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#20
by
TrevorMonty
on 08 Aug, 2020 21:09
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I predict that NGSS will exit the medium/heavy launch market, focus on orbital propulsion (hydrolox), and dangle a solid smallsat launcher concept in front of USAF for extra cash. The big booster space is too crowded and way too competitive for NGSS. The same could be said for smallsat launchers, but USAF will sprinkle money around, and with the exception of Rocket Lab, who knows if any of the competitors will remain solvent.
I know the prompt is specifically about LVs, but in all likelihood, NGSS has much better prospects in LEO and beyond, and from a neutral space fan perspective, I think it's a good thing for the traditional aerospace giants to move up the value chain and cede the launch sector to the younger companies that can do it more cost-effectively.
I'm also fan of NGSS inspace efforts, at present they are leaders in this field, think its right place for them to focus their business.
In regards to smallsat launcher, SRB booster with restartable BE7 powered US could be interesting option.
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#21
by
JEF_300
on 08 Aug, 2020 21:20
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I predict that NGSS will exit the medium/heavy launch market, focus on orbital propulsion (hydrolox), and dangle a solid smallsat launcher concept in front of USAF for extra cash. The big booster space is too crowded and way too competitive for NGSS. The same could be said for smallsat launchers, but USAF will sprinkle money around, and with the exception of Rocket Lab, who knows if any of the competitors will remain solvent.
I know the prompt is specifically about LVs, but in all likelihood, NGSS has much better prospects in LEO and beyond, and from a neutral space fan perspective, I think it's a good thing for the traditional aerospace giants to move up the value chain and cede the launch sector to the younger companies that can do it more cost-effectively.
I'm also fan of NGSS inspace efforts, at present they are leaders in this field, think its right place for them to focus their business.
In regards to smallsat launcher, SRB booster with restartable BE7 powered US could be interesting option.
I once realized that the Electron first stage and the GEMs are quite similar in size, and ever since then I've wondered if a properly modified GEM could be used as the first stage of a smallsat launcher. My guess would be that it's probably not possible to get the propellant to burn slow enough for that to be practical, but I'd love to hear from people who know more.
If it is possible, I suspect that commonality with the strap-ons for Vulcan and Atlas
(and maybe OmegA) could make it actually quite affordable.
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#22
by
ChrisWilson68
on 09 Aug, 2020 01:52
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There are still Cygnus launches, Antares isn't an inexpensive launch vehicle and had been a total flop commercially. If they could punt Cygnus launches over to Omega and pick up even a single extra flight per year that might just be enough or better than where they are now.
No, OmegA is a lot more expensive to NGSS than Antares. It would be bonkers for them to launch Cygnus on a more expensive launch vehicle. Cygnus launches are on a fixed-price contract, not cost plus. The government won't pay a dime more to launch Cygnus on OmegA, so moving it would just cause NGSS to lose a whole lot of money for no gain.
Anyway, if NGSS thought it made any sense to launch Cygnus on Omega after having lost NSSL Phase 2, then they would have thought it would make even more sense when they were still in the running for NSSL Phase 2 and they would have loudly announced it then, because it would have supported their NSSL Phase 2 bid.
There is also NG's satellite servicing business, if they can vertically integrate for launches of that Omega would be an asset to them.
No, integrating a much more expensive launcher than the competition into a package would not be an asset to them. Not at all. They'd either have to sell the package deal at a huge loss and throw away money or price it to break even and have zero customers for the package.
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#23
by
ChrisWilson68
on 09 Aug, 2020 01:57
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Better to fly it at near cost and make some money. If they aren't trying recoup R&D investment then could be quite competitive, even with F9R.
In what fantasy universe? If it could be cost competitive with reusable Falcon 9, why couldn't they find any commercial customers for it?
In regards to lander missions, they will need heavy version using Castor 1200, this isn't scheduled to fly till 2024.
There's no reason to believe OmegA will get any lander missions, that was just speculation based on zero evidence. If OmegA were getting any lander missions, NGSS would have loudly announced it already.
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#24
by
ChrisWilson68
on 09 Aug, 2020 02:05
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#25
by
sdsds
on 09 Aug, 2020 02:41
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all the people who have been working on OmegA.
How many is that? What are their job titles?
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#26
by
ChrisWilson68
on 09 Aug, 2020 03:01
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all the people who have been working on OmegA.
How many is that? What are their job titles?
Obviously, I don't know their job titles or the exact number of people. So what?
Obviously there were a significant number of people working on the OmegA program. They were getting hundreds of millions of dollars in government funding for it and they were announcing progress on it.
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#27
by
yg1968
on 09 Aug, 2020 04:18
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#28
by
GWH
on 09 Aug, 2020 15:52
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all the people who have been working on OmegA.
How many is that? What are their job titles?
Obviously, I don't know their job titles or the exact number of people. So what?
You seem very sure that Omega is more expensive than Cygnus for NG to operate so obviously you must have an in depth knowledge of the program that the rest of us don't have.
PS Antares launch cost is $80-$85M as per this document:
http://www.gao.gov/assets/690/686613.pdfThat's much more than F9 and not much less than Vuclan's expected price. If Omega was to be cost competitive than it shouldn't be much more. As the underdogs in the competition I wouldn't expect them to be higher in cost and also heavily subsidized by their SLS booster work.
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#29
by
ChrisWilson68
on 09 Aug, 2020 16:24
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all the people who have been working on OmegA.
How many is that? What are their job titles?
Obviously, I don't know their job titles or the exact number of people. So what?
You seem very sure that Omega is more expensive than Cygnus for NG to operate so obviously you must have an in depth knowledge of the program that the rest of us don't have.
No, it doesn't take in-depth knowledge to know that OmegA is more expensive than Antares. Just look at the evidence.
OmegA and Antares aren't even in the same payload class. OmegA can launch far more. OmegA could launch big GEO comsats. But they've gotten no commercial interest. It's clear that OmegA is too expensive to compete on price in its own payload class, so the idea it could be cheaper than a rocket for a much smaller payload class is not plausible. And NGSS have not been talking about moving Cygnus launches to OmegA, which they would have been doing already if OmegA could compete with Antares on price.
Solid rocket technology is widespread around the world because it's useful for military purposes. Yet the world of launch is dominated by liquid rockets for their cores, with solids relegated to strap-on boosters as a way to give additional performance for additional cost. Solid-based launchers have been limited to cases of old ICBMs that governments didn't need any more and sold cheap as launch vehicles. All of that indicates pretty strongly that liquids are more cost-effective for the cores of launch vehicles, particularly in larger launch vehicles.
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#30
by
GWH
on 09 Aug, 2020 16:28
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#31
by
ChrisWilson68
on 09 Aug, 2020 16:39
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[ OmegA can launch far more. OmegA could launch big GEO comsats. But they've gotten no commercial interest.
https://spacenews.com/saturn-satellite-networks-to-be-first-customer-of-northrop-grummans-omega/
That was not a real commercial customer.
This is just a case where the manufacturer needs to do a test flight as their first flight of a new vehicle. The manufacturer has to pay for the test flight anyway. Someone without a lot of money is willing to pay some small amount for a very high risk, low cost flight for their payloads. The money the manufacturer receives is nowhere near enough to pay for the cost of the flight, but it doesn't matter because they have to pay for the flight anyway so they might as well get a little revenue from it.
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#32
by
ncb1397
on 09 Aug, 2020 16:59
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Nationsats can mass up to 1700 kg. So, two of them could be 3,400 kg which is in the same mass range of quite a few Falcon 9 launches to GTO. I wouldn't assume that this is a low revenue flight. It seems like SSN may not be exactly happy with the service by SpaceX given a few weeks after it was reported their launch vehicle was being delayed by SpaceX, they signed this agreement with Northrop Grumman for NationSats 2/3. So, the reasons for the move may not exactly be heavily discounted pricing.
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#33
by
JEF_300
on 09 Aug, 2020 20:34
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I'm gonna make a prediction that one day, maybe about a year from now, I will be thinking about either OmegA or Antares pricing, and I'll think, 'Wait, wasn't there a discussion on NASASpaceflight.com about this a year ago?' And then I'll go looking for this discussion you guys have had above.
But I'll never find it, because when I read the title of this thread (which I'll probably have totally forgotten about in a year), I'll think, 'No, that discussion I'm looking for doesn't have anything to do with what comes after OmegA. I think I'll go check in the OmegA General Discussion thread instead.'
Seriously though, this has happened to me before. You guys have made a lot of very good posts, with good information, that are totally off-topic on this thread, and I wish I was confident I could find them later.
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#34
by
Aiden22TheAstronaut
on 10 Aug, 2020 06:11
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I could only really see OmegA launching 3 missions, 2 missions for Saturn Satellite Networks, and the HALO component for Gateway since Northrop Grumman is building the module.
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#35
by
ChrisWilson68
on 10 Aug, 2020 08:02
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I could only really see OmegA launching 3 missions, 2 missions for Saturn Satellite Networks, and the HALO component for Gateway since Northrop Grumman is building the module.
I don't think there's been any talk of 2 missions for Saturn Satellite Networks. What has been said is that Saturn will fly one or two satellites on the first OmegA launch. So if Saturn flies two satellites on OmegA they will both be on the same flight, the first OmegA flight. The satellites aren't very big, so OmegA can easily carry two of them at the same time.
As to flying HALO, just because NG is building it doesn't mean they get to decide which launcher it uses. Normal NASA practice is to contract with one company to build something and with another company to launch it. The launch contracts are normally competed separately. I don't see any reason it would be any different with HALO.
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#36
by
Steven Pietrobon
on 10 Aug, 2020 09:30
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Solid-based launchers have been limited to cases of old ICBMs that governments didn't need any more and sold cheap as launch vehicles.
Here are two solid launch vehicles that contradict your point.
EpsilonVega
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#37
by
ChrisWilson68
on 10 Aug, 2020 09:59
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Solid-based launchers have been limited to cases of old ICBMs that governments didn't need any more and sold cheap as launch vehicles.
Here are two solid launch vehicles that contradict your point.
Epsilon
Vega
Yes, and there's Pegasus and Taurus/Minotaur too. I didn't say quite what I meant to say in my post. I meant to say that solid-based launchers have been limited to either small, expensive vehicles or cases of old ICBMs that governments didn't need any more and sold cheap as launch vehicles.
Epsilon: $39 million for 590 kg to SSO
Vega: $37 million for 1,450 kg to SSO
Pegasus: $40 million for 443 kg to LEO
Minotaur: $40 million for 1,054 kg to SSO
All more than half the price of even an expendable Falcon 9 for less than a tenth the payload of a reusable Falcon 9.
So these small solid launchers support my point, which was the last statement in the post to which you responded:
All of that indicates pretty strongly that liquids are more cost-effective for the cores of launch vehicles, particularly in larger launch vehicles.
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#38
by
Welsh Dragon
on 10 Aug, 2020 10:41
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Solid-based launchers have been limited to cases of old ICBMs that governments didn't need any more and sold cheap as launch vehicles.
Here are two solid launch vehicles that contradict your point.
Epsilon
Vega
Yes, and there's Pegasus and Taurus/Minotaur too. I didn't say quite what I meant to say in my post. I meant to say that solid-based launchers have been limited to either small, expensive vehicles or cases of old ICBMs that governments didn't need any more and sold cheap as launch vehicles.
Epsilon: $39 million for 590 kg to SSO
Vega: $37 million for 1,450 kg to SSO
Pegasus: $40 million for 443 kg to LEO
Minotaur: $40 million for 1,054 kg to SSO
All more than half the price of even an expendable Falcon 9 for less than a tenth the payload of a reusable Falcon 9.
So these small solid launchers support my point, which was the last statement in the post to which you responded:
All of that indicates pretty strongly that liquids are more cost-effective for the cores of launch vehicles, particularly in larger launch vehicles.
Cost isn't everything. Independent access to space, prestige, and safeguarding industry are all very important factors for governmental space agencies.
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#39
by
nicp
on 10 Aug, 2020 11:15
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Solid-based launchers have been limited to cases of old ICBMs that governments didn't need any more and sold cheap as launch vehicles.
Here are two solid launch vehicles that contradict your point.
Epsilon
Vega
Also Scout