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Starship is still not understood

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Re: Starship is still not understood

#61

Post by ren_engineer »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #28
ncallaway wrote: post #8

I’m kinda confused by the criticism of the industry and NASA not designing for Starship. The author argues that NASA doesn’t understand Tempe game changer that Starship is, but I don’t think that’s accurate. I think the risk to NASA of assuming the benefits of Starship before it’s proven are just too high. If NASA (or other industry players), assume Starship will deliver the benefits it promises, they to fundamentall…

NASA just announced that they want to spend $1B per launch for SLS once a year until 2050. For a capability less than what SpaceX might provide for $10M. That's not sensible risk management, that's head in the sand denialism. https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/10/nasa-wants-to-buy-sl...

>denialism

more like corruption

Re: Starship is still not understood

#62

Post by kiba »

dangerbird2 wrote: post #60
bryanlarsen wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NASA just announced that they want to spend $1B per launch for SLS once a year until 2050. For a capability less than what SpaceX might provide for $10M. That's not sensible risk management, that's head in the sand denialism. https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/10/nasa-wants-to-buy-sl...

The problem is that for Starship to hit that $10M price point, SpaceX will have to demonstrate several as of yet unproven capabilities: In-space refueling (required for any missions outside LEO), safe and reliable re-entry from orbit, and fast turnaround for Starship to be launch-ready after landing. The last thing NASA needs is a glorified Space Shuttle 2.0 that takes months to be rebuilt after each re-entry, and ha…

It doesn't matter if Starship can't do all of these. It will still be likely cheaper and more capable than NASA's SLS, even if it's capable of only launching one time.

Remember, SpaceX is engineering a production line to make Starship, not just prototyping Starshipp.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#63

Post by vanattab »

ceejayoz wrote: post #55
vanattab wrote: post #41

>Starship is intended to be able to transport a million tonnes of cargo to the surface of Mars in just ten launch windows. So at 100tons per starship sent to Mars that's 10,000 trips or 1000 per launch window. But the current plans call for something like 16 starship launches just for refuelling the one starship for the lunar mission. Suppose we can do the Mars trip with the same number of flights that's 170,000 laun…

By the time you're sending a thousand Starships in one go, the fuel's probably coming from an orbital refinery processing chunks of captured comets, not Earth launches. Or they've been replaced with some big Aldrin cyclers built using Starships.

That's exactly my point. This guy is pissed that NASA is not planning properly because Starship will unlock the ability to send millions of tons all over the solar system but in realty starship is only one of hundreds (thousands?) of advancements that will need to be made before we can think of sending 100's of millions of tons around the system.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#64

Post by GDC7 »

Space is becoming a religion for atheists, with SpaceX serving the role of the church and Elon Musk in charge of it as the techno-utopian Pope.

No wonder really smart people like Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and George Soros are staying out of it.

The amount of mass that we have to bring up there to live and thrive and be happy is so enormous that Nobel astrophysicist Kip Thorne and Christopher Nolan had to essentially cheat their way into the epilogue of Interstellar. The hero of the movie finds the answer to the problem of how to lift humanity off the Earth into the Gargantua Black Hole, which by definition is the place where all the rules are off, and there is no knowledge of what really happens in there, so that Kip Thorne could, in good conscience, allow it in the script.

People who love space should work on mind uploading and laser transmission of the aforementioned upload. That's the only way we can manage to lift ourselves.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#65

Post by phkahler »

>> A space-adapted tractor needs better paint, a vacuum compatible hydraulic power source, vacuum-rated bearings, lubricants, wire insulation, and a redundant remote control sensor kit. I can see NASA partnering with industry to produce and test these parts, but that is no way to service the institutional overhead embodied by a team of hundreds of people toiling on a single mission for a decade.

If one function of NASA is to redistribute pork spending around the country, that seems like an even better way to do it. Rather than have contractors that strictly focus on NASA activities, use existing companies and fund projects to make space-capable versions of existing equipment. That also means the money can be shuffled around more as needed.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#66

Post by altcognito »

vanattab wrote: post #41

>Starship is intended to be able to transport a million tonnes of cargo to the surface of Mars in just ten launch windows. So at 100tons per starship sent to Mars that's 10,000 trips or 1000 per launch window. But the current plans call for something like 16 starship launches just for refuelling the one starship for the lunar mission. Suppose we can do the Mars trip with the same number of flights that's 170,000 laun…

Blue Origin said it would be 16, Musk has claimed it won't be more than 8.

https://wccftech.com/musk-rejects-blue-origins-claim-of-16-s...

It ends up being ~100,000 launches over 10 launch windows. Elon has talked about building 1000 starships (presumably you would need less boosters)

https://www.tesmanian.com/blogs/tesmanian-blog/1000-starship...

Anyway, it's absolutely the case that transferring a million tons of cargo will require a new way of thinking about the scale of launches.I would also not assume that the refueling launches have to all take place within the window, that's a bad assumption to start with. You would start your refueling launches well ahead of the window.

added point - I do think the article overlooks that while Starship will change things, the timing is likely to be slow enough that NASA will be able to adapt. They do have ridiculous timelines on some of their projects, but just like everything else, they will just rewrite those timelines if new solutions present themselves.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#67

Post by ceejayoz »

vanattab wrote: post #63
ceejayoz wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By the time you're sending a thousand Starships in one go, the fuel's probably coming from an orbital refinery processing chunks of captured comets, not Earth launches. Or they've been replaced with some big Aldrin cyclers built using Starships.

That's exactly my point. This guy is pissed that NASA is not planning properly because Starship will unlock the ability to send millions of tons all over the solar system but in realty starship is only one of hundreds (thousands?) of advancements that will need to be made before we can think of sending 100's of millions of tons around the system.

I think it's reasonable to think NASA should currently being doing exploratory thinking about "how would we build something like a space station, lunar base, or Mars mission if Starship is available within the decade", though. Which is what I think the author is advocating; to get a few years out in front, rather than waiting until Starship reaches the point where it can't be ignored.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#68

Post by panick21_ »

coldtea wrote: post #57
panick21_ wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the middle class is poor because a tiny part of the budget is invested in space? I don't understand what argument you are trying to make.

> So the middle class is poor because a tiny part of the budget is invested in space? No, it's poor because the same logic that invests that "tiny part of the budget" in space (and prints billions of money to fund the likes of Musk, Bezos, and so on), also runs the other investments and public policy decisions.

> and prints billions of money to fund the likes of Musk, Bezos, and so on

That's not how monetary policy works but ok ...

> also runs the other investments and public policy decisions

So you don't like some things the government does and therefore anything the government does is bad and we can have no argument about what spending is good and what is bad?

Re: Starship is still not understood

#69

Post by yokem55 »

panick21_ wrote: post #44
bryanlarsen wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NASA just announced that they want to spend $1B per launch for SLS once a year until 2050. For a capability less than what SpaceX might provide for $10M. That's not sensible risk management, that's head in the sand denialism. https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/10/nasa-wants-to-buy-sl...

This is beyond insane and wont happen. Once Starhip flies even the last politicans can be cornered to admit to kill this ridiculous rocket.

No, there will be one excuse after another. Starship isn't human rated and only Orion is rated for human deep space flight. So something else will still be needed to launch Orion to that lunar trajectory. That something else is SLS.

Now the obvious solution is to rate Dragon for deep space and launch humans in that on a falcon and have it meet up with a starship in LEO. But getting that will probably take more years and billions paid to to the Orion and SLS POR before it will actually come to pass.

Never underestimate the power of a self-licking ice cream cone.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#70

Post by panick21_ »

dangerbird2 wrote: post #60
bryanlarsen wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NASA just announced that they want to spend $1B per launch for SLS once a year until 2050. For a capability less than what SpaceX might provide for $10M. That's not sensible risk management, that's head in the sand denialism. https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/10/nasa-wants-to-buy-sl...

The problem is that for Starship to hit that $10M price point, SpaceX will have to demonstrate several as of yet unproven capabilities: In-space refueling (required for any missions outside LEO), safe and reliable re-entry from orbit, and fast turnaround for Starship to be launch-ready after landing. The last thing NASA needs is a glorified Space Shuttle 2.0 that takes months to be rebuilt after each re-entry, and ha…

Even if you assume only basic first stage re-usability (that is well proven). That is still a 200-ton to Orbit launcher for the cost of a Falcon 9 or cheaper.

And for what it is worth, SLS should be canceled no matter if Starship exists or not. Its a program that embodies everything bad about the modern space industry and space policy.

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