zolotiyeruki

Holy smokes, I would totally mount that on my wall.

Antitrust law steps in not on the occurrence of a monopoly, but on the abuse of one, at least in theory. If SpaceX got a monopoly and then told a supplier (say, of payload fairings) to no longer sell to Boeing or ULA, that's when it should kick in. Does the $28 million reflect SpaceX's all-up launch cost for a new F9, or is it the cost of a launch with a gently-pre-used booster? Given the likely delays in the manned moon program, SpaceX could just launch all the cargo, facilities, rovers, habitation modules, etc, etc and just leave them there for whenever NASA gets its astronauts there Or, maybe by the time astronauts land, SpaceX will have already engineered, tested, launched, and landed robots that will set everything up for the astronauts. So the manned lander is a glorified hotel shuttle!

Maybe they'll build them in LA, and the test flight for each will be a suborbital hop over to FL?

The relative velocities of those satellites at deployment are probably measured in single-digit centimeters per second, and those satellites aren't very heavy. If they can make it through launch and staging, I think they can handle a tiny little bump against their neighbors.

Someone needs to suggest to SpaceX to add some lights to the booster, near the cameras, so we can see more than just a dark, vague blob from the cameras after stage separation.

That's not quite right--you can't count the cost of both boosters. If they succeed, their cost to get from one launch to the next is (ASDS recovery + cost of refurbishment) If the booster misses, it's (ASDS recovery + cost of a new booster)

I dunno, I imagine that first stage is gonna be pretty spectacular as well.

The most recent launch was the fourth for that particular booster, if memory serves.

Is anyone else having trouble parsing this tweet? Should that be "SpaceX’s Dragon capsule will carry new cutting-edge research to the ISS in an upcoming launch."?

You know, I heard yesterday about the Iranian government shutting down basically all internet communications in the wake of recent demonstrations, and I couldn't help but think "gee, Starlink might be a big help in such a situation"

Sweet, thanks for your help!

I uploaded the new zip file to the repo, but forgot to update the release too. That's now fixed, and thanks for your patience. Is there a way to verify that I did it right?

Thanks for the help. I've merged the change and re-uploaded the zip file.

If you're looking to simply blow up a target, then boots on the ground are not what you want. As for detectability, that would be a problem in a contested area with substantial radar/AA systems, but when I think about high-value targets of the type the military pursues in the middle east, I don't see that being an issue. I just checked the first Falcon Heavy launch, and the side boosters went transonic about 30-45 seconds before touchdown, with the landing burn starting about 20 seconds prior to touchdown. That's not a lot of warning from either the sonic boom or the landing burn. Also, generally on these missions, rapid exfiltration isn't a need--they usually take a few hours to secure the site, gather any sources of intel, etc before bogeying out. If a Starship were stationed closer, say at a military base in the region, it wouldn't need nearly as much fuel, would it? If you're looking at only hopping a few hundred miles each way, would there be enough fuel to make both hops?

This has probably been asked and answered before, but... I'm sure a lot of us have launched a craft with a combination of LV-N's and some sort of LF/Ox motors (usually RAPIERs for me). I often end up with excess Oxidizer that I won't need for the rest of the mission, but which I cannot vent/jettison (without a mod). That leaves me with a conundrum: Option 1: Use the RAPIERs until all the Oxidizer is gone, taking a dV hit early, but then benefit from the lower dry mass when the LV-Ns run Option 2: Leave the oxidizer in the tanks, and only burn the LV-N's, due to their higher Isp So I put together a spreadsheet, outlining the dV from each scenario. The results are interesting, although not surprising. The short version: if the mass of oxidizer is more than about 24% of your vessel's total mass, use the RAPIERs until they're out of fuel. If you have less oxidizer than that, stick to the LV-N. As a rule of thumb, though, you might as well just stick with using the RAPIERs until they're dry. In the least-efficient scenario (about 15% craft mass LOX), you'll give up about 75m/s total, and your TWR will be a bit higher for the rest of your mission.

Good catch. Can you tell I'm new to this? I've updated the .version file and re-uploaded the zip file. Is there a way to kick off a new build attempt?

Alright, I've uploaded a zip file and created a release. You can see it here. Is there anything else you need me to do for CKAN? https://github.com/zolotiyeruki/Pilot-Assistant/releases/tag/v1.13.4

What should the root directory for the zip file be? Should the zip file contain the GameData directory, or the PilotAssistant directory that goes in the GameData directory?

Given technological advancements over the last half century, I imagine the equipment in Crew Dragon takes up a lot less space than Apollo's did

A 10% reduction in pressurized volume represents a much larger reduction in *crew* space, though, since a bunch of the pressurized volume is occupied by equipment.

My understanding is that Starlink satellites will be low enough that without occasional boosts, their orbits will decay relatively quickly, so the risk of Wall-E isn't as great as it might initially appear.

I just had a thought last night. A 9m diameter SS has GOT to have the NRO pricking their ears.

SS's radius is 4.5m, which is off the bottom of the chart. Tethering two starships nose-to-nose could certainly work, however.

"Ready by the 28th" ...but for what? Attaching the various parts of the fuselage is one thing. Connecting all the plumbing, valves, control systems, instrumentation is another, let alone all the testing that needs to happen before this thing can take flight.

If it's deep sand, I'd be more worried about what the rocket exhaust would do to the surface than whether the legs will sunk in