tater Posted May 25 Share Posted May 25 2 hours ago, darthgently said: You could be referring to the SRBs, the porkolox fuel, or both "Made in all the districts" was the thought. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darthgently Posted May 25 Share Posted May 25 11 hours ago, tater said: "Made in all the districts" was the thought. porkolox fueled. Not all a bad thing, but we've all seen the dark side Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JoeSchmuckatelli Posted May 25 Share Posted May 25 15 hours ago, tater said: What makes Ariane 6 really tick (hint: it's the same special sauce as SLS/Orion): Participation trophy mindset. Probably because the politicians are so stupid that handing them a lollipop entitlement to their district is about as far as they think. This is why market driven scenarios work better (well, actually, war driven scenarios also work) to drive innovation and efficiency. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted May 25 Share Posted May 25 4 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said: Participation trophy mindset. Probably because the politicians are so stupid that handing them a lollipop entitlement to their district is about as far as they think. This is why market driven scenarios work better (well, actually, war driven scenarios also work) to drive innovation and efficiency. To be fair, this is the model that the US used from the early days of the Apollo program, and pretty much all other space programs have been top-down affairs. If everyone plays the same game it's slow, but it works. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JoeSchmuckatelli Posted May 25 Share Posted May 25 1 hour ago, tater said: To be fair, this is the model that the US used from the early days of the Apollo program, and pretty much all other space programs have been top-down affairs. If everyone plays the same game it's slow, but it works. Kinda my point. Space Race was part of the Cold War... And then once the prestige goals had been met, and there wasn't any immediately obvious profit motive - everything slowed dramatically. Sure we kept putting up spy sats and some science - but it took a commercial reason for 'Space' to be viable. Internet, phones, television and navigation and other communication technologies became (and still are) the primary drivers. Until recently - those firms were too small to be able to do anything but ask for rides from the government(s). The Bezos / Musk / other private launch competition is changing things - we are seeing the market in action and possibly the most innovative time in 'Space' since the 60s. I just hope people not only keep making money from 'Space' but that we keep inventing new ways to make even more money and the process snowballs Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darthgently Posted May 25 Share Posted May 25 2 hours ago, tater said: To be fair, this is the model that the US used from the early days of the Apollo program, and pretty much all other space programs have been top-down affairs. If everyone plays the same game it's slow, but it works. I admit, I was harsh. But I find it hard to say their committee space system is working well and that makes it hard to be gentle. They were in a position to move to compete with F9 but the web of existing contracts held them fast to the past. Very familiar story. It is chaffing a bit that the CCP may land a booster before a big player like ESA. They are as pridefully afraid of appearing to be "copying" as the Chinese are shamelessly willing to unabashedly do so. There really is a middle ground called "creative competition in the real world". So glad other private firms in the West are taking the new normal seriously Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted May 25 Share Posted May 25 6 minutes ago, darthgently said: I admit, I was harsh. But I find it hard to say their committee space system is working well and that makes it hard to be gentle. They were in a position to move to compete with F9 but the web of existing contracts held them fast to the past. Very familiar story. I agree with you completely. I was merely saying that their method was the norm pre-SpaceX. No government(s) are going to be as agile as required I think. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spaceception Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 https://www.aerosociety.com/media/23637/efs-day-2-valere-girardin.pdf I don't think this has been shared here, but this is a study for space based solar, using fully reusable rockets developed by Ariane/RFA (page 5). May or may not be funded, but I suppose it's something that they have a concept? https://x.com/KenKirtland17/status/1792995308932063556 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Exoscientist Posted June 27 Share Posted June 27 (edited) ESA official discusses the upcoming in July Ariane 6 inaugural launch: Europe aims to end space access crisis with Ariane 6’s inaugural launch. Frédéric Castel June 24, 2024 https://spacenews.com/europe-aims-to-end-space-access-crisis-with-ariane-6s-inaugural-launch/ He doesn’t think the Starship will be a competitor to the Ariane 6. He also doesn’t think there is currently enough of a European market for reusable rockets yet, though he says reusabilty for European rockets will be important in the following few decades. Bob Clark Edited June 27 by Exoscientist Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RCgothic Posted June 27 Share Posted June 27 Lol, Europe doesn't have a rocket market anymore. There'll be a few mandatory government payloads and that's it. Ariane 6 won't be competing with Starship because it can't even compete with Falcon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RCgothic Posted June 28 Share Posted June 28 (edited) Speaking of: https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/06/mere-days-before-its-debut-the-ariane-6-rocket-loses-a-key-customer-to-spacex/ Even government payloads not safe for Ariane it seems. Edited June 28 by RCgothic Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Exoscientist Posted June 29 Share Posted June 29 22 hours ago, RCgothic said: Speaking of: https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/06/mere-days-before-its-debut-the-ariane-6-rocket-loses-a-key-customer-to-spacex/ Even government payloads not safe for Ariane it seems. From the article: In a shocking announcement this week, the European intergovernmental organization responsible for launching and operating the continent's weather satellites has pulled its next mission off a future launch of Europe's new Ariane 6 rocket. Instead, the valuable MTG-S1 satellite will now reach geostationary orbit on SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket in 2025. Instead of ESA complaining that someone chose a better product when they offered a poor product, they should instead offer a better product, fully within their capability to do so: Towards a revolutionary advance in spaceflight: an all-liquid Ariane 6. https://exoscientist.blogspot.com/2023/06/towards-revolutionary-advance-in.html Bob Clark Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
.50calBMG Posted June 29 Share Posted June 29 A new product that will be even further delayed? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RCgothic Posted June 29 Share Posted June 29 Europe clearly needs to do something to compete. But even if they put forward a design targeting falcon-like cadence and reusability, by the time it's ready it'd already be obsolete. Needs a much larger rethink than just producing an all-liquid ariane variant. They need an engine that can be produced at a rate of several per day, with better-than-Merlin levels of reusability, and enough thrust to not need solid boosters for assistance. Hydrogen engines are out on poor thrust and difficulty to refurb (tricky h2 seals). Kerolox is out because of coking. So they probably need a methalox engine as a starting point Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darthgently Posted June 29 Share Posted June 29 7 minutes ago, RCgothic said: Europe clearly needs to do something to compete. But even if they put forward a design targeting falcon-like cadence and reusability, by the time it's ready it'd already be obsolete. Needs a much larger rethink than just producing an all-liquid ariane variant. They need an engine that can be produced at a rate of several per day, with better-than-Merlin levels of reusability, and enough thrust to not need solid boosters for assistance. Hydrogen engines are out on poor thrust and difficulty to refurb (tricky h2 seals). Kerolox is out because of coking. So they probably need a methalox engine as a starting point The problem as I see it is that F9 reusability is the smaller portion of SpaceX's advantage. The larger portion is that SpaceX has vertically integrated their own killer-app use-case: Starlink. ESA clearly won't be competing for Starlink launches and without that "market" F9 launches would be a fraction of what they've been. For all the shade Musk gets that he isn't a "real" engineer, I think that history will reflect that he was perhaps the most astute entrepreneur of our era, at the top for sure, derpy though he may present to some Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CBase Posted July 9 Share Posted July 9 Live broadcast today of Ariane 6 launch : https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/ESA_Web_TV Stream starts at 19:30 CEST (1:30pm EDT), launch window is 20:00-24:00 CEST Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted July 9 Share Posted July 9 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kerb24 Posted July 9 Share Posted July 9 Successful flight, it seems. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grawl Posted July 9 Share Posted July 9 There is only one thing to say (pronounced with a strong south-west french accent ): PROPULSION, NOMINALE; TRAJECTOIRE, NOMINALE; Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted July 9 Share Posted July 9 Stage 2 was not nominal. ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grawl Posted July 10 Share Posted July 10 11 hours ago, tater said: Stage 2 was not nominal. ? Well, it was !... at the time of my post. I heard there were some failures during engine relight. Anyone has more info on the matter ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darthgently Posted July 10 Share Posted July 10 DEUXIÈME ÉTAGE, NON NOMINAL. zut Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RCgothic Posted July 10 Share Posted July 10 (edited) Oh dear Arianespace. Not another one. Wikipedia is saying failure of Vinci's APU, and it was an intended de-orbit burn (with apoapsis raise as well for steeper descent?) That doesn't sound too critical, should sort it in the next flight. Edited July 10 by RCgothic Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted July 10 Share Posted July 10 Yeah, seems like they can sort it out, otherwise a good launch. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CBase Posted July 11 Share Posted July 11 Scott Manley has a nice recap of the APU failure and why it was successful to show orbital capabilities while failing short on one important selling point Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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