Another Private Space Startup

An anonymous reader writes "Wired has a story about former PayPal owner Elon Musk who has his own rocket company, SpaceX, trying to lower the cost of getting into space. They just tested the rocket engine, and hope to fly a test by the end of the year. Not bad for less than a year's worth of work so far." We mentioned this guy last year.

Re:Well, it come with two pair of pants.

[ifreakshow]

Later the article claims he plans on charging $6 million dollars. Sounds like a bargain to me.

Space Entrepreneurship Network

[AbdullahHaydar]

The guy in the article should join the Space Entrepreneurship Network [spaceentre...urship.net].

Maybe I should too...

Either way, I'll better off than that stupid NSync guy who thought Pepsi was going to sponsor his $20 million ride on a Soyuz. If he's really a space fanatic, as he claims, he should have put the money up himself. (I'm sure he's got enough, with all the teenage girls who listen to that crap.)

Re:Very dangerous

[nemski]

I thought that Colubia was damaged at take-off, not while in space.

Thank the X prize

[apsmith]

If you're wondering what's up with all these private space ventures lately, the Space Access Society [space-access.org] conference is going on right now. This particular contender is for freight, not human travel (at least at this point), and orbital, not suborbital as in the X Prize [xprize.com] competition, which has also been heating up the last few months, since they got the full $10 million in the bank last October.

Re:I've Got a Rocket Company Too

[lynnroth]

You can make your own with a two liter bottle and some pressurized air. I used an air compressor.
Very easy to get 80 ft or more.

[google.com]
A google search

Re:Obligitory PayPal Reference:

[Grab]

Too right.

"Hey, this guy who stole all our money is spending it on something cool for himself, so now he's a hero."

The wierd ironies of Slashdot postings. And to think tabloid newspapers get criticised for being fickle - they ain't got nothing on geek news...

Grab.

Re:Fitting for former PayPal founder

[ianjk]

http://www.paypalwarning.com/WallOfShame/Default.a sp

Testimonials to Paypals fair buisness practices.

Re:Very dangerous?

[johnnys]

IIRC, none of these private ventures that are trying to go into space are also trying to go into orbit. They are trying to do "sub-orbital" flights like the first couple of Mercury flights.

So, none of the "waste" that they may leave behind is going to remain up there: It will all come falling back down into the atmosphere where it will not pose any danger to any other spacecraft.

Re:X Prize

[foolish]

Actually a fair number of the XPrize entrants may not spend $10M in R&D and launch costs to get to their shot... so there is the possibility of it being a net benefit. Plus, first come first serve in terms of possibly being able to sell rides...

You might also check out the ERPS proposal for a series of similar federal prizes...

http://www.erps.org/papers/isdc2003.html

neat stuff, with escelation of prize monies the closer to orbit they git. keep in mind the Xprize is not a orbital infrastructure, but a ballistic shit... There are hurdles to get to orbital velocity.

Re:John Carmack

[nofx_3]

Yeah, his company is called armadillo aerospace, it uses a hydrogen peroxide engine and has no control surfaces, instead it is controlled by software so that the engines are independently controlled and can be used to stabalize the craft. check it out at Armadillo Aerospace [armadilloaerospace.com]

"COKE ADDS LIFE!"

[jo_ham]

This was part of the plot of the Red Dwarf novels.

A spacecraft, called the Nova 5, was sent up into space to trigger certain stars to go supernova at precisely the right times so that when the light from each of them reached the earth, it would spell out "COKE ADDS LIFE!" across the night sky - an ad campaign that would supposedly "buy pepsi for good".

The crew were in stasis on their way to add the final dot on the excalmation mark when the ship's android decided to clean the computer - with hot soapy water. The ship, with no computer (the android, Kryten, cleaned the backup computer as well), crashed into a moon, to be found three million years later by Red Dwarf and its crew - with Kryten still tending to the needs of the three female crash survivors, feeding them, bathing them etc, although they've been skelotons for a fairly large proportion of those three million years.