da Vinci odds

Would you bet money on da Vinci's chances to win the X Prize?

SS1 is ahead, but the slightest problem may delay a second flight.
If SS1 needs the full 2 weeks and Da Vinci goes up twice in less than a week, then we have an "unexpected" winner.

Anyway, there is probably a far higher gain ratio if Da Vinci wins.

Do the bets have to be placed at the Golden Palace Casino?

(Man, "The GoldenPalace.com Space Program" is such a sucky name. Thank god Wilbur and Orville weren't strapped for bucks. Can you imagine "Burmashave" painted across the wings of their glider?? Ah well, 21st century.)

- binarysunrise

*heh* no kidding. Should we be looking forward to The 3rd Annual Mitsubishi Orvelle Redenbacker Ansari X Prize Cup?

In all seriousness, I'm cool with that. Art and Science both have often been sybiotically related to patrons. Commerciallization is simply patronization in 21st Century clothing.

As for the race, I agree with H.D.; SS1 still has my bet. I know that things could go wrong, and Rutan may wish to spend several days looking over the data. But in the strictest sense, I don't see any reason why they couldn't do there two flights in the same day: Launch, return, refuel, and launch again. Who knows?

Weather, for a start. They aim to launch early in the morning, because the winds are usually lightest then and pick up later in the day. Given the issues with windshear on the last SS1 flight I would think they'd be rather cautious about that.

Plus, replacing a hybrid rocket motor casing is ever so *slightly* more complicated than putting a nozzle in a gas tank

True. Still, I'll bet there's plenty of time for a one day turnarround, let alone a 3 day turnaround. We'll see

I really don't blame Davinci for taking Golden Palace's offer. For $500k to launch my rocket I'd paint pretty much anything on it. It could have been worse - imagine if it had been a porn site that was the only one to offer up the cash. Still, it is going to look pretty cheesy, as well as being a bargain for GP in collateral media coverage.

I second in that I hope Feeny doesn't get himself killed.

Carmack will pwn this guy

rutan has basically said his best turnaround time is 4-5 days.

The odds against Da Vinci project have become huge; the attempted
launch this October may be stopped cold; the Canadian government/bureaucracy is interferring...throwing 'new' restrictions and
bureaucratic barriers up against the launch. It looks bad.

From what i've seen of Da Vinci, it's a definate, 1:1 ...........against!

I hope they prove me wrong.

I'm sorry, Nova, I don't think the Canadian government is going to allow the launch. It's 99 percent against Da Vinci project now.

I know about that, that's one of the reasons why I said what I did. I still hope I am proved wrong!