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https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-announces-us-industry-partnerships-to-advance-moon-mars-technology

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SpaceX of Hawthorne, California, will work with NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida to advance their technology to vertically land large rockets on the Moon. This includes advancing models to assess engine plume interaction with lunar regolith.

 

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SpaceX will work with Glenn and Marshall to advance technology needed to transfer propellant in orbit, an important step in the development of the company’s Starship space vehicle.

 

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1 hour ago, sh1pman said:

Blue Origin of Kent and SpaceX of Hawthorne. Sounds like they’re honorable knights or something...

It sounds to me that NASA needs SpaceX a lot more than they need NASA atm 

They better at least be getting paid handsomely for it.

( Who really cares what the engine exaust will do to the lunar dirt btw Apollo seemed to get by fine :/ )

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Just now, Dale Christopher said:

It sounds to me that NASA needs SpaceX a lot more than they need NASA atm 

They better at least be getting paid handsomely for it.

( Who really cares what the engine exaust will do to the lunar dirt btw Apollo seemed to get by fine :/ )

I think it's that SpaceX can use the facilities and expertise, and NASA can use the data sort of thing, with no transfer of money. But I may be wrong.

Apollo didn't have to use that engine again.

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NASA is taking Starship seriously? I'm becoming less and less skeptical of flying water towers.

I sometimes wish to take just a tiny peek into the future and see how well all those SpaceX plans went and which got changed and which ones worked/didn't work.

Edit:

image0.jpg

Edited by Wjolcz
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19 minutes ago, Ultimate Steve said:

Apollo didn't have to use that engine again.

Ah yer true, wouldn’t want to try to take off only to find a family of lunar ground squirrels had made a nest in your thrust nozzle XD

Edited by Guest
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33 minutes ago, Dale Christopher said:

Who really cares what the engine exaust will do to the lunar dirt btw Apollo seemed to get by fine :/

Apollo didn’t have to take off again with the same engine. ;) Which, IIRC, would sustain considerable damage as it was, just from the interaction of the plume with the surface. Sadly, the real world is not the Kerbalverse where you can just land on your engines. ;.;

20 minutes ago, Wjolcz said:

sometimes wish to take just a tiny peek into the future and see how well all those SpaceX plans went and which got changed and which ones worked/didn't work.

And maybe pickup a sports almanac while you’re there... place a couple of bets... y’know, no big deal... <_<

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20 minutes ago, CatastrophicFailure said:

Sadly, the real world is not the Kerbalverse where you can just land on your engines. ;.;

Apollo 15 did.

The Apollo descent motor nozzle was designed to be crushable, because they knew they had very limited control over how smooth the terrain was and they didn't have a great deal of clearance between the landing leg pads and the nozzle. Starting with Apollo 15 they had even less than before, because the extra mass of the rover required them to use a bigger nozzle in order to get more performance from the descent engine.

Edited by mikegarrison
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2 hours ago, mikegarrison said:

Apollo 15 did

Au conter counter contry :P I disagree. While Dave Scott certainly did thump it down, the nozzle didn’t actually contact the surface, it buckled due to (relevant subject!) firing so close to the lunar surface, as mentioned here (about 10:00 in):

Hence why the whole subject needs further study. Either way, still wouldn’t wanna take off with it. :wacko:

Edited by CatastrophicFailure
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If a lunar base is ever established, it also sounds like NASA & SpaceX would both be keen to get a better handle on how best to stop everything nearby (habitats, rovers, equipment, astronauts etc) from being turned into a sieve every time a rocket lands or takes off nearby and starts flinging dirt around at 3km/s in an environment where there's no air to slow the debris down.

http://www.planetary.org/blogs/guest-blogs/2014/0419-forensic-ballistics.html

" The exhaust of the Shuttle’s solid rocket boosters pulled several thousand bricks from the wall of the launch pad’s flame trench, slammed them into each other, creating many thousands of fragments, and blew them as far as a kilometer from the pad."  :o

 

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2 hours ago, CatastrophicFailure said:

Au conter counter contry :P I disagree. While Dave Scott certainly did thump it down, the nozzle didn’t actually contact the surface, it buckled due to (relevant subject!) firing so close to the lunar surface, as mentioned here (about 10:00 in):

Hence why the whole subject needs further study. Either way, still wouldn’t wanna take off with it. :wacko:

Interesting 

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Just now, tater said:

interesting. Also seems like good news for Starship if they are actually doing this kind of research. Makes it more real somehow. 

Poor BO... If Starship is landing on The Moon that lander seems pretty obsolete. Maybe there will be a market for delivery of robot missions to the surface, but put that next to what is basically a giant chrome hotel... it seems pretty (insert word here that the language filter will turn into "excrement") XD

 

 

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4 hours ago, Dale Christopher said:

If Starship is landing on The Moon that lander seems pretty obsolete.

They have to fly to orbit first (Starship), then work out the refilling ops. Long poles.

As for BO...

They have to fly to orbit first (with literally anything), then work out transfers and lunar landing, lol. Long poles.

;)

 

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