4 ms·
Citation needed. Falcon 9 uses a carbon fiber skin over an aluminium honeycomb. And Wikipedia claims that Starship originally used bog-standard 301 Stainless
by phire 4y ago
Citation needed.
Falcon 9 uses a carbon fiber skin over an aluminium honeycomb.
And Wikipedia claims that Starship originally used bog-standard 301 Stainless Steal, and later switched to also bog-standard 304L Stainless Steal.
The only alloys that I'm aware of SpaceX developing are inconel alloys for hot, oxygen rich parts of their engines.
- someperson 4y agoAlso PICA-X is a SpaceX variant of a NASA heatshield. It's typical for SpaceX to use the off-the-shelf material initially, then do R&D to customize it for a material that better suits their needs.
- hintymad 4y agoIIRC, Musk explained it in a SSB-BPA joint meeting last year. They considered carbon-fiber, aluminum lithium alloy, and 301 steel. It was a fascinating discussion. The materials were great under low temperature, but had other issues as well as degraded performance under high temperature. For instance, carbon-fibers can leak gas (or react with the percolated fuel?). Starship eventually used 30X, a steel alloy.
- someperson 4y agoSo Starship doesn't use 30X stainless steel?