Tag: commercial

SpaceX donates used Merlin engine and Falcon 9 grid fin to Smithsonian

9:10 am

A SpaceX used Merlin engine and a Falcon 9 grid fin will go on display at the Smithsonian Air & Space museum when it reopens its east wing after a major renovation.

In addition to the 2019 launch of SpaceIL’s “Beresheet” moon lander, which entered lunar orbit but crashed into the moon’s surface, the donated Merlin engine was one of nine that flew on the first stages of two other Falcon 9 rockets. In 2018, it was launched twice from Vandenberg Air Force Base (today Space Force Base) in California, helping to loft commercial communications satellites (Iridium-6) and an Argentinian Earth-observation satellite (SAOCOM 1A). The latter stage was the first to land on land on the U.S. West Coast, as opposed to using one of SpaceX’s ocean-going droneships.

The grid fin flew only once, on the 2017 launch that placed a South Korean communications satellite in orbit.

From an engineering perspective, one can’t help wondering why SpaceX chose to donate these items in particular. Why for example did the grid fin fly only once? And why was the Merlin engine retired?

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Bob Smith out at Blue Origin

8:03 pm

Though this change probably comes four years late, the CEO of Blue Origin, Bob Smith, announced today that he is resigning from the company, effective at the end of the year.

The company’s incredibly slow implementation of all of its projects, which begun when Smith took over in 2017, has made it something of joke punchline in the space business. Suborbital test flights of its New Shepard spacecraft went from almost monthly test flights to none for years. Its orbital New Glenn rocket is four years behind schedule, and it is still doubtful it will fly next year. And the company’s BE-4 rocket engine was also years behind schedule and even now has caused enormous delays for its one outside customer, ULA, delaying the launch of its Vulcan rocket by at least four years. As noted at the link:

Smith brought a traditional aerospace mindset into a company that had hitherto been guided by a new space vision, leading to a high turnover rate. And Blue Origin remains significantly underwater, financially. It is likely that Bezos is still providing about $2 billion a year to support the company’s cash needs.

Crucially, as Blue Origin meandered under Smith’s tenure, SpaceX soared, launching hundreds of rockets and thousands of satellites. Smith, clearly, was not the leader Blue Origin needed to make the company more competitive with SpaceX in launch and other spaceflight activities. It became something of a parlor game in the space industry to guess when Bezos would finally get around to firing Smith.

Smith will be replaced by Dave Limp, who had been Amazon’s VP for devices and services until last month. Whether he can get this company moving again is still an unknown, considering he was also involved in launching Amazon’s Kuiper satellite constellation, the development of which has been as slow and uninspiring as all of Blue Origin’s projects.

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Manon – Act I, ‘Bedroom’

6:01 pm

An evening pause: Written by Kenneth MacMillan and performed by Marianela Nuñez as Manon and Federico Bonelli as Des Grieux of the Royal Ballet.

Contrast the gentility and elegance of this dance of two, of which Astaire and Rogers were of the same class, with that of the raw modern gymnastic routines of large groups. Both have their merits, but to me there is something more civilized and thoughtful about the former.

Hat tip Judd Clark.

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SpaceX launches 21 Starlink satellites from Vandenberg

11:43 am

SpaceX early this morning successfully launched another 21 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg in California shortly after midnight.

The first stage successfully completed its sixth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

68 SpaceX
43 China
13 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 79 to 43, and the entire world combined 79 to 69. SpaceX by itself now trails the rest of the world combined (excluding American companies) by only 68 to 69.

Hat tip to BtB’s stringer Jay. I had missed this launch last night, until he reminded me of it.

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SpaceX launches 22 Starlink satellites, flying its second booster for a 17th time

9:09 pm

SpaceX tonight successfully launched 22 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral using a first stage booster flying for the seventeenth time.

The booster landed successfully on a drone ship in the Atlantic. The company now has two boosters that have flown that many times, plus at least one that has flown fifteen times.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

67 SpaceX
43 China
13 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 78 to 43, and the entire world combined 78 to 69. SpaceX by itself now trails the rest of the world combined (excluding American companies) by only 67 to 69.

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House speaker Kevin McCarthy proposes bill to extend “learning period” for rocketry

9:52 am

The speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy (R- California) today introduced what he calls the STAR act, which would extend the learning period that exempts the new human commercial space industry from heavy regulation from its impended expiration this year for eight more years, to 2031. From his statement:

The STAR Act would extend the learning period by 8 years to provide sufficient time for the FAA and commercial space industry to develop consensus standards for human safety in space flight. The bill’s proposed 8-year extension corresponds with the lengths of the original learning period — from 2004 to 2012—and the extension by Rep. McCarthy’s SPACE Act (P.L. 114-90) — from 2015 to 2023.

More information here. That McCarthy has introduced this bill suggests its chances of passage are high, assuming a very divided and partisan Congress can manage to pass anything in the coming weeks.

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SpaceX shows off a Raptor-2 engine during local Texas parade

12:13 pm

During the annual Founders Day parade in McGregor, Texas, SpaceX participated by including on its float a Raptor-2 engine, used by Starship and Superheavy.

Outside of an unannounced display of an engine in town one day, SpaceX, known for it’s secrecy, hasn’t had a public showing like this before. Residents waved as the engine passed by while SpaceX employees and their families waved and tossed candy from the trailer hauling the engine.

McGregor, whose population is only 6,000, is the location of SpaceX’s engine facility, where it builds and tests its rocket engines. Very clearly this parade proves this evil capitalist company is doing harm to these poor rural Texans and the environment that surrounds them. The hate that emanates from these citizens is truly overwhelming!

Hat tip to Robert Pratt of Pratt on Texas.

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NASA requests proposals from private industry for deorbiting ISS

9:21 am

NASA on September 18, 2023 sent out a request for proposals from private industry for methods for deorbiting the International Space Station (ISS), with a deadline for such proposals of November 17, 2023.

You can review the request here. According to the press release at the first link, the bulk of any contract will be fixed price.

To maximize value to the government and enhance competition, the acquisition will allow offerors flexibility in proposing Firm Fixed Price or Cost Plus Incentive Fee for the Design, Development, Test and Evaluation phase. The remainder of the contract will be Firm Fixed Price.

That the development phase might be cost-plus allows a lot of room for budget growth, however, especially since the companies most likely to want such a contract are the old big companies (Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman) that routinely go overbudget and behind schedule.

The full proposal is more than 600 pages long, so I have not reviewed it in its entirety. I wonder therefore if NASA would entertain proposals that include salvaging any ISS modules for use on other space stations.

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Wedding String Quartet – Le Onde by Ludovico Einaudi

6:01 pm

An evening pause: This video breaks one of rules for a good evening pause, in that is is shot from one static wide shot camera. I normally reject such videos, as the visuals are boring. I make an exception here because of the music and the arrangement, which is so breath-taking you don’t care about the visuals at all. Makes me want to know more about this composer and his work.

Hat tip Alton Blevins.

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German space plane company completes test program of prototype

10:37 am

The German space plane company Polaris Spaceplanes had now completed a 15-flight test program of the small prototype of its planned orbital and suborbital spaceplane.

The test-flights took place over the course of three days, between Aug. 22 and Sep. 8, and were meant to demonstrate the vehicle’s aerodynamics and flight control systems in preparation for a larger-scale spaceplane prototype the company plans to equip with a linear aerospike rocket engine.

MIRA-Light measures just 8.2 feet (2.5 meters) long, and flies using four electric fans. For 10 of MIRA-Light’s 15 flights, the mini-spaceplane was equipped with a mock aerospike engine to simulate its impact on vehicle performance. In total, the prototype accumulated about 40 total minutes of flight time, according to a report from European Spaceflight.

What makes this project interesting is its use of an aerospike engine, a rocket-engine concept that has been around for decades but never successfully implemented. If successful here, it will make the engines of Polaris’ spaceplane very efficient.

The company now plans a series of test programs using prototypes of increasing size, leading to flying its full-scale hypersonic space plane Aurora on commercial suborbital and orbital flights in ’26 or ’27.

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