Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!ames!amdcad!sun!pitstop!sundc!seismo!uunet!mcvax!ukc!etive!lfcs!ret
From: ret@lfcs.ed.ac.uk (Richard Eyre Todd)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: alternate launch vehicles
Keywords: HOTOL, funding, project future
Message-ID: <874@etive.ed.ac.uk>
Date: 21 Oct 88 17:46:44 GMT
References: <3433@geac.UUCP> <372@istop.ist.CO.UK> <871@etive.ed.ac.uk>
Sender: news@etive.ed.ac.uk
Organization: Department of Computer Science, Edinburgh University
Lines: 56


kev @ ist.CO.UK ( 20 Oct 88 ) writes :

>It appears as though British Aerospace's (BAe) Hotol project has been 
>swept under the carpet again. BAe want to proceed but are not prepared to
>unless the cost can be shared with someone else. HMG is not prepared to 
>spend anything on it (or anything else if they can help it), but will 
>permit BAe to look for other investors, as long as they are not foreign
>to the UK - for reasons of NATIONAL SECURITY. Naturally there are no
>indigenous companies prepared to invest/risk large sums of money on the 
>venture.

The British government have indeed declined the opportunity to invest
further hard cash in the HOTOL project. The good news however is that
a group of anonymous city backers have come forward to provide the
necessary funding for the next three years. To this end a corporate
vehicle has been created, which will be known as the HOTOL Development
Corporation.  Negotiations are presently underway. No hard contracts
have been signed as yet, so further discussion at the present time is
speculative and may be prejudicial. I will post an update when further
information becomes available.


>The designer (whether of the engines alone or the project in 
>general, I'm uncertain) apparently is the modern day equivalent of 
>Barnes Wallace and Frank Whittle, and has publicly stated that his baby
>WILL be built, and that as HE holds the copyrights he would 'defect' to 
>the highest bidder should the project be stopped. HMG informed him that 
>this would break the Official Secrets Act...        etc.,etc.

bob @ etive.ed.ac.uk (Bob Gray) ( 21 Oct 88 ) responds :

>Alan Bond. He designed the engines and demonstrated that his
>designs WILL work if built. 

In 'Spaceflight News' (October 1988) Alan Bond is quoted :

"Some of the areas of major difficulty have been examined to a level
where solutions are known to exist, but that is a far cry from
actually having the technology all buttoned down such that you
know there's not going to be something nasty pop up when you've
got to go on to develop and produce vehicles. The whole object of
this next stage of the [HOTOL] program is really to address
those areas with the right level of effort, such that you have
a complete 'technology map' of all the difficult areas of the
vehicle".

The more astute news.reader will note that, in all probability,
the public relations department of the HDC will take over from
Alan Bond's 'freelance' reporting of the project status in the
future :-).

> Richard Eyre-Todd.  Department of Computer Science, University of Edinburgh.

> JANET:  ret@uk.ac.ed.ecsvax        | Solid fuel is for camp-fires,
> UUCP: ...!mcvax!ukc!ed.ecsvax!ret  | not boosting Space Shuttles. :-)