SpaceX Falcon Heavy

[Frozen_Heart]

Well, the Falcon Heavy benefits from the booster staging, i.e. it looses dry mass early and thus gains extra dV. Especially if fuel crossfeeding is enabled (yes, FH is actually expected to be able to do that).

It also needs less development because you're just reusing existing, fully developed cores instead of making a new one from scratch.

But you are right, it definitely has many advantages as well. I can easily see such a rocket existing sometime in the 2020's.

Would the Raptors higher ISP make up for the fact it keeps the dry mass longer?

[Kryten]

The payload is probably some science mission bound for the outer planets...probably Saturn...and Titan(or Enceladus)...or maybe Jo- I mean Jupiter and Europa..hopefully with some sort of lander. Nasa was able to afford this mission due to the reduced costs of launch so they could spend more on the probes itself..right? right??? I can dream...

The projected budget for Europa Clipper-excluding launch, and with a huge effort made to reduce costs-is $1.5 billion. Even the most expensive launch system on the planet (D4H) would add about an extra third to that.

Edited January 27, 2015 by Kryten

[Technical Ben]

If the Raptor cannot be throttled, it does not land.

But as a single use rocket, yes your idea is great.

Also if you have one failure one the single-core landing sequence you get 0% re-usability, whereas even if you have an explosive barge failure with the three-core F9H you still can recover the other booster.

Failure rates do not work that way for recovery averages. Less items/objects means less overall failures. More items/objects means longer continuous use.

Thus, for a mission/profile that allows for small failures, you can have many (see 9 engines per cluster, with up to 2 or so failures and still a "success").

But only 3 or less individual stages for recovery, with preferably 1-2 as the less rockets to land, the less "crash" when a mistake happens.

For an example of this, Google have some good numbers on failure rates of HDDs. Too many and you end up with more failures than your providing backups to. Too few and you get more failures and loose data/up time.

I would assume it's the same for the rockets. Too many (3 or more stages) and things get complicated, too few (one big single stage) and you loose a lot in a failure. Though I may be wrong, as some design ideas are going up to like 6 boosters!

Edited January 27, 2015 by Technical Ben

[Frozen_Heart]

If the Raptor cannot be throttled, it does not land.

That's a fair point. Like trying to land a rocket in KSP using only Z and X!

However as the Raptor is designed for use with the (still theoretical) MCT which is designed to land, I assume they are building it with at least some throttling capability.

[Camacha]

That's a fair point. Like trying to land a rocket in KSP using only Z and X!

I can tell from experience that this actually works wonderfully well. I doubt that a real engine can be turned on and off so rapidly and reliable though, so it is still a no go.

[How2FoldSoup]

The projected budget for Europa Clipper-excluding launch, and with a huge effort made to reduce costs-is $1.5 billion. Even the most expensive launch system on the planet (D4H) would add about an extra third to that.

You say a third like that's not a significant cost. That brings the total price to $2 billion to which the launch cost is more like a quarter of the entire cost of the mission. Now Congress comes in demanding cuts so they have to cut the budget of said budget by 10%...which would leave $300 million for the launch provider. It's still a hefty sum but the point I was trying to make is that they can launch larger payloads for cheaper(which is obvious) and if Nasa spends less money on launch costs it leaves more money for other things.

[AngelLestat]

Lol, all this last week I was searching all the data that I could find from Falcon Heavy.

Because I made few days back a similar copy for KSP stock kerbin, buy I was not sure the size of the boosters or the fly pattern that each stage follows. In fact I read that the booster would be a bit longer.

I knew that my falcon 9 imitation had similar payload to orbit (reusable and max version) and my falcon heavy too.

This was not Real solar system mod, so it was a terrible comparison, but even with that I had the hunch that longer booster as we can see in the page had no sense.

http://www.spacex.com/falcon-heavy

Now I am happy to notice than in the video the boosters has the same size. than the center core.

This is my imitation with procedural parts:

I imagine that the center core first stage, would separate before reach orbit speed, then it would use the remaning fuel to boost at prograde and complete the turn over earth to go back at base. Meanwhile the second stage would finish the burn to orbit.

It has more sense for the GTO case, when the first center core stage reach orbit, and then the second stage goes to gto and then go back.

Edited January 28, 2015 by AngelLestat

[Robotengineer]

That is awesome. If they can reuse all 3 of the cores, how much would that shrink costs?

[Rakaydos]

That is awesome. If they can reuse all 3 of the cores, how much would that shrink costs?

Well, it means they're losing 1 engine per launch- the upper stage engine. With 27 lower stage engines, firing 3-4 times per flight, you will run into needing engine overhauls more than you need to replace disposed-of engines.

If they dont reuse the core, they get 3 launches out of each booster- First launch as a LFB, second launch as the other LFB of the next launch (with a new lFB on the other side), third launch an an expendable core. (with the slightly used LFB on one side, and a new LFB on the other)

[Nibb31]

That is awesome. If they can reuse all 3 of the cores, how much would that shrink costs?

Reusing only saves the manufacturing cost of the stage, which is only a small part of the total launch cost. All the other costs associated to operating a launch service and maintaining the infrastructure and R&D remain. You still have to pay for the R&D, logistics, integration, facilities, mission control, marketing, and administrative overhead. As long as SpaceX hasn't done several cycles of actual reuse, we can't really have any idea of the actual operational costs.

A wildly optimistic estimate is that reusing the first stage of the Falcon 9 might save 20% on the total cost. That could bring the price of a F9 launch down from $60 million to $50 million. On the Falcon Heavy, reusing a single core as planned, would save you much less than that. Reusing all three cores might save you a little bit more.

But as has already been noted, reuse of the central core isn't realistic at this stage, and it might not be possible to recover both of the side cores.

Also note that the Falcon Heavy has the same problem as SLS: the lack of payloads. There aren't any 50 ton payloads in the pipe, so there is no market for it. Science institutions don't have the budgets to design large missions like that and the commercial comsat market uses standardized satellite platforms that are smaller but launcher-agnostic, which is a major cost-saver. Developing a larger commercial satellite bus that is tied to a single launcher brings some additional cost and additional risk that comsat operators might not be willing to take.

The capacity of the Falcon Heavy is a bit of a game changer that requires customers to change their game too, and we aren't seeing any of that emerging.

Edited January 28, 2015 by Nibb31

[Albert VDS]

Reusing only saves the manufacturing cost of the stage, which is only a small part of the total launch cost. All the other costs associated to operating a launch service and maintaining the infrastructure and R&D remain. You still have to pay for the R&D, logistics, integration, facilities, mission control, marketing, and administrative overhead. As long as SpaceX hasn't done several cycles of actual reuse, we can't really have any idea of the actual operational costs.

Where did you get the information that building a rocket is the smallest part of the whole operation?

[Frozen_Heart]

For starters, the landing area shown has multiple pads only because those are emergency divert pads. The proposal that SpaceX put forth for the area calls for one single central landing pad (with surrounding emergency divert options) that will be for landing one single core only. As such, only one of the FH side boosters will be able to return. No future expansion proposals are in the works, and even this current one hasn't been approved yet (much less started any construction).

I'm pretty sure that they will find a way around this eventually. It would be pretty pathetic if the entire reusable rocket industry was stalled due to only having one big concrete square rather than two.

There aren't any 50 ton payloads in the pipe, so there is no market for it.

If the heavy is flying reusable it won't capable of doing 50 tons. The satellites it will be launching will be a similar weight to that of an expendable Falcon 9.

[magnemoe]

Where did you get the information that building a rocket is the smallest part of the whole operation?

Note that SpaceX has an backlog on launches, if they can reuse stages they will be able to launch more often.

And the idea of only landing one of the falcon heavy boosters would be insane.

Its more likely that they are not at the stage of planning for booster recovery yet, first they need to get the single core down.

And the Falcon heavy boosters would be perfect for recovery, they drop early and the falcon heavy has lots of capacity and will seldom has to lift 50 ton.

[Nibb31]

Where did you get the information that building a rocket is the smallest part of the whole operation?

Not the smallest, and nobody has the exact numbers, but an educated guess suggests that the actual manufacturing process of the first stage isn't the most expensive part of launching a rocket.

The biggest cost factor is probably the R&D. And even in the manufacturing process, the largest cost factor isn't the raw materials to build the rocket, it's the workers. By reusing rockets, you need less of them, but you still need to maintain a factory and a decent workforce to run it, so you don't necessarily make huge savings there. And the manufacturing workers are only a small part of your total workforce. The highest salaries are in the R&D and mission control departments. And you are still going to need hundreds of people to do all the logistics, transportation, payload integration, testing, and other administrative work. There is also the cost of maintaining facilities. Launch sites, research centers, factories, mission control centers, aren't cheap.

So, even if the actual hardware is 50% of the total launch cost, the first stage is probably around 70% of that, which would make it 35% of the total launch cost (not the price!). The price of a launch, is $60 million, so to simplify, let's consider that the cost without reusability is around $50 million, so you save $17 million on each reusable launch. If you reuse your first stage 10 times, it brings the average cost of a launch down to around $36.5 million ((1x50+9x33)/10), which results in saving about 30%.

But that is a highly optimistic estimation. It assumes zero refurb cost, zero transport, and a constant unit price for the actual reusable unit. It also assumes 10 time reuse, which is also optimistic.

Don't forget that the cost of each unit increases as you reduce the number of units produced. If a factory is sized to produce 400 engines/year and you only build 40, then your costs are not optimized. Your fixed costs take a larger part of your total costs and ou also don't get large volume discounts from your suppliers. So your unit cost increases, which also eats into the savings that you might get compared to launching 400 disposable engines. There is a balance to be found somewhere, and until SpaceX has some real data about the recovery and refurbishing costs in an operational environment, nobody really knows how much reusability will save.

So it's more likely that in the end, you're looking at something like the 20% figure I quoted above. Conveniently, when applied to the public launch price, it brings the $60 million figure down to $50 million, which is what SpaceX was charging last year.

Edited January 28, 2015 by Nibb31

[FishInferno]

Note that SpaceX has an backlog on launches, if they can reuse stages they will be able to launch more often.

And the idea of only landing one of the falcon heavy boosters would be insane.

Its more likely that they are not at the stage of planning for booster recovery yet, first they need to get the single core down.

And the Falcon heavy boosters would be perfect for recovery, they drop early and the falcon heavy has lots of capacity and will seldom has to lift 50 ton.

Hopefully SpaceX will have succeeded in landing a first stage before the FH demo flight. Even if they haven't yet, I don't see how booster recovery is any different than a F9 first stage, other than the fact that there are two boosters at once.

[AngelLestat]

Where did you get the information that building a rocket is the smallest part of the whole operation?

Nibb31 gets his info from a cookie fortune

Elon Musk said that is even possible to reduce their actual cost in a 1/100 with a full reasuable program. And I believe that.

Most of the saving cost comes with the manufacturing costs, the testing cost and how fast you can launch the next rocket.

A stage core that you launch and goes back, it means that it works fine, so it does not need months of testing, just maintenance.

Your developing cost is not taken into account in the launch cost. Because that money comes from investments.. And if you reach a new step in your development, then you attract new investors that would paid the profits of old investors plus the new ones.

[shynung]

Elon Musk said that is even possible to reduce their actual cost in a 1/100 with a full reusable program.

A cost reduction of 1% is hardly significant.

[Kryten]

Nibb31 gets his info from a cookie fortune :)Elon Musk said that is even possible to reduce their actual cost in a 1/100 with a full reasuable program. And I believe that.

Most of the saving cost comes with the manufacturing costs, the testing cost and how fast you can launch the next rocket.

Think. What are manufacturing or testing costs? Mostly salaries. Can they stop they paying these salaries? No because their 'vertical integration is god' business strategy means all of the people involved are SpaceX employees, and they'd lose the ability to test or manufacture rockets. It costs just as much to pay people to sit on their arses and not build a rocket as it costs to pay them to build one, and it costs just as much to maintain the factory; so where the hell are these 99% savings supposed to come from?

Edited January 28, 2015 by Kryten

[Frozen_Heart]

One of the reason SpaceX is expecting quite high cost reduction is because they have much lower company overhead then other companies. There are very few unnecessary paid staff compared to companies such as Boeing.

This makes the cost of building the actual rocket proportionally higher than comparable businesses.

[AngelLestat]

A cost reduction of 1% is hardly significant.

if your cost is 1 and you reduce that by a factor of 100, then your new cost is 1/100

Think. What are manufacturing or testing costs? Mostly salaries. Can they stop they paying these salaries? No because their 'vertical integration is god' business strategy means all of the people involved are SpaceX employees, and they'd lose the ability to test or manufacture rockets. It costs just as much to pay people to sit on their arses and not build a rocket as it costs to pay them to build one, and tt costs just as much to maintain the factory; so where the hell are these 99% savings supposed to come from?

your are forgetting of the extra launch you get by year. Also the rockets has a lifetime, after 5, 10 or 40 times you need to make new ones. Then you also need workers for new prototypes (developement cost), so you dont need to fire anyone because your company is grown up very fast.

You can also sale engines to different agencies.

[Kryten]

your are forgetting of the extra launch you get by year.

That was Beal's mistake, and Hannah's, and the Sea Launch consortium's, and Lockheed Martin's more than once. Because launch is almost never the majority cost of a space program, 'built it and they will come' simply does not work. Your program lives or dies based on other market forces pushing up payload numbers, and all the ones that have been tried so far have ended up in the 'dead' camp when the next recession hit.

[Frozen_Heart]

Your program lives or dies based on other market forces pushing up payload numbers, and all the ones that have been tried so far have ended up in the 'dead' camp when the next recession hit.

I suspect that SpaceX is thinking along similar lines. With their satellite manufacturing and internet I think that they are trying to push up the use of space to make their own rockets more economical. No idea if it will work though...

[AngelLestat]

sattellites and spacecraft are very expensive just because launch cost are expensive..

There is no point to make a spacecraft that worth 1 millon if your launch cost worth 100 millon.

The same for a 100 millons spacecraft if the launch cost is 1 millon. In those cases you make spacecraft a lot cheaper, if they fails, you launch another.

They does not need to be perfect in efficeincy, because with the new cost you can launch 50 of them.

With these cost, new markets arise, and Elon musk would control all the space markets, that is even more important than the profit you get for each launch.

[Kryten]

The same for a 100 millons spacecraft if the launch cost is 1 millon. In those cases you make spacecraft a lot cheaper, if they fails, you launch another.

They does not need to be perfect in efficeincy, because with the new cost you can launch 50 of them.

Don't talk nonsense. The ITU is sure as hell not going to give anybody 50 slots on the Geosync ring, and nobody is going to pump in the extra infrastructure cost to support a system of fifty sats rather than a few. You're making the same mistake a lot of space enthusiasts do; focusing exclusively on launch. Payloads, ground infrastructure, ITU regulations, potential customer base, insurance costs; all these raise issues that are at least as important as launch costs. Assuming changing launch costs alone would fundamentally change the market is a mistake many have made before, to their detriment.

[Nibb31]

One of the reason SpaceX is expecting quite high cost reduction is because they have much lower company overhead then other companies. There are very few unnecessary paid staff compared to companies such as Boeing.

Yes, and those savings have already been applied. SpaceX is about as lean as it can be, which makes trimming more overhead off even harder.