Re: Robert Bigelow to announce $50 million orbital space prize; inflatable modules

From: Pete Lynn (pete_at_peterlynnkites.com)
Date: 10/02/04 

Date: Sat, 2 Oct 2004 18:55:46 +1200

"George William Herbert" <gherbert@retro.com> wrote in message
news:415e32c8$0$13844$c0de7616@newsreader.dsl.net...
>
> I confidently posit that the R&D cost for doing such a large
> integration will exceed the $2-3 million in hardware saved
> by making an integrated stage, multiplied by the number of
> flights likely in the next 5-8 years.
>
> Probably even worse if you include ROI on the R&D.
>
> Several people here will object. That's fine. They can chase
> the prize their way.
>
> In my opinion, the cost of entry of reusable stuff is
> one major barrier to manned orbital operations including
> orbital tourism, and if someone gets the startup financing,
> they will likely not recover the capital costs within any
> reasonable timeframe. The cheap way to do the early phases
> is expendable. When the market expands, reusables and their
> higher R&D costs but lower operational costs will be the
> better solution. But from here to there is too far to
> take in one jump.

Yes, a capsule and Falcon V upper stage integration would have to assume
a rather high flight rate. A flight rate that I hope might start to
become possible in 5-8 years time. But I do wonder if this is a useful
evolutionary pathway, whether this would be easier than developing a
completely new reusable vehicle from scratch at that time.

Say,
- Develop a capsule.
- Develop it towards reusability.
- Integrate it with an upper stage.
- Develop a version to go beyond LEO.

This might be a fairly natural progression.

Pete.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: National Labs, Fortran, and free compilers
    ... It costs more to ... > have to support multiple platforms. ... More training, more integration ... > headaches. ...
    (comp.lang.fortran)
  • Re: National Labs, Fortran, and free compilers
    ... It costs more to ... >have to support multiple platforms. ... More training, more integration ... The bottom line is the cost of the software. ...
    (comp.lang.fortran)
  • Re: National Labs, Fortran, and free compilers
    ... > have to support multiple platforms. ... More training, more integration ... > headaches. ... it costs more to support productive scientists than pointy haired rule ...
    (comp.lang.fortran)
  • Re: Japans Moon Ambitions - Theyre KIDDING, Right ?
    ... and losing vehicles and pilots occasionally ... >> Because of the absurdly low flight rate, and the fact that it's not ... if you want to have low costs. ... >And if reusability is good, why isn't some reusability better than ...
    (sci.space.policy)
  • Re: Fuuture of pads 39 A and 39B
    ... Too big a booster means a low flight rate. ... >flight rate, and you're talking about costs on the order of Saturn/Shuttle, ...
    (sci.space.history)