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Lukaszenko

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Posts posted by Lukaszenko

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    On 5/7/2021 at 6:58 PM, SpaceFace545 said:

    Like spaceman said, spacex's goal is to leave earth. Starship isn't being built to be a launcher, it is to go to mars. Even dragon was developed initially as a mars lander. Spacex is run by a man obsessed with mars and he could care less about earth. They haven't done anything for this planet and its people and I doubt they ever will.

    What about that whole Tesla "sustainable transport and energy" thing?

    And the solar energy thing? They certainly don't seem like the "screw earth" types of ventures.

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted · Edited by Lukaszenko

    7 hours ago, SpaceFace545 said:

    I really just don't like it. It just seems kinda oversaturated and not really that special. I don't know if other people have this same feeling but I do. I love watching launches from ULA or Ariane space because every launch is something special, wether it is some DOD satellite that can read the newspaper on my driveway or the super advanced probes from NASA and ESA. But with commercial launches its just repetitive, you know?

    It's indeed ugly and it looks old-school and like they patched it together with a hammer; it's certainly not winning any beauty contests and perhaps it never will.

    I'll definitely agree that sending anything to space; many-billion dollar probes on many-hundred-million-dollar sweet-looking rockets in your examples, is indeed special. I'll argue however, that sending whatevertf you want, whenevertf you want, for a tiny fraction of the price is even more so.   

    Butt-ugly as it may be, Starship is at the very least showing that this is within reach.

    Besides, if SpaceX really wants to drop some panties, they can always add some bling-bling and window-dressing to the Starhip later. They'll certainly have the margin for it. 

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    17 minutes ago, Majk said:

     

    • Will the booster simply cancel all horizontal velocity it got, gain a comparable amount of horizontal velocity in the opposite direction to come back to the launch site? Again, this sounds incredibly wasteful, even one could argue that by staging the payload, the dry mass decreases significantly, thus improving delta-v of the booster.

    It's exactly this. Yes, it is incredibly wasteful, but of fuel, which if everything else works out is of little concern. As long as there's plenty of performance left over for launching the Starship (there should be) and it allows for rapid reusability (it should), then so be it.

    The math is pretty straightforward: if sacrificing 50% of a launch's payload capacity allows you to have 100000% more launches, then it's stupid not to do it (I pulled these numbers out of my ass, but that's the jist of the argument).

    Keep in mind that Falcon 9 already does this on missions where there's margin left over.

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    It's also easier to be a SpaceX fan because they made a crazy-ass promise (cheap/ easy access to space), and each success they have is a step closer to delivering on this. You can actually visually see a step-by-step growth and progression towards this goal, you can can extrapolate that it will probably happen, and it's exciting.

    Starliner is great and all. But, if they succeed, whenevertf that will be, then we'll....have another capsule. You know, like we did in the 60s.

    Not nearly as exciting.

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    18 hours ago, SpaceFace545 said:

    So why does spacex build starship like that. Like seriously it's being built like a silo. Why don't they use actual rocket building or aerospace techniques such as using milled isogrid "skin" or better materials such as aluminum and titanium (steel is good but not the best). Now don't give me excuses like "steels cheaper" or "making a rocket like a grain silo is cheaper" and "its just a prototype". Money aside this is marketed as the most advanced spacecraft ever built yet my farmer cousin can make the same thing.  This sounds kinda harsh but just why build something the cheapest way possible?

    Agreed. They should definitely make it at least as Space Shuttle, or better yet SLS. But 10x more expensive, because advanced. Make it so so expensive so as to bankrupt entire nations before the tooling is delivered, because it's a rocket dammit!

    And, every component should be designed to be one-time-use only, as a true rocket should be.

    They should make the access road to the pad out of single-crystal inconel. Why? Because rocket.

    And scrap it after one use as well, for good measure. 

    Down with Gwyneth! Down with Musk! 

    SpaceFace545 for president of SpaceX! 

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    Yeah indeed this is getting tedious reading the same argument about why it won't work, over and over. It's an interesting argument, point taken, but we ultimately don't know and the answer is still a giant "maybe", no matter how much we keep on beating this dead horse.

    On one side we have kerbiloid from the internet, on the other we have SpaceX and to an extent NASA.

    I'd be willing to bet money that SpaceX has a better idea about this than keribiloid. I'd be willing to bet billions, in fact. Of course, I'm talking out of my ass since I don't have billions.

    However, some people do, and that's exactly what they did with it.

     

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    9 hours ago, Flavio hc16 said:

    BRUH....

    I wouldn't change that, especially not during an human flight, not after it worked 100+ times

    If you find a risk and just keep rolling the dice because you didn't lose 100 times, you're just asking for something to go wrong.

    Off the top of my head, I can think of ALL the NASA crew losses as an example. 

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    20 hours ago, StrandedonEarth said:

    I don’t think I saw this posted here; finally a cause for the last failed landing:

     

    Good explanation, but it leaves more questions than answers. For example, how did they find out about this "hole" if they lost the booster? Did they know about it BEFORE the launch? :wacko:

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted · Edited by Lukaszenko

    11 hours ago, Clamp-o-Tron said:

    I don’t think this will delay Crew-2 or any upcoming CRS missions, but does anyone have an idea if the landing anomaly will push back some launches as they investigate? They obviously don’t want to potentially throw away boosters if they can help it.

     

    USSF-44 (Falcon Heavy) has been delayed to July, probably unrelated. Also, it seems like Starlink will be 75% of SpaceX’s manifest through Q1 and Q2 this year.

    It's not just about throwing away boosters, it's about having a reliable and robust recovery of rockets, especially if they eventually plan to expand this into a reliable and robust recovery of 100+ people.

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    15 hours ago, mikegarrison said:

    People are pointing out that the grid fins are designed to take very large aerodynamic loads, which is true. But those are distributed loads, not point loads. Which could be another issue.

    Could be. But, the very things that allow them to perform their aerodynamic function also helps them perform their new structural function: they are thick and they are large. They are also made of titanium to contend with the heat.

    Even if I'm completely talking out of my ass, strengthening them up in order to take the loads would surely be less costly mass-wise than adding a bunch of legs.

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    All legitimate answers which I considered myself, but for every answer I have even more questions...

    Quote

    If the payload is mass-limited and not volume-limited, then they could use the same cabin and get more to orbit without the Superdracos.

    If. But, is it?

    Quote

    Also, you can save on cost be eliminating them. The small unused space in the pods is hardly worth worrying about.

    True. But, it's supposed to be fully reusable.

    Quote

    Another factor is splashdown, not having the 9 engines trough the hull make it easier to waterproof the capsule.

    True, but again it's supposed to be reusable. So, is it really that big an issue?

    Quote

    No point in reducing payload mass for a launch escape system on an uncrewed cargo capsule. The SuperDracos aren't used in the course of a normal mission anyway.

    SpaceX's own history shows that it would be nice to have a way to salvage the payload in case something goes wrong. The question is, at what cost? Here it seems like they're actually going out of their way to remove a perfectly good system of salvaging it. Lost payload mass is indeed a serious cost; do they actually utilize it?

    Again, all are legitimate but speculative answers; we don't don't what the real explanation is

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    45 minutes ago, RCgothic said:

    Cargo Dragon 2 looks weird without Superdracos! Still has the porthole that isn't a porthole though, lol.

     

    I'm trying to wrap my head around the decision to remove them. If it's for more payload, do they use the capability? If not, why not leave them in, just in case? Or, maybe removing them shows confidence in success? 

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted · Edited by Lukaszenko

    57 minutes ago, SOXBLOX said:

    ...and don't use highly refined rocket engines which experience some of the most difficult environments for materials to survive in. 

    I especially agree with the above; airliner turbine blades experience THE most difficult environments for materials to survive in.

    SpaceX Discussion Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    18 hours ago, mikegarrison said:

    I hate be a wet blanket and all that, but what's so exciting about this? I watched that video and those guys were giddy with excitement. It's basically the same thing we've already seen, isn't it?

    I'm sure for the engineers involved it is very exciting because they just doubled their store of flight data. And probably they tested some new stuff. But as an observer, it's just not terribly entertaining.

    It's like watching the Falcon 9 rocket launches. They're getting less and less exciting by the launch, but it's not the launch itself that's interesting, it's the fact that each one represents a step on the ladder to making space cheap and accessible. 

    I don't watch any other rocket launches, whether bigger or faster or whatever, because they don't represent progress to making us a properly space-faring civilization; they just represent the same 'ol excrements.

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