SpaceX BFR Discussion.

[Streetwind]

I'm fairly confident that the booster section will remain being named "Big Falcon Rocket". It just has been called that for too long, it already kinda stuck. Plus, Elon loves himself some trollish wordplay.

The spacecraft section, on the other hand, doesn't really have a name yet, and it definitely qualifies for one. It'll probably get a general name, like "Magic Space Thing", and each individual spacecraft will get an individual name like any maritime ship would. You'd have "the Magic Space Thing class spacecraft, Heart Of Gold".

Now what I'd want to put in the place of Magic Space Thing? I don't know. Traditionally SpaceX has named its manned spacecraft after dragons. But that "tradition" is limited in the sense that there's only really one spacecraft named after Puff The Magic Dragon as a joke, plus an uncreative "v2" for its followup. Still, maybe... Wyvern? Which is a close relative to dragons, specifically known for having wings and flying around a lot.

Not sure that that's a good name for a civilian transport, though. So maybe they'll not bother trying to follow the extremely limited tradition, and just name it something else entirely. Maybe Elon's love for dad jokes will be tickled by naming it after the largest bird of prey imaginable, the Roc, not just because it's extremely large and SpaceX likes using birds of prey, but also because "it rocks!"   Or maybe it'll get an utilitarian name in the spirit of the now-discarded "interplanetary transport system". Or something related to Mars. Who knows...

[Nibb31]

Roc is already taken by Stratolaunch.

I agree that it should be a bird of prey, like Merlin, Falcon, Kestrel, Raptor, etc... "Harrier" would be good, as it's a big bird and a nod to the vertically landing jump jet. Also rimes with "carrier".

My favorite is "Lammergeier", just to troll most people who won't be able to spell it properly. It's also big and ugly, which fits pretty well.

Edited March 16, 2018 by Nibb31

[Green Baron]

Lämmergeier, actually Lammergeier is an anglification, anglicism, angwhatever :-)

If you meant the bearded vulture ...

[magnemoe]

Makes me wonder how they will transport this thing on land. just getting it to the pad will be an challenge, 
Not as hard as moving the N1 because they say they will mate first and second stage at pad. 
They need to move it from pad to hangar for more intensive maintenance too assuming they go for the plan to land back on pad. 
If they need they better have multiple pads as they will have a landing fail someday.
They would need to transport the upper stage to and its not much smaller.

[Streetwind]

My favorite solution, which sadly will never ever happen, is "suborbital hop from Hawthorne to Brownsville"  

[kerbiloid]

Moby Dick.

Because:
- big head with jaws (cargo version) and/or oil (tanker version)
- hitchhiker's guide
- big and white
- BFR

Edited March 16, 2018 by kerbiloid

[YNM]

49 minutes ago, magnemoe said:

Makes me wonder how they will transport this thing on land.

Their assembly area is just "a throw of rock" away from the pad. It's not like S-V.

[kerbiloid]

2 hours ago, Green Baron said:

Lämmergeier

Jǫrmungandr or Miðgarðsormr

(a reptile, too, like birds, dragons and raptors)

Edited March 16, 2018 by kerbiloid

[Green Baron]

13 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

(a reptile, too, like birds, ...)

A classification as valid as saying that mammals are fish.

From a phylogenetic point of view all vertebrates have a common ancestor, but a finer grained classification is more than useful for every day use.

[kerbiloid]

Spoiler

1 minute ago, Green Baron said:

mammals are fish

mammals are hairy amphibia, they are not fish

While birds are post-dynos

 

[Green Baron]

1 minute ago, kerbiloid said:

  Hide contents

mammals are hairy amphibia, they are not fish

 

Mammals are not amphibians. Amphibians need water for reproduction (hence the name: they have an ambiguous life between land and water) because of the construction of their eggs. In the end mammals stem from amphibians, which stem from fish, which and so on until you arrive at chemistry, supernovae and star evolution.

Or are you just joking ? I never know ... :-)

[kerbiloid]

8 minutes ago, Green Baron said:

Or are you just joking ? I never know ... :-)

I mean, they are counterpart of reptiles in amphibian ancestry.

[YNM]

35 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

mammals are hairy amphibia, they are not fish

Only in Down Under I think.

[sevenperforce]

I would say Sinosauropteryx, since this was the first obviously-non-avian raptor positively identified as having feathers and thus being a close relative of modern birds, but that doesn't exactly roll off the tongue.

I do like T. rex but again, same problem.

What about Tyrannosaur?

2 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

  Hide contents

mammals are hairy amphibia, they are not fish

While birds are post-dynos

 

Birds are dinosaurs. Theropods, to be precise. There is no definition of "dinosaur" which does not apply to birds unless you get intentionally arbitrary.

Mammals are not hairy amphibians; we are hairy synapsids. Synapsids and amphibians are both tetrapods, but synapsids are not amphibians.

[tater]

I think a name that is a nod to science fiction is more likely.

It reminds me of trying to make consistent names in KSP, I just can't manage it. The Culture novels use pretty generic, descriptive class names (General Systems Unit, etc), then the ships name themselves in pretty whimsical ways. Musk is a fan, and hence I think that ITS was a nod in that direction, even if they never liked it. This vehicle is definitively not for that sole purpose, so a "General" might be in there. Course it's also likely small to Musk (GSUs house a planet full of people, after all).

General Orbital Vehicle (GOV)?

Medium Orbital Vehicle (MOV), Medium System Vehicle/Unit (MSV/MSU)?

He might stay away from Culture stuff, as that's the ASDS naming structure.

 

 

[Bill Phil]

General Transport Vehicle? He did propose using it in an airline like capacity...

[justidutch]

Instead of birds or dragons, why not fish?

First up could be: Muskellunge

[NSEP]

4 hours ago, Bill Phil said:

General Transport Vehicle? He did propose using it in an airline like capacity...

General Transport Vehicle sounds like something i have in my garage to use everyday to get to work or school. Like a car or a bicycle. And although having a gaint rocket in my garage for going to school would be very cool indeed, i would still prefer using my bicycle rather then getting alot of noise complaints.

[Bill Phil]

15 minutes ago, NSEP said:

General Transport Vehicle sounds like something i have in my garage to use everyday to get to work or school. Like a car or a bicycle. And although having a gaint rocket in my garage for going to school would be very cool indeed, i would still prefer using my bicycle rather then getting alot of noise complaints.

Yeah, but usually those can't go to space...

[Mitchz95]

Knowing Elon, I highly doubt he'd go for something "boring" like General Transport Vehicle. Maybe he won't go all-out like with The Boring Company, but a sci-fi reference seems very much appropriate here.

Edited March 17, 2018 by Mitchz95

[YNM]

10 hours ago, Bill Phil said:

General Transport Vehicle

Hmm...

[Mitchz95]

57 minutes ago, YNM said:

I wonder if someday we'll have a BFR serving as Air Force One.

Edited March 17, 2018 by Mitchz95

[kerbiloid]

Spoiler

2 hours ago, Mitchz95 said:

I wonder if someday we'll have a BFR serving as Air Force One.

Who'll be a Rocketman then?..

(not politics)

 

[Wjolcz]

Do you guys think BFS might do orbital hops from LA to Florida, or at least to the Mexican Bay?

If they are building a factory on water near Hawthorne then they will either have to transport it by water to Boca Chica/Florida (through Panama canal?) or simply fly it. Knowing their tendency to do R&D whenever possible to save time and costs that would be a great opportunity to do R&D AND transport the BFSs to the launch site. Basically partially flight-proving them before refuelling and putting on boosters.

The only problem is it would have to fly over the continental US and AFAIK that's a big no. Russians do it (and sometimes drop the boosters on villages) but they don't really have much choice. Now since BFS would be hopping and landing in one piece they might allow it to fly over relatively unpopulated areas, no?

Edited March 17, 2018 by Wjolcz

[PB666]

How do the plan to get BFR from Texas to its launch sites?