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New Glenn is not that different from Falcon 9 regarding reusability as they will have to expend the upper stage and fairings every single launch.
by _Microft 6y ago
New Glenn is not that different from Falcon 9 regarding reusability as they will have to expend the upper stage and fairings every single launch.
- hinkley 6y agoDidn’t they just recover both fairings on the last launch? I don’t know how you want to work the math, but it is probably best to think of it in a fractional way. Between accidents and wear do they manage better than 4 launches in average? They just managed 6 for one lower stage, with tighter turnaround time. We don’t know how much of that rocket was reused. So we might be talking about expending 20% of a lower stage per launch, and some higher ratio of upper stages.
- _Microft 6y agoYes, they did. Great achievement, I was afraid they might abandon the approach sooner or later. This only meant to say that New Glenn isn't that different from Falcon 9. Both are limited (with respect to cost and frequency of launches) in that they need to throw away hardware on every launch. Starship on the other hand will be a true game changer if it works as intended.
- hinkley 6y agoI wonder how accurate it is to call the Falcon 9 the Model T of the rocket world. I wonder how long we have to wait for the moral equivalent of the 65 Mustang, or even the '63 Stingray, complete with malfunctioning headlights. Almost all scifi is SSTO craft, or craft that never enter atmosphere. Maybe if we start building skyhooks we can split the difference, and have craft you reuse with only minor maintenance between flights.