Elon Musk vs. the Trolls
bloomberg.com
bloomberg.com
If it was, buying a spot on a Falcon or on a Delta would be simple:
TCOFalcon = cost of launch + self-insurance-markup.
TCODelta = cost of launch + self-insurance-markup.
Falcon costs $1233/lb
Delta IV costs $8694/lb.
To compare apples to apples, to launch 50,000 lbs (a full Falcon FT 50,000 lb), a Falcon would cost 61,650,000, and a Delta IV would cost 434,700,000).
A Delta IV failed once out of 33, and the Falcon 9 failed three out of 29.
Therefore, TotalCostOfLaunch = CostOfLaunch+costOfSatellite * failureRate.
For TCODelta = TCOFalcon
CostOfLaunchDelta+costOfSatellitefailureRateDelta = CostOfLaunchFalcon+costOfSatellitefailureRateFalcon.
Plugging in Numbers,
434,700,000+c * (1/33) = 61,650,000+c * 3/29
c/33-2 * c/28 = 61,650,000 - 434,700,000
c = 5,100,126,428
Any satellite worth less than five billion (!! That's an _insanely_ expensive single mission) would be cheaper to launch on a Falcon, despite its failure rate
The only problem is that you have to wait for a new satellite
Nobody builds commodity satellites because there's no cost efficient way to launch them (microsats aside), and nobody tries to pioneer more cost efficient but lower reliability launch systems because there's no proven demand.
Your reasoning shows the edge under current economics. But I think the real money will be made once we get to "Well, I could build a second satellite for lower unit cost and have two in orbit." Because when demand shifts to that, suddenly anyone without a cost-efficient launch system to offer gets priced out of that chunk of the market.
I also think that the Falcon 9 has changed far more during its live time, compared to the Delta 4, so you would expect some more failures.
If they had some depth to their arguments they would at least make you think twice but such desperate tactics pretty much tell you that you're traveling in the opposite direction to the entrenched interests, attention seekers and outright weirdos.
> The bottom line: Elon Musk attracts a wide array of real and fake online antagonists criticizing his work on electric cars, rockets, and solar panels.
Is "the bottom line" a thing Bloomberg has started including with some articles or is this a bizarre one off?
edit: that quote was not from Elon, I misread the post. Sorry.
Leech, who continues to file Tesla complaints, also insists that SpaceX’s success in landing rockets back on earth is a hoax, videos of the landings notwithstanding. “People tell me I shouldn’t talk about the fake rockets,” he says, “because it makes me sound crazy.”