Jim - 21/3/2007 3:56 PM Quotepippin - 21/3/2007 4:49 PM QuoteKayla - 20/3/2007 10:43 PM Yes, the current market dollar volume for larger payloads is bigger than small payloads. But where does $300M/launch come from? When was the last commercial launch priced above ~$100M? Bad guess, couldn't find a quick figure ;-) But at $100M it's still 10 times the size. And there are 3-5 competitiors that have to split the 4.5t GTO market . OSC isn't sharing its
pippin - 21/3/2007 4:49 PM QuoteKayla - 20/3/2007 10:43 PM Yes, the current market dollar volume for larger payloads is bigger than small payloads. But where does $300M/launch come from? When was the last commercial launch priced above ~$100M? Bad guess, couldn't find a quick figure ;-) But at $100M it's still 10 times the size.
Kayla - 20/3/2007 10:43 PM Yes, the current market dollar volume for larger payloads is bigger than small payloads. But where does $300M/launch come from? When was the last commercial launch priced above ~$100M?
If you don't count overseas rockets like Cosmos and Rockot...
jabe - 21/3/2007 5:15 PMHow about this for a new long shot market . Bigelow gets a falcon 9 to launch is inflatable hotel.Falcon 1's are used to bring suppliesfalcon 9 to send 7 paying customers to hotel.falcon 1's used to supply ISS rather than soyuz..never know what market there will be if a cheaper launch system is present. but I'm probably wrong
Jim - 21/3/2007 3:20 PM far for "rapid deployment", a just 1st stage is not marketable.
Sorry Jim, salvagable asset means not that you sell it from the company, but that the company could sell it or itself to another firm desiring the asset, which they could then take somewhere.
Stop being snarky about rapid deployment. You saw the operations - this is the worst it will ever be, and it looked darn good. Tell me who looks better.
And yes there is a market, judging by the degree of envy present alone in this forum. I'd estimate the net worth of SpaceX assets as upwards of $200 M just at a spot assessment. How much would it cost for Lockmart to develop the same capability?
the battle for survival is not over. He has only launched two volleys and they came up short. DARPA will have another "incident" investigation, just like they did for the first one The next launch customer I bet is TBD.
I wouldn't care less if he has a half dozen, as long as it gets better for the cost. Sometimes I've wondered if we over simulate and over test, when what might be better is to risk a full-up test because its more realistic. If you're going to get a radically cheaper vehicle, you can't incrementally take boxes of proven good parts and glue them together to get cheaper systems and services. So whats happening here is Space-X starts off with a lowest cost design, has a number of rough tumbles, adds back some expense while getting it operational. He can get at Demming's dysfunctional structural costs of the industry.
I bet he gets more customers signed up.
He hasn't proven his costs yet
Do you really expect him to at this stage? Hardly. But there's an excellent chance he's gotten around cost structures that have hobbled other LV's. And we will have to "wait and see".
Falcon I simply means he can do LV's. He'll have to prove his costs on Falcon 9 for their to be a "going concern". We won't know that til he's launching and winning contracts away from other LV's, and at that point its all academic.
hyper_snyper - 21/3/2007 2:22 PM I'd venture so far as to say F1 won't be flying nearly as much as soon as F9/Dragon gets up and running. Maybe the occasional small sat, but F9 is the meat and potatoes of what SpaceX is trying to do.
I suspect that a peek at the launch manifest on the SpaceX web site would be informative to attempt a guess at the mix of Falcon I and Falcon IX in the out years.
Danderman - 21/3/2007 5:49 PMI suspect that these attacks on Musk's business plan are mostly based on ignorance of his plan. I would not be surprised is 3 out of the first 5 Falcon I launches are failures, but down the road, it won't matter. Falcon I is a test vehicle, that can generate some small amounts of revenue. Falcon IX is the big money maker, if it works, providing Delta II lift at a fraction of the cost. I would not spend much time worrying about if Elon is making money at this point.IF Falcon I never works, Elon will go out of business. If he can get it to fly, then he has a chance of making a go of it with Falcon IX. Everything else is speculation.
hyper_snyper - 21/3/2007 4:22 PMYou need Dragon to resupply ISS. F1 isn't going to help you there. I'd venture so far as to say F1 won't be flying nearly as much as soon as F9/Dragon gets up and running. Maybe the occasional small sat, but F9 is the meat and potatoes of what SpaceX is trying to do.
sammie - 21/3/2007 3:47 PM People were talking about the market for Small sats, just thought that I add some data to it. In the table you'll find a short overview of all small launch vehicles launches, with a payload, between 2002 and 2006. In one collum you find the actual number launches, the second colum of each year is whether the Falcon 1 could have launched it. I've been pretty generous, looking only at actual weight and orbit, and things like that. Not considering that the Falcon 1 might not be the cheapest option per kg to orbit. More ifs and buts are connected and shown at the bottom of the table. I attach no meaning to it, no judgement, just wanted to add a little bit of data to the debate.
Well, you have got a bunch of smallsats there, but there is also the nanosat (Cubesat) market as well as some smallsats that fly as piggyback payloads on larger LVs.
sammie - 21/3/2007 4:59 PM I think the second part of the argument is somewhat flawed, as the Falcon 1 isn't the cheapest in the global market and the sat market is inelastic (ie. if you reduce the price you won't get a factor increase in demand). Main reason for this is that for most satellites the price of building and operating them is many times higher then the cost of putting them in orbit.
I believe that this is a "canard". Cheaper Russian launchers have provoked lots of satellites to be flown that otherwise would never have been launched on Ariane, Atlas or Delta. I believe that if Falcon I is ultimately successful, NASA will find a way to fund a Small Explorer program that launches many times a year.
Danderman - 21/3/2007 2:34 AMQuotesammie - 21/3/2007 4:59 PM I think the second part of the argument is somewhat flawed, as the Falcon 1 isn't the cheapest in the global market and the sat market is inelastic (ie. if you reduce the price you won't get a factor increase in demand). Main reason for this is that for most satellites the price of building and operating them is many times higher then the cost of putting them in orbit. I believe that this is a "canard". Cheaper Russian launchers have provoked lots of satellites to be flown that otherwise would never have been launched on Ariane, Atlas or Delta. I believe that if Falcon I is ultimately successful, NASA will find a way to fund a Small Explorer program that launches many times a year.
nobodyofconsequence - 21/3/2007 5:25 PM[Stop being snarky about rapid deployment. You saw the operations - this is the worst it will ever be, and it looked darn good. Tell me who looks better. >
josh_simonson - 21/3/2007 7:58 PMNot to mention X-43 type missions and military uses. Falcon 1 only costs 2-3x a tomahawk cruise missile.
If launch costs are down business cases might get viable that are not today. That sats are expensive to build and operate just means that only the expensive ones get launched.
