CCDev to CCiCAP to CCtCAP Discussion Thread

[Jim]

You're really taking your curmudgeonly persona to new extremes.

It isn't curmudgeonly, I just don't care for the thinking that anything that is not Spacex must be bad. 

[Brovane]

Let's remember that SpaceX and Boeing are both good companies.  I think it is great that SpaceX has come so far in so short of time that they are getting contracts on equal footing with Boeing.  It was only 10-years ago that people thought that SpaceX was some type of Musk fantasy.  I say congrats to both companies and I fully expect that SpaceX will be getting there Capsule to ISS before Boeing's capsule and the US flag to be brought back down to Earth from the ISS will be coming back down in a SpaceX Dragon Capsule. 

[SirThoreth]

Bigelow is developing CST 100 alongside Boeing. If that's not a vested interest I don't know what is.

Do you have a source? That's the first I've heard of that. I've been out of the loop lately so I likely have obviously missed it.

I've heard quite a bit about it, but here's a sample from a quick search:

http://www.commercialspaceflight.org/2010/06/bigelow-aerospace-joins-the-commercial-spaceflight-federation/

“Moreover,” Bigelow added, “we’re extremely pleased to be part of the Boeing team constructing the CST-100 capsule under the auspices of NASA’s own Commercial Crew Development program.  Boeing’s unparalleled heritage and experience, combined with Bigelow Aerospace’s entrepreneurial spirit and desire to keep costs low, represents the best of both established and new space companies.  The product of this relationship, the CST-100 capsule, will represent the safest, most reliable, and most cost-effective spacecraft ever to fly.

[QuantumG]

Bigelow was a Boeing subcontractor 4 years ago, what of it?

[mspacek]

Watching armchair experts blather and whine is really tiresome to people who understand aerospace development and government contracting.

Please do enlighten those of us in our armchairs... that's what a forum like this is well-suited for.

[Jim]

Watching armchair experts blather and whine is really tiresome to people who understand aerospace development and government contracting.

Please do enlighten those of us in our armchairs... that's what a forum like this is well-suited for.

First, don't make statements bashing one contractor just because your anointed one didn't get selected.

[punder]

I said "It is pretty amazing that aerospace giants Boeing and Lockheed, in the form of ULA, will contract a startup with no orbital spaceflight experience to build a new engine for national-asset Atlas V.  Am I reading that correctly?"

Thinking a little more clearly, BO obviously will be a seriously junior partner in any collaboration with ULA--more like the relationship of Bigelow to Boeing wrt CST-100.  BO probably has some ideas, patented tech, or personnel that ULA likes, or perhaps they like the added political clout of Bezos himself.

[butters]

I said "It is pretty amazing that aerospace giants Boeing and Lockheed, in the form of ULA, will contract a startup with no orbital spaceflight experience to build a new engine for national-asset Atlas V.  Am I reading that correctly?"

Thinking a little more clearly, BO obviously will be a seriously junior partner in any collaboration with ULA--more like the relationship of Bigelow to Boeing wrt CST-100.  BO probably has some ideas, patented tech, or personnel that ULA likes, or perhaps they like the added political clout of Bezos himself.

ULA also worked with XCOR on an "RL-10 replacement". No guarantees that any of this stuff ever flies.

[CapitalistOppressor]

So if both companies said they can satisfy the requirements, but SpaceX said they can do at a far cheaper cost, why didn't they win the whole award ?.

They both won the whole award. This isn't a prize for coming in first, it is a contract to deliver a whole bunch of specific things. SpaceX may even make more margin on their $2.6B than Boeing with their $4.2B. 

However I am interested in the extra studies funding, and now what Boeing and SpaceX reveal about the details of what they have bid to do. Which, while they both are offering to meet the same NASA requirements they are committing to other things that have to do with what their proposals differ on in terms of precursor developments and milestones.

This actually seems quite likely to me.  Boeing just has a lot more that it has to do in order to put people into space, while SpaceX seems to be much closer to the finish line.  SpaceX really did get a headstart thanks to their commercial cargo effort.

That, plus the fact that their cost structure appears somewhat lower makes me think that their margins on this contract could be quite large.  Moreso when you consider the possibility of F9R 1st stage being re-used.

In contrast, I would speculate that Boeing is keeping their margins on the development program as low as possible so they can remain at least semi-competitive for the follow on crew contract.

[Karlman]

So this means SpaceX is funded to develop from 3 to 7 Dragon v2 crew modules? (Test flight, plus 2 to 6 ISS flights).

That should be a nice stockpile slightly used Dragons that can be used for other manned launches, assuming SpaceX can get even 2 or 3 flights out of each one, let alone if they meet the 10x re-use goal on some (probably too optimistic for the first batch of crewed dragon).

If nothing else, they should have all the hardware they need to test and eventually prove-out re-usability of the Dragon v2!

[brokndodge]

Thinking a little more clearly, BO obviously will be a seriously junior partner in any collaboration with ULA--more like the relationship of Bigelow to Boeing wrt CST-100.  BO probably has some ideas, patented tech, or personnel that ULA likes, or perhaps they like the added political clout of Bezos himself.

Bezos also owns The Washington Post.  Possibly some back scratching for a favorable light in the news media?

[AJW]

Congratulations to both Boeing and SpaceX on their winning bids, and my condolences to Sierra Nevada.  I wish that there were enough funds for all three competitors.

It really looks like we are entering an era where new competition is accelerating development.  The news that Ariane may move more quickly towards '6' is an indicator of this along with tomorrow's expected announcement from BO.  I just wish this could have started about 30 years earlier.

Looking forward to the next decade or two of bickering and name calling.  Just don't forget that funding could still be our common enemy.

[Chris Bergin]

Firstly, stupid posts should not be made. Stupid posts should be reported. People should not then quote stupid posts and say "that's a stupid post". That's twice the amount of work to repair the thread.

Come on people, this is a space flight site, not a One Direction forum.

[DaveH62]

Why aren't we excited. The meme is very negative, but the reality is we have a new space race. A space race for the first time in almost 50 years. It should not be about who got more money, but who is going to build a better ship, who is going to be first, who is going to build a sustainable, more than LEO, more than NASA passenger business model.

Sure SNC would have been great, but this is the safe technical and political path and we have two American competitors that could be fighting for contracts for the next 20 years. With 20 years of competition we have an opportunity to advance our space capabilities more than the last 45.

[spacetraveler]

Why aren't we excited. The meme is very negative, but the reality is we have a new space race. A space race for the first time in almost 50 years. It should not be about who got more money, but who is going to build a better ship, who is going to be first, who is going to build a sustainable, more than LEO, more than NASA passenger business model.

Sure SNC would have been great, but this is the safe technical and political path and we have two American competitors that could be fighting for contracts for the next 20 years. With 20 years of competition we have an opportunity to advance our space capabilities more than the last 45.

Not exactly. First of all I don't think Boeing is interested in building a "more than LEO" passenger business model. They made it pretty clear that they were only interested in developing their capsule for the NASA station crew use case. Second, it's not really even a "race" to LEO since both companies are funded and will get a chance to obtain their launches, irrespective of the development path of the other.

[wes_wilson]

Why aren't we excited. The meme is very negative, but the reality is we have a new space race. A space race for the first time in almost 50 years.

I couldn't agree more!  I'm thrilled that we are going to have not one but three different crewed space vehicles flying atop three different rockets.  No more single point of failure grounding the entire program for years at a time every time there's an accident.  It feels like we're actually intending to become a true spacefaring nation again.

[punder]

Thinking a little more clearly, BO obviously will be a seriously junior partner in any collaboration with ULA--more like the relationship of Bigelow to Boeing wrt CST-100.  BO probably has some ideas, patented tech, or personnel that ULA likes, or perhaps they like the added political clout of Bezos himself.

Bezos also owns The Washington Post.  Possibly some back scratching for a favorable light in the news media?

All I'm saying is, every space company wants its own in-house ESVB (Eccentric Silicon Valley Billionaire)! 

"Mr. President, we must not allow... an ESVB gap!"  (from Dr. Strangelove, for those who are not classic-movie nuts)

[erioladastra]

Two little birds told me you have first hand ISS program knowledge, which is nice to know.  So you are saying that it's not a Commercial Crew provider issue, but an ISS scheduling issue that is outside of the control of the transportation providers?

Yes, ISS, and for that matter CCP.  Plus these schedules also appear to assume funding at the presidential request.

I'm not sure why it would matter to SpaceX if there is a second winner, unless you're assuming a split in the money will affect the schedule.  Could happen.  We'll know better once the award(s) are made and the schedules unveiled.

Because if you need NASA to review your products and NASA is too busy to review your products because they are also reviewing another companies products, you don't get there on the same schedule.  Note that this is not a case of a private company doing it on their own with NASA spot checking.  This will be NASA OVERSIGHT, for better or for worse.  SpaceX has not even begun to see how things are going to change.

[CapitalistOppressor]

Lot of snippiness in this thread.  I really don't get the anti-Boeing sentiment (or the pro SNC sentiment for that matter).

This decision by NASA seems entirely logical.  They have a very firm requirement to get crew back into space on American launchers by 2017.  Going with a dual track effort provides a very high degree of assurance that they'll succeed in meeting the requirement. 

The amount they will pay for that mission assurance is doubtless going to be much less than the ~$6.8b award they announced, since that figure assumes a maximum award of 12 flights split between both contractors.  So assuming that the appropriations come through, this dual track structure is likely to be quite affordable (under $5b spent to get both into space?  The incremental cost per launch will be an interesting detail).

Going with Boeing makes a lot of sense because of their history.  There is a very high likelihood that they succeed, and given where they are in the development process, and the work they have to do (manrating Atlas V for instance) their $4.2b bid seems quite fair.

Going with SpaceX makes a lot of sense because of where they are, and what they are doing.  Many here in the forum probably think there is much more potential upside to the side projects that SpaceX seems to have going (me included), but they are clearly a riskier option than Boeing.  They seem to be much farther ahead, but there are many things that could trip them up (a failed abort test discovering a design flaw for instance).  If your only criteria is economics, then they are probably the clear winner, based on their low bid, and relatively high chance of success.  But "relatively high chance" is a pretty far cry from "mission assurance" at a time when relations with the Russians are shaky.

Going with SNC just seems like risk piled upon risk to me if my goal is to assure access to space for American crews.  This was a downselect waiting to happen considering the history of this program.  Why throw a long bomb if your only payback is cross range capability?  That's just my opinion obviously, but I just don't get it.

[QuantumG]

Going with Boeing makes a lot of sense because of their history.  There is a very high likelihood that they succeed

Or get the project cancelled, walking away with the money and not having to produce anything.. as they've done countless times before.