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(Mods, feel free to move - I don't know exactly where to put this)
Near-space, and to a lesser extent sub-orbit, have the advantage that they are accessible to small groups and even individuals. You don't have to be a billionaire to go there, or even a millionaire. I think they've been overlooked by people rushing to get to space.
A manned orbital mission is beyond the capability of any space advocacy group at the moment, but sustaining a near-space research station shouldn't be. That would allow the developers to gain experience in a low-pressure environment. I also think tourism could provide the funding necessary. Imagine seeing the stars from the top deck, without the clouds and atmosphere to distort them; or the blue ball of Terra rolling below you...
Use what is abundant and build to last
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This has been an ongoing topic since SS1 did win the prize with is unique rubber fuel but has not been picked up as a commerical venture to give low cost flights to the edge of space. Bezo did build a rocket for that purpose but its marketing of flights is little more than a local event for them. Space x while if could convert a falcon 9 for such flight has no capsule for humans to go in. The likes of the Northrup Gruman (atk orbital) lacked the same as well as does lockheed and boeing.
With no human capable capsule for flights its going no where soon.
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Spacenut:
Virgin's Spaceship Two still uses the hybrid rocket, rather similar to the one used on Spaceship One. Supposedly, they are once again well into flight tests. So there are Virgin and Blue Origin for the suborbital market, and probably near-term, if the test flights continue to go well.
There's Spacex and Boeing for crew transport to ISS by capsule, as managed (and to some extent micromanaged) by NASA. Spacex was ahead of Boeing for most of that effort, which caused NASA to delay things repeatedly so that its favored contractor Boeing would not be embarrassed. Then Spacex really screwed up that NTO-through-a-leaking-check-valve thing. Now it's neck-and-neck, and way too long delayed.
NASA's SLS/Orion has become an open joke. They are still pushing-into-the-future test flights, manned and unmanned. What good is a rocket too expensive to fly more often than once a year? That is, if you consider $1+B per launch only once a year affordable.
There will be some Falcon-9's and a few Falcon-Heavies available to compete with Atlas-5 and a few Deltas for the next several years. The unmanned Dragon is working quite well, and is the only payload capable of Earth return among the lot. Unfortunately, Crew Dragon is all messed-up in the NASA program with Spacex's recent screw-up that destroyed one on the ground.
Spacex has bet the farm on replacing Falcon-9, Falcon-Heavy, unmanned Dragon, and Crew Dragon with its "Starship"/Super Heavy design. In the long term, that may well prove to be the right thing to do. But in the near-term, my guess is that they have underestimated the stocks of Falcons and Dragons they will need before the Starship/SuperHeavy is ready.
Fallibility abounds, does it not?
GW
GW Johnson
McGregor, Texas
"There is nothing as expensive as a dead crew, especially one dead from a bad management decision"
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Sounds like stagnant progress with regards to human flight as well as for the tourism industry that is still on hold waiting to bring in cash.
Its the same thing for orbital hotel suites and much more for an industry that is still quite busy launching satelites, probes (landers, rovers included), gps upgrades and communication internet from earth.
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It is pretty disappointing that we don't have routine sub-orbital flights, 15 years on from the Ansari X-Prize being awarded. What happened?
It's also disappointing that JP Aerospace don't appear to be going anywhere. They haven't even had a manned flight yet... something Nick Piantanida achieved. I'd put more stock in them if they had manned airships making routine stratospheric flights. I wonder if the multitude of NewSpace companies that have folded in the last 15 years would have been better off focusing on near-space tourism. You could even have experience in freefall if you return in a glider - freefalling for 10km gives you 45 seconds of it, and given the height we could probably get a full minute.
The N-Prize is going nowhere too, but then, achieving orbit is pretty difficult, even when you're not restricted to a £999.99 budget. I'd still like to see some suborbital N-Prizes. $10,000 to the first team to achieve manned airship flight above 25km. £50,000 to one that keeps two people up there for a minimum of 72 hours. That sort of thing.
Use what is abundant and build to last
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Terraformer,
I'd like to see more work done on airships and aircraft designed to operate indefinitely in the upper atmosphere of Earth and Venus. A lot of R&D needs to be done with respect to making lightweight inflatables fabricated with the latest generations of engineering polymers and CNT fabrics, thin film photovoltaics, and electric motors using CNT wiring and Iron Nitride permanent magnets. Although airships would operate at much lower altitudes on Mars, their ability to transport cargo with minimal energy input is of extreme importance for life here on Earth and Mars.
CNT composite gliders powered by fuel cells and electric motors are required for efficient transport between suborbital platforms. The Airbus / Windward Performance Perlan II glider immediately comes to mind, in that regard. It's fabricated from CFRP, but CNTRP would be stronger and lighter still. Perlan II's gross weight is 816kg, but a CNTRP should easily cut that to a half or third. The mass saved would enable mounting of thin film solar cells on the wings, a lightweight electric motor in the tail for propulsion, and a fuel cell to deliver the power to climb to altitude on its own. An electromagnetic launch system would gently launch the glider from land, perhaps from atop a mountain, the fuel cell would propel the glider to altitude, whereupon it would approach a suborbital station for crew or cargo transfer. A super-sized version of Festo's robotic octopus gripper would snatch transport gliders out of the sky as they approached the station and mate them to docking ports below the station. Once aboard the station, small rockets with micro capsules could be used to launch into space from the edge of the stratosphere. That means vacuum-optimized rocket engine nozzles could be used.
Anyway, just some more ideas about how we could make space launch more affordable.
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...and it should be doable on a budget measured in millions, rather than billions. Low enough to be open to far more people, whilst generating a lot of experience in surviving a near vacuum.
Use what is abundant and build to last
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