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Starship Flight 5: Launch and booster catch [video]

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Re: Starship Flight 5: Launch and booster catch [video]

#121

Post by dominicdoty »

monkeydust wrote: post #105
ghc wrote: post #23

Nothing could have prepared me for how that catch looked. I was sure the rocket was careening into the tower at the last second before it straightened out. The control algorithms must be incredible for the landing system to work within those small tolerances.

Watched several times, amazing stuff. Had flashbacks to playing Jupiter Landing on the C64! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jupiter_Lander Edit: SpaceX should create a simple 'catch' the rocket game. Play in browser style. Just for kicks and marketing.

Shameless plug for my own project with a similar bent - write your own lunar lander autopilot in browser

lunar.unnecessarymodification.com

Re: Starship Flight 5: Launch and booster catch [video]

#123

Post by skrebbel »

Can someone explain to me why this is more impressive than landing the rocket? To a layman like me, it looks very similar - the thing looks just like a rocket but without a pointy tip, and on the way down I don't understand why difference that matters.

(I mean I still think it's mind blowing, because I think landing a rocket is also mind blowing)

Re: Starship Flight 5: Launch and booster catch [video]

#124

Post by Denvercoder9 »

sourcecodeplz wrote: post #36
aaronharnly wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Naive question: I obviously expect there to be flames from the engines, but there were flames on the lower sides for quite a while after the catch – is that expected?

who cares... they did it and it didn't burn up or destroy the platform. rest is just nitpicking

> who cares...

I bet SpaceX does. They've solved the big problems, now it's time to solve the small problems and make reuse a reality.

Re: Starship Flight 5: Launch and booster catch [video]

#126

Post by _dain_ »

flaburgan wrote: post #76
treespace8 wrote: post #14

I'm just so happy to see this level of progress. This another big step for opening up space. To think that one day this will be considered normal. 150 Metric tons sent on a fully reusable rocket. Thats like a 747 to space.

So, reusable is supposed to reduce the cost. But the space shuttle was reusable and it has been shutdown because it was too expensive. What is the differences between the two?

Manufacture and maintenance contracts for the Shuttle were deliberately spread out across many companies and states, especially in key congressional districts. It was a jobs programme; waste was a feature not a bug.

Same thing for SLS.

Re: Starship Flight 5: Launch and booster catch [video]

#127

Post by dotnet00 »

eqvinox wrote: post #122
t1234s wrote: post #118

Do they recover whats left of the ship from the Indian Ocean?

They can probably go fishing, but anything that sunk is gonna stay sunk. That ocean is not shallow, and deep submarine operations are expensive …

They did pull the bottom of the previous booster out. On the webcast they mentioned adjusting the landing maneuver for the ship to be a bit softer in case they decide to recover it too.

Re: Starship Flight 5: Launch and booster catch [video]

#128

Post by JumpCrisscross »

flaburgan wrote: post #76
treespace8 wrote: post #14

I'm just so happy to see this level of progress. This another big step for opening up space. To think that one day this will be considered normal. 150 Metric tons sent on a fully reusable rocket. Thats like a 747 to space.

So, reusable is supposed to reduce the cost. But the space shuttle was reusable and it has been shutdown because it was too expensive. What is the differences between the two?

> space shuttle was reusable

SpaceX builds vehicles. The Shuttle was “reusable” because they needed a term between the default for transportation capital expenditures (e.g. trains, planes, cars and ships) and the modified missiles that defined post-War spaceflight. “Reusable” in the Shuttle’s context meant months of specialist overhaul time and the cost of a Falcon 9 launch in SRB booster replacements alone [0].

At the end of the day, in 2010, “the incremental cost per flight of the Space Shuttle was $409 million, or $14,186 per kilogram” [1]. ($591mm and $20,512 in 2024 dollars, respectively [2].) SpaceX’s prices per kg are around $3,170 on Falcon 9 [3] and $1,520 for Falcon Heavy [4]. Starship should bring those costs below $1000.

[0] https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=51959.0

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_program

[2] https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/

[3] https://www.spacex.com/media/Capabilities&Services.pdf LEO

[4] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_Heavy LEO, theoretical

Re: Starship Flight 5: Launch and booster catch [video]

#129

Post by jq-r »

skrebbel wrote: post #123

Can someone explain to me why this is more impressive than landing the rocket? To a layman like me, it looks very similar - the thing looks just like a rocket but without a pointy tip, and on the way down I don't understand why difference that matters. (I mean I still think it's mind blowing, because I think landing a rocket is also mind blowing)

From what I understand, it reduces the turnover dramatically. In theory the booster should be refuelled, new second stage mounted on top and ready to go for another flight. So could cut down from weeks to days/hours. That's significant.

Re: Starship Flight 5: Launch and booster catch [video]

#130

Post by Denvercoder9 »

skrebbel wrote: post #123

Can someone explain to me why this is more impressive than landing the rocket? To a layman like me, it looks very similar - the thing looks just like a rocket but without a pointy tip, and on the way down I don't understand why difference that matters. (I mean I still think it's mind blowing, because I think landing a rocket is also mind blowing)

It is a rocket. The biggest difference with the Falcon 9 first stage is that this one is about 6 times as big (diameter of 9m vs 3.7m), and that catching it with the tower requires a much higher precision in landing location. The drone ships that Falcon 9 lands on are about 90 x 50 meter. To catch it with the tower, they need to be accurate to within a few meters.

The big advantage of catching it with the tower is that it'll (eventually) allow them to put another Starship on top, refuel and launch again within hours, as opposed to the weeks it currently takes for Falcon 9.

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