NASA's attention grabbed

[vincent]

BOULDER, Colo. ? NASA's focus on the value of innovative commercial space firms took center stage in back-to-back meetings with a private space station module builder and a company developing a new space plane to fly passengers to and from Earth orbit.

The meetings were led by NASA's deputy chief Lori Garver, who traveled last week toinflatable space modulebuilder Bigelow Aerospace in Las Vegas and then visited the company Sierra Nevada, based here, to check on the progress of its Dream Chaser spacecraft.

In a briefing Friday (Feb. 4) at the University of Colorado at Boulder, Garver spotlighted NASA?s partnering with the commercial sector to develop innovative technologies of value to space agency aspirations.Real space hardware is being built in "a rapid and unprecedented way," Garver said, with NASA recognizing that the government can?t and shouldn?t do everything.

?We?re looking to loosen our grip and allow companies to do those things in low Earth orbit that we?ve been doing for over 50 years," Garver said.

Bigelow?s business

Garver?s visits with space entrepreneurs groups included Feb. 4 discussion with Bigelow Aerospace president and founder Robert Bigelow, a Las Vegas-based general contractor, real estate tycoon, hotel businessman and developer.

In 2006 and 2007, the space company launched orbiting space station prototypes, Genesis 1 and Genesis 2.

Garver and Bigelow discussed several issues, including the prospect for a Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM) ? an inflatable room for the International Space Station. BEAM would be a larger version of the already flown Genesis-type unit.

But Bigelow has his sights on a grander adventure: Building the first of multiple, fully-functioning stations by 2015. The initial "Alpha" complex would consist of Bigelow's large Sundancer and BA 330 modules.

"How exciting to see that government isn?t the only one interested in doing things on-orbit," Garver told SPACE.com regarding Bigelow's plans. "And guess what they need? They need transportation services."

Currently, NASA has deals in place with two other private companies to provide unmanned cargo delivery services that will keep the International Space Station stocked with supplies once the agency retires its shuttle fleet for good later this year.

Under those deals, California-based Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) will provide deliveries using its Dragon capsules and Falcon 9 rockets. Orbital Sciences Corporation in Virginia is NASA's other commercial partner in the venture, and is developing Cygnus freighters and Taurus 2 rockets to provide the service.

Bigelow Aerospace's new deals

Meanwhile, Bigelow Aerospace has been busy hammering out new agreements to spur customer use of the firm?s expandable, orbital space complexes.

The company is currently on the road marketing a variety of individual spaceflight programs, tied to an array of duration and pricing options, including an option of $28,750,000 for a 30-day astronaut visit.

A Memorandum of Understanding between the Emirates Institution for Advanced Science and Technology (EIAST) and Bigelow Aerospace was announced on Jan. 31. That deal is geared to explore joint efforts to establish a next-generation commercial human spaceflight program for Dubai and the United Arab Emirates.

The agreement was signed by His Excellency Ahmed Al Mansoori, director general of EIAST, and Robert Bigelow, president of Bigelow Aerospace. In a joint statement, they said they will work to create a world-class microgravity research and development program ?with a potential focus on advanced biotechnology applications, and a variety of other commercial space-related activities.?

Earlier this month, another memorandum was inked between Bigelow Aerospace and Space Florida, a group created to strengthen Florida?s position in aerospace research, investment, exploration and commerce. That deal is focused on pursuing and identifying foreign and domestic companies

According to Bigelow, if the company attracts enough customers to lease all of the orbiting, inflatable modules on the company?s Complex Alpha, it could mean up to 25 launches a year -- possibly from Cape Canaveral -- to ferry cargo and crew into Earth orbit. Module launches could be accommodated by current United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rockets or other vendors, such as the SpaceX Falcon 9 booster.

Space plane drop testing

One day after visiting with Bigelow's team, Garver visited the brains behind the Sierra Nevada Corporation's (SNC) Dream Chaser spacecraft. Her Feb. 5 visit with the Colorado-based company stemmed from the partnership being carried out under an award of the space agency?s Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) program.

SNC?s Space Systems Colorado in neighboring Louisville has also partnered with the university to draw upon hands-on student talent in design, test, and human-rating aspects of Dream Chaser.

The seven-person Dream Chaser vehicle is based on NASA HL-20 lifting body work, a legacy design completed in the 1980s and 1990s at the space agency?s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va.

Dream Chaser would fly to the International Space Station and back. The vehicle is slated to launch vertically on an Atlas 5 rocket and land horizontally on conventional runways.

According to former NASA astronaut, Jim Voss, vice president of SNC Space Exploration Systems, Dream Chaser is taking shape with modern methods and materials.

The core structure of the craft will become an atmospheric flight test vehicle, to be taken to high-altitude and released by the White Knight Two mothership, built by as part of a space launch system by Scaled Composites of Mojave, Calif., to support Virgin Galactic?s suborbital spaceliner business.

"We?ll do approach and landing tests much like what was done for the space shuttle before it flew into space," Voss told SPACE.com. "We plan to be ready for drop testing by May 2012 if we are aggressive and work more quickly like we did during CCDev 1?then we expect to be doing our drop testing at that time."

Voss said that drop testing via helicopter of a Dream Chaser scale model in December was carried out at NASA?s Dryden Flight Research Center in California.

The 88-pound (40-kilogram) model was designed, built, and operated in collaboration between SNC and the Research and Engineering Center for Unmanned Vehicles at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

Space: Not a solo sport

Mark Sirangelo, head of Sierra Nevada Space Systems and a corporate vice president, spotlighted the harmony needed between government, industry, and academia to work on Dream Chaser.

"Space is not a solo sport. You don?t do it on your own. You need a team. You need a village to make that happen," Sirangelo said.

Sirangelo pointed out that "It?s a very interesting time. Everyone sees that it?s a difficult time in the space industry ? certainly a difficult time in the budget world."

But in calling attention to those issues, he added: ?Today, we?re here to talk about the positive. This is a good time. There?s a lot of change going on.?

Under the NASA CCDev award, Sirangelo said that the company has met all of its milestones, announcing that "we?re on time, actually under budget." He added that Dream Chaser will become a fully capable suborbital vehicle on the way to reaching orbital capability.

Concerning the work of Bigelow, as well as his enterprise, Sirangelo said it?s all about building infrastructure together.

"NASA didn?t invest in this program to take people to the space station. NASA invested, in my view, in this program to help build and spur industry," Sirangelo said. "There are many markets that we are looking at that really justify the nation?s investment in this ? as well as our investment."

Garver said that NASA's partnerships with commercial space efforts "truly are our collective future? to help the U.S. win that future by out-innovating, out-educating and out-building our competition around the world.

"The entrance of the entrepreneur into the field that has been dominated by government investment is now poised for rapid commercial growth," she added.

Space.com

[Crisp]

Awesome! :alien:

[neoadorable]

looks good, the more the merrier. some of the spaceplane suggestions and concepts are really shaping up to be like that Pan Am plane from Kubrick's 2001. bout time, too. i wish we'll be able to see these things flying commercially in the next few years, so that NASA and other national agencies can focus on longer range destinations, open up new markets and then it's hellow Weyland-Yutani, CEC and RDA. those guys will take it from there.

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

tl;only_read_a_little

very cool - i would love to see many companies trying to get into low-orbit. anything's better than the clunky space shuttle!

[Hum]

Looks a bit scary -- hope that it flies well. :s

[Growled Member]

?We?re looking to loosen our grip and allow companies to do those things in low Earth orbit that we?ve been doing for over 50 years," Garver said.

It's about time. Allowing commercial space firms to enter the field will allow affordable space travel to develop quicker than the government going it alone.

[neoadorable]

indeed, like i said before, the more the merrier. i doubt private enterprises can muster the will or resource to do much beyond low orbit, but to be honest, the gov'ts of the world haven't really been performing in that department either...

[DocM]

very cool - i would love to see many companies trying to get into low-orbit. anything's better than the clunky space shuttle!

Coming fast are commercial orbital spacecraft that will fly both NASA & ISS consortium astronauts to the ISS and other customers to the Bigelow Aerospace commercial space stations (CSS).

The tech has been tested on Bigelow's 2 Genesis modules, which have been in polar orbit for 4 years. The first 180 cubic meter Sundancer module for CSS Alpha goes up on a SpaceX Falcon 9 in 2014. When finished the CSS's will be 690 cubic meters, nearly as large as ISS's 837 cubic meters, and expandable in 330 cubic meter jumps - the size of their larger BA-330 module. These modules are more radiation and meteor/space debris resistant than anything installed at the ISS, and NASA is talking about installing one there to test the tech.

So far 7 nations have signed up to use the CSS stations as part of their national space programs. Bigelow is prepared to build 10 CSS stations, some in low Earth orbit, and at least one large one as a space dock at EML-1, the gravitational way-point between Earth and the Moon - the perfect location. From there spacecraft, or one of Bigelow's land-able bases, could be refitted between planetary missions or on their way to the Moon.

CSS- Alpha

Orbital spacecraft players & status, and most of these will go operational - (click name for large imagery)

Dragon: SpaceX capsule - now flying NASA/ISS qualifications (7 passengers or 13,000+ lbs of cargo). Launcher is the SpaceX Falcon 9. It was to fly 3 test missions, but the first flight went so well that SpaceX & NASA are talking about merging the last 2 and having Dragon dock at the ISS and drop off cargo during the 2nd one if the rest of the flight goes well.

Dream Chaser: Sierra Nevada Corp/Northrop Grumman/Virgin Galactic spaceplane (7 passengers + undefined cargo) - drop tests from Virgin Galactic's White Knight 2 start in early 2012 with a test flight in ~2014. Launcher is the ULA Atlas V.

CST-100: Boeing/Bigelow Aerospace capsule - (7-8 passengers + small cargo) - under construction with an estimated first flight in 2013. Launcher can be the ULA Atlas V or Delta IV or the SpaceX Falcon 9.

Prometheus: Orbital Sciences/Northrop Grumman spaceplane (6 passengers) - just starting, but based on an existing design with a lot of work already done. Launcher would be the ULA Atlas V.

Dragon after it's historic Dec. 8, 2010 flight - the first commercial spacecraft to return from orbit, something only nations have done before. A crewed Dragon will be able to touch down on either land or water, as shown in the SpaceX video at bottom. Yes, it will land using rockets - just like in the 50's movies and Robert A. Heinlein novels.

[neoadorable]

thanks a lot for posting this Doc! very interesting stuff and gives one something to hope for! i'm very glad commercial entities are stepping up to the plate for LEO operations, this way the national space agencies can focus on longer range destinations....or maybe band together to form a new global space exploration treaty that will expedite matters by a decade or two...? again, one can hope.

however, most of the tech you posted about seems to use multi-stage launchers if i'm not mistaken? not an expert so could be wrong without researching these further. i think a new space treaty should be promulgated that will ban multi-stage launchers....we're already dealing with so much crap in space, from the Apollo 13 LEM to Sunita Williams' pliers or something, adding to that is not a good idea.

[DocM]

SSTO (single stage to orbit) is theoretically possible, but not a competitive cost to multistage. The problem is that the first stage has to be so large that it more than exceeds the cost and complexity of 2-3 stage designs. It's been tried, but until tech advances it's pie in the sky. There are possibilities, Reaction Engines SABRE engine that morphs from air-breathing jet into a rocket for one - but not yet.

One way to help the debris issue is redesigning how stages separate; most do this using explosive bolts, which of course generates a ton of debris. The international community is coming together on better ways to do this. Another problem is dead 2nd stages - they burn out and just stay in orbit. This can be handled by using re-startable stages that can guide themselves into re-entry where they will burn up or end up in the ocean - something that conventional solid rockets cannot do since they can't be stopped or restarted.

SpaceX's Falcon 9 2nd stage can do this, which also gives it the ability to drop several satellites into different orbits. On that December flight the Dragon was separated at 200 miles up, then it dropped off 8 more small satellites; 1 for the Army, several for the NRO (national reconnaissance office), and a couple of university satellites, and then it demonstrated that it still had enough energy to put itself into a 7,000 mile high orbit (this orbit was set up to decay, so....) The next Dragon flight will do more of the same, releasing 2 ORBCOMM communication satellites, more small ones and of course the Dragon and its cargo.

Another fix that could work for either solid or liquid 2nd stages is to install an electric ion thruster on them. These are very light, use very little fuel but could over time maneuver a burned out stage, or satellite, into a decaying orbit where it would re-enter and burn up. These have been flying for several years, with the Deep Space 1 mission flying about the solar system for years on just 60 kg of Argon fuel and <1,500 watts of electricity from its solar panels. A set of 3 ion drives are powering the Dawn mission to Ceres and Vesta.

Deep Space 1's ion drive

One step further -

A large electric plasma drive also exists in the form of VASIMR - variable specific impulse magneto-plasma rocket. VASIMR can also run on solar, but if you make very large ones powered by a nuclear reactor they could power a mission to Mars that would take just 30 days instead of 1-2 years to get there. They are the equivalent of the engines on the Discovery in the movie 2001, but for real. Many also compare VASIMR to the impulse engines on the USS Enterprise, and the comparison could well hold for its most evolved form: a fusion rocket. Such a device would generate its own power and far more thrust, and its inventor (a former US astronaut & fusion physicist) thinks it's do-able. Fiction? Nope - a 200,000+ watt solar powered VASIMR flies up to the ISS in 2014 for use re-boosting the stations orbit as it decays, and there are plans for a 10 megawatt nuclear VASIMR.

VASIMR

(the temp of that exhaust is about 1.8 million degrees Fahrenheit - any longer and those sensors would have vaporized)

[neoadorable]

you're a mind reader. i've been walking around all week with this UNOIA - UN Office of Interplanetary Affairs - supervising a 50MW nuclear VASIMR ship that can travel to Mars in two weeks and to Titan in five months scenario in my head. heh heh. i've known about VASIMR for a while now, but you explain it very well, so thanks again. but i think you're too pessimistic regarding conventional rockets....even the clunky N1 stuff from the 1950's was capable of reaching Mars orbit from earth in like six months, and i think all the probes we've sent made it there in 4-7 months depending on their transit. i think 1-2 years is for like Jupiter. well, maybe Mars when it's on the bad side of the sun if you're on a really slow rocket :laugh:

thanks for explaining all the debris-reduction strategies. note i said reduction. and i don't believe in the pie in the sky clause, nonsense (i don't mean what you're saying is nonsense, i mean the way it's used to avoid any real action). it's all a matter of will. the same people that printed trillions of dollars to give to their wall street buddies could have paid for something like the Valkyrie shuttles in Avatar, which were based on the X-33 i think...or was it X-31? i mean seriously, we know how to build a spaceplane that can fly from earth to the moon. we know, but we won't do it because we're short sighted and stupid. to paraphrase one of my college professors, NASA not carrying out the Apollo missions to the logical conculsion of permanent moon base followed by Mars missions is the same as the emperor telling Zheng He he can't go to Africa anymore, and forget about America. it's all the same, bro, all the same. humanity's been held back for aeons by idiots. and the stuff you post just makes me feel sad, because it shouldn't be a couple of guys in a lab stuggling to get financing while Obama grins as he announces $850 billion in tax cuts. if we don't expand to other worlds in the next 30 years, might as well give up. we're ****ed anyway.

[DocM]

For the record - X-33/Venture Star failed for two reasons: the composite liquid oxygen tank they depended on didn't work and the linear aerospike engines never met their design goals. Since then composite tanks have improved enough, but the aerospike is still wandering the desert.

Spaceplanes have no place beyond Earth orbit, as I detailed in the other thread.

[neoadorable]

so in other words you believe we will always need multi-stage to get to moon surface? i mean i understand for longer range missions, obiously we can't have really big craft entering atmospheres, but for a short trip like the moon?

thanks for explaining the X-33 situation, it does look like it's a very good design, the aerospike engine has lots of promise, why can't they get it to work?

[DocM]

The efficiency of the aerospike was a problem, in no small part due to the unconstrained plume of one thruster affecting its neighbors. This may be fixable down the road, but with low-cost engines like SpaceX's Merlin in mass production instead of the usual one-off method....

Lunar and other beyond Earth orbit (BEO) destinations would better be handled by a dedicated vehicle assembled in orbit or at the first Lagrange point (EML-1) then sent out on missions & returned there for refitting. The EML-1 base, actually a space-dock similar to Star Trek, has already been worked out by Bigelow and would be built using their modules.

As to Bigelow - more info on their rigs thanks to folks correlating data from press releases and other data....

Launch mass: 50 kg/m3 +/- 10%

Launchers: Atlas V, Falcon 9, Falcon 9 Heavy

Core diameter: 1/3 inflated diameter (important vs. launcher fairing size), with the expandable parts wrapped around the core and initial stores & parts inside it.

Redundancy: each module has its own docking ports, solar power, life support, water stores, propulsion, galley, radiation shelter & crew quarters, making every module in a station independent of the others and a potential lifeboat. They can even generate their own hydrogen/oxygen thruster fuel out of waste water.

When looking at the below image of relative proposed module sizes bear in mind that the pressurized volume of Destiny, the largest module in the ISS and main US laboratory, runs 106 m3 and that of the entire ISS is 837 m3. The smallest CSS module, Sundancer, will be 180 m3, and the proposed Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM) logistics module for ISS would be about 130 m3.

BIG mothers, with the large ones requiring super-heavy booster like Falcon XX.

Image credit: Rob Davidoff

[DocM]

As far as the NASA & manned spaceflight goes there's more than enough blame to go around in both parties, and even outside of conventional politics.

Take that from a strong conservative who feels Obama's handling the NASA situation rather well considering the screwups that have been handed down since the 60's - the whole misbegotten shuttle program for starters.

As impressive a piece of tech as the shuttle is, it was faulted from the get-go: launch 100+ metric tons just to take up 25 tons of cargo? At high risk to a crew when it could be done without them, or they could be launched/returned on something safer? 'cmon....that bird never met any of its design goals, and because of poor decisionmaking it's been in service 2X as long as originally planned.

As for a true exploration vehicle, this is what we should be doing: NAUTILUS-X

[neoadorable]

thanks for the posts Doc, always very interesting and informative. the Bigelow design looks great, but i think too small for the ships we were talking about? i mean, those VASIMR-driven Mars boats are supposed to be like 200m long at the very least if i'm not mistaken?

you are perfectly right about the space shuttle and NASA as a whole. those guys have more cabinets than IKEA for all the programs they file on a regular basis, which is s shame because there's so much talent and heart there. if they had their way and their funding, we'd be on our way to Alpha Centaury by now. my common sense has always told me both the shuttle and the ISS are a waste of effort...they're not even in space. we should be focusing our efforts on realizing true potentials, not playing make believe.

BTW thanks for the Nautilus info, very impressive but doesn't seem to go far enough...guess for a preliminary phase it'll do. what about debris protection? it looks kinda flimsy...

[DocM]

The current Bigelow modules run from 180 to 330 cubic meters, which is big for space habs, but down tbe road they're talking of units up to 3.250 cubic meters - enormous at nearly 4x the current size of ISS in one unit.

The habs on Nautilus and the gravity centrifuge would all use Bigelow's tech, which provides massively improved debris snd radiation shielding vs. NASA & Russian aluminum cans.

A few years ago NASA did a test where they fired projectiles from their hyper-velocity gun at an early version of Bigelow's inflatable tech and at a standard ISS tin can to see how each would handle debris impacts.

Result: the ISS can was shredded and completely penetrated, but the projectile didn't even get half way through the inflatable. Bigelow has improved that tech since, so it's even stronger now. Better yet, a 16" plus thick inflatanle made of hydrogen-rich polymers provides better radiation protection than a tin can.

Why so strong? Because the polymers used by Bigelow are >16" of Vectran and Kevlar - both of which are widely used in body armor and among the strongest man made matefials. Instead of depending on metallic rigidity the entire structure deforms slightly to absorb the energy.

[neoadorable]

heh heh tin cans...well said.

thanks for the explanation, that makes sense. i guess the smaller Bigelows are for lagrange points, once it's off to Mars the bigger ones will go up...that makes sense to me. this looks like promising technology.

[DocM]

Promising enough to try it at ISS, something NASA is seriously looking at. It's not as if the tech hasn't flown since Bigelow launched 2 subscale Galaxy modules a few years ago on Russian Dnepr boosters. They're still happily spinning around in high polar orbits - no leaks & fully functional.

The first crewed one will be a 180 m3 Sundancer launched in late 2014 on a Falcon 9, followed by another Sundancer and a BA-330.

Lots of people are already conceiving lunar and planetary ships with Sundancers as command habs.

More interesting perhaps are their plans for a land-able base consisting od 3 BA-330's plus 4 propulsion buses & hubs equipped with landing gear. It would be assembled at EML-1 and landed on the lunar (or a Martian moons) surface ready to go.

McMoonBase ;)

[neoadorable]

the more the merrier and as always thanks for the information. this does look like it's the right way to go, at least partially. if it makes up for lacking public funding and enterprise, then so be it. But why are they waiting until 2014 to launch into LEO? and what do you mean by polar orbit? i'm not familiar with that one.

[DocM]

Their habitat factory is about half built and Falcon 9, the lowest cost booster capable of lofting the Sundancer, is just becoming operational. That plus NASA has a claim on at least 14 of the first few years production of F9's & cargo Dragons - part of a $1.6B contract to resjppli the ISS. SpaceX is going to be very, very busy.

Orbits have a factor called inclinafion, which is the angle between the plane of the orbit and the plane through Earths equator. Ex: ISS's orbit is 51.6? to the equator. Other satellites use different angle depending on their needs. A 0? inclination would be an equatorial orbit.

Some launch locations are better suited to some inclinations than others, often having to do with land overflight issues but also orbitkal mechanics. These are why the ISS inclination is as it is - Russia's Baikonur Cosmodrome launch complex is best suited to that angle, so the first ISS modules used it over others.

KSC situated on a coastline so it can handle a wider range of options though some come at the cost of a lower payload. Vandenberg is used mostly for polar orbits - no one wants the remains of a failed Delra IV or Falcon 9 Heavy (both monsters) coming down over LA :p

A polar orbit is one with an inclination of, or close to, 90? relagive to the equatorial plane. This means that a polar orbiting satellites path takes it over the poles. Spy satellites and other observation birds often use polar orbits so they can map most all of the globe in strips as the Earth rotates under their orbital plane.

[neoadorable]

ahh understood, thanks for taking the time to explain that. when you say high polar orbit, how many miles off the surface are we talking about?

[DocM]

Bigelow Aerospace's Genesis I and Genesis Ii habitat prototypes are in 350 mile orbits. Most satellites orbit at 150-200 miles. ISS averages 190 miles.

Geostationary orbits like those used for communications, TV etc are a special case: 22,236 miles. Satellits are first put into a highly elliptical (low at perigee, high at apogee) geostationary transfer orbit (GTO), then a thruster circularizes the orbit & moves the satellite into its slot.

[neoadorable]

thought the ISS was more like 300 miles? oh well, those heights are not space to me. it ain't space if it's inside moon orbit far as i'm concerned, but i know you won't agree...still, i am rooting for Bigelow, thanks for bringing so much of their work to our attention.

[DocM]

ISS = 350 kilometers.

No problem - Bigelow modules have the potential to revolutionize how we do things in space and to drastically reduce costs. ISS at ~850 cubic meters cost >$100 billion to build over >15 years and dozens of $1 billion+ shuttle flights, but a Bigelow station twice that size could be built for far less (~$150m for a BA-330) over a much shorter span and with less than 10 far cheaper EELV launches (Atlas, Falcon etc,)