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Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

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Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#301

Post by m4rtink »

boricj wrote: post #125
contrarian1234 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are the Europeans wworried that "between now and 2030s" the US will cut off their access to space? I understand things can go wrong and it's good to have a backup plan in the long term... But that's not that many years out. You can go without access for a few years .. It seems like a tiny risk

The French mantra is strategic autonomy. We are allies with the USA, we are not vassals of the USA and we do not want to depend on anybody else to defend our own interests or our own agenda. This is why the French army has independent expeditionary and nuclear deterrent capabilities and why nearly all of our military kit is designed and produced either locally or in partnership with nearby European countries. It's no…

Simple solution - get a decent launcher instead & deploy your nukes in orbit. Problem solved! :)

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#303

Post by nick__m »

amelius wrote: post #233
flohofwoe wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also, rocket science is just Newtonian physics. Spoken like a true software engineer ;)

Software engineers have a lack of self-esteem when comparing to other STEM disciplines. The reason we see more fuck-ups in software than in other fields is not because software engineers are stupid, but because software is inherently difficult.

Rockets and drugs discovery seems harder but failure is part of those discipline and they are managed accordingly. It's rarely the case in software.

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#304

Post by Diederich »

sschueller wrote: post #27
ur-whale wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So because an incumbent exists ESA should give up No. But they should learn their lesson and try to run instead of plodding along at a glacial pace. Oh but wait, they're govt funded with no success incentives other than some sort of vague sense of pride for a job well done. My money is on they're not going to come out ahead in the race.

What race? The race to the price bottom and who can get us to the Kessler syndrom first?

> Kessler syndrom

Is this a big risk in the low, high drag orbits that the vast majority of SpX launches target?

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#305

Post by pie420 »

sidewndr46 wrote: post #190
InTheArena wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having followed the launch industry for 30 years, I can safely tell you that this is the exact line that every competitor (save RocketLabs and the startups fueled by the SpaceX diaspora of engineers) says whenever they are trying to justify their legacy wasteful rockets. Even Rocketlab's CEO had to "eat his hat" when he finally realized that the cost difference was real, that reusability was here to stay, and they ha…

Given that ULA historically purchased engines from Russia, are you suggesting that it was a direct mechanism for transferring tax revenue to Russia companies?

Every engine that america was buying from Russia was not ending up in China. Massive national defense win.

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#306

Post by dotnet00 »

TheLoafOfBread wrote: post #146
christkv wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main genius of SpaceX is the mass production. Hopefully they can replicate that in the future.

Well question is why would EU want mass production of rockets and for what purpose?

Well, right now they lack that capability and don't show any interest in it, so why would anyone in the EU even bother working on the things that would use it, like, LEO megaconstellations (ie Starlink or Starshield alternatives)? They also miss out on business building out such constellations from other companies. Amazon bought up a bunch of Ariane 6 launches, but obviously in the long term they'll be shifting to something which can potentially be more cost efficient like New Glenn.

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#307

Post by JumpCrisscross »

jltsiren wrote: post #234
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> space start-ups are starving, because nobody sees any business opportunities there I’ve raised money for and invested in space start-ups. There is a lot of opportunity. There are even more vapid PowerPoint decks. > If somebody actually wanted a reusable rocket, the real issue would be engineering, not funding It’s absolutely a problem of funding. You need to be able to tell a group of highly-demanded engineers with…

The lack of funding reflects the lack of interest. For-profit investors don't see the business opportunity and governments don't see the need. There are other uses for the money, and the people with money don't want better rockets that much. Rockets are not particularly expensive, but they are also not particularly relevant.

> lack of funding reflects the lack of interest. For-profit investors don't see the business opportunity

Not true. Launch and propulsion are amply funded. (If you have a good idea in the space, and capacity to execute, I’d love to connect.)

> Rockets are not particularly expensive, but they are also not particularly relevant

Hell of a lot more to launch than just rockets. And there is demand, today, for non-SpaceX launch providers.

Plenty of capital stands ready for this sector. And hundreds of millions are deployed every quarter. (Yes, private capital, occasionally in the billions.) SpaceX crowds out the market, yes, but Arianespace suffocates it by providing the same crowding effect with none of the utility in pay-off. And part of SpaceX’s wake comes in the form of commodification, particularly at the low-mass end. (To be clear, I think smalsat launch is overblown.)

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#308

Post by wongarsu »

jari_mustonen wrote: post #9

Even though this is not impressive compared to SpaceX, it is still essential that we have multiple actors building rockets. The competition makes sure that SpaceX needs to push the boundaries. Our future as a multi-planetary species is not dependent on a single actor. I'm hoping for some space race. It would be great if the United States would transfer a part of MIC funding to space exploration.

We do have a minor space race between the Artemis program and the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program.

It's not as high-profile as the race to the first moon landing, but America's new ambitions to returning to the Moon are at least in part fueled by not wanting to be upstaged by the Chinese. Now both are aiming for putting humans on the moon again before 2030, and both have plans for at least one moon base (that each originally announced to happen before 2030)

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#309

Post by dotnet00 »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #180
TheLoafOfBread wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arianne 6 is not about competition, but about strategic independence at the first place.

And also, SpaceX is booked full for years; there is plenty of space for competition even if it costs more.

SpaceX is the only medium-heavy lift provider in the West with free space on their manifest right now. Sure they're constantly launching Starlink, but their entire offering is that if someone else needs to launch a payload, they'll just repurpose a launch that would otherwise be carrying Starlink (since external launches come with a profit, while Starlink launches are at internal cost).

Vulcan's capacity for a year or so is already booked, and Ariane 6 is also fully booked for several years out. Others in the class are approaching first flight, but still lacking enough information to book a launch on.

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#310

Post by TheLoafOfBread »

inglor_cz wrote: post #261
Beretta_Vexee wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> SpaceX is a 100% American company. It's a huge fucking problem if you're not American. If you don't want to be subject to American law. If you don't want your technology inspected or tampered with by Americans. If you don't want the transaction to be in dollars (extra-territoriality of US law on all dollar transactions). If you don't want to deal with the problem of American citizens and companies subject to FISA,…

In practice, those who seek launches on commercial markets don't mind all those America-related complications much. The US isn't really interested in the secrets of some Malaysian or Brazilian TV satellite.

They don't until they compete with some big US company which has direct contacts into government. Then it suddenly matter.
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