Are they required to cease to exist?But I'm more interested in whether those restrictions could be relaxed if they were no longer seen as a monopoly.
Quote from: QuantumG on 03/09/2014 10:02 pmAre they required to cease to exist?But I'm more interested in whether those restrictions could be relaxed if they were no longer seen as a monopoly.It isn't up to the US gov't, it is up to Boeing and LM. They are the ones that aren't going to allow ULA to compete outside of the EELV family. Boeing and LM want to compete outside of ULA so they don't have split the money. The shuttle processing part of USA was told that it was not to look for more work and it was not to bid on the KSC Test and Operations Support Contract (TOSC) which replaced the Boeing CAPPS and USA SFOC contracts. Boeing and LM bid individually for the TOSC. ULA isn't Boeing or LM at the worker level but "Board of Directors" are all executives from Boeing and LM.
Quote from: Jim on 03/09/2014 11:36 pmQuote from: QuantumG on 03/09/2014 10:02 pmAre they required to cease to exist?But I'm more interested in whether those restrictions could be relaxed if they were no longer seen as a monopoly.It isn't up to the US gov't, it is up to Boeing and LM. They are the ones that aren't going to allow ULA to compete outside of the EELV family. Boeing and LM want to compete outside of ULA so they don't have split the money. The shuttle processing part of USA was told that it was not to look for more work and it was not to bid on the KSC Test and Operations Support Contract (TOSC) which replaced the Boeing CAPPS and USA SFOC contracts. Boeing and LM bid individually for the TOSC. ULA isn't Boeing or LM at the worker level but "Board of Directors" are all executives from Boeing and LM.Then SpaceX has already won, long-term.
Quote from: Blackstar on 03/08/2014 05:01 pmQuote from: clongton on 03/08/2014 01:58 pmWhether he likes it or not, ULA will now have to *earn* its launch contracts, and it will never again get them all. He's just going to have to suck it up, sharpen his pencils and do his job - or get replaced. I'm not terribly interested in jumping into the perennial ULA/SpaceX fight, but I'd just note two things:1-I'm sure that he thinks that they have been earning their launch contracts by producing highly reliable rockets that launch on time. The fact that nobody has competed with them is probably besides the point to them.I think it's reasonable to point out cost vs value. IE that DOD expects to get more value from these payloads than the price they pay.In critical situations (I'd think the current crisis in Ukraine is a good example), I can imagine DOD relying heavily on the payloads they launch. When F9 V1.1 has only launched three times so far (eight if you include v1.0), it's easy to understand them being risk-averse. Allowing SpaceX to compete for the payloads outside the bulk buy seems a reasonable way for them to on-ramp.Will be interesting to see how things change *if* SpaceX manages to fulfil all the launches they currently manifest for 2014 before the end of 2014, and all the launches they currently manifest for 2015 before the end of 2015. (I'll give them a pass on FH into 2015.)cheers, Martin
Quote from: clongton on 03/08/2014 01:58 pmWhether he likes it or not, ULA will now have to *earn* its launch contracts, and it will never again get them all. He's just going to have to suck it up, sharpen his pencils and do his job - or get replaced. I'm not terribly interested in jumping into the perennial ULA/SpaceX fight, but I'd just note two things:1-I'm sure that he thinks that they have been earning their launch contracts by producing highly reliable rockets that launch on time. The fact that nobody has competed with them is probably besides the point to them.
Whether he likes it or not, ULA will now have to *earn* its launch contracts, and it will never again get them all. He's just going to have to suck it up, sharpen his pencils and do his job - or get replaced.
Er part of the qualifying criteria are 3 successful consecutive launches. Note that's 3 not 6 or 4 or 12 or 56 but 3 and only 3. Why does some people think that this is insufficient? If it was seen as insufficent, then I imagine that it would have been higher but well geez, it ain't.Sorry but I get sick of some people continuing on about lots of launches to prove reliability. And they may be right but not in this context.Anyway, by the time they get to fly one of these contested payloads, they will no doubt have more than 3 under their belt.
Note that's 3 not 6 or 4...
Quote from: beancounter on 03/10/2014 06:57 amEr part of the qualifying criteria are 3 successful consecutive launches. Note that's 3 not 6 or 4 or 12 or 56 but 3 and only 3. Why does some people think that this is insufficient? ...Just to be clear, are you sure these three flights (plus additional insight) get them certified as a Category 3 launch vehicle ...
Er part of the qualifying criteria are 3 successful consecutive launches. Note that's 3 not 6 or 4 or 12 or 56 but 3 and only 3. Why does some people think that this is insufficient? ...
No, BeanCounter just said that three flights are necessary, as "part" of the "qualifying criteria". He didn't get into all them thar categories.Gass and company have a great track record, which is obviously why he toots that horn with every bit of lungpower he has.
People think around here that three launches is insignificant, but they hold that thought because they have a favorite LV, which has launched more than three times. In the case of SLS, those proponents hold that zero launches is already a sufficient track record. How weird is that?
Quote from: MP99 on 03/10/2014 09:37 amQuote from: beancounter on 03/10/2014 06:57 amEr part of the qualifying criteria are 3 successful consecutive launches. Note that's 3 not 6 or 4 or 12 or 56 but 3 and only 3. Why does some people think that this is insufficient? ...Just to be clear, are you sure these three flights (plus additional insight) get them certified as a Category 3 launch vehicle ...No, BeanCounter just said that three flights are necessary, as "part" of the "qualifying criteria". He didn't get into all them thar categories.Gass and company have a great track record, which is obviously why he toots that horn with every bit of lungpower he has.People think around here that three launches is insignificant, but they hold that thought because they have a favorite LV, which has launched more than three times. In the case of SLS, those proponents hold that zero launches is already a sufficient track record. How weird is that?Watch somebody now post about "legacy" launch systems, as if to prove something about SLS.
Quote from: JohnFornaro on 03/10/2014 05:42 pmNo, BeanCounter just said that three flights are necessary, as "part" of the "qualifying criteria". He didn't get into all them thar categories.Gass and company have a great track record, which is obviously why he toots that horn with every bit of lungpower he has.True.QuotePeople think around here that three launches is insignificant, but they hold that thought because they have a favorite LV, which has launched more than three times. In the case of SLS, those proponents hold that zero launches is already a sufficient track record. How weird is that?Good point.There is an issue with the small number of launches that the confidence of the next one being OK is limited. I think Robotbeat pointed out you need something like 53-54 launches to have 95% confidence the next launch is going to be OK. However every successful launch improves that likelyhood. The question of course is how many Spacex launches will take place this year.
That's odd. You should be able to sample the coating and run it through mass spectrum analyzer to figure out what it is. Then its a process of applying some chemical engineering to it to reverse engineer it. U.S. chemical engineering is rather good.
That confidence is with the pessimistic assumption (but perhaps warranted! given how easy it is to tilt the rest of the analysis) that you can only gain insight into the likelihood of a launch failure by the past history. There are processes and technologies that can be employed to improve the odds and give better confidence than you would get just by looking at historically similar launch vehicles.Also, you can examine near-misses to examine how likely a failure will be, however you need to take into account robustness of the launch vehicle... for instance, a "brittle" architecture will have far fewer "near misses" for the same actual launch failure rate as a more resilient architecture (like engine-out capability or larger delta-v margins), so by looking at near-misses alone, you might exaggerate the reliability of brittle architectures.But in general, if push comes to shove, I would put more weight on flight history than "process" or design features (like engine-out capability) when deciding on which vehicle is the most reliable. But as you get past 10 or 20 launches, you're essentially pretty close to 30 or 40 launches (understood logarithmically), and so things like process, near-misses, vehicle complexity, and engine-out capability would become more important (assuming that both systems have a nearly perfect launch history). Thus ULA is definitely ahead at this point (and has very good "process"), though I could certainly see SpaceX becoming essentially even with them in the next 3 or 4 years. And poor SLS will always suffer from a low launch history, having to rely entirely on process (without any advantage in complexity), thus likely to keep costs high (especially while launching crew) while definitely having inferior reliability confidence. Well, that's my take.
Yes that's my thinking. For the time being until FH is certified for DOD payloads there will be payloads that Spacex simply cannot launch and will not be able to for (I'd guess) 2-3 years.
It takes longer than 3-6 years to build vertical integration capability?
Also, do ALL DoD payloads need vertical integration? Considering many payloads (like defense comm sats) share platforms with commercial satellites, surely there must be some that can use horizontal integration, right?