Rocket Lab Signs First Neutron Launch Customer (spacenews.com) 19
Rocket Lab says it has signed the first customer for its Neutron launch vehicle, with a launch planned for mid-2025. SpaceNews reports: The company announced Nov. 12 that it signed a contract with an undisclosed "commercial satellite constellation operator" for two launches of Neutron, one in mid-2026 and the other in 2027, a deal that could lead to additional launches for the same customer. "We see this agreement as an important opportunity that signifies the beginning of a productive collaboration that could see Neutron deploy this particular customer's entire constellation," Peter Beck, chief executive of Rocket Lab, said in an earnings call Nov. 12 to discuss the company's third quarter financial results. [...]
Beck said Rocket Lab is "deep into the qualification testing" of flight hardware, including vehicle structures and the Archimedes engine, which was hotfired for the first time in August at the Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. "Our engine test cadence in Mississippi has doubled over the quarter, and we've bought multiple engines to the test stand," he said. Neutron is a key part of the company's ambitions to deploy its own constellation, something that Beck has hinted at in some previous earnings calls. His presentation called that constellation the third pillar for Rocket Lab, after launch services and spacecraft production, both of which support the constellation.
"We're not ready to reveal details on what this constellation or application may be," he said, "but I think it's important to understand the strong foundation we've built up across launch and space systems to enable it in due course." That includes Neutron, with Beck citing SpaceX's use of Falcon 9 to deploy its Starlink constellation. "Everything is irrelevant without a reusable high cadence launch. So, Neutron is really the key to unlocking that."
Beck said Rocket Lab is "deep into the qualification testing" of flight hardware, including vehicle structures and the Archimedes engine, which was hotfired for the first time in August at the Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. "Our engine test cadence in Mississippi has doubled over the quarter, and we've bought multiple engines to the test stand," he said. Neutron is a key part of the company's ambitions to deploy its own constellation, something that Beck has hinted at in some previous earnings calls. His presentation called that constellation the third pillar for Rocket Lab, after launch services and spacecraft production, both of which support the constellation.
"We're not ready to reveal details on what this constellation or application may be," he said, "but I think it's important to understand the strong foundation we've built up across launch and space systems to enable it in due course." That includes Neutron, with Beck citing SpaceX's use of Falcon 9 to deploy its Starlink constellation. "Everything is irrelevant without a reusable high cadence launch. So, Neutron is really the key to unlocking that."
We also need a real space station soon (Score:2)
By this I mean one that rotates so there's a crew habitat and a place to work with simulated gravity, a von Braun space wheel, the station has to be extensive, the side effects of Coriolis force needs to be managed.
In theory, the station could be configured to simulate the gravitational acceleration of Earth (9.81 m/s2), allowing for human long stays in space without the drawbacks of microgravity. ~ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Rotation puts extra stress on the station though, so it's not ideal for long term integrity. It also makes maintaining it a bit of a pain, because you either have to work in gravity or halt the rotation temporarily. Docking becomes more difficult too.
Then there's the question of what you would actually do up there. One of the nice things about the ISS is you can do micro gravity experiments. What are you going to do on a station with gravity? Things like telescopes don't work as well with rotation compared
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sigh, ever watch 2001: A space odyssey? the hub need not rotate, as in counter rotation, this is all just engineering, not even tht difficult, the really difficulty part is in the development of zero g technologies for building
we also need orbital assembly platforms and this is all before we can even think about a real moonbase, first we need orbital tech and infrastructure
we need boots in space
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Actually having part that doesn't rotate, or rather counter-rotates to be stationary relative to the body it is orbiting, makes it harder. They were looking at adding a rotating module to the ISS, but vibration was a problem. You have a huge amount of mass, a huge amount of energy to control. You would have to be very careful not to unbalance the rotating part too.
How would gravity help with in-orbit assembly? Seems like it would make it more difficult.
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again, it's just engineering, also, nothing says the rotating part has to directly connect to the non rotating part either
it's because people and our tools are designed to be used in gravity, look, z g has advantages and disadvantages, we need both for maximal efficiency and productivity, not only that, it's inevitable, we should just get on with it
NASA could have done this already given the money they've already spent
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Actually having part that doesn't rotate, or rather counter-rotates to be stationary relative to the body it is orbiting, makes it harder. They were looking at adding a rotating module to the ISS, but vibration was a problem. You have a huge amount of mass, a huge amount of energy to control. You would have to be very careful not to unbalance the rotating part too.
How would gravity help with in-orbit assembly? Seems like it would make it more difficult.
It isn't that hard, if the design is a wheel/disc. The whole thing can be rotating in one axis but is "stationary" as far as docking is concerned if you're coming at it perpendicular to the wheel. Since the hub is always in the middle the orientation doesn't matter, and it should be rotating much slower than the outer ring so even if you have to time/align a locking mechanism to tie the spacecraft to it I don't see that being a wild operation.
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By this I mean one that rotates so there's a crew habitat and a place to work with simulated gravity,
Why?
The whole point of going into Earth orbit is for the microgravity. If you need 1-g to do what you want to do: you have 1-g on the surface of the Earth.
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why, so we can put materials into orbit and then assemble them into stuff we need in orbit, people can't stay in zero g without suffering health consequences, people need gravity for many things, makes no sense having to bring people up and down constantly
we need to have a commercial station, not just a government one
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to boldly go where no one has gone before ...
of course
Neutron propulsion (Score:2)
While you could use high velocity neutrons to propel a spacecraft, its not something you'd want near a inhabited planet.
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Depends on the inhabited planet.
Why? (Score:2)
I'm left wondering: Why?
At a glance I don't see why, based on the capabilities of the launch vehicle, you'd choose for your expensive satellites to be the guinea pigs for a Rocket Lab. SpaceX has a tried-and-true offering. It'd be like backing a Kickstarter for hybrid car with the capabilities for a Prius, from someone who's never actually sold a car, rather than just going to the Toyota dealer and buying a Prius.
The most reasonable explanation is that Rocket Lab is offering a very compelling launch pri
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They already have launch contracts with their smaller non-reusable rocket, so it may be an existing customer that has confidence in their abilities. Or it could be a new customer basing their purchase off the existing track record. Launches are usually insured too so even if it fails they're out time but still get the capital back to rebuild their satellite. Obviously the customer would hope that's an unlikely scenario, but it massively mitigates the risk
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You raise fair points. But even if the capital costs of rebuilding the satellite are insured, if using that insurance money to rebuild the thing significantly delays you bringing your product to market, it may still sink your business. If your satellite blows up on the pad (or even just doesn't reach the desired orbit) and your competitor that went with the proven option of SpaceX gets to market a year before you do, have fun explaining the reason you gave up the first mover advantage to your board.
Of cou
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Keep in mind RocketLab has done a good job at vertically integrating, so it's completely possible they're also building part or all of the satellites we're talking about, in addition to launching them, that could be another reason the customer went with them rather than SpaceX.
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That's not entirely fair: RocketLab has been around for a while. They have a proven launch vehicle already, and a decent manifest of existing paying customers.
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That's all fair. I'll admit that I wasn't aware of Rocket Lab's existing launch business. If you can launch something into orbit already, it certainly lowers the probability that you're going to put out something that detonates on the pad. Ability to recover the first stage... TBD. But the customer doesn't really care about that.
I still don't think that trying to stimulate competition is a plausible, primary justification for the buyer. This describes a company starting a new constellation. It seems lik