What's Happening at Bigelow?

[Cherokee43v6]

http://www.8newsnow.com/story/14916667/i-team

Quite interesting..

Indeed!

"More memorable than a business card".  Does anyone know if Mr. Big has a store in Las Vegas where you can buy these models?  Or a knock-off facsimile?

http://www.bigelowaerospace.com/careers-description.php?id=82

Better yet... might he partner with Revell and sell kits for US to build!

[manboy]

Since Bigelow has no plans to provide artificial gravity anytime soon, can we take this discussion over to the Advanced Concept section, and get back to What is Happening at Bigelow?

People here are impatient to learn when there will be ponies.

Agreed. I wonder is Space Station Alpha and Beta are still in the works or if they've downscaled to a single module station?

[manboy]

http://www.8newsnow.com/story/14916667/i-team

Quite interesting..

Very cool. But why do news outlets always was show old outdated CG renderings of ISS?

[tigerade]

Agreed. I wonder is Space Station Alpha and Beta are still in the works or if they've downscaled to a single module station?

I bet it would depend on how many customers they get.

I'm really curious how many potential customers Mr. Big might have.

[ChefPat]

Agreed. I wonder is Space Station Alpha and Beta are still in the works or if they've downscaled to a single module station?

I bet it would depend on how many customers they get.

I'm really curious how many potential customers Mr. Big might have.

I've been wondering the same thing recently.
At ISDC in May he pretty much committed to two BA-330's.
Would those be better used together in LEO? Or separate in LEO? Or 1 in LEO & 1 at EML-1?

[Danderman]

I bet it would depend on how many customers they get.

I'm really curious how many potential customers Mr. Big might have.

Everything depends on how many customers Bigelow gets. So far, there are zero customers, so nothing is being launched. When you hear about hard contracts with aerospace terms being signed, then that's your signal that Bigelow is going to fly a full scale system.

[oldAtlas_Eguy]

http://www.bigelowaerospace.com/
Expediting BA 330 Development
Due to customer demand and progress in commercial crew transportation, Bigelow Aerospace has moved directly to BA 330 development. As the name indicates, the BA 330 will provide roughly 330 cubic meters of usable volume and can support a crew of up to six. The BA 330 can function as an independent space station, or several BA 330s can be combined to support an even larger orbital complex.
 

This little statement from Bigelow, Inc seems to indicate that marketing has realized that a half sized BA330 or Sundancer Module is too small to fulfill the market need and to skip it to proceed directly to BA330.

But it could also just be that by skipping Sundancer Bigelow is doing this to save money by lowering their expenditures in only developing one model right now.

[Danderman]

http://www.bigelowaerospace.com/
Expediting BA 330 Development
Due to customer demand and progress in commercial crew transportation, Bigelow Aerospace has moved directly to BA 330 development. As the name indicates, the BA 330 will provide roughly 330 cubic meters of usable volume and can support a crew of up to six. The BA 330 can function as an independent space station, or several BA 330s can be combined to support an even larger orbital complex.
 

This little statement from Bigelow, Inc seems to indicate that marketing has realized that a half sized BA330 or Sundancer Module is too small to fulfill the market need and to skip it to proceed directly to BA330.

But it could also just be that by skipping Sundancer Bigelow is doing this to save money by lowering their expenditures in only developing one model right now.

Or kicking the expenditure of real money farther down the road.  So, the first to test the life support equipment in space will be the inhabitants of the first commercial space platform, with the cancellation of the testbed.

[oldAtlas_Eguy]

So, the first to test the life support equipment in space will be the inhabitants of the first commercial space platform, with the cancellation of the testbed.

Sundancer was just a smaller module that just happened to be scheduled to be the first to be occupied. Sundancer would have lowered the risks for BA330 but would not eliminate the need to test BA330’s life support system during the first occupation just like the testing for Sundancer would have been.

All space vehicles to get its full life support system testing must at one point have someone test it on orbit for the first time. Testing on BA330 will be no different than what has occurred for all of the ISS modules, Shuttle, and other HSF vehicles flown to date. There is only so-much that can be tested on the ground, and Bigelow is already doing those tests including testing with humans. Eventually long duration testing on the ground of the life support components would be performed before launching the BA330 into orbit.

[Patchouli]

Dragon's ECLSS was ground tested before the first F9 ever flew.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11699810/

[ChefPat]

I sure would like to have been a fly on the wall in Mr. B's office when the Boeing/Atlas V announcement was made.

[docmordrid]

Wonder what he thinks about the choice of a 412 with that SRB?

[grr]

Wonder what he thinks about the choice of a 412 with that SRB?

He is a businessman.
He has said all along that he NEEDS multiple systems to keep costs down and reliability high to fly his stations.
He will keep his promise to Boeing, which likely said that he will give Boeing 1-2 launches for 2-4 years (that was a total SWAG).  Boeing then has to compete against the likes of Dreamchaser on an atlas 402, new shepard originally on an atlas (), and of course,  dragon/F9. Considering that 3 of these use atlas as their lauchers, it pretty much guarentees that dragon/F9 will have some missions. Afterall Bigelow will not want to depend on exactly one launcher (reliability).
Unless Boeing is making zero profits on their CST-100 bigelow launches, I suspect that Boeing will have exactly the minimum promised with Bigelow and no more. He simply will not need them. He will have dream chaser and new Shepard.

[baldusi]

The 412 is about 10M more than the 402. But CST-100 is also further along in development than DC and NS, so we still don't know if either won't need more a solid or two. And may be, Boeing is testing with 412 for an extreme case, but they could launch on a 402. There's still a lot of ground to cover yet.

[ChefPat]

Wonder what he thinks about the choice of a 412 with that SRB?

I'll bet he had some influence on the choice.
Can this Atlas V configuration get a CST-100 to EML-1?

[Jason1701]

Wonder what he thinks about the choice of a 412 with that SRB?

I'll bet he had some influence on the choice.
Can this Atlas V configuration get a CST-100 to EML-1?

No, it can only get it to LEO.

Edit: 551 posts, good for today.

[ChefPat]

Wonder what he thinks about the choice of a 412 with that SRB?

I'll bet he had some influence on the choice.
Can this Atlas V configuration get a CST-100 to EML-1?

No, it can only get it to LEO.

Can a Centaur be refueled in LEO & then continue on to EML-1?

[Jason1701]

Wonder what he thinks about the choice of a 412 with that SRB?

I'll bet he had some influence on the choice.
Can this Atlas V configuration get a CST-100 to EML-1?

No, it can only get it to LEO.

Can a Centaur be refueled in LEO & then continue on to EML-1?

Centaur is not designed for on-orbit refueling. A hydrolox upper stage with that capability would represent a significant development effort.

[jongoff]

Wonder what he thinks about the choice of a 412 with that SRB?

I'll bet he had some influence on the choice.
Can this Atlas V configuration get a CST-100 to EML-1?

No, it can only get it to LEO.

Can a Centaur be refueled in LEO & then continue on to EML-1?

Centaur is not designed for on-orbit refueling. A hydrolox upper stage with that capability would represent a significant development effort.

Not as much as you would think.  It isn't there yet, but they've already started work on most of the pieces you would need.  The Integrated Vehicle Fluids work they're doing right now would take them from four fluids on the rocket (LOX, LH2, Hydrazine, and Helium) down to just LOX and LH2.  The Centaur hardware is actually good enough for rendezvous.  Combine it with a depot-based scaled-up version of the "Direct to Station" delivery concept Altius is working on, and you've got capture/docking.  At that point you only have prop transfer standing in the way, and that's something that they already know ways they're pretty sure would work, just haven't been tested yet (and they're not big technical challenges--just need to be flight tested to make sure there aren't any subtle challenges that still need to be addressed).  Sorry it's a bit off-topic for this thread, but I think that once IVF development is finished (and it's an actively funded priority last I heard), most of the rest of the upgrades are pretty straightforward.

Now admittedly, if you want long storage times, that requires more work (which has been started), but if you're just using it say for a TLI burn shortly after prop transfer, the Centaur wouldn't be the pacing item in a Centaur/depot system, the depot would be.

~Jon

[8900]

http://www.bigelowaerospace.com/

Sundancer is now missing on the Bigelow website, statement released indicates that Sundancer has been cancelled