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adiggs
Well-Known Member
Colonizing space is such a big task, there's plenty of space-transport business for everybody.
I figure one of two (simplistic) scenarios play out.
1) ULA never really gets things going, even with the big investment from this contract, can't deliver on the contract, and doesn't move beyond its current state. Probably ending sooner than later (a decade?) when there are alternatives, and they're all dramatically cheaper.
2) ULA is able to use this cash infusion to build capability and capacity and becomes a fast follower to SpaceX. A valuable position to be in as many / most organization that want access to space want multiple avenues for that access. So that one can be down for whatever reason, and the other might not be. Maybe ULA becomes one of many fast followers - this investment extends the lifeline and (MHO) creates the possibility of #2.
If I'm betting, I take #1 and am willing to give odds.
Probable case, it will be used to fill the megaconstellation demand over the next decade. While certainly Ambition Is King these days with mega constellations (beyond Starlink, today there's Kuiper, OW/OW2, Telesat, Transport and whatever that ends up becoming, Blackjack, AST Mobile, LeoSat...sorta, The European Thing, The Jai-Nuh Things, The Boeing Thing, MEO stuff like mPower...) and while it is inevitable that some, perhaps many of those will die on the vine, consolidate, or downsize, it is also inevitable that some will survive. And it is inevitable that the capacity will be necessary, even despite what some folks here perceive as a Starship capacity monopoly.
Also, remember that launch only represents a portion of a program's overall cost, and for many entities soliciting launch service, availability, control, and hardware diversity are just as and sometimes more valuable than the downside of incrementally higher total program cost [again compared to what some folks here intuit as an inevitable Starship cost monopoly]. The big issue we're all finding with Starship--which was clearly going to be the issue even 5 years ago--is that you're either a) all-in on a Starship optimized satellite that can't fly on anything else (and thus, you're banking your whole business model/timeline on Starship) or b) you're designing a 5m class satellite that can leverage launcher diversity but ends up way sub-optimized for Starship. So with a 5m satellite you can book a few H3's, a few A6's, a few Neutrons, etc., you can distribute launcher related risk (Timeline, fleet anomaly, etc.) get a decent mass rate (versus going with a single LSP that could only hope to launch once a month), and pay a little more than Starship.
In the other direction, worst case ULA is the proud owner of fully funded capex that goes generally unused, other than whatever recurring cost upside ULA might realize from the [presumably] more cost efficient tooling. Their beancounters will probably also figure out how to advantageously depreciate the capital into a huge win anyway, and they'll strong-arm their local municipalities into not dinging them on taxes (or whatever) on the otherwise idle resources/facilities.
It would be unprofessional of me to take any bet.
But its a no brainer: ULA doesn't go away. It is Boeing and Lockheed. The US will not allow it to fail.
adiggs
Well-Known Member
My observation about ULA going away isn't intended to be any kind of short term thing. Rather - if SpaceX is successful getting Starship into production and then we have years like the recent few years of Falcon launches with probably 100's of flights, somewhere in there the sort of time to market and cost of a ULA becomes completely untenable in all markets; commercial first, but eventually government as well.It would be unprofessional of me to take any bet.
But its a no brainer: ULA doesn't go away. It is Boeing and Lockheed. The US will not allow it to fail.
But in my view, that isn't soon. 2030? Probably more like 2035, assuming Starship is past initial production use, and into something resembling volume (say current Falcon launch rate) by 2025. That'd be 10 years of Starship launches and landings. On this time scale ULA needs to get a lot better than their recently demonstrated competence to continue getting paid.
It might not be clear from my earlier post - I'm actually rooting for ULA success. I'm also rooting for the other launch providers, but they've got to demonstrate competence, and the bar SpaceX is setting is high. They don't need to clear it, but they can't miss it so completely either.
I do at least agree that ULA has the game heavily rigged in their favor; as you say the US won't allow it to fail. Politicians are going to look increasingly ridiculous trying to spend billions on development, to spend more billions on actual launches at low frequency and high delay, when they could buy a Starship launch that's going up so regularly (to quote an old Portland/Seattle airline) "you're never late for one launch; just early for the next".
All of this, of course, presumes that SpaceX gets Starship working in the next few years, and accomplishing something like the intended objective. Between success and failure on this assumption, I'm betting on "success" and giving odds
Fair, and I'd give it more like 2050.
All of this, of course, presumes that SpaceX gets Starship working in the next few years, and accomplishing something like the intended objective. Between success and failure on this assumption, I'm betting on "success" and giving odds
I mean, there's no question its going to happen. You walk around Starbase and it is palpable (not to mention contagious). The vibe, to me anyway, feels like it probably did in the 40's in Los Alamos--everyone is at Starbase for one thing, they're all hyper focused, they all work round the clock toward that common goal.
The question is how SX integrates antithetical customer needs into that common goal.
ULA orders 116 Aerojet Rocketdyne engines for Vulcan’s upper stage
ULA orders 116 Aerojet Rocketdyne engines for Vulcan’s upper stage
spacenews.com
HolyToledo- how much is the cost of one engine?ULA orders 116 Aerojet Rocketdyne engines for Vulcan’s upper stage
ULA orders 116 Aerojet Rocketdyne engines for Vulcan’s upper stage
[they should just give up and contract SpaceX.... so much cheaper! And reusable!!]
We know an RL-10 for the upper stage is something like $20 million each. These are main engines. There are two of them per rocket. Let's be generous and go with $15 million each. So $50 million just for the engines alone.... Not bad for the upgrade from the Atlas V, if true. Maybe $100 million for a base level Vulcan. But it certainly isn't in the ballgame of an F9. We should have a backup to SpaceX and now they have enough launches to kick up the manufacturing process and hopefully lower costs.
As I realize you know, a $100 million throwaway rocket is over an order of magnitude more costly than an F9 with a booster that flies 10 times (and clearly can fly more times than that).
Now that ULA has a large number of guaranteed launches for Vulcan they have little incentive to drive down manufacturing costs.
FWIW the X variant was a direct result of ULA's push to drive down manufacturing cost across Vulcan elements relative to previous revisions--especially at this volume they're probably looking at sub $10M/unit. That's still of course a huge wad of cash (~$35M for engines on each vehicle), but at least its trending in the right direction...? The RL10's ISP also provides a secondary upside to other second stage motors, so from a pure bean counting perspective its not a straight up cost-to-cost vs other second stages (that's also in no way meant to imply parity in a bottom line trade against something like the F9 second stage with Merlin.)
Yeah, whether one agrees with the national directive of diversity in launch suppliers or not, we're obviously going to have that with ULA moving forward so from a stability perspective that's better than bad. Of course for a while there the US sort of had just one-ish supplier when the launcher arms of B and LM more or less merged into ULA (in other words, a rule is a rule until it isn't), but from that point and up until F9 became a viable solution, A5 and D4 were still largely siloed from a supply perspective so there was still diversity in that regard. And hell, even just recently The Man shut down LM's acquisition attempt of Aerojet, so [even with this admittedly adjacent example] there's at least some semblance of consistency in the not-quite-written mandate. I digress...
Anyway, I figure it goes without saying, but obviously there's never a world where F9 and Starship become the sole US "backups" to each other, due to the many self evident reasons...
Moving forward to a more interesting, if not adjacent thought experiment, and playing off my thoughts from a few posts up, what WILL be of interest is how ULA's future unfolds beyond Kuiper. Certainly the Kuiper deal provides them some financial security for the next 5-6 years or whatever, and as noted upthread there's zero chance ULA goes away any time soon (many many decades). BUT...space programs are historically delayed, launch contracts are usually signed no sooner than L-24 months, and cash flow to a launcher is typically weighted to the back end. So...if Kuiper deployment schedule moves out, that could leave ULA with a LOT of warehoused Vulcan hardware that may not be fully paid for, AND no time to re-book that hardware because any prospective customer looking to launch in that timeframe would have already signed up with someone else (ostensibly, SpaceX, but also H3 and the other new launchers).
Of course its safe to assume the astute ULA beancounters can finagle that financial kerfuffle into an on-the-books win (and I'm sure there's contractural language to protect ULA from that scenario--Tory is no fool), but the bigger problem IMO is that it moves the Kuiper manifest wave further into the future and THAT generally moves out any opportunity for a major Vulcan next gen step function unless there's some [unlikely] evolutionary clauses in the ULA-Kuiper contract that provide mutual benefit and minimal Kuiper risk. AND, given that Kuiper will inevitably shift to 100% Blue, that possible delay then puts ULA further into the future with the same product and a non-returning anchor customer (and a higher-than-today capacity for that product), because their generally near-capacity Kuiper campaign means they won't be able to sell any [useful number of ] rockets in the timeframe to which the Kuiper wave is moving.
Certainly by then the megaconstellation demand that is currently re-defining the future of launch capacity will be more predictable, and certainly ULA will be able to leverage the role of pressure relief on that demand. Certainly ULA will play a large part in any gub'ment constellations in that timeframe (Transport Layer, Tracking Layer, whatever...), and as noted launch cost isn't the most important (or variable) element of a program budget so its plausible ULA may play more than just a pressure-relief role for the commercial constellations.
But also, Certainly by then there will be pretty established next-gen launcher competition (obviously Starship, but also NG, Neutron, maybe TerranR...), and absent some Vulcan step function into that competition its almost inevitable that ULA will be relegated back to at best the "mostly government" role its been playing in the industry, and maybe even farther, to something more or less analogous to the role the D4 program has played over the past 20 years.
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An unusual bipartisan group of senators tried to strip funding for a second HLS awardee (Ie. Bklue Origin), but failed. Senate rejects effort to strip NASA lunar lander provision from authorization bill - SpaceNews
Btw, in this case, it was NASA pushing for more pork funding, not the senate.
Btw, in this case, it was NASA pushing for more pork funding, not the senate.
And one of the senators opposing that idea was…
Oh what a surprise.
Blue Origin Opens New Headquarters in Kent, Washington
Yes, a second Artemis lander is all about “safety” and “redundancy” because it is well known that SpaceX builds highly unreliable and dangerous crewed spacecraft.
***Just so nobody reads into the above linked two year old article incorrectly, Blue Origin has been headquartered in Kent for over 20 years.
Yes I am aware. I was just looking for an article that showed where the BO headquarters was located so that people could connect that fact to the senator from Washington‘s silly statement.
SmartElectric
Active Member
Politicians get re-elected for this. Billions spent in local districts is exactly what keeps US politicians in their seats for decades.
“Some irony” indeed! Bezo’s failed lawsuit against SpaceX only succeeded in making him look pathetic.
Now if BO could at least get a partially reusable rocket to orbit, just once, that would be a success.
Now if BO could at least get a partially reusable rocket to orbit, just once, that would be a success.
I find even more irony when a competing company, in second place, fires off some sort of publicly highly visible smart-aleck comment (i.e.- Bezos "welcoming to the club" Musk & SpaceX when they finally landed a Falcon 9, only to have Elon set the record straight on the difference between lading an orbital rocket vs. sub-orbital hopper), only to then have that same competitor quietly copy what the leader is doing as he tries to catch up....
Ford commenting on their F-150 Lightning's 240 A/C outlet being able to charge "stranded Teslas", and then recalling all their Mach E's for battery pack flaws a week later is along the same lines....
Ford commenting on their F-150 Lightning's 240 A/C outlet being able to charge "stranded Teslas", and then recalling all their Mach E's for battery pack flaws a week later is along the same lines....
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