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This will be a monumental accomplishment, when it launches for the first time. 4-6 times the payload to LEO as the Space Shuttle, but 100% reusable with the ai

• soperj 5y ago
  Isn't the owner one of the engineers actually working on that rocket? I thought he was very involved in that piece?
  • phpnode 5y ago
    That seems extremely unlikely, there's only so many hours in the day and while I'm sure that he has a keen eye on what's going on the odds of him being personally involved in the actual engineering are close to zero. If he's spending time doing that it'd actually be a huge failure on his part, there are more important things for him to spend his time on.
    • genericone 5y ago
      I lightly disagree, maybe he doesn't do the calculations or write the tests, but he's almost certainly grilling people all the way down to ensure alignment on engineering. His passion being engineering, he's probably not asking 'program management 101' questions, but doing a smell-test on your technical work and your competence level just as a fellow-level senior engineer would.
    • quincunx 5y ago
      For Elon Musk, Jim Keller or even Steve Jobs, their value isn't in manually doing the CAD / VHDL / Code, rather, it is being the Eye of Mordor on the critical path and understanding the solution top to bottom. No excuses, only problem solving. I feel the key insight behind both SpaceX and Tesla is that both the napkin engineering from first principle and then having the force of will to personally see it through /are/ the most important thing. Both qualify as engineering. Happy to have my fairy tale hero's journey view of success corrected.
      • nthj 5y ago
        Anyone inclined to argue against this could maybe sink 1,000 hours into Factorio. The game is simple enough to require 1-person-engineer, but complex enough that the player must both solve low-level problems AND be The Eye of Mordor. If you don’t relentlessly pursue both, you get stuck in the tarpit and progress stalls.
    • soperj 5y ago
      He's one of the richest people in the world, with a massive interest in space & rockets, and owns the most exciting piece of space technology being built today. Where else would you spend your time in this situation?
      • phpnode 5y ago
        I would probably spend my time focussed on growing and sustaining my companies and hiring very skilled people to do that engineering work for me, I'd be very interested in the engineering work, but I wouldn't be doing that work myself. Similarly I don't expect Mark Zuckerberg writes much code at facebook these days, there's just too much other stuff to do
        • soperj 5y ago
          If you're goal is literally just a successful company, then sure that makes sense. But if you actually have a passion for what you do (and I'm not arguing that Zuckerberg doesn't have a passion for spying on people), and the company is already a huge success, why wouldn't you spend your time doing something that you think is really really cool and hire very skilled people to do the other stuff?
          • mensetmanusman 5y ago
            Exactly this. If your goal is to get rich and play golf and relax, that is one thing. The fact that Elon is one of the wealthiest people in the world and also as passionate as someone working in their garage seems kind of like a crazy situation. I wonder if there is similar historical precedence in terms of an ultra wealthy person being interested and involved like he is.
    • DennisP 5y ago
      A while back I saw an interview with a NASA engineer they loaned to SpaceX for six months. He described a meeting in which two engineering proposals were being debated, and at the end Musk said "ok we'll do it this way" and that was the end of it. The guy was kinda blown away, and said at NASA they'd have had a dozen more meetings first. Given that SpaceX lives or dies by how well their rockets work, I don't think there's really anything more important for Musk to be doing.
      • jp42 5y ago
        You are talking about Dan Rasky. Link to this interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxIiiwD9C0E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxIiiwD9C0E
  • IfOnlyYouKnew 5y ago
    Elon Musk contains multitudes, including a stellar mind for engineering, a credible claim to be working on products that are good for humanity, excellent business instincts, and the talent to come across as an obnoxious asshole. Seriously: when you have Bond-villain levels of fame and fortune, I expect you to be at least as clever as Peter Thiel in fucking over people who crossed you. Musk just randomly calling people he doesn’t like “pedophiles” on Twitter always feels… I dunno, “small”?
    • ethbr0 5y ago
      It's probably for the best that billionaires draw the line at Twitter rants, rather than... other things that money could buy.
    • Cipater 5y ago
      He's just a very rich nerd.
    • bdamm 5y ago
      If you're going to quote, at least quote correctly. "pedo guy" was the insult.
      • Niglodonicus 5y ago
        Which was pretty funny framing in any case, since Musk's wife Grimes is about 14 years old mentally (just watch any of her recent viral TikTok clips floating around).
      • vimacs2 5y ago
        He also hired a private investigator to target the guy. I'm a huge fan of his work with SpaceX but let's not downplay what a petty asshole he was during that whole thing.
        • bdamm 5y ago
          Absolutely. It is worth noting that Tesla was experiencing "production hell" at the time, so obviously Musk was under a ton of stress. That doesn't excuse the behavior, but does make it easier to understand. Frankly, Musk should have kept out of the whole thing, but staying silent isn't the style that anyone operating at that level is going to have. Asking his team to build a sub is inexcusable. Still love his product, despite the distraction.
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  • gamegoblin 5y ago
    The book "Liftoff" (about the early years of SpaceX) paints a picture of Elon as a very smart person with a mind for engineering, but his true value-add over any other aerospace company at the time was his ability to hire the right people and sniff out bullshit. That is, he knows enough about the engineering to hire people who know a lot about the engineering. That, combined with his relentless drive (to the point of overwork both on himself and his employees) seems to be the key to SpaceX success.
    • simonh 5y ago
      He very much reminds me of Steve Jobs in this regard. Steve was actually a competent technician, if not really an engineer at the time of the founding of Apple, and he really cared deeply about the engineering. He understood the language of engineers and the tradeoffs in a design and I think it's the same with Elon. The fact they both ran completely separate very successful and innovative companies at the same time might be a coincidence, but kind of clinches it for me.
      • deleted 5y ago
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      • soperj 5y ago
        If you read any of the fokelore stuff, there seems to be some disagreement there. He wanted stuff to look a certain way, but he didn't really understand the engineering trade off. Like asking for a computer with no holes in the case for cooling.
        • healthysurf 5y ago
          Well the current Macbook Airs don't have holes, so it's not like it was impossible.
          • soperj 5y ago
            And they run hot when under load, sometimes to the point where they're too hot to handle. Is there a benefit to not having proper ventilation?
  • geocrasher 5y ago
    He's not necessarily involved in the intimate engineering of rockets. He's deeply involved in the engineering of a rocket company. Talent and Engineering prowess are pointless without direction, and Musk provides strong leadership to move the company in the direction he sees fit. The actual rocket scientists are Woz, and Musk is Jobs.
• elif 5y ago
  "a fraction of the cost" is an understatement. By using a 100% reusable vehicle and the cheapest fuel available the aspirational launch cost of starship is $2M. Even Apples to Oranges it will be an order of magnitude cheaper than the current paradigm of $35M per Falcon9 launch. When you further consider it has 10x the payload capacity, this experiment gets really exciting.
  • barbegal 5y ago
    I don't understand how it can be an order of magnitude cheaper. There are more rocket engines to maintain, far more fuel, a more expensive launch structure and generally more expense in all the ground operations. In a world where this can be launched for $2M, Falcon 9 can be launched for less than $1M.
    • crawshaw 5y ago
      A falcon 9 launch expends the upper stage. Building the upper stage is now most of the cost of its launch.
    • deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    • slownews45 5y ago
      Fairing recovery on Felcon 9 is not perfect. Rumor was that alone was something like $5M per launch flushed.
    • simonh 5y ago
      They expect each vehicle to cost $200m and to fly them 100 times each. Hence $2m per launch. Falcon 9 costs a lot more than that because the upper stage is expended each time and that costs mid single-digit millions, and the first stages may not last much beyond a few dozen launches without significant re-engineering which would also make them heavier.
      • throwaway316943 5y ago
        Boy I hope they park them in orbit on the last launch and use them to build space habitats.
• afterburner 5y ago
  This is honestly the first really cool thing SpaceX is doing IMO.
  • maccam94 5y ago
    I would say the boosters landing on drone ships and getting reused 8 times are pretty impressive. Also the Starship landing with the flip.
    • afterburner 5y ago
      Yeah, those were cool. But not really cool. Self landing boosters is just the logical application of control algorithms. As with the "flip". Super Heavy Boosters, on the other hand, are an interesting new way to solve a problem.
      • jxidjhdhdhdhfhf 5y ago
        > logical application of control algorithms. LOL. Reusable rockets left as an exercise for the reader.
        • mensetmanusman 5y ago
          It has to be a troll…
          • afterburner 5y ago
            Come on guys, computerized directional thrust maneuvering isn't even new for this millenium, let alone this decade. It's the difference between iteration and bigger breakthroughs/shifts in technology.
            • jxidjhdhdhdhfhf 5y ago
              Lol, you're a funny person
• wefarrell 5y ago
  I'm currently reading "Liftoff: Elon Musk and the Desperate Early Days that Launched SpaceX" and I've become convinced that SpaceX's biggest accomplishment is convincing their customers (mostly the US government) to go along with their lean/agile development process. At a high level everyone was aware that the way the government micromanaging the design/build of rockets with cost plus contracts wasn't sustainable, but the government bureaucracy that awards contracts is heavily entrenched in that mode of operation.
  • adventured 5y ago
    Liftoff is an an excellent book. Recommended for anyone interested in SpaceX or space in general. The writer's style is a bit dry, however it's a fun story regardless. The gritty insides of the early days of SpaceX are both what you hoped to read about and sort of crazy remarkable (like the elaborated story about the imploded Falcon 1 that was being transported by C17 and ultimately saved SpaceX from oblivion). People risked their lives to make SpaceX happen. It reminds me of a bigger company version of Masters of Doom. Same hacker ethos driving those early days.
  • bumby 5y ago
    >to go along with their lean/agile development process. This is an accurate take, but in reality I think they convinced the government to outsource a lean/agile development process. 20+ years ago, NASA went through their "better, faster, cheaper" phase to try their own hand at a more agile environment. Unfortunately, it reduced quality and whenever something bad happened more requirements were levied. Now some are beneficial but there's also some that were bureaucratic and process bloat just because of political risk and the fact nobody wanted to be on record saying the risk was acceptable. I think one unspoken risk is whether the government, as the largest SpaceX customer, will try to enforce the same quality and safety standards as the company matures, particularly with human-rated spaceflight. Or if they are comfortable with a hands-off approach.
• thinkcontext 5y ago
  > fast turn-around times and minimal refurbishment This is the biggest risk in the program, along with how many times they can reuse each piece, which is related. Last I looked Musk was projecting using the boosters hundreds of times and the 2nd stage dozens, both obviously very aggressive projections. If the real numbers are lower then the price per flight rises. As far as I know we don't have any independent way of knowing whether these projections make sense or not. I hope he's right. Even if he's a little wrong and the flight cost was $20M instead of $2M that would be a great thing. But he could also be very wrong and it might not work at all.
  • mabbo 5y ago
    This is why I think the crazy ambition of the project is so important. If they're wrong by an order of magnitude they still change everything.
  • throwaway0a5e 5y ago
    After they break a bunch working out the kinks I bet hundreds and dozens will be realistic.
  • marcusverus 5y ago
    > This is the biggest risk in the program, along with how many times they can reuse each piece, which is related. Last I looked Musk was projecting using the boosters hundreds of times and the 2nd stage dozens, both obviously very aggressive projections. The first re-flight of a booster was in 2017. The practical science of rocket reuse is only four years old. During that time they've flown ~40 missions with reused cores with zero failures. One Falcon 9 has been reused 10 times. My point is that there is no reason to assume that we've reached the limits of reuse in such a short period of time, so it doesn't seem that aggressive to assume that there is room to improve by ~10x
    • thinkcontext 5y ago
      > My point is that there is no reason to assume that we've reached the limits of reuse in such a short period of time, so it doesn't seem that aggressive to assume that there is room to improve by ~10x There's an enormous gulf between asserting this and the engineering to realize it. Maybe Raptor isn't as reliable as they hope. Maybe 3mm steel is too delicate so they have to stay with 4mm which makes them overweight. Maybe the thermal protection system is too fragile or doesn't provide enough protection. Maybe their novel alloy can't meet its targets. Maybe the tower catch won't work so they need legs which will add too much weight. Etc, etc. All of those are extremely nontrivial issues, there's a lot of risk because of how ambitious what they are attempting is. I hope they succeed.
• HWR_14 5y ago
  I mean, they're using modern computers instead of 1970s computers to do the engineering. The formulas are a lot more turnkey now. Is it that impressive a feat when you adjust for the better resources?
  • nwah1 5y ago
    The proper comparison is whether their competitors like ULA can match them or not.
    • HWR_14 5y ago
      That makes good sense. Unfortunately, all I see is comparisons to the space shuttle, so I have no idea what their competitors are up to.
• bumby 5y ago
  >minimal refurbishment Is there any information available on the activities they actually plan on doing in terms of quality checks and refurbishment? I'm a big fan of SpaceX but I also feel like people talk about this point without actually knowing what goes into aerospace refurbishment regarding the level of quality assurance typically required. I remember back when they had a Falcon 9 failure attributed to a faulty material spec on a strut and the response was they would perform quality checks on future material.[1] As someone who worked in the industry, my initial question was "Why weren't they already doing this?" as it's a commonplace within industry on safety critical or flight hardware. I've also been involved in rocket rebuilds and to say they need "minimal refurbishment" is a understatement. Even if none of the components actually need rebuilt, the quality inspections still take a lot of time and money. And there's always the chance you find an issue that warrants a legitimate rebuild. So, while I'm pulling for SpaceX to succeed, my worry is that every failure or close-call like the strut issue will layer additional quality checks that gradually erode that "minimal refurbishment" claim. [1]https://arstechnica.com/science/2015/07/spacex-says-faulty-strut-led-to-falcon-failure/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2015/07/spacex-says-faulty-s...
  • rlt 5y ago
    We don’t have to “refurbish” airplanes after every flight. Are the stresses of rocket engines / getting to orbit simply so great there’s no way to engineer away “refurbishment”? And will that always be the case, or could advances in materials change that?
    • bumby 5y ago
      Aircraft are on very strict maintenance schedules and need to be signed off for airworthiness in order to fly. As the plane ages, this certification is usually signed off by an certified A&P mechanic. It's regulated (in most countries) and acts as the form of quality control. It's not like a car where you can just decide to continue operating at your own risk. (This doesn't generally apply to experimental aircraft, though). So in that context, airplanes are being continuously refurbished. That's also why it's relatively inexpensive to buy a plane, but extremely expensive to own one. Flight hardware typically has much higher quality standards. Sometimes they use more exotic materials that don't have the background testing to ensure that quality. If you want to use a cheaper new seal material, for example, there's probably not much data available for its compatibility with hypergolic fuels. It's not uncommon to use one-off components in a design, which means they may not have the same type of well-tried process control during manufacture. Then you have the costs of maintaining hardware pedigree (chain-of-custody, maintenance of material test data, lot material coupons for later testing, some of which may need to be maintained in a bonded, climate controlled room etc.). New materials and manufacturing processes will definitely help and I think SpaceX is doing good work here. But the demands of spaceflight adds constraints. Steel and titanium are the most common non-fatiguing materials. Steel may be too heavy so you might be left with only using titanium, which is much more expensive. And you still haven't done the compatibility testing etc. So while it's a trivial example, you can see how it can become a tough problem to factor in cost, quality, and speed.