5 ms·

They are definitely in the need of extra cash from smallsat market.

rtkwe 7y ago
The transferable nature of the ride seems like a big gamble pared with their statement that launches won't be held up by co-passengers. Guess they're just counting on the odds that enough passengers will drop out to make the launch uneconomic will be fairly low.
- ortusdux 7y ago
  It makes me wonder if they have any projects planned that they can throw in if there are empty slots.
  - rtkwe 7y ago
    Maybe that would help the economics quite a bit but I'm not sure what they'd be planning to use it for. SSO is a lot of earth observation (or sun observation for some specific SSO orbits that ride the terminator) and that doesn't really fit anything they're doing and there's already a couple companies in the low cost earth observation game.
- foota 7y ago
  Maybe they're planning to fill vacancies with their own payloads that are not time sensitive?
  - rtkwe 7y ago
    Maybe, I'm not sure how useful a SSO is to SpaceX though.
    - knd775 7y ago
      Starlink sats can maneuver to different orbits. Their original test sats launched on an SSO launch.
      - Symmetry 7y ago
        The Starlink satellites are using hundreds of m/s raising and lowering their orbit. The sort of plane change you're talking about would take something close to a thousand, conservatively.
        Robotbeat 7y ago
        Not if it's a near-polar orbit. They'll probably need some in that orbit eventually.
        rtkwe 7y ago
        They're only going up to 84 degrees inclination [0]. Not surprising there's an absolutely tiny number of customers that would use it if they added enough satellites to make 100% coverage. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink_(satellite_constellation) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink_(satellite_constellat...
        Robotbeat 7y ago
        Hmmm, that is a relatively high delta-v to change inclination that much (~1.5-2 km/s for a ~12-15 degree difference). On the other hand, if the shared payloads are light enough (and they very well may be, particularly if the launch is undersubscribed), the upper stage could do the orbital transfer and should have plenty of delta-v to do so (particularly with a droneship landing) considering F9 regularly does recoverable flights with many tons through 2.5km/s above LEO.
      - rtkwe 7y ago
        They can but doing so reduces their operational life time so they'll want to minimize the amount of the thrust budget they expend on slot filling launches. As someone else pointed out their prices are high enough to cover the cost of a reusable launch with maybe half the ports filled so they're probably just playing the numbers game assuming there won't be a large coordinated drop out of customers. And those prices don't include the main top port which will likely cover a fair portion of the operation cost of the launch by itself.
  - knd775 7y ago
    This seems likely. If customers drop out, they can just toss in a couple starlink sats.
    - greglindahl 7y ago
      Wrong orbit.
    - mlindner 7y ago
      SSO != Starlink orbits.
      - knd775 7y ago
        They launched tintin A and B on SSO-A. They maneuvered to the correct orbits.
- notatoad 7y ago
  another comment mentions starlink launches. If spaceX has 12000 satellites of their own that they need to send up, they can fill up a fair bit of unused capacity. it sounds like they're essentially selling the opportunity to take the place of a starlink satellite in any given launch. if the customer cancels, no big deal - they'll just send the originally scheduled starlink satellite.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - rtkwe 7y ago
    This looks very different from their Starlink launcher though and doesn't look like it could live above or below it either. Sun synchronous orbit is a pretty specific orbit too.
    - Symmetry 7y ago
      Yeah, there aren't any plans to put Starlink satellites in SSO.
    - dr_orpheus 7y ago
      Yeah, the Starlink launcher was a pretty specific device designed around the Starlink satellites. The attachments shown in the attached link are the ESPA (EELV (Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle) Secondary Payload Adapter) [1] rings. They work well for a variety of customers using it because you can put out a generic document for an interface and a box you need to fit within. The first dedicated rideshare program like this was the STP-2 mission. [2] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EELV_Secondary_Payload_Adapter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EELV_Secondary_Payload_Adapter [2] http://www.planetary.org/multimedia/space-images/spacecraft/stp-2-payload.html http://www.planetary.org/multimedia/space-images/spacecraft/...
- mikeash 7y ago
  In their graphic, I count 7 15" ports and 8 24" ports, which at their before L-12 pricing is over $50 million. There's also the large port on top, which doesn't list pricing, but is presumably quite a bit more. The L-12 to L-6 pricing would be more as well. I believe their cost for a launch is something in the neighborhood of $30 million so they have quite a bit of margin to make money on this. Especially now that they're routinely reusing first stages and will probably use these flights as the final send-off for stages that are end-of-life.
mlindner 7y ago
This is one launch per year. They already launch about 20 per year for the last few years. The extra cash here is minimal.

The transferable nature of the ride seems like a big gamble pared with their statement that launches won't be held up by co-passengers. Guess they're just counting on the odds that enough passengers will drop out to make the launch uneconomic will be fairly low.

ortusdux 7y ago
It makes me wonder if they have any projects planned that they can throw in if there are empty slots.
- rtkwe 7y ago
  Maybe that would help the economics quite a bit but I'm not sure what they'd be planning to use it for. SSO is a lot of earth observation (or sun observation for some specific SSO orbits that ride the terminator) and that doesn't really fit anything they're doing and there's already a couple companies in the low cost earth observation game.
foota 7y ago
Maybe they're planning to fill vacancies with their own payloads that are not time sensitive?
- rtkwe 7y ago
  Maybe, I'm not sure how useful a SSO is to SpaceX though.
  - knd775 7y ago
    Starlink sats can maneuver to different orbits. Their original test sats launched on an SSO launch.
    - Symmetry 7y ago
      The Starlink satellites are using hundreds of m/s raising and lowering their orbit. The sort of plane change you're talking about would take something close to a thousand, conservatively.
      - Robotbeat 7y ago
        Not if it's a near-polar orbit. They'll probably need some in that orbit eventually.
        rtkwe 7y ago
        They're only going up to 84 degrees inclination [0]. Not surprising there's an absolutely tiny number of customers that would use it if they added enough satellites to make 100% coverage. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink_(satellite_constellation) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink_(satellite_constellat...
        Robotbeat 7y ago
        Hmmm, that is a relatively high delta-v to change inclination that much (~1.5-2 km/s for a ~12-15 degree difference). On the other hand, if the shared payloads are light enough (and they very well may be, particularly if the launch is undersubscribed), the upper stage could do the orbital transfer and should have plenty of delta-v to do so (particularly with a droneship landing) considering F9 regularly does recoverable flights with many tons through 2.5km/s above LEO.
    - rtkwe 7y ago
      They can but doing so reduces their operational life time so they'll want to minimize the amount of the thrust budget they expend on slot filling launches. As someone else pointed out their prices are high enough to cover the cost of a reusable launch with maybe half the ports filled so they're probably just playing the numbers game assuming there won't be a large coordinated drop out of customers. And those prices don't include the main top port which will likely cover a fair portion of the operation cost of the launch by itself.
- knd775 7y ago
  This seems likely. If customers drop out, they can just toss in a couple starlink sats.
  - greglindahl 7y ago
    Wrong orbit.
  - mlindner 7y ago
    SSO != Starlink orbits.
    - knd775 7y ago
      They launched tintin A and B on SSO-A. They maneuvered to the correct orbits.
notatoad 7y ago
another comment mentions starlink launches. If spaceX has 12000 satellites of their own that they need to send up, they can fill up a fair bit of unused capacity. it sounds like they're essentially selling the opportunity to take the place of a starlink satellite in any given launch. if the customer cancels, no big deal - they'll just send the originally scheduled starlink satellite.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- rtkwe 7y ago
  This looks very different from their Starlink launcher though and doesn't look like it could live above or below it either. Sun synchronous orbit is a pretty specific orbit too.
  - Symmetry 7y ago
    Yeah, there aren't any plans to put Starlink satellites in SSO.
  - dr_orpheus 7y ago
    Yeah, the Starlink launcher was a pretty specific device designed around the Starlink satellites. The attachments shown in the attached link are the ESPA (EELV (Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle) Secondary Payload Adapter) [1] rings. They work well for a variety of customers using it because you can put out a generic document for an interface and a box you need to fit within. The first dedicated rideshare program like this was the STP-2 mission. [2] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EELV_Secondary_Payload_Adapter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EELV_Secondary_Payload_Adapter [2] http://www.planetary.org/multimedia/space-images/spacecraft/stp-2-payload.html http://www.planetary.org/multimedia/space-images/spacecraft/...
mikeash 7y ago
In their graphic, I count 7 15" ports and 8 24" ports, which at their before L-12 pricing is over $50 million. There's also the large port on top, which doesn't list pricing, but is presumably quite a bit more. The L-12 to L-6 pricing would be more as well. I believe their cost for a launch is something in the neighborhood of $30 million so they have quite a bit of margin to make money on this. Especially now that they're routinely reusing first stages and will probably use these flights as the final send-off for stages that are end-of-life.

mlindner 7y ago

This is one launch per year. They already launch about 20 per year for the last few years. The extra cash here is minimal.