totm nov 2023 SpaceX Discussion Thread

[tater]

7 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

On yet another note - Starship Launched Starlink.

They're already looking to have a money-maker to pay for launch capabilities.

SpaceX Tips Gigabit Speeds for Starlink After Successful Starship Test | PCMag

Like... if this is real, and relatively soon... does this mean Falcon 9 retirement?  

 

*Relatively = relatively.  It was, IIRC, 2 years from Falcon 9 first launch to commercial worthiness and 9 before they started putting Starlink up.  If it's 2 years to put up commercial Starship... they might just have Big Starlink waiting to go.

Starlink V2 has always been an internal use for Starship. F9 sticks around for a while if for no other reason than Dragon—as landing people propulsively I think is a loooong pole.

[PakledHostage]

2 hours ago, darthgently said:

That is a lot of words just to make the blanket wetter.  You aren’t getting it.

[Wrings out blanket]

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

24 minutes ago, tater said:

Starlink V2 has always been an internal use for Starship. F9 sticks around for a while if for no other reason than Dragon—as landing people propulsively I think is a loooong pole.

Thanks for the reminder; It's late & I wasn't thinking about people, just stuff.

Re: Starlink - I've been so focused on seeing them get the durned thing to work, I'd forgotten they have a use for it outside of Mars & NASA.

Edited October 15 by JoeSchmuckatelli

[tater]

39 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Re: Starlink - I've been so focused on seeing them get the durned thing to work, I'd forgotten they have a use for it outside of Mars & NASA.

Yeah, they announced V2 (and that it was too big for F9, the current version is a "mini V2") a while ago. Meanwhile, the real reason is still... Mars:

"Since your handle is “Whole Mars”, perhaps this lengthy reply is apropos: Getting the cost per ton to the surface of Mars low enough that humanity has the resources to make life multiplanetary requires a roughly 1000X improvement in rocket & spacecraft technology.

Recent US Mars missions have had a cost per ton of useful load to the surface of Mars of about $1B. Moreover, it has become more, not less, expensive over time!

To build a city on Mars that can grow by itself likely requires at least a million tons of equipment, which would therefore require >$1000 trillion, an obviously impossible number, given that US GDP is only $29T.

However, if rocket technology can be improved by 1000X, then the cost of becoming sustainably multiplanetary would drop to ~$1T, which could be spread out over 40 or more years, so <$25B/year.

At that cost, it becomes possible to make life multiplanetary, ensuring the long-term survival of life as we know it, without materially affecting people’s standard of living on Earth.

Starship is designed to achieve a >1000X improvement over existing systems and, especially after yesterday’s booster catch and precise ocean landing of the ship, I am now convinced that it can work."

Edited October 15 by tater

[darthgently]

6 hours ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

On yet another note - Starship Launched Starlink.

They're already looking to have a money-maker to pay for launch capabilities.

SpaceX Tips Gigabit Speeds for Starlink After Successful Starship Test | PCMag

Like... if this is real, and relatively soon... does this mean Falcon 9 retirement?  

 

*Relatively = relatively.  It was, IIRC, 2 years from Falcon 9 first launch to commercial worthiness and 9 before they started putting Starlink up.  If it's 2 years to put up commercial Starship... they might just have Big Starlink waiting to go.

It would be cool if the F9 design could be licensed like the FN-FAL to allies, ITAR notwithstanding.  Once SpaceX reaches the point where that would make sense

[zolotiyeruki]

9 hours ago, tater said:

However, if rocket technology can be improved by 1000X, then the cost of becoming sustainably multiplanetary would drop to ~$1T, which could be spread out over 40 or more years, so <$25B/year.

In addition to everything else, I'm stoked about the idea of reusing stripped-down starships in space as the foundation for a space station.  Picture a bunch of stripped-down (no tiles, ablative, or even flaps) Starships docked to a central hub like wheel spokes.  The amount of volume for science or even space tourists would be spectacular.

[tater]

16 minutes ago, zolotiyeruki said:

In addition to everything else, I'm stoked about the idea of reusing stripped-down starships in space as the foundation for a space station.  Picture a bunch of stripped-down (no tiles, ablative, or even flaps) Starships docked to a central hub like wheel spokes.  The amount of volume for science or even space tourists would be spectacular.

One other implication of a 1000X reduction in their cost is that the launch market is not a thing that makes money if prices were to drop that much (that;s single-digit $ per kg). Just to maintain current revenue streams from launch will requires a 1000X increase in demand. This kills other launch providers completely, so I suppose SpaceX just charges about what they charge now, and pockets all the cash. Assuming anyone else is a fast follower, then prices drop substantially.

Odd to see people estimating that the launch market increases in total revenue—a 10X in revenues could be had with lower costs, and current prices, but should prices drop 1000X, it requires 10,000X demand increases (or just 10X whatever the drop ends up being).

Price drops can increase demand (asteroid mining?), but it's not at all clear that such a market will ever come to pass in the near future. Interesting times.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

2 hours ago, tater said:

the launch market is not a thing that makes money if prices were to drop that much

True- ish.  If the cost per kg drops precipitously, the market for "Stuff" goes up.  The 'launch market' becomes like the trucking and shipping industries; making money off of volume of tons shipped. 

The remarkable thing is that we might be seeing a moment akin to the Erie Canal.  Yep - the 'huh, wot, Erie Canal?!?' canal.  In its time it dropped shipping costs per ton-mile to the Great Lakes and Midwest by 90%.  It changed history; moving the most economically important city in the US from New Orleans to New York.  It changed how emigrants and Americans populated the continent.  It made the spread of industry to the interior financially feasible.   It created the conditions that enabled the North's dominance in the Civil War.  And today?  We barely think about it.

Musk wants SS to be as reliable and common as watching planes fly.  If he succeeds, we're in a whole new ballgame.

(...and if History is any guide, it could be decades before we realize the world has changed)

Edited October 15 by JoeSchmuckatelli

[Ricktoberfest]

Anybody else think it’s weird that we haven’t seen a rant from exoscientist yet?  Kinda miss him. He’s apparently been inactive for a couple weeks.  I mean it seems that his “engines need to be tested in the ground more” argument has gone up in smoke as there didn’t seem to be any engine outs during the entire test hop

[AckSed]

And on that note, new Eager Space vid:

tl;dw In the case of on-the-pad/just-past-launch failure, every 9 engines on your rocket, your overall reliability rises. Adding a tenth drops it down again, but not back to simply having 1.

Edited October 15 by AckSed
Corrections

[Exoscientist]

On 10/13/2024 at 2:49 PM, 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.

There was a notable fuel leak and flame on the outside of the booster during the landing burn. Perhaps this leak also extended into the engine bay?

  Bob Clark

[darthgently]

4 minutes ago, Exoscientist said:

There was a notable fuel leak and flame on the outside of the booster during the landing burn. Perhaps this leak also extended into the engine bay?

  Bob Clark

Have you looked into this at all before posting?  That was planned venting/safing of excess fumes from the quick disconnect port that happened to benignly ignite from landing plume.  No different than a drill rig burning off fumes.  The flow rate was low, planned, and safe by all accounts

Edited October 15 by darthgently

[CBase]

30 minutes ago, AckSed said:

tl;dw Every 9 engines on your rocket, your overall reliability rises

Actually the claim is only that booster reliability decreases when you add engines until it rises once you gain redundancy.

The magic number of 9 comes from the fact that falcon 9 has proven single engine redundancy (~ 8:00), which actually depends on T/W, spare fuel etc.. Expendable rockets have different math as they don't carry extra fuel for landing. And for higher counts it would be unlikely that all failures happen right after lift off. But by time of flight you gain redundancy as loss of thrust can be compensated by longer burn duration. His reliabilty curves for 15+ clusters will hardly reflect SpaceX risk estimations.

Edited October 15 by CBase

[darthgently]

3 minutes ago, CBase said:

Actually the claim is only that booster reliability decreases when you add engines until it rises once you gain redundancy.

The magic number of 9 comes from the fact that falcon 9 has proven single engine redundancy (~ 8:00), which actually depends on T/W, spare fuel etc.. Expendable rockets have different math as they don't carry extra fuel for landing. And for higher counts it would be unlikely that all failures happen right after lift off. But by time of flight you gain redundancy as loss of thrust can be compensated by longer burn duration. His reliabilty curves for 15+ clusters will hardly reflect SpaceX risk estimations.

Yeah, he was very rough and raw with the initial assumptions.  And kind of rushed past the multiple engine out margins

47 minutes ago, Ricktoberfest said:

Anybody else think it’s weird that we haven’t seen a rant from exoscientist yet?  Kinda miss him. He’s apparently been inactive for a couple weeks.  I mean it seems that his “engines need to be tested in the ground more” argument has gone up in smoke as there didn’t seem to be any engine outs during the entire test hop

You jinxed it, lol

Edited October 15 by darthgently

[darthgently]

3 hours ago, tater said:

One other implication of a 1000X reduction in their cost is that the launch market is not a thing that makes money if prices were to drop that much (that;s single-digit $ per kg). Just to maintain current revenue streams from launch will requires a 1000X increase in demand. This kills other launch providers completely, so I suppose SpaceX just charges about what they charge now, and pockets all the cash. Assuming anyone else is a fast follower, then prices drop substantially.

Odd to see people estimating that the launch market increases in total revenue—a 10X in revenues could be had with lower costs, and current prices, but should prices drop 1000X, it requires 10,000X demand increases (or just 10X whatever the drop ends up being).

Price drops can increase demand (asteroid mining?), but it's not at all clear that such a market will ever come to pass in the near future. Interesting times.

WRT mining, it would be interesting to start trying to wrangle some of these near earth asteroids when they become temporary moons of the Earth.  Seems like a good place to start anyway.  Start with the tiny ones, and move up.   Probably too late for the 20 meterish one currently looping around our planet until late November

https://www.astronomy.com/science/earth-gets-a-new-mini-moon-this-weekend/

Edited October 15 by darthgently

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

6 minutes ago, darthgently said:

WRT mining, it would be interesting to start trying to wrangle some of these near earth asteroids when they become temporary moons of the Earth.  Seems like a good place to start anyway.  Start with the tiny ones, and move up.   Probably too late for the 20 meterish one currently looping around our planet until late November

https://www.astronomy.com/science/earth-gets-a-new-mini-moon-this-weekend/

Much as I love the idea (and we've been over this ground before...) I don't see Asteroid Mining being profitable except for off-planet manufacturing.  Even if you brought back solid gold / diamond the cost per ton won't really shift the needle much on utility.

[Ricktoberfest]

47 minutes ago, darthgently said:

 

You jinxed it, lol

I don’t know if that was coincidence or not, but great timing!  As much as he annoys me it’s good to have dissenting opinion here. It just annoys me about how he never seems to see any good in all this, no matter what the accomplishment. 

[Exoscientist]

On 10/13/2024 at 3:27 PM, AckSed said:

I may be wrong about it being reentry heating, or only reentry heating: rewatching the ED stream, at 2 hours 30 minutes, when it's 38-32km up and moving 4330km/h, the glow of a fire spreads through the internal engine bay. This may just be trapped methane from engine chilldown.

 Could you give the time according to the launch time? It only went 1 hour 6 minutes from launch to Starship splashdown.

  Bob Clark

Edited October 15 by Exoscientist

[tater]

1 hour ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

True- ish.  If the cost per kg drops precipitously, the market for "Stuff" goes up.  The 'launch market' becomes like the trucking and shipping industries; making money off of volume of tons shipped. 

The remarkable thing is that we might be seeing a moment akin to the Erie Canal.  Yep - the 'huh, wot, Erie Canal?!?' canal.  In its time it dropped shipping costs per ton-mile to the Great Lakes and Midwest by 90%.  It changed history; moving the most economically important city in the US from New Orleans to New York.  It changed how emigrants and Americans populated the continent.  It made the spread of industry to the interior financially feasible.   It created the conditions that enabled the North's dominance in the Civil War.  And today?  We barely think about it.

Musk wants SS to be as reliable and common as watching planes fly.  If he succeeds, we're in a whole new ballgame.

(...and if History is any guide, it could be decades before we realize the world has changed)

Given the bold part (bolded by me), sure. That's a long way from SS/SH simply working reusably, though, and I think that I addressed it. Ie: if retail prices literally dropped from $1600/kg to $1.60/kg, for the launch market to be worth what it is right now they would need to move 1000X the commercial mass to space. That might happen—low cost creating new demand—but it will not be linear, and I don't think quick. The current market is pretty much LEO, and I'm not sure we even want to see 1000X as many sats per year as 2024, lol.

Now if it's actually as safe as aircraft—then the mass to space could be people. Even tourism works at those sorts of prices, with airline level safety.

So I agree at some level in the long term, it's very destabilizing in the short term to drop retail costs by, heck, even 10X, much less 1000X.

21 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Much as I love the idea (and we've been over this ground before...) I don't see Asteroid Mining being profitable except for off-planet manufacturing.  Even if you brought back solid gold / diamond the cost per ton won't really shift the needle much on utility.

I honestly don't know what the "killer app" is for spaceflight. That's why I'm actually OK with SpaceX wanting to colonize Mars (even if I personally think seriously considering it is absurd until someone does a spun up hab and raises a few generations of mammals at 0.38g to see how it works out). It means that they are will to simply light money on fire to build capability... which maybe bootstraps some other space economy.

Any ideas what might actually constitute a real space economy if the mining math doesn't close? I tend to think it's actually tourism—but again, that requires airline level safety to be a thing, and airline travel is astoundingly safe, an almost impossibly high bar for human spaceflight I think.

[darthgently]

26 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Much as I love the idea (and we've been over this ground before...) I don't see Asteroid Mining being profitable except for off-planet manufacturing.  Even if you brought back solid gold / diamond the cost per ton won't really shift the needle much on utility.

Who says it has to be returned to earth?

10 minutes ago, tater said:

would need to move 1000X the commercial mass to space

Well, Bezos, and many others, would like to move heavy industry to space for environmental reasons.  Seems like a pretty big market just to get that done

[tater]

23 minutes ago, darthgently said:

Well, Bezos, and many others, would like to move heavy industry to space for environmental reasons.  Seems like a pretty big market just to get that done

I tend to think we get there eventually—my point is that as a business, launch costs and new businesses coming about are a chicken and egg thing. Drop prices 1000X, and you either immediately get 1000X the customers, or you start burning money.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

56 minutes ago, tater said:

Any ideas what might actually constitute a real space economy

I enjoyed our previous discussions on this.  The key, IIRC, is the stages of how this goes. 

• Initially, LEO is king - with likely the killer app being worldwide uncensored fast access to the internet; that will be destabilizing and wonderful and same-as-it-ever-was all at once.  In other words - more of what we're already doing for less.
• Second, likely is a combo: national outposts/research projects of large scale & expenditure to proof concepts of just how to build something on the Moon/Mars/LEO given the new capabilities, with some billionaire tourism.  Continues the current meta , just more of it.  The speculators / entrepreneurs will likely jump in trying to wild-west some kind of new thing like early commercial mining; most will fail - some will get rich
• Third - we have places up in space that are stable: large stations with manufacturing / science that offer real-world applications down in the gravity well and the stations/outposts become something like self-sustaining either through tourism or something new we haven't figured out yet.
• We're a solar-system species living on multiple rocks and pray we don't Motie ourselves.

[Ultimate Steve]

Testing Testing, is this thing on?

[Elthy]

We are back, finaly!

One thing that happened during the outage: SpaceX posted a video of the landing of starship:

https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/1g6rio6/ship_30_performing_the_flip_and_burn_manoeuvre_in/

Edit: And just as i was posting this, another 502 -.-

[Spaceception]

On 10/15/2024 at 12:33 AM, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

On yet another note - Starship Launched Starlink.

They're already looking to have a money-maker to pay for launch capabilities.

SpaceX Tips Gigabit Speeds for Starlink After Successful Starship Test | PCMag

Like... if this is real, and relatively soon... does this mean Falcon 9 retirement?  

 

*Relatively = relatively.  It was, IIRC, 2 years from Falcon 9 first launch to commercial worthiness and 9 before they started putting Starlink up.  If it's 2 years to put up commercial Starship... they might just have Big Starlink waiting to go.

Okay. So it looks like the forum ate my reponse since I replied right before the forums went down. Luckily, I can see the first part of it in my email notifications. So I'll try to reconstruct/expand it now.

But, while Falcon 9 may stop launching Starlink in the near-term future to trade off with Starlink, Falcon 9/Heavy still has plenty of payloads left to fill its manifest, particualrly from government contracts. And those will likely last the longest. It both depends on how much it costs to launch Starship vs Falcon 9/Heavy (currently ~$100 million a stack or so, before the profit margin), and what's being launched to where. LEO/GTO will be the first to be displaced by Starship since those don't require refueling, followed by GEO for select payloads where refueling is an option (dedicated depot in orbit for commercial missions?). Interplanetary will likely take the longest, and may involve a kick stage like Impulse's Helios.

I think it'll take until the 2030s for Falcon 9/Heavy to be put on the path for retirement, with government contracts making up the last flights. But we could very well see Starship overtaking Falcon 9 in annual flights before the end of the decade, between taking over for Starlink, flying the occasional comm/govt mission, and performing refueling missions for Artemis, that'll add up quickly.  By that point, Falcon 9 will begin to wind down as contracts are shifted over, or exclusively signed to Starship.