Blue Origin Successfully Test Fires Game-Changing BE-4 Rocket Engine (geekwire.com)

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Blue Origin Successfully Test Fires Game-Changing BE-4 Rocket Engine (geekwire.com)

Posted by BeauHD on Thursday October 19, 2017 @10:00PM from the fired-up dept.

Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin space venture has successfully test-fired its BE-4 rocket engine, marking a key step in the development of its own New Glenn rocket as well as United Launch Alliance's next-generation rocket. GeekWire reports: ULA has been waiting for months to get good news about the BE-4 tests in West Texas. The company wanted to see a successful full-scale test before going ahead with plans to use the BE-4 engine on its Vulcan rocket, which is due to have its first flight in 2019. A Blue Origin competitor, Aerojet Rocketdyne, has been waiting in the wings with its AR1 engine, which ULA saw as a "Plan B" for the Vulcan in case the BE-4 faltered. Wednesday's initial hot-firing didn't reach full power or full duration, but the test's success nevertheless reduces the likelihood that ULA would turn to the AR1. The BE-4 engine, which uses liquefied natural gas as fuel, is built at Blue Origin's production facility in Kent, Wash., and shipped down to Texas for testing. Assuming that it's accepted for ULA's use, engine production will eventually shift to a factory in Huntsville, Ala. Engines for the orbital-class New Glenn rocket will go to Blue Origin's rocket factory in Florida, which is due to be completed by the end of this year.

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Game changing? by wisebabo · 2017-10-19 22:29 · Score: 4, Insightful

I read the linked article and maybe I'm old (Ok I am old) but I couldn't see how this was "Game changing".
Landing 11 story boosters and re-launching them? Yes
Making a new liquid fueled rocket engine (that wasn't even using LH2 which I hear is harder). Not so sure
I realize that of all the parts of a rocket, the engine is the hardest. Like an air-force general said "A new plane doesn't make a new engine possible, a new engine makes a new plane possible" you get the idea. Still, considering the number and variety of liquid fueled engines out there (from the Russian RS-180 to NASA's RS-25 to Space-X's Merlin and even to Aerojet's AR1 which they refer to in the article), I'm not sure how this qualifies as game changing. An improvement? Maybe but I didn't see where in my (brief) reading of the article. And does even a less than order of magnitude improvement merit being a game changer?
Is the term being overused here or am I missing something?
1. Re:Game changing? by esperto · 2017-10-19 22:49 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Completely disagree, reusing the first stage reduces the cost so much that it left the other rocket companies running like headless chickens, they are really afraid to simply loose all lunches covered by F9 lifting capacity simply because spacex can potentially charge tens of million dollars less and still have a lot of profit.
2. Re:Game changing? by Rei · 2017-10-19 22:49 · Score: 2
  
  "Reusing airplanes isn't game changing either. It's an improvement, but not a game changer." Would you argue that?
  No, the simple fact that something is "reused" isn't on its own the be-all end-all situation; you have to have a high enough launch rate to overwhelm your overhead costs. But SpaceX definitely looks to be en route to that, and Blue Origin likely as well eventually. Both are making good use of the lessons of the past in their designs.
  Just because the Shuttle was hobbled by NASA's extremely high overhead costs, major cutbacks in the design phase that hindered reusability and turnover time, and a number of design flaws, doesn't mean that the concept of reusability is wrong. It's in most contexts essential for low costs. And while rockets are in many ways more challenging than airplanes, they're not fundamentally on some totally different playing field.
  
  --
  I'll BUILD someone to replace you. Some kind of gamma-powered monster, with a heart as black as coal!
3. Re:Game changing? by Anonymous Coward · 2017-10-19 22:50 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  A better article explains it betterer:
  "SpaceX has also invested significant amounts of its own funds into its new Raptor engine, which has a sea-level thrust of 380,000 pounds. But this engine has yet to undergo full-scale testing.
  Meanwhile, Blue Origin's BE-4 engine is more powerful, at 550,000 pounds of thrust—it is in fact the most powerful US rocket engine developed since Rocketdyne built the RS-68 engine two decades ago."
  https://arstechnica.com/science/2017/10/blue-origin-has-successfully-tested-its-powerful-be-4-rocket-engine/
4. Re:Game changing? by michelcolman · 2017-10-19 22:58 · Score: 1
  
  they are really afraid to simply loose all lunches
  What a beautiful typo. SpaceX is eating their lunch indeed :-)
5. Re: Game changing? by D.McG. · 2017-10-19 23:10 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  Disingenuous. The raptor has a higher efficiency by using full flow staged combustion. The current lower output is for two reasons. The first is for optimizing the thrust to weight ratio. Higher thrust engines disproportionately weigh more. The second is multi engine out support. If you have one big engine and it goes down, you crash. If instead you have 3 smaller engines in the same space and 1 goes down, the mission continues on the remaining 2. When landing becomes imperative with lives at stake, I'll take multiple engines over bragging rights.
6. Re:Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-19 23:12 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  Paraphrasing Edison, NASA merely found *one* way how not to make a reusable launcher.
  
  --
  Ezekiel 23:20
7. Re:Game changing? by Megol · 2017-10-19 23:13 · Score: 1
  
  Liquid hydrogen is harder, sure. As in near impossible. It have a low energy density, it have to be stored at low temperatures ( the fuel tank would be _big_ which mean heavy and the extreme insulation needed will just add to the weight.
  The thing here isn't that someone have switched to another liquid fuel - it is that they have succeeded in using LNG as the liquid fuel. If cheap* natural gas can do the work of a relatively expensive** RP1 fuel (as used by SpaceX and most other liquid fueled rockets) well then maybe that may be a significant advantage?
  (* don't know how much processing have to be done to make it usable, it may not be cheap)
  (** significant processing => expensive)
8. Re:Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-19 23:16 · Score: 2
  
  "SpaceX has also invested significant amounts of its own funds into its new Raptor engine, which has a sea-level thrust of 380,000 pounds. But this engine has yet to undergo full-scale testing.
  What full-scale testing? This full-scale testing? That's already happening. If I understand the situation correctly, SpaceX has accumulated 1200 seconds of full-scale tests by now, whereas Blue Origin just now had its first several-second burn.
  
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  Ezekiel 23:20
9. Re: Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-19 23:18 · Score: 1
  
  They also had to down-scale the "full-size" engine along with the recent downscaling of the upper stage from 150 to 80 metric tonnes. If the dry mass of the upper stage is 80 metric tonnes, the formerly planned 3 MN version would make landings with redundancy problematic.
  
  --
  Ezekiel 23:20
10. Re:Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-19 23:24 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  I didn't notice anyone, much less the US Congress, forcing ULA to buy their engines from the Russians. If anything, AJ/Rocketdyne and ULA on their own decidednot to fork out the money to manufacture the engines domestically about a decade ago.
  
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  Ezekiel 23:20
11. Re:Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-19 23:42 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  The three actual benefits of methane fuel at the moment for SpaceX are 1) the enabling of the FFSC cycle which is impossible with RP-1, 2) improved prevention of fouling up the internal fuel lines in the engine necessitating extra maintenance, and later, 3) easy synthesizability on Mars. Lower price gets only important in the long run, perhaps around the time when 3) comes into play as well. For now, it's still two orders of magnitude cheaper than the flight hardware. So it only gets reasonably important when you get to the point of having >50 flights per vehicle lifetime or so.
  
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  Ezekiel 23:20
12. Re: Game changing? by fubarrr · 2017-10-20 00:16 · Score: 2
  
  Russians are making Soyuz first stages for less than $1m a pop, and they don't even use aluminium there.
13. Re:Game changing? by jbmartin6 · 2017-10-20 00:19 · Score: 2
  
  I think the game changed is the competition between various engine companies.
  
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  This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
14. Re:Game changing? by dunkelfalke · 2017-10-20 00:31 · Score: 1
  
  Nothing wrong about this. The engines are very efficient, they were designed to be reusable and there is already an assembly line for them. This is why SpaceX trying to make the issue a political one is Musk being a dick.
  
  --
  "It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
15. Re:Game changing? by esperto · 2017-10-20 01:10 · Score: 1
  
  I'm not defending Musk's behavior, but it is not like ULA does not play US congress and senate to get contracts and the like, he is just playing the game.
  Regarding ULA costs, it is expensive because they could charge those prices, rockets are very niche and not that many companies are capable of building one, and the over-engineering costs can be a requirement by the air force, but they also the advantage of that, they weren't complaining before.
16. Re:Game changing? by MightyYar · 2017-10-20 01:14 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  Not only that, buying "Russian" engines also kept former Soviet rocket engine designers busy with something that did not involve a despotic regime. People forget how important that was (and to some degree still is).
  
  --
  W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
17. Re:Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-20 01:15 · Score: 1
  
  Nothing wrong about the RD-180s, except for the already significant price of around $25M per unit and the emerging competing engine customer in the form of Angara, quite likely to drive prices higher? The reusability potential of the RD-17x/18x/19x line...interesting, at the very least given their ignition mechanism. It's quite clear that the designers didn't have frequent flights in mind.
  
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  Ezekiel 23:20
18. Re: Game changing? by hecksagon · 2017-10-20 01:29 · Score: 2
  
  Falcon 9 has already actually proven engine out capability during a flight where a leak shut down an engine. Primary mission was completely successful and secondary would have if Nasa had relaxed rules about ride-sharing ISS flights.
19. Re:Game changing? by Jeff+DeMaagd · 2017-10-20 01:41 · Score: 1
  
  The original decision to develop the RD-180 in the first place was because of a government cooperation with US and Russia. General Dynamics was paid to integrate the engine into their Atlas rockets. Maybe they weren't forced but there might be nuances that imply some level of pressure.
  Despite what the press release implies, no RD-180 engines were made in the US. ULA had revived the idea a couple years ago but that has taken a back seat to BE-4 and AR-1 programs.
20. Re:Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-20 02:23 · Score: 1
  
  The full-scale Raptor is now the 1.7 MN version. The old test a year ago was indeed the smaller unit. But do you have ANY information or reason to believe that the unit in the video is NOT the full unit? For example, the *full-scale* oxygen preburner was already tested two years ago.
  
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  Ezekiel 23:20
21. Re:Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-20 02:28 · Score: 1
  
  I find it quite unlikely that this ISN'T the full-scale engine, seeing that the first flight version is supposed to have 1.7 MN at 25 MPa and they're now in the 20 MPa range or so. They were at 1 MN a year ago.
  
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  Ezekiel 23:20
22. Re:Game changing? by hey! · 2017-10-20 02:35 · Score: 1
  
  that wasn't even using LH2 which I hear is harder
  You say that like it's a good thing. Methane is easier to handle and makes refurbishing the engine for reuse simpler, cutting costs all around.
  I think the game-changing aspect is supposed to be a combination of low manufacture cost, low operation cost, high thrust, and very high reusabiity -- 25 missions. The idea is to be pretty good on every metric, not necessarily the best (e.g. highest thrust) in every metric. That's engineering for you: it involves making choices. And you can never be certain you made the right ones until the produce either succeeds or fails.
  
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  Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
23. Re:Game changing? by Megol · 2017-10-20 03:05 · Score: 1
  
  Blue origin != SpaceX.
24. Re:Game changing? by dunkelfalke · 2017-10-20 03:13 · Score: 1
  
  Angara is not a competitor, it is mostly vapourware and a higher production rate would most likely have lowered the price anyway. And generally the price is justified because of the performance - high thrust and a very high specific impulse. The Blue Origin replacement will definitely have lower thrust and probably inferior efficiency as well due to lower chamber pressure. RD-170 was designed for ten flights, I don't think RD-180 isn't much different in this matter. Not as good as the planned 25 flights of the BE-4, but still reasonable. It is kind of a waste for expendable rockets, though.
  
  --
  "It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
25. Re: Game changing? by D.McG. · 2017-10-20 03:25 · Score: 1
  
  The trick is having engine out capability when landing on empty tanks. F9 lands solely on the center engine. SpaceX identified this as a point of failure. BFS is now expected to have 3 central engines lit for landing (up from 2 stated during the 2017 IAC). If one goes out, easy enough to throttle up the other two. They can run as low as 20% thrust. Is New Glenn still targeting just 7 engines with only 1 near the center? Seems like a similar point of failure.
26. Re: Game changing? by chispito · 2017-10-20 03:28 · Score: 1
  
  Disingenuous. The raptor has a higher efficiency by using full flow staged combustion. The current lower output is for two reasons. The first is for optimizing the thrust to weight ratio. Higher thrust engines disproportionately weigh more. The second is multi engine out support. If you have one big engine and it goes down, you crash. If instead you have 3 smaller engines in the same space and 1 goes down, the mission continues on the remaining 2. When landing becomes imperative with lives at stake, I'll take multiple engines over bragging rights.
  Why are you getting defensive? AC said nothing about which engine is a better design, only that the BE-4 is bigger and more powerful.
  
  And it is.
  
  --
  The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!
27. Re:Game changing? by chispito · 2017-10-20 03:56 · Score: 1
  
  I find it quite unlikely that this ISN'T the full-scale engine, seeing that the first flight version is supposed to have 1.7 MN at 25 MPa and they're now in the 20 MPa range or so. They were at 1 MN a year ago.
  They have yet to test the full-scale engine. See recent Musk response here to a question about the status of scaling up the Raptor.
  
  --
  The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!
28. Re:Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-20 03:56 · Score: 1
  
  Yes, I know. And your point is?
  
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  Ezekiel 23:20
29. Re: Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-20 03:58 · Score: 1
  
  It does seem like it, but having such a point of failure is less painful for an unmanned first stage than for a BFS full of people, so it's probably not an issue for New Glenn.
  
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  Ezekiel 23:20
30. Re:Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-20 04:06 · Score: 1
  
  Angara is a competitor in the sense that it would take away production capacity of engine chambers which I believe are mostly or completely identical throughout the RD-17x/18x/19x lineup. It's not the only vehicle with such potential either - Sunkar or Soyuz 5 would do the same thing, and OATK's Antares switched to the RD-183 recently. If the production capacity is limited and customers are swarming around you, there's no reason to assume that the RD-180 manufacturer wouldn't ask for more money for simple market reasons. They're not obligated not to sell to the highest bidder.
  
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  Ezekiel 23:20
31. Re:Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-20 04:56 · Score: 1
  
  Yes, but "scaling up" overwhelmingly likely only means increasing the development pressure from the current figures to the full figure of 25 MPa. Otherwise you'd be talking about redesigning the engine to a size only about 10% larger, and there's very little sense in doing that, as opposed to building the actually much larger 3-3.5 MN unit which has been abandoned.
  
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  Ezekiel 23:20
32. Re:Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-20 04:57 · Score: 1
  
  "the development engine's pressure", of course.
  
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  Ezekiel 23:20
33. Re:Game changing? by Immerman · 2017-10-20 05:03 · Score: 1
  
  Well, it certainly changes the game for Blue Origin at least... this is their ticket to moving from the "insane-class model rocketry club" into the orbital rocketry business.
  As I understand it (may be wrong, haven't been following them closely) this will be their first attempt at a first-stage engine - their previous one being strictly a suborbital or possibly second-stage engine. If it works, and if they're able to scale their landing system to an orbital rocket (I'm smelling a lot of "if" coming off of this plan...), then there could be someone giving SpaceX some genuine competition - which may well be a game-changer in itself.
  Whether that means driving innovation even faster, or just destroying the profit margins that make competing with the "Old Guard" possible... time will tell.
  
  --
  --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
34. Re: Game changing? by stdarg · 2017-10-20 05:35 · Score: 2
  
  Kind of an ironic comment... it's pretty obvious that the "????" meant incredulity that reusable boosters isn't game-changing, i.e. an invitation to explain why they are not game changing. That you assumed it meant that the sentence itself wasn't understood is really funny. "What is so hard to understand" indeed.
35. Re: Game changing? by Immerman · 2017-10-20 05:36 · Score: 1, Informative
  
  That's not game-changing, that's strategic advantage. Developing ICBMs, nukes, etc. is always a game changer - no matter how many others already have them. It moves you from the "kiddie table" to being taken seriously. Why do you think Russia felt no compunction about "liberating" a chunk of Crimea? Or that there's such strong opposition to various Middle-Eastern countries becoming nuclear powers? The existing powers have long been accustomed to trampling all over them, waging thinly veiled wars-by-proxy amongst each other for control of their resources - buying advantage for themselves at the cost of devastation to the locals. That becomes a lot less appealing when the locals can hit back.
  Reusable launch vehicles (that don't cost more to refurbish than most disposables cost to build) fundamentally change the rocketry game. It's no longer just optimizing thrust-to-mass ratios and construction costs - it's developing long-term reliability, low-cost refurbishment, etc,etc,etc.
  It changes the game from dialing in the final optimizations on a mature technology to gain a few percentage cost advantage, to using that technology as a starting point to develop completely new optimizations capable of reducing launch costs by several orders of magnitude in the long term - and even in the near term (10 years?) there's the potential for a 5-to-10-fold reduction in the cost of getting things into orbit. Which is a game changer for space exploitation - order of magnitude cost reductions in enabling technologies are almost always followed by massive changes across the industry.
  We're already seeing Bigelow, etc. starting to get serious about their orbital-infrastructure projects - lots of companies have been basically biding their time developing technologies that require a big reduction in launch cost to see any demand. And now they're starting to rev up towards production to be ready for the rockets that will make them relevant.
  
  --
  --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
36. Re:Game changing? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-20 05:59 · Score: 1
  
  No, I'm making the claim that the goal has changed. Does that change surprise you? Or are you claiming that the previous subscale version was half the size it was supposed to be? The "full size raptor ... 2-3X the size of the current subscale version" isn't happening now.
  
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  Ezekiel 23:20
37. Re:Game changing? by dunkelfalke · 2017-10-20 06:32 · Score: 1
  
  The original production line was meant for regular Zenit starts, a rocket that was supposed to replace the Soyuz and the Proton. It will be under-utilised even if Angara will commence commercial flights.
  
  --
  "It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
38. Re:Game changing? by davester666 · 2017-10-20 07:23 · Score: 1
  
  Of course, it also gave that despotic regime buckets and buckets of hard cash to do despotic things. And it takes fewer rocket engine designers (maybe none?) to manufacture more of the same engine...
  
  --
  Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
39. Re:Game changing? by petermgreen · 2017-10-20 09:22 · Score: 1
  
  The cost of fuel is a small part of the cost of an orbital rocket launch.
  LH2 burns clean and gives the best specific impulse but it's low density leads to high tankage mass and it's low boiling point makes it impractical to manage on long missons. RP1 is easy to handle but it's high carbon content leads to low specific impulse and leads to coking problems.
  Methane is essentially a middle ground between the two. Better specific impulse and less coking than kerosene, higher storage temperature and density than hydrogen.
  
  --
  note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
40. Re:Game changing? by painandgreed · 2017-10-20 10:45 · Score: 1
  
  I read the linked article and maybe I'm old (Ok I am old) but I couldn't see how this was "Game changing".
  Game changing in that it means that the ULA may actually still be in the game. With the military using SpaceX finally, there is no real reason to use ULA rockets except for man launches or congress say so. SpaceX is workign on their man rating and economics will eventually win congress over. Meanwhile, the ULA are a generation behind in rocket design and trying desperately to catch up with their own reusable first stage rocket. Both Blue Origin and ULA will essentially be putting their futures behind the BE-4 and the rocket it goes in.
41. Re:Game changing? by k6mfw · 2017-10-20 11:48 · Score: 1
  
  Shuttle was hobbled by NASA's extremely high overhead costs, major cutbacks in the design phase that hindered reusability and turnover time...
  yep, in those early design phases, Dale Myers (associate administrator or acting admin for NASA) was faced with possibility that after Skylab, the US will no longer have means to put people into space. Apollo Soyuz was not scheduled at that time. OMB kept rejecting plans and then comes 1972 big election year and Nixon is thinking of all those electoral votes of CA and FL (both states with a lot of engineers laid off from aerospace). OK enough, "OMB stop rejecting Shuttle plans, approve it now. Oh, no fully reusable, do the TAOS option."
  
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  mfwright@batnet.com
42. Re:Game changing? by davester666 · 2017-10-20 12:05 · Score: 1
  
  Those regimes got/are getting a bunch of missile technology from Russia...
  
  --
  Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
43. Re:Game changing? by MightyYar · 2017-10-20 12:39 · Score: 1
  
  It's still better than knowing how to make it themselves. And this is over the intervening period since the Soviet collapse. A bunch of out of work weapons guys was a serious problem at one time - that's the only point I was trying to make. This was the main impetus behind the whole program of cooperation between NASA and Russia from that era.
  
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  W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Natural gas as fuel? by blindseer · 2017-10-19 22:52 · Score: 1

The BE-4 engine, which uses liquefied natural gas as fuel
Yeah! Fuck my carbon footprint, I'm going to the MOON!

--
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
1. Re:Natural gas as fuel? by physburn · 2017-10-19 23:18 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Methane has almost double the hydrogen of Kerosene, so this is in fact a great improvement in weight and CO2 production, on kerosene based rockets. Liquid Hydrogen is hard as a big volume, and needs cryogenics so methance is a good compramise
2. Re:Natural gas as fuel? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2017-10-19 23:20 · Score: 2
  
  Methane ought to have lesser CO2 emissions than RP-1. Anyway, the impact of spaceflight fuel is minuscule even compared to aviation, and even more so when comparing it to the impact of the global car population. There's just not nearly that many rockets flying around.
  
  --
  Ezekiel 23:20
3. Re: Natural gas as fuel? by fubarrr · 2017-10-20 00:11 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  Hydrokarbons are for hipsters, real men fly on pentaborane + chlorine pentafluoride
4. Re: Natural gas as fuel? by D.McG. · 2017-10-20 00:27 · Score: 1
  
  Real men tried, just that little problem of it bursting into flame on contact with the air, and the toxic exhaust.
5. Re: Natural gas as fuel? by thomst · 2017-10-20 00:55 · Score: 1
  
  fubarr quipped:
  
  Hydrokarbons are for hipsters, real men fly on pentaborane + chlorine pentafluoride
  Mod parent +1 funny, please ...
  
  --
  Check out my novel.
6. Re: Natural gas as fuel? by MightyYar · 2017-10-20 01:28 · Score: 2
  
  No problem! We'll just build a cryogenic containment vessel so that any escaped gas condenses and save money that way!
  
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  W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
7. Re:Natural gas as fuel? by Immerman · 2017-10-20 03:52 · Score: 2
  
  Indeed. In fact, methane produces less CO2 per joule than any other hydrocarbon fuel, since all four energy-rich carbon bonds are connected to hydrogens, rather than having carbon-carbon bonds "wasting" energy storage potential. The fact that hydrogen is practically massless compared to most other elements also means methane is pretty much the most energy-dense hydrocarbon fuel in terms of MJ/kg - about 20% denser than gasoline, and twice as dense as ethanol or potato chips. Plus it's not terribly difficult to liquefy and store - unlike pure hydrogen, which is about 3x as energy dense so long as you ignore the storage system, not to mention the oxidizer, which should be the majority of the mass even for methane.
  
  --
  --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Who shortens state names like that? by oobayly · 2017-10-19 23:13 · Score: 4, Insightful

If you want to abbreviate surely use WA, TX, AL, or write the actual name. It's just bizarre reading Wash, Ala, etc. Capitals were used so they might as well have finished off the word.
1. Re:Who shortens state names like that? by oobayly · 2017-10-20 00:30 · Score: 1
  
  Ah, I didn't know that. Even as a non-American, two letter State abbreviations jump out at me. I'd struggle to name all 50 states but given the abbreviation I've a pretty good chance of getting it right.
2. Re:Who shortens state names like that? by DNS-and-BIND · 2017-10-20 01:33 · Score: 1
  
  Those two-letter abbreviations were created by the Post Office to help them sort mail, and they don't even need them any more because everything is done by ZIP code. Wash, Ala, are fine, they're more human-readable. Quick, what's the difference between ME and MS? Or CT and CO? Yeah, exactly.
  
  --
  Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
3. Re:Who shortens state names like that? by MightyYar · 2017-10-20 01:33 · Score: 2
  
  In the early 80s, we still addressed our envelopes with the old-fashioned abbreviations. Fortunately, I grew up in a state where the old abbreviation was the same as the new, just with dropped punctuation :) N.J. -> NJ
  Here's the list of proper abbreviations.
  
  --
  W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
4. Re:Who shortens state names like that? by iggymanz · 2017-10-20 02:58 · Score: 1
  
  You must be young. Before the silly and misleading two-letter abbreviations came out states had longer abreviations that were more human-friendly and sensible. A computer can of course deal with these too, no need for two letter:
  http://www.searchforancestors....
5. Re:Who shortens state names like that? by iggymanz · 2017-10-20 03:01 · Score: 1
  
  nah, methane in deep gravity wells and what are you going to use for oxidizer?
  why not crack water using a nuclear reactor with 20+ year life?
6. Re:Who shortens state names like that? by crtreece · 2017-10-20 03:28 · Score: 1
  
  Is Ala. supposed to be Alabama, or Alaska?
  
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7. Re:Who shortens state names like that? by crtreece · 2017-10-20 03:34 · Score: 1
  
  You must be young.
  You're defining young as "learned abbreviations before 1959"? Let us know when they update it to include Alaska and Hawaii. And when was the last time you were in I. Terr.?
  
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8. Re:Who shortens state names like that? by iggymanz · 2017-10-20 04:31 · Score: 1
  
  nope; those abbreviations were still in common use in 1970s and in many places until early 1980s. of course, you wouldn't know that but since I was there I do.
9. Re:Who shortens state names like that? by angel'o'sphere · 2017-10-20 06:40 · Score: 1
  
  Who cars? They both are somewhere in america, and both don't launch rockets :D
  
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  Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
Re:Payload? by bobbied · 2017-10-20 00:00 · Score: 1

No payload in orbit yet?
No paying customers yet, so no payload to send anywhere....

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"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Game changing because by Kogun · 2017-10-20 00:52 · Score: 4, Funny

it will allow Bezos to put Amazon women on the moon.
Excellent! by l0n3s0m3phr34k · 2017-10-20 05:16 · Score: 1

They should keep working on the AR series too. When we do finally get to the real "space age", having three different manufactures of rocket engines will be a good thing. It's great that the US is finally getting back into the rocket engine game. The RD's from Russia are great, reliable engines; but we really need to have domestic production again.
Mars Needs Women by Anonymous Coward · 2017-10-20 07:21 · Score: 1

it will allow Bezos to put Amazon women on the moon.
Mars Needs Women
Question: by kaatochacha · 2017-10-20 09:34 · Score: 1

Should we really support anything, especially rocket technology research, being done by a guy who is obviously Lex Luthor?