X Prize Race Heats Up

evenprime writes "Armadillo Aerospace have already done a drop test, and Burt Rutan's company Scaled Composites did a second flight test of their launch plane/spacecraft combination on July 3. SC haven't posted the results yet, but when they do you will find them here. Sadly, PanAero doesn't appear to be doing that well. Although I like their "Junkyard Wars" technique, it doesn't look stuffing rockets in the back end of a business jet will build a legitimate contender."

Comments

Armadillo

[tra2499]

It's interesting to note that Carmack, with Armadillo Aerospace, is taking more of an Open-Source approach to the X-Prize by participating in mailing lists and discussing various aspects of his designs with others in the rocketry community. While he's not going full-disclosure, he's at least sharing a lot more than Rutan.

I'm cheering for Armadillo.

Re:tumbling

[tra2499]

It's not necessarily the sudden shock that makes parts separate themselves from each other. The airframe was rated to 0.8 Mach. Okay, let's assume that the FAA is being their usually pessimistic selves when it comes to airframe ratings and that it can sustain twice that much for a short duration. The speed of sound (Mach 1) is roughly 780 mph. If the airframe is capable of short bursts of 1.6 Mach, then I can't really see it surviving 2.97 Mach.

Once they hit transsonic, they will undergo a severe amount of turbulence. The longer they spend in the transsonic region, the bigger danger to those long, thin wings.

Are Competitors Building Dead-End Technology?

[reallocate]

I don't mean to demean any of the efforts, and all that cash is an obvious incentive. But, are any of the competitiors building something that isn't dead-end technology?

Consider: Rutan and others plan to boost a more-or-less conventional aircraft to a few times the speed of sound, coast to altitude, and glide back. (You can't just put a bigger firecracker in the back, remember. You need life-support, navigation, communications, and, especially, safe passage through re-entry.)

So, one of them bags the X-Prize, but in the end you still have a vehicle with a maximum velocity of 1500-2500 mph. That's a long way from the 17,000 mph needed to reach and sustain orbit.

Are any X-Prize competitors building something that can be the basis of a realistic orbital vehicle?

Re:Are Competitors Building Dead-End Technology?

[seanthenerd]

Actually, I read in a PopSci article (right here) that Rutan does have plans for the SpaceShipOne/WhiteKnight, but that he wants others to build and commercialize them:

Rutan's historical model is Wilbur Wright's tour of France in 1908, which sparked tremendous growth in the industry. Rutan wants SpaceShipOne to kick-start a similar burst of innovation. Hence his ambitious post-X-Prize testing and demonstration plan: Fly every Tuesday for five months, 20 flights in a row on schedule, to determine the system's cost and reliability. Though he envisions everything from 10- passenger suborbital tour buses to a giant White Knight that uses eight 747 engines to launch a 300-ton spacecraft, Rutan says those are for others to build: "The Wrights didn't build the world's first airliner--they didn't need to," he says. "I hope people don't expect me to certificate a spaceship and offer rides. I want to be doing something more exciting by then."

Go, Burt!

Re:Wanna fly it?

[hayesjaj]

Yes, it is more realistic, but it still needs work. From an experienced pilot's point of view, out of the box, X-Plan isn't as "real" as M$ Flightsim 2002 Pro (I'm sorry, but I did a snap roll in a 747 at 250 knots in the new xplane beta out of the box...that won't happen) . If you have some time (and the knowhow) to tweak it, it can really rock though. It is way more customizable and the graphics are much prettier. They need to add some more joystick support though...our setup here uses 6 usb joys for the throttle quad, yoke, pedals and switches. Xplane won't handle that yet. Here's hoping.