ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way for SpaceX

Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by pjscott on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @02:09AM (#10586415)

ULA's reasoning was pretty straightforward. The main reason they dropped out of the competition is because the bidding was to be decided largely on price, and they can't compete with SpaceX on price -- their selling point these days is that they're the boring, less-risky option that nobody ever got fired for buying. This is totally a valid selling point, until SpaceX gets a longer track record, but GPS satellites are the kind of payload that wouldn't be too disastrous to lose, so in this case going for the cheaper launch option makes a lot of sense.

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by peteretep on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @02:34AM (#10586487)

    > This is totally a valid selling point

Respectfully, a selling point is only valid if your customer base care.

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by sslayer on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @07:24AM (#10587280)

Once you start losing a couple of 250 -750 million dollar payloads, your customer base will care. This isn't KSP.

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by ceejayoz on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @08:44AM (#10587603)

If they're not time critical, chances are they don't care that much. They've got insurance on the launch and payload. It'd have to happen enough for the premiums to start going up.

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by rory096 on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @09:59AM (#10588023)

The US government doesn't buy launch insurance.

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by ceejayoz on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @10:11AM (#10588097)

http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/west/2012/05/22/248566.... says NASA self-insures, and the CRS missions appear to carry commercial insurance http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2014/10/29/345...

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by rory096 on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @11:23AM (#10588642)

>NASA self-insures

This just means they don't insure and instead absorb losses. AFAIK they don't even set aside a pool of money like corporate self-insurance tends to do.

>CRS missions appear to carry commercial insurance

This is to (partially) cover the losses to the commercial space companies, since NASA withholds money in the event of a failure. None of it covers the payload. (Actually at least in Orbital's case they get paid a portion of the CRS contract, since there's technically two milestones – ignition/liftoff and mission success. They lose out on the latter.[1])

[1] http://spacenews.com/42658orbital-sciences-entitled-to-parti...

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by hydrogen18 on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @10:47AM (#10588322)

Thanks for bringing this up. This is a oft forgotten point as to why private space flight is so difficult in the US. Private ventures can't compete when the rules are set up so they've been kneecap'd from the start.

Ironically, I can't drive my car without insurance but I can fly a plane without it.

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by SHIT_TALKER on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @02:46AM (#10586513)

ULA's reasoning was pretty straightforward. The main reason they dropped out of the competition is because the bidding was to be decided largely on price,

The reason they had to drop out is because they're a space launch company without any goddamned engines. The chatter about the bid process is just the typical jawing members of the defense cartel engage in when they deign to speak of competitors. Sometimes they're even successful in reopening the bid process. [1]

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KC-X

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by gozo on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @03:41AM (#10586655)

> (From Article) Congress wants to phase out the use of the RD-180 engine for national security launches by 2019 as a result of Russia’s actions in Ukraine.

I have't been paying close attention, but maybe you know this. Didn't Russia actually ban export of engines for military launches over Crimea before congress?

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/may/15/us-space-mili... http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-russian-rocket-ban-201...

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by fleitz on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @10:56AM (#10588381)

Yes, like most people quit their jobs before they get fired.

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by fleitz on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @03:12AM (#10586580)

As they say in the space industry...

All rocket, no engines.

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by tgb on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @06:44AM (#10587143)

I don't understand. Can you explain this and the parent's comment on engines?

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by JumpCrisscross on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @07:09AM (#10587220)

ULA's vehicles were designed around the RD-180 rocket engine [1][2]. This is an engine built and designed in Russia.

After Russia annexed Crimea, Congress banned the Pentagon from using Russian rocket engines. Russia responded by counter-banning the Pentagon from using its engines [3]. This made things complicated for ULA.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RD-180

[2] http://www.ulalaunch.com/faqs-rd-180.aspx

[3] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-05-13/russia-ban...

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by fleitz on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @10:54AM (#10588367)

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=all%20hat%2C%...

So if you're a rocket company and don't make your own engines you're not really a rocket company, you're just talk.

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by avmich on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @01:32PM (#10589723)

Or if you don't have a reliable supplier of engines. In this case world politics meddled with space rocketry, so supplier's goods became less than completely available.

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by danmaz74 on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @07:05AM (#10587203)

The ULA launchers use the Russian produced RD-180 engine

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by avmich on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @01:34PM (#10589733)

Only Atlas-V. Delta-IV uses American hydrogen engines (RS-68); however Delta-IV is rather more expensive than Atlas-V. Even though Atlas-IV is rather more expensive than Falcon-9 - which uses simpler, less performant but cheaper technology.

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by mattkevan on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @12:15PM (#10589079)

Bit embarrassing isn't it, that a joint venture between two of the US's (and world's) largest aeronautics and defence companies doesn't have their own engines – and has to rely on the Russians?

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Re:ULA bows out of Pentagon launch competition, paving way f... by avmich on Wednesday November 18, 2015 @01:30PM (#10589710)

Well, Russians are world leaders in at least kerosene-based rocket engines for one. And ULA doesn't quite lack just any engines - they have RS-68 hydrogen engines.

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