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SpaceX's mega-rocket to debut next year at pad 39A
- avmich 13y agoI'm quite curious to know what this rocket is going to be used for. Say, next 5-10 years. Saturn-V was used for an important national program, where money weren't the option. N-1 was closed after 4 unsuccessful flights. Energia flew only twice. Shuttle flew for long time, but it was expensive, political and at a time even the only option. All other rockets had LEO payloads under 25 tons. That helped them to be cheaper, which, in turn, helped to prolong their operational life. SpaceX can't afford to have an expensive rocket. To fly only occasionally is dangerous - reliability may suffer. To fly frequent... Where they're going to get payloads for that? 50+ tons - that's a lot these days. Unless price per launch will be quite comparable to other launchers and reliability on par, F-9H may be left without paying customers. And to launch this rocket cheap may prove unwise for the company which is making it.