SpaceX (general discussion)

progress on Site
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JABVYpgIHuA


I think that Black ring and Grey ring they assemble
will be use for Booster3 MaxQ testing

new problems ?
FAA hat issues with SpaceX again
"The company is building the tower at its own risk," they say
www.cnbc.com

FAA warns SpaceX that massive Starship launch tower in Texas is unapproved

The FAA warned Elon Musk's SpaceX in a letter two months ago that the company's work on a launch tower for upcoming Starship rocket launches is yet unapproved.
www.cnbc.com www.cnbc.com

Total off-topic
Elon Musk DESTROYS a Lawyer In Court Over Frivolous Lawsuit
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_ApfqlS_ps
 
Um. Elon's "two weeks" joke is based upon him promising deadlines he cannot keep. He has been promising new FSD software updates often saying it is "two weeks" away and then it turns into months, and FSD as a whole years now. He is making a joke at his own expense.
 
I have a bad headache trying to understand the marketing of Starship so if anyone has any answers please help.

1626501614698.png

It costs according to them 15 million dollars for marginal costs of Falcon 9 where 60% is to 1st stage and 20% is to upper stages but 50 million dollars fully for the rocket. 1st stage engine is 30 million dollars and 2nd stage engine is 10 million dollars but the re-usability for falcon 9 was 6 times that means 40+10+10+10+10+10 equaling 90 million divided by those 6 launches you get 15 million dollars which of course I understand a little better where he got those price estimates

So the Starship differs from the Falcon 9 or Falcon heavy because it uses Raptor engines instead of Merlin engines which have used Kerosene and it is estimated that a single raptor engine costs 1 million dollars and he is planning it for 250,000$.

1626501774689.png
Currently the Raptor 9 engines are expandable not re-usable(AFAIK from a source) since the lower and upper stages of starship are up to 32 means that a single launch costs 32 million dollars disregarding the methane fuel that was burned but just the engines themselves. If they get to 250k as their goal which is not achieved yet that is 8 million dollars but disregarding the methane fuel that was burned but just the engines themselves. Which means in order to get to that 2 million dollar orbit payload costs the engines will have to be less than 62,500 dollars with the addition of methane fuel to reach that 2 million dollar launch orbit payload costs that he claims. He has not even reached the future goal yet of 250,000 dollars per Raptor engine and even if he did that would still be over 2 million dollars. I don't get it, is he expecting some re-usability on the raptor engines? I think he claimed that the Starship 1st and 2nd stage was fully re-usable so are the raptor engines re-usable? If they are re-usable than how many times are they re-usable?
 
tequilashooter said:
I have a bad headache trying to understand the marketing of Starship so if anyone has any answers please help.

View attachment 660810

It costs according to them 15 million dollars for marginal costs of Falcon 9 where 60% is to 1st stage and 20% is to upper stages but 50 million dollars fully for the rocket. 1st stage engine is 30 million dollars and 2nd stage engine is 10 million dollars but the re-usability for falcon 9 was 6 times that means 40+10+10+10+10+10 equaling 90 million divided by those 6 launches you get 15 million dollars which of course I understand a little better where he got those price estimates

So the Starship differs from the Falcon 9 or Falcon heavy because it uses Raptor engines instead of Merlin engines which have used Kerosene and it is estimated that a single raptor engine costs 1 million dollars and he is planning it for 250,000$.

View attachment 660811
Currently the Raptor 9 engines are expandable not re-usable(AFAIK from a source) since the lower and upper stages of starship are up to 32 means that a single launch costs 32 million dollars disregarding the methane fuel that was burned but just the engines themselves. If they get to 250k as their goal which is not achieved yet that is 8 million dollars but disregarding the methane fuel that was burned but just the engines themselves. Which means in order to get to that 2 million dollar orbit payload costs the engines will have to be less than 62,500 dollars with the addition of methane fuel to reach that 2 million dollar launch orbit payload costs that he claims. He has not even reached the future goal yet of 250,000 dollars per Raptor engine and even if he did that would still be over 2 million dollars. I don't get it, is he expecting some re-usability on the raptor engines? I think he claimed that the Starship 1st and 2nd stage was fully re-usable so are the raptor engines re-usable? If they are re-usable than how many times are they re-usable?
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You should register at NASAspaceflight.com forums. They have a bazillion pages and threads discussing SpaceX and Falcon 9 economics ad nauseam since, what, ten years ?
 
Archibald said:
You should register at NASAspaceflight.com forums. They have a bazillion pages and threads discussing SpaceX and Falcon 9 economics ad nauseam since, what, ten years ?
Click to expand...
I will have to be on my best behavior there than, thanks for that idea.
 
Grey Havoc said:
Via Slashdot:
www.cnbc.com

FAA warns SpaceX that massive Starship launch tower in Texas is unapproved

The FAA warned Elon Musk's SpaceX in a letter two months ago that the company's work on a launch tower for upcoming Starship rocket launches is yet unapproved.
www.cnbc.com www.cnbc.com
Click to expand...
Let’s see if this ever happens and how the DoD will react. Starship is becoming or better said, starts to be regarded as, a national security asset in a context where production speed matters.

A

PS) Ahemm… typos corrected. Spellcheck messed up.
 
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tequilashooter said:
Currently the Raptor 9 engines are expandable not re-usable(AFAIK from a source)
Click to expand...
No, this is not correct. Raptor engines are fully reusable. They have been designed for reuse from the beginning, and should be capable of many more engine starts and require less reconditioning than Merlins.

The only way they are "not reusable", is that on the first launch, SpaceX will not recover either stage, simply because they want to prove that their landing accuracy is suitable before aiming the re-entry track towards something of actual value, by essentially doing a mock landing except just on some specific point of sea. This first launch is obviously going to cost them a lot in engines, and so will not reach their cost targets.
 
What a year to be a space nerd ! Nauka and JWST breaking their 25-years curse and flying into space. Virgin and B.O breaking their 15 years curse and flying at least. BFR-Starship and SLS. The Mars rovers. Ton of other stuff I can't remember. Hubble adding his own drama.
Edit: chinese space station.
 
The Europa Clipper launch I believe will be fully expendable, I think it’s just too high energy for any kind of recovery.
 
Grey Havoc said:
Archibald said:
In your face SLS... and former Congressman Culberson !
Click to expand...
I suspect that there is quite some way to go yet. The SLS supporters will not take this lying down, to put it mildly.
Click to expand...
That ship has sailed politically. The SLS is now fully committed to Artemis with nothing spare for any other launches. The award has been made and the contract signed with Space X.
 
That hasn't stopped Congress before though. As far as at least some of its members past and present are concerned, their whims and convenience are a perfectly good cause for contract termination in any situation.
 
A very good reading ! Rocket launches are heading to international waters... just like pirate radios in the 60's !
 
publiusr said:
I want a single RS-68 SLS as an upper stage for Super Heavy.
Click to expand...
No, stick with an RL-10 if you go Hydrolox, the 465 s vacuum ISP is way better, not to mention it can start in a vacuum. Then again, vacuum Raptor is probably good enough and doesn't need the NRE...
 
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Elon Musk is a pragmatist

he got a Private Jet, just like other rich guys
but he use it mostly to taxi SpaceX Workers between California to Texas.
 
how the new High Bay could look like:

E7VPT7GXIAocp9O
 
OMG the Launch Table and GSE-5 are on move, while Segment 9 is put on tower
 

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What are we looking at? Is that (the rosette of tubes) the feed lines for 29 hungry raptors?
 
TomcatViP said:
What are we looking at? Is that (the rosette of tubes) the feed lines for 29 hungry raptors?
Click to expand...

Yes. You are looking down into the bottom LOX dome. Under it, there are the mountings for 29 raptors, in a 20-8-1 configuration. Each raptor gets two feed lines, one directly from the LOX tank (so they are just openings here), and one from the central downcomer that comes from the LCH4 tank
 

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