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N-Prize Founder Paul Dear Talks Prizes For Nanosat Race
Rob Goldsmith writes to point out this interview with Dr. Paul Dear, founder of the N-Prize, and explains: "For those of you who haven yet heard of the N-Prize, the N-Prize is a £9,999.99 (sterling) cash prize which can be claimed by any individual, or group, who are able to prove that they have put into orbit a small satellite. The satellite must weigh between 9.99 and 19.99 grams, and must orbit the Earth at least 9 times. This project must be done within a budget of £999.99 (sterling)."
I wonder if bribing someone at NASA or ESA to include your mini-satellite as part of the payload of the next launch would be acceptable; it's probably the most realistic chance...
It's official. Most of you are morons.
This guy just have a fetish for the number 9 or something?
At least it's a new one, can't find a term for it anywhere.
"For those of you who haven yet heard of the N-Prize, the N-Prize is a $19,636.90 (dollars) cash prize which can be claimed by any individual, or group, who are able to prove that they have put into orbit a small satellite. The satellite must weigh between 0.35 and 0.71 ounces, and must orbit the Earth at least 9 times. This project must be done within a budget of $1,963.67 (dollars)."
...some days you're the dog, some days you're the hydrant...
£999.99 could probably buy enough menthos and coke to launch the projectile.
It's pound sterling, but I guess that £ only stands for pound so they felt it necessary to say sterling too. Whatever, I'm from Georgia and played in the mud as a child, so I'm pretty sure I shouldn't be trying to answer this.
Hmm, with a budget of ~$2000, I just need $1000 worth of rubber tubing and two mountains. Anybody want to design the satellite?
All ideas^H^H^H^H^Hprocesses in this post are Patent Pending. (as well as the process of patenting all postings)
WHY!?
Is this some prototype for a global diamond delivery system? Serious, apprise me of the value of putting less than an ounce of something into orbit. And it's the "orbit" part that's tricky. A sufficiently large model rocket can do Alan Shepard-esque sub orbital flight. But to then pop it into orbit with a "circularizing burn" is tricky... on a budget.
I'm trying to not be a troll here, but this prize is designed to develop a $2K ICBM for very tiny payloads. If you put VX gas into something that might survive reentry, you'd have the plot for an Austin Powers movie. I'd call it "MoonShagger: It's a gas gas gas."
What a brilliant marketing meme: with just one borderline-ludicrous sentence, he managed to get many thousands of people talking, got his name in the news, launched a website, and promoted the website creation company, all at practically no cost, backed up (should someone ever achieve the borderline-ludicrous challenge) by a home-equity loan. The publicity-to-signal ratio is huge, at miniscule cost.
Can we get a "-1 Wrong" moderation option?
It's a pound that's 92.5% pure
*Prices* look like 9,999.99 so they appear small.
*Prizes* should look like 10,000.00 so they appear big.
Getting into orbit for less than $2,000 seems absurd (and not even worth firing up Rocksim to get specific figures). Ground launch would require very large motors - just the motor casings (solid or hybrid fuel) would likely cost over $2000. (98mm solid fuel casing costs about $500; that size motor might be able to achieve orbital altitude, but nowhere near orbital velocity). Add the cost of the fuel and a guidance system, surely it would cost many tens of thousands of dollars to get into orbit. Any other rocketeers here see a way to get into orbit for anywhere near $2,000? Or even $20,000? Sounds to me that the Dear Doctor has been Pounded on the head by a (sterling) Silver Hammer.
Aren't there enough issues with space debris, without 1000 amateurs chucking miniature debris into space? It's tantamount to throwing rocks at satellites and NASA shuttles, isn't it? What is this, space guerilla warfare??
We all live in a state of ambitious poverty. -- Decimus Junius Juvenalis
The full, official name pound sterling (plural: pounds sterling) is used mainly in formal contexts and also when it is necessary to distinguish the currency used within the United Kingdom from others that have the same name. Otherwise the term pound is normally used. The currency name is sometimes abbreviated to just "sterling", particularly in the wholesale financial markets, but not in amounts; so "payment accepted in sterling" but never "that costs five sterling". The abbreviations "ster." or "stg." are sometimes used. The term British pound is commonly used in less formal contexts, although it is not an official name of the currency. A common slang term is quid (plural quid).
The term sterling is derived from the fact that, about the year of 775, silver coins known as "sterlings" were issued in the Saxon kingdoms,[6][dubious - discuss] 240 of them being minted from a pound of silver, the weight of which was probably about equal to the later troy pound. Because of this, large payments came to be reckoned in "pounds of sterlings", a phrase that was later shortened to "pounds sterling". After the Norman Conquest, the pound was divided for simplicity of accounting into 20 shillings and into 240 pennies, or pence. For a discussion of the etymology of "sterling" see Sterling silver.
The currency sign is the pound sign, originally with two cross-bars, then later more commonly £ with a single cross-bar. The pound sign derives from the blackletter "L", from the abbreviation[citation needed] LSD - librae, solidi, denarii - used for the pounds, shillings and pence of the original duodecimal currency system. Libra was the basic Roman unit of weight, derived from the Latin word for scales or balance. The ISO 4217 currency code is GBP (Great Britain pound). Occasionally, the abbreviation UKP is used but this is incorrect. The Crown dependencies use their own (non-ISO) codes: GGP (Guernsey pound), JEP (Jersey pound) and IMP (Isle of Man pound). Stocks are often traded in pence, so traders may refer to pence sterling, GBX (sometimes GBp), when listing stock prices.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
The simplest way to launch satellites is to design a great big gun. The U.S. did some experiments with this with Project HARP. They were abandoned because manned flight required lower g-forces. However, if you just wanted to put a satellite into orbit, then guns can make sense.
Unfortunately, the last guy to try this (Gerald V. Bull), went on to attempt to build a super-gun for Saddam Hussein, and then mysteriously got shot (possibly by Israel's Mossad).
I'm not sure I want to win this contest. There have been quite a few projects in the area, and they all get canceled.
If you can get something in orbit for about $2k, I don't see why an upper weight limit would matter. Satellites are made as light as possible to keep down the cost of the launch, so I would think the goal would be to make the thing as heavy as possible within that budget. Whole thing seems stupid.
I remember seeing an analysis of this idea quite a few years back. In short, in order to add enough thrust using "D" engines to make it to orbit, you add so much extra weight that you'll never make it to orbit ... adding still more engines just compounds the problem.
Of course, this analysis was done assuming launch from ground, not launching from ... say ... a balloon launch platform at 20000m
If libertarians are so opposed to effective government, why don't they all move to Somalia?
The pound sign comes from "L". Where LSD - librae, solidi, denarii - was originally used in duodecimal from pounds, shillings and pence.
I never in my life thought that history lesson from high school would ever come in hand.
A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort.
See Sputnik... It only weighed 186 pounds and needed an 280 Metric ton launch vehicle... The fuel alone will cost more than $2k. Hmm... Big Model Rockets.... Nope... I believe the record altitude for model rocketry is just under 20,000 feet (Gates). A little short of space I'm also pretty sure they spent more than $2k to build it as well.. All in all a neat little marketing gimick.
1+2+1+1 || 1+2+2+1
I used to come in hand often during history class, my teacher was oh so yummy.
Why is that a *whoosh*? It is correct.
The original "Pound Sterling", way back when, was just that -- one pound of Sterling (92.5% pure) silver.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Hi all, Wow - this thread has grown fast. A few quick answers to some points raised: 1) Why? What use is it? - For fun, and none at all, in that order. Also to prove that the world isn't run by accountants and safety officers. 2) 20 grams is too light. - No it isn't. We're beyond valves. 20 grams is plenty for a half-watt transmitter, a few square cm of solar panels, and more. Most entrants are looking to put video on their satellite (you can get camera modules weighing less than a gram). Some entrants are going for optical signalling. Either way, it's not really a problem. 3) "Other" applications/ICBMs etc - So, what? We're supposed to say 'nobody is allowed in space because there are terrorists who could use this technology'? If so, they've already won, haven't they? 4) Space junk - Yes, we'll be adding one or two pieces to the tens of thousands already up there. However, N-Prize entrants are mostly aiming for low (sub-200km) orbits, which will decay quite quickly. 5) Feasibility at the price - it's on the borderline of possiblity, using either single-use launchers OR using a small recoverable launcher (in which case, you can spend what you like on the launcher, and only the fuel and refurb costs count). 6) Cost of permits etc - If you want to get permits etc, then that's fine. Their cost is not counted as part of the budget (see full rules). 7) Come on, guys, loosen up a little! This is an invitation to play, and to try something almost impossible for no practical reason whatsoever.
OK, I am a rocket engineer, you are not...
;-}
No, I did not neglect gravity, air resistance, etc. Orbital velocity is 7.7 km/s. I had a few hundred m/s extra for drag, and a few for gravity. I assumed a dense fuel (that's why the Isp sucks at 280), which minimizes air drag. I assume a rapid (as in high G) boost, because I don't see how you could possibly do this otherwise. I made lots of other assumptions, all vaguely reasonable, to make a back of the envelope calculation. The most unreasonable assumption, if you want to know, is that I am assuming an SSTO - which was obvious from the math, and so since you did not call me on it you are obviously not someone who has ever designed a rocket! An SSTO is very hard at normal sizes, and a tiny one is going to really require some "clever stuff", but hey, that why you get the big bucks for this design!
20:1 ratios have been achieved in the 1960s - yes, it is aggressive, are you saying this prize is not going to require an aggressive design?
If you really want to go into all this, read the wiki on delta-v - last time I was there, it was pretty good. High Isp designs (450 seconds, like the shuttle) require large delta-v budgets for air resistance and gravity losses, because they use hydrogen which is not dense, leading to larger airframes and lower thrust engines. (Engine T/W ratio is linked to propellant density).
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I AM a degreed Aerospace Engineer who worked in El Segundo for a company that is now known as Boeing. Savvy? I worked with real rocket engines (Marquardt 5lbf and 100lbf I knew Gil and Phil...), loaded bi-propellant into very thin titanium tanks, and worked with those who worked with the solid motors, including the PAMs. (yeah, them). Now, I grant you i'm rusty, so that I had to look several times to make sure your Delta-V equation was correct. So, here's some more that you neglected.
I AM a ... Savvy?
OK, well getting into a credentials pissing contest with a pseudo-anonymous person is just silly - especially since, if what you say is true, our credentials are orthogonal. (My title has three letters in it, and my budget is much larger than yours I'd bet)
But, as I said, I'm pseudo-anonymous, your pseudo-anonymous - so let's let the math speak for us:
Wave drag + stagnation temperature - you seem to be assuming high velocities in the atmosphere which, as you point out, is probably a sub-optimal design. Fortunately I assumed no such thing - I was doing a back-of-the-envelope calc, and just assumed that getting 10 kg clear of the appreciable atmosphere was not going to be a challenge, as balloons do that every day, etc. BTW, I did include "wave drag" and every kind of drag in my "couple of hundred m/s. Obviously, you could challenge that and I would not try to back it up - I'm not interested in this contest, except possibly as an advertising vehicle, so I am hand waving a lot of issues aside. (As I am sure you know, stagnation temperature means nothing - it is the temperature of the air a few feet in front of you. You want to calculate the heat flux transmitted to you by it, but fortunately you do not ever have to survive that temperature. Otherwise, no one would ever pass mach 5 or so - indeed, for a long time it was thought to be impossible)
Combustion pressure - Look, I hate to be rude, but this paragraph really doesn't sound like it was written by an aerospace guy. The engine pressure needs to be at least 3 times the external pressure or so (minimum design point). Since the burn will start way out of the atmosphere, that pressure will actually be limited by your combustion process rather than external pressures. Your pressure vessel calculations are, well, wrong. Tank mass scales directly with pressure and volume - and tanks do not care much about shape (as long as you have directional strength capabilities). That said, enclosing your entire propellant supply at full operating pressure is unlikely to be optimal - there are many ways to raise the propellant up to pressure as it is used, as I'm sure you realize. The critical point here is that engines with a T/W ratio of 100 are pretty easy using dense propellants. This really isn't the issue you seem to think it is.
Guidance, Circularization - OK, a lot of this just gets chalked up to the agreed premise that only thrusting in the atmosphere is dumb. But since I was talking about a rocket, rather than Bull's cannon, that is beside the point. Guidance is very hard - but not for the reasons you claim. Vectoring thrust is easy, proven and addresses all of your claims. What you missed is that while engines, tanks, and thrust vector control systems scale with vehicle size - guidance computers do not. This is a real problem for a 500 gram rocket - and is one of those things that you would have to design around.
Final stage - OK, if there was a point here, I missed it. I proposed an SSTO, which you say is dumb (words I believe you will eat inside 10 years). You then said that adding staging hardware eats mass (sort of - I submit that SSTO is harder and therefor heavier, but whatever). While true, it does not really apply.
You also mentioned performing a shuttle boost trajectory - that would not be very clever, since the shuttle only does that because they need to hit a particular orbit and have to launch from Florida. This project has no such requirements - obviously you would go to the equator and launch due east, for maximum boost.
On your engineering claims, I know how I would attempt it if I wanted to (somehow, dreams of $20K just don't excite me anymore) but I don't want to discuss that in an open forum. (You do know about ITAR, right?)
Let me just say that in regards to engineering (and science, for that matter), never believe someone who says it cannot be done. You cannot prove something impossible, and existenc
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Offtopic, but couldn't everyone here use GBP, USD, EUR etc. instead of the various currency symbols which get trashed on slashdot?
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it