Spinlaunch wins suborbital launch contract from NASA
Capitalism in space: Spinlaunch has won a launch contract from NASA to use its rocket-tossing spin launcher, shown in the photo to the right, to place a test payload on a suborbital flight later this year.
Unlike a vertical rocket first stage, the launcher spins its upper stage to a high acceleration and flings it upward. While the G-forces are too brutal for any delicate equipment or biology, this technique could be a very cheap way to toss bulk payloads like water and oxygen into space.
Spinlaunch has already done one test flight in November ’21, and hopes to do its first orbital test flight by ’25.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Capitalism in space: Spinlaunch has won a launch contract from NASA to use its rocket-tossing spin launcher, shown in the photo to the right, to place a test payload on a suborbital flight later this year.
Unlike a vertical rocket first stage, the launcher spins its upper stage to a high acceleration and flings it upward. While the G-forces are too brutal for any delicate equipment or biology, this technique could be a very cheap way to toss bulk payloads like water and oxygen into space.
Spinlaunch has already done one test flight in November ’21, and hopes to do its first orbital test flight by ’25.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
In terms of non-rocket launchers
1) Bob Heinlein’s idea in the Fifties, if memory serves, was a electromagnetic railgun, to launch cargos of raw materials (and eventually “rods from God”) in “The Moon is Harsh Mistress”
2) Gerald Bull took Jules Verne’s “from the Earth to the Moon” (as modified by Professor Rausenberger and Krupp) to heart with Project HARP back in the Sixties
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinetic_bombardment
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_HARP
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Gun
I’ve always wished HARP had been a success
One suspects that few people have worked the actual numbers on the scheme.
Zman, comments?
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/04/pentagon-declassifies-1500-pages-ufo-reports-claim-ufo-encounters-cause-nervous-system-damage-unaccounted-pregnancies/
“The documents also reported encounters with “ghosts, yetis, spirits, elves and other mythical/legendary entities” classed as “AN3” and witnessing a UFO with aliens on board would be “CE3”.
Poltergeists, crop circles, spontaneous human combustion, alien abductions, and other paranormal events are also categorized, The Sun reported.”
Information? Disinformation?
From what I have read about magnetic accelerators or mass accelerators is that they would work great on the Moon (as in The Moon is a Harsh Mistress), but not as well on Earth. The main reason is the lack of air pressure to over come on the moon.
Spin Launch supposedly lowers the pressure in the spin chamber to overcome this. I have read some on this, but it seems like they still have a lot to overcome.
To say that it cannot launch delicate objects is an understatement. The instant transition when let go that changes the forces on the cargo almost limit it to solids only.
I am puzzled about how the spin launcher handles the balancing of the launch arm. The asymmetric force must be very high either before the launch, or after the launch, unless a compensating mass is also released from the other end of the arm at the moment of payload release.
Or is the problem solved by the use of a really big freaking bearing?
“Maybe they are among us? I don’t know.”
https://youtu.be/5WuGolAXZVg
If they evacuate the spin chamber for the launch, there must be one heck of a re-entry when the projectile slams into the normal atmosphere outside the chamber.
There’s a Youtube video about their test launch that explains the air-pressure issue. I don’t recall the balance issue being addressed, but it is a very good point. To get up to speed, a counter-weight would be handy, but after launch!? I thought my washer rocked in the spin cycle.
For an Earth-based rail gun, you want the open end to be really high. Up the side of a tall mountain would be helpful. Up the side of a tall mountain onto a long same-grade track would be even better(*). Most of the depressurization would take care of itself by closing the hatch at the bottom while leaving the top open. Close the top hatch and pump it down; that sounds really expensive. But, The Boring Company wants to use evacuated tunnels, so it must be at least vaguely feasible.
(*) Active support would probably work. If one is rail-gunning tons of cargo up to speed, a few megawatts to hold up the end of the tube is probably acceptable. Perhaps some sort of giant dirigible as a backup system so it doesn’t just fall out of the sky if the power goes out.