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SpaceX Discussion Thread


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23 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

The idea was not that. The idea is that somebody in NASA wants to have a NASA Corp, so SpaceX is a good protege.

As well as Axiom.

@tater's Pauli quote pretty much sums it up. Maybe it works this way in Russia, but not here.

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7 minutes ago, CollectingSP said:

if you want something in a wonky orbit, or you want to send a mission far out into the solar system, pick ULA’s expendables, as they are better for that. Just look at how many missions spacex has sent outside of LEO. One? Two?

Centaur.

Centaur is an epic rocket stage. I wish ACES was still on the table. I wish Atlas Heavy had been a thing, and the old ULA cislunar stuff was very well thought out. I think the problem is what I said above, the literal mission of the different companies. Making money is great (money is fine stuff, collect as much as possible!), and because they have shareholders, it's not just the goal, it's a duty.

SpaceX and Blue Origin simply do not have that constraint (assuming BO ever does anything interesting). If there was a large market for 150t to LEO, ULA could come up with something to compete. ULA is not in a position to build something crazy like that with the idea, "If you build it, they will come." They can't. Back when NASA was talking about crazy heavy lift vehicles in the 60s and 70s, the ULA parent companies (including smallers ones those 2 absorbed) designed some incredible things. No funding came, so they were never tried.

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4 minutes ago, SOXBLOX said:

Maybe it works this way in Russia, but not here.

It works everywhere, just for different money. Just let's don't start the theme of overpriced military contracts known from the "here"'s press.

Edited by kerbiloid
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Just now, kerbiloid said:

It works everywhere. Just let's don't start the theme of overpriced military contracts known from the "here"'s press.

NASA doesn't have enough money to have a pet rocket company. Their budget is TINY.

The NASA budget is about the same as the budget for the New York public school system—not the State of NY, the city.

 

 

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5 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

It works everywhere. Just let's don't start the theme of overpriced military contracts known from the "here"'s press.

That's a broad statement...

My side: SpaceX competed for and fairly won a contract which enabled them to move on. SpaceX is not a " NASA Corp."; it is not beholden to NASA except for its contract obligations. And, as tater says, they're not in this market for profit.

Out of curiosity, what part of this do you not agree with?

2 minutes ago, tater said:

The NASA budget is about the same as the budget for the New York public school system—not the State of NY, the city.

Is that legit!?!? LOL! I had no idea! Obviously tons of money to be gotten here, folks! Tens of billions of dollars of handouts, for everyone with a sketch of a rocket! :lol:

Edited by SOXBLOX
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Just now, SOXBLOX said:

Out of curiosity, what part of this do you not agree with?

I'm not aware of personal influence of NASA staff in the contract distribution, including the non-NASA ones, and see no need to turn this thread into investigation.
USA money, USA problems.

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3 minutes ago, tater said:

No, I stand corrected. City of NY school budget is $34B. Way more than NASA.

I'm laughing so hard because just days ago someone told me we should stop wasting so much money on useless things like NASA. I'mma go tell 'em this...

1 minute ago, kerbiloid said:

I'm not aware of personal influence of NASA staff in the contract distribution, including the non-NASA ones, and see no need to turn this thread into investigation.
USA money, USA problems.

Then why did you bring....y'know what, never mind.

Edited by SOXBLOX
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Related to Raptor production at the end of 2019 Musk tweeted:

Obviously 2020 might have thrown a bit of a monkey wrench into that, so they are behind on the 1 per day, and closer to 1 every other day. So they think 1 every 48 hours is slow.

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Just now, SOXBLOX said:

I'm laughing so hard because just days ago someone told me we should stop wasting so much money on useless things like NASA. I'mma go tell 'em this...

Yeah, the NASA budget is not really a big deal. The entire annual global commercial launch market is smaller than the NASA budget, too. Amazon collects over a billion $ a day as a reference.

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Just now, tater said:

Yeah, the NASA budget is not really a big deal. The entire annual global commercial launch market is smaller than the NASA budget, too.

The salary of a concrete human is not necessary the measure of his influence in contract distribution.

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I'd add that it's why I complain about other space programs that don't pony up money. Everyone wants their ride to the Moon, then they throw in some little thing from their space program representing countries with a combined GDP similar to the US, with a space program budget that is 1/6 the size.

I think Albuquerque spends a couple billion on the school system here per year (about half the ESA budget).

Just now, kerbiloid said:

The salary of a concrete human is not necessary the measure of his influence in contract distribution.

Because former NASA people don't also work at Boeing, LockMart, Northrop Grumman, etc, ad nauseum? I'd not even try to venture a guess at the way the Russian space industry works.
 I don't know people in it, and I don't get the system in general there.

 

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4 minutes ago, tater said:

I think Albuquerque spends a couple billion on the school system here per year (about half the ESA budget).

The way ESA is right now is how I fear NASA will end up soon, with them only training astronauts and occasionally building probes to other planets. SLS is, in my opinion, a big 40 billion dollars grave on what NASA was at the time the Shuttle started flying

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21 minutes ago, Beccab said:

The way ESA is right now is how I fear NASA will end up soon, with them only training astronauts and occasionally building probes to other planets. SLS is, in my opinion, a big 40 billion dollars grave on what NASA was at the time the Shuttle started flying

Meh, it's a few billion a year over many years. It's break room money for government entities.

The LA public schools spend about as much as NASA per year.

(second largest school system in the country)

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2 hours ago, YNM said:

2 miles away from another country at that... hope they have good CEP if they do...

What about the oil-rig launchpads ?

If it gets to the point where they are launching ICBMs at aerospace industry facilities, it probably doesn't matter, as it will be full scale nuclear war and there will be no government left for Mexico to complain to anyways.

As for the oil rigs, while it would be nice if a submarine were to happen upon them coincidentally and sink them with conventional torpedoes, they probably don't matter too much to be targeted deliberately. What is important is the factories. A floating launch pad will be worthless if there are no rockets to launch.

This made me think of something. If SpaceX and Blue Origin complete their goals and bring about space colonization, it is going to cause some major strategic problems. If the industry is in space, nuclear strategy becomes partially obsolete as a good portion of the enemy industry and population would survive nuclear attack. Industries could be moved to Mars as well. Even if colonization of Mars proves moot, automated, humanless (or staffed with a small number of human caretakers) factories could be built.

Combined with orbital SDI-style ABM systems (which would be easy to construct with Starship), in theory it makes an American nuclear first strike a very tempting prospect in the eyes of another competitor state. I wonder if anyone in any government has thought about such implications (because unlike in most science fiction stories, nuclear deterrence and conflict across the world will likely be still around by the time space colonization were to succeed (if it is successful)) or whether they are betting A) SpaceX and BO will fail or B) war will come before they even launch the preliminary Starship derived habitats and end modern civilization along with its high technology.

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2 hours ago, SOXBLOX said:
2 hours ago, tater said:

No, I stand corrected. City of NY school budget is $34B. Way more than NASA.

I'm laughing so hard because just days ago someone told me we should stop wasting so much money on useless things like NASA. I'mma go tell 'em this...

I'm laughing reading the thread about the SenateLaundrySystem (notice, that's not me who called it so) and telling that things work different way.

Anyway, as I said before, it ain't of my business how do they spend their money. Just I don't believe the faery tales.

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1 hour ago, kerbiloid said:

I'm laughing reading the thread about the SenateLaundrySystem (notice, that's not me who called it so) and telling that things work different way.

Why bring up SLS in a SpaceX thread? One is a program dictated by Congress and the other is a commercial company. I don’t get your message. SpaceX doesn’t have powerful senators and representatives who order NASA to buy Falcon launches. On the contrary, when SpaceX won the HLS contract, we saw a torrent of negativity from those politicians, even from one representing Texas, if I remember correctly.

Edited by sh1pman
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6 minutes ago, sh1pman said:

SpaceX doesn’t have powerful senators and representatives who order NASA to buy Falcon launches. 

I doubt that, i think its more probable they are not being open about it just YET, the time will come and it will be glorious for various reasons.

Edited by Serenity
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6 hours ago, tater said:

They are building Starlink to make money—so they can make giant rockets. Failing to realize this difference will really confuse the way you read the situation.

Would be pretty cool honestly to think your ISP is building rockets.

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7 hours ago, SpaceFace545 said:

I honestly doubt that anyone will nuke an offsea launchpad, that just seems impractical. Spacex also isn’t affiliated with any country, it’s private. Starship and their future endeavors don’t really have a nationality.

Snark - during the Cold War, the Rooskies targeted the US military industrial complex, including all the private companies that benefited from our fascination with the USSR.  

When it comes to a war of mutual destruction - you don't have to be practical, you just need to make sure that you don't miss something important. 

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6 hours ago, SunlitZelkova said:

This made me think of something. If SpaceX and Blue Origin complete their goals and bring about space colonization, it is going to cause some major strategic problems. If the industry is in space, nuclear strategy becomes partially obsolete as a good portion of the enemy industry and population would survive nuclear attack

Progress is always dangerous to humans - it upsets the status quo. 

 

 

... 

 

 

 

Upset humans always seem to be doing something dangerous to gain or maintain status. 

 

Edited by JoeSchmuckatelli
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