totm nov 2023 SpaceX Discussion Thread

[tater]

 

[zolotiyeruki]

11 hours ago, tater said:

Never gets old.

I've heard in the past that the first stage's trajectory  initially just misses the ASDS, and that it corrects during the landing burn once everything is nominal, but it seems like in this clip, it was headed toward the ASDS from the get-go.  Am I seeing something incorrectly?  Maybe the correction happened before that clip started?

[tater]

18 minutes ago, zolotiyeruki said:

I've heard in the past that the first stage's trajectory  initially just misses the ASDS, and that it corrects during the landing burn once everything is nominal, but it seems like in this clip, it was headed toward the ASDS from the get-go.  Am I seeing something incorrectly?  Maybe the correction happened before that clip started?

It comes down at an angle, so it's sort of hard to tell—and in that latest landing, the cloud deck is also really low.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

This stuff is so big... That it looks small. 

 

[sevenperforce]

28 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

This stuff is so big... That it looks small. 

It was definitely good to see a white cloud of water vapor instead of a brown cloud of concrete debris.

[tater]

 

[Pthigrivi]

Have we seen shots of the deluge plate post-static fire? Seems like its okay?

[darthgently]

2 hours ago, Pthigrivi said:

Have we seen shots of the deluge plate post-static fire? Seems like its okay?

Your post reminded me to look around for some news but I can't find any.  If I had to guess, if the deluge plate and concrete escaped entirely unscathed I'd wager that SpaceX would have released an image by now to soothe ppl.  Since they haven't,  who knows? 

Or maybe they are just too busy to worry about soothing ppl.  I'm dying to know and would appreciate some soothing, but will try to be patient in an unentitled state of mind, lol

[tater]

 

[tater]

23 hours ago, Pthigrivi said:

Have we seen shots of the deluge plate post-static fire? Seems like its okay?

 

[tater]

2.5 hours:

 

[Nuke]

On 8/8/2023 at 4:48 PM, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

This stuff is so big... That it looks small. 

 

now if only we could get a guy to stand on top of it while holding a banana. should totally be done for the scientific value of having one standard banana in frame. 

[tater]

choice of cameras

live, btw

Go

[Brotoro]

Entry burn funtime

Booster sure does slow down fast in the air. How many Gs it it pulling?

Landed!

Such a dainty touchdown.

[darthgently]

7 hours ago, Brotoro said:

Entry burn funtime

Booster sure does slow down fast in the air. How many Gs it it pulling?

Landed!

Such a dainty touchdown.

Partially outside the circle darn it

[Pthigrivi]

4 hours ago, darthgently said:

Partially outside the circle darn it

Yeah when was the last time they actually biffed a landing and lost a booster? I can't even remember. 

[Terwin]

Just now, Pthigrivi said:

Yeah when was the last time they actually biffed a landing and lost a booster? I can't even remember. 

Weren't the last 2 unintentional booster losses due to rough seas causing it to fall over before it got back to shore?

I have not been paying close attention, but those are the last two that I remember.

[Pthigrivi]

1 minute ago, Terwin said:

Weren't the last 2 unintentional booster losses due to rough seas causing it to fall over before it got back to shore?

I have not been paying close attention, but those are the last two that I remember.

Yeah google is telling me they lost a couple in 2019 and 2020 to rough seas, but I think the last one was an unexpected engine shutdown in 2021, 2 and half years ago. Wild. 

[Geonovast]

The only biffed landings I can remember recently were the two that lost an engine on the way up, and one ended up missing because of bad wind data being uploaded to the booster on its way back down.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Falcon_9_and_Falcon_Heavy_launches (81, 83, 108)

The rough seas one was Arabsat 6A Falcon Heavy.  The center core landed, but the octograbber wasn't configured for the Falcon Heavy core yet (it's different than the Falcon 9 Solo/Side booster config).  So it tipped over from rough seas. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Falcon_9_and_Falcon_Heavy_launches_(2010–2019) (FH2).  Every other Falcon Heavy launch either failed landing or intentionally expended the center.  (First test flight had insufficient Tea-Teb), and the STP-2 mission had a heatshield burn through that damaged the TVC.

As far as I know, that booster (1055) is the only one that landed successfully and then was lost during the recovery process. 

I believe the only other Block 5 landing failure was B1050, which had a gridfin get stuck on descent and soft landed in the water just offshore.  I mean, it landed... just not where it was supposed to.

[Exoscientist]

On 8/8/2023 at 8:48 PM, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

This stuff is so big... That it looks small. 

 

 

 A four engine shutdown after only 2.7 seconds is not reassuring. Also, we were misled before by a 5 second static test prior to the first test launch that it was safe.  The only way to be sure is a static test burn of actual full flight duration and at full thrust.

   Bob Clark

Edited August 12, 2023 by Exoscientist

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

2 hours ago, Exoscientist said:

The only way to be sure is a static test burn of actual full flight duration and at full thrust

Which they can do at altitude over the Gulf, IIRC 

Edited August 11, 2023 by JoeSchmuckatelli

[tater]

2 hours ago, Exoscientist said:

 A four engine shutdown after only 2.7 seconds is not reassuring. Also, we were mislead before by a 5 second static test prior to the first test launch that it was safe.  The only way to be sure is a static test burn of actual full flight duration and at full thrust.

This is nonsense.

Where was the SLS full duration static fire? Not the Green Run, that was not in fact under the thermal loads the RS-25s actually experience, since there were not 2 huge SRBs next to them. If a full duration static fire is required, any vehicle needs to be clamped down the the SRBs firing.

The only reason for full thrist static fires aside from engine testing is to test the pad—which only needs to deal with full thrust for a few seconds.

Edited August 11, 2023 by tater

[darthgently]

3 hours ago, Pthigrivi said:

Yeah when was the last time they actually biffed a landing and lost a booster? I can't even remember. 

Seriously.  It has gotten to the point where if it isn't a near bullseye it seems like a "miss".  It's relative I suppose.  I can't even remember the last time a foot was outside the circle

[Exoscientist]

8 hours ago, tater said:

This is nonsense.

Where was the SLS full duration static fire? Not the Green Run, that was not in fact under the thermal loads the RS-25s actually experience, since there were not 2 huge SRBs next to them. If a full duration static fire is required, any vehicle needs to be clamped down the the SRBs firing.

The only reason for full thrist static fires aside from engine testing is to test the pad—which only needs to deal with full thrust for a few seconds.

 The point is the 5 second burn was not diagnostic of the problems that would arise in the first test flight. It also didn’t diagnose how many engines would fail during an actual flight burn, eight of them with two actually exploding.

 THIS is how a static burn is supposed to be done:
 

 

 SpaceX should stop dismissing the lessons of Apollo and learn from them.

   Bob Clark

[tater]

21 minutes ago, Exoscientist said:

The point is the 5 second burn was not diagnostic of the problems that would arise in the first test flight. It also didn’t diagnose how many engines would fail during an actual flight burn, eight of them with two actually exploding.

 THIS is how a static burn is supposed to be done:

Why?

Fly it, instead. They have a barn full of them.