totm nov 2023 SpaceX Discussion Thread

[tater]

[kerbiloid]

8 hours ago, tater said:

All US space efforts are "commercial." NASA builds nothing, contractors do. Most look at the USAF and NASA as the customer

I thought "commercial" is not the same as "paid from budget", but "paid by non-budget customers, paying taxes into the budget".
So, then all Soviet launches, including Laika, were commercial.
And submarines with SLBM, too.

8 hours ago, tater said:

Mueller (designer of the Merlin engine) was referring to the case for SpaceX. If they built it, aside from Mars (which doesn't generate revenue, it costs money), what is it good for? One use case is selling lunar missions to someone with deep pockets... the US government. SpaceX was gonna build SS anyway, if they can sell a couple flights for $2.9B, that's great for them.

The same could be said about Voskhod, if they were selling the seats for space tourists.
Then anything at all can be called "commercial", because you can sell tickets to watch  it.

[Flying dutchman]

28 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

So, then all Soviet launches, including Laika, were commercial.
 

In the soviet Union all "companies" were owned by the state. Afaik the us government doesn't have a majority stake in SpaceX.

 

 

[kerbiloid]

3 minutes ago, Flying dutchman said:

Afaik the us government doesn't have a majority stake in SpaceX.

When SpaceX sells launches for commercial sats, it's of course, commercial flights,

But yet haven't heard about lunar landings sold to somebody but budget.

[tater]

44 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

I thought "commercial" is not the same as "paid from budget", but "paid by non-budget customers, paying taxes into the budget".

The difference in this case is more one of speculation.

If a home builder builds a house for a client, they have a budget (which they generally exceed, lol, one $1000+ change order at a time), and they make it. They know at the start of the project how much the client is obligated to pay them.

Home builders can also work on spec. They build a house, and after it is complete, it is sold to someone—if they chose the site, design, market conditions poorly—they are out the cost of the home with no one wanting to buy it.

SpaceX and Starship in this case (the Mueller quote) is the latter. They were going to build Starship anyway—but once it exists at some level, there is a very likely buyer—NASA.

Edited April 18, 2021 by tater

[kerbiloid]

1 hour ago, tater said:

They were going to build Starship anyway—but once it exists at some level, there is a very likely buyer—NASA

Currently the only lunar customer is NASA, and unlikely it will change in SpaceX lifetime.

So, it looks like a dedicated, budget-aimed activity.

USSR was building T-72 for its own needs, no matter if somebody else buys.
Does it mean that the Soviet tank building industry was commercial, if they sold some of them to random customers?

Will the SpaceX lunar things be ever sold if NASA won't buy them (paying from budget)?

Edited April 18, 2021 by kerbiloid

[Flying dutchman]

17 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

 

USSR was building T-72 for its own needs, no matter if somebody else buys.
Does it mean that the Soviet tank building industry was commercial, if they sold some of them to random customers?

 

it does mean that the soviet state sold tanks to a friendly (to them) nation. i'm pretty sure that if the US wanted to buy one at the time they wouldn't sell. 

now did that make the soviet state a commercial organisation?

 

not a clue honestly.

Edited April 18, 2021 by Flying dutchman

[Shpaget]

In my head canon there have always been two definitions of the concept commercial in this context.

1. If (US) gov wants a rocket, and they (directly or through NASA, doesn't matter, since in this context I consider NASA to be gov) pay a private company to build it for them then it is commercial. On the other hand if it's NASA that does the building, then it's not commercial contract.

2. If a private company builds a rocket and sells it to gov, it's a government contract. On the other hand, if they sell it to some other private company, then it's commercial.

So the same contract can be both commercial and government depending on which side I'm looking from.

(Something like "borrow" and "lend").

[RCgothic]

My opinion on the difference between commercial and govt contacts:

1) A govt agency has a design. It wants the design built, so it goes out to contractors. The contractors haven't necessarily built this before, so because the govt has responsibility for the design, any problems that crop up are the govt's responsibility. The contract is cost+.

2) A govt agency has a requirement. Suppliers bid their own designs to meet that requirement. The supplier has responsibility for the design and any obstacles it might face. The contract is fixed cost.

 

[kerbiloid]

1 hour ago, Flying dutchman said:

it does mean that the soviet state sold tanks to a friendly (to them) nation. i'm pretty sure that if the US wanted to buy one at the time they wouldn't sell. 

The US tank builders were commercial companies performing also state orders among others.
The SU tank builders had the only customer - the state (or govt)  They were also producing civil tech, but only for the same only customer.
SpaceX currently has the only lunar customer - the state (or govt).
So, the lunar program is as commercial as a federal agent on salary. The state pays - it works. The state doesn't pay - it doesn't work. No other lunar customers are seen.

[SunlitZelkova]

25 minutes ago, RCgothic said:

My opinion on the difference between commercial and govt contacts:

1) A govt agency has a design. It wants the design built, so it goes out to contractors. The contractors haven't necessarily built this before, so because the govt has responsibility for the design, any problems that crop up are the govt's responsibility. The contract is cost+.

2) A govt agency has a requirement. Suppliers bid their own designs to meet that requirement. The supplier has responsibility for the design and any obstacles it might face. The contract is fixed cost.

 

I kind of think your view is the "correct" one.

Mercury was designed by NASA and they simply contracted McDonnell to build it. NASA still did all of the testing and launched it. It was not a commercial contract.

Crew Dragon was designed by SpaceX, built by SpaceX, tested by SpaceX, and correct me if I am wrong, but is launched and operated by SpaceX too (SpaceX does mission control from Hawthorne). It is a commercial contract.

[tater]

6 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Currently the only lunar customer is NASA, and unlikely it will change in SpaceX lifetime.

So, it looks like a dedicated, budget-aimed activity.

SpaceX would have continued building Starship had they lost the contract—in fact by far the most likely outcome, their win was completely surprising.

SpaceX is not building Starship to serve the only lunar customer. They are building it speculatively.

5 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

The US tank builders were commercial companies performing also state orders among others.
The SU tank builders had the only customer - the state (or govt)  They were also producing civil tech, but only for the same only customer.
SpaceX currently has the only lunar customer - the state (or govt).
So, the lunar program is as commercial as a federal agent on salary. The state pays - it works. The state doesn't pay - it doesn't work. No other lunar customers are seen.

The current procurement system for military hardware tends to be that they have a contract for a specification. Say a tank of certain mass and dimensions with some capability (the first 2 so it can be shipped using existing military logistics). Say 3 companies want the contract, they pitch ideas. The Army picks 2 to go on, and both are paid to develop prototypes. The prototypes are then tested, and a final selection is made, the winner of which gets the B$ contract. The people bending metal get paid, and no one has to bend metal without knowing ahead of time they will be paid.

If I had a great idea for a tank, and simply built it—then tried to sell it to the Army, that would be purely speculative.

SpaceX is building a tank (flying tanks), and only then selling it for the lunar use case. They tried for a smallsat contract (not a constellation, I think FIVE) and bid Starship a few weeks ago.

 

Starship exists for two reasons, IMO, and neither has to do with the Moon. One, SpaceX wants to colonize Mars (kooky, but there you go). Two, SpaceX wants to continue to have the ability to lower cost to orbit—not out of altrusim, but because slow as they may be, BO is plodding along towards having NG in service, and NG has more capability than F9 in every way, and is being specifically designed to be able to compete on cost with F9. If not Starship, they would need to make a LV that is at least 7m in diameter, puts FH-like mass in LEO, and is as cheap to fly as F9. Such dev takes time, so they had to start before BO is flying.

[kerbiloid]

38 minutes ago, tater said:

SpaceX would have continued building Starship had they lost the contract—in fact by far the most likely outcome, their win was completely surprising.

I'm particularly about the lunar stuff. Obviously, Starship is a launch vehicle of common purpose, including commercial.

[tater]

11 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

I'm particularly about the lunar stuff. Obviously, Starship is a launch vehicle of common purpose, including commercial.

While I think this contract obviously helps them, they were doing it anyway.

I was also surprised when BO first announced the "National Team," vs their previous "Blue Moon" presentations, for sort of the same reason. Bezos wants to go to the Moon personally (from interviews I have read). I always assumed they'd be designing their own vehicle—they they would simply build and present to NASA as a fait accompli. It was odd (IMHO) for them to team up with partners that would literally not build that particle board mockup in Houston without getting paid for it first.

[Terwin]

14 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Currently the only lunar customer is NASA, and unlikely it will change in SpaceX lifetime.

 

I thought SpaceX already sold the 'Dear Moon' mission to a rich guy.  It may not be a lunar landing, but looping around the moon does sound rather lunar to me...

14 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Will the SpaceX lunar things be ever sold if NASA won't buy them (paying from budget)?

Once they have demonstrated the capability(and possibly even before), I rather expect that there will be at least a few non US gov buyers for payload to the moon.

[tater]

Starship really does change everything if/when they get it working.

Even without crew safety established for SS liftoff and Earth EDL, they can fly distributed launch missions to the Moon and back from LEO. Both Commercial crew vehicles are actually capable of holding 7 crew, and there's no need to worry about crowding for a short launch to meet SS in LEO (and zero reason to launch to ISS inclination, so a fast rendezvous should be possible). With just a single CC taxi flight to load it, we'd nearly double the number of astronauts to the surface on any given mission.

 

[magnemoe]

14 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Currently the only lunar customer is NASA, and unlikely it will change in SpaceX lifetime.

So, it looks like a dedicated, budget-aimed activity.

USSR was building T-72 for its own needs, no matter if somebody else buys.
Does it mean that the Soviet tank building industry was commercial, if they sold some of them to random customers?

Will the SpaceX lunar things be ever sold if NASA won't buy them (paying from budget)?

Well dear moon is commercial. 

I say this is structural, first organisations like NASA or the military is not supposed to make profit, for the military its even restrictions on this to prevent the officers from using transport aircraft or engineering companies for commercial work. 

Even in an profit oriented company divisions like customer support are not designed to make an profit, even trough they make some money on stuff like premium support or consultant work their main purpose is customer satisfaction and have them stay with company. 

 

[tater]

The important distinction is the amount of entrepreneurship, speculation, whatever you want to call it.

Any business builds what they think there is a market for, and F9, Vulcan, NG all fit that bill. From a purely business POV, Starship dev started partially because of Mars, which is NOT a business POV (no plausible business case for Mars), and partially I think because they saw a combination of Starlink launches and future competition from NG as an issue to address. Cargo SS addresses both as reuse makes it cost effective, and it is capable of hauling any larger cargo designed to take advantage of NG's 7m fairing. Since new LV dev takes a number of years, they needed this to happen in advance of NG flying, so that even if NG flew first, they'd follow fast with a superior vehicle.

Getting a large bolus of money from NASA is gravy for SpaceX, but really does stop the others in their tracks. I assume BO goes forward with Blue Moon regardless, and perhaps they try and leverage that for a crew lander at some point.

[sh1pman]

45 minutes ago, tater said:

Starship dev started partially because of Mars, which is NOT a business POV (no plausible business case for Mars)

Has tourism for ultra-rich been ruled out?

[Jacke]

16 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

USSR was building T-72 for its own needs, no matter if somebody else buys.

The USSR designed the very complex T-64 for its own needs.  It was only used by them and the best client forces in East Germany and Hungary.  To increase the number of more modern tanks, as well as form a basis for an export model, they also built the T-72.

Quote

The T-64 is a Soviet second-generation main battle tank introduced in the early 1960s. It was a more advanced counterpart to the T-62: the T-64 served in tank divisions, while the T-62 supported infantry in motorized rifle divisions. It introduced a number of advanced features including composite armor, a compact engine and transmission, and a smoothbore 125-mm gun equipped with an autoloader to allow the crew to be reduced to three so the tank could be smaller and lighter. In spite of being armed and armored like a heavy tank, the T-64 weighed only 38 tonnes (42 short tons; 37 long tons).

These features made the T-64 expensive to build, significantly more so than previous generations of Soviet tanks. This was especially true of the power pack, which was time-consuming to build and cost twice as much as more conventional designs. Several proposals were made to improve the T-64 with new engines, but chief designer Alexander Morozov's political power in Moscow kept the design in production in spite of any concerns about price. This led to the T-72 being designed as an emergency design, only to be produced in the case of a war, but its 40% lower price led to it entering production in spite of Morozov's objections.

At present the T-64 is in use in very few nations or regions, but is currently undergoing significant factory overhauls and modernization in Ukraine. The newest, vastly upgraded and improved model of this 50-year-old design, the T-64BM Bulat, has increased in weight to 45 tonnes and is seeing active service in the field.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-64

The lessons from the past could also end up applying to current space industry.

Edited April 18, 2021 by Jacke

[tater]

3 hours ago, sh1pman said:

Has tourism for ultra-rich been ruled out?

To Mars?

Every single destination for humans in space needs to be constructed. There's no visiting Mars until someone builds something worth visiting on Mars. How much would you have to charge people to make that a worthwhile business model? Visiting Mars takes the "tourist" a min of what, 500-600 days (opposition). Not seeing much of a market. Hundreds of days in a tube for a month maybe on the surface, then back in the tube.

 

[RCgothic]

 

The thumbnail isn't a great view, but I'm sure they've attached even more heat shield tiles. I think they must be aiming to complete the rectangle of tiles before flight.

Edited April 19, 2021 by RCgothic

[tater]

Cislunar tugs have been talked about for many decades. SpaceX might actually be able to do them, IMO. I know they have not talked about it, but it makes a lot of sense.

Imagine SS with the curved nose gone some number of rings above the dome. The fairing is attached using the same hardware used to to dock 2 SS together at the tail—resulting in a tug that can dock nose to tail with another SS.

This allows a 2-stage SS in orbit. I'm unsure about the ability of such a tug to aerobrake, but it seems like it should potentially be possible, otherwise it has to re-circularize in LEO after putting the other SS into an eccentric HEO (shy of TLI) propulsively—luckily for an empty vehicle this is surprisingly cheap in props.

Such a vehicle could give a full SS with 100t cargo 2300 m/s and leave props for 100% propulsive recircularization. Now we have a SS headed for the Moon fully tanked, and it needs to provide only 900m/s for TLI (305t props) itself. That gives us a lunar SS with 895t of props remaining otw to the Moon (I'm using 100t for the dry mass, so if SS is less, then more props or more cargo).

Assume its a normal SS that can aerobrake or aerocaptuure. If the cargo was propellants, and this was a ballistic trajectory to NRHO, we can in fact deliver 995t to NRHO. Some is needed for the 450 ms burn—less than 15t from NRHO. So we have a tanker at the Moon with980t of propellants. If LSS is 85t, then that's ~9.4km/s dv. ~5.5km/s is needed for the RT to the surface from there. Returning LSS has residuals, so future resupply can sacrifice propellant for cargo, and none the less slowly build up the props in LSS to being filled.

[CatastrophicFailure]

33 minutes ago, tater said:

we can in fact deliver 995t to NRHO

Gateway starts to look reeeeealy silly tho, stuck there as a little dot amongst assorted docked Starships, each several times its mass... 

[tater]

8 hours ago, CatastrophicFailure said:

Gateway starts to look reeeeealy silly tho, stuck there as a little dot amongst assorted docked Starships, each several times its mass... 

At that point use another bespoke SS as gateway.

BTW, the tug can have a crew compartment.

The top dome is sleeved with a single ring. There are then 4 ~1.8m rings before the nose cone—7.2m. My suggestion would be a 2 ring tall crew compartment (3.6m), giving a habitable volume of 229m³ (~3X Shuttle crew volume). That leaves the "trunk" at the nose. That section mimics the engine skirt area, including all SS docking hardware (including prop transfer?). In the center is an IDA, so crew or cargo vehicles can also dock to it along the center line. Tucked along the sides? Possibly a robot arm—we're building a tug here:

\

EDIT: KSP quick versionThe top has a landercan stuck inside wirth a docking port on top to give an idea—yes, that's 9m in diameter. Engines in the skirt at the bottom.

This is a lower mass vehicle than LSS or SS, and can comfortably take crew on the 3 day trip to the Moon. You can use a frozen LLO, and take the propellant hit as well. The use of the Lagrange point family of orbits is not always a bad idea. Not sure on Earth-Moon phasing for something like NRHO vs a frozen, polar LLO.

Such a transfer vehicle could refill LSS, and deliver crew to it—crew put in LEO by existing crew vehicles at vastly lower cost than SLS/Orion. Both CC capsules were designed for 7 crew, and given that the tug will be in an ideal orbit for TX/FL launch, CCVs can do a rapid rendezvous in a few hours, so 7 crew is not a problem. We'd nearly double the Artemis astronaut count per mission.

Edited April 20, 2021 by tater