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Just $10M Keeping "Red Neck Rocket Scientist" From Reaching Space
McGruber writes "The Arizona Republic has an update on Morris Jarvis, a Project Manager at Intel who also happens to head Space Transport and Recovery (STAR) Systems, a commercial space-travel company, out of his east Mesa, Arizona home. Jarvis has built the Hermes, a prototype, proof-of-concept model of a space shuttle, that is 27 feet long with a 21-foot wingspan. He believes that if he were to receive $10 million today, he could have the first test launch in a year. Jarvis 'envisions two tour options for his completed Hermes. In the first, a high-altitude balloon will raise the Hermes to 100,000-plus feet, where customers can see the curvature of the Earth. The second is a rocket-powered option that will put customers in a suborbital trajectory where they can experience weightlessness.' According to the Silicon Valley Watcher, Morris likes to describe himself as the 'Red Neck Rocket Scientist.' (He was interviewed in this May 24, 2011 IntelFreePress Video posted at YouTube.)"
There's a reason NASA's Shuttle budget was immense, and that it takes a billionaire like Elon Musk to succeed at space entrepreneurism: It costs a lot of money to design, build, test, redesign, rebuild, retest, [rinse and repeat...] to the point where you're not being criminally reckless to put a human being in a space vehicle.
And even then, deadly accidents happen.
The Russians do it slightly differently by emphasizing building the hardware and testing it rather than modeling, analysis and simulation, especially in the preliminary design phases. It saves a little money, but is still costly.
Put another way, if garage-built rockets could make it into space, then we'd have orbital, Lunar and asteroid colonies by now.
But one of these days, technology and materials will allow "garage" projects like this. Perhaps the time has come. I wish him luck. It takes cojones grandes to be the first. If he's patient, deliberate, extraordinarily cautious, and more than a little lucky then he can pull it off.
I can see the fnords!
"Hey ya'll hold my beer and watch this!"
Fixed that for you; he's the Red Neck Rocket Scientist after all.
I can see the fnords!
The first thing I noticed was the shape of the windows. Notice the sharp edges, and the shape. Looking at the windows on modern spacecraft (in this case, this is a part of the Orion MPCV before being welded together, one can see that there is a large support structure around the window, all of which adds a tremendous amount of weight.
An aerodynamic clone of the space shuttle, such as Buran, must retain the shape in it's exactness, or else it will ruin the design without a lot of testing.
If anything, they could do what Boeing is doing with the X-37C, and scale down the shuttle (though it differentiates from the design slightly).
I see a lot of fundamental flaws. Their idea isn't impossible, but they should focus more on copying what's out there in the public domain before trying to improve the cockpit by adding big protruding windows to the cabin, which will make this thing a deathtrap. To keep costs down, nothing new should be added to this spacecraft that hasn't already been tested by a government over and over (the most expensive part of spaceflight). Normally a space system one or two new technologies to it. If one were to be a scaled copy (say a shuttle designed for two people), it could be done for significantly less.
Personally, if I had $10 million to develop a shuttle, I'd clone three SSMEs, make an orbiter that held two people (scale down of the current orbiter), and make it work without Solid Rocket Motors. I'd also make sure to use the new PICA heat shield tiles (the old orbiters only got new tiles if one fell off).
Sig: I stole this sig.
Hi everyone,
I've been working on the Hermes Spacecraft for about 1.5 years now. I'd like to clear up a few things for you.
Like everything else in our project so far, the vehicle you see is a prototype. It is flight worthy, with some work, but NOT space worthy. If we had full funding immediately, we would set aside the current vehicle and use it for promotion, to send out to schools and other interested parties.
The prototype is made of aircraft composite skins with chrome-moly steel. This makes the craft much heaver and not as robust, but, its significantly cheaper than space rated materials. Revision two, the actual Hermes Spacecraft, will consist of: Chrome-Moly Steel and aluminum airframe, Inconel Standoffs to support outer skin from the fuselage, Carbon-Carbon Skin where needed, etc. etc.
The cockpit, and windows, are not pressurized currently. The windows are just standard plexiglass as is. Again, it boils down to working with the materials that we have, and working towards getting the funding we need. A garage spacecraft cannot support space rated materials unless you're a millionaire/billionaire :)
The reason the prototype was built in the first place is, when Morris Jarvis (the creator/owner of the Hermes) went to seek funding several years ago, he made no progress because he had no prototype/mockup. The decision was then made to create a near-full scale replica of what the vehicle would look like. And here we are...
The wings currently DO fold up. That was a logistics requirement, not a design feature. The prototype had requirements to travel, it's been to California and Texas. With the wings folded up, the craft fits in a standard sized trailer, that can be towed cross country. In the space-rated version, the body and planform would be a single piece.
We successfully raised 20k on Kickstarter to progress our propulsion development. We have a few design iterations to go, but our plan is to use our hybrid propulsion technology to take us to our mission altitude. Our mantra is "build a little, test a lot"; we will be doing a lot of testing for our engines, but we have some unique ideas that will hopefully benefit us. There are a couple guys A LOT smarter than me who are volunteering some of their time for materials selection and propellant combination testing.
I am a huge fan of Copenhagen Suborbitals. I wish them the best.
I'll be happy to answer any questions you guys have. All I ask is that you give us a look and consider supporting us. We're aerospace entrepreneurs. We're used to working with no money, little materials, and making progress. Our passion is space. Our mantra is "Space for All". If you feel the same way, join us!
-Mark