sorry to bring it up again but what next?

i was wandering when the tems have all launched their suborbital ships will they just spend years earning from trips for their passengers?
Unless there is a new x-prize will the teams have the motivation to go further or will they reap the awards from small flights?
Would it cost too much more to design and fly new ships to go further? if so then maybe the teams will not bother for a few years or so! Maybe it will just all stop there for years and interest will be again lost?
any thoughts on how long it would take to design and build new more powerful ships?

I have been wondering where they can go after x-prize is won. It is obvious that orbit is too big an increment in terms of technology and expenditure. This may sound odd but how about developing a competition to go for distance travelled, accuracy, and payload. I realise this is essentially a missile but how about a high speed courier service. One of the other posts said that the Phoenix RLV landed only a few cm from the runway centreline on automatic. These are the abilities teams will need to master if they are to go orbital in the future.

It would more closely follow the intent of the early aviation prizes too, i.e. towards the development of useful suborbital craft.

How far would SS1 go if they went for distance instead of altitude?

I would like to know that too. Is there any information on its max burn time as we know it glides just fine. Of course, we couldn't count time/distance spent on the WhiteKnight carrier .

Dr. Keith may be on to something here for the next X Prize (X2)... What if it was done as a race; a suborbital hop from, say, New Mexico to somewhere in Asia. Ships must hit 62 miles in altitude and a specific distance; and prizes awarded for first, second, third, etc.

I would think this has many advantages, spurring greater competition, and broadening the contest. Just as the early pylon races in the 30s helped develop aircraft and the early stock car and Indy type races automobiles, this competition would positively impact spacecraft design, raising standards of both technology and public interest.

Just a thought for discussion.

--Ralph

To add more:

The current X Prize is designed to stimulate eventual space tourism.

The NEXT X Prize should encourage eventual regular passenger service, which is why I suggested the "race" structure in my previous message.

--Ralph

wow never thought of it like that, guess thats the benefit of having several minds thinking instead of one hey!
They could do America to Oz having to reach 62 miles up, yes im loving it already! oone dessert to another, not to mention what they could do in space while they were there, would be hard to know when to start people, you could have a handicap like in boat racing so ss1 could be on white night earlier than the rockets! what a fantastic view as well of them all in space together at the same time! very inspiring. Don't wan a sound like a kid here but sounds better than pod racing hehehe, forgive me

Actually, if they set up the race structure that Ralph is talking about (fastest from point A to point B, with the proviso they attain a minimum altitude) then ... if the race proper started from (e.g.) passenger boarding time and ended with passenger egress ... the WK/SS1 setup might be at a severe disadvantage compared with a Starchaser type of approach. Something like a 1 hour disadvantage I would guess. No?

hmm yeah i think if this was allowed to go ahead and be safe they would have to have apoints system. Maybe points for passengers, speed, etc then work out who won. Will the xpcup be similar points for events then work out who scores the most in all areas to win?

and would the xprize teams realy want to do this when they could be putting lives into danger? maybe they would think it ws pointless. though publiciy would be good!

I think WK/SS1 is a double edged sword depending on the nature of the contest. As far as range is concerned, carrying a full fuel load up to high altitude will give them a big advantage. In so far as a speed race is concerned, you are quite right, I read on their (SC) website that WK is only doing 125mph at the end of its climb. Remember though that Starchaser's capsule has a slow steerable parachute descent. Armadillo would flash past like a sub-orbital 'flying bedsted'!

I understand that the transition from suborbital to orbital is large, but I don't see why the next "xprize" couldn't be for that specific purpose. 10 Million probably wouldn't be enough, but what about 30 million?

Couldn't we, the fans of Xprize, organize to create a form of Xprize-2? If the result of Xprize is to spur a new industry, then why not push it further?

Why make an ANSARI X PRIZE 2... ? I think one day the ANSARI X PRIZE CUP will include all those new chalanges...

Diffrences with an XPRIZE2 and the XPRIZECUP is:
a) not 1 prize, but manny pizes related to (altitude, turn arround speed, passangers count etc etc)...
b) not 1 winner... but every year several winners.
c) every year a large event instead of 1 event.
d) ... and so on

To further clarify my point:

Going up and then down again, that's just an elevator to a bully observation deck..

BUT, going from say the U.S. to Australia, then BACK again---THAT'S a transportation system.

Space tourism is a limited market; consistant FAST passenger service and small package service---that's big bucks, that's an industry, that's progress, that's the X Prize encouraging the future to happen sooner.



--Ralph

i agree on the suborbital passenger traffic idea

but maybe a prize should include cost factors for the crafts in operation when finding the winner? i think scaled would win by a long shot if they did that as scaled doesn't need new infrastructure (spaceports) to be constructed to be viable (in addition i think the rocketplane-like concept wins over capsules for a number of reasons in the sub-orbital transport market)

*whispers in allens ear* hehe i wish

Yes, for suborbital passenger service, a single stage rocket plane is the way to go.

Fifteen minutes to London from New York. Just time for a quick bag of peanuts and your astronaut wings.



--Ralph