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> to make it out of solid, Congressional grade pork. Which would be SLS. Since nobody benefits by cancelling it, There are always other people who think 'maybe those Alabama $ could go to Texas instead'.
SLS pork is spread to all 50 states. Texas gets a good chunk of it. A small fraction of $2B is more than all of $10M.
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…
I would buy your argument if they weren’t assuming the benefits of SLS before it’s proven. Why give SLS, but not Starship, the benefit of the doubt?
There is a real non-zero risk of something bad gappebing to him and then future of SpaceX is in question, its not a robust institution like NASA
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…
> Makes me wonder how old the author is.
The author works for JPL.
> 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.
How many of these had 10+ prototypes fly and had a dedicate launch site near to complete?
How many had a working next generation engine for there first and second stage?
How many were designed by companies that had already developed the largest rocket in the world?
> burned many times by the promises of the next shiny rocket: DC-X, VentureStar, NASP, Ares, SLS,
Non of those were even remotely close. DC-X was a sub-orbital technology demonstrator. Even had it been successful it would have been nothing more. NASP is another technology demonstrator.
VentureStar was far, far away. Comparing it to Starship is just not accurate. It was basically almost delusional to think it would ever happen. And many people even back then were very skeptical of a SSTO Spaceplane. And beyond that politically it getting the needed funding was also not gone happen.
Ares, SLS are basically just warmed up shuttle concepts. These are designed to keep contractors employed, not to solve the problem. They no potential to solve anything.
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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.
They had all the data and they officially declared it was very doable and that SpaceX had a path to get there.
So its ok to plan for it but pretend it only exists for that one thing they contracted if for, and ignore if for everything else.
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…
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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 tr…
No you don't. Just as there was no redundancy for Saturn V. As there is not for Falcon Heavy. There was no redundancy for Delta 4 Heavy. There is always a largest rocket.
And if you do need redundancy, SLS is not how you would get there.
If Starship doesn't work, then there will simply be no moon landing. Period.
> Iirc, NASA is trying to shift SLS production to the private sector, to try and "get rid" of this ugly duckling.
That is just contract mombo jumbo that changes nothing about the actual project.
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Even 90,000 launches over 10 launch windows is 9,000 launches per window. Launch opportunities are about 30 days max per window (depending on the flight profile) so that'd be 300 launches per day or over 12 launches per hour . I'm not saying this is bonkers, but this is completely ridiculous and it doesn't matter whether it's 90,000 or 180,000 or even "just" 45,000 launches - it's completely impractical. Not to menti…
Based on what, your gut feel? 12 launches per hour does not seem insane at all.
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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.
If they can't prove rapid reusability for both stages, it's extremely unlikely the cost will be anywhere close to as cheap as current estimates. And if they can't refuel in orbit (which as of now, has only been performed a handful of times with small satellites), Starship will be unable to leave Earth's gravity well.
>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…