Moon Express Signs Launch Contract For Possible First Private Lunar Landing 73
MarkWhittington writes: According to a story in Space.com, Moon Express, one of the leading contestants in the Google Lunar X Prize competition, has made a giant leap toward its goal of being the first private group to land on the moon. The company has signed a contract with Rocket Lab, a new launch company based in New Zealand, for five launches of its upcoming Electron rocket. The first two launches will take place in 2017 and will be attempts to land the MX-1 lander on the lunar surface in time to win the prize by the current deadline by the end of that year.
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The Electron and the fiddle,
The space-cow jumped over the moon.
Space-X laughed,
To see such sport,
And NASA ran away with the spoon.
The first two launches will take place in 2017 (Score:3)
No, they won't.
Why? Because first launches *never* happen on time...
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I dunno... Bob Richards has been in the Space biz for a long time, and probably has a good eye for TRL's. But even if Rocket Lab isn't ready by 2017, MoonEx might be able to find an alternate launch provider. Remember, there's a fairly good chance that SpaceX could turn the entire launch market upside-down in a few weeks, if/when (fingers crossed) they "stick the landing" on their next F9 launch. In any case, I don't think MoonEx's chances of winning the GLXP will be limited by Rocket Lab's schedule, there
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I question the electric turbopumps. In many ways it makes building the rocket much simpler but the performance hit will be brutal.
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I question the electric turbopumps. In many ways it makes building the rocket much simpler but the performance hit will be brutal.
For many uses, performance doesn't matter, except to the extent that it increases costs. Fuel is cheap, fuel tanks are relatively cheap, rocket engines are expensive.... so reducing the cost of the engines can easily compensate for having to burn more fuel.
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The more fuel you burn the more you have to lift the more you have to lift the more you have to burn......
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The more fuel you burn the more you have to lift the more you have to lift the more you have to burn......
You didn't even read my post, did you?
Let me repeat:
Fuel is cheap. Fuel tanks are cheap.
Engines are expensive.
Trading cheaper engines for more fuel can save $$$$$.
Get it now?
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No you do not get it it.
The more weight they more fuel you have to carry which is more weight. To life more weight you must add more thrust which means more engines which means more weight and more fuel.
You can not just keep adding more tanks and fuel you must then add more engines because it takes more thrust to lift the fuel and tanks which means you burn more fuel and need more tanks and so and so on.
In the end you will have a Saturn V that puts 200Kg in LEO.
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"If your goal is to put something - anything - on the Moon in one piece, as a technology demonstrator, maybe that tradeoff works."
Maybe but I find the idea of electrically powering the turbo pumps of the engine as very questionable vs classic turbo pumps.
I wonder if they are using thermal batteries?
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Because first launches *never* happen on time...
They'll launch on time. For manned missions, you need six nines (99.9999%) reliability. But this is an unmanned mission, so even 99% is "good enough", especially when a delay will mean forfeiting the $20M X-Prize.
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For manned missions, you need six nines (99.9999%) reliability.
That'll be why the space shuttle broke up and killed its crew about 1.5% of the time.
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Well, it would be why they finally retired the space shuttle, yes.
Prior to Challenger they had a 100% safety rating, and prior to Columbia the single instance of failure wan't enough to extrapolate a trend. Also orbiters not named with a capital "C" still have a 100% safety rating.
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For manned missions, you need six nines (99.9999%) reliability.
That'll be why the space shuttle broke up and killed its crew about 1.5% of the time.
That's 99.9999% reliability for each component times a million components.
NZ? (Score:2)
"launch company based in New Zealand,"
Isn't New Zealand a bit far south to be taking advantage of the spin of the earth for launching rockets?
At least for the moon you want to be closer to the equator I thought
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....what? "falls" into space? You need to reach escape velocity (the direction of which interestingly doesn't matter). At the poles, you have to do it all by yourself, on the equator you only need to add sufficient speed to what you're already getting due to Earth's rotation.
Re:NZ? (Score:5, Insightful)
But New Zealand is on the underside of the Earth, so they have to use magnets to hold themselves to the ground. You just remove the magnets from the rocket, and it falls out into space.
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Well, good point. I stand corrected.
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I always assumed they were just held down by use of their Kiwi magic.
Re:NZ? (Score:4, Insightful)
Insightful? Seriously?
I'm having trouble deciding whether this is ironic or tragic (or meta-ironic?)... Guess I'll have to settle for meta-tragic.
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You could also practice recognizing obvious jokes.
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Or moderators could practice modding jokes as "Funny" instead of "Insightful".
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It being modded insightful was the joke that went over your head...
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No, it was my comment that it was "meta-tragic" that went over YOUR head.
Nyah-nyah-nyah! ;-)
Re:NZ? (Score:5, Funny)
....what? "falls" into space?
Yes. Try this simple experiment: Put a globe on your desk. Hold a coin or other dense object against the south pole with your finger. Now let go. What happens? I falls *away* from the globe. That doesn't happen in the northern hemisphere, unless you flip the globe over, and there is no way to flip the entire earth. Of course, the south pole is the ideal launch point, but it is cold and logistically difficult. So New Zealand is about as good as you are going to get.
You need to reach escape velocity
Yes, of course. But you need to learn to use gravity instead of fighting it. We already do this with gravity assist [wikipedia.org] off other planets, so there is no reason we can't do it with the earth as well.
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Actually, when I hold the coin in the northern hemisphere it simply slides down and falls off from around the equator. All we need to do for northern launches is allow the rocket to slide along the ocean first and cushion it against the forces involved, which shouldn't be too hard since even a coin manages the trip without damage.
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....what? "falls" into space?
I know; I actually winced when I read that.
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....what? "falls" into space? You need to reach escape velocity (the direction of which interestingly doesn't matter). At the poles, you have to do it all by yourself, on the equator you only need to add sufficient speed to what you're already getting due to Earth's rotation.
The earth's rotation helps you enter an orbit, it does not help you escape the Earth's sphere of influence.
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Please be kidding.
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Re: NZ? (Score:2)
that sounds wrong. If you were at the poles you would be basically taking off sideways. It's way more efficient to orbit the earth a few times and catch the moon. It's way more efficient to start on the equator to get into orbit.
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Corporations aren't yet allowed to go door to door with guns to take your money
Patience. Give President Trump some time.
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The mighty private innovators and job creators took 60 years to just try to *imitate* what government did over half a century ago, and that's only because the innovators copy what was done before??
All glory capitalism! Boo to socialism!
The Federal Government only funded the project. Douglas, Boeing, Chrysler, North American, and many other companies actually did the development and manufacturing.
The biggest difference between then and now is that back then, the government was willing to spend just about anything that it cost to make it happen, and had the purse to do so. Now, non-government entities, be they public companies, private companies, nonprofits, whatever, do not have the financial resources of the Federal Government, so th
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http://bitsocialmedia.com/wp-c... [bitsocialmedia.com]
Now please go play somewhere else, the adults are trying to have a conversation, k?
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Again, corporations don't have free speech rights because "they are people". The Supreme Court ruled the people who make up the corporations maintain their free speech rights when participating in the corporation.
In other words, Congress doesn't get to create a group of people called a "corporation", then strip The People of their free speech rights as a cost of participation.
The money buys almost exclusively advertising, which is the "press" part of the First Amendment, the means of mass production and di
Free Hasselblad for the first few visitors! (Score:2)
Maybe they're planning to collect?
Nope (Score:2)
This will NOT happen. As well, it will be many many many years before man sets foot on Mars (lack of compelling reasons, money, technology...)
I doubt it (Score:4, Insightful)
I'll be shocked and astounded if this actually ever takes place.
A Moon shot is a hell of trick to pull off, even getting into orbit is beyond the capability of most countries, let alone transit to the Moon.
Space travel is hard; it's expensive, it's complex, and space is probably the most unforgiving environment imaginable.
Color me skeptical; I don't think this is going to happen via private industry for another 20 to 50 years at the very least.
I'd be overjoyed to be wrong, though! :)
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Color me skeptical; I don't think this is going to happen via private industry for another 20 to 50 years at the very least.
A moon shot is only marginally more difficult if at all than a GEO satellite. Or for that matter a Mars shot, it's just a slightly longer rocket burn. The difficult part is what the fsck do you do when you're in orbit, it's the descent/landing that is challenging. That SpaceX can land rockets is obviously to save costs here on Earth but it's also to fill a major gap in our capability to go to Mars. I don't think a dedicated lander will ever get sufficient private funding, a spin-off technology of landing ro
Re: I doubt it (Score:2)
"Moon Express"? (Score:3)
That seems limited - it shows a lack of vision. They need to THINK BIG.
I think the company should be called Planet Express. I even have some thoughts regarding what their ships might look like [wikipedia.org].
Reviving my inner middle schooler (Score:2)
We aught be sendin' whalers! (Score:2)
The last probe we sent spotted a whale just laying out on the surface! That's free gold for the taking if we send whalers there!
Vaporware? (Score:2)
This would be a much more exciting posting if they were contracting with a company who had already made successful launches.