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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."
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.
I'd hardly call rocket engines added to a working design of a plane a "junkyard wars" approach.
More like two reliable systems mated together. Sure, the union isn't inherently reliable, due to unforseen interactions, but the individual components of each certainly are. They may be behind, but it's no reason to scoff at them.
********* sig: If you don't like the law, get filthy stinking rich, and buy a better one.
I don't think I want to be a passenger in that particular entry. Breaking ground is a pretty severe way of landing, in my opinion.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
Runs on OS X, OS9 and Windows. Warning: Harder to fly than MS Flightsim -- of course!
X-Plane, being fairly realistic, even has an FAA rating so it can be used (with a $150.000 motion platform) to log hours towards your Airline Transport Certificate.
Don't do it. It'll void your warranty.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
which significantly reduces the problems of going transsonic. Once you take the lack of air into account, turbulence becomes a lot less of a problem!
A pizza of radius z and thickness a has a volume of pi z z a
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?
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
Three jet aircraft take off. Two jets at either end of a long piece of knicker elastic. The third jet would have the payload of a space rocket attached by a hook to the middle of the knicker elastic. When all three planes have reached their ceiling. The middle plane flies earthwards, the other two planes fly horizontaly in opposite directions, loading the knicker elastic with the mathematical maximum of energy. When this point is reached, the middle plane releases the space rocket. All the energy stored in the knicker elastic will be transfered to the space rocket. How fast would the space rocket be going before it fired its engine, how much fuel would it need to achieve escape velocity?
I am not a mathematician, nor a materials scientist, so I do not know how much energy can be stored in knicker elastic. But I'm sure that it can be released in an effective way to be able to claim the 'X' prize.
I will not die happy if I never see elephants dance the pas de deux. Or human beings achieve true bird like flight. Or humanity starts the herculean task of putting the earth back the way they found it. Come on lads parties over, lets clean the place up, and put all the trees back. I know a place where there is lots of space, lots of room, its very quiet, very clean, no bugs, and twenty four hours a day sunshine. No earthquakes, no typhoons, hurricanes, very few neighbours.
It's called an elephant's trunk whereas it is in fact, an elephant's nose, a nose by any other name would smell as sweet
... I'd be spending my moolah on propulsion technology research, as opposed to the more high-profile Drive For The X-Prize.
Dense and compact energy sources... hell, fund fusion research for a start... more powerful and efficent ion engines... I don't happen to be a rocket scientist, but you get the idea.
To me, the one who revolutionizes propulsion, will be the first trillionaire in history. Not to mention a true hero to future generations.
The name's Cochrane... Zefram Cochrane... it could be you...
I would like some interplanetary travel (at least!) before I pass from this place. Someone help me out...
Years later, a doctor will tell me that I have an I.Q. of 48, and am what some people call "mentally retarded".
I believe that Slashdot is the only place where you can hear serious talk about international terrorism and antimatter bombs in the same post.
Armadillo and Scaled Composites have quite the financial backing and I think everyone believes that it's just a matter of time before either they succeed or take part in the most expensive darwin award to date. I'm kinda tired of the top news story being W's and Blairs lies and the "war in Iraq" that's supposed to be over yet we're still reportting casulties on both sides.
Everyone dreams of going to space, everyone has looked up in the night sky and thought I wonder what it's really like up there, and everyone at one time growing up pretended they were an astronaut/cosmonaut. I really wish the Ministry of News would declare this newsworthy beyound the nince websites and occassional backpage news blurb.
So who do I call, I'm curious, is there a director of the Ministry of News that declares everything in america newsworthy? Isn't it time that we started focusing on individual efforts for success rather than constantly dwelling on what's gone wrong for the last year? Did the war in Iraq stop these guys? Did september 11th (well legislation limiting their supplies sure didn't help)? Are they terrorists in disguise? NO NO NO NO NO, I want everyone to see that there's hope for the future and not everything is so dark and abismal.
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
One of the greatest side-effects of the claiming of the X Prize will be something that no one could have predicted just a year ago:
The X Prize will be won while the space shuttle is grounded.
So what, you might ask. Well, it's a big deal. For years, various groups have been trying to persuade NASA to work with, not compete with,
private ventures. And NASA has always given many reasons to refuse, the biggest one being "when was the last time a private company flew a man in space on their own rocket... er, never?" Of course, that's a perfectly legitimate concern.
But when the X-Prize is won while the shuttle is grounded, I think it will send a big message to both NASA and the people in the Administration who hold the purse strings, and we might see some interesting changes in NASA policy, the kind of changes that might speed up the day when every middle class American can enjoy a trip into space for a reasonable price.
Cool, huh?
And it's clear that the X Prize is going to be won soon. Check out
this article, which describes Rutan's plans to fly into space by December.