Blue Origin's New Shepard details revealed

[soyuztma]

The FAA AST has posted the The Draft Environmental Assessment for the Blue Origin West Texas Commercial Launch Site. It reveals a lot about the New Shepard. <br /><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>The New Shepard RLV system would be comprised of a propulsion module and a crew capsule(CC) capable of carrying three or more space flight participants to space. The CC is stacked on top of the propulsion module. The stacked vehicle would have a roughly conical shape with a base diameter of approximately 7 meters (22 feet) and a height of approximately 15 meters (50 feet).<p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br />They are planning to begin test flights this year. <br /><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>In the third and fourth quarters of 2006, Blue Origin would ship the first prototype low-altitude test vehicle to the site and conduct the first flight tests. Ten or fewer flight tests could be conducted in 2006, each to an altitude of approximately 610 meters (2,000 feet) for less than one minute.<p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br /><br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[nacnud]

From the report can you work out the propellants?<br /><br />It superficially sounds like the DC-X.<br />

 

[nacnud]

And looks like it.

 

[soyuztma]

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>From the report can you work out the propellants?<p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br />The report says:<br />"The propulsion module would use 90 percent concentration hydrogen peroxide, called high test peroxide (HTP) and rocket propellant (RP) grade kerosene as the propellants."<br />and:<br />"Before flying the human-carrying operational New Shepard RLV for commercial operation, Blue Origin proposes to develop and flight test a series of unmanned prototypes at the West Texas launch site. The first of these vehicles would be a low-altitude demonstrator of the propulsion<br />module using approximately 2,042 kilograms (4,500 pounds) of HTP as a monopropellant,<br />capable of reaching an altitude of no more than 610 meters (2,000 feet) with a mission time of<br />less than one minute."<br /><br /><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>And looks like it.<p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br />That's because it is a drawing of the DC-X. It's not a drawing of the New Shepard.<br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[nacnud]

Doh, I did think that <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /> <br /><br />I didn't think the the DC-X was that cylindrical near the top, plus the landing gear was round rather than oval. Still it's only a drawing.<br /><br />Thanks for the propellants. I wonder how that choice fares for higher energy trajectories an orbital posiblities.

 

[larper]

I think I am going to cry!!!<br /><br />I was hoping that Blue Origin was a DC-X type vehicle, and now to see that beautiful shape again...... <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong><font color="#ff0000">Vote </font><font color="#3366ff">Libertarian</font></strong></p> </div>

 

[kdavis007]

Neat....

 

[gunsandrockets]

"I was hoping that Blue Origin was a DC-X type vehicle, and now to see that beautiful shape again...... "<br /><br />A DC-X type vehicle? In terms of vertical take-off and vertical landing, yes it is a DC-X type vehicle. In terms of it evolving into a Delta Clipper type SSTO, I very much doubt it.<br /><br />The New Shepard is a suborbital vehicle using HTHP and RP-1 as propellants. Scaling the New Shepard up to a SSTO using the same propellants is not credible. Even the Delta Clipper using LOX/LH2 was only theoretically capable of SSTO flight. However the description I read of the New Shepard over at hobbyspace.com leads me to think that SSTO is not the direction of Blue Origin's development plan.<br /><br />The New Shepard vehicle is described as having a crew cabin which can separate from the vehicle and land via parachute as the rest of the New Shepard vehicle lands under power. Now that cabin might just be a safety feature, but I think the New Shephard suborbital vehicle is really part of a phased development plan towards a two-stage-to-orbit vehicle (TSTO). The suborbital New Shephard could be a scale model of the first-stage of a two-stage vehicle, while the cabin is leading to an orbital capsule.<br /><br />Many design possibilities arise from the basis of a TSTO layout. If the second stage is expendable, then only the small crew cabin would need heavy heat-shielding to survive re-entry and parachutes for recovery. The reusable 1st stage could use very modest but durable thermal-protection because it would never reach a very high speed during flight (maybe Mach 7?). Even if Blue Origin wants to develop a fully reusable second-stage that could land vertically under power DC-X style, an expendable second stage gives Blue Origin a short-cut to orbital flight capability.

 

[qso1]

gunsandrockets:<br />Even if Blue Origin wants to develop a fully reusable second-stage that could land vertically under power DC-X style...<br /><br />Me:<br />A recoverable first stage may be doable depending on where the craft is launched from. A recoverable second stage would be pretty expensive I would think because the second stage would probably have to be near orbital velocity when a capsule section would separate. This would involve a thermal protection system for the second stage along with chutes among other things. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[gunsandrockets]

Didn't I just say that?

 

[scottb50]

Sounds pretty busy to me, especially where they are launching from. Where is the first stage going to land? Georgia if it goes to orbit.<br /><br />I simply don't see any possibility of vertical landings because the weight of propellant would be rediculous, I do see a winged launch vehicle with turbojet engines as very possible. They could be used during launch to offset the weight they require as well as supplimenting the rocket motors.<br /><br />If you then use the second stage tanks as building materials or Tugs the entire system is re-usable. The payload attached to the second stage could be a return vehicle or a cargo module, the module being used as building material once the cargo is removed. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[josh_simonson]

There is little propellant on board when it lands - the T/W ratio of the craft will be enormous. The article said landing would be a 15 second burn. That's not much.

 

[j05h]

This type of craft will be at terminal velocity in the lower atmosphere - it will only be falling at several 100kph. Add physical airbrakes/alerons on the upper surface and it should be a fairly easy ride down. This type of craft is cool - DC-X heritage, Phil Bono, etc.<br /><br />NPR had a piece on Blue Origin yesterday. pretty good, included a quote from the City Inspector describing permitting of rocket fuel handling in their warehouse. Included an Andrews Space quote that this level of ultra-rich "hobbyist" being necessary but that they can lock in on a technique and stick to it through to failure. I think he was referring to VTVL enthusiasts. <br /><br />Josh <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <div align="center"><em>We need a first generation of pioneers.</em><br /></div> </div>

 

[vogelbek]

Yeah, I was the student in that interview...kinda cool to be asked my opinion about anything...<br /><br />I wonder what they are thinking from a systems level with their prototype first stage. Monopropellant performance just isnt high enough to do much as a primary propellant (I crunched the numbers with the CEA code, it looks like about 1784 m/s isp, 181 s in english units) I'm thinking they mean to use the monopropellant as a high reliabilty restartable engine for landing opperations. The other options are maybe turbojets (I'm guessing the T/W ratios arnt that great) or restartable LO2/Kerosene engines.<br /><br />Maybe they're really getting hard-core about things and using H2O2/kerosene bipropellant as their primary propulsion (270 s isp, compare to LOX/kerosene @ 286 s isp). A key advantage to that is storable oxidizers (fewer ground-handling issues), and plenty of "green" monopropellant for restartable landing thrusters. I'm a big fan of non-cryogenic propellants whenever they're possible.<br /><br />Of course it goes almost without saying that they will be using an upper stage for orbital opperations- there is no way that SSTO would work with H2O2/Kerosene (and only works for LO2/LH2 on paper)...pity... There's a book called "The Rocket Company" (by Patrick J. G. Stiennon & David M. Hoerr) that was really pretty good about a 2-stage powered VTOL orbital vehicle. I didn't check any of their numbers, but it sounded generally plausable to me.

 

[publiusr]

No official artwork as of yet?<br /><br />The DC-X had some tankage from Birmingham Alabama's defunct Chicago Bridge and Iron.

 

[soyuztma]

The Carried Away blog has put up trip report of a trip to the Blue Origin spaceport: 3 New Spaceports in 3 Days -- Blue Origin (Van Horn). It includes a distant view of the main spaceport buildings. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[docm]

Talk about resurrecting a thread :roll:

Dr. S. Alan Stern gave a talk before the USRA Division of Space Life Sciences in September and some Blue Origin stuff was included. Here's a link to the video (long, but worth it).....

http://www.dsls.usra.edu/grandrounds/20090922/

and here is the PDF with his slide images.....

http://www.dsls.usra.edu/grandrounds/20090922/stern.pdf

from that PDF here is the latest version of New Shepard's first stage on the production floor and below is a digital rendering of the completed article. Looks like the New Shepard they flew 3 years ago (bottom) is actually a second stage crew/cargo capsule, doesn't it?

The top photo is about a year old and Stern says it's now pretty much completed and so should be nearing test flights. Stern estimates its height at 33 feet. If you look closely it looks like a small nose cone, or just part of the capsule, is in the background to the left. Note its similarity to the piece at the top of the New Shepard in the bottom pic.

Could also be a cone for the first stage to enhance it's fly-ability during recovery and there is an interstage (carbon composite tube) between the first stage and New Shepard to provide clearance. Using an identical profile to the cone that caps New Shepard would cut design and production costs.

 

[Jazman1985]

Great pictures and links! Looks like I imagined it, appears to be the same design they advertised years ago, so I'm going to guess it's still a mono-propellant vehicle. From the looks of that vehicle they are definitely posing to scale it up to orbital. The girth of that rocket is pretty impressive.

 

[EarthlingX]

This is what Blue Origin promises, but has yet to deliver :

No news since 2006, only talk, no flight info, or at least i couldn't find it. They seem to be very tight lipped.

I think that Sheppard could easily do orbital flights, with refueling in LEO.

Couple of words about the ship and promises:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Origin_New_Shepard

The New Shepard craft is planned to be a vertical take-off/vertical landing (VTOL) system. Its appearance and technical concept are similar to the DC-X. The overall shape is circular in cross-section and ogive (bullet shaped) from nose to tail, the base being somewhat rounded. It is powered by a cluster of nine engines powered by High test peroxide (HTP) and RP-1 kerosene, arranged in a 3 by 3 grid on the bottom. Four landing legs containing shock absorbers also extend from the edges of the bottom. The existing demonstrator vehicle has a diameter of 7 metres and a height of 15 metres. The total mass of the propellant is 54 tons and the thrust is 1000 kN.

Initial low altitude flight testing (up to 600 m) with subscale prototypes was scheduled for the fourth quarter of 2006.[2] This was later confirmed in a press release by Blue Origin.[4] It could involve up to ten flights. Incremental flight testing to 100 km altitude is planned to be carried between 2007 and 2009 with increasingly larger and more capable prototypes. The full-scale vehicle is expected to be operational for revenue service in 2010, and could fly up to 50 times a year. Clearance from the FAA is needed before test flights begin, and a separate license is needed before commercial operations begin. The company held a public meeting on 15 June 2006 in Van Horn, as part of the public comment opportunity needed to secure FAA permissions.[2] Blue Origin says that once cleared for commercial operation, they would expect to conduct a maximum rate of 52 launches per year. The RLV would carry three or more passengers per operation.[5]

and experimental version tested
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Origin_Goddard

video clip of Blue Origin First Flight

Whatever happened to Blue Origin? dated December 8, 2008 brings some info and guesses:

So, my guestimates for a testing timetable is the following;

1. End of 2011 first test flight of the entire integrated vehicle, perhaps slipping into 2012

2. BO's Little Joe (scale first-stage) launches CC test article for parachute landing in 2011

3. Parachute drop tests in 2010

4. Increasing altitude powered ascent/descent of first-stage through 2010 and 2011

5. Ground based LAS tests 2009

6. BO Little Joe launches of instrumented CC test article for avionics and other subsystems

7. Lots of altitude chamber testing of the first stage's engines until first test flight

8. Repeated test stand full mission duration firings of full-scale first-stage test article

and here are some more secrets revealed :
http://www.personalspaceflight.info/cat ... ue-origin/

among them old news

Blue Origin has moved on from its original demonstration vehicle, Goddard, to a second vehicle currently under development. At least one more demo vehicle will follow that second one.

and some more.

 

[Boris_Badenov]

With all the secrecy Blue Origin practices I can't help but to wonder if some of what they do is politically incorrect. Could they possibly be working on a Nuclear Propulsion system?

 

[docm]

Not likely with all those (presumably) thrust chambers at the base. IMO the secrecy is that they're working with Phantom Works and that there are military applications. Heard a few rumors of connections to the intelligence community which would go along with that. Intelligence agencies could benefit from a fly-back booster/spacecraft that because of VTOL could operate most anywhere and be carried in a standard cargo plane.

 

[EarthlingX]

SDC article :
Veil Lifts Slightly on Secretive Blue Origin Rocket Project

posted: 26 February 2010
08:22 am ET

BOULDER, Colo. — For all the shake, rattle and roll that a rocket emits on takeoff, the secretive private rocket firm Blue Origin is still keeping quiet even as new details are emerging regarding its new vertical launch and landing rocket.

 

[docm]

Blue Origin's biconic capsule as pictured in the Lindenmoyer/JSC AIAA C3PO pdf....

 

[EarthlingX]

Blue Origin's biconic capsule as pictured in the Lindenmoyer/JSC AIAA C3PO pdf....

Very nice

 

[Valcan]

OOOO nice. Thanks for the info. Hope to hear something good out of these people soon....

Really really hope the stupid conspiracy theory crap will die a horrible death. God hate conspiracy theorist. There is a Reason people think your crazy.