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Their plan of landing a single stage is pure fantasy. The risk of tipping over or damaging the engines with debris makes it unworkable. At best they might be a
by kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
Their plan of landing a single stage is pure fantasy. The risk of tipping over or damaging the engines with debris makes it unworkable. At best they might be able to pull off a special two stage variant with landing legs but they aren't going to get there in three years.
- versteegen 4y agoThe issue with stability is not that it's a single stage, but rather the tall shape of the lunar Starship. A single stage lander/ascender, with all the weight of the engines on the bottom, will be beneficial for stability. The mass of the engines is a significant fraction of the total because there's rather little propellant. (E.g. the Apollo ascent stage had a propellant mass ratio of exactly 1:1 (2,353kg to 4,700kg gross), despite a low ISP of only 311s.) But certainly you're right about the risk of damage on landing.
- panick21_ 4y agoGood that you know so much more then the people at NASA who investigated the design. The initial design has special high up landing engines btw, this solves the debris issue. And in terms of the stability, Starship has enough mass-fraction to add whatever kind of legs on that thing they want. NASA didn't even list that as a minor issue in the report.