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SpaceX Starship rocket explodes minutes after launch from Texas

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Re: SpaceX Starship rocket explodes minutes after launch from Texas

#431

Post by marktangotango »

Galxeagle wrote: post #402
nomilk wrote: post #157

Anyone reading the headline could easily be misled: this was a massive success. Some context: - This was the first "integrated test" of the Starship space craft with its booster - The whole thing together was 120 meters tall - It will be one order of magnitude larger than the current largest rocket in terms of carrying capacity (~150 tonnes if it needs to return the booster, 250 if it doesn't) - There's 5 more of the…

As a SpaceX fan reading through the post-launch analysis, this was definitely more of a success than the headline applies, but 'massive' is a stretch. Most commentary I'm seeing put it at a C or B-. It's true that there was a number of areas where the risk is now retired, but three engines out at launch with three more dropping out along the way hints that their engine design still isn't as reliable as it needs to be…

In fact it was a really amazing "engine out" test. The thing appeared to been shedding engines all the way to RUD. I imagine these engines were all early generation, might as well fly them, units. It's easy to imagine a calculus of "we're pretty sure X% of engines will fail, but we only need Y% for this flight, go ahead and fly them". But yeah, Musk once said there's a gigawatt of power going through these Raptor engines, that's not nothing.

Re: SpaceX Starship rocket explodes minutes after launch from Texas

#433

Post by greedo »

s1k3s wrote: post #275
simondotau wrote: post #6

Success was defined as the rocket leaving the launchpad. Suggesting that this test “failed” is at best a mischaracterisation.

> Success was defined as the rocket leaving the launchpad. That's not what they said in their mission presentation though. It was supposed to launch, separate, return the booster back, then the rocket was supposed to orbit once around the Earth and then fall into the ocean. I understand people have their feelings invested into this (for whatever reason), but objectively speaking that was not what "success was defined…

There was no plan to return the booster back.

Re: SpaceX Starship rocket explodes minutes after launch from Texas

#435

Post by arethuza »

mempko wrote: post #350
pas wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SpaceX is doing the classic statistic thing[0], making spacecraft stronger where they explode until they don't. It's more like a hyperparameter search and less like QA for individual parts. [0] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b2/Survivor... :)

SpaceX is just doing what the Soviets did. The Soviets preferred to launch and learn just like SpaceX does today. Soviets also ran on a much smaller budget than NASA and preferred simplicity over complexity and constant tweaking. The Soviets proved that methodology works and SpaceX continues it to this day. I have a feeling most that follow SpaceX think they are trying a new revolutionary approach here.

What is your view on where the Soviets went wrong with their N1?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N1_(rocket)

Re: SpaceX Starship rocket explodes minutes after launch from Texas

#436

Post by phkahler »

bumby wrote: post #264
mabbo wrote: post #61

People want to see 100% success in all things. But that isn't very economical. Compare the SLS to Starship. SLS has had a 100% success rate. One launch, one success. But it costs $2B per launch (and climbing) and has taken 12 years to get here. Plus, it's stealing pieces of the Space Shuttle, which was developed in the 70s over a long period of time. Starship will launch a half a dozen "failures" before they achieve…

> "Fail fast" applies to more than just software. Yes, but let's not take the analogy too far. For people who work in safety-critical design (including software), it takes a different mindset than what is often prevalent in silicon valley. When the stakes are high, you don't really want to "move fast and break things". You can actually see this in SpaceX. In development when stakes are relatively low (e.g., no payloa…

Let's look back at Star Hopper. SpaceX literally hired a company that builds water towers to build a prototype tank for Starship - and flew it! They were primarily trying to figure out how to build it, move it, etc. Obviously the risk tolerance was high. That's really the difference between them and say Boeing. SpaceX starts with higher risk tolerance just to figure out the lay of the land, but they start reducing that tolerance as development progresses. Boeing aims for perfection out of the gate (apparently).

Re: SpaceX Starship rocket explodes minutes after launch from Texas

#437

Post by mgfist »

fabian2k wrote: post #202
mcculley wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Success was defined as the rocket leaving the launchpad." I am confused. Everything I read before the launch said that it was intended to reach orbital altitude and make it around the Earth.

This is a bit of spin by SpaceX. Blowing up the pad would be a serious failure and would be a large and costly setback. But they obviously didn't achieve the goal of the test flight here. It is a test flight, so it's not a complete failure and not entirely unexpected. But it's not a full success either, significant parts that were planned to be tested could not be tested because the rocket failed early.

> significant parts that were planned to be tested could not be tested

I don't think "planned" is the right word - the right word is "hoped".

Re: SpaceX Starship rocket explodes minutes after launch from Texas

#438

Post by dingosity »

cryptoegorophy wrote: post #81
mabbo wrote: post #61

People want to see 100% success in all things. But that isn't very economical. Compare the SLS to Starship. SLS has had a 100% success rate. One launch, one success. But it costs $2B per launch (and climbing) and has taken 12 years to get here. Plus, it's stealing pieces of the Space Shuttle, which was developed in the 70s over a long period of time. Starship will launch a half a dozen "failures" before they achieve…

How much did starship cost?

Well... the US tax-payer spent $2.9B for a starship or two. Or to be more accurate, there's a contract between NASA and SpaceX to deliver a Lunar Lander Starship variant (NextSTEP-2, Appendix H, Option A.) Last year it was upgraded to Option B which (I think) calls for a beefed-up Starship that can perform multiple lunar missions.

I'm sure they're not just dumping 2.9B in Elon's bank account (I mean... if they did he would just buy back all the Tesla stock) but there are a series of milestones that need to be met for the government to release the next chunk of funds. I don't know if NASA published the exact milestones, but maybe "not exploding on the launch-pad" was enough to release the next block of funds.

Re: SpaceX Starship rocket explodes minutes after launch from Texas

#440

Post by flippinburgers »

samsari wrote: post #392
vvillena wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of SpaceX company culture. All their launches are cheer-heavy. Even mission control gets rowdy at times.

I remember I think it was when they first landed the booster successfully, there was a big "USA! USA! USA!" cheer from mission control. I thought that was a bit of an ugly look myself.

Having pride in ones country is a good thing.
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