BoringEntropist t1_ixia3z5 wrote
Reply to comment by Newish_Username in Berlin to Back French-Built Rockets in Race Against Musk by Soupjoe5
Countries have a strategic need for independent access to space. Navigation, intelligence and communication infrastructure in space has become vital, and if states have to rely on other countries they become dependent on them. So, Europe is going to build rockets whether F9 or Starship exists or not.
Europe just got lucky with the Ariane 4. It was the F9 of its days: cheap, reliable and accessible. It paid for itself which made it popular to politicians who have to explain the funding to the tax payers.
My_Soul_to_Squeeze t1_ixii2ik wrote
And political / self sufficiency factors are important enough that this future rocket doesn't have to beat F9 or SH at anything really. It just has to be good/ cheap enough to rationalize paying the "made in Europe by Europeans" premium.
Ramenastern t1_ixjmhw1 wrote
There is that aspect to it, but it should be kept in mind that Ariane for the most part is a commercial operation, carrying commercial payloads, so it does have to be fairly competitive.
CosmosExpedition t1_ixk8xvd wrote
Ariane is too big to fail. Even if it was hemorrhaging money, either the French government would bail it out or a plan between the major European powers would probably be made to bail it out.
toodroot t1_ixks6v5 wrote
Arianespace is hemorrhaging money.
CosmosExpedition t1_ixkxm0r wrote
toodroot t1_ixky2oa wrote
Yes, that on-time completion of Ariane 6 really helped their financials! That plus the Amazon order means they didn't need any launch subsidies in the most recent ESA budget.
Oh, wait.
CosmosExpedition t1_ixl1x7i wrote
Let’s completely ignore publicly available financial data because… reasons! Arianespace is not hemorrhaging money. There is no debate here.
Sorry.
toodroot t1_ixl7bxy wrote
The article says that Arianespace expected to break even for 2021, including a subsidy.
How did 2022 turn out? Well, Arianespace had to give OneWeb some of their money back, Ariane 5 launched twice and one launch only had a single satellite, Vega C will probably launch twice, and woo hoo, 1 Soyuz launch in February.
panick21 t1_ixj0mzj wrote
And then the developed Ariane 5 and it was mostly a bad idea badly designed opening the market up to get their ass kicked.
Ramenastern t1_ixjpd7l wrote
Beg your pardon? Before SpaceX came along, their cost was fairly competitive, and they had over 80 consecutive successful launches. It's not been quite as reliable as the Ariane 4, but still has a success rate of over 95% (93% if you discount partial successes), so it's not exactly a dud.
But yes, it's not as competitive as it used to be, and a successor is overdue. Funny to read Ariane 7 is being planned before 6 has even launched the first time.
Edit: Just to illustrate the reliability point: JWST was launched on Ariane, partly because it was such a proven, established platform with a good track record.
toodroot t1_ixkse88 wrote
> Just to illustrate the reliability point: JWST was launched on Ariane, partly because it was such a proven, established platform with a good track record.
That was a barter agreement with NASA, not any kind of competition. SpaceX didn't exist when that barter was decided, but ULA certainly did.
BoringEntropist t1_ixjfir5 wrote
True. But A4 had one major problem: the fuel. Not only was extremely toxic, difficult to handle and ecological concerning, but the French were transitioning to solid fuel for their SLBMs. The supply of hydrazine would then become a problem. A new design became necessary, one that could use the the solid fuel rockets the French were developing. Essentially they copied the approach the Americans were using for the shuttle system: A big, low thrust first stage burning hydrogen with some big strap-on boosters for the initial kick.
They hoped the solid fuel would keep the costs down, in combination of dual launching satellites. The market caught up with them though. The Russians and the Chinese opened their market and sold launches much cheaper.
I wouldn't go as far as saying the A5 was badly designed. It made sense with the constraints the Europeans were working with. But like the shuttle the system didn't became as profitable as they hoped for.
panick21 t1_ixjmdm5 wrote
I defiantly agree they should not have continued with the A4.
> Essentially they copied the approach the Americans were using for the shuttle system: A big, low thrust first stage burning hydrogen with some big strap-on boosters for the initial kick.
Lessen Nr.1, copy from Von Braun or the Soviets, not post-Apollo NASA.
> in combination of dual launching satellites.
This was actually a major mistake, it limited the number of launches, limiting their options for mass production and they were not able to dominating both mid and large market.
> It made sense with the constraints the Europeans were working with. But like the shuttle the system didn't became as profitable as they hoped for.
I disagree that it made sense. If they can develop a GG hydrogen rocket, they could have developed a GG RP-1 rocket.
BoringEntropist t1_ixkgevl wrote
Yeah, going full kerolox in the first stage would have been better. I think it was because of politics, in particular pressure from the French. They were (and still are) leading the project. They wanted solid fuel to subsidize their military rocket developments, and kerolox would have made that unnecessary. This was the constraints I was talking about. In aerospace often times politics are more important than the engineering itself.
In A6 you can see this too. At the beginning it was envisioned as having a purely solid first stage, but the Germans wanted to keep building large tanks. Basically it was planned as a larger Vega, but instead we've got a shrunken A5.
panick21 t1_ixl6lof wrote
> This was the constraints I was talking about.
A self imposed constraint is not a constraint.
> In aerospace often times politics are more important than the engineering itself.
And it often makes the difference between a great design and a not so great one.
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