/Adam

"Yes, but you have to start somewhere. The more you can demonstrante a market, the sooner you can expect more development and lower prices."

Yes, I agree. A market must be established first, and with high costs you must look at the client(s) who will both consume and invest in your product. I do not believe this particular market will expand enough to attract a middle-income consumer in the near future without a focused effort. Private industry has two opportunities. First, it clearly has potential to exploit a new market, thus rapidly developing space exploration. Second, it has the opportunity to open that market to a very large number of people. Private enterprise can set a very positive tone IF it wants to. The question is whether it will. In this economy, I don't see it happening without at least some basic regulation.

Actually, you're not going to outer space for the $200K. You only get sub-orbital space (about 70 miles up). While a press release offered details on advanced avionics and other such stuff, there was no word if peanuts would be served or if an in-flight movie is available.

Re-read. I didn't say the problem was fuel; the problem is weight. Any structure savings figures into it, but compared to fuel it really isn't a huge ratio. There are quite a few minor details I didn't cover. I really didn't want to write a full dissertation.

I don't understand what you mean, "saving the cost of disposable stages that were spent or had to be recovered".

You're saying it costs more to use re-useable solid fuel boosters than it does to build/maintain a launch plane? Well, if you're launching anything with weight, it doesn't matter. We can't air launch large payloads at this time into a sustained orbit from an aircraft.

Like I said with air launch, at this time it is only feasible with small light payloads. A savings of 40,000 feet (less than 8 miles) when you are launching something into an orbit of 120+ miles and attempting to achieve 18,000+mph isn't a great deal.

If it was as you say, it would be used a great deal. In fact, it would be used any time something was put into LEO… but it isn't.

The problem is not saving fuel, its saving the cost of the disposable stages that were either spent or had to be recovered and re-certified after every flight.
Air launch means the first stage is a normal aircraft that can be serviced by regular technicians and conduct multiple launches between overhauls.

On a different note I would like to point out that its the rich snobs who pay for overpriced things that make much of what we take for granted today possible.
They were the first to invest in airlines, cars, fast ships and fancy computerized gadgets. They were the ones that got the government and big business looking at the potential of these things.

Given time I believe they will herald the future of space travel for the masses, since they will be the ones who build the competitive private market.
Much as the blatant display of wealth may annoy folks, in this case its best to restrain ones hate.

"At the same time, a monumental event for the elite 1% of the world's population with $200k to spare. "

Yes, but you have to start somewhere. The more you can demonstrante a market, the sooner you can expect more development and lower prices.

Sill:

"Would using this plane (or something similar) offer any avantage in launching payloads?"

Yes you could. White Knight can just as well fucntion as an air-launcher for a small expendable orbital rocket.

White Knight I did some seperation and drop tests for T/Space to this end, several years ago.

Weight is by far the most costly, and it isn't proportional. Say you need 2000 pounds of fuel for one pound of payload (the sick part is there comes a point where you really start to consider fuel as payload); if you want two pounds of payload, your fuel weight may be 6600 pounds of fuel, not 4000.
Orbit is another costly item. The higher you go, the longer distance you have to travel, and since most orbits tend to follow the shape of the earth, you don't fly straight up. Again, this distance horizontally is disproportionate to distance vertically and dependent on orbit type. So if you want to increase your orbit by 20 km in height, you will have to travel around 80-100 km horizontal distance; which means more burn time and more weight (ie fuel becomes payload now) you need more fuel to carry the weight of the extra fuel.

So definitely launching at 40,000 feet vs. sea level will save you some fuel; proably around 5-10 percent (more for a really light load to a low orbit). Pretty close to the amount of fuel it would take for you to get to this height (plus horizontal distance depending on the other factors).
Still to launch a medium size satellite into LEO the rest of the way would still take more fuel than a B52 could carry. So this option is only available for very small payloads.

No, Space Ship Two isnt a small payload but… A huge difference with Space Ship Two which goes barely into LEO for 5 minutes and a satellite into a decent LEO for years is the speed it must achieve. The satellite has to get to a speed of over 18,000 mph, space ship two will not need to go near as fast.

Not to mention, for most satellites low earth orbit isn't the best choice of locations, but that is a different mini-lecture.

Cheers! Ian

That already makes a big difference. For lightweight LEO payloads, it's probably quite a bit more economic than launching from the ground. And I'm pretty sure the payload would be larger than with the Pegasus.

PS.: Ian, in case you haven't seen it yet, there's an answer waiting for you concerning your Supernova remnant question.

Cheers, Ian

Is it possible to reach a commercial orbit by launching an unmanned rocket stage from it? Would it even be economically interestiing to save a mere 100 km?

At the same time, a monumental event for the elite 1% of the world's population with $200k to spare.

I doubt the price will come down any time soon, considering the bear market.