SpaceX

[bknight]

Wrt?

[schlaugh]

Wrt?

With Regard To...

[docmordrid]

Boca Chica launch site

Looks like the orbital launch table's skeleton, which would attach to the top of those 6 massive legs built last fall.

20210224_164804.jpg

https://twitter.com/MTrider16/status...57880398495753

[Zartan]

You may keep up with this tabulation more closely than I, but Googling the heavy results in 3 launches one recovery.

As said, the booster landed successfully but subsesquently fell overboard, so I am not counting it as 'successful recovery', obviously.

Gateway launches will surely be fully expendable, no?

[docmordrid]

As said, the booster landed successfully but subsesquently fell overboard, so I am not counting it as 'successful recovery', obviously.

Gateway launches will surely be fully expendable, no?

Don't know yet. FH can deliver about 90%* of an expendables performance by expending only the center core and catching the boosters on two droneships, this not counting any Merlin improvements they've made since 2017 when those numbers were posted. NASA's spec is for a loaded Dragon XL to mass14 tonnes tops.

*
57 tonnes to LEO vs. 64 tonnes
24 tonnes to GEO vs. 26.7 tonnes
15.2 tonnes to Mars vs. 16.8 tonnes

[bknight]

As said, the booster landed successfully but subsesquently fell overboard, so I am not counting it as 'successful recovery', obviously.

Gateway launches will surely be fully expendable, no?

So if a booster landed successfully on the drone ship and then started into port and some difficulty with the drone ship caused the booster to fall over, you're classifying as a failure. You really need to get a grip on reality.

[Zartan]

So if a booster landed successfully on the drone ship and then started into port and some difficulty with the drone ship caused the booster to fall over, you're classifying as a failure. You really need to get a grip on reality.

Yes it's a booster recovery failure, what else? We have to look at the performance of the entire system, not just individual parts of it. Now with improvements, it maybe don't happen again.

[docmordrid]

SN-10 static fire #2: pad clear

[docmordrid]

Static fire 2. With good data they may fly SN-10 this week.

https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight/...73626588999695

[docmordrid]

FAA Operations Plan Advisory for Feb. 26 includes a SpaceX Starship launch,

https://www.fly.faa.gov/adv/adv_spt.jsp

[schlaugh]

FAA Operations Plan Advisory for Feb. 26 includes a SpaceX Starship launch,

https://www.fly.faa.gov/adv/adv_spt.jsp

Mind translating this please? Also the plan is for February 27 so I think the posted link may be outdated.

[docmordrid]

Launch is a moving target. New TFRs for March 1-3 (Mon-Wed)

@nextspaceflight
SpaceX is targeting no earlier than Monday, March 1 for Starship SN10's test flight, per the latest Temporary Flight Restrictions. Additional opportunities are available on March 2 and 3.

https://twitter.com/nextspaceflight/...15166213074947

[docmordrid]

SN-10's flight termination system has been installed. Looks like a flight early in the week.

[docmordrid]

StarLink 20 launch in 30 minutes

#8 flight for this booster

https://youtu.be/DpsrExXlQrA

[docmordrid]

Abort at T-01:24

Next opportunity tomorrow at 2015 Eastern

[docmordrid]

Eastern time is + 1 hour

Mary @BocaChicaGal
Feb 28, 2021
I have just been notified that I have to evacuate tomorrow for a possible Starship SN10 launch attempt. Happy to oblige
@NASASpacefligh

Attachment 25926

https://twitter.com/BocaChicaGal/sta...70535416238085

[docmordrid]

SpaceX gets a $8,499,489.00 USAF Research Laboratory award,

"...to refine thermal protection system manufacturing technologies to enable low-cost, high volume production of next generation TPS."

Wondering if this is to help develop a TPS (thermal tiles) for Starship, the reason being DoD's high interest in it as a rapid Earth Point-2-Point military transport? Basically, hauling 80-100 tonnes of cargo 10,000 km in <30 min without a first stage booster, or further with one.

https://beta.sam.gov/opp/5cf429cfee9...ve=true&page=1

[Roger E. Moore]

Crew-2 on schedule for April launch while next Starliner flight delayed. The Crew-2 mission, a flight of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft carrying astronauts from NASA, the European Space Agency and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency to the station, remains on track for a launch no earlier than April 20, agency officials said at a briefing.

https://spacenews.com/crew-2-on-sche...light-delayed/

[docmordrid]

SN-10

Road closures for March 3-5 (Wed - Fri)

Eastern time = +1 hour

SN-10 MARCH 3-5.jpg

[Trebuchet]

So if a booster landed successfully on the drone ship and then started into port and some difficulty with the drone ship caused the booster to fall over, you're classifying as a failure. You really need to get a grip on reality.

Yes it's a booster recovery failure, what else? We have to look at the performance of the entire system, not just individual parts of it. Now with improvements, it maybe don't happen again.

And they only lost the upper half. The lower half, with pretty much all the expensive bits, came back into port.

[docmordrid]

A Falcon 9 booster failed to land after its most recent launch Feb. 15 because of “heat damage” it sustained, but a SpaceX official said he was confident that the boosters can be reused 10 or more times.

https://spacenews.com/spacex-blames-...n-heat-damage/

On the recent failed recovery,

the failed booster landing has a cause; one of the engine's flexible boot sprung a hole, hot gases got in and took out said engine.

This did not occur during re-entry but on the way uphill, so at first it was an engine-out situation - a successful one. After S2 separation the booster flipped to do the entry burn, but the failed engine was one of the 3 engines used for the entry burn. Oops.

Now that they've ID'ed this boot issue, consider it one more mole whacked.

[docmordrid]

Boca Chica Village and surrounds may be be reincorporated as the City of Starbase, Texas.

SpaceX informed the County govt a few days ago.

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1366859619461570561

[publiusr]

[QUOTE=docmordrid;2531970
Wondering if this is to help develop a TPS (thermal tiles) for Starship, the reason being DoD's high interest in it as a rapid Earth Point-2-Point military transport? [/QUOTE]

To some, that might smell too much like the ABMA troop rocket concept of nearly a half-century ago. Redstones and Jupiters killed in favor of the USAF Thors and Titans.
More likely-the Blue Suits and their spooky friends want Elon to test a new TPS for the next Groom Lake hot rod with Skylon jets, a fraction of Starship's payload, and a lovely set of wings...because-AIR FORCE!
Now with any luck at all, I am wrong-and space advocates are a little more in charge of their own affairs...so perhaps Space Force will survive longer than the ABMA did. I wish Medaris could have met Elon. But the Marines were pushing for a Hot Eagle on steroids concept called SUSTAIN a decade or two back-so there is more friendly support of rocketry now that conventional forces do so poorly against submariners in every wargame of which I am aware-sorry Big Don:-)
I do hope the tests go well, but I wil miss the bare metal look as Starship reaches puberty and starts sporting that dirty, five o' clock tile look that the 1980s Shuttles shared with Don Johnson. Can't keep cute forever.

[Nicolas]

On the recent failed recovery,

the failed booster landing has a cause; one of the engine's flexible boot sprung a hole, hot gases got in and took out said engine.

This did not occur during re-entry but on the way uphill, so at first it was an engine-out situation - a successful one. After S2 separation the booster flipped to do the entry burn, but the failed engine was one of the 3 engines used for the entry burn. Oops.

Now that they've ID'ed this boot issue, consider it one more mole whacked.

Maybe also add some code to use alternative engines for descend when there is a relevant engine out on ascent?

[Roger E. Moore]

Starship lunar mission by 2023: SpaceX will fly its deep-space rocket Starship in orbit "many, many times before 2023" and will take 12 people around the moon that year, the company's founder and CEO Elon Musk announced on Tuesday. "It will be safe enough for human transport by 2023 -- it's looking very promising," Musk said in a video announcement with Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa.

https://www.spacedaily.com/reports/M..._2023_999.html

[Darrell]

Maybe also add some code to use alternative engines for descend when there is a relevant engine out on ascent?

If I remember correctly not all the engines have the ability to restart. They start the Merlin engines with a shot of TEA-TEB. At launch all of the 1st stage engines are started using ground equipment. From what I recall they've designed the restart system as a separate add on "module" that can be added, or not, to any engine. Whatever the case, apparently only 3 of the 9 engines have the ability to restart. They could change that presumably, but no doubt there are constraints, for example mass.

[Roger E. Moore]

SpaceX’s Starship SN10 will attempt to launch – and nail the landing – as early as Wednesday, after passing all the pre-launch requirements. Weather conditions held the launch from an initial target of Monday and will continue to be the main factor in determining the target T0 on Wednesday.

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2021...ll-boca-chica/

[cjameshuff]

If I remember correctly not all the engines have the ability to restart. They start the Merlin engines with a shot of TEA-TEB. At launch all of the 1st stage engines are started using ground equipment. From what I recall they've designed the restart system as a separate add on "module" that can be added, or not, to any engine. Whatever the case, apparently only 3 of the 9 engines have the ability to restart. They could change that presumably, but no doubt there are constraints, for example mass.

I think it's largely a safety/handling issue. TEA-TEB is toxic, its smoke is hazardous, and it ignites spontaneously on contact with air, water, or liquid oxygen. Landing with a bunch of unused TEA-TEB fluid on the vehicle is not ideal.

[schlaugh]

Looks like SN10 may go shortly. Currently they're venting methane and the next step is engine chill followed by launch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XOQkk3ojNfM

ETA: Launch apparently scheduled for 03:18 EST, barring holds.

[Nicolas]

Indeed, both on the mass and safety accounts of having more engines restartable. In that case, they'd have to centralize the TEA-TEB tank and add loads of plumbing and valves compared to the current design to give more engines the ability to restart, which sounds like introducting more failure modes than it solves. So if they can make the current design sufficiently reliable (which sounds very achievable since they know exactly what went wrong and the succes rate already was high), there's no need for all that.