XCOR and the Lynx rocket

[Mariusuiram]

New $5M from VC, no cash starvation now.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2015/05/26/chinese-venture-firm-haiyin-capital-is-investing-in-space-company-xcor/

I get the impression its more important than just the cash:

1. Its cash in during delays in producing their product, extending their ramp and allowing more marketing (as mentioned in the article)
2. Its a new investor who is making a very small investment and could step up in a later round. Adding to a base of investors who have knowledge and faith in the company when they try to progress
3. It should help them improve promotion and access in China which is potentially a huge market. It mentions that 10% of pre-sales are Chinese. That figure could definitely keep growing considering the disposable income available to the ultra-rich there.

[meekGee]

New $5M from VC, no cash starvation now.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2015/05/26/chinese-venture-firm-haiyin-capital-is-investing-in-space-company-xcor/

$5 million really isn't very much for a program to build a passenger ship going to space.  I wouldn't say it's enough to say there's no more cash starvation for Lynx.

Yup.

It's payroll for a year.  Not peanuts, but it's a good bit of oxygen.

[manboy]

XCOR Space Expeditions announced that it will raise the price of a flight aboard XCOR Lynx from $100,000 to $150,000 effective January 1st, 2016.

http://www.xcor.com/news/ticket-price-change/

[CameronD]

Forget the rest of new space, XCOR does it all.  Wow!

..without actually doing anything much.

Like the offerings from a couple of other companies - they'll be doing more when they actually fly. 

[savuporo]

http://www.mrt.com/business/development/article_38ce081a-4a00-11e5-8df8-f3d2bdc67589.html

Peck estimated that XCOR is six to nine months away from the Lynx 1’s first flight.

Hey that's a lot shorter than the classic 'two years from flight'. They are getting closer to the first flight by a month in about every six months. Whats that, 3-4 years in real time ?

[Robotbeat]

http://www.mrt.com/business/development/article_38ce081a-4a00-11e5-8df8-f3d2bdc67589.html

Peck estimated that XCOR is six to nine months away from the Lynx 1’s first flight.

Hey that's a lot shorter than the classic 'two years from flight'. They are getting closer to the first flight by a month in about every six months. Whats that, 3-4 years in real time ?

Hey, I'll settle for that, provided it works as well as they say it will!

[Moe Grills]

  Correct me if I am wrong, but I have seen a photo of the Lynx Mark 1 spacecraft assembly NOW fitted with wings recently. If I am correct with this info then we should start a debate on the "safety" of the Lynx Mark 1 as it reaches Mach 1, Max Q at low-altitudes and the dangers of a flat-spin during re-entry.
The Lynx Mark 1 may be as dangerous as? SS2?

[MattMason]

  Correct me if I am wrong, but I have seen a photo of the Lynx Mark 1 spacecraft assembly NOW fitted with wings recently. If I am correct with this info then we should start a debate on the "safety" of the Lynx Mark 1 as it reaches Mach 1, Max Q at low-altitudes and the dangers of a flat-spin during re-entry.
The Lynx Mark 1 may be as dangerous as? SS2?

Spaceship Two's incident wasn't due to the wings but a premature deployment of the wing's feathering system.

A closer analogue would be the X-15 incident where it went into a flat spin with astronaut Mike Adams, eventually leading to his death from other factors.

Wings alone aren't a formula for doom, if tests and simulations are properly conducted.

[Gliderflyer]

  Correct me if I am wrong, but I have seen a photo of the Lynx Mark 1 spacecraft assembly NOW fitted with wings recently.

The wings aren't quite done yet. In a recent talk, Jeff Greason mentioned they would be done around December I think.

[ChrisWilson68]

http://www.mrt.com/business/development/article_38ce081a-4a00-11e5-8df8-f3d2bdc67589.html

Peck estimated that XCOR is six to nine months away from the Lynx 1’s first flight.

Hey that's a lot shorter than the classic 'two years from flight'. They are getting closer to the first flight by a month in about every six months. Whats that, 3-4 years in real time ?

Hey, I'll settle for that, provided it works as well as they say it will!

They've been talking for an awfully long time.  Remember the original X Prize?  Back in 2003 XCOR said they weren't bothering with winning the X Prize because it would distract them from getting to commercial suborbital passenger service quickly.

Then there was the Rocket Racing League where different teams flying XCOR-built rocket planes would be racing against each other and drawing huge crowds and corporate sponsorships.

XCOR seems to be progressing with their ULA partnership for an upperstage engine, which gives them some credibility, but we have to weigh that against a lot of rosy projections on the rocket plane front that haven't materialized.

[jongoff]

http://www.mrt.com/business/development/article_38ce081a-4a00-11e5-8df8-f3d2bdc67589.html

Peck estimated that XCOR is six to nine months away from the Lynx 1’s first flight.

Hey that's a lot shorter than the classic 'two years from flight'. They are getting closer to the first flight by a month in about every six months. Whats that, 3-4 years in real time ?

Hey, I'll settle for that, provided it works as well as they say it will!

They've been talking for an awfully long time.  Remember the original X Prize?  Back in 2003 XCOR said they weren't bothering with winning the X Prize because it would distract them from getting to commercial suborbital passenger service quickly.

Then there was the Rocket Racing League where different teams flying XCOR-built rocket planes would be racing against each other and drawing huge crowds and corporate sponsorships.

XCOR seems to be progressing with their ULA partnership for an upperstage engine, which gives them some credibility, but we have to weigh that against a lot of rosy projections on the rocket plane front that haven't materialized.

Bootstrapping a rocket company without any billionaire backers is definitely an approach that's not for the impatient or the faint of heart! They've only really had enough money to make this happen for 1-2yrs, even though they've been around for 15. They have accomplished a lot in that time, but yeah it can be agonizingly slow when you aren't able to secure enough outside capital to move quickly. They've also made a fair deal of mistakes along the way (like the rest of us). I still think they'll beat everyone but Blue Origin into regular suborbital flight operations.

~Jon

[MattMason]

AmericaSpace has a November 2 article on the construction status with photos.

The photos also show a rather curious homebrewed wind tunnel device constructed from a Ford F-250 pickup.

You can't make this stuff up.

[ChrisWilson68]

It looks like they're making good progress on Lynx.  There's still obviously a long way to go.

I wish them well, but it still rubs me the wrong way that on the one hand XCOR makes a big point of emphasizing how it's taking a long time because they're doing cutting edge research and development and nobody has ever done this before, and on the other hand they're selling tickets and have been selling tickets for years.

They say "The fact is that we are in a process in which you just can’t rush things. For the first time in history we are developing a genuinely instantly reusable launch vehicle and there’s no building instructions, best practices or timeline available for something so ground breaking." and "it’s ready when it’s ready." -- that's fine, except it's XCOR that's been repeatedly making these predictions about when they're going to fly, and selling tickets based on these predictions.

They're just as bad as Virgin Galactic in this way, which is pretty bad.

[zt]

Let's hope they're much better than Virgin Galactic at safety. If I were them, I would release a study of the effect of human factors on the design of their cockpit or something like that.

[Gliderflyer]

The photos also show a rather curious homebrewed wind tunnel device constructed from a Ford F-250 pickup.

You can't make this stuff up.

It is not unheard of to use trucks for wind tunnels. Scaled Composites used a similar creation to test full scale models of the tail for SpaceShipOne. It is talked about 34 minutes into this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wz8wlcUPz90#t=34m

[parabolicarc]

http://www.mrt.com/business/development/article_38ce081a-4a00-11e5-8df8-f3d2bdc67589.html

Peck estimated that XCOR is six to nine months away from the Lynx 1’s first flight.

Hey that's a lot shorter than the classic 'two years from flight'. They are getting closer to the first flight by a month in about every six months. Whats that, 3-4 years in real time ?

Hey, I'll settle for that, provided it works as well as they say it will!

They've been talking for an awfully long time.  Remember the original X Prize?  Back in 2003 XCOR said they weren't bothering with winning the X Prize because it would distract them from getting to commercial suborbital passenger service quickly.

Then there was the Rocket Racing League where different teams flying XCOR-built rocket planes would be racing against each other and drawing huge crowds and corporate sponsorships.

XCOR seems to be progressing with their ULA partnership for an upperstage engine, which gives them some credibility, but we have to weigh that against a lot of rosy projections on the rocket plane front that haven't materialized.

The Rocket Racing League never really developed into anything. That wasn't the fault of XCOR. In fact, XCOR ended up suing RRL over alleged failure to pay for work that they did. it's a shame that didn't work out because it would have given the company a lot of operational experience flying rockets that would have proved useful for the Lynx. And brought in income to fund the space plane program.

[Gliderflyer]

XCOR has a press release on the Lynx flight simulator: http://www.xcor.com/news/xcor-develops-lynx-simulator-in-partnership-with-protobox-llc-and-air-force-research-lab/

[jongoff]

Wow, XCOR just announced that both Jeff Greason and Dan DeLong have left the company "to pursue other interests": http://www.xcor.com/news/founders-stepping-back-marks-new-phase-in-xcor-lynx-development/

I had seen via LinkedIn last week that Dan had left, but I hadn't expected Jeff to leave too (though Jeff will technically retain a board seat).

Not sure how to digest this info. But I do wish XCOR, Jeff, and Dan the best going forward.

~Jon

[Rocket Science]

Wow, XCOR just announced that both Jeff Greason and Dan DeLong have left the company "to pursue other interests": http://www.xcor.com/news/founders-stepping-back-marks-new-phase-in-xcor-lynx-development/

I had seen via LinkedIn last week that Dan had left, but I hadn't expected Jeff to leave too (though Jeff will technically retain a board seat).

Not sure how to digest this info. But I do wish XCOR, Jeff, and Dan the best going forward.

~Jon

I'm still picking my jaw off the floor Jon... Thank you for posting the "puzzling" news....

I'll add my best wishes to them both as well.

Edit to add:

[jongoff]

Apparently Aleta Jackson was also let go. That makes 3 out of the 4 founders. The official story is that they left to pursue other interests, but I wonder if they were forced out. It's possible that in their fundraising they ended up giving up enough board seats that their investors took over...

Jon