3 ms·

How long did it take Spacex to develop their human rated capsule? I think that was 10+ years as well

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
Retric 2y ago
Depends on what you consider starting. 16 years is probably the most reasonable number, but you could argue for as little as 6. Initial work on Dragon began in 2004, it ‘entered service’ in 2009, had its first mission in 2010, but first connected to the ISS in 2012. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Dragon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Dragon Work on a crewed version was officially mentioned in 2006 though they only got a contract for manned missions in 2014 and the first manned mission was 16 November 2020. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Crew-1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Crew-1
dotnet00 2y ago
IIRC it took SpaceX ~7 years. It's kind of useful perspective that when the contracts for this were being awarded, Boeing argued that SpaceX shouldn't get the contract at all because Boeing, having "human spaceflight heritage", was guaranteed to do the better job than an inexperienced upstart. Plus the extra $400M they extorted out of NASA despite this being a fixed price, milestone based contract.
- nordsieck 2y ago
  > when the contracts for this were being awarded, Boeing argued that SpaceX shouldn't get the contract at all because Boeing, having "human spaceflight heritage", was guaranteed to do the better job than an inexperienced upstart. I think it's useful to note that this wasn't just Boeing's opinion - it was pretty widely believed in the industry. And not without reason - Boeing had Shuttle heritage. Thankfully, NASA kept both awards.
- Retric 2y ago
  It wan’t an inaccurate assessment. SpaceX was working on life support for a crewed module 14+ years before their first successful manned launch. IE: It took them longer than Boeing. However the missing context is SpaceX put in 8+ years into the project before getting the award which offset most of the issues. So it worked out well for NASA, but SpaceX was approaching it more as a prestige project than a profitable one.
boxed 2y ago
They got the contracts at the same time, and Boeing has been building rockets since the 60s...
perihelions 2y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17509988 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17509988 ("Internally, NASA believes Boeing ahead of SpaceX in commercial crew" (2018))
- pfdietz 2y ago
  In retrospect those defending Boeing there and attacking SpaceX (and Eric Berger's reporting) are just hilarious.
  - tekla 2y ago
    Its Hacker News Dropbox over and over and over again.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

Depends on what you consider starting. 16 years is probably the most reasonable number, but you could argue for as little as 6. Initial work on Dragon began in 2004, it ‘entered service’ in 2009, had its first mission in 2010, but first connected to the ISS in 2012. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Dragon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Dragon Work on a crewed version was officially mentioned in 2006 though they only got a contract for manned missions in 2014 and the first manned mission was 16 November 2020. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Crew-1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Crew-1

dotnet00 2y ago

IIRC it took SpaceX ~7 years. It's kind of useful perspective that when the contracts for this were being awarded, Boeing argued that SpaceX shouldn't get the contract at all because Boeing, having "human spaceflight heritage", was guaranteed to do the better job than an inexperienced upstart. Plus the extra $400M they extorted out of NASA despite this being a fixed price, milestone based contract.

nordsieck 2y ago
> when the contracts for this were being awarded, Boeing argued that SpaceX shouldn't get the contract at all because Boeing, having "human spaceflight heritage", was guaranteed to do the better job than an inexperienced upstart. I think it's useful to note that this wasn't just Boeing's opinion - it was pretty widely believed in the industry. And not without reason - Boeing had Shuttle heritage. Thankfully, NASA kept both awards.
Retric 2y ago
It wan’t an inaccurate assessment. SpaceX was working on life support for a crewed module 14+ years before their first successful manned launch. IE: It took them longer than Boeing. However the missing context is SpaceX put in 8+ years into the project before getting the award which offset most of the issues. So it worked out well for NASA, but SpaceX was approaching it more as a prestige project than a profitable one.

boxed 2y ago

They got the contracts at the same time, and Boeing has been building rockets since the 60s...

perihelions 2y ago

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17509988 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17509988 ("Internally, NASA believes Boeing ahead of SpaceX in commercial crew" (2018))

pfdietz 2y ago
In retrospect those defending Boeing there and attacking SpaceX (and Eric Berger's reporting) are just hilarious.
- tekla 2y ago
  Its Hacker News Dropbox over and over and over again.