CatastrophicFailure

Interesting... I wonder if they’ll schlep a drone ship to the Gulf eventually specifically to do longer hops? The tin can is the rocket.

No. At least, not as far as I understand. The finial, orbital+ vehicle will still be all fancy and composite, it’s the hopper(s) that will be stainless. Makes a lot of sense, too. Notice how quickly the thing is going together, and on an unimproved dirt lot in the middle of bloody nowhere to boot? They can build these things fast, and they can build them cheap. Relatively. I’m guessing SpaceX is expecting to lose more than one along the way, like they did with the original Grashopper, and will probably go through different versions as well (the one doesn’t have the folding fins like the end product, for example).

i think all the hubbub about the “radical change in materials” was just his biggest troll since... well, at least like a month or two...

Cool. Yeah, will definitely be going the OC route, that company I’m pricing through will even do that for buyers. “Nothing weird” is always a plus, too. Like... Do you want T-1000s? Cuz I’m pretty sure that’s how you get T-1000s...

Ok, now that makes sense, thanks. I started getting lost from computer scene when it seemed to hit this limit with clock speeds and everyone jumped on the MOAR COARES bandwagon. So stepping back to an i5 and maybe the power supply, I should even be able to get the RAM there and keep everything simple. Lol, good thing you didn’t start off with that analogy, I’m a truck guy...

How so? Not doubting, just seeking to understand...

@qzgy Thanks for the info, sorry for the belated response, my neighborhood's been in the dark ages the last few days. You've given me enough to start comparing apples to apples at least. Er, poor word choice, I guess, but... And DANG RAM is alot cheaper on Amazon! Yes, I plan to migrate over most of my drives, just need a little SSD for OS. Will need a new copy/licence of Windows, I supposed, and get stuck with Win10 I think the Win8.1 install on my current rig was actually the last hardcopy software I ever bought, from an actual physical store, even. For reference, here's my current setup: i5-4690K @3.5ghz 16GB Ram Gigabyte Z97N-WIFI Radeon R9 200 6890MB Win 8.1 OK, after some fiddling, here's what I came up with: Not sure if I can link directly there. Thoughts? I stepped down from the GTX 1060 to a RX 580 8GB, figure I could always add a second card down the road. Could possibly step down on the power supply, too, but that might negate adding the card later. Leaves me a little wiggle for the Tax Man . I'll get RAM elsewhere, either squeeze that in somewhere else, or could I maybe cannibalize and swap with my current rig? Current rig will get refreshed as a stand-alone system to run my security cameras, could probably get by with 8gb on that. RX 580 8GB vs GTX 1060 6GB

I stoled dis.

Welp, I finally got to see it after all. Even SpaceX seemed a bit underwhelmed with the coverage. But the little hunks of ice catching and then bouncing around on top of the... is that the turbopump exhaust manifold? Well they were amusing.

I’ll chime in, I think this is a thing you, the writer, needs to decide. What do you want to write? Either way, there’s likely an audience, the Mission Reports subforum has plenty of the latter, and here in Fan Works you’ll find plenty of emotion. Perhaps more important, where does the Story lead you?

Musk, of course, raised more than a few eyebrows with his “material change” tweet, but I think he sometimes gets too much credit for decision-making at SpaceX. He does not run the place in a vacuum, after all (yet ), and any significant decisions no doubt have an approval process to go thru. This “counter-intuitive” change has no doubt been in the pipes for a while, now. I think the heavy steel structure is probably a water tower or control tower, but the aluminum stuff, especially that nose cone-looking thingy, sure does look like space ship parts. But we’ve still got the composite bits in LA. Hold up... wait a sec... Could the big steel structure with the fixed legs actually be a grasshopper-type testbed for the SuperHeavy booster maybe?

Sounds like I didn’t miss anything anyway. Guess I’m not the only one plagued by high winds.

[string of expletives] Finally on a weekend, and here I am, still with no power, no cable, and only the barest trickle of data when the cell tower deities smile in my general direction. Theoguhput so low I can’t even use smileys.

Nasty storm rolling through now. Just had a 39mph gust at our house, which is largely sheltered by trees. That's a record by a lot. Power's out, gennie's on, and now I'm just sitting here watching the cameras waiting for that old, dead tree I should have dealt with last year to fall and knock out our power meter stack. What's that curse about interesting times?

Interesting tidbits in this article, RE: Falcon Heavy. ArabSat-6A is manifested for March, but we knew that, STP-2 is set to follow “back to back” in April, and they will be re-using the same set of booster cores. No mention of the center core, maybe they want to actually get it back first. These flights look like they’ll fit right in between Demo-1 in January and Demo-2 in June, all from the same pad.

I finally got paid the two years of backpay my employer has owed me for the last, well, two years, so among other things I’m looking for a new computer. But I’m so out of the loop at this point I’m not even sure what to be looking for. I used to know it all.. back in the dark times... back in Win3.1... Anyways, this will finally be a dedicated rig for running KSP. That’s 90% of what I do, but I’d like to keep it usable for other games as well (the wife insists I get the new GTA the day it comes out... whenever it does come out...). I’d been tossing around building it myself this time, but now I’m not so sure. Dunno if I want another project right now, and the list of stuff is just so mind-boggling at this point get the latest 1200mm 4K screen-wiping case fan! A must-have for any rig! I don’t need fancy or pretty colors, just to not turn my office into a sauna. The only thing I am sure of is that I’m irrationality in love with this case: Everything else is up in the air. Obviously I’ll get more bang for the buck building, but I’m torn. If I buy, I’d probably go thru CyperPowerPC again, they did my current rig and I’m pretty happy with it still. 32 gigs of RAM is the other target, but flarp it’s expensive. Thoughts/advice, guys? Budget is a bit skinny at a firm $1500. Cuz papa also needs a new pair of shoes.

Funny thing about the English language, you can just make up any silly, nonsense word you want and yet it still gets the point across.

I can still hear every single note in my head from playing it on repeat until the disc wore out. [thousand yard stare] That was a long time ago... before the dark times... before the short hair... For some reason, it is really hard to fully appreciate the size of everything on this beast.

Heh, now it works. Flarping mobile display.

Dangit, you’ve wormed this into my head: [cue chunky speed metal riff] Darkness, imprisoning me, all that I see, absolute horror, I cannot launch, I gotta scrub, trapped in myself, fuel tanks held by the TEL... Spacex... has taken my TEA... taken my TEB... taken hydraulics, Taken my fins... taken my legs... taken my soul... left me expendablllllllllle... [epic solo]

But sadly, the video does not seem to be working.

Let’s hope that’s not the beginning of a trend this week...

Finally! There’s the solar panels! I have an irrational amount of excitement at finally seeing them.

I have a “gaming” desktop and it’s crawling with only a few hundred parts. Maybe it really is time for a new rig... [Exterior, wind-blown mountain range] Protagonist, voice-over: So, I bet you’re wondering how I wound up in this mess...

I think that’s so they don’t burn the fins off with the SuperDracos in a low-altitude abort... which would be a really, really bad time to have your fins burnt off. They’re integrating flight hardware. I think January seems quite reasonable, the bureaucracy is the big unknown at this point.