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SpaceX Successfully Soft-Landed Booster Rocket in the Atlantic

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Re: SpaceX Successfully Soft-Landed Booster Rocket in the Atlantic

#81

Post by ElComradio »

andrewtbham wrote: post #29
BrandonMarc wrote: post #6

Equally large news from today's press conference at the National Press Club - SpaceX is taking on ULA (united launch alliance, a consortium of incumbent players in the market) and the "block buy" allocation of military / national-security launches to ULA. Here's their handout, from one of the reporters there: https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/459734785314013184 Playing politics a bit, Elon's claiming a ~ 75% redu…

I watched a senate hearing where Elon Musk squares off with the ULA. It's awesome. One great quote is where the ULA says Space X can't handle the missions. Elon responds. If our rockets are good enough for NASA, they are good enough for the Department of Defense. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_azyt1JhI0

I suspect if you asked a DoD gal if it was more critical that, say, a military commsat got to orbit than something that measures solar flares, she'd beg to differ with Elon.

Re: SpaceX Successfully Soft-Landed Booster Rocket in the Atlantic

#82

Post by ef4 »

HarryHirsch wrote: post #55
grinich wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rockets are built to be pretty durable machines (obviously). The environment they operate in outside of the atmosphere is harsher in many ways. Two big issues with sea landing: transport (tug, crane, huge truck, etc.), and corrosion/contamination from saltwater. They'll still need to verify all systems and components before a second launch, but that's way easier to do when the vehicle is sitting empty on the pad next…

They'll still need to verify all systems and components before a second launch That. You need to re-qualify the engine after each launch. The cost of labour far exceeds the cost of materials, you need to strip and re-build the thing, and you ask yourself just how much money you can save through re-using the first stage. I don't think it's much.

> you need to strip and re-build the thing

That's how politically-designed boondoggles like the shuttle work. It's not inevitable, if you actually spend the engineering effort on reliability and repeatability.

If NASA operated an airline, they would probably be tearing down and rebuilding every jet engine after every flight, and a ticket would cost $100,000.

Re: SpaceX Successfully Soft-Landed Booster Rocket in the Atlantic

#83

Post by trhway »

kindredlight wrote: post #26
physcab wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ULA uses engines manufactured from many different sources. Some rockets fly with engines manufactured in Russia, and as far as I know these aren't necessarily new engines but re-used from the 60's. But other programs use engines manufactured in the US. Atlas V rockets have engines made by Aerojet Rocketdyne which is based in Sacramento California. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlas_V Also to match costs, you have to…

All Atlas V first-stage engines (RD-180) are manufactured in Russia. That the second stage engines are made in the US doesn't change the fact that you're dependent on Russian supply. In response to your edits: >but they can't get more flights because of their record The Air Force required 3 successful flights in the exact configuration the Air Force would fly. SpaceX provided the "record" as stipulated by the Air For…

>you're dependent on Russian supply

and my understanding that this supply is limited to the what had already been manufactured long time ago. Beside the inventory issues, one can easy imagine Putin saying "bad Americans, no more gas ... err... rocket engines for you"

Re: SpaceX Successfully Soft-Landed Booster Rocket in the Atlantic

#84

Post by BrandonMarc »

Wait ... did Elon mention building a spaceport in Brownsville, TX? I can see how that would work well for GEO and GTO launches. That's an interesting breakdown for launch manifests:

- FL, 39a: the NASA launches

- FL, 40a: the DoD launches

- TX: the GEO launches

- CA: the polar launches (Vandenberg)

It is interesting, that by bringing the lawsuit, Elon is essentially saying "hey! how come the block buy deal magically appeared only now that a viable competitor exists?"

Re: SpaceX Successfully Soft-Landed Booster Rocket in the Atlantic

#85

Post by derekp7 »

redthrowaway wrote: post #16
cloudwalking wrote: post #7

- Successful soft landing in the Atlantic - Seas were too rough for a quick recovery - Rocket subsequently destroyed by wave action - Will attempt recovery of the next Falcon 9 launch - A Falcon 9 recovered on land could be re-used the next day (!) - SpaceX is lobbying to allow private competition for National Security launches (eg GPS satellites)

Is "the ocean was wavy" really a justifiable reason for losing the rocket? Surely sea conditions are something they'd take into account when planning and executing the mission.

Just to be clear, it is not their goal to reuse rockets that are soft-landed in the ocean. This particular attempt was to prove that they could make the rocket slow to zero meters/sec at the surface of the ocean, with it upright. Which they did.

Their next attempt will be to target a smaller radius, to prove their aiming accuracy. Finally, after a couple more ocean landings (with possible recovery for analysis purposes), they will attempt to land on dry ground. To do this, they need to prove they can set down within a 1-mile radius. But they believe they should have the same precision of a helicopter.

After this, they are aiming for same-day reusability.

Re: SpaceX Successfully Soft-Landed Booster Rocket in the Atlantic

#86

Post by gsnedders »

hga wrote: post #53
Patrick_Devine wrote: post #24

Is it SpaceX's intention at some point to forgo the launch tower and launch directly off of the landing legs grasshopper style? I realize it's not really necessary, but it might make it easier to get a rocket off of Mars instead of having to build a tower. Although, presumably if you can refine rocket fuel on Mars, maybe building a launch tower is no big deal. Anyways, kudos again to Musk and SpaceX.

I don't know about the need for a "tower", but the Falcon 9 launch sequence includes firing up all the engines and making sure they're running fine. Same too for the SSMEs as I recall. That's one of the great advantages of liquid fuel rockets, you can turn them off. Ditto the mighty Saturn V, they started "8.9 seconds" before launch, 300 milliseconds apart. So you need some serious hardware to hold it down till relea…

SSMEs ignited 6.67s before launch. From memory, a lot of aborted launches were due to some sensor reading an error with one of the SSMEs.

Re: SpaceX Successfully Soft-Landed Booster Rocket in the Atlantic

#87

Post by Crito »

syncsynchalt wrote: post #80
BrandonMarc wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

... especially if, as he said, he can reduce his current launch costs by 30% by re-using rockets.

It seems likely the the USAF would specify first-run rockets for the best chance of success, so the USAF would not see a cost reduction unless spacex were to re-purchase the recovered booster or similar (or offered a credit that equated to the same).

The USAF buys a launch, not the rocket itself. The recovered stages belong to SpaceX.

Re: SpaceX Successfully Soft-Landed Booster Rocket in the Atlantic

#88

Post by joyeuse6701 »

lotsofmangos wrote: post #52
[deleted] wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

Calling for NASA to stop working with Roscosmos and the ISS over Putin is nuts. Space research and exploration is more than petty flag waving.

Somehow I think taking over Crimea is more than petty flag waving to the people who live there. I'd ask for more empathy for those whose lives may be irrevocably damaged by the actions of the Russian Head of State.

Re: SpaceX Successfully Soft-Landed Booster Rocket in the Atlantic

#89

Post by m_mueller »

andrewtbham wrote: post #29
BrandonMarc wrote: post #6

Equally large news from today's press conference at the National Press Club - SpaceX is taking on ULA (united launch alliance, a consortium of incumbent players in the market) and the "block buy" allocation of military / national-security launches to ULA. Here's their handout, from one of the reporters there: https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/459734785314013184 Playing politics a bit, Elon's claiming a ~ 75% redu…

I watched a senate hearing where Elon Musk squares off with the ULA. It's awesome. One great quote is where the ULA says Space X can't handle the missions. Elon responds. If our rockets are good enough for NASA, they are good enough for the Department of Defense. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_azyt1JhI0

That was an interesting watch, even as a foreigner. The ULA representative did everything he could to defend their contract - a 'good' politicians as it seems. He responded pretty well to Feinstein's chart I have to say - a chart with cost per ton in orbit would have been much more informative and I couldn't deduct from her numbers whether that has actually gone up significantly. Musk's response to Shelby's remark on a partial SpaceX mission failure was very witty - "according to ULA's standard's this mission was perfect" - he seems to be very good at thinking on the foot.

Re: SpaceX Successfully Soft-Landed Booster Rocket in the Atlantic

#90

Post by amatix »

aschampion wrote: post #32
Patrick_Devine wrote: post #24

Is it SpaceX's intention at some point to forgo the launch tower and launch directly off of the landing legs grasshopper style? I realize it's not really necessary, but it might make it easier to get a rocket off of Mars instead of having to build a tower. Although, presumably if you can refine rocket fuel on Mars, maybe building a launch tower is no big deal. Anyways, kudos again to Musk and SpaceX.

The strongback does a lot more than legs ever would: resistance to winds when awaiting the launch window, fueling, data connections, etc. Not to mention you need some sort of tower to lift the rocket upright after payload integration and servicing -- unless you do vertical integration, which they will need to do to win USAF contracts. But then you need a crane, anyway.

Genuinely curious, why would USAF (or anyone) need vertical integration?
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