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The Step-By-Step DIY Approach To The X-Prize

Posted by timothy on from the step-one-write-doom dept.

HobbySpacer writes "According to this article, John Carmack's Armadillo Aerospace team is making steady progress towards a X PRIZE rocket vehicle. Playing the tortoise to Burt Rutan's hare , the Texas team just might win the race to 100km altitude. At least if some of the other teams don't get there first."

3 of 154 comments (clear)

  1. Re:NASA/ESA are just not the right guys by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    See the first comment on advances made by the private sector.

    And as for a 'Microsoft' in space, that will never be allowed to exist. There's a big difference between space and software - mainly, space is *space*. That is, area to be controlled. Planets and asteroids, which are veritable land to be dominated over and taxed.

    Look at the New World. The private sector made the journeys, but the flags they flew were that of England, Spain, Portagal and a few others. And those nations wisely stepped in and prevented private monopolies.. Because anyone with land (or space) and accompanying resources (which, if you believe asteroid mining/farms on the moon theories) can easily become a nation, and thus, a threat.

    The idea of privatizing space exploration is a good one. If private jokers start creating moon bases, governments will have no choice but to follow suit. And governments are in a very good position to do that - all it takes is a simple declaration of 'National Security!' and a corporation's monopoly on launch/flight/etc. vehicles is no longer a monopoly.

  2. Re:More Analogies (Re:Analogies) by tengwar · · Score: 2, Interesting
    The Concorde went out of service because...

    Sheesh guys, don't bury the old girl 'til she's dead. Concorde still goes over my house every day, and will do for the next eleven days.

  3. Re:Carmack's project by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting
    "When Scaled Composites released their first publicity shots of their two hulls, they were just that -- hulls. No rocket engine, no mating assembly, no jet engines even. But they carefully photoshopped the images (see previous Slashdot coverage) to make it appear that they were farther along than they were at the time."

    Umm, i don't know who told you that, but they were mistaken. When Scaled announced the program to the public on April 18th 2003 they had already flown the White Knight 20 times. The first flight was on August 1st, 2002; several months before the program was announced. In addition there had already been 5 motor test firings. Heck, they even flew White Knight for the unvieling on the 18th and then again on the 26 for "CNN, ABC, PBS, Tech TV, Discovery & National Geographic TV"
    Source: http://www.scaled.com/projects/tierone/index.htm

    Scaled hasn't faked a single report. They aren't giving daily reports to their progress; but why whould you want to let your competition know exactly where your at? I think Carmack's making a mistake by issusing the weekly reports. Every X-Prize team knows exactly where Carmack's team is at and how much time they to finish their entry till he launches.