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Blue Origin thread.


Vanamonde

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Just now, tater said:

More on point, the point of the ship vs barge was that underway it was a more stable platform in heavier seas to improve launch windows WRT weather.

Maybe they decided that didn't pan out? Maybe they looked at SpaceX and decided that based on F9 history, the weather window problem isn't as big of a problem as they thought? Maybe they decided it was lower risk to use a proven solution?

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How predictable is a ship underway in heavy seas? Even with stabilization, could it not tend to lurch side-side or speed up/slow down due to wave action?  Easier to just try to stay still is my intuitive thinking, which I admit does not always match reality 

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32 minutes ago, mikegarrison said:

Maybe they decided that didn't pan out? Maybe they looked at SpaceX and decided that based on F9 history, the weather window problem isn't as big of a problem as they thought? Maybe they decided it was lower risk to use a proven solution?

Yeah, that's very likely true. Also, they don't expect to have a flight rate anything like SpaceX for a while, they can afford to wait for a weather window, it's clearly allowing decent cadence for SpaceX.

I think it's a sensible decision, and admirably "agile" of them, but maybe they should not have ponied up whatever the ship cost in the first place... that or they simply sell her off.

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On 7/4/2022 at 3:04 AM, RCgothic said:

Are we sure it's not just an illusion of size caused by the lack of engine bells in the picture?

Well, that might be part of it, but the machinery still looks pretty big when there is a nozzle to put it into context: 180420-blue.jpg?ssl=1

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On 7/9/2022 at 11:32 AM, RCgothic said:

And the whole engine's also about 50% bigger than Raptor anyway. Yeah, that pump is huge.

It depends on what you compare with. I was once in a museum diesel locomotive which had two turbos at crudely same physical size (compared to humans in some photos). Power of main engine of that locomotive was 1900 hp and shaft power of turbos probably on the order of 100 kW. Those rocket turbopumps have several tens of MW. That gives totally ridiculous power to weight or power to volume ratio. Is there any machinery which is even near? Whatever normal industrial machine at 30-50 MW power rating typical to those large rocket engines (steam or gas turbine, generator, diesel engine etc.) fills a large industrial hall and needs special truck for transport.

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6 hours ago, Hannu2 said:

It depends on what you compare with. I was once in a museum diesel locomotive which had two turbos at crudely same physical size (compared to humans in some photos). Power of main engine of that locomotive was 1900 hp and shaft power of turbos probably on the order of 100 kW. Those rocket turbopumps have several tens of MW. That gives totally ridiculous power to weight or power to volume ratio. Is there any machinery which is even near? Whatever normal industrial machine at 30-50 MW power rating typical to those large rocket engines (steam or gas turbine, generator, diesel engine etc.) fills a large industrial hall and needs special truck for transport.

Jet engines are pretty powerful but not up to rocket engines because rocket engines has better oxidizer than air :) 
Most other stuff is much larger simply for fuel economy and no pressing need to make it small. 

And turbos pump air and is powered by the exhaust so they has to be much larger than an turbo pump for its power level, turbo pumps tend to run fuel rich to not melt as cooling the turbopump blades is impractical. Now this is done on jet engines and as this pump is so large I wonder if it could work? In short jet engines pump air trough channels inside the blade and out on the front to cool them 

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  • 2 weeks later...

The booster landing looked off.. needed a big correction after it tilted too far after the landing boost started. And the guy screaming "We are not going to die!!!" after the main chutes deployed was funny.

Edited by cypher_00
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https://www.nasa.gov/saa/domestic/36958_SAA2-403403_Annex_8_FullyExecuted.pdf

Quote

This Annex shall be for the purpose of performing a trade study to determine feasibility
of aerocapture for the Blue Origin Lunar Clipper. The study will attempt to, where
possible, isolate the aerocapture analysis from the broader Lunar Clipper vehicle
architecture to minimize impacts to that system.

Interesting.

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