SpaceX Tuesday...

[Eric Mc]

Announcement by the Kremlin's head chef shortly after the safe return of the Zond.

"Gentlemen, in honour of our glorious and triumphant circumnavigation of the moon by Soviet citizens, I have prepared a special repast for tonight's Politburo dinner - borscht and turtle soup.

[CraigyMc]

eharding said:

I like to think it ended happily for the turtles, after being fêted on their return, awarded the title Hero Turtles of the Soviet Union, photographed waving from the May Day parade reviewing stand next to Brezhnev, and finally retiring to a nice dacha on the Black Sea coast, spending the rest of their days blissfully frolicking about on the warm sandy beaches.

As I say, I like to think that, which is why I'm not going to Google to find out what actually happened to them.

With the fall of the USSR, they moved to NYC, fell on hard times and ended up training in martial arts while living in a warm underground aquatic environment.

[loudlashadjuster]

eharding said:

As I say, I like to think that, which is why I'm not going to Google to find out what actually happened to them.

Probably a good idea

[RizzoTheRat]

CraigyMc said:

eharding said:

I like to think it ended happily for the turtles, after being fêted on their return, awarded the title Hero Turtles of the Soviet Union, photographed waving from the May Day parade reviewing stand next to Brezhnev, and finally retiring to a nice dacha on the Black Sea coast, spending the rest of their days blissfully frolicking about on the warm sandy beaches.

As I say, I like to think that, which is why I'm not going to Google to find out what actually happened to them.

With the fall of the USSR, they moved to NYC, fell on hard times and ended up training in martial arts while living in a warm underground aquatic environment.

Which also explains what happened to one of the 2 rats on Sputnik 5. I think the other one moved to Paris and became a chef.

[Eric Mc]

After Ham retired in 1962, he got a bit part in "The Jungle Book".

[hidetheelephants]

RizzoTheRat said:

CraigyMc said:

eharding said:

I like to think it ended happily for the turtles, after being fêted on their return, awarded the title Hero Turtles of the Soviet Union, photographed waving from the May Day parade reviewing stand next to Brezhnev, and finally retiring to a nice dacha on the Black Sea coast, spending the rest of their days blissfully frolicking about on the warm sandy beaches.

As I say, I like to think that, which is why I'm not going to Google to find out what actually happened to them.

With the fall of the USSR, they moved to NYC, fell on hard times and ended up training in martial arts while living in a warm underground aquatic environment.

Which also explains what happened to one of the 2 rats on Sputnik 5. I think the other one moved to Paris and became a chef.

Are you related?

[annodomini2]

hidetheelephants said:

Would need to be a very big one and even then it'll be veeery slooow; an MSR would be a better bet, orders of magnitude higher power density. Just the small matter of funding someone to perfect a working example, NASA's SLS budget would comfortably pay for the development several times.

MSR would probably be too heavy for space use.

GFR would probably be more practical.

More advanced designs would be more suited, but obviously further from reality.

[Krikkit]

annodomini2 said:

.

GFR would probably be more practical.

That'd be my bet as well, especially if it's CO² cooled as you've got a huge atmosphere to replenish with in case of bother. Also relatively light, self contained etc.

Biggest issue would be having to bury it before you can fire it up.

Unless there's a new design waiting that makes more sense of course, or fusion of course.

[Beati Dogu]

SpaceX are straight up building UFOs now:

[hidetheelephants]

annodomini2 said:

hidetheelephants said:

Would need to be a very big one and even then it'll be veeery slooow; an MSR would be a better bet, orders of magnitude higher power density. Just the small matter of funding someone to perfect a working example, NASA's SLS budget would comfortably pay for the development several times.

MSR would probably be too heavy for space use.

GFR would probably be more practical.

More advanced designs would be more suited, but obviously further from reality.

Gas-cooled reactors are orders of magnitude poorer in power density and require massive pressure vessels to contain high pressure; MSRs can operate at around 1 atmosphere, so even on Mars the reactor vessel can be quite lightweight.

No-one has even built an experimental GFR, at least there have been actual MSRs built and operated.

Edited by hidetheelephants on Saturday 20th February 10:54

[Beati Dogu]

Starship SN10 has been static fired and it looked to go ok.

Hopefully that clears the way for its flight in a few days.

[annodomini2]

Beati Dogu said:

Starship SN10 has been static fired and it looked to go ok.

Hopefully that clears the way for its flight in a few days.

My launch tracker currently says Thursday

Edited by annodomini2 on Wednesday 24th February 09:09

[GTO-3R]

They're swapping one of the raptors so there might be a delay!

[Beati Dogu]

They also static fired a Falcon 9 over at Pad 39a in Florida this morning.

"Static fire test complete – targeting Sunday, February 28 at 8:37 p.m. EST for launch of Starlink from LC-39A"

That's for Starlink-17, which has been delayed since late last month. I'll be the booster's 8th flight.

[annodomini2]

GTO-3R said:

They're swapping one of the raptors so there might be a delay!

They've swapped it out now, another SF planned for today, launch app is saying tomorrow, but that is probably optimistic

[rxe]

Beati Dogu said:

Starship SN10 has been static fired and it looked to go ok.

Hopefully that clears the way for its flight in a few days.

Is there anything on why they think the Raptors didn’t start properly on the way down? They need to fix that bit before flying again! Or do a static fire while flipping the rocket about....

[eharding]

rxe said:

Or do a static fire while flipping the rocket about....

I did wonder if something along the lines of NASA's Lunar Landing Research Facility gantry could be constructed to test operation of rocket engines whilst being flung about and gyrated whilst suspended from cables, but the thing would probably need to be gargantuan, hideously expensive and take ages to build - much cheaper and quicker to keep churning out stainless steel grain silos and slap the engines on that and see what happens, albeit the engines after unsuccessful tests tend to be less amenable to inspection.

[Beati Dogu]

rxe said:

Is there anything on why they think the Raptors didn’t start properly on the way down? They need to fix that bit before flying again! Or do a static fire while flipping the rocket about....

I'm sure it's their top priority. I know they are working on being able to throttle the engines down more, so they can land on 3 engines. They're too powerful for that currently and it would start to go back up again. LOL

[Einion Yrth]

Beati Dogu said:

rxe said:

Is there anything on why they think the Raptors didn’t start properly on the way down? They need to fix that bit before flying again! Or do a static fire while flipping the rocket about....

I'm sure it's their top priority. I know they are working on being able to throttle the engines down more, so they can land on 3 engines. They're too powerful for that currently and it would start to go back up again. LOL

Very deep throttle capability might well be more difficult than reliable restart.

[Beati Dogu]

All three contestants for NASA's Human Lander System (moon lander) have shown them their crude mockups.



Dynetics flying drum kit.

SpaceX's window cleaning scaffold for transporting people and goods between a Starship and the Moon's surface

Blue Origin's fire escape ladder from hell.