Rocketforge

The 2004 International Space Development Conference was held this past weekend but I was unable to make it. Reports are slowly trickling in so I’ll list them here as I find them:

• From the new NSS Chapters blog reports of a launch vehicle debate between Zubrin, Tumlinson and Greg Allison. Plus there is the Top 10 Reasons for NOT going into space.
• From Jeff Foust comes some inside information on the state of the suborbital bill currently in the house.

Articles will be sparse until around June 2 due to conferences and the holiday weekend. If someone wants to submit something I’ll definitely be able to approve it…

(via Derek Deville on arocket)

HOT NEWS – The payload has been recovered and the data analyzed. It verifies just over 77 miles max altitude. Anything plastic touching the inside skin of the nose cone was melted from the heat. The stickers were all gone but the anodizing held up. The nosecone tip was damaged on impact so ablation effects couldn’t be determined. The electronics were all in great shape. Weightless for over 7 minutes.

Now my original post that I was writing…

Korey and I were there to share in this wonderful experience. The launch was flawless. The team assembled by Ky and led by Jerry Larson was running like a well oiled machine. The base camp included the GoFast bus and GoFast helicopter, there for search and rescue, along with a significant array of ground station electronics and antennas. I am confident that the data will be retrieved and will validate the rockets travels into space. It was a real privilege to be part of the team and we extend our thanks and congratulations to all involved.

Now a little bit about our involvement with the team. We are newest members of the CSXT team joining only six months ago. Since that time, incollaboration with Ky and Jerry, we have designed, developed, and built the largest amateur rocket motor ever. The solid propellant motor contained aderivation of the propellant that I have used for my O and P motors for the past few years. The motor is designated as an S-50000 containing 435 lbs of AP based propellant configured in a monolithic case-bonded grain with a central fin-o-cyl core with a nearly neutral thrust profile. The case was aluminum 6061 with an OD of 10″ and 175″ long. The end closures we reretained with two rows of radial bolts. The nozzle was created from a newprocess using a combination of graphite, carbon fiber, and ablative materials and featured a bell shaped exit cone. A number of static tests were performed on 3″ and 6″ hardware to characterize the propellant. A fullscale static firing revealed issues with the motors end closures that were corrected for the flight motor. Chuck Rogers assisted in designing the test configurations and in addressing issues such as erosive burning and nozzle losses. The propellant, known as D8, in 6″ P-motor sub-scale testing had a delivered Isp of 222.6 seconds. This results in a final minimum delivered total impulse of 96,831 lb-sec. We believe that the flight motor should have had a slightly higher delivered Isp due to altitude effects and delivered just over 100,000 lb-sec.

Video of the launch is at http://www.hybrids.com/video/csxt_flight.mpg

Arlington, Va. — May 18, 2004 — Space Adventures, Ltd., the world’s leading space experiences company, announced today it has begun working with Dentsu, the world’s largest advertising agency, to send a prominent Japanese figure to the International Space Station (ISS) within the next several years.

As part of the agreement with Dentsu, Space Adventures will dedicate one of the four seats the company has available on the Russian Soyuz TMA spacecraft. Space Adventures currently has a contract with the Federal Space Agency of Russia that provides them with the sole rights to transport the next four private space explorers to the ISS. The first of the four seats has already been contracted by American technology entrepreneur, Greg Olsen, Ph.D., who is currently training at the Yuri Gargarin Training Center in Star City, Russia. His expedition is currently planned for April 2005. With two of the four seats committed, Space Adventures has two seats remaining on the Soyuz.

“I welcome the opportunity to work with Dentsu. They are the world’s premier advertising agency and we are delighted to embark on such an exciting opportunity with them,” said Eric Anderson, president and CEO of Space Adventures. “As Dentsu has cultivated unique artistic designs and opportunities for advertising in today’s marketplace, we, at Space Adventures, are using the same enthusiasm and innovative techniques to open the space frontier to private citizens. Together, we will make history by sending the first Japanese private explorer to space.”

About Space Adventures: The world’s leading space flight experiences and space tourism company offers a wide range of programs from Zero-Gravity and Edge of Space flights, cosmonaut training and space flight qualification programs to reservations on future suborbital spacecraft. Headquartered in Arlington, Va., with an office in Moscow, Space Adventures is the only company to have successfully launched private individuals to the ISS. The company’s advisory board comprises Apollo 11 moonwalker Buzz Aldrin, shuttle astronauts Kathy Thornton, Robert (Hoot) Gibson, Charles Walker, Norm Thagard, Sam Durrance and Byron Lichtenberg and Skylab astronaut Owen Garriott. For more information, please visit www.spaceadventures.com.

About Dentsu Inc.: Founded in 1901, Dentsu is the largest advertising agency brand and the fifth largest marketing and communications organization in the world. Based in Tokyo, Dentsu offers national, multinational and global clients the most comprehensive range of advertising and marketing services through its unique “Total Communications Services” approach. Dentsu has pioneered and set global standards for integrated communications, which in latter years have been adopted by a number of major international networks. The group has more than 6,000 clients and 14,245 full-time employees in both Japan and in its offices overseas. Consolidated billings (net sales) for fiscal term 03/04 were recorded at 1,749 billion yen. Dentsu is publicly quoted on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. For more information, please visit www.dentsu.com.
2 comments

Alan Boyle (Cosmic Log) has some rather informed speculation on when Scaled’s attempt will be. With the X Prize Foundation confirming a 60-day notice that also blows out my 2 month prediction since I made that a little more than a month ago.
The 60-day notice is nice since that will give me time to get a decent ticket and hotel reservation.

(Via ARRL)Rocket Carrying Ham Radio Payload Reaches Space!

NEWINGTON, CT, May 17, 2004–An amateur rocket carrying a ham radio avionics package reached the edge of space May 17. Launched from Nevada’s Black Rock Desert, the 21-foot Civilian Space Xploration Team (CSXT) GoFast rocket quickly attained the 100 km altitude to make Amateur Radio and amateur rocketry history. Two earlier CSXT attempts to reach space–the last almost two years ago–were unsuccessful. A jubilant Avionics Team Leader Eric Knight, KB1EHE, called the successful launch “a phenomenal experience.”

Congratulations guys!

As long time readers will remember, I’m an advocate of using open source management/business techniques when possible. The folks at OSDN have a nice, concise article in IT Manager’s Journal on Seven open source business strategies for competitive advantage. Most of it is IT oriented but there is much of value in there for how aerospace companies can build value in different ways that allow them to take market share from the big boys.

(Via Space.com) Private Rocket SpaceShipOne Makes Third Rocket-Powered Flight

Estimates are for an altitude of a little over 200,000 feet. No speed estimates yet. The fligh was completely nominal as far as anyone can tell.

It seems that the ISS will eclipse Jupiter this coming Thursday evening and the path of totality passes directly over my house. I’m willing to bet that will be the day that one of these scattered afternoon thunderstorms that conspire to rain everywhere but my yard decides to park itself directly overhead.

The Day Job® and spending 4 hours on the tarmack at O’Hare have conspired to keep me from blogging several recent developments that need the attention. In no particular order:

• Jon Goff, part of the BYU Space Development Club, is working on a sparkless igniter that uses catalytic ignition of gaseous hydrogen to create a super reliable ignition system.
• Alan Boyle coversa Frank Sietzen article on a planned speech by the President soon after the Aldridge Commission submits its report.
• Robert Steinke has created a new project in the wiki for his temperature difference based pump design.
• Cats and dogs sleeping together! Leading Space Groups Agree: It’s Time For The Moon, Mars and Beyond. This new group is an alliance between the following bits of oil and water: Aerospace Industries Association, Aerospace States Association, American Astronautical Society, American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, California Space Authority, Florida Space Authority, The Mars Society, National Coalition of Spaceport States, National Space Society, The Planetary Society, ProSpace, Space Access Society and Space Frontier Foundation.

  The Moon Society will be joining the alliance soon.

• Bigelow Aerospace has contracted with SpaceX to launch a test inflatable on a Falcon V sometime next year. I wonder if that would qualify as the first free-market based contract for a launch service that is directly related to permanent, for profit human presense in LEO?
• New Mexico gets the Xprize Cup nod. I guess that means I’ll have to make some regular reservations at some tiny little motel in the New Mexico desert.
• While at Space Access ‘04 I mentioned the progress that JP Aerospace had been making and had some pictures of the presentation. Well I know have a PDF of the entire presentation.
• Check out HobbySpace on a daily basis since Clark does a much better job than I do on keeping track of everything that’s going on.