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Anyone reading the headline could easily be misled: this was a massive success. Some context: - This was the first "integrated test" of the Starship space craf
by nomilk 4y ago
Anyone reading the headline could easily be misled: this was a massive success. Some context:
- This was the first "integrated test" of the Starship space craft with its booster
- The whole thing together was 120 meters tall
- It will be one order of magnitude larger than the current largest rocket in terms of carrying capacity (~150 tonnes if it needs to return the booster, 250 if it doesn't)
- There's 5 more of these being built right now so the next tests can be done soon
- sschueller 4y agoSaturn V was 110m tall and 140t in the 1960s.
- nomilk 4y agoThe height difference is not huge, but Starship is twice the weight and 1/10th the cost ($50b vs $5bn in 2022 USD)!
- mempko 4y agoStarship at this point is mostly a shell. Internal human grade components aren't there yet. We have no idea what the final cost will be. But doesn't matter since NASA is the one paying.
- 93po 4y agoWhat? This makes zero sense. The cost to create a crew capsule is extremely well understood because they've been made countless times before. Also to imply the cost of that would put any dent whatsoever into the 5b vs 50b comparison is ridiculous. The cost of adding a crew capsule is a rounding error on total cost.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- Denvercoder9 4y ago> We have no idea what the final cost will be. But doesn't matter since NASA is the one paying. The HLS contract SpaceX has gotten from NASA is a fixed-fee contract (like most contracts NASA gives out these days), so the final cost absolutely matters to SpaceX's bottom line. Anything they spend beyond the contracted amount they'll have to come up with themselves. A good example of this is Boeing, which is now booking losses on the Starliner program every quarter because it has gone over time and budget.
- panick21_ 4y agoActually we do know what NASA will be paying. Its all in the public contract. And its fixed cost, so it will not cost NASA more, no matter how often it blows up. That doesn't give us details about how much it will cost SpaceX but its good information.
- 93po 4y agoAnd twice the thrust
- samstave 4y agoIs 2x thrust accomplished by scaling # of engines, or are the engines 'more-thrustful' per unit because of engineering advances?
- scrumper 4y agoSV first stage had 5 engines, vs 33 on the Starship's booster. Which I think answers your question :) I don't know about other metrics for comparing engine efficiency. But the design requirements seem quite different here - they have to be restartable (not something the F1 engines on the SV had to worry about), probably more steerable, and able to throttle down to quite low power for landing. And presumably the fact that there's so many in an array also imposes its own constraints on the design.
- samstave 4y ago>>Which I think answers your question :) " it doesnt, please eLI5
- kfarr 4y agoMore engines make it go fast
- barbacoa 4y agoHaving a whole bunch of engines means loosing a few at launch won't end in disaster. That means you can pursue more high-risk, high-performance engine designs.
- vkou 4y agoThe N1 was designed with 30 engines, under that same theory. It, uh, didn't do so well. As it turns out, getting 30 rocket engines to run at once is not trivial.
- rootusrootus 4y agoAs impressive as Starship is or will be, Saturn V has definitely earned a place in the history books that cannot be undone. The first airplane flew in 1903. Just 64 years later, Saturn V was launched for the first time. The fact that it has taken us 56 more years since then to outdo it says a lot.
- mschuster91 4y ago> The fact that it has taken us 56 more years since then to outdo it says a lot. Mostly that people stopped caring after it was proven that, yes, the US can land a person on the moon.
- cubefox 4y agoAnd by all excitement and history and nostalgia, if we are honest, the moon landing program was a massive waste of money. Like the Egyptian pyramids. The are impressive, yes ...
- vkou 4y agoYou're correct. On the scale of vanity projects of questionable utility, manned space flight is definitely up there.
- szoszon 4y agoIf there are 5 more of these being built, how they will incorporate anything they learned during this failed attempt? Isn't that just a waste of money?
- baq 4y agoSome parts are interchangeable. The countdown process needs optimization. There are things missing and things which shouldn’t be there. We’re talking about speed of loading propellant, density of it, etc. Then there’s software. So much software. And a million other things. Rockets are complex, launching them doubly so.
- samstave 4y agohttps://youtu.be/9jK-NcRmVcw https://youtu.be/9jK-NcRmVcw
- szoszon 4y agoYeah, that's why you engineer, and test before trying to launch something like that. There won't be any other attempt this year - I can bet my lunch money on this.
- shkkmo 4y ago> There won't be any other attempt this year Possible, but not a sure bet by any means and one I'd happily take the other side of.
- szoszon 4y agoalso, to test the software you don't need to launch the rocket, so I'm not sure why you even mention that..
- foota 4y agoTell that to the mars climate orbiter: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Climate_Orbiter https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Climate_Orbiter
- AviationAtom 4y agoI wonder how many folks have looked at the other details of Starship. One I find most impressive? Weight of Starship when fueled: 11 million pounds
- nonethewiser 4y agoThat’s so hard to comprehend. I used to operate a 25ton crane. That’s less than half of 1% of Starship. That made me think it’s in the magnitude of a skyscraper. Apparently the Empire State Building is “only” 7 million pounds. What the fuck.
- ralfd 4y agoTransposed digits? According to Wiki the ESB is 80 times heavier: > According to official fact sheets, the Empire State Building weighs 365,000 short tons (331,122 t) But Eiffeltower is only double the weight with 10100 tons.
- Galxeagle 4y agoAs a SpaceX fan reading through the post-launch analysis, this was definitely more of a success than the headline applies, but 'massive' is a stretch. Most commentary I'm seeing put it at a C or B-. It's true that there was a number of areas where the risk is now retired, but three engines out at launch with three more dropping out along the way hints that their engine design still isn't as reliable as it needs to be, several years and several engine test campaigns later. SpaceX doesn't have a test stand where they can static-fire the booster at full power or duration, which feels like an interesting gap in their usual 'hardware-rich, test-often' iterative approach. I'm betting we see something like that roll out soon.
- marktangotango 4y agoIn fact it was a really amazing "engine out" test. The thing appeared to been shedding engines all the way to RUD. I imagine these engines were all early generation, might as well fly them, units. It's easy to imagine a calculus of "we're pretty sure X% of engines will fail, but we only need Y% for this flight, go ahead and fly them". But yeah, Musk once said there's a gigawatt of power going through these Raptor engines, that's not nothing.
- pnpnp 4y agoIt’s also possible the engines were damaged by flying debris off the pad.
- s1artibartfast 4y agoPossible, but I don't think that's the full explanation. When the booster did a static test at half throttle, not all of the engines were able to light as well. SpaceX clearly chose to go ahead with a launch without waiting for a booster test with 100% ignition
- urbane_myth 4y agoI actually feel safer about someday flying on one because it kept going even after at least one of the engines detonated during ascent.
- dang 4y agoWhat would be a more neutral and accurate headline?
- sidibe 4y agoSpaceX launches Starship Off Launchpad in Stunning Success, Giant Leap for Humanity
- cubefox 4y agoHa ha
- nonethewiser 4y agoSuccessful Starship Launch Tempered by Failed Seperation
- rodoxcasta 4y agoFirst orbital attempt of Startship got halfway there before exploding
- adamsb6 4y agoI guess "Largest rocket test in history successfully launched" doesn't generate enough traffic compared to the pessimistic "explodes minutes after launch."