SFS News: ARCA - Haas Orbital Rocket Launcher for Google Lun

The weather has been fine for the past 2 days, and it will be acceptable for this time of the year until Tuesday.
Probably these are the last days of calm, clear and sunny weather of the year.

The weather, starting on 28 th through all upcoming week is very bad, perhaps the worst in the past several months. Didn't ARCA team know that? I strongly doubt, since the information about weather forecast was already available at the time they made the announcement.
This makes me believe they are looking for bad weather, as an excuse to delay, postpone or cancel the flight indefinitely, kinda backing off from a growing embarrassing situation.

The original delays had to do with their ability to obtain ships. If ARCA has to delay for weather it is no different than when NASA has to delay.

The equipment has been unloaded into the harbor on 17th, as they declare.
A project of this scale must be done with serious ahead planning and with multiple options to cover as much as possible the variables involved.
On the other hand, NASA/ESA/others, dut to the technologies they use (i.e. ground-launched rockets) don't have to rely as much as these guys on good weather.

The last information I see on the site of ARCA is that they have just been awarded 300 000 Euro by a bank called BRD - Groupe Société Générale.
http://www.arcaspace.ro

Likely, ARCA was waiting for this money. A launch failure would have made them loose the 300 000 Euro.
Now that they got the funds, they can launch HELEN rocket or postpone the event indefinitely. It simply does not matter.
Bogdan & Company reached their goal.

No surprise here, the weather forecasts showed fine weather - that would suit ARCA's requirements - until the 28th.
From now on winter's bad weather moves in and pro'lly it won't go away until march.

I find it hard to believe that once one gets all the clearance papers a month before the launch schedule they won't allow time to set up procedures and briefings with the Navy before any gear gets on the pier, and once it gets there (oct. 17th) it takes more than 3-4 days to load it onto the ships, recap all the procedures and proceed to launch once the weather is fine.
That's serious - but not hard - project management and ahead planning. Failing to do this is not a good sign.
It's true, trying to do anything in this country is a beaurocratic nightmare, grease money aside, but these guys spent their lives here, so one gets used to how things work here sooner or later.

Believe it... We could write a book about all the bureaucratic hurdles... We don't enjoy spending time and money in Constanta. However, we will load the equipment on the ship very soon and this is the only thing that maters. There are no more bureaucratic obstacles now. We will proceed with the launch activities.
One more thing for chandrayaan, the partnership with BRD was signed several weeks ago. Only the press release was done on Oct. 26. This bank has more then 160000 employees, being one of the most important banks in the Eurozone. Yes, we won, but not the 300,000 euros. We won the confidence of such an important bank. BTW, how many GLXP teams have partnerships with important banks?

I wander how you was able to convince the bank your Helen rocket would be a success?
Any serious investor would have been waited the outcome of the launch and financed you only after.
I am convinced no serious lift off attempt will take place and no desire to launch HELEN rocket exists from the the side of ARCA.

The fact that BRD invested in us before the flight is relevant. We'll see about our desire to launch HELEN. We'll see about the results.

ARCA = publicity, show, spectacle, etc., but little rocketry.

Pictures with Helen rocket being loaded on a ship.
http://picasaweb.google.ro/arcaorbital/Constanta#
http://www.arcaspace.ro

Latest news from the ARCA web stie

"The Helen rocket launch is scheduled for November 10, 2009 from the Black Sea."

November 8, 2009 - CONSTANTA
The Helen rocket launch is rescheduled for November 13-14, 2009, because of unfavorable meteorological conditions. In this period of the year, over the Black Sea, the weather is extremely dynamic and the meteorological predictions are not able to offer sufficient long term precision, as for a stable period of the year.
http://www.arcaspace.ro/index.htm

They have no intention to launch. They look for a honorable way out from all this story.
In this time of the year, the meteorological conditions they need to launch Helen rocket are hard to meet and even if the weather is good enough in a certain day, this will not be known two - three days in advance and due to the complicated logistics the launch can not be scheduled one day in advance.
ARCA had all the approvals they needed, but they missed good weather opportunities without giving any explanation.
They always have good reasons not to launch and always the culprit is something else: the weather, authorities which do not give all approvals, etc.

As you can see in the following description, Helen rocket is a long chain of untested parts, beside the fact that the whole system constitutes a "Pendulum Rocket Fallacy".
Only stage two, "Demonstrator 2B" performed a short flight of 1 km in 2004. The rocket was launched from the ground and aerodynamically stabilized. The other two stages are simply untested in flight.

On the other hand, the hydrogen peroxide - 70% ARCA uses has an ISP less than 117 s. The calculations shows that in order to reach 100 km, the engine of at least the first stage has to work for about 30 seconds or even more at a flow of 17 kg/s. I have never heard ARCA performed such a demanding test.

HELEN Rocket has no chance to perform a successful flight and ARCA is completely aware of this.

Helen rocket has the following components:

A. Solar balloon
B. Stage I - Demonstrator 2
C. Stage II - Demonstrator 2B
D. Stage III - Demonstrator 3
E. Payload – The avionics of European Lunar Lander

A. Solar Balloon
Features
- Volume - 150 000 m3
- Length - 90 m
- Diameter - 70 m
- Empty Weight - 900 kg
The balloon is made of - HDPE + LDPE 25 micro meters

Performance
- Maximum altitude during Mission 3 - 14 000 m
- Maximum speed - 20 m / s
- Flight duration - 1 h 30 min
Designed in 2006. The first test in flight - 2006

B. Stage I - Demonstrator 2
- Diameter approx. - 0.6 m
- Length approx. - 8 m
- Traction engine approx. - 2000 kgf
- Fuel hydrogen peroxide - 70%
Designed in 2003. First flight --

C. Stage II - Demonstrator 2B
- Diameter approx. - 0.3 m
- Length approx. - 5 m
- Traction engine approx. - 800 kgf
- Fuel hydrogen peroxide - 70%
- Designed in 2003. First flight 2004.

D. Stage III - Demonstrator 3
- Diameter approx. - 0.2 m
- Length approx. - 4 m
- Traction engine approx. - 200 kgf
- Fuel hydrogen peroxide - 70%
Designed in 2009. First flight --

E. Payload - avionics ELL
Features
- Length approx. - 0.82 m
- Diameter approx. - 0.2 m
- Performance
- Maximum altitude possible - 117,000 m
- Maximum vertical flight velocity - 1450 m / s
Designed in 2008. First flight 2009

The rocket is made of composite materials

Are they pure monoprop peroxide?