VG SpaceShipTwo Test Flight
 

Posted here in part because this video of SpaceShipTwo's latest supersonic test flight manages to look very reminiscent of newsreel of Blue Steel launches!


About a decade ago I did my ICSC presentation on the potential military applications of privately-operated space planes (this was not long after SpaceShipOne had won the X-Prize for exceeding 100km). The credit crunch has slowed things down a bit, but it seems that Branson still has a big queue willing to pay 200K for their five minutes of weightlessness.

And the Chief Pilot of Virgin Galactic, is a former RAF Harrier and Test pilot :ok:

Showed that video together with the one on the BBC re Alan Bond's Reaction Engine space plane concept. The kids were mesmerised that in say 25 years they may be in a position to take a flight into space for their 40th birthday treat. Realistic, perhaps, just as air flight has become routine and cheap. With Branson's business acumen I can certainly see it happening.

More important is that that the Reaction Engine space plane concept must surely get of the ground - come on UK government back this winner and keep the technology in the UK.

sorry can't embed the BBC video so here is the link

BBC News - Could Scotland house European spaceport?

And a very modest Shuttleworth chap and an excellent VS 747 Classic Captain as well.

BZ Dave. :ok: :ok: LFH

Is that a yaw string around the back of the nozzle?

There are far cheaper ways to experience weightlessness than VG and their £200k.

For ~£3k you can fly in the 'vomet comet' - https://www.gozerog.com/

Or go for aerobatic trial lesson for ~£150 per hour and ask the pilot to keep unloading to 0g!!!

I'm sure that they pay their £200k for the full astronaut experience: rocket ride, weightlessness, the view from outside the atmosphere, re-entry and the ability to say they did it!

The B Word

Tom ...

Here is a superb lecture from Alan Bond on Skylon and Reaction Engine Technology ... really worth a watch ... if you haven't seen it :ok:


Best ...

Coff.

Coff, According to my membership card we have Richard Varvill (Tech Director Reaction Engines) coming to Cambridge RAeS on 13th March. Do we expect a similar lecture? I do hope so.
Drag

Coff,

Thanks for video - post message to you.

dragartist:

Soo envious - any chance he could face time it:{

Please get an update on support by UK Plc and EASA/EADS. I want a space port at Lossie;)

Tom

Drag old chap ... sounds great ... please do report back :ok:

Let's hope CUAS get an invitation to attend ... help inspire some of budding young Mil Aviators :ok:

Tom,
Not sure of your location but all the RAeS lectures are open to the public. I must admit the Cambridge lot have put on some good shows in recent months it has been standing room only on a few occasions.


Still by March the interest in space my have died down a bit.

Skylon/Sabre
 

It's certainly all exciting stuff, especially the SABRE engine; if whatever magic dyson frost trick there is in there is effective.

However, the heat dumping into the hydrogen fuel will be interesting, and the margin for any weight growth in the whole Skylon concept is exceedingly slim. When you have to set aside using methane as a fuel and adopt hydrogen as the only one that will do the job, it's a worry. Its survival after an engine failure or a tangle with a goose or two also looks unlikely.

If SpaceX can recover substantial parts of their rockets, or if Stratolaunch works, then the cost of launching on a rocket drops close to Skylon levels, and the business case for a Skylon-type vehicle gets thin.

Potential military applications of an upper-atmospheric Skylon for something along the lines of "prompt global strike" might make for a more entertaining case, but I don't see well-heeled passengers, or their insurers, being able to afford flights to the antipodes.

And in the context, don't forget that Mr Branson's fairground ride in that video only gains about a tenth of the energy required for orbit. While that seems to be well placed commercially (at least for PR), Virgin Galactic's lack of an escape system may also weigh on the minds of the insurers or the rich and famous.

The whole SABRE and Skylon concept has been explained and gone over almost to death by some very interesting people here:

The Reaction Engines Skylon Master Thread (1)
The Reaction Engines Skylon Master Thread (2)
The Reaction Engines Skylon Master Thread (3)

It's a huge amount of reading and needs to be summarised but you can hardly imagine a question which hasn't been very well addressed as far as anyone can with a development project and within the understanding of a lay person such as myself.

I think the point about whether the Hydrogen can absorb all the heat is answered by the fact that they don't liquify the incoming air. They just get it very cold so it becomes compressible. This is the key insight which makes their effort different from ones in the past - that a rocket can run on cold, non-liquid gas. The amount of hydrogen needed becomes a great deal less than in a Liquid Air Cycle Engine.

If you read the threads you'll find that their weight margin is very good.

SpaceX is interesting. They may and may not reach their reusability goals. Someone pointed out that a rocket booster containing explosive fuel and kept aloft by a delicate mechanism is not something that you would want to have any failures with if you were one of the people underneath who is waiting for it to land. Also not something you want to have within many many miles of a city in such an event either. I don't really know because I am the farthest thing from being an expert.

There is also an aspect known as cross-range which controls the difference between where a rocket can take off from and where it can land and having a big one like you get with a winged vehicle is an advantage.

Regards,

t43562

Is it my imagination or does the exhaust plume look 'dirty' as if there were impurities in the fuel?

Like many hybrid engines they use rubber and nitrous oxide and that produces a dirty flame but is far safer and more efficient than earler generations of rocketry.

:ok:

Dumb question maybe but do crew and passengers have to wear any sort of specialist clothing or is it a case of check in and off you go. Google doesn't say.

I'm only used to seeing peroxide rockets powering dragsters; their exhaust is always clean as it's mainly steam!!

Article in Flight recently said PAX would be in shirt-sleeves.

Looks like the PAX will get a few seconds of microgravity right at the beginning of the flight when they're dropped from the mother-ship. That'll certainly get their attention :eek:

I reckon Mr Bond would be better off flogging his IP to the Chinese and let them take this on. There's simply no way we in the UK can afford to fund this project through to fruition.

As for those million+ welds in each engine, well good luck with getting those right :ok:

Passenger experience on Virgin Galactic
 

They'll get a lungful of stomach for a couple of seconds on the drop, a push-back-into-their-seats as they climb into space, and then several minutes of weightlessness between engine cutout and the rise of drag as the atmospheric density builds on descent.