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The landing software is really the same, the engine controls are different but that was never the major issue. They don't need a 'tanker version' initially any
by nickik 7y ago
The landing software is really the same, the engine controls are different but that was never the major issue.
They don't need a 'tanker version' initially any Starship can refuel any other Starship. The 'tanker version' would just make it more efficient.
How do you know that they don't have any payload? Do you have special insight into what SpaceX is doing? Or are you just assuming because they haven't developed that stuff outside in a tent it can't possibly exist.
- qayxc 7y ago> How do you know that they don't have any payload? Do you have special insight into what SpaceX is doing? I know that because Musk said so himself several times. His priority is providing the means of transportation - everything else is someone else's job.
- nickik 7y agoThe refueling system is fundamental to the transportation problem. Without refueling you don't have transportation, you have one time deliver and Elon knows that.
- qayxc 7y agoThat's why he wants to mass-produce Starship. The idea is to let the first Starships just sit on Mars and serve as part of the first colony.
- nickik 7y agoI'm sorry but that is absolutely, fundamentally and totally wrong. It goes against literally everything anybody from SpaceX including Elon has ever said.
- qayxc 7y agoIs it, though? I think you're stuck with the mindset that there's only one type of Starship when there isn't. There's a distinction to be made between cargo ships, tankers, and crew transport. The first uncrewed cargo flights have zero change of returning to Earth. There's simply no infrastructure for generating fuel and refuelling yet. So unless you want to tell me that Musk is some sort of space wizard able to conjure methane fuel into the tanks of the first cargo ships that land on Mars, this is exactly what's going to happen.