Armadillo Aerospace Update Thread

[Danderman]

Not knocking AA, i've been a fan of theirs since they started.
Its just an observation that they aways seem to be around a year or a bit more away from actual suborbital flights. If you remember, they were planning to win the original X-Prize ..

I agree that AA is always 12 months from suborbital flight in space, but their development effort nonetheless is fantastic.

What I don't know is how their lander is going to fare at transonic speeds, and during atmospheric re-entry.

[corrodedNut]

Flight today?

http://twitpic.com/20an6z

Yes?

http://twitpic.com/20asq4

Well, now that I've done the math, I think this must have happened yesterday Sat 26.

[mmeijeri]

Would it be fair to say some of the New Space companies have now matched or even surpassed the capabilities of DC-X, and on a much smaller budget? Also a little under twenty years later of course and with much lower performing engines.

[Jim]

Would it be fair to say some of the New Space companies have now matched or even surpassed the capabilities of DC-X, and on a much smaller budget? Also a little under twenty years later of course and with much lower performing engines.

no, it was a much larger vehicle

[NotGncDude]

Would it be fair to say some of the New Space companies have now matched or even surpassed the capabilities of DC-X, and on a much smaller budget? Also a little under twenty years later of course and with much lower performing engines.

no, it was a much larger vehicle

So? In terms of flight time and ability to do in-air restart they have.

[corrodedNut]

Don't forget the much more fancy landing gear.

[Garrett]

Would it be fair to say some of the New Space companies have now matched or even surpassed the capabilities of DC-X, and on a much smaller budget? Also a little under twenty years later of course and with much lower performing engines.

no, it was a much larger vehicle

And larger is better?
Any chance the DC-X was larger than it needed to be? I'm thinking along the lines of the SF to San Jose CalTrain. A beast of a train that makes it look like the engineers were trying to use as much metal as possible!

[neilh]

Some info on Armadillo's work with Project M:

http://twitter.com/wikkit/status/16957478457
http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local-beat/Up-UP-and-Away-isnt-Far-Away-.html

On Wednesday, the team launched a prototype they've partnered with NASA to test.
"It's to test out some of these capabilities on the ground. To understand how they work. To further improve our capabilities so that we can prepare for an eventual launch to the moon," said Jon Olansen with NASA.
"The reason they partnered with us is we can do things phenomenally quickly," said Milburn. "In three months, we've gotten a vehicle that's test flying that would have probably taken them three years."

[Robotbeat]

Armadillo just did a boosted hop to 2000 ft, not a record breaker (for them or anyone) and they didn't do an airstart or anything, but they did use an aerosurface for roll control instead of using pressurant in cold gas thrusters (the usual method for roll control for them). This will help them conserve pressurant/consumables. They say they may have to move to Oklahoma for higher trips after a few flights.

[corrodedNut]

"This video is of NASA Project M Lander free flight test at Armadillo Aerospace outside of Dallas. The lander launched on June 23rd 2010. This is the prototype of the lander that will launch a version of Robonaut on future exploratory missions"

I guess "M" is for methane.

PS: I guess not, while this is Armadillo's Pixel vehicle re-purposed as a methane test bed, "Project M" is that 1000 day NASA project. I guess "M" is for Moon.

[Lee Jay]

Looked like a lot of cosine losses, didn't it?

[kkattula]

Was that frost on the injector and around the top of the chamber?  Sure looked like it. 

I believe they use fuel film cooling. Seems it's so effective the top of the engine never gets hot enough to melt the frost from the Liquid Methane & LOX.

Edit:  Watching it again, the frost actually develops and grows on the engine while operating.  Cool.

[ugordan]

Looked like a lot of cosine losses, didn't it?

I think that would be qualified as steering losses, not cosine losses.

[NotGncDude]

"This video is of NASA Project M Lander free flight test at Armadillo Aerospace outside of Dallas. The lander launched on June 23rd 2010. This is the prototype of the lander that will launch a version of Robonaut on future exploratory missions"

I guess "M" is for methane.

Whoa. That's quite an oscillation there. I thought they had overcome that.

Now I see why John Carmack dislikes the quad configuration.

[mmeijeri]

I guess "M" is for Moon.

I think it's the Roman numeral M for 1000, this is supposed to be a project that would land something useful on the moon within 1000 days after the start of the project.

[Danderman]

I guess "M" is for Moon.

I think it's the Roman numeral M for 1000, this is supposed to be a project that would land something useful on the moon within 1000 days after the start of the project.

How do they propose to store the LOX en route to the Moon?

[mmeijeri]

How do they propose to store the LOX en route to the Moon?

And the methane too. Cryocoolers maybe? It's only for a couple of days.

[Robotbeat]

Both methane and LOx are "space-storable." Remember, hypergolic fuels have to be heated so they don't freeze in space.

[mmeijeri]

I'm not sure LOX/methane are storable in LEO without active cooling, but I have nothing against using cryocoolers and the lander wouldn't spend a lot of time in LEO anyway. And if we were to use noncryogenic propellant I wouldn't be thinking of hypergolics but kerosene/peroxide if Armadillo were doing it. They'd still have to start the engines in microgravity. A positive expulsion device is not the only way to do this, but it is one reasonably simple way.

[hop]

Another neat Project M video with more background, via http://twitter.com/wikkit/statuses/17652968435