2008 Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge

Swampcat · Oct 19, 2008

Lunar Lander Teams to Compete for $2 Million NASA PrizeNine teams with rocket-powered vehicles will compete for $2 million in NASA prize money during the 2008 Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge, Oct. 24-25, at Las Cruces International Airport in New Mexico.Teams must fly their vehicle, simulating a takeoff and landing on the moon, and repeat the task in a limited period of time. The competition provides a demanding test of navigation and control for the vehicles, as well as a demonstration of reusable rocket engine technology.This event is not open to the public. Check the link for webcasting site. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

Swampcat · Oct 19, 2008

Word on the street is that Armadillo is a shoe-in to come away with all the prize money. Unreasonable Rocket had to drop out. Edit: I stand corrected...Unreasonable Rocket dropped out of the Level 2 competition. They are still planning on competing for the Level 1 prize.  <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

Swampcat · Oct 24, 2008

SDC Blog John Carmack and his Armadillo Aerospace team have successfully won the Northrop Grumman Level 1 contest. Tomorrow they return for a much more difficult Level 2 effort - making use of a different vehicle to shoot for the Level 2 prize money. Just got home and saw this report. There doesn't seem to be much elsewhere concerning the event other than this from HobbySpace, which reports the crash of TrueZer0's vehicle. Hopefully, more information will become available soon. Looking forward to some video. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

Swampcat · Oct 25, 2008

Armadillo rocket takes $350,000 prize After two years of near-misses, Armadillo Aerospace won a $350,000 prize Friday in an rocket contest created by NASA to encourage the development of new lunar lander prototypes. More at the link. We'll probably have to wait until Mr. Carmack and his team return home after the weekend to get the details from his perspective. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

Swampcat · Oct 25, 2008

SDC blog Another article about AA's L1 success is here. Video of Day 1 After a brief introduction of the event by Peter Diamandis, this video shows both AA flights and the crash of TrueZer0's vehicle. Interesting that on AA's first flight, the vehicle actually bounced off the ground on landing on its first flight attempt, but maintained its attitude and landed safely.  <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

nimbus · Oct 25, 2008

Replying to: <DIV CLASS='Discussion_PostQuote'>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhnY5tT4YeE Posted by Swampcat</DIV> Link had %22 added to its end. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

Swampcat · Oct 26, 2008

Replying to: <DIV CLASS='Discussion_PostQuote'>Link had %22 added to its end. Posted by nimbus</DIV>Thanks for pointing that out. Plucks HTML editor is a plucked up mess.The links have been fixed.  <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

Swampcat · Oct 27, 2008

Article from SpaceRef.com: NASA $350,000 Prize Goes to Armadillo Aerospace in Lunar Challenge Armadillo Aerospace of Rockwall, Texas, earned $350,000 in NASA prize money during the Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge in Las Cruces, N.M. The challenge is a two-level, $2 million competition designed to accelerate commercial space technology and is sponsored by NASA's Centennial Challenges program. After Armadillo's $350,000 first place win for level one this year, $1.65 million remains as available prize money for future competitions. Armadillo's winning vehicle successfully demonstrated some of the technologies needed for a lunar lander capable of ferrying payloads or humans back and forth between lunar orbit and the lunar surface. During the first day of competition at Las Cruces International Airport on Oct. 24, the vehicle rose to a height of 50 meters, translated to a landing pad 100 meters away while staying aloft for at least 90 seconds, landed safely and later repeated the flight. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

nimbus · Oct 27, 2008

Did I read right, they're considering letting Armadillo run the LV2 again in a few months?  Or is it the LLC that's scheduled for less than a year from now? <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

Swampcat · Oct 28, 2008

Replying to: <DIV CLASS='Discussion_PostQuote'>Did I read right, they're considering letting Armadillo run the LV2 again in a few months?  Or is it the LLC that's scheduled for less than a year from now? Posted by nimbus</DIV>I'll have to get back to you on that question. There was some discussion in other places of holding another LLC event early next year, but I've heard very little about that and nothing definite. The way this event was scheduled, postponed, rescheduled, moved, etc., it's a wonder it actually happened. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

nimbus · Oct 28, 2008

Carmack mentions it here:<< Saturday just turned out to be another day of testing for us, we collected some data that we need, and we should be able to get a real fix made soon. From some discussions at the event, It sounds like it may be possible to make another try for the level 2 prize sometime earlier than next October this time. >>  <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

Swampcat · Oct 28, 2008

Replying to: <DIV CLASS='Discussion_PostQuote'>Carmack mentions it here:<<Saturday just turned out to be another day of testing for us, we collected some data that we need, and we should be able to get a real fix made soon. From some discussions at the event, It sounds like it may be possible to make another try for the level 2 prize sometime earlier than next October this time.>>  Posted by nimbus</DIV>I've written an e-mail to the X-Prize Foundation asking them what their plans are on this. I'll post their response...if any. As you may know (others may not), AA had some problems with the FAA getting approval for some of their testing. They knew there were some minor problems with the vehicle. Had they not been delayed in their testing they probably would have won the L2 prize. They should be ready to try again in a few weeks, but must wait for another opportunity. X Prize Foundation announcement. There's some new video on this page of the L2 attempt. It's rather short <img src="http://sitelife.space.com/ver1.0/content/scripts/tinymce/plugins/emotions/images/smiley-smile.gif" border="0" alt="Smile" title="Smile" />. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

Swampcat · Oct 28, 2008

Armadillo Aerospace News Archive John Carmack writes about this past weekends events. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

Swampcat · Oct 29, 2008

Thought I'd throw this on here:This is a quote by Neil Milburn of Armadillo from the arocket list: "We are campaigning for an LLC2008-1/2 rather than waiting for LLC2009 in October 2009. I think that this has advantages for the X-Prize Foundation, the state of New Mexico, NASA Centennial Challenge, Northrop Grumman and, not least, the teams. The Foundation had hinted earlier, and Peter D confirmed during the webcast, that an interim competition is possible."I would think that we will have the electronics issue killed stone dead within a couple of weeks. We are also discussing our options for how to attack the Level II next time. BUT, what do the other teams think would be a reasonable timeframe for getting their vehicles ready to fly. I'm particularly thinking about Paul, Kevin et al who came VERY close to making the start line. The most likely scenario would be a repeat performance at Las Cruces or, subject to pad construction, a launch site christening event at Spaceport America ... No facilities there though and the bushes aren't tall enough to hide those with small bladders or weak clack valves

"From other discussion, it appears that several teams are interested in not having to wait a year for another shot at L1.  <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

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