Criticize the parts of the system that are both expensive and prevent us from taking advantage of Starship's ability to land 100 tons on the moon. SLS.
They're aiming for a turnaround time of eventually less than a day. I'm not sure how ships are going to be caught and stacked, but even if ground ops took hundreds of people it's still less than a man-year effort as far as cost when it's done in a day.
Fuelling, systems checks, clearing the launch area, launching, fuel transfer, re-entry, recovery, diagnostics, repairs, recertification, snacks for the repair crew, lawyers, drinks for the lawyers, et cetera.
The goal is automating everything. But even the Falcon family is currently around 3 weeks' sustainable turnaround.
They pump tons of fuel per second, obviously automated. Connecting/disconnecting pipes are with that movable platform. Granted, today it's different, and some more operations might be needed, like, say, more careful stage positioning on the launch system after it landed previously, but they don't seem problematic to include, right?
> systems checks,
SpaceX vastly increased number of channels collecting data on rocket performance. They have much better understanding of the rocket state after landing because of that. Some checks could be done on earth, but we surely don't do system checks every time we sit in a car, and this comparison is only somewhat stretched, agree?
> clearing the launch area,
For Super Heavy the landing happens some minutes after launch; don't think there's going to be many people near the pod. The zone below the trajectory will probably be permanently closed, at least for period of intensive pad use, just like it's done for construction projects now.
> launching,
Of course.
> fuel transfer, re-entry, recovery,
All in-flight operations are automated, even today, because there's no crew around. Problems and misses today, but we're just testing.
> diagnostics,
What's the (crucial) difference with system checks? Seems like we're talking about the same goals.
> repairs,
No repairs for the nominally working system. If checks show repairs are needed, the system - rocket stage - goes to the factory for fixes, that's much longer than the time between flights, but we have spares to use while the repairs happen.
> recertification,
What do we need here to do that is costly or takes a long time? How long does recertification take for a commercial airliner between flights?
> snacks for the repair crew,
Well, repairs are supposed to be a relatively exceptional thing, so done in the factory, with full lunches if not dinners.
> lawyers, drinks for the lawyers, et cetera.
All that for customer's money and time, not on a launch pads.
> The goal is automating everything. But even the Falcon family is currently around 3 weeks' sustainable turnaround.
Don't you have a suspicion that Falcons aren't being improved that much now because it doesn't make sense for the current mass flow to orbit and given that Starship is planned to become available soon?
Sure. Easier said than done, particularly with rapid reuse and when all your equipment is being repeatedly thermal and pressure shocked.
> Some checks could be done on earth, but we surely don't do system checks every time we sit in a car, and this comparison is only somewhat stretched, agree?
We don't send cars to space and back again. (We've also had cars for a century.) Hopefully by the time we're sending humans to Mars, this will be automated. But not in time for Artemis.
> zone below the trajectory will probably be permanently closed
You're describing major shipping lanes in the ship-surveillance area. KSC and CC also tends to close off a few popular flight routes into Orlando.
> in-flight operations are automated, even today, because there's no crew around
Still need people monitoring, including--by law--people ready to abort or order redirect.
> What's the (crucial) difference with system checks?
You have to open the rocket up.
> No repairs for the nominally working system
This has never been demonstrated. (Repairs/refurbishment.)
> Don't you have a suspicion that Falcons aren't being improved that much now because it doesn't make sense for the current mass flow to orbit and given that Starship is planned to become available soon?
No. Falcon launches are currently pad limited.
Note: I think Starship is vastly superior to SLS. But that's in part because the ground operations, including infrastructure, are reused and thus amortised across many flights.
the system is unable to get to the orbit, its not tested. Its all high-hopes and conjectures as it is now.
All of those plans are opinions, that's the problem.
Its like planning your infrastructure around hyperloop, but it doesnt exists. So all of the plans are founded on vaporware.
That is highly problematic thinking.
That's more than SLS has managed.
The flight also did a fuel transfer test.
The larger question is whether it will be able to reenter. However 14 fully expendible starships are still cheaper than a single SLS launch.
SLS did get to earth orbit with the Orion payload. While the latest Starship (IFT-3) barely reached "orbital speeds" and failed on re-entry. How is that "more than SLS has managed"?
You could argue that since SLS is not reusable, it kind of also failed on re-entry by design. But the Starship failure was an accident and it has never actually reached orbit, nor has it delivered a meaningful payload successfully. And Starship has ambitions do a lot more than SLS, acting as a full lunar lander and being reusable.
All in all, Starship is in a much earlier stage of development. SLS already fulfilled the purpose it was designed for back in 2022.
SLS burned an absurd amount of money and spent over a decade making sure that the first launch went relatively well, because they can't afford to have visible failures, in part because people are stupid when it comes to testing, and in part because they can only build them fast enough to launch once every other year (unless they're given another ridiculous sum of money and another decade to build more infrastructure).
Starship is testing iteratively, so they spend less money up front to figure out everything before flying, and instead put in a reasonable effort ahead of time and then just fly to figure out what needs improvement. They can afford to do this, because they are designing for mass prduction and because as a private company, they don't have to answer to the ignorant public. Building a new Starship stack is a matter of months, and they're more limited by the rate at which they can test and get through paperwork to launch the things than the rate at which they can build them.
For reference, SLS launched in 2022 and next might launch in 2025, Starship had a close to orbital velocity launch in March (it effectively proved they can get to orbit, it was not actually orbital so as to avoid leaving debris stuck in orbit until they can prove the ability to deorbit) and is expected to launch again in late May/early June.
Indeed SLS is very inefficient, Starship certainly has more potential and its achievements are more impressive already in terms of innovation, speed of development and costs. But it's not nearly as capable yet, there are still many unknowns.
SLS burned a lot of money because it needed to have massive production in politically-needed districts.
It had orbital velocity, but it wasn't on an orbital trajectory. At least based on the numbers provided and Scott Manley's description of events.
I think the NASA award for pumping tonnes of oxidizer required them to be at or above orbital velocity.
You correct. Artemis 1 put the Orion capsule in a distant retrograde lunar orbit [1] before successfully splashing down, all unmanned. I believe this is the same orbit astronauts are going to fly in Artemis 2 in 2025.
I don't think you can compare Hyperloop and Starship, Hyperloop is just a wild bullshit idea, Starship is a far more realistic project and there are some real resources behind its development.
I would view the claims about the cost of reuse with a huge question mark though. SpaceX has been much better than previous efforts in making reuse feasible, but I think only looking at the fuel is likely to be hugely misleading in terms of actual costs.
hindsight 2020, there have been bilion of $ thrown at it. Musk was promoting it as easy thing to do. And yet its "wild bullshit idea" how come reusable rockets is not a "wild bullshit idea"?
I dont understand how people can eat anything up Musk wildly claims and forget all BS the moment it turns out it was BS.
According to his claims, he will have people on the way to mars last year, for sure.
How come people who hired bunch of grannies to knit a nav computer memory got to moon without loosing a single rocket. And now loosing 3 rockets and still not orbiting is an amazing achievement?
> How come people who hired bunch of grannies to knit a nav computer memory got to moon without loosing a single rocket.
NASA did lose a good couple rockets. They also lost the Apollo I and its crew even before it flew, as well as a number of near misses that were recovered by the brilliance of astronauts (Armstrong saved the day TWICE) and ground crews alike. They also lost two shuttles precisely because they couldn't afford bad news from propagating back to the senate.
> And now loosing 3 rockets and still not orbiting is an amazing achievement?
NASA-style development is very risk averse, which is natural, as it's primarily a government agency tasked with keeping the aerospace and rocket industry happy and healthy, and preventing talented engineers and scientists from moving to Europe, India, Russia, or China. Or North Korea.
NASA can't afford to lose three rockets, because each small piece is expensive and exhaustively simulated and tested before being assembled and launched. It does that to advance our theoretical understanding of how to build spacecraft.
SpaceX iterates quickly and cheaply, blows up engines, rockets, tanks, launch pads and anything else, because it makes them cheaply and use them to learn what NASA does by careful simulation and lab testing.
Well :) Saturns were simpler, and more modest by performance. And also tested more on test stands, not like Russians used to do - with more emphasis on flight testing. Look how much more successful the Starship testing program is in comparison to Soviet N-1 flights - and remain assured, N-1 was made by serious professionals.
I don't understand the question. Could it be the fact that a Falcon 9 just landed after its 20th trip to space? Seems pretty reusable to me.
> How come people who hired bunch of grannies to knit a nav computer memory got to moon without loosing a single rocket.
Apollo 1 wasn't the whole rocket, but I'd say the three astronauts who died were worth more than that. How many astronauts has SpaceX lost? ETA: Not one of those first stages returned to earth intact, so in that sense, all the rockets that launched were lost. ETAA: Apollo 1 wasn't on a Saturn V, so my initial response doesn't really follow.
Is that, I have no arguments so I call people names reply? There are so many of the posts using it like a 'I win ticket'
Its just a stupid Ad hominem attack.
The stuff i can make up and call it probable future that never materializes but then nobody remembers it as I move on to another grift, facts wink
All Musk weirdness aside - SpaceX revolutionized the launch business for the planet, and for quite some time already, so it makes sense to watch what they're doing. Results tend to follow, even though many are delayed - but delayed only in comparison to announcements, not to how it's done elsewhere.
It couldn’t even get its attitude right for rentry.
> the system is unable to get to the orbit, its not tested.
Yes. Just like every other rocket that is under development.
> Its all high-hopes and conjectures as it is now.
Engineering plans from the company that built the most reliable rocket in human history while pioneering first-stage reusability are "hopes" and "conjectures". They're just spitballing, you guys.
> All of those plans are opinions, that's the problem.
Totally agree. Engineering is more of an feeling than a science.
What's the problem here which is going to stop the progress on the Starship program?