Vegas' Bigelow Aerospace to launch first space station

[Dis]

I have never even heard of this. I want to get a job there.

[Asher]

Originally posted by GePap
Sorry, but I donj't buy the notion that the people at NASA, and the Soviets/Russian, the guys who have had the longest experience running a space station, would know of the supposed "superiorities" of some inflatable shell and not use that in their designs.

Engineering is Engineering.

Oh, and nice to see that the private sector has to use the designs of the Russian (ex Soviet) space program to get this thing into space.

What we need is some liberal arts majors to build a space station.

[Harry Tuttle]

Originally posted by Asher
What we need is some liberal arts majors to build a space station.

It will be made out of hemp...

[Skanky Burns]

Originally posted by GePap
Sorry, but I donj't buy the notion that the people at NASA, and the Soviets/Russian, the guys who have had the longest experience running a space station, would know of the supposed "superiorities" of some inflatable shell and not use that in their designs.

Engineering is Engineering.

And politics is politics. Do you really believe that a multinational bureaucracy is able to change directions so fast?

As for the space station, balloons made out of fabric sound stronger than balloons made out of metal. That extra space will certainly come in handy.

[DanS]

Looks like the launch has been delayed until after July 4.

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/13171475/

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Hueij
What's up with those planet pics in mission control?

show off their l33t monitors

[Kuciwalker]

They should do it on July 4; it's a win-win proposition. If it succeeds, they win, if it fails, at least we get some spectacular fireworks.

[Harry Tuttle]

Originally posted by DanS
Looks like the launch has been delayed until after July 4.

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/13171475/

Well that sucks.

[DanS]

Delays happen all the time in space launch. No big deal. Or at least, people unfortunately have come to expect it and plan accordingly.

[DanS]

Go Genesis!

Several weeks late, but it looks like a successful launch of Bigelow's first test module.

No word yet on whether there has been a successful deployment.

Here's space.com's article.

EXCLUSIVE: Bigelow Orbital Module Launched into Space
By Leonard David
Senior Space Writer
posted: 12 July 2006
11:29 am ET

Thanks to a boost today from a Russian and Ukrainian rocket-for-hire company, a U.S. private space firm has sent a novel expandable module toward Earth orbit – and a step forward in providing commercial space habitats.

Bigelow Aerospace of North Las Vegas, Nevada is flying prototype hardware that the firm anticipates will advance habitable structures in space to carry out research and manufacturing, among other tasks.

The Genesis-1 module was lofted skyward atop a Dnepr booster under contract with ISC Kosmotras. The rocket – a converted Cold War SS-18 Intercontinental Ballistic Missile – roared out of its silo from the Yasny Launch Base, an active Russian strategic missile facility.

“That’s one small step for Bigelow…one giant leap for entrepreneurial space,” reported Mike Gold, corporate counsel for Bigelow Aerospace in Washington, D.C. - on hand for the Dnepr liftoff. “We’ve had a successful launch. Of course this is just the first step in what’s going to be a long mission. We’re eager to get more information in regards to the progress of the mission,” he said.

Bankrolling the expandable space module concept – now roughly a $75 million investment -- is businessman, Robert Bigelow, owner of the Budget Suites of America Hotel Chain among other enterprises, and head of Bigelow Aerospace.

Packing and deployment procedures

Gold told SPACE.com via phone that this first flight of a Bigelow module was also the inaugural ISC Kosmotras Dnepr takeoff from the Yasny site. If all goes according to plan, the Genesis-1 is to be injected into Earth orbit. From there, the focus of the mission is establishing if both packing of the module and deployment procedures are optimal and functional, he added.

Once the module is in orbit, command and control of the hardware will be done through a futuristic-looking Bigelow Aerospace Mission Control Center in North Las Vegas. Ground operators there will also receive video and images from Genesis-1.

There is the potential, Gold pointed out, for Genesis-1 to remain in orbit for years with the company’s space engineers hoping to learn how the module’s systems withstand the harsh space environment – including exposure to natural and human-made space debris, as well as radiation. Extensive testing of the expandable module that’s fashioned out of advanced soft-goods material has been done both in the United States and in the Ukraine, he said.

“We believe that the expandable Bigelow Aerospace system will not only offer protection equal to traditional habitat designs, but will actually exceed those,” Gold said.

“Our motto at Bigelow Aerospace is ‘fly early and often’. Regardless of the results of Genesis-1, we will launch a follow-up mission rapidly,” Gold said. “As a matter of fact, work on Genesis-2 was already underway last year, and is proceeding in earnest as we speak.”

No mission is ever perfect, Gold added, and Genesis-2 -- similar in construction and purpose to its predecessor -- will help the firm fill any gaps left by Genesis-1 in terms of vehicle performance and capability.

Building the business case

“Ultimately, we expect to have anywhere from six to ten sub-scale demonstrator flights, which will help establish both the technology and the business-case necessary for the deployment of a full-scale, private sector expandable habitat,” Gold explained.

In regard to timing, Bigelow Aerospace could probably launch a mission roughly twice a year, Gold advised. “Of course, the launch date of Genesis-2 will be influenced by the performance of Genesis-1, but, I would expect to see our second mission at some point in late 2006 or early 2007.”

Gold said that a successor to the Genesis-class hardware is tagged Galaxy. A full-scale expandable module is called the BA-330, a designation noting the 330 cubic meters of usable volume that each individual habitat would provide.

Creativity, imagination, and innovation

The step-by-step increase in size, Gold said, not only will establish the technology but also help build the business case for the Earth orbiting modules. “You don’t want to shift from first to fourth gear,” he said, the idea being to build familiarity and confidence in experimentation, applications, and space commerce.

“From a technical perspective, we will be establishing the conceptual foundation that all future expandable systems will be built upon,” Gold said. “You see a lot of Power Point slides and pretty pictures of inflatable habitats in the literature, but, the fact of the matter is…an expandable system has never been tested in an actual orbital environment. No real data currently exists, and hopefully, the Genesis-1 mission can help change this situation dramatically,” he added.

In a statement from Robert Bigelow on the firm’s website: “A free system called capitalism works very well on Earth, and there is nothing about microgravity that changes this. We need to encourage creativity, imagination, and innovation, in order to bring the benefits of space development to fruition, not just for the privileged few, but for all of humanity.”

Giving birth to a baby

Vladimir Mikhailov, First Deputy Director General of Kosmotras, told SPACE.com in a pre-launch phone interview that the Genesis-1 mission will be the company’s sixth commercial flight. “We’ve had a number of U.S. satellites on several of our launches. Sometimes they were pretty small…but this time Genesis-1 is a large satellite,” he observed.

“Every mission of our launcher is like giving birth to a baby for us,” Mikhailov said. “Each one is a special one.”

More than ten industrial companies and upwards of a 1,000 specialists are involved in booster preparation and launch operations, Mikhailov stated. To launch its module, Bigelow Aerospace has relied on the talents of both Kosmotras and SDO Yuzhonye of the Ukraine – the group that does much of the hardware work on the Dnepr booster itself, Gold said.

“Frankly, one of the most difficult aspects of conducting a mission like this is surviving all of the red-tape involved in export control,” Gold explained. “Launching the spacecraft in many ways is the easy part, since, by the time you reach that moment, all of the regulatory concerns have been successfully addressed.”

Whether it’s export control, the telemetry system, or identifying quality subcontractors, Gold said that building the system necessary to develop and operate the spacecraft is the first and most crucial step that any program faces.

“No matter what happens on Genesis-1 and subsequent missions, we have established the infrastructure to allow for success, and, in the long-run, that is probably the most important accomplishment of all,” Gold concluded.

[MRT144]

nevermind, beaten to the punch

[DanS]

That was too easy.

[Darius871]

Originally posted by DanS

It's a really nifty idea that was first imagined by NASA in its Transhab program in the '90s. They imagined it too late to use on the ISS. So Bigelow has an "easy" opportunity to leap-frog the ISS.

How could it be too late? Couldn't the safer & cheaper Vectran modules simply be attached to what has been built so far?

Then again we're talking about a guv'mint agency here, so who cares about cheaper?

[DanS]

I guess it could. Don't know how advisable it would be, given that it would take a huge amount of spacewalking assembly.

NASA probably wouldn't take any risks with it, while a private company might look at it as a worthwhile learning experience.

[DanS]

CNN's article on the launch. Still no word yet on deployment.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/space/07/12/private.space.station.ap/