51–59 of 59 posts
Watching the camera feed of the launch around the 5 minute mark all I could think was: if the rocket turned around now, it could probably land in New York in another 5 minutes
On a ballistic trajectory, you can reach anywhere on Earth in 40 minutes or less. I've seen cute little diagrams of the relevant times before, but I wasn't able to quickly Google one up.
Is this the re-usable launch vehicle, i.e. the one that re-enters the atmosphere and lands itself upright?
Awesome! Are they going to repeat the launch for the west coast?
Wow I can't believe this finally launched. So far so good! And of course, the most exciting thing about this is the return attempt of the F9 first stage core. I don't think that'll be covered in the webcast but we'll certainly get video of it later. MECO successful. Edit: r/spacex has good updates regarding the landing attempt [T+27m]: Elon's jet and NASA plane circling a particular area... http://www.reddit.com/r/sp…
Awesome, I noticed they were tracking the landing leg attachment points at liftoff, so perhaps there is a new leg deployment system. Also the note that 'kaboom' after splashdown suggests that some part of the landing mechanism didn't deal well the transition from flight to sailing. One wonders what the temperature differential is between the landing first stage and the ocean, on the one hand it might be hot (burning…
The launch video was beautiful though, the water vaporizing and forming a could around the rocket is awesome, the inside view of the engine was amazing.
Can't wait to see the landing video!
What about the location of the landings? Have they been on target?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Awesome, I noticed they were tracking the landing leg attachment points at liftoff, so perhaps there is a new leg deployment system. Also the note that 'kaboom' after splashdown suggests that some part of the landing mechanism didn't deal well the transition from flight to sailing. One wonders what the temperature differential is between the landing first stage and the ocean, on the one hand it might be hot (burning…
Like trothamel commented below, the stage isn't designed for tipping over and slamming into the water.
If you've ever seen loggers drop tree trunks in a river you can imagine what that looks like, it starts out vertical, then reaches point where it displaces enough water that it is essentially floating (but unstably so) and then rotates to horizontal around the point on the trunk that is at the surface of the water.
I totally understand that this isn't an intended landing mode :-).
Thinking about how they manage fuel load, it made me wonder how I would do it, do you hover until you've exhausted all fuel? Or do you just shut off the engine? And at flameout are you out of volatiles or just some volatiles (like LOX)and do you have the 'gas tank' issue that auto mechanics deal with where residual vapors can be explosive.
Would love to sit through the briefings on this stuff.
I have nothing at stake in these launches but every one of them makes me nervous, I almost can't watch them. At any moment, boom. The launch video was beautiful though, the water vaporizing and forming a could around the rocket is awesome, the inside view of the engine was amazing. Can't wait to see the landing video! What about the location of the landings? Have they been on target?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Like trothamel commented below, the stage isn't designed for tipping over and slamming into the water.
My problem with that theory/scenario is that the stage is designed to land on its legs. When the test vehicles land they have very little angular momentum, presumably these tests would mimic that. And if the momementum was managed, then at engine shut off it would drop vertically into the water, and then fall over as the counter pressure of buouancy was not stabilized by the landing legs. If you've ever seen loggers…
Wow I can't believe this finally launched. So far so good! And of course, the most exciting thing about this is the return attempt of the F9 first stage core. I don't think that'll be covered in the webcast but we'll certainly get video of it later. MECO successful. Edit: r/spacex has good updates regarding the landing attempt [T+27m]: Elon's jet and NASA plane circling a particular area... http://www.reddit.com/r/sp…
Awesome, I noticed they were tracking the landing leg attachment points at liftoff, so perhaps there is a new leg deployment system. Also the note that 'kaboom' after splashdown suggests that some part of the landing mechanism didn't deal well the transition from flight to sailing. One wonders what the temperature differential is between the landing first stage and the ocean, on the one hand it might be hot (burning…
I suspect its more to do with that being where the giant spacex logo is painted on.