On Wed, 01 Oct 2003 14:48:15 -0700, David Weinshenker
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> David Anderman once said on the CATS Prize Board that static tests
>> don't count. HPR doesn't count, static tests don't count, viewgraphs
>> don't count, even bench proven hardware doesn't. To really be
>> somebody in the CATS world, you have to fly something you made
>> yourself. I got all bent out of shape - then asked myself why. It
>> was because he was right, and that meant ERPS, which had only ever
>> done static tests and a lot of facilities maintenance, didn't count.
>> That was not acceptable, and thus was born KISS.
>
>Does the CATS world count? :)
It was a good technical goal for amateur rocketry. In hindsight,
something that didn't require AST involvement might have been better
suited to the amateur rocketry mindset.
>(I think I pretty much missed out on most of the publicity and politics
>of that whole business - IIRC the prize was in the process of expiring,
>unclaimed, around the time I first got involved with ERPS.)
You had good timing. It was not a pleasant experience. ERPS got
involved for a while, with Black Adder, a one and a half stage UGLV.
We can thank AST for getting us out of that mess: when we got the 28
pages of instructions for how to apply for a waiver, we canceled the
project. It was a diversion anyway, and would *only* have been worth
doing if we had won - and it looked like JPA was going to walk away
with the money.
-R
--
"SEAL training is just like Ranger training, except
it's three weeks longer. It takes that long to teach
them how to balance the balls on their noses."
-- Doug Jones
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