Max Vozoff (SpaceX) on COTS-like procurement

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docm

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Max Vozoff (SpaceX's Director of Civil Business Development) on COTS-like space procurement.

GREAT read!

Space Review link....

“COTS-like”: the future of space procurement

by Max Vozoff
Tuesday, September 8, 2009

The current Administration’s Review of Human Space Flight Plans Committee (aka the “Augustine Commission”) has generated a lot of debate, but one message has emerged loud and clear: NASA is going to have to find a way to do more with less, which means a greater use of commercial procurement practices. As USAF Colonel Peter Garretson observed in a recent article, “The most important and transformational program at NASA is not Constellation, but rather COTS [Commercial Orbital Transportation Services] and its innovative partnership and prize programs, which are focused on a meaningful and more important sustainable expansion of viable American capabilities.” (see “Elements of a 21st century space policy”, The Space Review, August 3, 2009) As NASA determines how best to engage the commercial space sector that is increasingly becoming an established part of the aerospace landscape, they should take a close look at their own Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program, which the Obama campaign identified last year as a good model for government/industry collaboration.
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neutrino78x

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In the military we used the term COTS to stand for Commercial Off The Shelf, meaning, instead of having stuff custom built, you would try to take the same model of device that was sold commercially and adapt it to the military environment, make it more rugged, etc. For example, instead of a $500,000 custom built CRT monitor that can withstand a grenade going off -- it is CRT because it took that long to get it certified MILSPEC -- maybe you take a $200 commercial LCD monitor and put in a MILSPEC case. Then you can always upgrade the monitor to the latest model, and keep the same MILSPEC case for 20 years. Now it can still withstand a grenade going off, but you don't have to use old technology. Makes it a lot easier to use the latest stuff. In theory, anyway. lol. ;) Here is a good article about it: COTS on the USS Helena Fast Attack Submarine (I was on a submarine, but not the helena, it was the Florida, at the time a trident missile boat, it has since been converted to SSGN, and I was also on a fast attack boat, though I never went to sea on that one because it was in drydock the whole time. I was sonar.)

But I think this is related because it would probably decrease cost and increase flexibility in the same ways.

I did have a question about this subject though...can the Orion capsule go on top of Ares I, Delta, or Falcon rocket equally well? Or do you have to modify it somehow to be used on something other than Ares I?? I would prefer the first way -- ability to go on any small rocket -- for maximum flexibility. That way, you normally go on "whatever commercial rocket is available" to stimulate the private sector, but in an emergency situation (rescuing civilians in space?), you can whip out a rocket from the existing USAF or other military inventory.
 
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radarredux

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neutrino78x":3g55789o said:
Now it can still withstand a grenade going off, but you don't have to use old technology.

The monitor might survive, but the human operator might not come out so well in that scenario.

neutrino78x":3g55789o said:
I did have a question about this subject though...can the Orion capsule go on top of Ares I, Delta, or Falcon rocket equally well? Or do you have to modify it somehow to be used on something other than Ares I??

IMHO, that should have been their first design goal. But too often (and this just isn't Constellation or NASA) they will design a spec to ensure that nothing can meet its need and thus justify the need to build something new like Ares I. :|
 
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