The stealth rocketeers

John Doe, Seattle, Wash. — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 23:59:28 GMT

So much for space flight being the motivating factor to lose weight.

The stealth rocketeers

Rob Abiera, Oklahoma City, OK — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 13:34:52 GMT

Love it! Love it! Love it! Go XCOR! Go Virgin! Go SpaceX! Go Armadillo! Let the naysayers grouse all they want - I'm looking forward to seeing a real private space transportation industry develop into a real space-bound community (AND BEYOND!!!) and I'm loving every step of the way! Disappointments? Sure. So what! That doesn't mean we're not still getting there! And thanks to sites like Cosmic Log and HobbySpace for helping us keep up with those steps!

The stealth rocketeers

Scott Knighten, Ada, OK — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 13:56:41 GMT

Progress such as this gives me hope. We have been taking the slowest track to more available spaceflight, and any progress is welcome.

The stealth rocketeers

steve smyth — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 22:00:15 GMT

does never getting off the ground provide the stealth aspect?...the vehicle doesn't appear to be there because...IT AIN'T...that's stealth for ya, eh?

The stealth rocketeers

Gino, Salem, Or. — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 00:38:48 GMT

People gush over space flight as if there was some place to go to up there. Settle down, folks,and think;
no rest stops, no filling stations, no Motel 6, no
Oxygen should you want to breath, no ONSTAR to rescue
your stranded, radiation riddled carcass. But who am I
to rain on your parade? Dream On!

The stealth rocketeers

Alan Boyle — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 02:13:38 GMT

No, Steve... The stealth part is that XCOR is off the ground and getting people to pay for rockets, and people don't even know it. Instead of having one billionaire pay for a space program (Paul Allen, Richard Branson, Robert Bigelow, Jeff Bezos), they're finding ways to get a million here, a million there to move them along. Kind of like using the ground game instead of the passing game, which is apt considering that the rocket demonstration was put on in Vince Lombardi country.

The stealth rocketeers

Norman, Houston, TX — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 05:51:40 GMT

I am the designer of the Cosmos Mariner spaceplane for Lone Star Space Access. It is amazing to me the similarity in their craft and ours.

The stealth rocketeers

Dave BC WA — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 06:04:21 GMT

Gee, less than 100,000 dollars for a half-hour flight. What a bargain. Can’t wait. In the meantime, come out to Eastern Washington. I’ll give you a half-hour flight in my ’68 Corvette that will blow your socks off for a couple of six-packs. For most of us, that’s as close as we’ll ever get to feeling what it’s like to ‘blast-off’, ‘feel G-forces’, and, with a few bumps, ‘weightlessness’.
Anyway, if we keep going forward, maybe one of our great grandkids will experience the real deal.

The stealth rocketeers

steve smyth — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 10:41:20 GMT

OOPS!!!
You got me, Al...didn't read the piece...just the headline.
Any group clever enuf to avoid the single billionaire phenomenon and leave me with egg on my face deserves a closer look.
There's no way they ever do more than 'barnstorm'... but, that's where it all starts, eh?
The Single Billionaire Phenomenon is my thought for today...what a concept...single billionaires rule space.
We got Billionaire EnviroMentalists too, don't forget...they're everywhere...they're everywhere...

The stealth rocketeers

Drew Wohlenhaus, Bellingham Wash — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 20:35:10 GMT

It'd be fun if they sold these rather than just gave tours. A 1 seat composite chassis for one of these crafts cannot cost much more than 5k for materials, albeit the tooling would be pricey, It'd be interesting to set up an Ansari like X-Prize based on what the automotive X-Prize is trying to do, crafting a manufacturing plan. Getting these companies to produce on a larger scale would change the world, for better or worse no one knows.

This is probably already in the works which might explain the planned 30% price hike for carbon fiber next month.

I leave you with this.
The more rigid definition of a scientific group, the more consequences persist. When the individual scientist can take a paradigm for granted, he need no longer, in his major works, attempt to build his field anew, starting from first principles and justifying the use of each concept introduced. That can be left to the writers of textbooks. Given a textbook, however, the creative scientist can begin his research where it leaves off and thus concentrate exclusively upon the subtlest and most esoteric aspects of the natural phenomena that concerns his group. And as he does this, his research communiques will begin to change in ways whose evolution has been little studied but whose modern end products are obvious to all and oppressive to many. No longer will his researches usually be embodied in books addressed, like Franklin's Experiments on Electricity or Darwin's Origin of Species, to anyone who might be interested in the subject matter of the subject field. Instead they will usually appear as brief articles addressed only to professional colleagues, the men & women whose knowledge of a shared paradigm can be assumed and who prove to be the only ones able to read the papers addressed to them.

T.S.K

The stealth rocketeers

Frank Glover, Rochester, NY — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 20:54:34 GMT

Gino, the Universe is about 14 billion light years across, and getting bigger every second. There's nowhere to go, out of all that? Go take a second look...

BTW, earlier explorers and settlers couldn't count on most of those things either, yet here we are, humans living in almost every corner of the planet.

The stealth rocketeers

Stewart, Gainesville FL — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 22:19:06 GMT

Gino, have you not heard of a fellow named Bigelow? He's already launched two inflatable test habitats, and looks likely to provide that "someplace to go" in time for the orbital private market. After all, Oregon was considered a howling wilderness but a few centuries ago!

The stealth rocketeers

Jon Ander, Seattle, Wash — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 16:08:18 GMT

Norman, you wrote,

"I am the designer of the Cosmos Mariner spaceplane for Lone Star Space Access. It is amazing to me the similarity in their craft and ours."

Your correct... seems like everyone is borrowing from Von Braun's vision!

The stealth rocketeers

Chuck Sweet — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 20:35:58 GMT

Oregon was considered a howling wilderness just in the past century. In 1960 my father was able to convince some East Coast folks that to get to his family's house one could indeed fly to Portland, but then one had to take the train to Salem, Or and from there one had to take a coach from there to the Coastal town of Newport, and from there ride horse to the tiny town of Siletz as the roads were unpassable to motor vehicles. In reality one could drive right up to the front door, but folks believed it even in the 60's yet... However, I know for a fact that my grandparents only got an indoor bathroom when my father went into the Navy...it seems he was the only one who knew where the 'older' outhouse holes had been dug and ran into 'problems' with the newer holes. We are not far from our "Olden Exporer" days as many think and for some to say that the spirit of the old explorers is gone, they only need to look at the number of Science and Biology researchers that go all over the world, still finding places where we have not set our feet or hands upon.
Mankind MUST get off this planet, this is the last major direction for us to explore and utilize other than the deep sas, and in fact, shares some technological difficulties with the manned exploration of space: the containment of a suitable atmosphere, energy sources and access to the outside environment. Extreme pressure vs no pressure (well, reversed extreme pressures?) is the major difference, aside from the ease of getting there, with Oceanic exploration one only need go down, and to float up, going into space takes a lot of energy change, energy that must be given back up if one is to return safely from space. This last actually explains the problem of one engineer saying that a competitor's ship looks "a lot like our own" is that a tool designed for a specific purpose, built by one person (or group of people) is going to look an awful lot like another tool used for the same purpose by another man (or group) just because of the same forces acting upon it and the needs of the designers are going to be very close, so the outwards form is going to be similar...just like why a whale and a submarine look an awful lot alike since the flow of water and streamlining is what rules the outter shape, just like any space plane is going to look similar to any other space plane....in reality, how much difference is there in modern combat aircraft made for the same types of missions...almost identical.

But, in any case, this is very, very good news, that space flight is getting to the point where not only rich researchers are going for it, older, established companies that have worked with space manufacturing in the past are working towards building their own instead of just building to order. Getting space exploration to a point where more of the masses of this planet can participate must be seen as a high priority if we are going to have any chance at colonization of space and saving our race as a whole. The earth is a trap, if we dont escape it soon the jaws will inexorably close on us, leaving us either too broke to do it, too broken up (regional or world wars) or plain unable to do it if we, for some reason lose our technical ability. And Yes, that CAN happen. We Have to get off this mudball and start making places for ourselves to live in. The Universe is trying to kill us all, and may succeed!

The stealth rocketeers

Ron, New York, NY — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 22:57:10 GMT

Thanks Dave, but you're going to have to get those six-packs from somebody else. If it's all the same with you I think I'd just rather start saving up for that $100,000 ticket. Washington? That's right next to Oregon, isn't it?

The stealth rocketeers

Dave BC WA — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 08:25:21 GMT

Ron of New York, I’m not sure what you’re saying in regards to Washington being next to Oregon. I’ve lived in both states. For the record, I live in Washington but as I write this, I’m at my Dad’s house in Oregon. Who’d figure?
Anyway, what I’m saying is most of us will never experience space flight. The best most of us can hope for is that our great grandkids will. If you do save your 100,000 and get a ticket that would be great. Hopefully, over the years, the price will come down or wages will go up so my offspring can afford it too.

The stealth rocketeers

Joe Strout, Fort Collins, CO — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 21:51:13 GMT

I'm pleased to see XCOR making progress. I've been rooting for those "rocket plumbers" ever since they formed, which was more years ago now than I care to think about. But since then, they've become top-notch engine builders, with innovative and reliable designs that have proven themselves again and again. It's great to see them taking the next step to full craft development. Can't wait to see what the next five years will bring!

The stealth rocketeers

red — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 11:51:40 GMT

"no rest stops, no filling stations, no Motel 6, no Oxygen should you want to breath, no ONSTAR to rescue your stranded, radiation riddled carcass."

Gino: There's no ONSTAR *without* space - it's a satellite system!

There's a push to develop more "rest stops" and "filling stations" like the ISS (e.g.: Bigelow space stations, on-orbit refueling). If the reusable vehicles like XCOR's meet their long-term goals, this infrastructure will be a lot more economical. It will benefit explorers, "space tourists", and most importantly all the people on Earth with better and cheaper services like ONSTAR and countless others (existing and new).

The stealth rocketeers

Loren, SF Bay Area, CA — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 23:48:23 GMT

Let's hope the privateers get some sort of reliable LEO transport system worked out before the Russians cut off our ability to use Soyuz craft to get to the ISS. Hopefully the current political crises will wake someone up to the fact that, without Russian cooperation, our manned space program and access to ISS is screwed.

The stealth rocketeers

Wade Whitlock, Aberdeen, MD — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 19:03:24 GMT

Speaking of "it looks like...". Does any one remember the X-20 DynaSoar?

During the late unlamented SST rush the Russians were accused of doing a reproduction of the Concorde (Concordski) and responded that the similar performance specifications produced similar designs. Of course they did. And having a copy of the plans didn't hurt, either.

Look at Apollo and Soyuz. Identical requirements and dissimilar responses.

The stealth rocketeers

Doug Jones, Mojave, CA — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 02:05:05 GMT

Actually, Wade, Lynx resembles the Soviet Bor-4 more than Dynasoar. This was driven by a lot of CFD modeling, and only a little by historical research. The references did not give sufficiently detailed design data to allow reverse engineering even if we wanted to; it was just convergent evolution.

The stealth rocketeers

bob smith, thrall, texas — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 15:20:07 GMT

if th g-force is great then let the people who can get a ride do it for free.

The stealth rocketeers

Lloyd W., Los Angeles Calif — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 21:38:20 GMT

I think it's great that there are private companies that are going to space in practical manner. I love NASA but let them do the big stuff. The way space will be conquered by the everyday guy/gal is through private ventures. Near Earth Orbit, Geospace, and Low Earth Orbit can be mastered within 10 years. I also see if government and private space programs are set free, commercial and civil lunar colonies could be florishing by 2025.

The one draw back is big areospace. Just like the automakers of 20th century if they smell competition they may try to squash it by buying it up.

The stealth rocketeers

Earle,Lawnside NJ — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 06:53:29 GMT

Unless they conquer cosmic & gamma radiation many people have damage done to their bodies that can cause cansor,sterility and damage to your genes. I would like to go to space too,but I know the risks.