I’ll register for your RSS feed and bookmark your website so I can come back to review more. Thank you a lot!

Development of an integrated LAS got $75M in funding under CCDev2.

Dragon appears to have the best potential for reuse among the vehicles currently under development

Why would it have more potential for reuse than Dream Chaser, CST-100 or Blue Origin’s biconic capsule?

but reuse of the launch vehicle is at least as important in reducing cost, and SpaceX, although it is certainly interested, has limited options for this.

Blue Origin’s work is centered around RLV development and even ULA has plans for partial reuse.

I’m also not sure I would agree that “all NASA RLV programs have been a failure”. All five major NASA RLV programs were canceled or abandoned by NASA under Bush II.

I’m not saying they were necessarily technical failures or that the engineers were incompetent. Just that if we try the same thing again we’ll likely get the same results, namely more cancellations for reasons that may be irrational but also predictable. I was a huge fan of DC-X and X-33 and I would have loved to see them fly, but I have zero faith that the NASA bureaucracy would be able to deliver on it under the political constraints it would have to work under.

Believe me, there is hardly anything I’d like to see more in the field of manned spaceflight than RLVs, or more precisely cheap lift, i.e. cheaper by an order of magnitude. It’s precisely why I advocate establishing a large and fiercely competitive propellant launch market as soon as possible.

There are no technical obstacles to doing so now, just as we could have done at any point in the past thirty years. If we had, we would have had RLVs by now, and therefore a manned moon base, several commercial LEO stations, limited lunar tourism and manned NASA missions to at least Mars orbit.

“Demand” programs such as Orion/HLLV will not advance practical human spaceflight since they require spending the entire HSF budget on operations with very expensive ELVs rather than R&D on new concepts.

MPCV / SLS will indeed do nothing, which is why I want to see both cancelled. But the demand I’m talking about would be very different. One or several billion dollars a year worth of competitively procured propellant launches would be totally different. NASA would indeed spend most of its HSF budget on operations, which is as it should be as far as I’m concerned.

But that doesn’t mean there wouldn’t be money for R&D. Companies always spend a percentage of their revenue on R&D and they would collectively do the same with those several billion a year. They would have a strong incentive to do so if NASA used a reverse auction (or maybe even a sort of futures and options market as with oil) to procure the launch services.

If you could launch more cheaply than your competitor, you might be able to sell 100% of your capacity. I strongly believe that this would lead to substantial funding for RLVs. Compare that to what we have today, hardly any funding. Given sufficient funding, this would almost certainly work, assuming that RLVs are technically possible.

“Development of a man-rated Dragon is not part of CCDev, it is part of COTS-D.”

The current COTS program only covers cargo, and so far as I know, COTS-D is not currently funded.

Here’s what NASA says about CCDev:

“In a multiphase strategy, the program is designed to help spur the innovation and development of new spacecraft and launch vehicles from the commercial industry, creating a new way of delivering cargo – and eventually crew – to low-Earth orbit (LEO) and the International Space Station (ISS).”

Although we’re not to the final stage of the CCDev program, the CCDev-2 award to SpaceX for Dragon does show that Dragon is being considered by NASA for carrying crew.

Regarding CCDev vs COTS-D, maybe CCDev does the development portion, and COTS-D will take over when they are ready for crew certification? I guess we’ll have to wait and see how the money gets allocated.

Development of a man-rated Dragon is not part of CCDev, it is part of COTS-D. Dragon appears to have the best potential for reuse among the vehicles currently under development, but reuse of the launch vehicle is at least as important in reducing cost, and SpaceX, although it is certainly interested, has limited options for this.

Even a Gemini capsule was flown twice (it was unmanned). That doesn’t make it a system which permits feasible reuse. A capsule that lands by parachute is far more likely to be beyond economical repair than a runway lander. I realize the the Dream Chaser is referred to as a runway lander but this design has been around for many years and I’ve seen no evidence that it or any lifting body has ever landed on a runway at any gross weight that is realistic for orbital flight.

I’m also not sure I would agree that “all NASA RLV programs have been a failure”. All five major NASA RLV programs were canceled or abandoned by NASA under Bush II. X-33, X-34 and DC-X were starved for funds and/or canceled by incompetent managers for irrational reasons, a NASA problem to be sure but not one associated specifically with RLVs. The X-37 was transfered to DOD for reasons that remain murky but since one has landed and another is in orbit it is difficult to call it a failure. Shuttle was the first real attempt anywhere to build an orbital RLV and will soon have flown 135 missions with two losses due to problems that were subsequently corrected. Shuttle was canceled to pay for Constellation. “Demand” programs such as Orion/HLLV will not advance practical human spaceflight since they require spending the entire HSF budget on operations with very expensive ELVs rather than R&D on new concepts.

Who not if NASA were to spend $1B a year on competitive propellant launches? The propellant is crucial, trying to create RLVs by demand pull using crew launches would be much harder than with propellant. You’ve so far ignored this argument, which is a pity, because it shows the synergy between exploration and RLVs.

Instead of developing RLVs first, we should explore first because that is certain to be better for exploration and nearly certain to be better for RLVs. In fact the latter is an understatement. Big NASA RLV programs are likely to be as much of a failure as they’ve always been. A large and fiercely competitive propellant launch market on the other hand would be highly likely to succeed at generating RLVs.

Unfortunately CCDev bizarrely consists of hiring 4 contractors to propose essentially the same technology as SpaceX, expendable launchers and spacecraft.

How often do you have to be corrected on this before you’ll stop peddling misinformation? Dragon, CST-100, Dream Chaser and Blue Origin’s capsule are all intended to be reusable, not expendable. It’s time to let go of the Shuttle and most of its workforce. Fifteen or twenty years ago it might have been possible to transition the Shuttle to a real and economical RLV, after which it could be transitioned to the private sector. It’s far too late for that now.

To do better requires new fully reusable technology. Even Musk can’t afford that kind of R&D without NASA support. Unfortunately CCDev bizarrely consists of hiring 4 contractors to propose essentially the same technology as SpaceX, expendable launchers and spacecraft.

“Vladislaw wrote:
“SpaceX said they could supply a Falcon 9 heavy for 100 mil but there were no takers.”

Not quite correct. True there were no takers (at this stage) for the first flight however Elon did state that they were in serious talks with takers for flights 2 – 4.”

I was not refering to the new Falcon Heavy, I was refering to the original, the falcon 9 heavy. It was listed at 95 million .. there were no takers for that system.
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vulture4 wrote:

“The only instance of this is manned flight, where Soyuz, as the only supplier, could bump price up to $50M. Soyuz and SpaceX can break even at about $20M so with both in the market price will decline to that level.”

Soyuz I thought was already at 56 million, my thoughts on this were that when the next bid comes up SpaceX will just under bid what soyuz is costing. It will be a slow spiral downward. I dont know how much other processes can lower price. Musk achieved some of his lower costs not through new technology but new processes on how to do launch operations and intergration.

You and Vladislaw are having a great discussion, and I wanted to add my perspective.

“But no matter how much competition there is, the price can’t drop below this level because the suppliers would go bankrupt.”

The way I look at it is that we’ve had two restrictions to space travel up until now.

The first has been lack of supply, since the Russians have only had room for seven tourists so far, and the U.S. Government didn’t allow paid tourists to fly on the Shuttle.

The second has been price. If you wanted to fly to space (LEO or beyond) and you couldn’t get a ride on the Soyuz or Shuttle, then the price to get to space rose dramatically. You probably could have tried to buy a whole Soyuz flight, or otherwise you would have had to build your own spacecraft. That’s a pretty high barrier.

With new supply coming online, we’ll finally see what the true demand is for space travel when it costs between $20-60M/seat. If Bigelow gets their space module business going, I think that will be what the market needs in order boost flight rates up to the point where companies and individuals will be able to test out potential business models fairly quickly.

“So except for some incremental improvements that SpaceX can afford, nothing will happen even if NASA spends the same $1B every year creating artificial demand.”

Yes this is a conundrum. But I think if there is strong market response to LEO travel at the $20-60M/seat rates, and there is growing traffic to LEO for expanding ISS use, Bigelow stations, and who knows what else, then I think there will be renewed interest in the next phase of launch vehicles.

I hope that ends up being RLV’s of some form, since they have the greatest potential for lowering cost and allowing more supply. But I don’t see serious work on this happening until the initial LEO market becomes clear, and that likely won’t happen until the 2020-25 timeframe. Still, I think it will happen.

Not just new technology, more efficient manufacturing and business processes too.

out of reach even for Elon Musk.

Not with $1B or $2B a year worth of propellant launches.

other companies will not be able to enter the market and none will have the capital to leapfrog SpaceX

Of course they will, because if there’s a profit to be made then commercial funding will be available.

Only new technology can lower cost, but the cost of significant new tech is high , probably $10B over 10 years, not that much for NASA but out of reach even for Elon Musk. SpaceX already is at close to the optimum for ELVs. So except possibly for Boeing, which will only compete for a government contract, other companies will not be able to enter the market and none will have the capital to leapfrog SpaceX. So except for some incremental improvements that SpaceX can afford, nothing will happen even if NASA spends the same $1B every year creating artificial demand.