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So that was the most noninformational informational meeting I have ever attended. ie he gave little away. He spoke and showed information mostly about the Australian based ScamSpace project, very little about RocketLab NZ.
Frustrating..
But .... to update.
(1) No, they have not orbitted anything yet but have attained 120km altitude repeatedly and fired over 80 successful launches. Saw some interesting videos of various tests.
(2) Sandy is Belgian, has worked on several incomplete Scram projects including the Australian one. All were killed due to either funding issues or in the Australian case, destruction of the test vehicle at launch.
(3) The cojoining factors in all projects is cost to launch. All projects he has worked had the ultimate target of making space affordable for smaller operators. Rocketlabs NZ is the first to be ready to acheive that.
I buttonholed him after and 'accused' him of not saying much about the NZ project. He laughed and agreed, showed a test firing of the Rutherford engine on video which was extremely impressive. ( It shifted the vid cam back about 6 meters and it was attached to some heavy metal ). He gave a hint when asked, that the name, Electron, had something to do with the new technology and thus the patents and secrecy on the project.
He wasn't giving much away.
But had a long chat with another interesting character about historical aircraft and technology. So a good night regardless.
My long weekend was excellent except for the the fact I had a full on head cold the whole time and it's still hanging around .... bleghh !
Few pix over on the weebly website (link below) if anyone is interested
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