From: Mike Lorrey (mlorrey@datamann.com)
Date: Sun Jun 24 2001 - 06:51:34 MDT
One x-prise contender has their prototype built.....
attached mail follows:
Hi Folks!
Competition heats up in Britain for the $10,000,000 X-Prize;
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/dynamic/news/story.html?in_review_id=403000&in_review_text_id=351234
Holiday spaceship unveiled - by Geraint Smith, Science Correspondent
The prototype of the first British spaceship designed to carry a man
into space is due to go on show in Earl's Court next week.
Looking remarkably like something out of an episode of Tin Tin, the Nova
rocket was designed and built by Star-chaser Industries, based at Hyde
near Manchester.
Just over 30 feet tall, it is a two-thirds scale version of the model
with which they hope to become the first British enterprise to send a
human into space - preferably a passenger paying #500,000 for the
privilege.
The rocket, which will be formally unveiled at the Tomorrow's World Live
exhibition at Earl's Court next Wednesday, will be used to make two
unmanned test flights this autumn, culminating in a manned flight
scheduled for either late this year or early next year.
None of the initial flights will reach space, but, if all goes to plan,
only to about 13,000 feet - a little more than a third the height at
which a commercial jet airliner flies.
The programme is in preparation for an attempt on the $10,000,000
"X-Prize" being offered for the first non-governmental organisation to
put three people in space - defined as 100km above the Earth's surface -
and bring them back down twice within two weeks.
That attempt will be made by the final 55ft version, which will reach a
speed of 4,000mph.
However, even the first version should accelerate from 0 to 700 mph in
three seconds flat.
The company, and its managing director Steve Bennet, were behind
previous test flights on Morecambe Bay - all 12 successful - and a
spec-tacularly failed flight from Dartmoor in 1998.
According to Mr Bennet, the Nova works on exactly the same principle as
a dart. "Nasa space craft don't have tail fins, and use active
stabilisation - rockets - to keep them going in the right direction," he
says. "Ours works just like the feathers on a dart."
The initial flights, says Mr Bennet will be "to make sure that
everything is stable and safe". The second in November or so will carry
a crash dummy, and the third will have someone on board.
"That will go only up to about 13,000 feet, though, because otherwise
you have to pressurise the capsule and provide oxygen and so on, and
this rocket is not designed for that."
The initial trials will have an engine burn of only a few seconds. These
flights are likely to be made from the Nevada desert, he says, citing
problems with air traffic control as the reason not to take off from
Morecambe again.
The rocket is designed to be completely reusable - again, unlike Nasa's
- and to parachute back to Earth in two pieces, the tail and main body
of the rocket in one, and the pilot capsule in the other.
The capsule will have a steerable parachute similar to those used by sky
divers, he said, and is designed to land on dry land in order to avoid
the cost of a sea recovery.
The astronaut escape system will also be rather less complex than
Nasa's. "He will have his own parachute, so if anything goes wrong, he
or she can jump."
-----------------------
a lot of BS rules and they don't even have the money yet!! but here is
the X-prize homepage;
http://www.xprize.org/~Xprize/home/default.htm
--
Jerry W. Decker - KeelyNet
discussion list archive http://www.escribe.com/science/keelynet
Order Out of Chaos - main site http://www.keelynet.com
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Nov 02 2002 - 08:08:16 MST