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SpaceX |OT| Reusable Rockets - To Mars!
- Thread starter Crispy75
- Start date
Hell of a show, super happy for the team! Hoping the onboard camera footage was archived somehow so we can see it in the official upload.
that's just the livestream which had ton's of drop out, i hope spaceX will upload the direct stuff if they have it
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hurt? why would it hurt?
People were not sceptical. They said it was impossible.
I dunno, I just don't understand the Cult of Elon, I guess. It's like wading into the console wars of the gaming side.
Sure, there was certainly some hyperbole of "it's impossible" out there, but I'd say the overwhelming view of the spaceflight community was that it was going to be incredibly challenging and they were unlikely to be able to pull it off. And not that it was even just technically possible (I think most agreed it was), but that it might not actually even prove its return on investment if it was successful, or be reliable enough to do so. There were also some real doubts that the cost of re-flight would be as cheap as they were predicting (and while it hasn't been, it's still been phenomenally cheap).
They rode a very fine line of agile development and safe engineering for awhile there, while barely staying afloat financially. I feel that the skepticism was appropriate and really just better highlights how insane SpaceX's achievements have been.
and they seem likely to do a equally insane repeat with starship.
Yep. They're really proving the value of the rapid development and testing feedback loop. Measuring what matters. Immediately throwing out ideas that aren't working. Really phenomenal to watch.
yup spacex has definitely internalized the silicon valley motto "fail faster"
It really shows how much of an outdated mindset most companies have. It's a generational issue really, thankfully more and more people from new generations are pushing those away.
The colonization of Mars by human has one particular benefit for humanity on Earth: you cannot afford to be wasteful if you are going to colonize Mars.
Food: has to be small, nutrition-rich, unless you could produce it entirely on-site, to cut down on cargo weight and space. And you have to be able to prepare or consume with as little material as necessary as possible, no appliances. If you CAN produce it on site, it means you can make nutritious food with little resources, essentially in a desert. So innovation will accelerate on this topic in a way that it would not on Earth because here we can afford to be inefficient.
Clothing: has to be durable, easy to wash or doesn't even require to be washed except maybe underwear. Again this means less waste, less production of clothes. Again, solve this, and you have a positive impact here on Earth.
Water usage: Same thing, you need to be able to get clean or clean things using very little water or none. All about cargo-space/weight. Major needs in small-scale water-treatment. So one day we could all be able to treat water at home with small machines.
The list goes on really. Space exploration is key to save Earth, because without it people will just keep hoping for solutions.
You assume I'm part of the cult of Elon based on...what?
The man is abhorrent, but the advances his companies have made are undeniable and should be lauded regardless of how crappy the man is.
With regard to the potential to land a booster. The big defence partners weren't even willing to try, despite getting countless billions every year for a multitude of purposes. People that have been able to make things like the B2, the F117, SR71, the Shuttle and countless other wonders of technology and engineering over the last 50 years.
SpaceX did it as a startup with the idea of "this can be done, how do we do it" not "this can't be done, don't bother investigating because the status quo suits us just fine".
Countless interactions with members of said cult where one should never doubt the glory and honour of SpaceX, for any skepticism must be seen as heresy.
There are countless people who post in these threads that think he's a complete dickhead.
fallout
what are you even trying to start/say here? like nobody in this thread is saying that musk is a god or some bullshit like that and just because people in this thread are saying good thing/being exited about the achievement of spaceX doesn't mean we're part of the musk club/cult what kind of shitty logic is that?
what are you even trying to start/say here? like nobody in this thread is saying that musk is a god or some bullshit like that and just because people in this thread are saying good thing/being exited about the achievement of spaceX doesn't mean we're part of the musk club/cult what kind of shitty logic is that?
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I'm just tired of the complex that SpaceX fans seem to have. Like I said, people were rightfully and reasonably skeptical of SpaceX. That's not the same as people thinking it was impossible and claiming so is like some sort of revisionist history.
The whole Cult of Elon thing is just something I assume of people if they can't seem to take any non-positive comments about SpaceX. Kinda like how whenever someone says: "I'm just asking questions, but ..." Sometimes it's innocent, but usually it's not.
The whole Cult of Elon thing is just something I assume of people if they can't seem to take any non-positive comments about SpaceX. Kinda like how whenever someone says: "I'm just asking questions, but ..." Sometimes it's innocent, but usually it's not.
starlink launch stream
edit:oh it's not just their starship stream that upgraded to 4k nice! now if only Nasa would upgrade as well...
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It's almost like a decade of groundbreaking successes in the face of overwhelming negativity on the part of the old-space establishment is worthy of a certain amount of celebration.
Maybe, instead of dropping into the thread for the sole purpose of shitting on people for half a page, you should find somewhere else to be where you actually enjoy the company.
10th Successful landing of a 1st Stage is big. ULA tried to claim profitability on reusable boosters would not be possible until the 10th successful landing.
Of Course SpaceX has shared very different numbers on number of flights versus profitability. SpaceX says after 3 successful landings it becomes profitable versus making more 1st stages. So if accurate this little booster has saved a lot of money. SpaceX puts a price tag of about 1 million Dollars on refurbishing the 1st stage.
Of Course SpaceX has shared very different numbers on number of flights versus profitability. SpaceX says after 3 successful landings it becomes profitable versus making more 1st stages. So if accurate this little booster has saved a lot of money. SpaceX puts a price tag of about 1 million Dollars on refurbishing the 1st stage.
Yeah, I shouldn't have brought Elon into this. Apologies for that.
There really aren't a lot of spaceflight threads on Era that I can go to. I've been celebrating SpaceX's achievement for years now. I just wish we could celebrate those achievements without all the smugness and insulting of anyone who has been skeptical. This really matters to me because I want a world where we can actually be critical of commecial entities without having their fans immediately jumping to their defense.
I imagine they'll just keep going until something comes up during refurbishment testing. And even if the booster itself can't be fully reused, there are numerous expensive parts they can repurpose for other rockets.
I'm a fan of SpaceX and I'm more than happy to criticise them where they deserve it.
I know that technically some suborbital rockets had landed before SpaceX started, but none of the big players with all the money and resources to try thought it could be done with an orbital class booster, as in, landed and resused profitably, not just landed which I'm sure they could have achieved. Even today more than 5 years since the first landing of an F9, have any of the others got anything coming? I think the ULA has talked a lot about basically saving the engines and avionics module of the Vulcan but not actually done much about doing it yet, publicly at least.
Maybe that's where a large element of the fandom comes from. SpaceX are happy to do all this stuff out there in the open which gets people interested and excited. They are happy to let shit blow up in the name of science and that too gets people interested.
I know that technically some suborbital rockets had landed before SpaceX started, but none of the big players with all the money and resources to try thought it could be done with an orbital class booster, as in, landed and resused profitably, not just landed which I'm sure they could have achieved. Even today more than 5 years since the first landing of an F9, have any of the others got anything coming? I think the ULA has talked a lot about basically saving the engines and avionics module of the Vulcan but not actually done much about doing it yet, publicly at least.
Maybe that's where a large element of the fandom comes from. SpaceX are happy to do all this stuff out there in the open which gets people interested and excited. They are happy to let shit blow up in the name of science and that too gets people interested.
Couple of years and I'll be buying a Lambo and a payload to space, then.
That's good to know and I'm sorry I jumped all over you yesterday. I could have made my point without being an asshat.
It's fascinating to me that nobody's followed their lead. Government contracts are a hell of a drug, I guess.
A lot of the competing designs use solid rocket boosters for lift off, which cannot use the same approach for reusability.
Consider the Ariane 6 for example. The solid rocket boosters cannot land themselves, nor can the liquid hydrogen / oxygen core (not enough thrust).
SpaceX knew from the start that they wanted to attempt re-usability, and avoided architectures that would prevent it.
I think it could happen rather rapidly. People can be acquired and technology has already been proven. The other companies are also full of very bright people.
But they'd have to find a way to differentiate to make it worth while. Like right now nobody is doing anything. By the time the next company is able to do what the F9 does SpaceX could have Starship landing on the bloody moon. And when the entire 1st and 2nd stage is reusable, possibly rapidly, and with the payload capacity to leo, geo, lunar etc, its going to be very interesting to see how much the lift industry changes over the next decade.
I think a reason why SpaceX has so many fans is because they have opened up and accelerated what was seen as a very slow moving, stagnant industry and they've also been pretty open about the whole process. Many people lost hope when the shuttle program was canned and nothing seemed to be on the horizon. SpaceX opened up space to a lot of people again.
Another reason is the success in the face of criticism. They've answered "you can't do that" with "why not?" and actually done it. Repeatedly. They continue to expand the market with cheaper launches and vertical integration not seen in the traditional industry players. It's honestly just exciting to see.
The New Glenn seems like it will provide some F9 functionality, with a reusable first stage, but by that stage Super Heavy / Starship will hopefully doing it (or well on the way) with a reusable second stage.
Another reason is the success in the face of criticism. They've answered "you can't do that" with "why not?" and actually done it. Repeatedly. They continue to expand the market with cheaper launches and vertical integration not seen in the traditional industry players. It's honestly just exciting to see.
The New Glenn seems like it will provide some F9 functionality, with a reusable first stage, but by that stage Super Heavy / Starship will hopefully doing it (or well on the way) with a reusable second stage.
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It would be a very risky thing to do. The road to SpaceX's success is paved with the bodies of many failed private space companies. Despite them making it look easy, it's hard and expensive to develop this sort of capability. The received wisdom is that there is not enough market elasticity to make it worthwhile. Why spend $100millions to halve the cost of launch, if you're only launching 10 times a year? You'll never recoup the cost.
SpaceX has neatly sidestepped around this problem by being its own customer (we can launch 40 times a year because 30 of those launches are for Sarlink) and by having a lunatic in charge who wants to colonise Mars and doesn't care about quarterly profits in the meantime.
*IF* Starship ends up as cheap as it's promised to be, and space is truly opened up, then competitors will step up I have no doubt. But for now, nobody thinks the pie is big enough to share.
It will be difficult for anybody to catch up because right now they're aiming to beat the Falcon 9. Meanwhile, Starship could quickly dominate in ways never seen before where the launches will be cheaper than the Falcon 9, but have crazy payload capacity. On top of that, they're already learning how to manufacture rockets at a pace never seen before.
If Starship works, it's game over. Especially when we're at the point in time where resource mining is possible in the near future.
Maybe there will be a company that makes nuclear work.
However, I think if Starship works, there will be competition outside of launch.
Depends what the market needs. If the market has settled into 'container' standards with satellites being designed around current launch capability then Falcon 9 size may be enough for most commercial traffic. Even heavy is barely used at the moment and I'm not sure what starship will be used for other than NASA/government contracts
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It all depends if Starship truly is as cheap to operate as is promised. The current launch market is based on launch costs of $thousands/kg. Starship is aiming for $tens/kg. Whole categories of use would open up.
Competition for Falcon 9 is sure to arrive. New Glenn _will_ fly eventually. Rocket Labs Neutron is supposed to be re-useable. And China is certain not to ignore it.
But not everybody will truly compete. ULA in particular is adverse to investing in development without the government paying for it. If they find themselves in a market where there are several cheap re-usable rockets (i.e. Falcon 9 and New Glenn) I could see them simply abandoning the launch market. After all, Boeing and Lockheed/Northrup make most of their money elsewhere, they probably aren't that attached to the launch market.
Arianespace will probably come along with re-usability eventually. But bureaucratic inertia will make them very late.
Starship probably will not be copied. Not only is it a huge development cost, but it's specific design has been heavily influenced by SpaceX plans for mars. For trips to Earth / Moon orbit, a space plane second stage probably makes more sense.
But not everybody will truly compete. ULA in particular is adverse to investing in development without the government paying for it. If they find themselves in a market where there are several cheap re-usable rockets (i.e. Falcon 9 and New Glenn) I could see them simply abandoning the launch market. After all, Boeing and Lockheed/Northrup make most of their money elsewhere, they probably aren't that attached to the launch market.
Arianespace will probably come along with re-usability eventually. But bureaucratic inertia will make them very late.
Starship probably will not be copied. Not only is it a huge development cost, but it's specific design has been heavily influenced by SpaceX plans for mars. For trips to Earth / Moon orbit, a space plane second stage probably makes more sense.
The new Ars Technica article about Blue Origin is pretty spicy:
arstechnica.com
A new book, Amazon Unbound, reveals Jeff Bezos’ envy of SpaceX
Bezos tried to hire Gwynne Shotwell to run Blue Origin in 2016.
arstechnica.com
Not a shock. You can't have a 20 year old rocket company that still hasn't got to orbit. It's mind-boggling.The new Ars Technica article about Blue Origin is pretty spicy:
A new book, Amazon Unbound, reveals Jeff Bezos’ envy of SpaceX
Bezos tried to hire Gwynne Shotwell to run Blue Origin in 2016.
They've also got a 10 year old game studio that hasn't released a game (that anyone cares about).
At the moment it's just for inspection, but while it's there, might as well...