WASHINGTON — Development of the Falcon 1 rocket from Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) is taking longer and costing more than expected, but the El Segundo, Calif.-based start-up still expects to make its maiden launch this year.
"It’s costing more than I thought, I have to admit," said SpaceX president and founder Elon Musk. "Building rockets — it ain’t cheap."
The Falcon 1’s maiden flight had been slated for January but has slipped several times. Musk now says SpaceX expects to conduct the launch by the end of September.
The company is currently dealing with some issues with the turbopumps that feed the rocket’s kerosene-fueled main engine. Musk expects full-duration burns of the proprietary propulsion system will begin soon.
Range safety approval for the Falcon 1 launch has hit a snag over flight qualification of a pair of receivers that would detect an abort signal in case of trouble after launch.
The receivers, built by CMC Electronics Cincinnati of Mason, Ohio, have been used for several years aboard missile defense interceptors and target vehicles. But Musk said there is a dispute over whether Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. range safety officials have the right to a CMC Electronics flight qualification report originally produced for St. Louis-based Boeing Co. as part of Boeing’s missile defense work.
Industry sources close to the dispute said Boeing has objected to the Air Force referring to that flight qualification data as part of the Falcon’s range safety review. Vandenberg spokeswoman Rebecca Danet confirmed that range safety approval is hung up over the flight termination receivers, but could not provide additional details. Kerry Gildea, a spokeswoman with Boeing Missile Defense Systems here, did not respond by press time to written questions from Space News.
Re-qualifying the receivers for SpaceX, industry sources said, could take 60 to 90 days.
Despite the technical and regulatory setbacks encountered in 22 months of development, Musk said he still expects to complete the reusable Falcon 1 for under $100 million and sell launches for $6 million apiece plus range fees.
Musk, who is financing the rocket development himself, said he is counting on selling three Falcon 1 launches a year to break even.
"I’m still feeling very good about the price of the vehicle, but it will take me a little longer to recover the cost of the capital," Musk said.
So far the company has sold two launches and says it is close to closing several other deals.
SpaceX’s only announced contract is with the Pentagon to launch an experimental military satellite called TacSat-1 on the Falcon 1’s inaugural flight.
SpaceX also has sold the first launch of the Falcon 5, a follow-on to the Falcon 1 still in development, to a U.S. firm that Musk said wants to remain anonymous. "For competitive reasons, they don’t want to say anything right now," he said. "We have a signed contract and money in the bank."
Musk said other prospective customers include more Pentagon programs in search of cheap rides, a non-U.S. space agency looking to put a payload in orbit above the equator, and a Houston venture that wants to launch a solar sail demonstration in 2005.
Charles Chafer, president of Houston-based Team Encounter, confirmed that he is close to concluding a deal pending NASA’s final approval. NASA awarded Team Encounter a contract in 2003 to include a tiny experimental navigation device on the company’s Earth-orbiting solar sail demonstrator. At the time of the contract, Team Encounter had been planning to launch its spacecraft on an Ariane 5 rocket as a secondary payload.
NASA spokesman Donald Savage said April 16 that the agency had only recently received the details of Team Encounter’s plan to switch to the Falcon 1 and has not yet approved the change.
Musk said he agreed to launch Team Encounter’s spacecraft for what Chafer said he would have to pay for a secondary slot on an Ariane — about $3 million. Musk said he will look for a second customer to share the flight, which is designed to deliver 650 kilograms to low Earth orbit.
SpaceX has also agreed to launch a much smaller payload for Chafer on the Falcon’s debut launch — a small canister of cremated human remains. The ashes are being flown as part of Chafer’s Celestis space burial service which has been launching cremated remains into orbit since 1998.
Musk said flying the Celestis payload is about as complicated as adding a two-kilogram bracket to the rocket’s upper stage. "It’s really completely nothing," he said.
Musk’s primary customer for the Falcon’s maiden flight is the U.S. Defense Department’s Office of Force Transformation, which hopes to use TacSat-1 to prove that it is possible to build and launch a small satellite within a year for $15 million or less.
Although TacSat-1 is still being built, Musk acknowledged that it is the Falcon 1, not the satellite, that is causing the schedule to slip.
"We try to be as frank as possible and we don’t mind taking the blame if we are the ones driving schedule," Musk said.
Musk said he is seeing no signs that his Pentagon customers are growing impatient waiting for the Falcon to be ready to launch. A Pentagon source affirmed that sentiment, saying officials there want to see SpaceX and the Falcon succeed.
SpaceX also is laying the groundwork for expanding its operations to the U.S. Marshall Islands in the Western Pacific. The company recently has picked out a launch site and bought office space at Kwajalein Atoll, home of the Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Defense Test Site. Musk said the location will help the Falcon serve equatorial orbits of interest to a number of prospective customers.
