The Blue Origin Space News Thread

Tuckerfan · Mar 15, 2017

Musk and SpaceX have their thread, let's give Bezo's some love, since he plans to start manned flights next year.

Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin Plans Crewed Launch Within a Year

The spaceflight company Blue Origin, which was founded by Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos, plans to launch its first crewed flight to suborbital space soon.

"We're trying to get to our first human flights within the next year. That's a laser focus for the team right now," Erika Wagner, Blue Origin's business development manager, told the audience at the New Space Age Conference on Saturday (March 11) here at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Sloan School of Management.

In November 2015, Blue Origin made history when it landed its New Shepard rocket after an uncrewed test flight to suborbital space. This was the first time that any company or country had successfully completed a vertical takeoff and landing with a reusable rocket during a mission to space. [How Blue Origin's Suborbital Rocket Ride Works (Infographic)]

"We're pretty proud of that milestone," Wagner said.

Over the next year, Blue Origin launched and landed that same rocket four more times, further demonstrating the reusable-rocket technology that Bezos has said could revolutionize spaceflight by slashing costs.

Elon Musk, SpaceX's billionaire founder and CEO, has expressed similar enthusiasm for reusability. SpaceX has landed the first stage of eight different Falcon 9 rockets during orbital flights and said it plans to re-fly one of these boosters for the first time later this month.

Both SpaceX and Blue Origin are also developing heavy-lift rockets, and each company has said it aims to launch moon missions in the next few years.

But if Blue Origin is feeling the pressure, it's not showing it. The company's motto, Wagner pointed out, is gradatim ferociter — Latin for "step by step, ferociously."

The company's first launcher consisted of four Rolls Royce jet engines strapped to a launch frame, and the main purpose of creating it was to develop software, Wagner said. Blue Origin then built small rocket engines, and then bigger ones. Now, the company has the suborbital New Shepherd, and engineers are working on the heavy-lifter New Glenn, an orbital vehicle that's scheduled to fly for the first time by 2020.

This same incrementalist philosophy will also apply to crewed flights, which will begin aboard New Shepard. (Blue Origin also intends to launch people to orbital space eventually, Bezos has said.)

"We're really taking that to the next level and proving out a rocket before we ever put our first human on board," Wagner said.

Safety is the primary goal, she added.

"We don't believe in qualifying a [specified] number of flights," Wagner told the audience. "We believe in qualifying performance. We really believe that safety comes from how well you understand a system."

Wagner said Blue Origin looks to NASA's human spaceflight integration standards — which establish health requirements for the preflight, in-flight, and post-flight phases of such a journey — as a guide.

"As soon as we're ready, we'll have humans on board," she said. "We're not there yet."
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steve2^4 · Mar 15, 2017

I agree. The rocket powered dildo deserves its own thread.

What about Virgin Galactic? They have the prettiest rockets.

Tuckerfan · Mar 30, 2017

The inside of Blue Origin's capsule.

Blue Origin releases first interior photos of the capsule that will take tourists to space

Private spaceflight company Blue Origin has released the first interior photos for the New Shepard, offering a glimpse at what the finished crew capsule will look like.

New Shepard is a reusable vehicle aimed at taking tourists to the edge of space, where they can float around weightless for a few minutes. The rocket has been successfully launched and landed five times already, but no people have ridden in the capsule yet. Blue Origin is planning to take its first paying customers to space by 2018, according to CEO Jeff Bezos.

The photos of New Shepard look quite different from the interior of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule. But while the New Shepard focuses on tourism, the main purpose for Crew Dragon is to send astronauts to the International Space Station. (Though CEO Elon Musk recently announced that he plans to send two tourists around the moon in the spaceship in 2018.)

“Every seat’s a window seat, the largest windows ever in space,” Bezos wrote in an email update about the New Shepard. The photos show reclining black seats with blue piping, and seats emblazoned with the Blue Origin feather logo, chosen because it is “a symbol of flight with grace and power.”

Reporters will be able to see a mockup of the capsule at the 33rd Space Symposium in Colorado Springs from April 3rd to 6th. Check out the images of the New Shepard crew capsule below.
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Tuckerfan · Apr 13, 2017

Jeff Bezos says, "No pooping in spaaaaaaaaaaace!"

Jeff Bezos Declares No Shitting in His Sexy Spacecraft

Jeff Bezos has many hobbies: he enjoys doing an Amazon, reading a Washington Post, and occasionally, dabbling in a space thing at Blue Origin. Lately, he’s been all about the latter, focusing much of his attention on one-upping Elon Musk promoting his aerospace company’s space tourism vehicle, New Shepard, which will carry tourists into suborbital space as early as 2018. While the capsule looks great, Bezos has implemented some stern ground rules for his passengers’ bodily functions to keep it that way.

“Go to the bathroom in advance,” Bezos told the crowd at the 33rd annual Space Symposium in Colorado Springs. “The whole thing, from boarding until you’re back on the ground, is probably 40 or 41 minutes. So you’re going to be fine. You could dehydrate ever so slightly if you have a weak bladder.”

Holding it in for that long might not be so bad, although the anxiety associated with the flight could trigger diarrhea, in which case, the passengers would be in for one torturous ride into suborbital space.

Still, Mark Shelhamer, former chief scientist at NASA’s human research program, says it’s fine for New Shepard to be without a bathroom.

“The flight is short,” Shelhamer told Gizmodo. “On the way up and down everyone will have to be seated for safety. And in 0g no one will want to use their valuable time in the bathroom. Plus it’s a small capsule. Even a bathroom wouldn’t provide much privacy.”

He did acknowledge, however, that some people will have stress responses that lead to “production of liquid or solid waste.” You know, shit happens in space.

“Diapers will probably be the answer,” Shelhamer said. “Apollo astronauts wore them on the moon so there’s no shame in it. You can’t be squeamish about body functions if you want to go to space.”

Holding it in for a little while is one thing. Perhaps Bezos’ most bizarre comment about his space tourism capsule is that he’s not concerned with his passengers puking.

“[People] don’t throw up right away,” he said at Space Symposium. “We’re not going to worry about it...It’s a delayed effect, and this journey takes 10 or 11 minutes. So you’re going to be fine.”

Shelhamer is not buying that one, noting that even professional astronauts can get motion sickness. As a person ascends into space, gravitational forces change and throw off their sense of spatial orientation. When the brain scrambles to correct that, a person might puke, whether they’re an astronaut or not.

“After paying a lot of money for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, people will be up and moving around to experience the weightlessness,” Shelhamer said. “And that will lead to motion sickness in some people, based on my observations in parabolic flight. It’s unpleasant but not fatal, but I think it’s a mistake to pretend that it won’t be an issue.”

It’s unclear whether or not Bezos’ rival, Elon Musk, has planned for bathrooms or barf bags aboard his astronaut vehicle and space tourism vehicle, the Crew Dragon. We’ve reached out for comment and will update this post if and when we hear back. We’ve also reached out to Blue Origin for comment because we’re petty like that.
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Zombie · Apr 14, 2017

Yeah I'd wear a diaper. Plus I also want a puke bag.

I wouldn't eat for at least 5 hours before the flight (and a small meal at that) but I'd still want the bag just in case.

Tuckerfan · Jul 14, 2017

Looks like Jeff's getting serious.

Huntsville Oks deal 'confident' Blue Origin plant is coming

The Huntsville City Council unanimously approved a deal Thursday night to bring a $200 million Blue Origin rocket engine factory and up to 400 high-paying jobs to Cummings Research Park.

That so-called Project Development Agreement depends on Blue Origin Alabama getting an engine production contract from United Launch Alliance. ULA assembles rockets in nearby Decatur to launch military and commercial satellites into space, and it needs a new engine to replace the Russian one it now uses.

But Blue Origin also needs the new engine for its own rockets, and city industrial recruiter Shane Davis said, "We feel really confident," that the plant will come.

If it does, and Davis expects to know for sure by the end of this year, Blue Origin will build on 46 acres the city gives it in Cummings Research Park West. The first phase of the two-phase deal will employ 265 full-time employees with "an average hourly wage of at least $36" and an initial investment of $90 million by the company.

The second phase will add 77 employees at the same pay and an additional $110 million in capital investment by Blue Origin.

As part of the deal, the city, county and state will:

* Pay $1 million in project development costs upon completion of Phase 1. That is split between Huntsville and Madison County.

* Exempt non-education local sales, use and property taxes for 20 years

* Exempt non-education state property taxes for 10 years

* Grade the site

* Make road improvements

* Extend utility infrastructure (electric, water, natural gas, sewer)

In exchange, Blue Origin will:

* Start plant construction no later than 6 months after getting the ULA contract and begin making engines within 24 months.

* Invest the $90 million Phase 1 cost

* Meet the hiring commitments

If the company does not meet the job or wage requirements, it will begin paying a mortgage on the plant. If it relocates any jobs or operations from the Huntsville plant within a 10-Year "performance period," Blue Origin will pay $6 million.

That so-called "clawback" provision, the mortage clause, and the other stipulations are to protect the city's investment, and City Council members praised their place in the deal. The entire 55-page agreement can be found by following the link in the council agenda here.

The return on the city and county investment will come from the ripple of those salaries through the local economy. Workers will pay sales taxes, purchase services and patronize local restaurants and shops.

"We originally bought that 46 acres to provide jobs," Mayor Tommy Battle said, "and that's what this is doing.... Blue Origin is the last of the propulsion companies I think we can land here."

Blue Origin will develop another deep-space engine after the BE-4, the mayor said, "one that's faster and stronger and has more lift.... This gives us a long-term employment perspective for the community and puts us in a position where nobody else can match us in the world and gives us jobs for a long, long time."
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Tuckerfan · Sep 12, 2017

They're getting serious.

Blue Origin enlarges New Glenn’s payload fairing, preparing to debut upgraded New Shepard

Blue Origin will likely launch the third iteration of its New Shepard suborbital launch vehicle by year’s end, paving the way for a human-rated version and ironing out the reusability plan for the orbital New Glenn rocket.

The company also revealed a large, 7-meter payload fairing for New Glenn, meant for launching more voluminous payloads than the original design.

Clay Mowry, Blue Origin’s vice president of sales, marketing and customer experience, said Sept. 12 that the third New Shepard incorporates lessons learned from the previous model that launched and landed five times before retiring last October.

“We have a new upgraded version of New Shepard that has actually been shipped to the launch site, and we’ll be flying again before the end of this year,” Mowry said at Euroconsult’s World Satellite Business Week here. “We hope to have human flights in 2018. It’s designed to take six astronauts into suborbital flight above the Von Karman line.”

The third New Shepard has modifications for improved reusability, he said, such as access panels that enable more rapid servicing in between flights. Blue Origin is also trying to improve New Shepard’s thermal protection.

“Our third propulsion module we are going to test hopefully by the end of this year — we are going to fly it again, testing it next year, and then there is a fourth propulsion module that will be coming, which is the one we actually fly people on,” he said. “We are step by step trying to incorporate lessons learned as we go.”

Another major difference between the second and third versions include real capsule windows, Mowry said — the ones on version two were painted.

Mowry said Jeff Bezos, Blue Origin’s founder, has invested $2.5 billion in New Glenn, and that the rocket has no funding from the U.S. government. Blue Origin has been working on New Shepard for over a decade. The first vehicle launched in April 2015, reaching the edge of space but failing to land.

While New Shepard’s future is in human spaceflight and suborbital payload research, Mowry framed that vehicle’s progress as beneficial to the satellite industry because of the strides made toward reusability for New Glenn.

“For us, New Shepard is really a vehicle we are using to teach ourselves how to launch, how to ramp, how to refurbish the vehicle and to re-fly again, and to do that at a much lower cost than we can do with the orbital vehicle — about a 50th the cost of flying an orbital mission,” he said.

New Glenn customers so far are Eutelsat and OneWeb for one launch and five launches, respectively. The rocket, which can carry 45 metric tons to low-Earth orbit and 13 metric tons to geostationary-transfer orbit, is scheduled to debut in 2020.

Mowry said the 7-meter fairing is the result of input from market demand and customer reactions. The original fairing was 5.4 meters, he said.

With a 7-meter fairing, New Glenn will be able to launch higher quantities of small satellites or geostationary satellites with larger antennas and structures.
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steve2^4 · Sep 13, 2017

In case anyone wonders:

Alan Shepard was the first US astronaut to fly a sub-orbital rocket, Mercury-Redstone 3, in May 1961. He dubbed the mercury capsule "Freedom 7."

John Glenn was the first US astronaut to orbit the earth on Mercury-Atlas 6, in February 1962. The capsule was dubbed "Friendship 7."

Yuri Gagarin orbited earth in Vostok 1 in April 1961.

Tuckerfan · Sep 26, 2017

Blue Origin announces a new customer and the opening of a new factory by the end of this year. http://spacenews.com/blue-origin-signs-up-third-customer-for-new-glenn/

Tuckerfan · Oct 6, 2017

Blue Origin says tourist flights will begin in 2019. http://money.cnn.com/2017/10/05/technology/future/blue-origin-launch-human-space-tourism/index.html

Dayton Kitchens · Oct 8, 2017

Blue Origin is one ugly rocket.

Tuckerfan · Oct 9, 2017

Dayton3 said: ↑

Blue Origin is one ugly rocket.
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The LEM wasn't exactly pretty, but it got the job done.

Dayton Kitchens · Oct 9, 2017

Tuckerfan said: ↑

Dayton3 said: ↑

Blue Origin is one ugly rocket.
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The LEM wasn't exactly pretty, but it got the job done.

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Wernher Von Braun specifically had the Saturn rockets painted in their distinctive black and white pattern because he liked it and he had used it on the V2s during World War Two.

Sure some had claimed it aided in ground tracking but that wasn't the real reason.

shootER · Oct 9, 2017

Dayton3 said: ↑

Tuckerfan said: ↑

Dayton3 said: ↑

Blue Origin is one ugly rocket.
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The LEM wasn't exactly pretty, but it got the job done.

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Wernher Von Braun specifically had the Saturn rockets painted in their distinctive black and white pattern because he liked it and he had used it on the V2s during World War Two.

Sure some had claimed it aided in ground tracking but that wasn't the real reason.
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Link?

Popular Science says "no".

https://www.popsci.com/why-was-saturn-v-black-and-white

And only the test versions of V-2s were painted that way. Operational ones were camouflage.

Tuckerfan · Oct 19, 2017

BO just completed a successful rocket test.

Blue Origin just sent a jolt through the aerospace industry

New space company Blue Origin has spent the better part of this decade developing a powerful rocket engine for use in its orbital rocket, New Glenn, and potentially other US-based launchers. This engine, the liquid natural gas-powered BE-4, has been closely watched both within the aerospace industry and in military space because it uses innovative new technology, has largely been developed with private funding, and is fully reusable.

However, while there was great promise with the new engine, it still had to perform. And so the aerospace community has been watching development of the engine to see if it could pass a key hurdle—a hot-fire test. After months of waiting, that's what finally happened on Wednesday at the company's facility in West Texas when the BE-4 engine fired at 50-percent power for three seconds.

This demonstration sends a clear signal that there is a new player in the industry preparing to compete both for national security and commercial launches. Some have derided Blue Origin for its original focus on New Shepard, a suborbital vehicle that the company plans to use for space tourism trips in a year or two. However, the brawny BE-4 engine supports the idea that Blue Origin is gearing up for orbital and deep space missions, too.

The company's success is all the more significant because it was largely funded by Jeff Bezos, without direct cost to taxpayers. Up until a few years ago, every US-based rocket engine was funded almost entirely through government contracts, such as the Saturn V's F-1 and the space shuttle's main engines. SpaceX changed the model by building its Merlin rocket engine (190,000 lbf) largely on its own, and then using nine of them to power the Falcon 9 rocket.

SpaceX has also invested significant amounts of its own funds into its new Raptor engine, which has a sea-level thrust of 380,000 pounds. But this engine has yet to undergo full-scale testing. Meanwhile, Blue Origin's BE-4 engine is more powerful, at 550,000 pounds of thrust—it is in fact the most powerful US rocket engine developed since Rocketdyne built the RS-68 engine two decades ago.

Competition

The problem with the RS-68 engine, which powers the Delta IV line of rockets, is that it costs too much. United Launch Alliance, which flies the Delta IV fleet, is seeking to stop flying the launch vehicles because they are so expensive to build. However, the US military has pushed back against this, because it doesn't want to be solely reliant on the Atlas V rocket (and its Russian-made RD-180 engine) to reach some strategic orbits.

Therefore, in recent years, United Launch Alliance has begun developing a new rocket to replace both the Delta and (eventually) the Russian-reliant Atlas vehicle. For the new rocket, dubbed Vulcan, United Launch Alliance has made its preference for Blue Origin's BE-4 engine clear. As a second option, the company is also considering the AR1 engine under development by Aerojet Rocketdyne, which has historically built most US engines.

Aerojet has been heavily lobbying Congress to pressure United Launch Alliance to select the AR1 engine, which has already received more than $200 million in federal funding. One of the Aerojet's principal arguments has been that as a relatively new company Blue Origin is incapable of building such a large, complex engine. In March, several Congressmen wrote to the Air Force to echo these concerns, saying Blue Origin's engine was "unproven at the required size and power." Then, in May, Blue Origin suffered a setback when an engine powerpack exploded on its West Texas test stand.

Wednesday's successful test demonstrates that Blue Origin not only recovered from that accident but has taken the additional step of assembling and hot-fire testing a full engine. In addition, such a test—the first of many to prove out an engine—backs up the claims of Blue Origin that it is significantly ahead of Aerojet in developing a modern rocket engine.

Commercial space

Successful development of the BE-4 engine also provides a jolt to the commercial space industry, which not only seeks to provide products and services in return for government contracts, but to marry private investment with limited government funding to provide important new capabilities.

In this case, the BE-4 engine is the cornerstone of Blue Origin's large orbital rocket, New Glenn, which could fly as early as 2020. Powered by seven engines, this massive 82-meter-tall rocket will have the capacity to lift 45 tons to low Earth orbit and an impressive 13 tons to geostationary transfer orbit. It will also be reusable—up to 100 times—according to Bezos. Blue Origin is attempting to position the New Glenn rocket as a centerpiece of a human return to the Moon.

"As Joe Biden would say, this is a BFD for the space industry," said Phil Larson, an expert in commercial space and assistant dean for strategy, planning, and communications at the University of Colorado's College of Engineering and Applied Science. "It goes to show we're accelerating into the moment where commercial space is driving our national space infrastructure."
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Tuckerfan · Apr 27, 2018

They're doing a launch on Sunday.

Tuckerfan · Apr 29, 2018

And they appear to have had a successful launch.

Blue Origin Launches New Shepard Space Capsule on Highest Test Flight Yet

Blue Origin, the private space company founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, launched its passenger spaceship New Shepard on a test flight Sunday (April 29), carrying a dummy astronaut and experiments on their highest spaceflight yet.
The New Shepard 2.0 rocket and capsule, which have both flown in space before, lifted off from Blue Origin's West Texas launch site at 1:06 p.m. EDT (1706 GMT). Despite several hours of delays (thunderstorms thwarted a 9:45 a.m. EDT launch target) and countdown holds for last-minute checks, the flight appeared to go flawlessly.

"Another spectacular test mission," Ariane Cornell of Blue Origin said during a launch webcast. "Everything looks nominal from here."

Blue Origin launched New Shepard to a target altitude of 347,485 feet (105,913 meters), Cornell said after the launch. That's almost 66 miles (106 km), slightly higher than the company's typical target of 62 miles (100 km) — the altitude widely accepted as the boundary line for space, Cornell said.

"Today, we're going to push the system a little bit harder," Cornell said during the launch webcast.

Sunday's launch marked the second flight of Blue Origin's New Shepard 2.0 vehicle (after a successful December 2017 test launch) and eighth test flight overall for the company's New Shepard program. An earlier version of New Shepard launched a series of missions in 2015 and 2016 before it was retired.
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More, including video, at the link.

Tuckerfan · May 27, 2018

Bezos aims to have a lunar base in the next 10 years.

Jeff Bezos and his Blue Origin space venture go all in on moon settlements

LOS ANGELES — Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos says his Blue Origin space venture will work with NASA as well as the European Space Agency to create a settlement on the moon.

And even if Blue Origin can’t strike public-private partnerships, Bezos will do what needs to be done to make it so, he said here at the International Space Development Conference on Friday night.

Bezos laid out his vision for lunar settlement during a fireside chat with yours truly, which took place just after he received the National Space Society’s Gerard K. O’Neill Memorial Award.

In the short run, Blue Origin’s objective is to reduce the cost of access to space — initially with its New Shepard suborbital spaceship, and then with its orbital-class New Glenn rocket in the 2020s.

In the long run, Bezos’ vision is to smooth the way for millions of people working in space. Those people just might live and work in hollowed-out asteroids — a concept that was proposed decades ago by O’Neill, a Princeton physicist whose ideas on space settlement fueled Bezos’ passion for the final frontier..

The way Bezos sees it, moving heavy industry into solar-powered space outposts is the only way to ensure that our planet can cope with the rising demand for energy, and the stress that growing populations will put on Earth’s environment.

“We will have to leave this planet,” Bezos told me. “We’re going to leave it, and it’s going to make this planet better. We’ll come and go, and the people who want to stay, will stay.”

Earth will be zoned for residential and light industrial use, while heavy industry will be moved off the planet and powered by 24/7 solar power, he said.

“The Earth is not a very good place to do heavy industry. It’s convenient for us right now,” Bezos said. “But in the not-too-distant future — I’m talking decades, maybe 100 years — it’ll start to be easier to do a lot of the things that we currently do on Earth in space, because we’ll have so much energy.”

So what comes between the short run and the long run? That’s where the moon plays a part.

Just as Mars is always at center stage for SpaceX’s billionaire founder, Elon Musk, the moon looms as a focus for Bezos. Even before the Trump administration officially pivoted to targeting the moon and its environs, Bezos was talking about using robots to build a lunar city for eventual human occupants.

During Friday’s chat, Bezos pointed out that the moon is conveniently located, reachable in just a couple of days with the right rocket. Scientists have determined that it has deposits of water ice near the poles that could be converted into drinkable water, breathable air and propellants for refuelable rockets.

“It’s almost like somebody set this up for us,” Bezos said.

To facilitate a return to the moon, Blue Origin has a lunar lander on the drawing boards that’s designed to be capable of delivery 5 tons of payload to the lunar surface. That’s hefty enough to be used for transporting people — and with enough support, it could start flying by the mid-2020s.

Blue Origin has proposed building its Blue Moon lander under the terms of a public-private partnership with NASA. “By the way, we’ll do that, even if NASA doesn’t do it,” Bezos said. “We’ll do it eventually. We could do it a lot faster if there were a partnership.”

The space agency is just starting to consider its options for a heavy-duty lunar lander — and Blue Origin is sure to face competition from other companies, including SpaceX as well as United Launch Alliance and Masten Space Systems.

It’s important to point out that moon settlement isn’t just a NASA thing. Bezos told me he loves the European Space Agency’s approach, known as the Moon Village.

“The Moon Village concept has a nice property in that everybody basically just says, look, everybody builds their own lunar outpost, but let’s do it close to each other. That way, if you need a cup of sugar, you can go over to the European Union lunar outpost and say, ‘I got my powdered eggs, what have you got?’ … Obviously I’m being silly with the eggs, but there will be real things, like, ‘Do you have some oxygen?’ ”

So how far is Blue Origin willing to go? Bezos has already committed the company to build rockets and landers. How about rovers, habitats and all the other hardware that a moon base will need?

“We’ll do anything we need to do,” Bezos said. “I hope we don’t need to do any of that. I want other people to do it. But if need be, we’ll do it.”

Bezos is in this for the long haul. He’s the world’s richest person, with a net worth of more than $130 billion, and he’s cashing in a billion dollars’ worth of Amazon stock annually to fund Blue Origin.

“One of two things will happen,” he said. “Either other people will take over the vision, or I’ll run out of money.”

“And I think it’ll be a while before you run out of money,” I told him.

“Let’s hope so,” he said with a smile.
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Bickendan · May 31, 2018

10 years? Ambitious. 15 would sound more 'reasonable'.

Tuckerfan · Jul 18, 2018

Tuckerfan · Dec 17, 2018

Blue Origin to attempt a launch tomorrow.

Tuckerfan · Jan 28, 2019

Blue Origin starts work on their factory.

Blue Origin Breaks Ground on Rocket Engine Factory in Huntsville, Alabama

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos’ rocket company Blue Origin has officially started construction on a Huntsville, Alabama facility that will produce engines for its New Glenn two-stage, partially reusable launch system, as well as the United Launch Alliance (ULA) Vulcan Centaur, Engadget reported.

According to AL.com, the $200 million, 46-acre facility in Huntsville—
sometimes called “Rocket City” for its long history with spaceflight projects—will employ some 300-400 workers to build both BE-3 and BE-4 engines, and is planned to be “highly automated.” Parts of the manufacturing process will be additive, i.e. 3D-printed.

“The engine has a lot of additive parts,” Blue Origin CEO Bob Smith told AL.com. “It has some very unique cladding and different ways we produce that engine. One of the things that’s not always obvious is that we at Blue Origin are a ‘make’ house. We’re not an integrator. We literally make everything that we have. We don’t have a lot of ‘build to spec.’”

“All of our things are ‘build to print,’” Smith added. “Everything that you’ll see that’s on that engine is actually going to be built from effectively bar stock or powder that we put into that facility.”

Smith added that the factory should be capable of producing “dozens” of rocket engines annually.

Blue Origin is planning on running the first crewed test of its existing New Shepard suborbital vehicle in 2019, while it hopes for New Glenn’s first flight to space to take place by 2021. ULA, a partnership between Boeing and Lockheed Martin, is planning on having the Vulcan Centaur replace its current line of Atlas and Delta rockets, the former of which uses Russian rocket engines, AL.com noted. ULA’s selection of the BE-4 for that system in September 2018 was a critical factor in Blue Origin’s decision to build the factory in Alabama.

According to SpaceNews, the BE-3 variant to be made at the facility (the BE-3U) is to be used for the New Glenn’s second stage. Smith also announced that Blue Origin is working on an agreement with NASA to take over Building 4670 at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville for acceptance testing.

The Seattle Times noted that both the New Glenn and Vulcan Centaur systems have been selected by the U.S. Air Force for future national security missions, which could “end the U.S.’ current dependency on using Russian RD-180 engines for critical national security launches.”
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Tuckerfan · May 2, 2019

Blue Origin has another successful test.

Tuckerfan · Aug 2, 2019

Tuckerfan · Dec 8, 2019

Bailey · Dec 8, 2019

Blue Origin not having to do a public song and dance to get investment dollars definitely means that their progress can seem slower than it is (although they are still way behind competitors in terms of achievements). Can't wait to see what they do with their Heavy Lift.

Tuckerfan · Dec 15, 2019

Another successful launch.

Blue Origin's New Shepard Makes Record 6th Launch to Fly NASA Science, Student Art to Space

A Blue Origin, the private spaceflight company founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, launched NASA experiments, student art projects and thousands of postcards from kids on a suborbital trip to space today (Dec. 11).

The company's reusable New Shepard spacecraft and rocket launched the NS-12 mission today after a 24-hour delay due to bad weather. Liftoff today occurred at 12:53 p.m. EST (1753 GMT) from Blue Origin's West Texas launch site.

"Welcome back, New Shepard," Ariane Cornell, Blue Origin's director of astronaut and orbital sales, said during launch commentary. "A beautiful launch to space and back."

Blue Origin originally aimed to launch New Shepard at 10 a.m. EST (1300 GMT) today, but pushed the launch back repeatedly due to heavy fog near the launch site. The company also briefly paused the countdown several times for final checks, including one just 20 seconds before liftoff. But the rocket ultimately liftoff off, reaching a maximum altitude of 343,061 feet (104,564 meters). That's about 65 miles (105 kilometers).

This was the rocket's first flight to space in seven months. It last launched in May, when it carried 38 science experiments to space. Today's launch also marks a sixth spaceflight for this vehicle, making it Blue Origin's most-flown booster and space capsule. The previous record was five flights, the company said.

New Shepard is carried a number of science experiments to suborbital space on the NS-12 flight. Among them were OSCAR, a NASA investigation, named after Oscar, the famously grumpy "Sesame Street" character, that will explore recycling in space. The spacecraft is also holding a weightlessness experiment designed by students from Columbia University and a NASA investigation to examine how gene expression changes for plants in space.

There is also art on board! The capsule is carrying two art experiments for the winners of the Art in Space Contest, which was held by the band Ok Go, which asked middle school and high school students to come up with innovative art projects to launch to space.

The capsule also contains postcards from kids as part of Blue Origin's nonprofit Club for the Future. For this project, children wrote postcards about what they think humankind's future in space could and should look like.

New Shepard is a reusable space capsule and rocket. Currently, Blue Origin has used the launch system to fly uncrewed science experiments, art and more to space. But the company hopes to eventually use the vehicle to fly paying tourists on suborbital spaceflights, reaching a maximum altitude of 307,000 feet (93,573 m).

The 1-stage rocket stands at 60 feet (18 meters) tall and, with 530 cubic feet (15 cubic meters) of volume in the spacecraft, the vehicle's capsule is estimated to hold 6 people. Those first passenger flights could begin in 2020.

"We've got a couple of more flights before we get there," Cornell said.
Click to expand...

Tuckerfan · Sep 24, 2020

Test launch will be streamed tomorrow.

We Are Borg · Sep 24, 2020

Tuckerfan said: ↑

Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin Plans Crewed Launch Within a Year
Click to expand...

Tuckerfan · Sep 24, 2020

We Are Borg vs. USS Crazy Horse said: ↑

Tuckerfan said: ↑

Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin Plans Crewed Launch Within a Year
Click to expand...

Click to expand...

He’s still not as far behind as VirginGalactic.

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