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YAPSLP: Yet Another Private Space Launch Plan
rleyton writes: "The BBC is reporting here that UK Rocket enthusiast Steve Bennett of Starchaser Industries is planning on launching himself into space soon. He's unveiling a rocket at a London exhibition. Other Rocket enthusiasts here in the UK are claiming it's "Suicide", but perhaps the momentum for a manned Private Space exploration is building?" First step: buy more D engines.
Yeah, the A-Team could build anything. Oh, wait "a team", not the "A-Team". Nevermind.
(I pity the fool who can't spell "roketier" correctly!)
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But then again, I could be wrong.
A long, long time ago
:).
I can still remember how the normal people got to space.
They got together with a team,
to fulfil a president's dream,
And be the ones to win the greatest race.
But now this loony makes me worry.
He seems to be in such a hurry.
He have deep enough pockets,
He's buying lots of rockets.
But I agree that if he tries,
To make his way into the sky,
Hop in, light up, and let it fly,
Then he will surely die.
Sing'n bye, bye crazy roketier guy.
Gonna fix a cement mixer to some rockets and fly.
But those who know say 'bennett's gonna die,
And if he does, nobody will cry',
Yeah if he dies, nobody will cry.
Thanks to Don McLean for one of the easiest to rewrite songs ever
Hopefully, Taco Bell will stick a target in the English Channel,and if the guy hits it, we all get a free Taco.
Hey, they tried it with Mir...
HI Mom!
Linux - Because Mommy taught me to Share.
Well-put.
I hope the guy makes it too, but I think he's toast.
You kiddies out there who've only watched "nice and slow barely-haul-yourself-off-the-pad" shuttle launches - solid rockets are capable of vicious acceleration.
I'm talking "supersonic by the time it's left the launch rail" vicious. Those of you who have ever seen a surface-to-air missile launch, you've got the right idea. (Those of you into model rocketry, scale up 36 or 72 times - as in, a full-size rocket clearing the launch pad in the same time as your model does! ;)
I don't know what kind of boosters he's using, but I'd sure like to. If someone this crazy is worried about the G forces on launch, I'm putting $5.00 on "The test vehicle launches, but turns him into a puddle of goo in the first second." (I've got another $5.00 on "The test vehicle crash-lands, but it didn't matter because the occupant was already goo before impact.")
On the off chance (maybe 25%) he survives the test flight, I've got $10.00 on "suffocates because he didn't think he had to test the pressure vessel", which I think is a 90%+ probability.
I think it's incredibly cool that he's got the brass ones to build a rocket and fly in it, and I definitely don't think the government should stop him from trying it (as long as he points the damn thing away from populated areas).
But I still don't think he's gonna make it.
Look at it this way, a lot of other private rocketeers are keeping an eye on Bennett and his launch efforts. Whatever happens, success or failure, they will gain from his experience. Bennet is a voluntary guinea pig. It sounds crazy but come to think of it, Christopher Columbus and his crew were willing guinea pigs too. They sure did not have the technology to send a self-piloted ship across the atlantic and back.
You are absolutely incorrect. Most liquid fueled rockets have a much higher ISP then their solid equivalents. The SRBs on the shuttle have an ISP of 260 something, if I recall correctly, while the SSMEs onboard the shuttle (liquid) have an ISP of over 400.
ISP is, basically, a measure of how much a pound of propellent goes towards propelling something.
The SRBs are cheap heavy thrust rockets, but nowhere near as efficient as liquid fuel.
He is sort of correct.
It is easier to get a high thrust to weight ratio out of solids, even though they have a lower Isp and generally a lower total dV per stage.
To get more thrust out of a solid, you basically just need a bigger nozzle, while to get more out of a conventional liquid engine, you need a bigger nozzle, and bigger turbopumps, plumbing, and combustion chamber.
Not that I think solids on a manned vehicle are very sensible...
John Carmack
And if he comes back in more than one piece, we'll ALL be able to pat him on the back.. in several different countries simultaneously! It's win-win!
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PaxTech
All movements for social change begin as missions, evolve into businesses, and end up as rackets.
b) Steve Bennett is a self-aggrandizing loon.
If website design skills have anything to do with building space craft, these people aren't going to get further then Wales.
Hopefully I didn't put any [] around my words.
A poorly-built wooden ship works like a raft.
A poorly-built airplane, provided you're not thick enough to push it off a cliff, works like a wagon.
A poorly-built rocket works like a bomb.
I'm beginning to wonder where our moral responsibility to protect an idiot from himself kicks in...
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
But it looks like all the smart ones are leaving first.
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One future, two choices. Oppose them or let them destroy us.
"...perhaps the momentum for a manned Private Space explosion is building?"
+5:offtopic,but anti-American
At this rate there's no need to worry about a "Nike solar system" or a "Microsoft galaxy". Just let'em all launch themselves into deep space on rockets fueled by egotism.
"I'm rich! I can do anyth---*crash*"
Sounds like he went from nothing to a leading contender for a Darwin Award.
"I wish I were a real boy, because then my mommy would love me." Really? I think I see a dead movie.
- the people who say it can't be done
- the people who say you can't do it
- the people who say only an organisation coincidentally like theirs can do it
- the people who say only an organisation run by a government can do it
Usually, most of these people are wrong.But they do serve to put people off doing it.
Space travel is too important to leave to chance. The more of us try it, the more likely it is that some of us will succeed at it.
So it might be dangerous? Big f'ing deal. In the country I live in, 10 people are killed by cars every day. Three guys in a rocket looks much more useful than that.
Go on, try doing something interesting today!
anarcho-roboticist [lopster incomplete: 6.5% of 2.5GB]