Author Topic: Lockheed Martin's "Jupiter" reusable space tug, CRS-2 bid (Read 127273 times)

somepitch · « **Reply #200 on:** 05/13/2015 08:19 pm »

Charles A. Lurio ‏@TheLurioReport 10m10 minutes ago
Rumors from Lockheed: Jupiter/Exoliner eliminated from CRS2 ISS cargo competition as not competitive.

https://twitter.com/TheLurioReport/status/598580761751588865

Danderman · « **Reply #201 on:** 05/14/2015 01:58 pm »

That leaves the two incumbents, plus Boeing and Sierra Nevada on the outside.

baldusi · « **Reply #202 on:** 05/14/2015 02:05 pm »

Quote from: Danderman on 05/14/2015 01:58 pm

That ~~leaves~~ would leave the two incumbents, plus Boeing and Sierra Nevada on the outside.

There, I corrected it for you. It's a rumor. Granted, an expected outcome, but for now, just a rumor.

gongora · « **Reply #203 on:** 05/14/2015 03:01 pm »

Couple tweets from Jeff Foust a few days ago (May 6) kinda hints that LM's Jupiter proposal wouldn't be cheap:

https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/596047671988617216
Josh Hopkins, LM: value of lunar orbit outpost is that we can’t take giant leap of 1000-day Mars mission from Earth orbit. #H2M2015

https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/596048732908552192
Hopkins: develop technologies for this by sneaking it into another budget line: ISS cargo (LM’s Jupiter concept.) #H2M2015

simonbp · « **Reply #204 on:** 05/18/2015 03:24 pm »

I wouldn't say that; SpaceX has pulled similar tricks getting COTS money to pay for the development of a crew capsule, and CRS money to pay for development of a reusable first stage.

LM is publicly talking up the non-ISS uses of Jupiter because that's a selling point, not a disadvantage.

AncientU · « **Reply #205 on:** 05/18/2015 11:10 pm »

Quote from: simonbp on 05/18/2015 03:24 pm

I wouldn't say that; SpaceX has pulled similar tricks getting COTS money to pay for the development of a crew capsule, and CRS money to pay for development of a reusable first stage.

LM is publicly talking up the non-ISS uses of Jupiter because that's a selling point, not a disadvantage.

They had the cheapest price for both. What SpaceX did with its revenue/profits (reinvest them instead of paying dividends or whatever) is not the issue.

jongoff · « **Reply #206 on:** 05/18/2015 11:55 pm »

Quote from: baldusi on 05/14/2015 02:05 pm

Quote from: Danderman on 05/14/2015 01:58 pm
That ~~leaves~~ would leave the two incumbents, plus Boeing and Sierra Nevada on the outside.
There, I corrected it for you. It's a rumor. Granted, an expected outcome, but for now, just a rumor.

And quite frankly, I'm pretty skeptical of the rumor. AIUI, doesn't NASA usually let both winners and losers know at the same time? If they had decided to do a two-step downselect, I would've thought that they would've said that explicitly when they announced they were slipping the announcement to September. Also, one of the rumors talked about LM working with Boeing, but Boeing can't really change its bid after it's been submitted.

Methinks we have a case of someone misinterpreting some data, then the echo chamber going.

~Jon

Danderman · « **Reply #207 on:** 05/21/2015 05:41 pm »

The rumors don't make sense, but the general rule is that all rumors are true.

If this rumor were not true, Lockheed would deny the rumor.

Star One · « **Reply #208 on:** 05/21/2015 07:14 pm »

Quote from: Danderman on 05/21/2015 05:41 pm

The rumors don't make sense, but the general rule is that all rumors are true.

If this rumor were not true, Lockheed would deny the rumor.

Why should they waste their time commenting on such an unsubstantiated rumour.

meekGee · « **Reply #209 on:** 05/21/2015 09:04 pm »

The minute they deny it, they give it much wider visibility. No upside.

jongoff · « **Reply #210 on:** 05/21/2015 10:35 pm »

Quote from: Danderman on 05/21/2015 05:41 pm

The rumors don't make sense, but the general rule is that all rumors are true.

If this rumor were not true, Lockheed would deny the rumor.

Heh. If all rumors were generally true, we'd live in a really interesting world. My experience is that most rumors are at best misunderstandings of 4th hand details that has at best a tenuous connection with reality.

~Jon

Patchouli · « **Reply #211 on:** 05/23/2015 12:55 am »

Quote from: somepitch on 05/13/2015 08:19 pm

Charles A. Lurio ‏@TheLurioReport 10m10 minutes ago
Rumors from Lockheed: Jupiter/Exoliner eliminated from CRS2 ISS cargo competition as not competitive.

https://twitter.com/TheLurioReport/status/598580761751588865

A bit of a shame as it was a great concept and was very flexible.

Quote from: Danderman on 05/14/2015 01:58 pm

That leaves the two incumbents, plus Boeing and Sierra Nevada on the outside.

If one of the outside contractors wins hopefully it'll be SNC who wins as then we'll get a space plane with near ATV cargo capacity.
I'm still annoyed that Boeing won the commercial crew contract with their unimaginative design.

GuessWho · « **Reply #212 on:** 05/23/2015 02:06 pm »

Quote from: Patchouli on 05/23/2015 12:55 am

Quote from: somepitch on 05/13/2015 08:19 pm
Charles A. Lurio ‏@TheLurioReport 10m10 minutes ago
Rumors from Lockheed: Jupiter/Exoliner eliminated from CRS2 ISS cargo competition as not competitive.

https://twitter.com/TheLurioReport/status/598580761751588865

A bit of a shame as it was a great concept and was very flexible.
Quote from: Danderman on 05/14/2015 01:58 pm
That leaves the two incumbents, plus Boeing and Sierra Nevada on the outside.

If one of the outside contractors wins hopefully it'll be SNC who wins as then we'll get a space plane with near ATV cargo capacity.
I'm still annoyed that Boeing won the commercial crew contract with their unimaginative design.

If it's true that the LM concept has been rejected, then one has to wonder what the real motivation is at NASA. NASA just released an RFI for the ARM mission that also includes a request for a LEO space servicing vehicle (space tug) on one hand (Govt. led) and rejects a "commercial" space tug from Lockheed Martin on the other. Rather curious from where I am sitting.

rcoppola · « **Reply #213 on:** 05/23/2015 03:12 pm »

The thing to remember is that CRS is a service contract, not a development program. So any new entrants' prices would need to envelop both their development and service costs and still remain competitive. That's no small task. NASA only has so much budget to commit to what is a service contract. Boeing may have a shot if they can, at minimal cost, leverage their crew CST design for cargo, or SNC, by perhaps only building 2 DCs and manage to keep refurbishment costs so low that they can make their development costs back by re-use and still remain competitive on price.

And needless to say, IMO, you can fill one slot of the contract with SpaceX regardless. They have the most experience and success now. I'm sure they proposed upgraded Dragon and trunk capabilitties and will continue to be the lowest cost provider.

So IMO, Jupiter, will probably find a home either in a DOD framework, or NASA Moon/Mars infrastructure planning architecture, LEO Servicing (Sats etc) but not CRS-2. Some program that will have development funds.

Star One · « **Reply #214 on:** 05/23/2015 05:56 pm »

The thing to remember are these are just rumours yet again.

baldusi · « **Reply #215 on:** 05/24/2015 01:00 am »

I don't expect them to win. LM is not used to the commercial market. Specially the commercial services LEO market. They have just won back a couple of GSO, and they won the Morelos-3 contract by slashing 20% their price. This would have meant a big investment upfront, to win a certain revenue that would put them in the forefront of the ARM and whatever EML1/2 station might appear in the future. But they won't bet this big on such uncertain outcomes.
Having said that, this is still a rumor and unless they failed at some technical level they will get their formal notification by August/September. Now, may be they didn't got much feedback, or they got asked a lot of answers they couldn't really answer in such a way as feeling confident. May be the technical equivalent of "is this all?!?!". Which I doubt, they are LM. And thus someone deduced they have not been selected. That's my guess.
I would guess that NASA will first decide on two "main" competitors, and based on the total cost, might chose to give a third "small" contract if the price is right. So the LM decision will (probably) be done by July/August.

TrevorMonty · « **Reply #216 on:** 07/06/2015 04:07 am »

Found this interesting article on in space assembly. They plan to using SPHERES on ISS to construct a small telescope inside ISS to prove out this technology.

http://ssl.mit.edu/spheres/library/SPIE-ALMOST-paper-final.pdf

My thoughts on it was that Jupiter could be used to do something similar but create a larger proof of concept telescope. The mirrors and modules could be delivered as external payload on Exoliner.
Construction could take place at ISS or some where nearby. Once telescope is operational Jupiter could deliver it to higher orbit eg 800km.

The advantage with in space construction is ability to replace faulty modules during or after construction. If construction is done in ISS vicinity then replacement parts could be delivered on next Exoliner. Completed GEO telescopes could be placed on ACES and delivered direct to GEO or a Lagrange point.

For repairs onsite somebody is going to have pay for a oneway trip of Jupiter to GEO or a Lagrange point, but once there it is available for future repairs, upgrades or building a new telescope.

savuporo · « **Reply #217 on:** 10/01/2015 08:42 pm »

http://www.wsj.com/articles/lockheed-martin-eliminated-from-nasas-cargo-competition-1443725840
By Andy Pasztor

Quote

NASA has quietly eliminated Lockheed Martin Corp. from a pending multibillion-dollar competition to ship cargo to the international space station starting in roughly three years, according to people familiar with the details.

The decision, which hasn’t been disclosed publicly, poses a potentially significant setback to Lockheed’s plans to accelerate development of enhanced space-exploration capabilities.

yg1968 · « **Reply #218 on:** 10/02/2015 02:22 am »

From the same article:

Quote

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration made its decision this past summer, according to the people familiar with the matter, and since then it has been a topic of discussion in industry circles. NASA made the call largely on the basis of price, according to one of these people.

docmordrid · « **Reply #219 on:** 10/02/2015 05:25 am »

Charles Lurio reported it last May.