SpaceX Tuesday...

[Beati Dogu]

SpaceX has been working with the US Air Force to customise the Falcon 9 rocket for their requirements. The resulting "Falcon 9 Upgrade" has now been certified for national security missions. So basically putting communication, recon, early warning, weather and GPS satellites into orbit.

http://www.losangeles.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123...

[Scuffers]

Beati Dogu said:

SpaceX has been working with the US Air Force to customise the Falcon 9 rocket for their requirements. The resulting "Falcon 9 Upgrade" has now been certified for national security missions. So basically putting communication, recon, early warning, weather and GPS satellites into orbit.

http://www.losangeles.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123...

they have been working hard on all fronts for this, ULA will be spitting teeth!

that's their monopoly on the most lucrative launch customer gone.

[Eric Mc]

As it should be too.

Back in the early days of the US space programme there were multiple launcher manufacturers providing lots of alternatives -

Boeing
Douglas
Convair
Martin
Lockheed

In more recent decades, because of mergers and consolidation within the industry, the number of competing launcher manufacturers has declined. It's good to see an element of competition returning.

[Scuffers]

Eric,

I'm not sure that's entirely true, back in the Apollo days, they were hardly in competition with each other they had so much work it was basically shared out between themselves.

[Eric Mc]

Scuffers said:

Eric,

I'm not sure that's entirely true, back in the Apollo days, they were hardly in competition with each other they had so much work it was basically shared out between themselves.

There was a lot going on back then, not just Apollo.

With very few exceptions (the Gemini spacecraft being one), ALL NASA, and DoD projects had to, by law, be put out to competitive tendering between the different manufacturers. Of course, there were and still are allegations that not all these projects were allocated fairly but certainly the selection process was supposed to be competitive and fair and in most cases, more than one manufacturer would submit a tender.

Read "The Man Who Ran the Moon" by Piers Bizony for an insight into how the various manufacturers were selected for Apollo.

[Toaster]

Mojocvh said:

You do understand what the big picture actually is?

Do enlighten us on your version of the big picture as there are many big pictures, Oh and please do not state the blindingly obvious of lowering launch costs by having reusable 1st stages.

[Toaster]

Scuffers said:

they have been working hard on all fronts for this, ULA will be spitting teeth!that's their monopoly on the most lucrative launch customer gone.

As with all suppliers they will sweat an asset as long as they can but whenever there is a step change in technology when a new technology comes along others will soon catch up there maybe some casualties along the way but not all competitors will collapse its not in the interest of the customer as the customer would only have one supplier and that is never good.

[Scuffers]

Toaster said:

As with all suppliers they will sweat an asset as long as they can but whenever there is a step change in technology when a new technology comes along others will soon catch up there maybe some casualties along the way but not all competitors will collapse its not in the interest of the customer as the customer would only have one supplier and that is never good.

no kidding...

http://spacenews.com/spacex-u-s-air-force-to-enter...

http://spacenews.com/spacex-air-force-reach-agreem...

that's not the sign of healthy competition is it?

[Eric Mc]

Have any space technology suppliers "collapsed" because NASA or the DoD cancelled a rocket?

[Scuffers]

Eric Mc said:

Have any space technology suppliers "collapsed" because NASA or the DoD cancelled a rocket?

well, considering we are talking Boeing and Lockheed, what do you think?

[LivingTheDream]

Question for you clever chaps - on the last SpaeX launch, it delivered 11 satellites into orbit.

How? How does a launch actually deliver 11 different things, presumably not all 11 go at the same time otherwise they all be grouped together. It must have some sort of system but i can't find any info anywhere.

[Scuffers]

LivingTheDream said:

Question for you clever chaps - on the last SpaeX launch, it delivered 11 satellites into orbit.

How? How does a launch actually deliver 11 different things, presumably not all 11 go at the same time otherwise they all be grouped together. It must have some sort of system but i can't find any info anywhere.

watch the video.

https://youtu.be/O5bTbVbe4e4

it launched 11 small satellites in sequence (3 at a time), the video shows this in pretty good detail.

this is not that unusual, although 11 is quite a lot. Usually this sort of stuff is usually low earth orbit small stuff like globalsat etc.

Edited by Scuffers on Tuesday 26th January 14:45

[Beati Dogu]

The satellites are only 1m x 1m x 0.5m in size and 172 Kg in mass.

http://spaceflight101.com/spacecraft/orbcomm-g2/


Because they were launching an odd number, to help balance on the rocket they used a "mass simulator" i.e. a weight.

Since the launch, the satellites have been slowly spreading out to cover their assigned areas. As shown from these maps from the CEO of Orbcomm:

https://twitter.com/Marc944Marc

[Eric Mc]

Scuffers said:

Eric Mc said:

Have any space technology suppliers "collapsed" because NASA or the DoD cancelled a rocket?

well, considering we are talking Boeing and Lockheed, what do you think?

Is that an answer?

[Scuffers]

Eric Mc said:

Scuffers said:

Eric Mc said:

Have any space technology suppliers "collapsed" because NASA or the DoD cancelled a rocket?

well, considering we are talking Boeing and Lockheed, what do you think?

Is that an answer?

well, yes?

ULA is Boeing and Lockheed, and no, neither of them are likely to "collapse"

[The Wookie]

Another barge kaboom sadly

http://www.weupit.com/spacex-rocket-explodes-after...

Tantalisingly close though.

Amazing how the thing just turned into a cloud of vapour (a split second before exploding) as soon as it touched the deck of the barge!

[Scuffers]

The Wookie said:

Another barge kaboom sadly

http://www.weupit.com/spacex-rocket-explodes-after...

Tantalisingly close though.

Amazing how the thing just turned into a cloud of vapour (a split second before exploding) as soon as it touched the deck of the barge!

that's over a week ago?

[Toaster]

Scuffers said:

watch the video.

https://youtu.be/O5bTbVbe4e4

it launched 11 small satellites in sequence (3 at a time), the video shows this in pretty good detail.

this is not that unusual, although 11 is quite a lot. Usually this sort of stuff is usually low earth orbit small stuff like globalsat etc.

Edited by Scuffers on Tuesday 26th January 14:45

Are you sure it was 3 at a time 3 in to 11 doesn't go.................(I know I will get my coat)

Why is 11 quite a lot who says? Planet Labs Cubesats Deployed 28 from ISS with Many More To Follow - See more at: http://spacenews.com/39459planet-labs-cubesats-dep...

surely it depends on the nature of the array and experiment or use they are being put to

[Scuffers]

Toaster said:

Are you sure it was 3 at a time 3 in to 11 doesn't go.................(I know I will get my coat)

Why is 11 quite a lot who says? Planet Labs Cubesats Deployed 28 from ISS with Many More To Follow - See more at: http://spacenews.com/39459planet-labs-cubesats-dep...

surely it depends on the nature of the array and experiment or use they are being put to

was not all 3 at a time, but they had to release them as pairs or 3 (one was dummy) to balance the ejection.

as for cubesats, they are tiny:

wiki said:

A CubeSat (U-class spacecraft) is a type of miniaturized satellite for space research that is made up of multiples of 10×10×11.35 cm cubic units, has a mass of no more than 1.33 kilograms per unit, and often sees the use of commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) components for its electronics and structure.

the orbicon ones were some 176Kg's each.

[Beati Dogu]

Eric Mc said:

Have any space technology suppliers "collapsed" because NASA or the DoD cancelled a rocket?

I don't think the completion of the Space Shuttle contract did Rockwell any favours, but the peace dividend in the 1990s probably had more of an impact on what had the largest defence contractor. Rockwell built the Shuttle orbiters and the Apollo command and service modules. They've since been broken up and sold off to various companies. The defence and aerospace business being bought up by Boeing.