Re: SpaceX armchair quarterbacking

In article <442b62e3$0$24187$636a55ce@xxxxxxxxxxxx>, frédéric haessig says...

"Geoffrey" <geoffrey.landis@xxxxxxx> a écrit dans le message de news:
1143389052.459201.182650@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

No, it's not. Most of the early boosters did suborbital tests first.
Saturn 1 did about four suborbitals before they tried an orbital, for
example.

Did any rocket devellopped since the 70s do so? Especially any commercial
one?

Ariane didn't, even for Ariane I ( which was sucessfull - the failures were
on the 2nd and 5th flight ).

Neither Sealaunch, nor Delta III or Delta IV, nor Atlas V did, AFAIK.

Similarly, the new version of Russian rockets don't, and I don't think GSLV
and PSLV did. I'm less sure about the japanese and chinese rockets.


Delta III/IV and Atlas V are expressions of corporate ego on even-numbered
days, attempts to feign continuity with earlier vehicles on odd days, and
neither of those allows one to admit a suborbital test or three might be
called for.

Sealaunch uses the Zenit booster, whose first two flights were suborbital
by design. All of the other new Russian rockets are ex-ICBMs, with lots
of suborbital flights under their belt, except the Angara which hasn't
flown at all. The PSLV's first flight was suborbital, though not by
design.

The Japanese H-II was orbital from the start. Same for the M-V as such,
but earlier M-series rockets had a suborbital heritage. Likewise the J-1.

The only operational Chinese launchers have been derived from the DF-5
ICBM, again plenty of suborbital flights there. The new Kaituozhe has
flown twice and not reached orbit either time; the Chinese aren't saying
much about what it was intended to do.


People who aren't investing massive ammounts of ego into government
megaprojects, and even some who are, seem to prefer shooting a bit lower
than Earth orbit for their first test flight. We'll see how SpaceX does
with their approach, but it's not the way I would go.


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