Blue Origin thread.

[tater]

https://www.wsj.com/articles/jeff-bezos-blue-origin-new-glenn-rocket-a328067

 

http://archive.today/81Tgx

 

(this link avoids the paywall)

[AckSed]

I think iterative development and the 'try it and see' has won this round. We also can't discount Starlink, the best test program for reuseability hidden in plain sight.

However, I am pleased to see BO finally has rocket bodies in the steel.

[darthgently]

46 minutes ago, AckSed said:

I think iterative development and the 'try it and see' has won this round. We also can't discount Starlink, the best test program for reuseability hidden in plain sight.

However, I am pleased to see BO finally has rocket bodies in the steel.

In a reply to one of Musk's X posts about the recent static fire someone asked how SpaceX built another booster so quickly after the termination in flight of the orbital test SS+booster.  Many people really haven't grasped the fundamental industry changes involved yet, and that these changes will sweep the industry eventually

[AckSed]

6 hours ago, darthgently said:

In a reply to one of Musk's X posts about the recent static fire someone asked how SpaceX built another booster so quickly after the termination in flight of the orbital test SS+booster.  Many people really haven't grasped the fundamental industry changes involved yet, and that these changes will sweep the industry eventually

"Behold, mine field of rockets. Look upon it, and know that it is bountiful."

[tater]

7 hours ago, darthgently said:

In a reply to one of Musk's X posts about the recent static fire someone asked how SpaceX built another booster so quickly after the termination in flight of the orbital test SS+booster.  Many people really haven't grasped the fundamental industry changes involved yet, and that these changes will sweep the industry eventually

That they have a bunch of them waiting. Truly hardware rich.

[KSK]

On 7/19/2023 at 3:25 PM, sevenperforce said:

My patent law experience is not extensive, but IMHO the levels of potentially infringing overlap aren't very significant. You can't patent physics, after all, and just because a patent might describe certain attributes in conjunction with its core aspects doesn't mean all of those attributes are protected.

But yes, Stoke holds patent priority on everything here.

The core of the Stoke patent is the dual use of the expander cycle with the heat shield cooling manifold to pump the coolant during re-entry. It's a truly novel idea and I think it will stick. The question is whether BO tries to copy that approach or not. 

There's a possible wrinkle here. 

The international (PCT) patents for Stoke's Actively Cooled Heatshield  (Stoke 1) and Augmented Aerospike Nozzle  (Stoke 2) were both published in June 2021 which is well before the December 2021 priority date for Blue's patent. So those two Stoke patents can be cited as prior art against both the novelty and obviousness of Blue's patent claims. 

For reference - and apologies if everyone is already aware:

• Novelty is fairly black and white - a patent is only bad for lack of novelty if the claimed invention has been unambiguously disclosed in the prior art.
• Obviousness (or inventive step) is the myriad shades of grey in between. A patent is  bad for lack of inventive step if the claimed invention is insufficiently different from a prior art disclosure.  There are various legal tests to determine whether an inventive step has been made but it's always going to be a) a bit subjective and b) determined on the facts on a case by case basis. 

However,  the international patent for Stoke's Annular Aerospike patent (Stoke 3) was published in December 2022, so after the December 2021 priority date of Blue's patent, but has an earlier priority date (April 2021). 

In the UK and Europe, this would mean that Stoke 3 could only be cited as prior art against the novelty of Blue's patent claims. 

That's potentially important because it means that, in principle, Blue's patent could claim an annular aerospike that's almost identical to the one disclosed in Stoke 3 except for some trivial differences, and that would be enough to rule out Stoke 3 as prior art.

I say potentially because (as you'll no doubt be astonished to hear), there are some other points to consider here, in particular whether everything disclosed  in the international patents is validly entitled to its priority date. That can get messy and it's impossible to tell for sure without actually reading through all the patents in question - which I'm not inclined to do purely for mulches and giggles.

I believe that there are similar provisions in US patent law, although I wouldn't like to say for certain without a strong cup of coffee, checking the relevant legislation with the aid of an ice pack on my head, and probably referring the question to outside counsel. From a UK/European perspective (my background), US patent law is... quirky.

Whether any of the above is significant enough that there's likely to be any patent wrangling over it - again, impossible to tell without reading the fine patents. But it's a possibility.

 

Edit.  I doubt this is necessary but I should probably add that I am not a qualified patent attorney, so don't take any of the above as actual legal advice. I do have over 20 years experience working in IP in various roles, so I like to think that I've picked up a couple of things along the way, but that's obviously not the same as being a qualified attorney in the field.

 

Edited August 10, 2023 by KSK

[tater]

 

[tater]

Interesting.

So they pulled the trigger with spectrum at the start of 2020, right?

"Amazon is required to launch and operate 50% of its satellites no later than July 30, 2026, and must launch and operate the remaining satellites no later than July 30, 2029." (Wiki)

Se here we are halfway to their first milestone, and they have launched ZERO sats. They were supposed to put the first 2 test sats on Vulcan, but they are moving those to Atlas (taking the spot of an Atlas that was supposed to launch as many as an Atlas holds)—wasting one of the 9 of vehicles they bought. They have a contract for Ariane 6 as well. Um, not a thing for a while. Well, at least they have New Glenn! Oh, wait. At least Vulcan is on sched... 

They needs to launch 1618 sats in 2 years, 10 months. That's ~48 sats launched per month. If they can have Vulcan/NG operating full til in just 10 months, then they only need to launch 68/mo!

How many can Atlas hold? NG? Vulcan? They're gonna need huge cadence right out of the gate if they want any hope of 50% in 3 years.

[darthgently]

1 hour ago, tater said:

Interesting.

So they pulled the trigger with spectrum at the start of 2020, right?

"Amazon is required to launch and operate 50% of its satellites no later than July 30, 2026, and must launch and operate the remaining satellites no later than July 30, 2029." (Wiki)

Se here we are halfway to their first milestone, and they have launched ZERO sats. They were supposed to put the first 2 test sats on Vulcan, but they are moving those to Atlas (taking the spot of an Atlas that was supposed to launch as many as an Atlas holds)—wasting one of the 9 of vehicles they bought. They have a contract for Ariane 6 as well. Um, not a thing for a while. Well, at least they have New Glenn! Oh, wait. At least Vulcan is on sched... 

They needs to launch 1618 sats in 2 years, 10 months. That's ~48 sats launched per month. If they can have Vulcan/NG operating full til in just 10 months, then they only need to launch 68/mo!

How many can Atlas hold? NG? Vulcan? They're gonna need huge cadence right out of the gate if they want any hope of 50% in 3 years.

Maybe they will make Kuiper the first suborbital satellite constellation and use New Shepherd to bounce them up and down from thousands of launch sites worldwide such thatb there are always "enough at altitude" to make a mesh

[Ultimate Steve]

I don't have a source for this but I seem to remember seeing that the "50% by X date" sort of thing is designed to prevent spectrum hoarding. As long as Blue is making a good faith effort to utilize the spectrum, being a few years late shouldn't be a huge deal.

[tater]

4 minutes ago, Ultimate Steve said:

I don't have a source for this but I seem to remember seeing that the "50% by X date" sort of thing is designed to prevent spectrum hoarding. As long as Blue is making a good faith effort to utilize the spectrum, being a few years late shouldn't be a huge deal.

True, though once they set a precedent of letting it slide they might encourage hoarding. They'd have to show some ability to actually launch with a cadence to achieve the goal I would think.

Regarding the lawsuit, though, this part is interesting:

Quote

The public version of complaint redacts many details about the launch contracts, including specific dollar values. It does state, though, that the combined contracts were “the second-largest capital expenditure in Amazon’s 25+ year history” after its $13.7 billion acquisition of grocer Whole Foods. Amazon’s second largest acquisition, of studio MGM in 2021, was valued at $8.5 billion.

Call it $10B in round numbers? At the F9 services "MSRP" on the SpaceX website, that $10B would buy 149 launches. If they can fit just 22 under an F9 fairing, 149 launches would deploy the entire constellation.

[StrandedonEarth]

12 minutes ago, tater said:

Call it $10B in round numbers? At the F9 services "MSRP" on the SpaceX website, that $10B would buy 149 launches. If they can fit just 22 under an F9 fairing, 149 launches would deploy the entire constellation

And it would take SpaceX three years to launch 149 missions for them if they allotted half of their current annual launch cadence (targeting 100 launches per year, currently appear to be on pace for 90) for that project. But do they really want to help the competition?

[tater]

9 minutes ago, StrandedonEarth said:

And it would take SpaceX three years to launch 149 missions for them if they allotted half of their current annual launch cadence (targeting 100 launches per year, currently appear to be on pace for 90) for that project. But do they really want to help the competition?

They would have sold the launches, Shotwell said as much.

What if the launch of the first two satellites results in them needing to change the design?

Then their delay will increase further. It seems to me they would have done better to launch the two test spacecraft on the quickest available launch they could buy. Then they could make any design changes required and iterate before they have a launch vehicle ready. So it’s not like they would have to launch a large number with SpaceX even just a few. 

[tater]

 

 

Edited September 1, 2023 by tater

[tater]

The above goes to 2028, with literally zero actions taking place in space.

Even the "docking demonstration" is at a "facility."

[tater]

This seemed like a good thread to deposit this in. I suppose it could also go in the ULA thread.
 

 

In short, getting to four launches within two years would be epic.

[tater]

 

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

Um.  Why name something B. O.? 

 

 

 

[tater]

1 minute ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Um.  Why name something B. O.?

They want people to call them "Blue" but yeah, that's not gonna happen to BO. Trying to tell other people how to refer to them is comically stupid.

Edited September 15, 2023 by tater

[darthgently]

Maybe Blue Suborbital until they've achieved orbit?  Humor aside, I look forward to the Orbital Reef era, but the path so far seems a bit wayward.  But who knows?  It could be a tortoise/hare thing going on with SpaceX being the hare.  Doesn't really click though

[tater]

 

[Spaceception]

Its been a long time coming, but I'm really looking forward to seeing a fully stacked New Glenn on the pad. I hope it's not much longer, relatively speaking.

[tater]

1 hour ago, Spaceception said:

Its been a long time coming, but I'm really looking forward to seeing a fully stacked New Glenn on the pad. I hope it's not much longer, relatively speaking.

I want all the big or reusable launchers to succeed.

 

Edited September 19, 2023 by tater

[Royalswissarmyknife]

18 hours ago, tater said:

I want all the big or reusable launchers to succeed.

 

Does that include Vulcan. 

[tater]

3 hours ago, Royalswissarmyknife said:

Does that include Vulcan. 

Sure, thought it's sort of medium.