3 ms·
The big caveat are the heat tiles. They were not a part of the very early design of what was then the BFR. They went with tiles when the liquid heat shield prov
by philistine 3y ago
The big caveat are the heat tiles. They were not a part of the very early design of what was then the BFR. They went with tiles when the liquid heat shield proved impossible, and they will probably need to be inspected after every flight.
The shuttle's tiles had to be manually removed and inspected. It took months to do. I don't know if Starship can escape that requirement.
- modeless 3y agoI agree. I'm not an expert but the heat shield looks to me like the most uncertain thing about the project. I'm sure they can do better than the Shuttle, especially since stainless steel can go much hotter than aluminum, but I don't know if they can achieve reliable reusability without refurbishment. Heat tiles were part of ITS though, and Dragon has them, so SpaceX has been thinking about them a long time.
- oskarkk 3y agoQuoting Wikipedia article on shuttle, "there were about 24,300 unique tiles individually fitted on the vehicle". Starship is just a cylinder with pointy end, and tiles on most of the vehicle will be the same, so that will help.