Lunar Spacecraft Compete For $2 Million NASA Prize

coondoggie writes "Nine rocket-powered vehicles will compete for NASA's $2 million, 2008 Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge, Oct. 24-25. The goal is to accelerate development of commercial Lunar Landers capable of bringing payloads or humans back and forth between lunar orbit and the lunar surface. NASA of course would expect to use some of the technology developed at the Challenge. To win the prize, teams must demonstrate a rocket-propelled vehicle and payload that takes off vertically, climbs to a defined altitude, flies for a pre-determined amount of time, and then land vertically on a target that is a fixed distance from the launch pad. After landing, the vehicle must take off again within a pre-determined time, fly for a certain amount of time and then land back on its original launch pad." Details about the teams involved with the competition are available at the X-Prize website. The event will be broadcast live via webcast next weekend.

Comments

I would have competed

[stonefoz]

I would have competed but I had an error in the firmware for the lander, meters converted to feet. Now I just have a crater in my back yard. Perhaps NASA doesn't need the help.

Re:I would have competed

[lysergic.acid]

yea, it seems like using a rocket & balloon combo for space launches might be cheaper or more fuel efficient, but there are also drawbacks. it would take a long time to get up to 80km using a balloon. i think hydrogen weather balloons are only used up to 40 km, above which sounding rockets are used. also, would hydrogen be practical for large payloads? you'd need a balloon large enough to lift a rocket + lunar lander. and AFAIK high altitude hydrogen balloons (and rocket + balloon combos) are only used with relatively small payloads.

perhaps hydrogen balloons might be most efficient for applications that require little to no flight control and do not demand speed or safety. and unless you could recycle the hydrogen somehow, it'd be least wasteful to use hydrogen balloons when you need to keep something up in the air for long periods of time (such as scientific instruments for conducting atmospheric research). but i don't know what it costs to manufacture rocket fuel compared to hydrogen gas. it may very well be that for non-time-critical applications hydrogen is still cheaper than rocket fuel for launching something into space.

Re:I would have competed

[Meumeu]

Most of the energy of a rocket is used to gain speed, not altitude. Even if you can reach 50km, that would only save about 1% of energy for a lunar rocket.

Re:I would have competed

[lysergic.acid]

i don't know the exact details, but apparently others have given it some thought and seem to have arrived at various solutions to the problem.

Re:I would have competed

[TheRaven64]

Low earth orbit is around 2000km up. Geosynchronous orbit is 35,786km above the Earth's surface. The height of the top of the stratosphere, which is about as high as you can get with a balloon, is 50km. It might be possible to get as high as 100km using a magic balloon. This would get you 5% of the way to LEO, or just under 0.3% of the way to geostationary orbit. The additional complexity of building something as massive as a balloon capable of getting a huge payload of rocket fuel to the edge of the atmosphere does not justify a 0.3% saving (closer to 0.1% in practice) in initial altitude. You can get a similar order of magnitude advantage without the additional complexity by launching from a large mountain.

If you want a multi-stage design, you'd be better off looking at jet and scramjet technologies than balloons. A jet is much more efficient than a rocket, because the reaction mass and the oxidiser are both taken from outside - it only needs to carry the fuel. Remember, in getting to orbit speed is more important than altitude. Escape velocity is around 11km/s. If you start from a jet at Mach 1, you are at 3% of this speed already. If you start from a jet at Mach 4 and then use a scramjet to get up to Mach 17 (the speed of X30) you are at 50% of escape velocity (70% of orbital velocity) before you leave the atmosphere. This reduces the size of the rocket needed by a huge amount.

Re:I would have competed

[hcdejong]

Low earth orbit is around 2000km up.

No, it's 200 km up.

If you want a multi-stage design, you'd be better off looking at jet and scramjet technologies than balloons.

That's been done already: Orbital Sciences offers the Pegasus which can launch up to 450 kg into a 200 km orbit. The Pegasus weighs 23 tons at launch.
To scale this up, you'd probably need a specialized aircraft: Pegasus is about the limit for launching from underneath the fuselage (larger-diameter rockets just won't fit), so you'd need to launch from a wing pylon, and I think there are no aircraft in service that have wing pylons rated for that much weight.
If you could modify an Antonov 124 to carry its full payload (150 tons) on a wing pylon, you'd get about 450x6=2700 kg in LEO.

Land? IRL?

[Tubal-Cain]

I am not ready to be landing spacecraft on the moon IRL. I can't even do it in the simulator

DC-X ???

[tekrat]

According to what the NASA statement wants from the vehicle, this sounds exactly like what the DC-X already was capable of doing and that technology is already available and tested. Why re-invent the wheel here?

I mean, am I crazy, or does it seem that NASA just likes doing the exact same thing over and over again, except using a whole new technology each time just to make everything more expensive than it needs to be?

Re:DC-X ???

[jcupitt65]

You're right that these projects are not doing much technically that's not been done previously by government programmes. Their innovation is that they are dramatically cheaper and that someone other than NASA is taking the risk and making the investment.

Re:DC-X ???

[lysergic.acid]

so should we still be using Atlas or Redstone rockets? or maybe we should scrap this contest and just reuse the Apollo Lunar Module design. there's nothing wrong with trying new & potentially better technology. that's the whole purpose of technological research--to drive technology forward.

besides, the DC-X project was never completed. if McDonnell Douglas wants to complete the DC-X and submit it into the competition, then they're free to do so. of course, the prize for this contest is only $2 million, whereas the estimated cost of completing the DC-X was $50 million...

Would a frog attached to a bottle rocket count?

[fortapocalypse]

Just asking... It seems like it would fit the definition:

"Rocket-propelled vehicle and payload (the frog is its own vehicle and payload, and can be rocket-propelled via bottle rocket) that takes off vertically (frogs jump), climbs to a defined altitude (frogs can jump consistently to a defined height), flies for a pre-determined amount of time (frog stays in the air a while), and then land vertically on a target (a lilypad) that is a fixed distance from the launch pad (1.5 feet away). After landing, the vehicle must take off again within a pre-determined time, fly for a certain amount of time and then land back on its original launch pad (frogs do this)."

Re:Would a frog attached to a bottle rocket count?

[dnwq]

... what sort of mutant frogs have you seen that can jump to the defined altitude of 150 feet?

Why not be specific ?

[mbone]

climbs to a defined altitude, flies for a pre-determined amount of time

Why not be specfic, since the details are available ?

There are two levels of difficulty. FTFA :

Level 1 requires a vehicle to take off vertically from a designated launch area, climb to an altitude of at least 150 feet, remain aloft for at least 90 seconds while traveling horizontally to a landing pad 300 feet away, then land vertically.

The much more difficult Level 2 requires a vehicle to take off from a designated launch area, ascend to an altitude of 150 feet, hover for 180 seconds, then land precisely on a simulated, rocky, lunar surface 300 feet away.

You get to refuel, then you have to come back in the same fashion.

Re:Lunar Challenge

[Teancum]

There are three things about Armadillo Aerospace to remember:

• They have (comparatively) low overhead for their facilities and personnel. While I think they now have a couple of full-time employees, it is just a couple of them... plus a couple of aeronautical engineering interns and others who are all making peanuts. John Carmack's salary doesn't figure into the equation (yet). Being in Texas and Oklahoma doesn't hurt either, especially with the decommissioned air base in Oklahoma that is desperate for customers and practically subsidizing Armadillo's efforts.
• They have been doing a couple of smallish contracts for NASA and a few other companies that are mainly propulsion studies. Armadillo is widely acknowledged as having the most practical experience with smaller liquid-fueled engines than almost anybody in the industry at the moment, where the cost of the rocket fuel is one of the major budget items for them, which is generally something most rocket launchers typically ignore due to how insignificant it is compared to operations and vehicle costs.
• Armadillo engines are being used with the Rocket Racing League, where at least six of them have been sold to paying customers. I believe this is the largest source of money at the moment, and something that looks like a steady source of future income.

John does post on here occasionally, so he might fill in some details, but there is a source of income for the company. They are also not stopping with these few revenue streams either, but have some huge ambitions for the future.