Starship is still not understood • Hacker News Board

Re: Starship is still not understood

#101

Post by neolefty » Thu, Oct 28, 2021, 2:34 PM UTC

qayxc wrote: post #85

gene-h wrote: post #72

A big part of the cost of space missions is not making things as light as possible, but developing the scientific instruments. More upmass doesn't always make designing sensitive scientific instruments easier. If said scientific instruments need to go on a rover, mass still matters. More mass can limit rover mobility and at some point the rover requires more power than can be provided with RTGs or solar cells.

Exactly. Way too many people seem to ignore the cost of developing and certifying scientific instruments. There's nothing gained from sending 50t of metal to the outer solar system. Scientific instruments are usually purpose-built and while lifting mass restriction can bring down cost, you'd still have to account for redundancy and precision because no one's going to fly out to Jupiter to properly unfold that darn an…

Nuclear power sources are still mighty expensive too. Solar is hard past Mars, and near impossible past Jupiter, AFAIK.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#102

Post by gremloni » Thu, Oct 28, 2021, 2:35 PM UTC

yeetaccount wrote: post #19

marktangotango wrote: post #13

Spacex is building the transcontinental railroads of the solar system. There is mind boggling upside for them. I'm kinda disappointed Blue Origin seems to have fallen in a rut. I'm sure Musk will be happy to provide transportation for Bezos space colony construction projects! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railroad_Tycoon Edit My point isn't to disparage Bezos, but to highlight the fact that anyone with grand aspirati…

Yeah but watching Bezos turn into a household joke is worth it.

He’s a household joke the same way Elon is a household joke.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#103

Post by zpeti » Thu, Oct 28, 2021, 2:35 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #56

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…

Would anyone like to estimate the CO2 emissions produced by that?

You are passive aggressively attacking the guy who is basically doing the only really inspiring thing in the world today, while at the same time basically single handedly forcing the auto industry into electrifying like 30 years early.

So, honestly, please, stop.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#104

Post by JulianMorrison » Thu, Oct 28, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

spacemark wrote: post #51

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…

As someone who has worked on NASA contracts pretty much my whole career, you're quite right. Starship is still extremely unproven. If you look at the history of rockets, mayyyybe 1 in 5 that make it to an orbital launch debut (which is like 1 in 50 paper rockets) in turn make it to commercial rollout. The author's claim that the potential benefits of Starship are not understood by NASA is cringeworthy naive. Everyone…

It seems a little unfair to compare a program with flying test vehicles and production already in progress, with flying Powerpoints that got cancelled because you can't make a cryogenic hydrogen tank out of scrith.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#105

Post by Cthulhu_ » Thu, Oct 28, 2021, 2:38 PM UTC

baggachipz wrote: post #93

dangerbird2 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

> NASA is right to not put all of its eggs in the Starship basket. The problem is that not only are they not putting any eggs into the Starship basket, they aren't even aware (or admitting) that the basket even exists.

Citation needed; they are aware, and admitting is down to the PR department. Can't have a government branch openly express support to a corporate party that easily.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#106

Post by tehbeard » Thu, Oct 28, 2021, 2:39 PM UTC

panick21_ wrote: post #70

dangerbird2 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Several problems with that.

One, it's Congress' baby.. ain't noone taking it out behind the barn.

Second, you need redundancy. If something is proven bad with falcon or starship design... You don't want another situation like we had with the shuttles where your paying for Soyuz seats for years on end while the problem is debugged and mitigated.

Iirc, NASA is trying to shift SLS production to the private sector, to try and "get rid" of this ugly duckling.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#107

Post by ClumsyPilot » Thu, Oct 28, 2021, 2:39 PM UTC

Yizahi wrote: post #92

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…

Latest post is more of a continuation of this one: https://caseyhandmer.wordpress.com/2021/03/04/sls-what-now/ I'm going to presume what author thought and quote him: ------ What does NASA do with teams that cost a few billion dollars a year to feed and whose main expertise is building rockets and space probes whose entire architectural philosophy is threatened by current launch costs, let alone the order of magnitud…

"Starship will be able to land 100 of them per flight. Now what?"

Starship cannot deliver 100 tonnes to mars, only to LEO. The rover was not just a ton, it came with a heatshield and other machinery.

Nasa has plenty of other projects, like the SAFE nuclear reactor, and I am sure these teams will be delighted to do something other than track every milligram

Re: Starship is still not understood

#108

Post by ARandumGuy » Thu, Oct 28, 2021, 2:40 PM UTC

prox wrote: post #87

spacemark wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who has worked on NASA contracts pretty much my whole career, you're quite right. Starship is still extremely unproven. If you look at the history of rockets, mayyyybe 1 in 5 that make it to an orbital launch debut (which is like 1 in 50 paper rockets) in turn make it to commercial rollout. The author's claim that the potential benefits of Starship are not understood by NASA is cringeworthy naive. Everyone…

This would be true perhaps if this wasn’t SpaceX. They already moved the goalpost with Falcon And I don’t think the author wrote what you said. His main point was that not one of NASA’s powerpoints even as much acknowledges that something like Starship might come round. The new constraints by Starship are a game changer.

Past success does not guarantee future success. And when you're dealing with space travel, which is inherently expensive and extremely dangerous, then you can't afford to buy into any hype.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#109

Post by Cthulhu_ » Thu, Oct 28, 2021, 2:41 PM UTC

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…

I just can't see it happening. How many launches have there been in total since the first launch of anything in space? I can't see it being much more than 10K, and it's definitely in that order of magnitude.

There's just not enough raw materials and fuel for that amount of launches, and environmental objections will catch up with them long before that.

Re: Starship is still not understood

#110

Post by dangerbird2 » Thu, Oct 28, 2021, 2:41 PM UTC

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #105

baggachipz wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> NASA is right to not put all of its eggs in the Starship basket. The problem is that not only are they not putting any eggs into the Starship basket, they aren't even aware (or admitting) that the basket even exists.

Citation needed; they are aware, and admitting is down to the PR department. Can't have a government branch openly express support to a corporate party that easily.

A big reason why they selected SpaceX's proposal to use a variation on Starship as the Artemis lunar lander is for NASA to start subsidizing Starship's development.