SpaceX (Vol. 2)
Discussion
Eric Mc said:
They have a LOT of things to sort out.
I'm sure they'll do it but it's a long way from operational yet.
Well, another flight or two. Even if they can't get it back down yet, it has proven that it could be an operational launch vehicle I'm sure they'll do it but it's a long way from operational yet.
.I wouldn't be surprised if they started carrying Starlinks or something.
Eric Mc said:
Three down. I think it will take at least another three flights before they manage to achieve all the fundamnetal requirements of the design at this rate.
Perhaps more. As you said above, Eric, Starship appeared to be “tumbling”, though it seemed to be a roll mainly. A definite attitude control issue. The Pez door - did it close properly?Things appeared to go properly wrong when it started to hit the upper atmosphere - if the door was partially open what effect would that have at that speed?
There would appear to be fundamental issues in getting the Raptors to reliably re-ignite and that’s the real kicker. They seem rock solid after their first firing.
There’s a lot of work. Nevertheless that was simply stunning, Starship in space was simply majestic, and the plasma shots were mental.
I see the Uk press - the Independent, self appointed arbiter of truth - coming up with the usual ill-informed bolleaux “Starship lost” with no mention of the overwhelming successes. And the same old guff in the comments “spend the money on housing the homeless” etc.
Solocle said:
Eric Mc said:
They have a LOT of things to sort out.
I'm sure they'll do it but it's a long way from operational yet.
Well, another flight or two. Even if they can't get it back down yet, it has proven that it could be an operational launch vehicle I'm sure they'll do it but it's a long way from operational yet.
.I wouldn't be surprised if they started carrying Starlinks or something.
That's a fair point, even as an expendable vehicle it's got to be massively more capable than anything else (and possibly cheaper as well) in plain terms of payload to orbit.
From a quick Google I'd say the news reports seem to be pretty balanced imo, stuff saying "ship lost" appears to be mainly from live updates where it's inevitably the last thing to be reported on.
From a quick Google I'd say the news reports seem to be pretty balanced imo, stuff saying "ship lost" appears to be mainly from live updates where it's inevitably the last thing to be reported on.
They are aiming very high with their ambitions. As a "simple" launcher they could have a winner. However, they want way more than that.
With the premature retirement of the Saturn V back in 1973, I've always bemoaned the loss of a true heavy lift launch vehicle. We now seem to have one, IF anybody feels they could make use of such a launcher in that role.
Imagine how quickly something like the International Space Station could have been assembled with a Starship class launcher.
With the premature retirement of the Saturn V back in 1973, I've always bemoaned the loss of a true heavy lift launch vehicle. We now seem to have one, IF anybody feels they could make use of such a launcher in that role.
Imagine how quickly something like the International Space Station could have been assembled with a Starship class launcher.
Eric Mc said:
Imagine how quickly something like the International Space Station could have been assembled with a Starship class launcher.
They'd need to come up with something bigger than their 'pez' cargo door - whether doors like the Shuttle's or an opening nose a la ...
Which is they way RocketLab seem to be going with their Neutron
Yes - the PEZ door looks a bit pathetic and rather wobbly too. I think it flexed too much which meant it wouldn't seat properly when they tried to close it.
The Space Shuttle's cargo bay doors were quite wobbly too and they did have some issues on the early missions getting them to close properly due to distortion. The Shuttle had a manual back up "hand winding" system.
The Space Shuttle's cargo bay doors were quite wobbly too and they did have some issues on the early missions getting them to close properly due to distortion. The Shuttle had a manual back up "hand winding" system.
MartG said:
Eric Mc said:
Imagine how quickly something like the International Space Station could have been assembled with a Starship class launcher.
They'd need to come up with something bigger than their 'pez' cargo door - whether doors like the Shuttle's or an opening nose a la ...Which is they way RocketLab seem to be going with their Neutron
Eric Mc said:
normalbloke said:
I think solving the re-entry temps is going to take them a lot longer than they realise at this point.
Agreed.Apart from the instability before and during re-entry, it was shedding tiles like confetti.
Even if it had re-entered in the right attitude it’s likely that it would not have survived.
There also seemed to be a problem with gases in the cargo bay and the bay door looked like it didn’t close properly.
Talksteer said:
I'm not sure it was shedding tiles, the stuff being shed looks fibrous. I would imagine that it was gap fillers and packing around the fins.
Agreed - the tiles are chunky thinks, that stuff all looked like crispy paper to me. I think they’ll get to recovering first stages fairly quickly, it’s a lot easier and they’ve had a lot of practice. That will make it very viable as a launch vehicle even if they expend the Starship (which would be a much cheaper thing to make without avionics, fins, tiles etc needed for re entry).
Re entry looks hard.
I was pretty impressed with the way that the countdown progressed right on down, no 40s hold, just right down and off it went. Showed massive confidence and looked like a real statement of intent.
My opinion is that Musk has given us (ie mankind) a one off opportunity. No government or shareholder company would ever take on this kind of endeavour with these kinds of risks and timescales. Musk is a bit of a unicorn in this respect; how often in history are we going to get ourselves a massive rocket nerd with the single mindedness to pursue this kind of thing? One could cite Bezos, but he’s not in the same league.
Hammersia said:
I'm thinking there must be some businesses keen to get 100 ton payloads up right now even with expendable Starships. It's such a huge leap forwards, and with methane engines.
If you build it, they will come. Looks like we haven’t seen anything yet. Elon posted this earlier:
“Max payload of Starship V1 in expendable mode (like the other rockets) is ~200 tons.
V3 is expected to be ~200 tons with full reusability and ~400 tons expendable. Length will grow by 20 to 30 meters and thrust to ~10k tons.”
Beati Dogu said:
Hammersia said:
I'm thinking there must be some businesses keen to get 100 ton payloads up right now even with expendable Starships. It's such a huge leap forwards, and with methane engines.
If you build it, they will come. Looks like we haven’t seen anything yet. Elon posted this earlier:
“Max payload of Starship V1 in expendable mode (like the other rockets) is ~200 tons.
V3 is expected to be ~200 tons with full reusability and ~400 tons expendable. Length will grow by 20 to 30 meters and thrust to ~10k tons.”
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