SpaceX (general discussion)

TomcatViP said:
So, who's gonna call Christo that he has to wrap also the Turks and Caicos?
(my preference with a sticky net)
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Why would they ever not? The only way there is zero chance of an incident is if they don't fly.
 
FighterJock said:
It will be interesting to see what happens at launch this time round. Fingers and Toes crossed that they launch without accident.
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No kidding. It's fun to imagine the cadence once they have that and the TPS nailed down. Then the launch pads become the bottleneck. They could be putting those up like weeds in 5 years.
 
martinbayer said:
As for me, I blame that darn airplane fuselage shoot'n habit on that gosh dang backwoods banjo music. Sustained exposure to that hellish sound made by the devil's ukulele fer sure can make a grown fully bearded mountain man go bonkers in a New York minute...
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...

yee-ha....

I have to get out of Alabama....
 
Every country promotes its internal products to others. Think about how Boeing benefits from this, for example, or Lockheed, or RTX.
 
something going on at launch pad B
Installation of Pad during this Weekend ?
GqbK9XcXQAAMyJ5
 
Halcyon66 said:

The US forces other counties to do things they should not have too, tariffs for example.

Think about what Starlink can be and the potential influence?

Regards,
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What you say is true. But the US has been a rather....beneficent imperial power, compared to pretty much any other down thru the years.

Back on topic:

1. If gun-toting, knuckle-dragging, Bible-thumpers (I am one of those), were a danger to overland transport of aerospace items, Boeing and others would not ship fuselages by rail from Kansas to Washington on freight trains. ( There was of course that one instance of Burlington Northern, (I believe), throwing some 737 fuselages into a canyon a few years back.)

2. When is the next IFT? When!?
 
I was reading this: detailed specs of SpaceX reusable booster stages.

en.wikipedia.org

Falcon 9 - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
en.wikipedia.org

SpaceX Super Heavy - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

Now that we have perfectly good reusable booster stages, it dawned on me we could create (suborbital) hydrolox rocketplanes to ride them. A 0.85 propellant mass fraction; isp 450 seconds; payload 10 tons.
-Without the booster: suborbital point-to-point transportation;
-With the booster: orbital missions.

This is speculative; back to SpaceX present developments.
 
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Titus said:
What you say is true. But the US has been a rather....beneficent imperial power, compared to pretty much any other down thru the years.

Back on topic:

1. If gun-toting, knuckle-dragging, Bible-thumpers (I am one of those), were a danger to overland transport of aerospace items, Boeing and others would not ship fuselages by rail from Kansas to Washington on freight trains. ( There was of course that one instance of Burlington Northern, (I believe), throwing some 737 fuselages into a canyon a few years back.)

2. When is the next IFT? When!?
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I saved some photos for the laughs...


Kyle+Massick+Boeing+Train+Derailment+2+(1).JPG

boeingderail6.jpg

20140704_165030.jpg
 
Archibald said:
Now that we have perfectly good reusable booster stages, it dawned on me we could create (suborbital) hydrolox rocketplanes to ride them
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There still SpaceX intercontinental Transport plan on the Table.
150 metric Tons in 90 minute to other side of World.
Like from Texas to west coast of Australia
 
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I just think about this,
how will Jeff Bezos react on this, If SpaceX starts to intercontinental Transport ?
I mean he was force by Amazon shareholders to Order four Falcon 9 to launch Kuipers Satellite.

Will the shareholders force Bezos at gunpoint to sign contract with SpaceX for express transport ?
Or will he running true BO HQ screaming "BUILD NEW ARMSTRONG LIKE STARSHIP !!!"
 
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NMaude said:
How come this was never in the international news? IMO there's no way that three brand new 737 fuselages being written off in a train derailment would make front page news.
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This Was back in 2014 roughly when Trump made his first announcement for President speech.

People was more focus on that boring deal then this.
 
TomcatViP said:
Salmons were bigger that year.
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I can just hear Attenborough’s narrating their return to their spawning grounds…

Back on topic—the single downcomer…did that allow more flexing?

With three, perhaps the vibrations of the Raptors are in a feedback loop.

SpaceX have some CFD guys looking into it, I hope.

Phys.org had an article called: "Eggs less likely to crack when dropped side on."

Now while it is hard to break an egg with your hand lengthwise... perhaps a sharp impact stoves in a blunt cone--where the side of the egg is more like a leaf spring--except--once again--when in contact with something thinner--the edge of a bowl.

Thinking about how forces are felt makes me wonder if Raptor 3's more compact nature is playing a part.

Which do you want to fail first? An engine? Or what it is attached to?

Raptor 3 is so compact--might it be that Starship is failing here--the opposite of the Titan II nozzle.

Another thought--engineers and their products are farther and farther removed one from the other.

Car mechanics are hands on like doctors--a NASCAR driver's rump his biggest sensor.

But the thermal and acoustic environments around rocket engines prevent such hands on techniques.

Maybe a reinforced Teslabot can serve as a Waldo--a robot proxy. The 'bot would have good hand sensors so--perhaps--an engineer can feel what is going on via telepresence.

Thoughts?
 
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publiusr said:
Raptor 3 is so compact--might it be that Starship is failing here--the opposite of the Titan II nozzle.
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Not relevant. Regardless the size of engine, they have the same three major interface points, gimbal, and the fuel and oxidizer feed lines.

publiusr said:
--the opposite of the Titan II nozzle.
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"opposite" of "the" Titan II nozzle? How and which one?

Again, just throwing stuff against wall without regard for any engineering knowledge.
You are not going to come up with the cause here.
 
SpaceX issue FAA (and USSF) papers for Vandenberg SLS-6 (former Delta-Heavy pad)
It feature two landing pads !
Since SpaceX SLS-4 has already landing Pad
so why need SLS-6 need two ? seem for Falcon Heavy !

Gq1NFnFX0AA2ndu
 
Michel Van said:
SpaceX issue FAA (and USSF) papers for Vandenberg SLS-6 (former Delta-Heavy pad)
It feature two landing pads !
Since SpaceX SLS-4 has already landing Pad
so why need SLS-6 need two ? seem for Falcon Heavy !

Gq1NFnFX0AA2ndu
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Yes, SpaceX announced in 2023 that they would use SLC-6 for F9 and FH launches; the former in 2025, the latter in 2026.

It has nothing to do with Starship.
 
Today was 28-th flight of the same booster, by the way. More than Columbia, Challenger and Endeavour. SpaceX is just five re-flights behind Atlantis, and eleven re-flights to beat the record of Discovery.
 
I didn't say it was.

I finally watched the latest CSI Starbase program--and that alone made the RS-25 guys and Marshall in general look better than you ever gave them credit for being.

So, Starship had no real Pogo suppression?

Really?

Water hammer was looked at I see.

Now many like to talk about Starship re-usability (SuperHeavy having less far to go on that note).

What I want to throw out there is the possibility that Raptors may not be the best choice for Starship.

Perhaps having engine and airframe blend into each other would lend itself towards greater re-usability.

Some here might remember the old post-Saturn concepts for engines with 20+ million pound thrust.

One concept was an enlarged F-1....but another seemed to point towards annular (if not nested) aerospikes.

From the CSI video, Starship looks more and more like MRIs of bad circulation.

Instead of thinking about engines being attached to an airframe--with whatever attachment points being hot spots for fractures--might an annular Starship engine set up be the lower part of Starship itself?
 
publiusr said:
I finally watched the latest CSI Starbase program-
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Not a relevant source

publiusr said:
I finally watched the latest CSI Starbase program--and that alone made the RS-25 guys and Marshall in general look better than you ever gave them credit for being.

So, Starship had no real Pogo suppression?

Really?

Water hammer was looked at I see.
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Neither did Delta, Atlas or Falcon. It is not required on every vehicle.

publiusr said:
What I want to throw out there is the possibility that Raptors may not be the best choice for Starship.
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No engineering or scientific basis for that claim. Any engine can fly on any airframe. It just takes some engineering (see F-1 or SSME)

publiusr said:
Perhaps having engine and airframe blend into each other would lend itself towards greater re-usability.
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No, it wouldn't. Can't test easily, no easy change out, no reproducibility for production, high cost.
publiusr said:
Some here might remember the old post-Saturn concepts for engines with 20+ million pound thrust.

One concept was an enlarged F-1....but another seemed to point towards annular (if not nested) aerospikes.
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Too large. Can't land with it.

publiusr said:
Instead of thinking about engines being attached to an airframe--with whatever attachment points being hot spots for fractures--
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No, just easier to fix the attach points.


Why do you want to throw away the baby with the bath water? You still don't get it. It is not just about building a very large rocket. It is about cost. It is not about just getting to Mars. They don't want to repeat Apollo. They want to make it sustainable. Have a vehicle that is low cost and with low operation costs. They don't want Nova or Sea Dragon, they want EOR.

There is no Starship without Raptors. They are forever linked. The low cost and producibility of Raptor are key. Same with its performance. A single engine design is another key point for lowering cost. As well as the propellant choice and its ability to be used in orbital refueling and production on Mars.

and to repeat again, it is about cost, not about a big rocket
 

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