LM Plan Evolves Atlas to Saturn V-Class Performance

[spacester]

<font color="yellow">How can SpaceX fly 10-12 Falcon V missions over 2 years and possibly have enough money to fund a Saturn V class rocket? </font><br /><br />Listen to that Space Show interview (I wonder if there's a transcript?). Then tell me I'm making this stuff up. Maybe you already have, maybe I read too much into what I heard. I am a zealot after all. <img src="/images/icons/laugh.gif" /><br /><br />Some folks seem to think that SpaceX is planning on losing vast amounts of cash with every launch. Yes, their marketing strategy is to undersell the competition, and their pricing appears to be only loosely tied to cost of launch, but . . .<br /><br />What they're trying to do is create a rocketship company. To achieve that basic goal, they need to fly rockets, and they aim to do so with 100% reliability. They have the internal and external financing they need to pull it off. The pricing reflects this strategy, yeah maybe they lose some money on every launch in the first two years. Call it product development, even though it will look like an operational rocket ship company.<br /><br />Plus, when you only need around a dozen people to launch the thing, maybe just maybe they're not losing money per launch after all.<br /><br />The other thing you're missing here IMO is emerging markets. I can't list them for you, but SpaceX thinks they are out there chompin at the bit to fly for a meager $16 Million. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[gunsandrockets]

"I suspect "Falcon X" will not turn out to be Saturn V class but more along the lines of Delta IV Heavy in terms of payload."<br /><br />I agree. If SpaceX takes a page from Lockheed and Boeing, the Falcon V booster would make an exellent Common Core Booster for linking 3 CCB in parallel to create a Medium Lift Vehicle.<br /><br />Besides development costs and production efficiencies realized by using CCB design, CCB design is easier to keep 1st stage reusability and recovery because the size of the CCB first stage remains the same. If instead of CCB design SpaceX went with a new jumbo sized first stage, the difficulties of successful first stage recovery would magnify.<br /><br />Another interesting variation of the CCB design would be to use different fuel combinations than LOX/RP-1 for the central core booster. If the Merlin main engine can be redesigned so that it uses LOX/LH2 in the central sustainer CCB stage, SpaceX could get the best of both worlds of CCB design. The Boeing Delta IV CCB makes a great sustainer, but not so great a 1st stage booster. The Lockheed CCB makes a great 1st stage booster but is not so hot as a sustainer. This can be seen when one compares the flight performance of a single CCB Delta IV and a single CCB Atlas V vs performance of the Delta IV Heavy and the Atlas V heavy which use 3 CCB each. A single Atlas V is superior to a single Delta IV, but a Delta IV Heavy is superior to the Atlas V Heavy.<br /><br />One added complication though to a LOX/LH2 central CCB is the different density of LH2 compared to RP-1. Perhaps the central CCB could be stretched to accomodate the extra volume, that would be easier than redesigning the central core to a larger diameter (I think).

 

[mikejz]

I see the a new Falcon going for a single F-1 Class motor based booster that would go after Delta-Heavy and the Com sat market (Ariane 5 style). The booster would offer 3 CBCs that would boost payload up to about 110,000lbs. From there as the market matures the ability to develop the a Saturn-V style would become a possible.<br /><br />Of course we can dream and think about a Saturn-V Heavy!

 

[redgryphon]

<font color="yellow">"Except when you dump it into the sea !"</font><br /><br />Just a little historical note. Tests were conducted as part of the EELV program involving dropping an SSME into water, using a water-tight module. While Boeing touted it as a great breakthrough, the technology was never used. <br /><br />Details in this press release.

 

[mikejz]

To tout droping a rocket engine in the water, then picking it up and using it as being a 'great breakthrough' is exactly what is wrong the aerospace industy. I mean seriously, who didn't think that it was possible or doable?

 

[drwayne]

Tangential thought:<br /><br />It took them quite a few drops of the command module to get the structures right to have it some through splashdown intact - and not sink.<br /><br />Wayne <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p>"1) Give no quarter; 2) Take no prisoners; 3) Sink everything."  Admiral Jackie Fisher</p> </div>

 

[shyningnight]

Mikejz;<br /><br />I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you don't live near the ocean <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /><br />Salt water is corrosive as hell... Pretty much anything you put in it will corrode VERY fast. And that doesn't even address suspended particulate matter (ie sand). I would wager that half a teaspoon of sand in a turbopump at 30,000 rpm and the pump would destroy itself in about 10 seconds. Maybe less.<br /><br />Is "seawater proofing" things possible? Yes. Is it EASY? Hint: if it was easy, you wouldn't see the US Navy overhauling, stripping and repainting ships every two years....<br /><br /><br />Paul F.

 

[mikejz]

1. The test was in in-land waters (so the test has nothing to do with salt water effects)<br /><br />2. The news relase talked about containing the engines in a 'water-tight module'. <br /><br />3. We are not talking about continous salt exposure, but in the order a few hours per launch, after which it would be picked up and cleaned off. <br /><br />4. The news release seems to only indicate the following. that the SSME was droped a undisclosed height into a river (salt content not disclosed) possibly in a protective shell and/or with shoot, and then taken out and hot fired. That was the test as it seems to me--i do find that not importent and not news worth in my book.