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> Aside from Arianespace, Europe is currently fostering a number of private rocket companies, including Rocket Factory Augsburg, Isar Aerospace, PLD Space and S
by nunuvit 3y ago
> Aside from Arianespace, Europe is currently fostering a number of private rocket companies, including Rocket Factory Augsburg, Isar Aerospace, PLD Space and Skyrora, with some of these rockets to be reusable. However the rockets in development are light-lift, whereas Ariane 6 and its possible successor are much more capable, medium-heavy-lift rockets.
The real problem is that there's no prototype path for Ariane. SpaceX had the grasshopper and others. The original space race was very incremental.
Hopefully the smaller companies will succeed with their more manageably sized rockets. Then they'll have to fight an uphill political battle against the big incumbents, just like SpaceX did.
Ariane could make prototypes too, but they probably won't.
- panick21_ 3y agoThere is no point in making prototypes for Ariane 6. What would they be testing. Its mostly just incremental updates in existing technology, if that. The only really fundamentally new thing is the upper stage engine and that's hard to prototype launch.
- nunuvit 3y agoIt's more about the humans than the hardware. Schedules slip for many reasons. Landing and reusing a rocket is new to them. There's nothing like reality to force people to be realistic and get experience.