said publicly.

Offline Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #120 on: 06/09/2015 10:14 pm »
Musk has stated that they designed the Falcon 9 so that they could "gas & go".  The airline model, not the Shuttle refurbishment model.

While they would LIKE to be confident that the rocket will require no "refurbishment" it is highly unlikely as the ENGINES at least require a good amount of work to be ready for the next flight. There are parts that need replacement which they have shown with test firings which is not even close to fully flight regime.

They qualified the Merlin 1D with 10 flights worth of firings, without any replacements.

At worst what they'll have to do, which happens with airliners all the time, is that they swap out an engine that is due for refurbishment or had indicators that showed sub-par performance.  Still fits the "gas n go" model.

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Boeing and Lockheed Martin are the top two U.S. Government contractors, and between them they generate $150B in revenue per year. SpaceX spent $300M to develop the initial version of the Falcon 9. I think Boeing and Lockheed Martin can afford to do what SpaceX has done and is doing. Airbus too.

You would therefore be "thinking" wrong I'm afraid. SpaceX is quite lucky because Musk requires no board of directors confidence and has no public trading so no pool of investors/stockholders to satisfy and therefore has much greater degree of ability to push money around within the company without "oversight" by anyone who might have conflicts with his ultimate goal.

Boards of Directors (BoD) are not there to stop companies from being competitive.  Their primary role is to review the performance of the CEO and take measures if necessary, such as rewarding or replacing the CEO.

CEO's have the responsibility to grow their companies, and any CEO that is not trying to do that should be let go.

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Boeing, LM and Airbus do not have that luxury as they are beholden to others who see ANY reduction in profit as a "bad" thing.

Not true.  The market (which includes stockholders) does reward companies for making smart moves, just as the market will punish companies for being too tepid in responding to potential threats to future profits.  It's not a one-way street.

Look, let's get back to the basics here.  If Airbus doesn't do anything to respond to the market threat SpaceX poses, they will be in far greater financial straights than they are today.  That is a given, even if SpaceX doesn't perfect reusability, and it becomes far worse if they do perfect any form of reusability.  The same with ULA.

So doing nothing is not an option, and doing half measures doesn't really address the problem either.  If you're losing money, you can't make it up in volume.

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ULA has barely gotten "permission" to begin such a process, (and probably would not have if they hadn't NEEDED to begin development of a new booster in the first place) while Airbus is still "floating" a concept and as of yet doesn't seem to have the support to do so.

Actually ULA has not received permission to proceed with Vulcan.  They are only being funded on a quarterly basis right now, with no guarantee of full funding.

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Mind you IF any of them get enough support to actually move forward in an aggressive manner you will suddenly see VERY different concepts coming forward as all the "players" here have done numerous studies on reusable vehicles with significantly better performance than the F9 architecture but in general they probably won't get enough support to make that aggressive of a transition.

Ooh, I LOVE secret plans that will never see the light of day!!

But I tend to believe they don't actually exist, because otherwise they would pursue them....
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 RanulfC

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #121 on: 06/09/2015 10:26 pm »
Hey Randy, I love the last line of your post.

I have my moments :)

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While I'm certainly not of the mind that except for RTLS, everything else sucks, I do believe that designing, building, testing and putting RTLS into an operational tempo, will have a more profound impact on the future of spaceflight.

The good news is that over the next 12 months, we'll actually get to see if RTLS and subsequent re-use, starts to become what we think it will become. And that is indeed very gratifying. Everything else will remain an intellectual exercise for us to banter about. Which is also very interesting. Just not nearly as gratifying.

And let's not forget that there is another company doing RTLS, albeit from sub-orbital. So that makes 2 companies actually doing RTLS and 2 companies studying Propulsion Pod returns. Interesting now that I think about it that way.

It's quite interesting all considered as it simply shows there's more than one way to do things which is always a good thing :)

There's no arguing that once it gets done and all the bugs are ironed out that RTLS will profoundly effect the thinking and operations of space launch. My view is that it will profoundly effect LEO operations rather than anything BLEO though as that will take the build up of an on-orbit infrastructure and market thereof. I also don't think it will be as cut and dried as some seem to think as there is a difference between LEO and GTO/GEO operations that require different options when building a launch vehicle.

Randy
From The Amazing Catstronaut on the Black Arrow LV:
British physics, old chap. It's undignified to belch flames and effluvia all over the pad, what. A true gentlemen's orbital conveyance lifts itself into the air unostentatiously, with the minimum of spectacle and a modicum of grace. Not like our American cousins' launch vehicles, eh?

Offline Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #122 on: 06/09/2015 10:32 pm »
Depending on who you listen to it could vary between 10 to 40 "flights" per engine with some (obviously) taking the higher or lower number depending on their degree of belief in the system :)

I don't know what others have in mind, but I would be impressed if they got 10 reuses out of a stage.  Now that is the body, not engines, since engines can be swapped out an infinite number of times.  And just like with airliners, engines can go off to have maintenance and then put on a completely different vehicle.

So maybe this is one of those situations where there are different interpretations of what "reuse" means, and "gas n go" means.  But for a brand new stage with brand new engines, my assumption is that they will be able to re-fly that exact configuration of engines and structures a number of times before they have to swap out an engine or two.  At least in the early days.  And then as they make improvements the frequency will go down, as it has with airliners.

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As an off the top of my head example, residual RP1 in the engine during zero-g coast could be vaporized by retained heat of the engines and leave some coking in the cooling tubes. This would never show up in ground testing however so would not be a "known" issue until engines have been recovered and examined. This may require more "maintenance" between flights or a shorter engine overall lifetime.
Again I doubt it, but you have to recover to know for sure.

I would imagine that is something they are curious about too.  Good point.

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Some "crazy" billionaire intent on spending himself into the poor house to prove a point and reach a fully personal goal with no hope of repayment economically is just not something you THINK about when your a CEO of something like Airbus, etc.

That is a completely wrong characterization of the situation, and of Elon Musk.

Musk is one of the most rational billionaires I've seen, and SpaceX has been grown using only the money Musk invested when he WASN'T a billionaire.

And SpaceX has not been doing any of this in secret, so claiming ignorance is not a rational defense.  Experts within Airbus would have been able to provide the CEO with enough information about what they were facing.  Heck, I could have told him what he was facing 5 YEARS AGO.

So kudo's to Airbus for having a secret group work on Adeline, but negative points for not funding enough such efforts so that they could come up with a truly competitive solution, and not this half solution.

And again, keep in mind that they will lose marketshare unless they come up with a complete solution to competing with SpaceX.  Anything less than that is giving up marketshare to SpaceX.

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They are treating this as an exercise in "updating" the business model which makes perfect sense understanding where this is coming from, they still expect SpaceX to fail and go back to "just" being a slightly cheaper competitor.

Evolution in action...
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 RanulfC

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #123 on: 06/09/2015 10:56 pm »
They qualified the Merlin 1D with 10 flights worth of firings, without any replacements.

No they have "qualified" the Merlin 1D with 10 flights worth of firing time without major maintenance. That's not the same thing as actual flights. And we know they do replacements and maintenance between test runs so it is hard to come to the conclusion that the engines will need "nothing" between actual flights which are far harsher conditions than test runs on a test stand.

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Boards of Directors (BoD) are not there to stop companies from being competitive.  Their primary role is to review the performance of the CEO and take measures if necessary, such as rewarding or replacing the CEO.

CEO's have the responsibility to grow their companies, and any CEO that is not trying to do that should be let go.

While "dictionary" correct it is a main job of the board of directors to ensure the investors/shareholders are happy which is actually their primary purpose. The CEO is supposed to work within the constraints of that relationship to ensure the company remains competitive. The details of this are what a CEO rises and falls over and the BoD very often can CAUSE a company to fail by not allowing the CEO to spend enough to remain competitive.

This has happened in the past and will happen again in the future. Musk and SpaceX do not have this layer to work with/around and it shows.

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Not true.  The market (which includes stockholders) does reward companies for making smart moves, just as the market will punish companies for being too tepid in responding to potential threats to future profits.  It's not a one-way street.

Look at your company histories, stockholders and investors have been FAR less interested in innovation than protecting profits margins paid back to them in the last 30 years and that hasn't changed recently. The will complain to high heaven over moves that cost them money at the time even if they end up increasing profits at a later date.

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Look, let's get back to the basics here. If Airbus doesn't do anything to respond to the market threat SpaceX poses, they will be in far greater financial straights than they are today. That is a given, even if SpaceX doesn't perfect reusability, and it becomes far worse if they do perfect any form of reusability. The same with ULA.

Airbus along with Boeing, and LM which own ULA all have other interests that make their space launch development business' less than a major segment of their business model. While they "have" to do something the amount they can really do is limited. And further it can be argued (and they have) that SpaceX's overall "effect" can easily be far less than many predict if SpaceX finds (a possibility which SpaceX admits to) that reusability is not as economical as they hope it will be. The actual effect becomes even less clear once you segment the market into LEO and GTO/GEO. The former is where SpaceX is hanging it's business case while the latter is where the other companies see the majority of the market remaining.

Going "back-to-basics" Airbus-et-al really do NOT have to "respond" to SpaceX other than finding small ways to cut their prices down some to match the F9H capability and price point. They will still own a share of the GTO/GEO market no matter what and meanwhile they can prep for the change without having to put forth the major investment and effort that actually beating SpaceX will entail.

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Actually ULA has not received permission to proceed with Vulcan. They are only being funded on a quarterly basis right now, with no guarantee of full funding.

Full permission no but they have enough of a go ahead to sign contracts and begin development work which is about where Airbus is. This is MUCH further than they have been given before with any other development program.

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Ooh, I LOVE secret plans that will never see the light of day!!

But I tend to believe they don't actually exist, because otherwise they would pursue them....

Far from secret and they have all "seen-the-light-of-day" and are publicly available if you care to look. The problem is they are STILL not proven to be needed or even economically viable given that FOR reusability to be viable it has to have a higher than current flight rate.

This is the conundrum of Airbus and everyone else in that they COULD beat the heck out of SpaceX if they could see it being needed but they don't because the overall business case is still very iffy and the up-front cost is more than they can gather unless the case is verifiably (survival at stake) solid.

Randy
From The Amazing Catstronaut on the Black Arrow LV:
British physics, old chap. It's undignified to belch flames and effluvia all over the pad, what. A true gentlemen's orbital conveyance lifts itself into the air unostentatiously, with the minimum of spectacle and a modicum of grace. Not like our American cousins' launch vehicles, eh?

Offline RanulfC

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #124 on: 06/09/2015 11:23 pm »
There is no evidence that F9 merlin engines need anything other than refueling and more igniter fluid and he like loaded between flights. What we do not know is how frequently other maintenance, particularly the center engine which fires multiple time's/launch is needed.  Remember the upper stage merlin fires for much longer than the first stage. So asserting lots of maintenance is required every flight is not based on any data; to the contrary, we have evidence gas and go is in fact feasible but not the maintenance interval or total life time, beyond what SpaceX has said publicly.

There is no evidence that they don't either or it would have been much easier to do so on a test stand than on an LV. If "gas-n-go" were in effect ready they could and would show it being done on a test stand. There would in fact be no question.

Depending on who you listen to it could vary between 10 to 40 "flights" per engine with some (obviously) taking the higher or lower number depending on their degree of belief in the system :)

I don't know what others have in mind, but I would be impressed if they got 10 reuses out of a stage.  Now that is the body, not engines, since engines can be swapped out an infinite number of times.  And just like with airliners, engines can go off to have maintenance and then put on a completely different vehicle.

A jet engine can be swapped in under an hour, last time I looked it took them a day or so on the pad and about a full day off the pad. This is in no way "gas-n-go" operations but is typical for a launch vehicle and rocket engine system.

I'll be impressed if they get one reuse, even more so if they get five but really they will need to find out first how much stress is involved in the whole recovery operation and how much it takes to get it ready to fly again.

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So maybe this is one of those situations where there are different interpretations of what "reuse" means, and "gas n go" means.  But for a brand new stage with brand new engines, my assumption is that they will be able to re-fly that exact configuration of engines and structures a number of times before they have to swap out an engine or two.  At least in the early days.  And then as they make improvements the frequency will go down, as it has with airliners.

The last yes but the first is an assumption because we don't know and the odds are that it will in fact NOT be possible to refly a previously flown stage without major repairs. I've noted over and over again the stage could very well return intact and be recovered and NOT be flyable again for a number of reasons so "assuming" that this will be the case is really being optimistic. Frequency will of course come but you have to have recovery and actual data to make such assumptions and SpaceX nor we have either.
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Some "crazy" billionaire intent on spending himself into the poor house to prove a point and reach a fully personal goal with no hope of repayment economically is just not something you THINK about when your a CEO of something like Airbus, etc.

That is a completely wrong characterization of the situation, and of Elon Musk.

Musk is one of the most rational billionaires I've seen, and SpaceX has been grown using only the money Musk invested when he WASN'T a billionaire.

Not at all since that WAS how he and SpaceX were characterized in the beginning :) And he WAS a billionaire when he stared which is why he is quoted as "How do you become a Millionaire..."

And this has only begrudgingly changed as his and SpaceX's success rack up.

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And SpaceX has not been doing any of this in secret, so claiming ignorance is not a rational defense.  Experts within Airbus would have been able to provide the CEO with enough information about what they were facing.  Heck, I could have told him what he was facing 5 YEARS AGO.

And you would have been laughed out of the CEO's office with good reason because you had and still have very little to back up your opinion. And this is money that Elon Musk has SAID he is going to spend whether he makes a "profit" or not if you will recall which is another reason some people call him crazy :)

And no, Musk is FAR from the most "rational" billionaire around as he's well known for doing 'crazy' things that just happen to work despite the "common wisdom" around him. Spending billions to make access to space cheaper isn't anything a 'rational' billionaire does which is why very few DO it. Musk knows this, plays on this, hell he REVELS in it!

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So kudo's to Airbus for having a secret group work on Adeline, but negative points for not funding enough such efforts so that they could come up with a truly competitive solution, and not this half solution.

And again, keep in mind that they will lose marketshare unless they come up with a complete solution to competing with SpaceX.  Anything less than that is giving up marketshare to SpaceX.

Another "assumption" here is that Adeline is in fact the ONLY response they have waiting for SpaceX. As far as we "know" this could be simply to calm current investor/shareholder fears with something really "wonderful" waiting till they actually need to justify the spending on it.
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They are treating this as an exercise in "updating" the business model which makes perfect sense understanding where this is coming from, they still expect SpaceX to fail and go back to "just" being a slightly cheaper competitor.

Evolution in action...

Less than you might think because they COULD be right and then they don't have issues with overreacting to a supposed "threat" that didn't materialize. You seem to be taking them at face value on one hand and then noting they actually CAN mobilize a lot more resources and money than SpaceX IF THEY NEED TO FOR SURVIVAL which at present would be very hard to argue under the current circumstances.

Randy
From The Amazing Catstronaut on the Black Arrow LV:
British physics, old chap. It's undignified to belch flames and effluvia all over the pad, what. A true gentlemen's orbital conveyance lifts itself into the air unostentatiously, with the minimum of spectacle and a modicum of grace. Not like our American cousins' launch vehicles, eh?

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #125 on: 06/10/2015 02:38 pm »
Is there a European engine that is capable of 10 (or 100) launches without extensive (a la STS) refurbishment?

For example here:

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Certains moteurs actuels, comme le Vulcain 2 d'Ariane 5, ont déjŕ démontré en essais leur capacité ŕ effectuer une dizaine de cycles.

Meaning Vulcain 2 has demonstrated in tests to be capable of doing 10 cycles.

I think RD-180 could also do that (according to ULA), so it seems almost standard for modern rocket engines. I wonder though how it affects reliability.

« Last Edit: 06/10/2015 02:45 pm by Oli »

Offline baldusi

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #126 on: 06/10/2015 03:12 pm »
Is there a European engine that is capable of 10 (or 100) launches without extensive (a la STS) refurbishment?

For example here:

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Certains moteurs actuels, comme le Vulcain 2 d'Ariane 5, ont déjŕ démontré en essais leur capacité ŕ effectuer une dizaine de cycles.

Meaning Vulcain 2 has demonstrated in tests to be capable of doing 10 cycles.

I think RD-180 could also do that (according to ULA), so it seems almost standard for modern rocket engines. I wonder though how it affects reliability.
RD-180 derives from the RD-170 that was supposed to be reused 10 time (the Energiya boosters were to be reusable). And new designs like the RD-0162 is designed for 25. Besides, there's a big advantage for development and certification testing with a high number of starts in the engines. An engine desgined for 25 starts might need just 20 to 30 engines for development vs 150 engines if it was just a 5 start engines. You don't want less than that because you need an acceptance testing plus a a couple of abort opportunities during launch.
But some upper stage engines, like the RD-0110 are single use, and thus they test 1/3 of each batches, and send the rest for integration. It is probably because it uses some felt ribs on the MCC to stabilize the combustion during ignition.
Summing it up, most modern engines are designed for a high number of restarts because of development concerns. But also, because sort of everybody is trying to keep their options open for reuse.

Offline gosnold

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #127 on: 06/10/2015 07:01 pm »
It will re enter 100s km downrange.

Under the assumption that this vehicle would have solid rocket boosters, it's flight might follow a trajectory like the Ariane 5.  That rocket's users manual includes the attached map.  The first stage reenters off the coast of Africa!  That's not just "100s km".  More like 5700 km. 
(51 deg = 0.89 Rad * 6378 km equatorial radius of the Earth = 5677 km)
That would be one awfully long flight back at "M 0.3 @ 3.5 km".

The velocity and altitutde profiles have also been attached.  (Staging is at the point marked "H2")
The fomer says the velocity is just under 7 km/sec.  At that speed that the engine pod would need a nearly full fledged heat shield, and wings would be problematic. 

That may mean that the original assumption of solids boosters is incorrect. 
(edit) Perhaps the solid boosters in the video are more artistic license.

The engines could land on Ascension island (which is UK so ESA territory) or in Africa (the French are quite influential there), with a range within 1000-2000km.

Offline DT1

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #128 on: 06/10/2015 07:35 pm »
Is there a European engine that is capable of 10 (or 100) launches without extensive (a la STS) refurbishment?

For example here:

Quote
Certains moteurs actuels, comme le Vulcain 2 d'Ariane 5, ont déjŕ démontré en essais leur capacité ŕ effectuer une dizaine de cycles.

Meaning Vulcain 2 has demonstrated in tests to be capable of doing 10 cycles.

I think RD-180 could also do that (according to ULA), so it seems almost standard for modern rocket engines. I wonder though how it affects reliability.
RD-180 derives from the RD-170 that was supposed to be reused 10 time (the Energiya boosters were to be reusable). And new designs like the RD-0162 is designed for 25. Besides, there's a big advantage for development and certification testing with a high number of starts in the engines. An engine desgined for 25 starts might need just 20 to 30 engines for development vs 150 engines if it was just a 5 start engines. You don't want less than that because you need an acceptance testing plus a a couple of abort opportunities during launch.
But some upper stage engines, like the RD-0110 are single use, and thus they test 1/3 of each batches, and send the rest for integration. It is probably because it uses some felt ribs on the MCC to stabilize the combustion during ignition.
Summing it up, most modern engines are designed for a high number of restarts because of development concerns. But also, because sort of everybody is trying to keep their options open for reuse.

The summary is correct:
Of course, a non-reusable engine can perform 10 to 20 tests on the ground. Otherwise the development would be too expensive. On the other hand, this fact does not mean that this engine could also make several flights. You could safely test engines on a test stand that could no longer fly safely.

This is also valid for technical details:
A non-throttlable engine  (in flight) can be made throttlable on a test stand. Otherwise you could only check one operating point during one test firing. That would also be a very expensive development.

That means an engine could have these capabilities but is not flight-qualified for them...
« Last Edit: 06/10/2015 07:56 pm by DT1 »
---------------------------
Ralf
*** AD ASTRA PER ASPERA ***

Offline Space Ghost 1962

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #129 on: 06/10/2015 08:15 pm »
Excuse me as I butt in ...


Less than you might think because they COULD be right and then they don't have issues with overreacting to a supposed "threat" that didn't materialize. You seem to be taking them at face value on one hand and then noting they actually CAN mobilize a lot more resources and money than SpaceX IF THEY NEED TO FOR SURVIVAL which at present would be very hard to argue under the current circumstances.

Randy

There are about ten places on the earth right now that can bring off competent and reliable launch technology/vehicles/services/etc. Given time and resources, they can clone anything, and most can innovate new launch and recovery systems. THEY AREN'T SLOUCHES. Not the issue.

These also have vast resources (manufacturing, skills, materials, ... budget). Not the issue.

Do they and funders have "the will" to do so? NO. Will they have it? Unlikely. Why?

Because launch services, and even also spacecraft, have occupied a well defined niche in certain specific communities. There are economic and engineering rationale's behind such that are not easy to change.

What are SX's motivations, are not others. One cannot "lift" part of this and drop it into another - providers aren't Legos (smirk) either...

That does not mean competition does not occur, nor that these proud groups are not sitting on thumbs while watching the Musk three ring circus. Great entertainment value.

Musk approaches this the same way always. Incrementally, getting up to the next step, then doing more, and so on.

"Gas n go" is happening just like Grasshopper and now F9R landings. Next step clearly is reflight out of sight in New Mexico where he can refit as needed. He doesn't give a rats a$$ at the moment about swapping parts on a hot fired Merlin before flight - why get worked up? Later, when he's sure of those parts (and costing), he bolts them it and doesn't change them for flights. Woot!

Does he bring this off? Likely. "When will then be now? Soon" ;) is what you hear back. Like with landing a rocket.

Meanwhile very likely no one else will cross that Rubicon.

As the costs and issues mount up, Airbus and others face this with a non deterministic roadmap that is untenable and impossible for them. Yet they have to do/say something. A "something" they do not feel "good enough" at taking the next steps on. Far too easy to look foolish here. And they hate it. But something has to be said.

Musk makes Airbus's efforts look bad. If he wins an inch, they lose a light year. He clearly relishes it. Good for him.

This is the post Shuttle development "hangover". Its global. Stinging. Good. Too complacent.

If Airbus/others thinks its bad now, wait until he pulls off a "launch factory" in Brownsville Texas, and captures 90% all global commercial launches with it. Doesn't need more than he has in hand already to do it.

Then where do the economics of launch go globally? National institutional launches hold up entire launch architectures as mostly sole users. No cost sharing. Very narrow financial footprints, anemic development given a bimodal distribution of launches with infrequent bump next to "frequent flyer" bump. Launch systems taking decades to modernize if that, next to weekly mods. Runaway.

That's when most other launch providers will "get real" about this. But ... what will they have left?

As to Musk's timeline ... does it really matter how long all of this takes? He seems to be the one advancing the timeline, because he seems to think his plans need it. If he does it in one or ten years, won't change the rest of the industry - they'll still be followers not leaders (except self-declared).

Because one would need to overtake on all fronts to become a leader. Not deconstruct and argue semantics of things like "reuse".

That's the hard truth of the moment. "You can't handle the truth!" ;)

Offline CJ

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #130 on: 06/11/2015 03:27 am »
Concept video



Thanks for the video, Borklund.

Something about the video makes no sense to me. The text says "No need for extra rocket fuel." It does so while showing the rocket engine firing post separation, thus contradicting itself.

Aside from that contradiction, I've got mixed feelings about this concept. There will be penalties, of course, and they're significant; making the structure segmented is one. Another is the mass of the wings, atmospheric engines, fuel, and props, and TPS. The craft will need to fly a significant distance; a ballistic entry will return to to atmospheric flight a long way downrange - several hundred miles.

Whether or not this concept works vis a vis SpaceX's concept also needs to take into account the differences between the F9 and Ariane 6. The Ariane 6 will have three stages plus boosters, and this concept will only return the first stage main engine, nothing else. The F9 is two stages, no boosters, and their concept returns the entire first stage. Very different approaches.

My hope is that both work.     

Edit; added av fuel to my list of wight penalties.
« Last Edit: 06/11/2015 03:32 am by CJ »

Offline kato

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #131 on: 06/11/2015 05:38 am »
The F9 is two stages, no boosters, and their concept returns the entire first stage.
In the F9 the first stage is destaged at around the same time that Ariane 5 is shedding its boosters. Without solid information on when Ariane 6 is planning to destage which stage it's not really something one can evaluate.

Offline Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #132 on: 06/11/2015 06:50 am »
And no, Musk is FAR from the most "rational" billionaire around as he's well known for doing 'crazy' things that just happen to work despite the "common wisdom" around him.

So apparently they weren't "crazy" after all, huh?

And isn't that really the history of innovation?  That innovators do what is unconventional?

Aren't we supposed to celebrate people like that?

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Spending billions to make access to space cheaper isn't anything a 'rational' billionaire does which is why very few DO it. Musk knows this, plays on this, hell he REVELS in it!

A look at where SpaceX is today with marketshare is a testament to how rational Musk has been.  And it's a template for what Airbus could do too.  In fact, Airbus and ESA could copy the Falcon 9 since Musk decided not to file any patents on the technology.  Airbus has copied successful designs before, as they did when they created the A320 to compete against the Boeing 737.

Who would care if they did copy the Falcon 9?  They could laugh all the way to the bank.

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Another "assumption" here is that Adeline is in fact the ONLY response they have waiting for SpaceX. As far as we "know" this could be simply to calm current investor/shareholder fears with something really "wonderful" waiting till they actually need to justify the spending on it.

As of today it is a fact that Adeline is the only new innovation that they have proposed.  Now maybe you believe that they have something even better that they are hiding... I fail to see the advantages of doing that, assuming they already know it's better than Adeline.

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Less than you might think because they COULD be right and then they don't have issues with overreacting to a supposed "threat" that didn't materialize.

The threat HAS materialized.  ESA flew Ariane 5 six times last year, and SpaceX flew Falcon 9 six times last year.  So far this year SpaceX is on track to fly ten flights, and their backlog continues to grow.  You don't think they can do math at Airbus and ESA?

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You seem to be taking them at face value on one hand and then noting they actually CAN mobilize a lot more resources and money than SpaceX IF THEY NEED TO FOR SURVIVAL which at present would be very hard to argue under the current circumstances.

Airbus and ESA have access to more funds and more existing capabilities than SpaceX had when they were creating Falcon 9 v1.0 ($300M to develop).  And SpaceX didn't have a validated design at that point, so Airbus and ESA already know what the validated design would be, and they should be able to build their own version far faster and for far less.

They have options, but either irrational national pride or just plain poor management is stopping them from pursuing better strategies...
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 john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #133 on: 06/11/2015 09:32 am »
Under the assumption that this vehicle would have solid rocket boosters, it's flight might follow a trajectory like the Ariane 5.  That rocket's users manual includes the attached map.  The first stage reenters off the coast of Africa!  That's not just "100s km".  More like 5700 km. 
(51 deg = 0.89 Rad * 6378 km equatorial radius of the Earth = 5677 km)
That would be one awfully long flight back at "M 0.3 @ 3.5 km".
This is actually OT. Thank you.

Yes that's about 15-16 hrs. Long by human standards, not too tough for a drone or a system on autopilot for what is basically a straight line, constant speed and altitude flight plan.
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The velocity and altitutde profiles have also been attached.  (Staging is at the point marked "H2")
The fomer says the velocity is just under 7 km/sec.  At that speed that the engine pod would need a nearly full fledged heat shield, and wings would be problematic. 

That may mean that the original assumption of solids boosters is incorrect. 
(edit) Perhaps the solid boosters in the video are more artistic license.
Could be. I did not know A5 dropped it's 1st stage so close to orbital.

When I looked at Vulcain 2 I always wondered if there was a market an SSTO. No SRBs, no US, just the V2 with shortened tanks, interstage not carrying the SRB loads, much lighter VAB.

But on that basis a "small" LV could be be built around the SRB/1st stage/VAB combination.
This is also valid for technical details:
A non-throttlable engine  (in flight) can be made throttlable on a test stand. Otherwise you could only check one operating point during one test firing. That would also be a very expensive development.
I completely missed this.

Neat point.
The engines could land on Ascension island (which is UK so ESA territory) or in Africa (the French are quite influential there), with a range within 1000-2000km.
Good point.

Ascension has quite a long runway as well.

MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #134 on: 06/11/2015 09:44 am »
A jet engine can be swapped in under an hour, last time I looked it took them a day or so on the pad and about a full day off the pad. This is in no way "gas-n-go" operations but is typical for a launch vehicle and rocket engine system.

I'll be impressed if they get one reuse, even more so if they get five but really they will need to find out first how much stress is involved in the whole recovery operation and how much it takes to get it ready to fly again.
I don't think people realize that when SX uses phrases like "Gas n go" these are similes with airline operations. In the ELV and semi RLV context they are aspirations.  I think Airbus is smart enough to know that's not going to happen anytime soon.
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The last yes but the first is an assumption because we don't know and the odds are that it will in fact NOT be possible to refly a previously flown stage without major repairs. I've noted over and over again the stage could very well return intact and be recovered and NOT be flyable again for a number of reasons so "assuming" that this will be the case is really being optimistic. Frequency will of course come but you have to have recovery and actual data to make such assumptions and SpaceX nor we have either.
This is the Airbus reusable stage thread.  :)

But the point applies to them as well.
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Not at all since that WAS how he and SpaceX were characterized in the beginning :) And he WAS a billionaire when he stared which is why he is quoted as "How do you become a Millionaire..."

And this has only begrudgingly changed as his and SpaceX's success rack up.
Indeed. They have laughed at him and SX.

Now they are fighting him.

I wonder what will happen next?
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And you would have been laughed out of the CEO's office with good reason because you had and still have very little to back up your opinion. And this is money that Elon Musk has SAID he is going to spend whether he makes a "profit" or not if you will recall which is another reason some people call him crazy :)

And no, Musk is FAR from the most "rational" billionaire around as he's well known for doing 'crazy' things that just happen to work despite the "common wisdom" around him. Spending billions to make access to space cheaper isn't anything a 'rational' billionaire does which is why very few DO it. Musk knows this, plays on this, hell he REVELS in it!
Yes. The  "He's not serious, he's crazy" view has served Musk well.

Other people may view his goals as crazy and (imagine) his execution is unlikely to be "serious."

This is a mistake.
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Another "assumption" here is that Adeline is in fact the ONLY response they have waiting for SpaceX. As far as we "know" this could be simply to calm current investor/shareholder fears with something really "wonderful" waiting till they actually need to justify the spending on it.
Unlikely but not impossible.
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Less than you might think because they COULD be right and then they don't have issues with overreacting to a supposed "threat" that didn't materialize. You seem to be taking them at face value on one hand and then noting they actually CAN mobilize a lot more resources and money than SpaceX IF THEY NEED TO FOR SURVIVAL which at present would be very hard to argue under the current circumstances.

Then where do the economics of launch go globally? National institutional launches hold up entire launch architectures as mostly sole users. No cost sharing. Very narrow financial footprints, anemic development given a bimodal distribution of launches with infrequent bump next to "frequent flyer" bump. Launch systems taking decades to modernize if that, next to weekly mods. Runaway.

That's when most other launch providers will "get real" about this. But ... what will they have left?
Indeed.

That just leaves one architecture standing.
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #135 on: 06/11/2015 09:50 am »
While "dictionary" correct it is a main job of the board of directors to ensure the investors/shareholders are happy which is actually their primary purpose. The CEO is supposed to work within the constraints of that relationship to ensure the company remains competitive. The details of this are what a CEO rises and falls over and the BoD very often can CAUSE a company to fail by not allowing the CEO to spend enough to remain competitive.
It's not clear where the Airbus Board comes from. For ULA Tori's Board all come from either LM or Boeing.

I'd guess that makes "Please let us hang onto some of the money we hand to your other employers" quite a tough sell in comparison.  :(
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This has happened in the past and will happen again in the future. Musk and SpaceX do not have this layer to work with/around and it shows.

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Not true.  The market (which includes stockholders) does reward companies for making smart moves, just as the market will punish companies for being too tepid in responding to potential threats to future profits.  It's not a one-way street.
Usually after the fact. While it's happening "The Market" complains about how much the company is spending to try to catch up.  :(
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Look at your company histories, stockholders and investors have been FAR less interested in innovation than protecting profits margins paid back to them in the last 30 years and that hasn't changed recently. The will complain to high heaven over moves that cost them money at the time even if they end up increasing profits at a later date.

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Look, let's get back to the basics here. If Airbus doesn't do anything to respond to the market threat SpaceX poses, they will be in far greater financial straights than they are today. That is a given, even if SpaceX doesn't perfect reusability, and it becomes far worse if they do perfect any form of reusability. The same with ULA.
True.
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Airbus along with Boeing, and LM which own ULA all have other interests that make their space launch development business' less than a major segment of their business model. While they "have" to do something the amount they can really do is limited. And further it can be argued (and they have) that SpaceX's overall "effect" can easily be far less than many predict if SpaceX finds (a possibility which SpaceX admits to) that reusability is not as economical as they hope it will be. The actual effect becomes even less clear once you segment the market into LEO and GTO/GEO. The former is where SpaceX is hanging it's business case while the latter is where the other companies see the majority of the market remaining.
Actually Shotwell admitted during her NATO presentation the NSS segment (lots of BLEO there) is also a major section of the market and you have to be a player there if you want substantial revenue.
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Going "back-to-basics" Airbus-et-al really do NOT have to "respond" to SpaceX other than finding small ways to cut their prices down some to match the F9H capability and price point. They will still own a share of the GTO/GEO market no matter what and meanwhile they can prep for the change without having to put forth the major investment and effort that actually beating SpaceX will entail.
Which is the sane, logical and pragmatic course.

I can hear the Board of the New Hampshire Buggy Whip company telling their worried CEO much the same.   :(

"Horseless carriages. Nonsense. Most people can't afford a single servant, let alone a full time Chauffeur".
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Full permission no but they have enough of a go ahead to sign contracts and begin development work which is about where Airbus is. This is MUCH further than they have been given before with any other development program.
This, like ULA's plans for engine reuse, look like they are about to get real.
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Far from secret and they have all "seen-the-light-of-day" and are publicly available if you care to look. The problem is they are STILL not proven to be needed or even economically viable given that FOR reusability to be viable it has to have a higher than current flight rate.

This is the conundrum of Airbus and everyone else in that they COULD beat the heck out of SpaceX if they could see it being needed but they don't because the overall business case is still very iffy and the up-front cost is more than they can gather unless the case is verifiably (survival at stake) solid.
And still can't if you're committed to the single manufacturer/operator model.

In it's defense Europe is the only place where there is significant separation between the builder (EADS Astrium as prime, whatever their name de Jour is) and Arianspace, to the point that Arianespace can operate Soyuz, which they have no involvement with developing at all.

Arianespace could operate other vehicles as well.
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Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #136 on: 06/11/2015 09:51 am »
I don't know what others have in mind, but I would be impressed if they got 10 reuses out of a stage.  Now that is the body, not engines, since engines can be swapped out an infinite number of times. 
Agreed.
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So maybe this is one of those situations where there are different interpretations of what "reuse" means, and "gas n go" means.  But for a brand new stage with brand new engines, my assumption is that they will be able to re-fly that exact configuration of engines and structures a number of times before they have to swap out an engine or two.  At least in the early days.  And then as they make improvements the frequency will go down, as it has with airliners.

I would imagine that is something they are curious about too.  Good point.
We are deep in the zone where the "unknown unknowns" lurk.  :(
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That is a completely wrong characterization of the situation, and of Elon Musk.

Musk is one of the most rational billionaires I've seen, and SpaceX has been grown using only the money Musk invested when he WASN'T a billionaire.
Err, he's describing Airbus and ULA's (historic) view of Musk and SX's operations.
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And SpaceX has not been doing any of this in secret, so claiming ignorance is not a rational defense.  Experts within Airbus would have been able to provide the CEO with enough information about what they were facing.  Heck, I could have told him what he was facing 5 YEARS AGO.
Which seems to be exactly what they did.
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So kudo's to Airbus for having a secret group work on Adeline, but negative points for not funding enough such efforts so that they could come up with a truly competitive solution, and not this half solution.
Well it's conceptually the same one as Vulcan.
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And again, keep in mind that they will lose marketshare unless they come up with a complete solution to competing with SpaceX.  Anything less than that is giving up marketshare to SpaceX.
Actually it's Arianespace that operates the Ariane space, so they are the people loosing market share.
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Evolution in action...
History has been on their side.
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Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #137 on: 06/11/2015 10:06 am »
Musk is noted as stating that after 40 firings (not flights) that some parts needs to be replaced due to stress. Then engines are going to have to be "maintenance" and inspected between flights which is going to be several hours work at least if not more. (I fully understand WHY SpaceX hasn't done the obvious thing and just keep cycling and engine till it fails catastrophically given the amount of focus directed at them but they really need to do so at some point)
It's not cheap but passenger engines do the what-happens-if-a-drive-turbine-blade-fails test to prove it won't escape the engine nacelle, or in SX's case the Kevlar around the engine..
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Given the H1 of the 50s was shown to be refurbishable indefinitely I suspect that SpaceX could confidently be able to fly a Merlin till it was literally to the point where they had replaced everything. But I suspect it will be more likely to have the engines fly to a set number of flights (not firings) when the cost of refurbishment is too high.
It's the pragmatic move as it's the flights that get in the revenue, not the firings.
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Unfortunately this is Musk talking without anything to base it on. He's got even less data to support this now as they at least know some of the maintenance and refurbishment required is going to take several hours if not a day or two to "re-qualify" a stage for launch let along actually stack, load a payload and launch.

Multiple flights OF multiple vehicles per day is possible but not multiple flights of the SAME stage and boosters.
It's one of those obvious-but-subtle points people miss.
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Not really as noted above the "flight-rate" Elon was talking about wasn't even considering the second stage it was specifically "first stage and boosters" which is not going to be as rapid a turn around as Elon would like to believe. And the tankage production can be ramped up with a back-stock to allow a pretty reasonable flight rate to be achieved. In the same manner as SpaceX Airbus could have multiple flights per day with multiple vehicles and about the same turn around rate of re-qualified vehicles as SpaceX. Operations costs would probably be slightly more due to having to basically build a new stage on the propulsion module but streamlining and experience would be pretty easy to build into the system so in the end the costs and time would be on par with full stage reuse AND possibly somewhat better if stage full stage reuse is limited as could still prove true.
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Recovery actually NOT reuse. Musk originally stated they wanted to recovery to see how the parts had worn during use and that they "might" salvage parts but while their end goal was reuse they initially JUST wanted to recover. Since recovery proved problematical (aerodynamics) the decision was made to go from attempted recovery to a fully reusable design with enough margin to withstand the proposed recovery method. The F9 DID start out as an ELV with the possibility of recovery, however once the decision was made for reuse the stage was redesigned to allow enough margin for recovery and reuse which DID impact payload capability as was anticipated. Since they didn't actually recover any of the "sea-landed" stages they still don't know if that margin is enough to actually allow reusability. They won't know if its enough until and unless they actually get a stage back to examine.
Yes, people's memories can be move comparing what was said with what they remember being said.
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"Supposed" to be which does not in any way mean it won't. While I agree it PROBABLY isn't an issue (it wasn't for the H1 for example) and RP1 is specifically designed to be a low coking as possible, no one has run an rocket engine over and over again in a reusable manner such as SpaceX so it's a learning experience.

As an off the top of my head example, residual RP1 in the engine during zero-g coast could be vaporized by retained heat of the engines and leave some coking in the cooling tubes. This would never show up in ground testing however so would not be a "known" issue until engines have been recovered and examined. This may require more "maintenance" between flights or a shorter engine overall lifetime.
Again I doubt it, but you have to recover to know for sure.
Nice example. Might show up on upper stage telemetry with multiple relights, might not.

But I'll bet there are still plenty of potential "gotchas" for the unwary.
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It's all about trade-offs. Delta IV is arguably the most modern LOX/LH2 powered rocket, and ULA feels it's unaffordable to compete against other expendable launchers, much less partially reusable ones.

JS19: Neither do LOX/Sub-Cooled Propane, or LOX/Methane or "technically" any modern LOX/RP1 (or Kerosene) engines if they are designed right. Coking is very much NOT as much an issue as it once was and is NOT a reason for deciding which propellant to use in a reusable LV. As we are all aware (or should be by now anyway) you avoid even THAT minor issue by using your LOX as a coolant instead of your fuel which is what every H2O2 engine did and is pretty much proven to be effective and pretty damn simple these days.
And yet SX still did not not go with LOX cooling, which looks the obvious way to go if you want reusable engines. I'll be interested to see if XCOR did as they have people with experience of it already.
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CR: The Delta-IV suffers from the main problem of all LOX/LH2 rockets; it's a pretty crappy combination of propellants for the FIRST STAGE of a launch vehicle. You really want higher density/thrust rather than higher ISP and lower of both. Hence Delta-IV is more "economical" if it's fitted with SRBs which get it off the pad and moving sooner than just relying on the main engines. My main take on the Delta-IV was simply that Boeing got paid to develop the RS-68 under the EELV contract and therefore base a launcher around it rather than trying to leverage any design "advantage" out of the contract. It doesn't seem that it was EVER going to be commercially viable versus the competition of similar ELVs let alone anyone building a semi-or-fully RLV.
IOW just like an Ariane 5.  :)

I did not realize Boeing got the RS68 funding under the EELV programme. Yet another case of "Get the development funds," rather than getting the best design possible?

Sounds like the AR-1 to me.
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Similarly the F9 "suffers" from the lack of an efficient upper stage and could be FAR more effective (but more costly) with anything OTHER than an LOX/RP1 propellant. Here the driver would be engine development since you could use the present tankage with various adaptions for the propellant. (But to my mind it would behoove SpaceX to consider it more seriously because I don't see it being cost prohibitive especially as they are planning on building a new-build methalox engine ANYWAY)
If SX went to a propellant change on F9 and FH (no evidence for this) Methalox would be the obvious choice. In fact I think the phrase anything but Hydrogen is a pretty good design heuristic for a lot of rocket problems except  where you need absolute maximum efficiency.

The question is of course how many people really need that?         
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Think/Operate are not the same thing and if you weren't "upper-management" where "engineering" is one of those "minor details" you probably really do NOT "know" how they think as its very often not as intuitive as you'd assume :)

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But the bottom line is this - you're either investing in your future to stay in business, or you're deciding to lose business to your competitors that are investing in their future while you're not.

Which is something the you GENERALLY do at a low level with a constant stream of your profit flow which is quite different when said "investment" suddenly requires a major influx of cash flow enough that your "profits" drop substantially.

I addressed this up-thread a bit but in order to do this "properly" (ie you don't get canned as a result or cause a major investor panic) you need to lay the groundwork and preparer the market and investors for the effort. This is Boeing building the 787 with several years of ramp-up time and not something you throw in a couple of billion dollars to achieve unless you have NO choice. And the thing is this has become a lot more 'immediate' than anyone in upper management was planning on.

Currently Airbus, Boeing, et-al are scrambling (without looking like they are because that also invites investor panic) to address a situation they were pretty confident that would never come up without a LOT more notice. It was clear, (and Boeing/LM, etc all were pointing out the numbers showing they were right) that RLV versus ELV was a question of economics that the ELV was the answer to. And it all had to do with the flight rate and projected market. Some "crazy" billionaire intent on spending himself into the poor house to prove a point and reach a fully personal goal with no hope of repayment economically is just not something you THINK about when your a CEO of something like Airbus, etc.

They are treating this as an exercise in "updating" the business model which makes perfect sense understanding where this is coming from, they still expect SpaceX to fail and go back to "just" being a slightly cheaper competitor. However it's pretty clear that while SpaceX may still "fail" to fully achieve all its goals it will still be below the current competitive price point they can achieve with any LV they currently have. So this is a way to prepare the relevant people with the idea that changes will need to be made and that they can (under this plan) come in at a slightly higher cost than "just" the normal upgrade and competitive costs that are currently planned.

Since "the" market is still considered GTO/GEO services and the average flight rate will still remain small enough that this sort of operations will remain economical there is no rush to try and beat SpaceX at a game that still looks economically unfeasible. Should however the market significantly change at least this is prepping the way for significant changes in policy should those be required. NOT taking those steps at this point is a gamble but you can't really argue that history and market is not on their side from their point of view.
Excellent summation.

Underneath the rhetoric the suppliers (of both the launch services and the LV hardware, which people forget are notthe same thing) are happy with  the status quo.

BTW I know you like to point out that rockets <> aircraft but there is one economic analogy that's quite a good fit for the LV/LV services business.

It's British Airways operation of Concorde.

BA made an operating profit because essentially the British government (when they were still owned by the British government) handed them to it to operate.

In Arianespace's case they are essentially handed a new LV and in the case of the EELV where Boeing and LM did contribute their own funds it didn't come out of their reserves. It came from debt funding arranged through their banks based on a long history of government launches both companies had supplied.

Not really the sort of bet-the-company investment Musk has made.
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #138 on: 06/11/2015 10:08 am »
For the folks who keep insisting that boost-back RTLS is "obviously" the way to go and everything else sucks I will point out that while SpaceX tried and "failed" with TPS, parachutes, and ocean recovery they NEVER actually got as far as doing any of it but INSTEAD went with the current method. The reason the former failed is because the stage was aerodynamically unstable on entry and broke up before they could open the parachutes and even attempt recovery. Had they added 'grid-fins' capable of withstanding reentry they would have been able to recovery their stages earlier on but they chose to do it this way.
Good point. In public companies that would take several Board meetings to discuss "Is it really a failure" "Can we make it work eventually" "Should we start a research project to decide how to replace it" "What level should we fund the the project"

I'm not sure how autocratic Musk is but I suspect the SX decision process to dump the approach and replace was much shorter.  :)
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- Says who? Falcon 9 performance is around 3.75t to an Ariane-equivalent GTO orbit. With A5 at 9.6t for dual launch, that makes approx. $16k/kg for F9 and $20.8k/kg for A5.

Going to point out that everyone seems to be on the same page that recovery and reuse is a LOT easier if you don't have to go all the way to GTO/GEO with your rocket and more so with the first stage of ANY launch vehicle. The main take away would seem to be (and what has been suggested by numerous companies at this point) that if you can divide your "flight" up into getting to LEO and then getting your cargo to GTO/GEO from there, everything is a lot easier. Actually getting to that point is the key issues as it's NOT cheaper if you are only flying infrequently (current launch rate) and economics is the driving factor. It is much cheaper to launch directly to GTO/GEO than establish and maintain the on-orbit infrastructure for a second system that moves cargo from LEO to GEO unless you delivery prices for LEO are really, really low.
Or (just throwing this out there) if you can just buy the capability at a known price and someone has to sell enough of them to stay in business. Then you're problem is having enough payloads to justify it.
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- A64 is supposed to cost 90m euros which is roughly $100m for 10t dual launch, which is $10k/kg. So if we believe in the 90m euro cost (which I do not), A6 will be almost 40% cheaper than F9 on a per kg basis. Just saying, its nowhere near as clear-cut as you think it is.

- The price for A62 is what governments will pay, not the actual cost which will be higher. I.e. A64 subsidizes A62.

"Price" is debatable because of who is defining it and how much they actual costs are or are not included or assumed.

Commercial launch costs give me a headache, government ones give me a migraine :)
True.

Let's not forget the squeeze "assured access" payments both ESA and DoD pay.
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #139 on: 06/11/2015 10:11 am »
There have been lots of good points made on this thread about ULA and SpaceX but can we please try and return the focus to Airbus plans for doing a reusable engine module and returning it for reuse?

While the context of why Airbus is doing this now is important it has become a bit overwhelming.  :(
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #140 on: 06/11/2015 12:00 pm »
Here are some interesting links and articles on DLR concepts for reusable boosters. This is going back to early 2000s. The boosters replaced SRB, staged at a modest  mach 5.8.

http://www.dlr.de/irs/en/desktopdefault.aspx/tabid-7582/12834_read-32243/

www.dlr.de/Portaldata/55/Resources/.../sart/0095-0212prop.pdf

http://www.la.dlr.de/ra/sart/projects/lfbb/lfbb.php.en

They were considering a Methane engine of similar power to RD180.
If Airbus do fly the Adeline and it is successful then the next logical step is to apply it to boosters, or take a giant step and do fully reusable flyback boosters.
The do need to develop or buy a RD180 class engine for the boosters. If the engine is being reused 10 times they will have a choice of engines come mid 2020s. RD180, RD181, BE4 and maybe AR-1 (ITAR willing).

The thing that has killed a lot of reusable LV in past has be relying on technologies with to low a TRL. Both Adeline and ULA SMART are using existing technologies, even SMART inflatable heat shield has been flown twice now by NASA.
One of the most expensive part of developing these reusable systems is the test flights especially when they repeatable fail. Things have even change here, SpaceX has shown that a company can make a profit on every test flight pass of fail. 




Offline baldusi

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #141 on: 06/11/2015 12:51 pm »
[...]
The do need to develop or buy a RD180 class engine for the boosters. If the engine is being reused 10 times they will have a choice of engines come mid 2020s. RD180, RD181, BE4 and maybe AR-1 (ITAR willing).

The thing that has killed a lot of reusable LV in past has be relying on technologies with to low a TRL. Both Adeline and ULA SMART are using existing technologies, even SMART inflatable heat shield has been flown twice now by NASA.
One of the most expensive part of developing these reusable systems is the test flights especially when they repeatable fail. Things have even change here, SpaceX has shown that a company can make a profit on every test flight pass of fail.
Ariane exists because Europe want independent access to space. Outsourcing propulsion is not acceptable. May be you mean that they could buy a license and build it themselves?
Look at the AVUM case. They got Yuzhmash to develop the RD-843, and they are already working on a replacement for it (and the Ti tanks). They appear to be willing to cooperate and pay for know how during development. Again, look at the Avio and KbKhA cooperation on the MIRA CH4/LOX propulsion.
But Adeline has "Vulcain recovery" written all over it. The wings offer an advantage for recovering an hydrogen sustainer engine, just like the Ariane 5's Vulcain. If they had a high thrust medium isp core stage, like Falcon 9 or Zenith, they boost back maneuver is not so bad. And if you can design an engine for the boostback requirements like the Merlin 1D, then most of the advantages of Adeline are not so critical.
I see Adeline as a solution to recovery while keeping current European experience and know how. Airbus is probably one of the top three aircraft and top five launcher companies in the world. If anybody can make it, it is them (or ULA/Boeing). But that's because it leverages their current (ok, SNECMA and Safran's) propulsion technology and experience, they current propellant industrial base (H2/LOX) and business model.

Offline Lar

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #142 on: 06/11/2015 03:47 pm »
Let's stay focused on the specifics of this proposal and a bit less about why Airbus should be scared of SpaceX and a bit less about why typical executives are not like Musk.  There are other threads for that.

Thanks
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Offline Patchouli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #143 on: 06/11/2015 03:54 pm »
Its only a patent and they call it basic research, I wouldn't get my hopes up.

Kind of reminds me of ULA's plans to recover the engine section. Interesting tidbit: Apparently engines, electronics, etc. make up 80% of the stage's value.

It would be interesting to see a comparison of the mass penalty for this concept versus the stage reuse for Falcon.  I'm sure there has to be some fairly significant structures to allow the engines to seperate from the tanks and be aerodynamic enough for flight back to a runway and the weight of jet engines and fuel.

The mass penalty is certainly a lot lower than with boost-back. Its no secret that flyback is more efficient. Whether its cheaper overall is another question.

That was the whole point of the Shuttle, you were recovering the Main Engines, the Fairing and the Avionics.

A lot of people like to point out the shuttle was a failure but it wasn't a complete failure.
The system did provide a relatively low reoccurring cost but it's fixed costs were very high.

Is there a European engine that is capable of 10 (or 100) launches without extensive (a la STS) refurbishment?

For example here:

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Certains moteurs actuels, comme le Vulcain 2 d'Ariane 5, ont déjŕ démontré en essais leur capacité ŕ effectuer une dizaine de cycles.

Meaning Vulcain 2 has demonstrated in tests to be capable of doing 10 cycles.

I think RD-180 could also do that (according to ULA), so it seems almost standard for modern rocket engines. I wonder though how it affects reliability.


I read somewhere even some older engines such as the H-1,F-1,and J-2 were good for several firings.


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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #144 on: 06/11/2015 04:19 pm »
Ascension has quite a long runway as well.
Ascension was one of the STS emergency landing sites. Also hosts an ESA tracking station (the third in the row - Kourou/Galliot, Natal, Ascension, Libreville, Malindi).

Although as stated before, it all depends on when you stage. The LFBB concept tossed around fifteen years ago had Kourou as planned flyback landing site.

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #145 on: 06/11/2015 05:26 pm »
BTW in case people don't think European TPS skills and materials are up to it you should be aware of ARD

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_Reentry_Demonstrator

This demonstrated near orbital reentry in 1998, using a mixture of ablatives, reusable tiles and including some tests of ceramic fasteners to hold the tiles in place.

DLR are very competent with RCC, to the point that the X38 nose cone, and a number of joints and actuators for the aerosurfaces would have provided by them.

The nose also held an integral Flush Mount Data System, giving local wind direction (IE airflow relative to the body) from orbit to landing, without the complexity of the Shuttles twin deployable Pitot tubes, which could not deploy above M5 and could not be trusted above about M3.
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Offline baldusi

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #146 on: 06/11/2015 05:36 pm »
Oh, I totally think they can technically pull it off. My question is if they can do it without an exponentially ballooning budget and actually achieve a significant reduction in costs without requiring a standing army that would only be economically viable at 20 launches per year.

Offline Space Ghost 1962

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #147 on: 06/11/2015 06:07 pm »
Disagree. Don't think they can pull off what we see because of too much creeping elegance (neither did another rocket reuse video either). Either fast cancel or back-off to a marginalized subset. Not because of competence but because of "will".

And I think they only have one shot at this (likewise ULA), because they'll lose never to regain market share before they get another chance. To my prior post's doomsday scenario with low/no follow on development budget.

They are spending that shot unwisely. Not in partial recovery or aerostructures to recover passively. Both make sense for hydrolox "fluffy", with the option to do more incrementally. High speed RV's do not make for low speed propulsive craft. Nor do I buy the remanufacturing scenario - too pat.

My point is that this is a "rear guard" strategy, not a leadership strategy. As such it's either waiting for the other guy to screw up, or accepting "second place".

What is the minimum for an Airbus reuse strategy to succeed?

Offline woods170

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #148 on: 06/11/2015 06:21 pm »
Disagree. Don't think they can pull off what we see because of too much creeping elegance (neither did another rocket reuse video either). Either fast cancel or back-off to a marginalized subset. Not because of competence but because of "will".

And I think they only have one shot at this (likewise ULA), because they'll lose never to regain market share before they get another chance. To my prior post's doomsday scenario with low/no follow on development budget.

They are spending that shot unwisely. Not in partial recovery or aerostructures to recover passively. Both make sense for hydrolox "fluffy", with the option to do more incrementally. High speed RV's do not make for low speed propulsive craft. Nor do I buy the remanufacturing scenario - too pat.

My point is that this is a "rear guard" strategy, not a leadership strategy. As such it's either waiting for the other guy to screw up, or accepting "second place".

What is the minimum for an Airbus reuse strategy to succeed?

As with 98% of all previous Airbus studies this one won't see anything remotely resembling reality either.
Nothing to see here folks. Move along.

Offline Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #149 on: 06/11/2015 07:27 pm »
A lot of people like to point out the shuttle was a failure but it wasn't a complete failure.
The system did provide a relatively low reoccurring cost but it's fixed costs were very high.

That's a distinction without a difference overall, plus the recurring costs were quite high - The External Tank cost $173M when purchased in volume, and a pair of Solid Rocket Motors (SRM) cost $69M.

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I read somewhere even some older engines such as the H-1,F-1,and J-2 were good for several firings.

Well sure.  But does it matter what engines from over 50 ago were capable of doing?
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 Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #150 on: 06/11/2015 09:19 pm »
My point is that this is a "rear guard" strategy, not a leadership strategy. As such it's either waiting for the other guy to screw up, or accepting "second place".

Agree completely.

Plus, and this is not always recognized until it's underway, but the paradigm change that is happening affects two aspects of the current market:

A.  $/kg to a destination in space is going down, potentially significantly.

B.  With reusable launch vehicles, launch frequency will go up.

Both of these address concerns that the market has had, in that with high launch costs they have been forced to make the most of their payloads, and that drives up costs and complexity.

As launch costs go down the market can start looking at lower cost payloads, although the economics of GEO slots probably won't change for a while.  However non-GEO locations, like LEO and MEO, could be an opportunity, and that is where SpaceX is headed with their constellation of 700 satellites in LEO.

So what SpaceX is offering the market is the opportunity to fly payloads that cost far less, and fly them whenever they want.  That should inspire companies to experiment with business models, and if they find success then it means that ESA will be at a disadvantage for that new market - SpaceX will have create a new Blue Ocean marketspace.

ESA also has to watch out for everyone else that plans to "step up their game" against SpaceX, so it's not a matter of being 2nd in the market, but potentially 3rd, 4th, 5th...

If SpaceX proves that physics allows for significant recovery and reuse of rocket stages, then ESA and Airbus would be foolhardy to ignore that ability and lock themselves into an uncompetitive architecture for the next decade or so.
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 john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #151 on: 06/11/2015 09:56 pm »
My point is that this is a "rear guard" strategy, not a leadership strategy. As such it's either waiting for the other guy to screw up, or accepting "second place".

Agree completely.

Plus, and this is not always recognized until it's underway, but the paradigm change that is happening affects two aspects of the current market:

A.  $/kg to a destination in space is going down, potentially significantly.
I'm glad you recognize that it's only potentially going to change. At present SX have a cheap ELV. It's good, if your payload fits in its performance envelope. I'll caution once again that while people expect SX to demonstrate recovery and reuse eventually neither has happened yet.

The question is to what extent Airbus senior management accept it's going to happen.
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B.  With reusable launch vehicles, launch frequency will go up.
Given the payload hit every historical design of RLV has taken its assumed that the only way to maintain payload to orbit is to increase launch frequency. It's not a goal, it's a side effect.
Quote
Both of these address concerns that the market has had, in that with high launch costs they have been forced to make the most of their payloads, and that drives up costs and complexity.

As launch costs go down the market can start looking at lower cost payloads, although the economics of GEO slots probably won't change for a while.  However non-GEO locations, like LEO and MEO, could be an opportunity, and that is where SpaceX is headed with their constellation of 700 satellites in LEO.
Actually one of the selling points of the Shuttle was the ability trun with less reliable payloads (with single string electronics) knowing they could be replaced quickly.
Quote
So what SpaceX is offering the market is the opportunity to fly payloads that cost far less, and fly them whenever they want.  That should inspire companies to experiment with business models, and if they find success then it means that ESA will be at a disadvantage for that new market - SpaceX will have create a new Blue Ocean marketspace.

ESA also has to watch out for everyone else that plans to "step up their game" against SpaceX, so it's not a matter of being 2nd in the market, but potentially 3rd, 4th, 5th...

If SpaceX proves that physics allows for significant recovery and reuse of rocket stages, then ESA and Airbus would be foolhardy to ignore that ability and lock themselves into an uncompetitive architecture for the next decade or so.
We'll see.
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Offline CJ

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #152 on: 06/12/2015 05:27 am »
I just checked up thread regarding the 1st stage downrange distance... if it's anything like Ariane 5, I was way off when I said the engine pod would need to fly back several hundred miles - it's a lot further. But even if it can make, say...  hrmm, Ascension is pretty much it... it's still going to be a fairly long haul on many flights.

IMHO, the concept it interesting, but the contradictions in the video (such as stating no extra rocket fuel needed while showing the rocket engine doing a burn post sep) make it seem unserious. Only the existence of the small test model seen in a photo make me think it's under any real consideration.

It's a very interesting concept though.   

IMHO, the technical challenges for making this work (both physically and fiscally) would be decidedly non trivial. While it's certainly true that SpaceX hasn't achieved recovery yet (let alone the important part, economical beneficial reuse) and thus it's, obviously, not known if they can achieve it, I think we likewise have to acknowledge that it's unknown whether this airbus concept can be made to work.

Personally, I hope this concept happens.

Offline The Amazing Catstronaut

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #153 on: 06/12/2015 07:59 am »
How much of a legal quagmire would using Ascension be, assuming they use RAF Ascension Island (which they would have to, Ascension isn't a big place)? I can't imagine it would be too much of an issue, but they'd to build some support facilities whatever occurs. Certainly the runway can accommodate the stage.
« Last Edit: 06/12/2015 07:59 am by The Amazing Catstronaut »
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Offline Zed_Noir

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #154 on: 06/12/2015 08:24 am »
I just checked up thread regarding the 1st stage downrange distance... if it's anything like Ariane 5, I was way off when I said the engine pod would need to fly back several hundred miles - it's a lot further. But even if it can make, say...  hrmm, Ascension is pretty much it... it's still going to be a fairly long haul on many flights.


Somewhat semi-serious.  :)

Maybe they can add a tailhook to the flyback propulsion module and land on a pseudo-carrier (austere amphibious assault ship) in the middle of the Atlantic.


Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #155 on: 06/12/2015 08:32 am »
How much of a legal quagmire would using Ascension be, assuming they use RAF Ascension Island (which they would have to, Ascension isn't a big place)? I can't imagine it would be too much of an issue, but they'd to build some support facilities whatever occurs. Certainly the runway can accommodate the stage.
Legally not that difficult. Several US air bases in the UK are nominally RAF bases so the idea of foreign operations is not unknown to the British.

Keep in mind this is an engine module and all propellants will be cryogenic. Any residuals will have boiled off long before landing.

Ideally you want the operations to be as simple as possible. Provided the whole package can fit into a transport aircraft then it's  of land, tow to hangar, box up and fly it  home.

Now how much is the round trip cost of hiring a transport plane for the Ascension/Kourou run?

IMHO, the concept it interesting, but the contradictions in the video (such as stating no extra rocket fuel needed while showing the rocket engine doing a burn post sep) make it seem unserious. Only the existence of the small test model seen in a photo make me think it's under any real consideration.

It's a very interesting concept though.   
Fair point. But then the 2011 SX' was very convincing. Only it's not going to happen.

All videos should be viewed with a large pinch of salt handy.
Quote
IMHO, the technical challenges for making this work (both physically and fiscally) would be decidedly non trivial. While it's certainly true that SpaceX hasn't achieved recovery yet (let alone the important part, economical beneficial reuse) and thus it's, obviously, not known if they can achieve it, I think we likewise have to acknowledge that it's unknown whether this airbus concept can be made to work.
True.

It depends how far away you're moving from the known knowledge base. Whole stages are a long way outside that base. Winged entry was demonstrated by Shuttle 130+ times, fully automated winged entry (by Buran) once.

Uncrewed takeoff, cruise and landing of a jet powered vehicle close to M2 was demonstrated in 1953 by the NA X10 project.

My instinct is the biggest part outside the Known SoA is the stabilizers.
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Offline inventodoc

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #156 on: 06/12/2015 12:33 pm »
Airbus is claiming a 30% cost reduction benefit from this 'concept' that will take ten years and is not yet committed to.

The business press acts like this is something immediately game changing.  It is not. These costs for ariane would still be much higher than falcon expendable as it is now.

A concept like this shows that airbus, and ULA (vulcan), are being nudged in the right direction due to the spacex challenge. They just aren't going far enough. This will be interesting to watch.

Offline baldusi

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #157 on: 06/12/2015 01:05 pm »
I've been think a bit about this. I'm going to go through Falcon 9 ASDS landing maneuver, to then compare it to the Airbus concept.
The F9 maneuver has three burns:
1) It's used to cut the horizontal velocity, so the stage doesn't go further downstage. When the first stage separates, it is on the beginning of a ballistic trajectory. If left as is, it would still keep going up until gravity brings it back. And thus it would also keep accelerating down, increasing the interface heat flux. So, a burn is needed. I would guess that in case of RTLS, this burn would be longer.
2) Second burn is the supersonic retropropulsion maneuver. It slows the stage just enough not to burn. I'm speculating that the flame flux also acts as a sort of heat shield and aerodynamic decelerator. At least, that's what I got from the Red Dragon presentation.
3) The third burn is the hover slam maneuver, where they decelerate at T/W>1 to land on the barge/pad.
Now, from ULA's presentation, each kg of upper stage propellant left unburned, cost 1.6kg of payload. So, for a first stage, that should translate to something like 1kg of payload lost for each 10kg of propellant. So propellant left unburned is expensive.
I've been thinking what I would Adeline to perform and what was shown on the video.
I believe that if the main engine could be restarted, it could perform the first propulsive maneuver (the one that decelerates from the ballistic trajectory) before Adeline separates. Nothing extra would be needed on the return module. But on the other hand, the standard efficiency for an in air turboprop is somewhere between 25,000s and 35,000s. And not separating implies that you also need to decelerate the tanks. So you'd have to decelerate about double the mass and thus need double the propellant.
But I would assume that if you already have the props and the wings, taking it back would be a lot cheaper mass wise with the props than doing a boost back burn post MECO1. The only limitation is the extra heat shield required on the entry interface.
And here is the important part, to do the retropropulsive maneuver to limit the entry heat flux, you have to do it just at interface, exactly when Adeline is entering with its fore. So I'm assuming that they will do no such maneuver.
And last, they can land like a plane, so there's no need for the third burn (obviously).
From this comparison I would assume three possible strategies:

A)
1) Retro burn post MECO1 to cut the ballistic trajectory and reduce the cross range needs and heat shield requirements (more propellant, less dry mass overall).
2) Adeline separation.
3) Semi-passive atmospheric entry.
4) "Short" flight back to landing strip.

B)
1) Adeline separation (less propellant needed, more mass required on the plane).
2) Retro burn.
3) Semi-passive atmospheric entry.
4) "Short" flight back to landing strip.

C)
1) Adeline separation.
2) Semi-passive atmospheric entry (more heat shield).
3) "Long" flight back to landing strip.

If anyone can see other possible strategy, or disregard one of my proposed ones, please do so.

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #158 on: 06/12/2015 02:14 pm »
If anyone can see other possible strategy, or disregard one of my proposed ones, please do so.

Well, as you have already said, if you have wings and props there's practically no reason to do boost-back.

Let's look at the Beechcraft King Air 350, just as an example. A range of 3270km with 2t of fuel, max. take off weight of ~7t.

Adeline might be aerodynamically less efficient and maybe somewhat heavier, but still have plenty of range. Further, in the case Adeline is capable of take off, I suppose it can land on every airport and refuel, as the props will use standard jet fuel (as long as the airports allow drones to land, obviously).



« Last Edit: 06/12/2015 02:18 pm by Oli »

Offline kato

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #159 on: 06/12/2015 03:07 pm »
At somewhere under ten to fifteen tons weight and likely rather limited dimensions you could also just load it onboard most standard cargo aircraft for return to Kourou too.

Offline GWH

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #160 on: 06/12/2015 03:22 pm »
Here's an AvWeek article with some good tidbits of further info:
http://aviationweek.com/space/airbus-proposes-reusable-core-stage-engine-concept-upper-stage-tug

-Adeline concept would enable the Ariane’s Vulcain 2 engine to be reused 10-20 times
-notes that the concept could be adapted for solid-rocket motors as well, but that based on experience with the current Ariane 5 and NASA’s Space Shuttle, such engines tend to suffer serious damage in returning to Earth
-In addition to Adeline, Airbus is evaluating a concept to preserve an electrically propelled upper stage in low Earth orbit to ferry communications and other satellites from LEO to geosynchronous orbit
-Similar to Lockheed Martin’s Jupiter concept proposed under NASA’s commercial cargo program, the solar-powered space tug is based on an Ariane liquid upper stage. Gilibert says the concept could lead to significant savings for satellite operators.
-"The launcher’s mission changes to carry the satellite and a little bit of fuel up to 1,000 km altitude, rather than to [geosynchronous transfer orbit],” he notes. With the space tug, the launcher could be somewhat smaller and capable of carrying 5 metric tons of payload, plus 1.5-2 metric tons of propellant.
« Last Edit: 06/12/2015 03:57 pm by GWH »

Offline Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #161 on: 06/12/2015 09:56 pm »
I'm glad you recognize that it's only potentially going to change. At present SX have a cheap ELV. It's good, if your payload fits in its performance envelope.

Launch service providers only exist to serve their customers, not the other way around, but the customers have to abide by the limitations of the launch service providers.  If reusability is proven out, two of those barriers, cost and lead-time, will both be decreasing.  Historically that's when a market changes, when you dramatically change one or more of the limitations.

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I'll caution once again that while people expect SX to demonstrate recovery and reuse eventually neither has happened yet.

Considering how close SpaceX has come, I'd say recovery has been proven enough to take it seriously.  As to reuse, if you take it into account when you're building your launcher, then I'd say reuse to some degree is possible using modern design and fabrication methods.  This is rocket science, we we've gotten pretty good at it...

Quote
Given the payload hit every historical design of RLV has taken its assumed that the only way to maintain payload to orbit is to increase launch frequency. It's not a goal, it's a side effect.

Since I'm not an engineer my perspectives are from a marketplace standpoint.  Engineers tend to, from what I've observed, look at absolute performance whilst ignoring market needs.

So "payload hit" be damned, the market really cares about how they can make money within the capabilities the market provides, which is why reducing cost for some of the parameters could inspire new business models to be tested.  Or it could just mean they book the cost savings as unplanned profit.  Either way it's good, since that will tend to drive down costs overall more firmly.

And this is what ESA should be fearing the most.  Sure it has a lock on some number of payloads, but over time it's customers may come under greater pressure from competitors that are using far bette reusable launch systems.  That's why it's so important that ESA gets this right today, because otherwise they will be locked in to an unchangeable cost model for the next decade.  Enough evidence exists today to understand what is at stake.

Quote
Actually one of the selling points of the Shuttle was the ability trun with less reliable payloads (with single string electronics) knowing they could be replaced quickly.

The government-subsidized Shuttle was not a good example to use for how todays commercial market will respond to increased competition and downward pricing trends.
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 Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #162 on: 06/12/2015 10:16 pm »
As with 98% of all previous Airbus studies this one won't see anything remotely resembling reality either.
Nothing to see here folks. Move along.

If we'd stop discussing all concepts which have 2% or less chance to become reality we'd have to shut down half of the forum ;)

Here's an AvWeek article with some good tidbits of further info:
http://aviationweek.com/space/airbus-proposes-reusable-core-stage-engine-concept-upper-stage-tug

-Adeline concept would enable the Ariane’s Vulcain 2 engine to be reused 10-20 times
-notes that the concept could be adapted for solid-rocket motors as well, but that based on experience with the current Ariane 5 and NASA’s Space Shuttle, such engines tend to suffer serious damage in returning to Earth
-In addition to Adeline, Airbus is evaluating a concept to preserve an electrically propelled upper stage in low Earth orbit to ferry communications and other satellites from LEO to geosynchronous orbit
-Similar to Lockheed Martin’s Jupiter concept proposed under NASA’s commercial cargo program, the solar-powered space tug is based on an Ariane liquid upper stage. Gilibert says the concept could lead to significant savings for satellite operators.
-"The launcher’s mission changes to carry the satellite and a little bit of fuel up to 1,000 km altitude, rather than to [geosynchronous transfer orbit],” he notes. With the space tug, the launcher could be somewhat smaller and capable of carrying 5 metric tons of payload, plus 1.5-2 metric tons of propellant.

Cannot read the article, but some of this is rather curious. How would you adopt this concept for solid rockets? Also I'm not sure why they talk about "preserving the upper stage" when they mention the space tug. The upper stage would still be needed I guess unless they intend to fly the core up to a 1k km orbit.
« Last Edit: 06/12/2015 10:27 pm by Oli »

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #163 on: 06/13/2015 01:10 am »
At somewhere under ten to fifteen tons weight and likely rather limited dimensions you could also just load it onboard most standard cargo aircraft for return to Kourou too.
Land it downrange then fit drop tanks for return to base flight. Being a drone it is cheaper to fly its self back to base than use transport plane. Also less chance of it being damaged from handling or in transit.
« Last Edit: 06/13/2015 01:12 am by TrevorMonty »

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #164 on: 06/13/2015 07:28 am »
Launch service providers only exist to serve their customers, not the other way around, but the customers have to abide by the limitations of the launch service providers.  If reusability is proven out, two of those barriers, cost and lead-time, will both be decreasing.  Historically that's when a market changes, when you dramatically change one or more of the limitations.
First off that's partial reusability you're talking about. I think we differ on wheather the possible reduction in price is significant enough  to grow the market. History suggests it gets eaten away by launch cost inflation. You might like to look how F9 prices have changed over the years from first announcement to 1st launch and then till today, versus say general US inflation.
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Considering how close SpaceX has come, I'd say recovery has been proven enough to take it seriously.  As to reuse, if you take it into account when you're building your launcher, then I'd say reuse to some degree is possible using modern design and fabrication methods.  This is rocket science, we we've gotten pretty good at it...
Again the question is wheather the whole process is economical The classic example being the Shuttle SRB's costing as much to refurb as to make, so why not just keep the production line open and the people employed?
Quote
Since I'm not an engineer my perspectives are from a marketplace standpoint.  Engineers tend to, from what I've observed, look at absolute performance whilst ignoring market needs.

So "payload hit" be damned, the market really cares about how they can make money within the capabilities the market provides, which is why reducing cost for some of the parameters could inspire new business models to be tested.  Or it could just mean they book the cost savings as unplanned profit.  Either way it's good, since that will tend to drive down costs overall more firmly.
OK let's look at what the market might see.
1)70% of the payload for 70% of the cost F9
2)70% of the payload for <70%  of the cost of an F9
3)70% of the payload for 100% of the cost of an F9
4)70% of the payload for 10% of the cost of an F9.

1) I'm buying a scaled down F9. Why bother? Most potential customers who couldn't get the funds togethers for a full F9 launch couldn't get 70% of that either.
2) Better. The devil would be in the price.
3) Now you're talking. That's the kind of level a lot of options open up. The key point. Cheap enough to fail. If it does, launch another one.

Only that's not going to happen because SX know they can't make upper stage recovery work "economically."

4) Counter intuitive except that F9SR offers a unique feature in that the 1st stage is known to work.  Given the (justifiable) paranoia customers have about launch failure that should not be underestimated.

Of course that option will bring about no reduction in launch prices, which will preserve the status quo and confirm both ULA's Arianspace's view that SX is just going to be another LV services provider in the market they are going to have to deal with.
Quote
And this is what ESA should be fearing the most.  Sure it has a lock on some number of payloads, but over time it's customers may come under greater pressure from competitors that are using far bette reusable launch systems.  That's why it's so important that ESA gets this right today, because otherwise they will be locked in to an unchangeable cost model for the next decade.  Enough evidence exists today to understand what is at stake.
Just to be clear ESA is in fact the customer, it funds Astrium to design and build the LV's and Arianespace sell launches to the market (including ESA, members of ESA who contract with it and anyone else).
So in fact it's Arianespace that has the lock on the ESA payloads.

Quote
The government-subsidized Shuttle was not a good example to use for how todays commercial market will respond to increased competition and downward pricing trends.
In execution perhaps not (but the amazing thing was they were able to develop at all given the budget rules).
It's goals are still very attractive to customers.
Regular launches to LEO, mean you can schedule  experiments, redesign based on data and fly again.
Likewise if you can recover a payload you can fix it, so you can run with single string redundancy (and NASA did a lot  of work on the fine details around design-for-on-orbit-servicing-and-repair).
The weight increase of more complex fasteners is offset by the need for single channel electronics.  1 set of bolts Vs 3 sets of (very) expensive circuit boards.

Sadly I doubt either ULA, SX or Airbus will deliver any of these goals.  :(
« Last Edit: 06/13/2015 07:31 am by john smith 19 »
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Offline Llian Rhydderch

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #165 on: 06/13/2015 09:12 am »

The government-subsidized Shuttle was not a good example to use for how todays commercial market will respond to increased competition and downward pricing trends.

The government-subsidized Shuttle is not a good example to use for any private company facing the ordinary incentives of the market process.
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Offline kato

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #166 on: 06/13/2015 09:47 am »
Also I'm not sure why they talk about "preserving the upper stage" when they mention the space tug. The upper stage would still be needed I guess unless they intend to fly the core up to a 1k km orbit.
Preserving an upper stage - read: a Vinci engine with some uprated avionics package, a docking mechanism and solar panels.
Due to the lower delta-v requirement in subsequent launches using that tug could possibly mean a switch e.g. from Vinci to a cheaper Aestus II (or similar) for the launcher upper stage as originally planned between 6.1 and 6.2, thus reducing cost.

Offline kato

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #167 on: 06/13/2015 09:55 am »
So in fact it's Arianespace that has the lock on the ESA payloads.
ESA doesn't exclusively launch with Arianespace btw. It's the preferred launch provider of course due to the subsidizing, but there've been ESA payloads on e.g. Russian, SpaceX and Indian launchers.

Offline Im_Utrecht

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #168 on: 06/13/2015 10:07 am »
I remember that a couple of years ago some French Arianespace officials burned the idea of reusability.
They said that they tried it, put some wings on it, propulsion unit etc. It became to heavy and expensive.

And now they come again with it to save their face (and position) now SpaceX is getting close. It is also a way to get more money from Europe.... It is a political move as well. The Germans are not so happy with the recent developments and the French attitude.
By the time 2025 it flies, if it ever flies, BFR and MCT are probably in operation.
« Last Edit: 06/13/2015 10:12 am by Im_Utrecht »

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #169 on: 06/13/2015 11:27 am »
I remember that a couple of years ago some French Arianespace officials burned the idea of reusability.
They said that they tried it, put some wings on it, propulsion unit etc. It became to heavy and expensive.
Just a reminder

Airbus <> Arianspace

Arianspace <> ESA.

Quote
And now they come again with it to save their face (and position) now SpaceX is getting close. It is also a way to get more money from Europe.... It is a political move as well. The Germans are not so happy with the recent developments and the French attitude.
By the time 2025 it flies, if it ever flies, BFR and MCT are probably in operation.
That's possible but the problem with all VTO and ELV derived ones especially is that normally the manufacturer is also the company that launches it and whatever you think SX is going to do they are going to make no change in that business model because of the way their hardware works.
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline chapi

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #170 on: 06/13/2015 12:24 pm »


I remember that a couple of years ago some French Arianespace officials burned the idea of reusability.
They said that they tried it, put some wings on it, propulsion unit etc. It became to heavy and expensive.

And now they come again with it to save their face (and position) now SpaceX is getting close. It is also a way to get more money from Europe.... It is a political move as well. The Germans are not so happy with the recent developments and the French attitude.
By the time 2025 it flies, if it ever flies, BFR and MCT are probably in operation.

As Airbus is a fully integrated French/German/other countries company, I don't see what you would be considered as a French or German move in the announcement they made last week. Furthermore, IIRC, there were no visible support from Space Agencies around this communication. No press release, no mention in Airbus speeches...etc. Actually, the lack of relay since then is probably a sign this is not really a political move.

In any case, what is annoying German officials in the "recent developments" around launcher reusability?

 

Offline baldusi

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #171 on: 06/13/2015 03:27 pm »
I remember that a couple of years ago some French Arianespace officials burned the idea of reusability.
They said that they tried it, put some wings on it, propulsion unit etc. It became to heavy and expensive.
I believe they were specifically talking about the Baikal project with Khrunichev.

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #172 on: 06/13/2015 05:28 pm »
Also I'm not sure why they talk about "preserving the upper stage" when they mention the space tug. The upper stage would still be needed I guess unless they intend to fly the core up to a 1k km orbit.
Preserving an upper stage - read: a Vinci engine with some uprated avionics package, a docking mechanism and solar panels.
Due to the lower delta-v requirement in subsequent launches using that tug could possibly mean a switch e.g. from Vinci to a cheaper Aestus II (or similar) for the launcher upper stage as originally planned between 6.1 and 6.2, thus reducing cost.

Yes, they could use hypergolics and a pressure-fed engine for the final ascent to orbit, like the EPS. In terms of reentry velocity it would of course be more like second-stage reuse.

Which makes me think that ESA should consider using the Adeline concept for a IXV successor, if feasible, otherwise they could end up developing 2 different winged reentry vehicles.

Offline GWH

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #173 on: 06/13/2015 05:31 pm »
Also I'm not sure why they talk about "preserving the upper stage" when they mention the space tug. The upper stage would still be needed I guess unless they intend to fly the core up to a 1k km orbit.
Preserving an upper stage - read: a Vinci engine with some uprated avionics package, a docking mechanism and solar panels.
Due to the lower delta-v requirement in subsequent launches using that tug could possibly mean a switch e.g. from Vinci to a cheaper Aestus II (or similar) for the launcher upper stage as originally planned between 6.1 and 6.2, thus reducing cost.

My initial thought before reading the article was to modify the 2nd stage into a refuelable space tug as described above but do away with the 2nd stage entirely when launching payloads.  To me that makes the most sense for cost reduction through re-usability.  Given that the core is staging at just under 7km/s and a heat shield would be required for re-entry, why not stretch the tanks slightly and take the core to a stable orbit where it could dock the payload with a tug and refuel the tug?

This would be an additional dV requirement of 1km/s? Assuming an Ariane 5 substituted the entire 2nd stage mass with additional propellant it looks like it could have a dV of 1.2km/s with a 7000kg payload? 

PS You need to sign up to AVweek to read there articles but it is a free registration.

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #174 on: 06/13/2015 06:18 pm »
Given that the core is staging at just under 7km/s and a heat shield would be required for re-entry, why not stretch the tanks slightly and take the core to a stable orbit where it could dock the payload with a tug and refuel the tug?

Because a small hypergolic stage is cheap and gives you a lot more performance. I put the A62 specs into Schilling's calculator (with the assumption of 20t dry mass for core + Adeline) and get a payload of 1159kg to a circular 1000km orbit. Adding an EPS gives 8599kg to the same orbit.

With 4 boosters and no EPS its 7622kg, plus in-flight start of Vulcain 2 gives 9113kg.

You can ignore the absolute values, it's just the rough magnitude of the relative differences that is interesting.

That said, if you reenter from orbit there's no need to fly back...on the other hand the reentry conditions might be more demanding.

« Last Edit: 06/13/2015 07:04 pm by Oli »

Offline Coastal Ron

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #175 on: 06/13/2015 06:45 pm »
First off that's partial reusability you're talking about. I think we differ on wheather the possible reduction in price is significant enough  to grow the market.

Yep, we'll have to see.  And that goes for Arianespace too, since the Airbus proposal has to be an ultimate cost savings.

Quote
History suggests it gets eaten away by launch cost inflation.

There is no relevant history for what SpaceX is doing, or for what Airbus has proposed.  No one has ever done reusable or semi-reusable VTVL in a commercial situation.

Quote
You might like to look how F9 prices have changed over the years from first announcement to 1st launch and then till today, versus say general US inflation.

I do track them, and except for the occasional "introductory pricing" periods, their prices have remained remarkable steady - 7 years ago you would have paid $57.75M to put your payload in GTO, and today it's $61.2M.  That increase is below the rate of inflation.

Quote
Again the question is wheather the whole process is economical The classic example being the Shuttle SRB's costing as much to refurb as to make, so why not just keep the production line open and the people employed?

The Shuttle is NOT a comparable reference for commercial operations.  Please stop using it.

Quote
OK let's look at what the market might see.
1)70% of the payload for 70% of the cost F9
2)70% of the payload for <70%  of the cost of an F9
3)70% of the payload for 100% of the cost of an F9
4)70% of the payload for 10% of the cost of an F9.

I don't understand why you are using 70% capacity.  The capacity listed on the SpaceX website along with the $61.2M price doesn't get degraded just because a 1st stage has flown once.  SpaceX has stated that their capacities already take into account reusability, so what you see is what you get.

What may be confusing is that so far they have had to make a trade-off for reusability testing, but that is because they haven't upgraded to the latest configuration, which will boost capacity by 30%.

Now do you see why the market will respond?  Same capacity for what could be something like $20M less or more?  And since SpaceX won't be offering such a service until they have done their validation testing, customers will have pretty good confidence that they'll be able to bank a huge savings as soon as their payload becomes operational.

Each step down in price that SpaceX is able to sustain creates a new pricing challenge, and Arianespace had better take their time to choose a solution that can continue to reduce costs too over time, otherwise their new system could be extremely uncompetitive before it's even operational.

And though Arianespace can count on a certain level of guaranteed business, those that provide that business are not immune to downward pricing pressures.  How do they compete with competitors that use SpaceX?

Now is not the time to offer timid solutions...
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 GWH

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #176 on: 06/13/2015 06:48 pm »

Because a small hypergolic stage is cheap and gives you a lot more performance. I put the A62 specs into Schilling's calculator (with the assumption of 20t dry mass for core + Adeline) and get a payload of 1159kg to a circular 1000km orbit. Adding an EPS gives 8599kg to the same orbit.

With 4 boosters and no EPS its 7622kg, plus in-flight start of Vulcain 2 gives 9113kg.

You can ignore the absolute values, it's just the rough magnitude of the relative differences that are interesting.

That said, if you reenter from orbit there's no need to fly back...on the other the reentry conditions might be more demanding.

Any idea on the magnitude of cost difference?
I was thinking more that the tug would park at a 285 km orbit. What payload would you get then? Is that calculator you used a free online tool?
FYI I used a dry mass on the A5 of 14.7t and a basic dV calc.
« Last Edit: 06/13/2015 06:52 pm by GWH »

Offline Oli

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #177 on: 06/13/2015 06:55 pm »

Because a small hypergolic stage is cheap and gives you a lot more performance. I put the A62 specs into Schilling's calculator (with the assumption of 20t dry mass for core + Adeline) and get a payload of 1159kg to a circular 1000km orbit. Adding an EPS gives 8599kg to the same orbit.

With 4 boosters and no EPS its 7622kg, plus in-flight start of Vulcain 2 gives 9113kg.

You can ignore the absolute values, it's just the rough magnitude of the relative differences that are interesting.

That said, if you reenter from orbit there's no need to fly back...on the other the reentry conditions might be more demanding.

Any idea on the magnitude of cost difference?
I was thinking more that the tug would park at a 285 km orbit. What payload would you get then? Is that calculator you used a free online tool?

Well I'm pretty sure an EPS is less expensive than 2 additional P120s, but otherwise I don't know.

They say a 1000km orbit, not 100% sure why.

This calculator: http://www.silverbirdastronautics.com/LVperform.html
In my experience the estimated payload is usually too big, there's a confidence interval though.

Offline kato

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #178 on: 06/13/2015 07:25 pm »
The 1000 km might be just a boilerplate figure for keeping the tug out of atmospheric drag (and primary space debris fields) and above the orbits of most polar orbit satellites.

Offline MikeAtkinson

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Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #179 on: 06/13/2015 09:44 pm »
OK let's look at what the market might see.
1)70% of the payload for 70% of the cost F9
2)70% of the payload for <70%  of the cost of an F9
3)70% of the payload for 100% of the cost of an F9
4)70% of the payload for 10% of the cost of an F9.

Actually it will be:

1) 100% of the payload for 70% of the cost F9 (F9R)
2) 130% of the payload for 100% of the cost F9 (full thrust single stick as an ELV)
3) ~250% of the payload for 80-90% of the cost F9 (FHR)
4) 500% of the payload for 200% of the cost F9 (FH as an ELV)

A bit more speculatively (a few years out):

5) 100% of the payload for 60% of the cost F9 (F9R at Texas launch site + economies of scale)
6) 65% of the payload for 40-50% of the cost F9 (F9R with reusable second stage)
7) 150% of the payload for 50-60% of the cost F9 (FHR with reusable second stage)

For a low cost of selling (fuel, constellations and SpaceX internal launches), simplified launch ops, high flight rate and a low SpaceX profit margin, in about 10 years time we could be looking at:

8) 65% of the payload for 10% of the cost F9 (F9R with reusable second stage)
9) 150% of the payload for 15% of the cost F9 (FHR with reusable second stage)

Cases 1) .. 4) look almost certain to happen in the next year or two.

Case 5) looks quite reasonable for about 2019.

Cases 6) and 7) only (!) need a reusable second stage and would allow SpaceX to increase its profit margin for each launch while at the same time increasing the number of launches.

Obviously a lot would have to go right for SpaceX for 8) and 9) to come about.

EDIT: part of my post went missing...

The relevance for a system like Adeline is that any competitor for SpaceX really has to be able to price a launch under $40M and have a credible path to under $20M
« Last Edit: 06/13/2015 09:54 pm by MikeAtkinson »

Offline Chris Bergin

Re: Airbus planning Reusable Stage.
« Reply #180 on: 06/24/2015 05:01 pm »
Feature article by Chris Gebhardt - mainly covering SpaceX, but also the competition of ULA and Airbus.
 http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2015/06/world-launch-markets-rocket-reusability/
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