RedKraken Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 (edited) Little Falcon Test Ship ..... I can imagine how nervous his engineers were about testing launch and reentry on an expensive 9m Ship. They can smash up a few little falcons without breaking the bank. I am a little disappointed we didn't get to see a methane F9 on a new methane pad at KSC. Using the f9 tooling and whatever design/plumbing mods it needed for autogen press and methane rcs. Would have been very cool. Edited November 7, 2018 by RedKraken Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CatastrophicFailure Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 12 minutes ago, Nightside said: Will it be a working upper stage or just a test bed? it should be able to at least get a few Starlinks into orbit. Just drag brakes and a “light weight” heatshield shoukd be a pretty small mass penalty, so I would imagine it’s fully functional, at least for lighter LEO payloads (like Dragon). One thing’s for sure, til they get the bugs out, it’s gonna be amusing as heck to watch this thing belly flop into the ocean from orbit the first few times. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nightside Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 (edited) 4 minutes ago, CatastrophicFailure said: Just drag brakes and a “light weight” heatshield shoukd be a pretty small mass penalty, so I would imagine it’s fully functional, at least for lighter LEO payloads (like Dragon). One thing’s for sure, til they get the bugs out, it’s gonna be amusing as heck to watch this thing belly flop into the ocean from orbit the first few times. Can Mr Steven catch it? It should have a lot more control authority than a fairing... Edited November 7, 2018 by Nightside Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedKraken Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 9 minutes ago, Nightside said: Can Mr Steven catch it? It should have a lot more control authority than a fairing... Too heavy? A fairing half is about 1 tonne. This thing could be 4-5 tonnes? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sh1pman Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 11 minutes ago, Nightside said: Can Mr Steven catch it? It should have a lot more control authority than a fairing... Much heavier as well... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedKraken Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 (edited) This mockup from purpleefilth on r/spacex I would rename it : "Calm yourselves...its just a test" link https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/9v2j0d/elon_musk_mod_to_spacex_tech_tree_build_falcon_9/e98wqtk Edited November 7, 2018 by RedKraken Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CatastrophicFailure Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 1 hour ago, Nightside said: Can Mr Steven catch it? It should have a lot more control authority than a fairing... Much heavier, going a lot faster (no parachute, So terminal velocity), and the MIMMS* Steve-O is way more expensive to fix than a barge if it goes wrong. *His Imperial Martian Majesty has mentioned the “bouncy house” idea before, tho if it’s just for data gathering I’d be surprised if there’s a real effort to recover it (intact) at all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Toonu Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 I haven't been at SpaceX news feed for some time and just saw that Falcon 9 with BFR there, is it current plan to test the BFR or is it just fake? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nightside Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 16 minutes ago, Toonu said: I haven't been at SpaceX news feed for some time and just saw that Falcon 9 with BFR there, is it current plan to test the BFR or is it just fake? That pic is fake, but check the previous page for the new plans Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NSEP Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 (edited) 18 minutes ago, Toonu said: I haven't been at SpaceX news feed for some time and just saw that Falcon 9 with BFR there, is it current plan to test the BFR or is it just fake? I think they really want to make a Small Falcon Spaceship, they also had plans to do a second stage reuse, so why not do both at once? Apperently this isn't going to be the reuse, just a test. Edited November 7, 2018 by NSEP Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sh1pman Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 55 minutes ago, CatastrophicFailure said: Much heavier, going a lot faster (no parachute, So terminal velocity) Maybe it’ll have a parafoil. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xd the great Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 16 minutes ago, sh1pman said: Maybe it’ll have a parafoil. Probably not. The parafoil for fairings is already a super duper pain in the ***. SpaceX has failed quite a number of times with its world class engineerers. And the empty stage weights much more than a fairing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CatastrophicFailure Posted November 7, 2018 Share Posted November 7, 2018 27 minutes ago, sh1pman said: Maybe it’ll have a parafoil. Like XD said, too heavy, too much mass penalty. SpaceX doesn’t have a good history with chutes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted November 8, 2018 Share Posted November 8, 2018 It's really a test of TPS at orbital velocities. The stage is still gonna take a swim. If the goal is to analyze the returned stage, then maybe it pops a chute, then gets fished out of the water (or they could even drop it someplace like WSMR here in NM). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted November 8, 2018 Share Posted November 8, 2018 I expect this to be a VERY simple addition to the stock stage 2. Some fins (they already fly fins on Dragon), a canard, and added TPS. Maybe a chute on the up side of the fairing adapter (more TPS). They can add this to existing launches (perhaps a Starlink would be a good first one), then gather real life data on EDL specifics at orbital speeds. Stage can also just impact if they have enough sensors on it, though it will be at terminal velocity sideways, not burning up. Why? Because adding stuff to a paid for launch (even one of their own launches for Starlink) and gathering data is cheaper, and easier than trying it full sized. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SuperFastJellyfish Posted November 8, 2018 Share Posted November 8, 2018 3 hours ago, Xd the great said: Probably not. The parafoil for fairings is already a super duper pain in the ***. SpaceX has failed quite a number of times with its world class engineerers. And the empty stage weights much more than a fairing. I think they are having trouble because the fairing itself is flopping around all the way down. A rigid body spacecraft with fins and a parafoil is a piece of cake. The X-38 used one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CatastrophicFailure Posted November 8, 2018 Share Posted November 8, 2018 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted November 8, 2018 Share Posted November 8, 2018 The talk where this video is from: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted November 8, 2018 Share Posted November 8, 2018 12 hours ago, tater said: Note that the BFS (BFR dev ship) they are testing (next year, hopefully) only needs to go supersonic for this testing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spaceception Posted November 8, 2018 Share Posted November 8, 2018 Has anyone posted this? An interview with Elon Musk, that touches on SpaceX as well as his other companies. Full https://www.recode.net/2018/11/2/18053428/recode-decode-full-podcast-transcript-elon-musk-tesla-spacex-boring-company-kara-swisher Condensed https://www.recode.net/2018/11/2/18053424/elon-musk-tesla-spacex-boring-company-self-driving-cars-saudi-twitter-kara-swisher-decode-podcast Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sh1pman Posted November 8, 2018 Share Posted November 8, 2018 (edited) Meaning that F9 can now launch Mars rovers, interplanetary probes, etc. For reference, F9 can send 4t to Mars, and MSL spacecraft (carrying Curiosity) had a mass of 3.9t. I'm not sure if F9 can launch nuclear materials, though. Edited November 8, 2018 by sh1pman Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted November 9, 2018 Share Posted November 9, 2018 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chel Posted November 9, 2018 Share Posted November 9, 2018 12 minutes ago, tater said: Cool! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rakaydos Posted November 9, 2018 Share Posted November 9, 2018 On 11/7/2018 at 5:55 PM, tater said: I expect this to be a VERY simple addition to the stock stage 2. Some fins (they already fly fins on Dragon), a canard, and added TPS. Maybe a chute on the up side of the fairing adapter (more TPS). They can add this to existing launches (perhaps a Starlink would be a good first one), then gather real life data on EDL specifics at orbital speeds. Stage can also just impact if they have enough sensors on it, though it will be at terminal velocity sideways, not burning up. Why? Because adding stuff to a paid for launch (even one of their own launches for Starlink) and gathering data is cheaper, and easier than trying it full sized. It cant be too simple- in order to be a reasonable heat shield test, it has to match balistic coefficent with a much larger BFS. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted November 9, 2018 Share Posted November 9, 2018 24 minutes ago, Rakaydos said: It cant be too simple- in order to be a reasonable heat shield test, it has to match balistic coefficent with a much larger BFS. No it doesn't, it merely needs to provide data that they can scale I would imagine. He said June. They are not doing anything terribly complicated to F9 by June. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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