totm nov 2023 SpaceX Discussion Thread

[AckSed]

Booster 12 is being slowly lowered down, and its carriage (transport stand) awaits.

Can I just say that of all the things that happened, the rocket nozzles glowing red-hot from reentry underlined how violent it was.

[tater]

I started thinking about a Starship staging off the nose again. A small upper stage—part of the curved nosecone—staging off the aero cover on a docking port, and with a 10% dry mass, 100 tons of props, and a single Rvac could meet Orion in LEO—with a 10 ton, comanifested payload—and fly that stack all the way to LLO with 400 m/s of margin to deal with boiloff/disposal. More payload if it's just going to Gateway and Orion is braking there.

A 200 ton props class upper stage can get Orion, plus an entire lander (BO/Dynetics/whatever) to LLO.

Both these work with zero refilling operations. Orion to LEO with NG. So assuming NG flies soon, SLS is a total waste of time.

[AckSed]

7 minutes ago, tater said:

I started thinking about a Starship staging off the nose again. A small upper stage—part of the curved nosecone—staging off the aero cover on a docking port, and with a 10% dry mass, 100 tons of props, and a single Rvac could meet Orion in LEO—with a 10 ton, comanifested payload—and fly that stack all the way to LLO with 400 m/s of margin to deal with boiloff/disposal. More payload if it's just going to Gateway and Orion is braking there.

A 200 ton props class upper stage can get Orion, plus an entire lander (BO/Dynetics/whatever) to LLO.

Both these work with zero refilling operations. Orion to LEO with NG. So assuming NG flies soon, SLS is a total waste of time.

"Off the nose"? What's that, a stage on top of the Starship?

[tater]

 

[darthgently]

I have no “likes” left so this is a note to blanket-like all posts in this topic today.  

Did any other older guys get a flashback to the Moon landing?  This was huge and historic.  The after shocks will be socially reverberating for awhile and the implications for space exploration just amplified magnificently.

I completely forgot about Starship for about 20 minutes because the booster landing saturated my wetware completely.  Starship performed amazingly also, but that catch.  Just wow.

[tater]

3 minutes ago, darthgently said:

Did any other older guys get a flashback to the Moon landing?  This was huge and historic.  The after shocks will be socially reverberating for awhile and the implications for space exploration just amplified magnificently.

Yeah, actually. My memory of Apollo 11 is incredibly vague—more about a bunch of people at the house (I was 4)—later Apollos I watched as well (all of them, my mom was super into it), and I remember the coverage, the different newscasters, etc. Hard since the video has been reused so often what's real and what I'm conflating with later rewatches I can't say. Shuttle I remember clearly, watched many early launches, and it was astounding to watch. This is absolutely up there with Apollo/Shuttle IMHO.

[darthgently]

Freight train to orbit, bay-bee.  This has been so long coming, and I don’t mean just the SpaceX phase.  The Moon landing was incredible, but mostly symbolic.  If the Moon missions were like Lewis and Clark, this more like transcontinental railway industrial strength epic, almost.  Half the track has been laid today, now it is just time and persistence.  The technology has been shown feasible by and large

 

26 minutes ago, darthgently said:

 

Tater said:
Yeah, actually. My memory of Apollo 11 is incredibly vague—more about a bunch of people at the house (I was 4)—later Apollos I watched as well (all of them, my mom was super into it), and I remember the coverage, the different newscasters, etc. Hard since the video has been reused so often what's real and what I'm conflating with later rewatches I can't say. Shuttle I remember clearly, watched many earlylaunches, and it was astounding to watch. This isabsolutely up there with Apollo/Shuttle IMHO.

I was 7 yo, but I remember it.  Older brothers made sure I fully appreciated it explaining stuff and pointing things out.  I’m certain that memories of later landings are mixed in there, but the tension when Armstrong was going down the ladder is unforgettable and singular

 

Edited October 13 by darthgently
Quoting broke so had to intervene

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

I got to share it with my wife and kids.  They're not as into this stuff as I am - but Wife appreciates what just happened as historic.

Kids, on the other hand, have watched a LOT of rocket landings with me - so basically, since they've been paying attention, landing a rocket propulsively falls into the category of stuff "Humans Can Do".  Thus, for them, it was cool, but not really getting the Historic vibe.  More like an iteration of the already feasible.

It's an interesting take on the different viewpoints.

I'm shouting "We just caught a falling BUILDING!!!" and they're like "Okay, Daaaad, like yeah, of course they caught it... that was the plan."

[PakledHostage]

2 hours ago, tater said:

 

The contrail at 22 seconds in the second video is interesting.  FlightRadar24 doesn't show anything in that part of the sky so it was probably military (without ADS-B enabled). There was a NASA WB-57 Canberra up at 44000 feet, but it was in the wrong part of the sky, relative to the pad. (Sunrise was at 99 degrees true, and the contrail was north of that.)

There was a Texas Department of Public Safety King Air out over the water, but it was down at 3300 feet, and there were a whole bunch of GA aircraft sightseeing from the margins. (I wouldn't have wanted to be up there with them, with everyone looking at the rocket and nobody looking out for other air traffic... fortunately nobody hit each other.)

[darthgently]

The valuation of SpaceX has to be punching through multiple estimated ceilings after this.

Edited October 13 by darthgently

[Minmus Taster]

 

[tater]

1 hour ago, AckSed said:

"Off the nose"? What's that, a stage on top of the Starship?

I mean the "payload" section (or even just part of it) as a stage 3

[Codraroll]

47 minutes ago, darthgently said:

I have no “likes” left so this is a note to blanket-like all posts in this topic today.  

Did any other older guys get a flashback to the Moon landing?  This was huge and historic.  The after shocks will be socially reverberating for awhile and the implications for space exploration just amplified magnificently.

I completely forgot about Starship for about 20 minutes because the booster landing saturated my wetware completely.  Starship performed amazingly also, but that catch.  Just wow.

I'm not sure if I'd break out the Apollo 11 comparisons, but it might still be up there with some of the earlier Apollo launches. It was a tech demonstrating mission, which certainly demonstrated some awesome tech. But we're still not quite at the point where the tech is *used* for a purpose other than to make sure it's working. We're seeing a big space freighter on a test run, demonstrating it can indeed get out to sea and return to dock, but it's still running with an empty hold.

Hopefully, the next mission will see it delivering something to orbit. And maybe putting Starship somewhere it can be recovered too? Or at the very least, dismantled and inspected?

[tater]

 

6 minutes ago, Codraroll said:

I'm not sure if I'd break out the Apollo 11 comparisons

Not in terms of importance, for sure, but in terms of... vibe? Dunno, the landings have a science fiction sensibility about them that is just next level even with Falcon. I suppose early Apollo test flights might be more accurate—but I don't remember those.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

13 minutes ago, tater said:

 

Not in terms of importance, for sure, but in terms of... vibe? Dunno, the landings have a science fiction sensibility about them that is just next level even with Falcon. I suppose early Apollo test flights might be more accurate—but I don't remember those.

Probably missed this upthread - but what's the fire above the engines?  Positioned so it looks like it might be part of the control systems - like a gas thruster or something.

Also - with the fire burning after catch, the next thing that catches the eye is all the LOX condensation, suggesting quite a bit of LOX remaining in tank - and the possibility of a catch, burn, boom scenario.

...which begs the question; how do they safely discharge unused fuel/LOX?

[darthgently]

16 minutes ago, Codraroll said:

I'm not sure if I'd break out the Apollo 11 comparisons, but it might still be up there with some of the earlier Apollo launches. It was a tech demonstrating mission, which certainly demonstrated some awesome tech. But we're still not quite at the point where the tech is *used* for a purpose other than to make sure it's working. We're seeing a big space freighter on a test run, demonstrating it can indeed get out to sea and return to dock, but it's still running with an empty hold.

Hopefully, the next mission will see it delivering something to orbit. And maybe putting Starship somewhere it can be recovered too? Or at the very least, dismantled and inspected?

Agreed.  But the main achievement today was popping a big cluster of pessimism bubbles.  The number of people that now think SpaceX is on to something just expanded by orders of magnitude.

[tater]

8 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Probably missed this upthread - but what's the fire above the engines?  Positioned so it looks like it might be part of the control systems - like a gas thruster or something.

Looks like the CH4 vent, it ignited away from the vent once mixed with enough air I guess.

10 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

...which begs the question; how do they safely discharge unused fuel/LOX?

Yeah, needs addressing. The plus is the vehicle is back on the OLM, and they are moving a transporter to take it back to the barn and study it—recovering vehicles will massively increase the rate of improvement.

[darthgently]

39 minutes ago, Codraroll said:

I'm not sure if I'd break out the Apollo 11 comparisons,

Also, to clarify, I am definitely talking vibe as Tater noted.  If you watched Apollo 11 as a kid it might click more.  If doing a historical analysis it is different.  Apollo was Lewis and Clark.  That booster catch is like the first real freight locomotive combined with track laid halfway to California.  The implications of Lewis and Clark was big.  The implications of the transcontinental railroad were vastly bigger.

[tater]

14 minutes ago, darthgently said:

Also, to clarify, I am definitely talking vibe as Tater noted.  If you watched Apollo 11 as a kid it might click more.  If doing a historical analysis it is different.  

This. Absolutely. I was commenting merely on my feelings of rocket launches I have seen vs this one, not my thoughts. Emotional reaction.

[AckSed]

Zoom in on the flamey end of the booster:

Spoiler

That is not a happy engine bay; that is glowing red-hot, with several fires outside the engines and distorted nozzles on the boost engines.

Maybe the retropropulsive burn needs reinstated.

[darthgently]

19 minutes ago, AckSed said:

Zoom in on the flamey end of the booster:

  Hide contents

That is not a happy engine bay; that is glowing red-hot, with several fires outside the engines and distorted nozzles on the boost engines.

Maybe the retropropulsive burn needs reinstated.

Maybe.  The other angle is that even in those hellish conditions: zero relight failure, zero engine failures at all.  But yeah, to last multiple reuses probably turning it dow from 11 to 10 or so might be a good move.  

[tater]

 

[magnemoe]

1 hour ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Probably missed this upthread - but what's the fire above the engines?  Positioned so it looks like it might be part of the control systems - like a gas thruster or something.

Also - with the fire burning after catch, the next thing that catches the eye is all the LOX condensation, suggesting quite a bit of LOX remaining in tank - and the possibility of a catch, burn, boom scenario.

...which begs the question; how do they safely discharge unused fuel/LOX?

As for discharging, simplest might be to put it back on stand for unloading.  Now all the fire in the medium ring, pretty sure they are burning methane there. It might be an standby flow so its faster to spin up some of these engines if needed.  And would want fuel reserves trying this the first time. 

[darthgently]

2 minutes ago, tater said:

 

Flight-Proven, Taxpayer-Friendly Boosters™️

[Spaceception]

Both of SpaceX SHLV's will be flying a day apart. I can't wait for Europa Clipper.

Seriously, 2030 is crazy - but I guess I have a goal. Finish my Bachelor before Europa Clipper arrives at Jupiter  (I've only been taking 4 classes a semester, might bump it up)