SpaceX Tuesday...

[MiniMan64]

Beati Dogu said:

Nothing I should think, although it will make for a good show. It goes upwards because of exhaust being thrown out the back at a rate of knots, not because of stuff coming back at them.

It'll be interesting to see which launches first - The Starship with booster, or NASA's SLS.

Both are more powerful that a Saturn V and should rattle a few fillings.

Surely Space X will win that race...?!

[Dog Star]

MiniMan64 said:

Surely Space X will win that race...?!

It is pretty crazy, isn’t it - the SLS stuff is basically ready, yet the Starship isn’t even finished, there’s half a launch tower and yet most people would still bet on them.

[Flooble]

Beati Dogu said:

That was Apollo 4, the first flight of the Saturn V. The pad water suppression system wasn't ready yet, so it was much louder than subsequent launches.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uoVfZpx5dY


SpaceX isn't using water suppression either. Something they admit they may have to rethink. There's a bunch of condos about 6 miles from the launch pad at Boca Chica. Lots of glass doors and windows.

Are they not using suppression on the orbital mount? I know they aren't using it on the little test stand mounts, didn't realise they were going to try and get away with it on the orbital one too.

[annodomini2]

Flooble said:

Beati Dogu said:

That was Apollo 4, the first flight of the Saturn V. The pad water suppression system wasn't ready yet, so it was much louder than subsequent launches.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uoVfZpx5dY


SpaceX isn't using water suppression either. Something they admit they may have to rethink. There's a bunch of condos about 6 miles from the launch pad at Boca Chica. Lots of glass doors and windows.

Are they not using suppression on the orbital mount? I know they aren't using it on the little test stand mounts, didn't realise they were going to try and get away with it on the orbital one too.

One of the tanks on the new tank farm is a giant water tank for a suppression system for the orbital launch mount.

[CraigyMc]

Dog Star said:

MiniMan64 said:

Surely Space X will win that race...?!

It is pretty crazy, isn’t it - the SLS stuff is basically ready, yet the Starship isn’t even finished, there’s half a launch tower and yet most people would still bet on them.

SLS is NET March 2022.

Does anyone on here think SpaceX won't have flown an orbital starship by then?

[FurtiveFreddy]

CraigyMc said:

SLS is NET March 2022.

Does anyone on here think SpaceX won't have flown an orbital starship by then?

Kind of...

Gandahar said:

Old news but just to say how important this is

https://techcrunch.com/2020/08/18/spacex-raises-1-...

I guess that Japanese bloke who asked for a space bride ran out of money.

Starlink is the biggest money spinner here potentially, less so on transferring objects including people up into LEO and finally the dodo that is stainless steel ships that can land again after orbiting. He's never going to be able to do that, bitten off more than they can chew. They just don't know it yet.

Edited by Gandahar on Friday 28th August 20:02

[rxe]

CraigyMc said:

SLS is NET March 2022.

Does anyone on here think SpaceX won't have flown an orbital starship by then?

I suspect it will be comfortably within this year. Starship is basically ready - they need to nail the vacuum engines in, but it flies, it has guidance, and they’ve designed it for re-entry. If it was empty, would it get to orbit on just the existing engines? The booster hasn’t flown yet, but that is pretty simple structural engineering that they’re good at. And a lot of rocket engines, but they’re pretty good at that too.

If I had to place a whole pint on the matter. I’d go for November. It will launch fine and get to orbit. The booster will successfully hover. They will leave it hovering for a minute or two until it runs out of fuel, just to take the piss. I think the first starship will fail spectacularly on re-entry, because that’s the bit that they haven’t been able to test.

[annodomini2]

rxe said:

CraigyMc said:

SLS is NET March 2022.

Does anyone on here think SpaceX won't have flown an orbital starship by then?

I suspect it will be comfortably within this year. Starship is basically ready - they need to nail the vacuum engines in, but it flies, it has guidance, and they’ve designed it for re-entry. If it was empty, would it get to orbit on just the existing engines? The booster hasn’t flown yet, but that is pretty simple structural engineering that they’re good at. And a lot of rocket engines, but they’re pretty good at that too.

If I had to place a whole pint on the matter. I’d go for November. It will launch fine and get to orbit. The booster will successfully hover. They will leave it hovering for a minute or two until it runs out of fuel, just to take the piss. I think the first starship will fail spectacularly on re-entry, because that’s the bit that they haven’t been able to test.

It's too heavy fully fuelled with existing engines, would need 3 more atmospheric Raptors and to run them and the vacuum engines at take off.

But it is theoretically SSTO, no idea what the exact payload would be, but obviously not 150t.

[RizzoTheRat]

rxe said:

CraigyMc said:

SLS is NET March 2022.

Does anyone on here think SpaceX won't have flown an orbital starship by then?

I suspect it will be comfortably within this year. Starship is basically ready - they need to nail the vacuum engines in, but it flies, it has guidance, and they’ve designed it for re-entry. If it was empty, would it get to orbit on just the existing engines? The booster hasn’t flown yet, but that is pretty simple structural engineering that they’re good at. And a lot of rocket engines, but they’re pretty good at that too.

If I had to place a whole pint on the matter. I’d go for November. It will launch fine and get to orbit. The booster will successfully hover. They will leave it hovering for a minute or two until it runs out of fuel, just to take the piss. I think the first starship will fail spectacularly on re-entry, because that’s the bit that they haven’t been able to test.

Isn't the plan to try and do a controlled "touch down" at sea with the first booster? Presumably it'll be following the same flight profile as a Falcon 9 booster so the software should be pretty much there and it won't take many launches before they successfully land one. The biggest issue I think will be the launch/landing platforms/towers as that's something totaly new for them.

Plus SLS will probably slip another year to the right...

[Beati Dogu]

Pretty much. The booster is more of a known quantity, which is why they left it until later.

The plan is for it to do a backflip after separation, followed by a boostback burn, before a soft landing in the sea.

As 236 ft chimneys are want to do.

[John_S4x4]

I have heard on the grapevine, that there is $96 million of US military funding in the budget for SpaceX, as the US military are interested in the concept of having 100 tons of payload land anywhere on earth, within the hour.

So how are they going to do that ? Do they land the Starship, unload the cargo and then leave the Starship there or does it take off again. I am presuming that 'air dropping' cargo & supplies via parachute from a Starship, would be a little bit harder than it is from a cargo plane ? Even with a Starship 'air drop', the craft would still have to travel back up in the sky to land at some other US military/SpaceX barge ?

Air drop parachute delivery from a falling Starship ? I seem to be thinking it might all end up like Thunderbird 2, for some reason.

[MartG]

I don't recall seeing the 1st stage so clearly before



And probably the best booster-eye-view of the landing to date

Edited by MartG on Thursday 3rd June 19:18

[CraigyMc]

John_S4x4 said:

I have heard on the grapevine, that there is $96 million of US military funding in the budget for SpaceX, as the US military are interested in the concept of having 100 tons of payload land anywhere on earth, within the hour.

So how are they going to do that ?

Depends. Is it allowed to be in space beforehand?

Is it a bundle of tungsten rods?

[Beati Dogu]

MartG said:

I don't recall seeing the 1st stage so clearly before



And probably the best booster-eye-view of the landing to date

Edited by MartG on Thursday 3rd June 19:18

Definitely. I was wondering if they've upgraded the camera and/or broadcast gear. Some of the shots looked new and the signal was quite robust. The one looking back at the launchpad for instance. It's a new rocket after all, so maybe.

The Dragon capsule should make it to the ISS on Saturday.

There's another Falcon 9 launch on Sunday too. This will launch the Sirius XM-8 satellite, which will provide satellite radio coverage over North America. SpaceX successfully launched its sister satellite XM-7 in December, but it failed in orbit in mid-January and has now been declared a total loss. It was insured for $225 million, spread amongst 20 insurers.

Launch window: 5.25 am - 07.26 am UK time
Launch site: SLC-40, Cape Canaveral, Florida

[MartG]

CRS-22 ISS docking live https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clxNSlhFTmw

[Krikkit]

Beati Dogu said:

Definitely. I was wondering if they've upgraded the camera and/or broadcast gear. Some of the shots looked new and the signal was quite robust. The one looking back at the launchpad for instance. It's a new rocket after all, so maybe.

I believe they've started using starlink on the booster to upload the video, hence a much more reliable connection.

[Beati Dogu]

Dunno, maybe. Also could be because the booster wasn't that far from land based stations when it came down.

The new Dragon 2 capsules are heavier than the original ones, so it doesn't have the fuel to return all the way back anymore. But they can come part of the way. This one landed about 188 miles off the coast.

By comparison, Sunday's Falcon 9 will land about 400 miles downrange.

[annodomini2]

CraigyMc said:

John_S4x4 said:

I have heard on the grapevine, that there is $96 million of US military funding in the budget for SpaceX, as the US military are interested in the concept of having 100 tons of payload land anywhere on earth, within the hour.

So how are they going to do that ?

Depends. Is it allowed to be in space beforehand?

Is it a bundle of tungsten rods?

Suborbital hop, they can probably do it with Starship with a partial fuel load.

[AJLintern]

Someone's done a rather good animation of the first orbital test: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFt_LsFRFEQ

[louiechevy]

Heres how spacex aim to get anywhere on earth in under an hour.

https://youtu.be/zqE-ultsWt0