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New Shepard's 8th test flight [video]
- loeg 8y agoDirect link (to the video included in the article as of this writing): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSDHM6iuogI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSDHM6iuogI . (Edit: Note that it's an earlier launch from December. They've pulled the livestream video of this launch, which is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUV53Nn3PhA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUV53Nn3PhA .)
- wmf 8y agoNote that's from December; there's another flight today but that isn't it.
- rory096 8y agoThe webcast was removed from Youtube when it ended — we'll have to wait for them to recut and reupload it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUV53Nn3PhA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUV53Nn3PhA
- loeg 8y agoIt's the (as of writing) current video linked from the "article" URL. Apparently the live stream was removed.
- evv 8y agoThe behavior of the booster landing looks very different than SpaceX's. Blue Origin's booster seems to switch to a different control logic at ~30ft up, from a rapid descent to a slow controlled touchdown procedure. Meanwhile, SpaceX has a very smooth touchdown that seems to use a single control logic. I'm sure that the SpaceX approach is better for fuel consumption, but the slower Blue Origin landings seem better for spectators! I love watching the physical effects of somebody's code, and I'd love to hear more about the decisions that led to this behavior.
- pilsetnieks 8y agoF9/FH cannot throttle down enough to do a hover landing, so they have to do a suicide burn (i.e., fire the engine just so the speed goes to 0 m/s at 0 m altitude.) The engine is too powerful and the body is too light to hover. Blue Origin might eventually encounter just that problem with New Glenn.
- walrus01 8y agoI don't know where you're getting this idea. The grasshopper hovered all the time in tests and uses the same single-engine as the F9 full thrust. https://www.google.com/search?q=spacex+grasshopper+video&num=100&client=ubuntu&hs=kOO&channel=fs&source=lnms&tbm=vid&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiorJPOm-HaAhVmVWMKHY1WBeUQ_AUICygC&biw=1493&bih=2011 https://www.google.com/search?q=spacex+grasshopper+video&num...
- greglindahl 8y agoI don't think it was exactly the same engine, and Grasshopper didn't have 9 engines, it had one. The engines are a surprisingly large mass fraction of a dry first stage.
- doikor 8y agoThey probably just put extra weight (fuel) in the grasshopper for easier testing. The F9 on the other hand is basically an empty soda can with engines at the bottom and small fins at the top when it’s landing so even when firing just a single engine at minimum power it will generate too much thrust to hover.
- IneffablePigeon 8y agoSpaceX is forced to do the "hoverslam" landings (where the velocity reaches zero exactly as altitude reaches zero) because their engines can't actually throttle low enough to hover when the booster is almost empty. At the lowest power it would still accelerate upwards. Blue Origin's booster, as far as I know, doesn't have this limitation (not that it seems to cause SpaceX too much trouble).
- akaryocyte 8y agoIt feels odd to see such a transparent exhaust from a rocket
- pilsetnieks 8y agoIt's a hydrogen/oxygen engine (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BE-3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BE-3), the exhaust is basically water or maybe hydrogen peroxide. https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/16821/what-is-the-cause-of-the-blue-light-from-lh2-lox-rocket-engines https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/16821/what-is-the-...
- saagarjha 8y agoThe Space Shuttle burned hydrogen and produced water, none of which are really easily visible to the human eye. If you look closely at a launch you might be a able to catch a glimpse of the heat shimmer from the main engine.
- greglindahl 8y agoWorth noting that you're talking about what's going on after the SRBs finish firing. The solids produce a lot of visible exhaust.
- saagarjha 8y agoYeah, ammonium perchlorate doesn't burn as cleanly as liquid hydrogen does.
- exDM69 8y agoThe space shuttle main engines did fire at liftoff while the SRBs were firing. They may be a bit hard to see at launch but the exhaust mach diamonds are clearly visible e.g. in [0]. They were much more clearly visible in the 7-ish seconds before liftoff, after the SSMEs had been ignited but before the SRBs go off. [0] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d6/STS120LaunchHiRes-edit1.jpg https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d6/STS120La...
- 51Cards 8y agoOne difference I find is that Blue Origin's videos almost seem too polished to me? With the advertising-esque overlays, the rock music, the editing. Always feels like I'm watching a commercial vs. an actual space flight. SpaceX has done this but usually it's just during their 3D sim videos. I guess the difference is that Blue Origin really needs to market this to the "general public" as that is their projected income source for now. Edit: I also found it interesting that they chose to show the closeup of the capsule landing in "slow motion". Edit 2: Seems they have just added the full live stream video vs. just the polished edited version I was commenting on earlier.
- _wmd 8y agoMaybe stating the obvious, but you are watching a commercial :)
- ckdarby 8y agoCurious what happens if the parachute for the landing capsule fails or only one deploys? Does it spin out of control and not land at 1 mph?
- wyck 8y agoI would assume there is a backup chute that can be deployed, probably with an altimeter that can auto far if manual deployment fails.
- robryk 8y agoSome background: Apollo Command Module had an apparently similar arrangement of parachutes. In the case of Apollo CM, two out of three main chutes had to be properly inflated for the landing to not likely cause a significant injury. In case enough main chutes failed, the crew could cause them to be cut away and a reserve chute to be deployed. IIRC speeds under just a reserve chute were similar to speeds under two main chutes. There are two significant differences between this spacecraft and Apollo CM: Apollo CM landed on water, while New Shepard lands on land and Apollo CM used a crushable piece of hull for final landing shock attenuation (that's why its landing attitude was slightly skewed), while New Shepard seems to use landing thrusters (a' la Soyuz).
- shirro 8y agoThey tested that already. They can land with two just fine. There is video on their youtube channel https://youtu.be/xYYTuZCjZcE?t=2m10s https://youtu.be/xYYTuZCjZcE?t=2m10s where they test this. They also tested an emergency escape from the booster near maximum dynamic pressure https://youtu.be/ESc_0MgmqOA?t=51s https://youtu.be/ESc_0MgmqOA?t=51s
- greglindahl 8y agoYes, a one-chute-fails test is standard for these sorts of systems.
- ckdarby 8y agoWhat about a two-chute fail?
- anovikov 8y ago:yawns:
- pavs 8y agoLooks a bit cartoonish compared to falcon9. I know they have a different purpose and are different in size.
- CommieBobDole 8y agoI agree, though 'different purpose' might even be understating it a bit. While impressive, New Shepard is really just a small-scale test vehicle, designed to do exactly what you see here and nothing more; it goes straight up and comes straight down; it can't get anywhere near orbital altitude or orbital speed - on the latter, it maxes out around 2000 mph, which is about 15,000 mph short of orbital velocity. I don't want to minimize what Blue Origin is doing here; they've got a good test vehicle, smart people, lots of funding, and ambitious plans, and they will no doubt be very successful, but what SpaceX does with the Falcon 9 on a regular basis is orders of magnitude more difficult and impressive.
- tomcam 8y agoWhat on earth does that mean?
- zargath 8y agoIm a huge SpaceX fan, but Blueorigin's New Shepard does seem more robust. Maybe just because its a smaller and more thick rocket, but somehow by not being as spectacular it makes space travel more "normal" as we all hope it someday will become.
- nickik 8y agoAlso, the BE-3 engine will be very useful and seeing how stable it performs is very good. It will fly on the upper stage of New Glenn (BE-3U). There are other projects that are suspected to use the BE-3.
- ceejayoz 8y ago> Im a huge SpaceX fan, but Blueorigin's New Shepard does seem more robust. That's a little like comparing a F1 racer to a wheelbarrow, isn't it? Both are immensely useful for specific things, and would fail miserably if applied to the other's thing. New Shepard is cool, and I'd love to hop in it some day, but it's doing a little up-and-down suborbital hop. The two launchers have totally different purposes, and are constructed in entirely different ways as a result.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- nordsieck 8y ago> more thick rocket This is almost entirely driven by the fuel used - liquid methane is about 6.5 times more dense than liquid hydrogen.
- dotancohen 8y agoWith the super-chilled densified propellants, the Falcon 9 would be better off shorter and thicker to reduce surface area. However, the Falcon 9 must be ground-transported, which is why it has the same diameter restriction that the SST's SRBs had: 3.6 meter. With no restriction on ground transport, the New Shepard can be as thick as engineering deems is necessary.
- FPGAhacker 8y agoHey listen, people that work at these companies also like and read hackernews. Maybe try to have a little compassion before you sound off with thoughtless comments like “it looks cartoonish compared to spacex.” People work pretty damn hard on these things that you piss on without a care.
- albertgoeswoof 8y agoAnyone who builds space rockets for a living is so far beyond the average hacker news reader that they really shouldn't care. I mean, this literally is rocket science.
- FPGAhacker 8y agoNot true at all. About the not caring. We are all trying to do the best we can, and we can all be discouraged by the cavalier words of others.
- killjoywashere 8y agoI think he meant the Blue Origin crew shouldn't care. Yes, Hacker News commentors should care. Agreed.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- jessriedel 8y agoMore important than the feelings of employees is probably just the fact that HN doesn't need uninformed comments talking exclusively about how the music in the video makes the commenter feel, or which company they think is cooler.
- privateSFacct 8y agoThe comments come in part because spacex mission profiles are more demanding. Falcon 9 thrust / payload capacity is 10-20Kg to mars level launch capability. New Shepherd is crossing the Karan line. Both totally cool, but very different. Just thrust alone is probably something like 23,000 vs 500 kN? Most of us are rooting for Blue Origin to succeed despite the fact they worked together with ULA to try and block spacex access to a pad in florida (total BS!). Seriously, build the orbital rocket then Nasa SHOULD give you space or make spacex provide space if needed - but the claims of need between 2013 and 2018 for the nasa pad seemed totally bogus.
- iamcreasy 8y agoCan anybody answer me, why BlueOrigin has to detach the passenger module? Can't they just land the passenger module with the booster since the booster have such controlled landing?
- jessriedel 8y agoI don't know, but one possibility is that they think it's easier to ensure the extremely high degree of safety with a separate parachute capsule. If the boosters can be recovered 99% of the time, but are destroyed 1% of the time, that would be plenty reliable to drastically cut the cost of the trip but obviously not reliable enough for humans. And it might not make sense to bring that reliability to something like 0.1% or 0.01%, which you need for humans, if it doubles the cost of the booster.
- shirro 8y agoPossibly booster landings were judged much less reliable than parachute landings when they originated the concept. Nobody had propulsively landed a booster that had been to space until Blue and SpaceX did it at around the same time. Before that things didn't always go so well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvim4rsNHkQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvim4rsNHkQ SpaceX were going to land Dragon 2 with rockets and it looks like NASA wasn't interested. Parachutes are still the safe, proven option. With orbital class boosters potentially being landed every couple of weeks and Blue having flown their vehicle multiple times I would guess future vehicle generations will benefit from that experience. SpaceX's BFS is going to combine a second stage and crew/cargo vehicle. If successful, competition might be pushed in the same direction.
- ekianjo 8y agoBy detaching the passenger module you can effectively give passengers a longer flight.
- agildehaus 8y agoNew Shepard has a single engine. If that engine fails to light, either every passenger dies or you escape the passenger module and ... land with parachutes. It's simpler to just separate near apogee and land with parachutes.
- callesgg 8y agoIt is fun to see that they are trying to get some publicity the same way that spacex has pulled of so nicely. I guess they could work on the polish of the video. I have become quite used to the insane production value levels that spacex has. I have asked myself how many people is involved in just the filming/streaming of spacex launches on multiple occasions.
- jordanthoms 8y agoKeep in mind, yes this is just a small suborbital vehicle but Blue Origin is making a lot of progress on their New Glenn rocket, which has a reusable first stage and capabilities between the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy with a single core. They'll be built right next to the launch site in Cape Canaveral and use Methalox rather than RP-1 (SpaceX is moving to Methalox for the BFR rockets). I'm a big SpaceX fan and they've got a big lead in terms of actual launches and recovery experience, but don't count Blue Origin out.
- nordsieck 8y agoStart 31:16 https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=31m16s&v=ZUV53Nn3PhA https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=31m16s&v=ZUV53Nn3PhA Launch 1:09:50 https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=69m50s&v=ZUV53Nn3PhA https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=69m50s&v=ZUV53Nn3PhA
- nordsieck 8y agoLooks like they edited the livestream. Launch 38:41 https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=38m41s&v=ZUV53Nn3PhA https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=38m41s&v=ZUV53Nn3PhA
- __john 8y agoThe exciting bit https://youtu.be/ZUV53Nn3PhA?t=4202 https://youtu.be/ZUV53Nn3PhA?t=4202
- pipboy 8y agowhy not show metric units, only on screen if not while they present. Please :)
- jacquesm 8y agoI hope internally Blue Origin uses the metric system, it's been a long time since Miles per hour and feet were used to talk about rocketry, NASA learned this the hard way. http://edition.cnn.com/TECH/space/9909/30/mars.metric.02/ http://edition.cnn.com/TECH/space/9909/30/mars.metric.02/
- hordeallergy 8y agoI wish they'd use them externally too. My on the fly calculations using feet and miles are clumsy approximations.
- rory096 8y ago>it's been a long time since Miles per hour and feet were used to talk about rocketry Falcon 9 is built on the imperial system, as are Atlas and Delta. SpaceX is only switching to metric with BFR.
- justinclift 8y agoOuch. They use Siemens NX, which AFAIR has to be set to either metric or imperial for all models and assemblies. Getting them mixed up sounds potentially risky. :/ Definitely would expect they've added some automatic safety checks around that, which is quite do-able in NX from memory.
- newnewpdro 8y agoDidn't it seem like the capsule speed suddenly dropped from ~18MPH to 0MPH at landing? I was under the impression there would be a short burn smoothing that transition, it did not appear to be the case to me. Also, the whole commercial advertisement format of the launch is far too contrived. Hearing the host describe the capsule window as gorgeous cheapens the entire thing, it's like I'm watching home shopping network.
- jessriedel 8y agoThe burn just before impact is very short. It is designed to ensure there are no injuries, but not to make the landing feather soft. I don't know what the technical restrictions are that motivate this, but I'm sure the design choice is deliberate; the Soyuz landing is very similar. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-l7MM9yoxII&feature=youtu.be&t=17m38s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-l7MM9yoxII&feature=youtu.be...
- ChuckMcM 8y agoCongrats Blue Origin Team! That was nicely done. I am always amazed when something so complicated is made to look "easy." With Virgin Galactic getting back into test flights after losing Spaceship 2, the possibility that non-astronauts might be making suborbital flights seems so much closer. I share the suggestion with other commentators here that using metric units might be more useful, even if your target audience (the tourists that fly) might not understand them, is a good one. Even if they don't understand them, tourists will recognize when something looks "Just like NASA does it" and that will instill confidence. The dynamic range on the BE-3 is particularly impressive. I don't believe anyone else's restartable rocket engine has a similar range of operation. I can't wait to hear when you guys start taking applications for passengers.
- jackfoxy 8y agoOr use both units of measure. Is there a reason not to?
- cm2187 8y agoHere is one: http://edition.cnn.com/TECH/space/9909/30/mars.metric/ http://edition.cnn.com/TECH/space/9909/30/mars.metric/
- SmellyGeekBoy 8y agoI think jackfoxy was referring to their press releases, not their engineering team.
- grondilu 8y agoAlso, their main altitude target is the Karman line, which is a nice round number in the metric system (100km). So why not stick to this?
- exDM69 8y agoThe de facto units in aerospace is usually thousands of feet for altitude and nautical miles for distance, knots (nm per hour) for speed and pounds for thrust. Some older aerospace literature I have even uses nautical miles for orbital altitude. I'm fine with this, but I'm not fine with mixing imperial and metric units. The worst was NASA Space Shuttle launches where they used statute miles for downrange distance with some nautical miles here and there for good measure. I'm guessing they use SI units internally for engineering.
- elvirs 8y ago'beautiful soft landing' ? really? at the beginning of the video she said the capsule will touch the ground at 1-2 mph speed because the rockets will come on kicking up dust and all. no visible dust and speed went from constant 16-17 mph in last 5 seconds to 0. Did the rockets fail?
- rory096 8y agoAs she said, it happens in the last milliseconds. You can see the cloud of dust kicked up just before impact at 49:00 in the video — that the speed reduction didn't make it to the on-screen indicator is probably more a reflection of the short time window than the rockets failing. Compare to the nominal landing at 1:14 in this video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSDHM6iuogI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSDHM6iuogI
- elvirs 8y agooh ok yeah can see it better in this video. thanks
- plicense 8y agoPardon me for the stupid question, but how is bringing the speed down to 0 milliseconds before landing by firing the rocket thrusters different from just letting the capsule hit the ground? I thought the thrusters were there to make the passengers not feel the inertia due to sudden arrest of speed from 16-17mph to 0mph. Firing the thrusters milliseconds before landing seems to have the same effect as just letting the capsule hit the ground? Or is it to protect the capsule itself?
- kevan 8y agoI'm a bit rusty on my physics, but the general idea is that with both methods the total impulse (force over a time interval) is the same. The capsule goes from 16mph to 0mph. But, if you let the ground stop you, you end up with all of the energy transfer in a few milliseconds. Because the time is so short, the force spikes to crazy high levels. This breaks equipment and people. The rockets firing spread out that force over a longer period of time. For example (all numbers made up): Time the ground takes to stop you: 25ms Time rockets fire before touchdown: 100ms Landing capsule weight: 2000kg Impulse needed to stop capsule: 7.15264m/s * 2000kg = 14300Ns Assuming in both cases the force is evenly applied over the time period... Force from the ground stopping you: 14300Ns / 25ms = 572,000N Force from the rockets + the ground: 14300Ns / (100ms + 25ms) = 115,000N
- stevespang 8y agoI never saw the dust kickup due to capsule engines, only dust was from capsule impact it seemed.
- notaki 8y agoBO, lol.