Ongoing SpaceX Thread

[Fuzz]

Starship flight 9 yesterday had a fuel leak, lost control, and eventually blew up. Should be on it's way to Mars any day now.

[KelVarnsen]

Nothing is stopping from Musk being a passenger on the next test flight

[photon]

I guess it's good they got further than the last 2 launches but that's 3 in a row that failed. They had fake satellites they couldn't test deploy either and a whole bunch of different heat tile tests that couldn't be tested.

Plus the booster exploded before they could test a 2 engine hover, though they did test a more aggressive reentry with that so maybe it was partially expected.

Seems a long way from being the moon lander even.

[Monahammer]

I hate musk as much or more than the next person, but I do want Spaceship to succeed. Having a reusable heavy launch vehicle commercially available opens up so much opportunity in space. Starts with space mining becoming a reality, then maybe a moon base...

I am still hopeful that this is a mission that will benefit humanity.

If we're talking about human habitation on another planet more seriously, then I vastly prefer the floating city on venus take to living in a dome on mars take.

[Scroopy Noopers]

The thing was rolling out of control again… jesus.

They did reuse that booster which went fairly well.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Monahammer

I hate musk as much or more than the next person, but I do want Spaceship to succeed. Having a reusable heavy launch vehicle commercially available opens up so much opportunity in space. Starts with space mining becoming a reality, then maybe a moon base...

I am still hopeful that this is a mission that will benefit humanity.

If we're talking about human habitation on another planet more seriously, then I vastly prefer the floating city on venus take to living in a dome on mars take.

I'm not at all convinced Starship is ever going to be viable. SpaceX has done some great things, but this reeks of Musk's over involvement. The payload numbers don't sound like they will ever be achievable, so he fell back on rapid re-usability to get mass to orbit. Who knows, maybe it'll work but it has so many challenges that it isn't going to be any time soon and maybe he could just be honest about that.

[WideReceiver]

Originally Posted by Monahammer

I hate musk as much or more than the next person, but I do want Spaceship to succeed. Having a reusable heavy launch vehicle commercially available opens up so much opportunity in space. Starts with space mining becoming a reality, then maybe a moon base...

I am still hopeful that this is a mission that will benefit humanity.

If we're talking about human habitation on another planet more seriously, then I vastly prefer the floating city on venus take to living in a dome on mars take.

I don’t want anything from Musk to succeed.

[Wormius]

So, not knowing much about these, what makes them being reusable so much better? I take it they need go through so much QA/QC after each launch that wouldn’t it make sense to recycle them and use new rockets?

[Fuzz]

Musk yesterday said the idea is to turnaround a rocket in the same day.


They have proven with the Falcon 9 they can do it, but the record there is still 9 days, and that thing has 9 engines vs 33 on the Starship booster. The Starship itself has another 3 raptors and 3 merlins.


This is kinda what I mean, he makes statements of fact based on theoretical minimums and maximums, but achieving those is often limited by reality.

[photon]

Originally Posted by Wormius

So, not knowing much about these, what makes them being reusable so much better? I take it they need go through so much QA/QC after each launch that wouldn’t it make sense to recycle them and use new rockets?

Cost basically. Costs far less to refurbish/re-certify one than to build an entirely new one. I've heard that it costs 10% the cost of a new Falcon 9 to refurbish one. That compounds pretty fast. Even if it isn't quite that good, and even if Starship never ends up in a same day turnaround the reusability reduces cost of putting things into orbit.

Just wondering how long until they just stick a normal expendable 2nd stage on the Starship booster and call it a day.

Starship has always looked weird to me anyway, when looking at the internals the amount of space for a payload seems pretty small.. how would you lift a Hubble 2 with it for example? You couldn't. I guess they could eventually change the form factor but at this point it seems designed only to launch Starlink satellites with the tiny payload door.

[Scroopy Noopers]

Originally Posted by photon

Cost basically. Costs far less to refurbish/re-certify one than to build an entirely new one. I've heard that it costs 10% the cost of a new Falcon 9 to refurbish one. That compounds pretty fast. Even if it isn't quite that good, and even if Starship never ends up in a same day turnaround the reusability reduces cost of putting things into orbit.

Just wondering how long until they just stick a normal expendable 2nd stage on the Starship booster and call it a day.

Starship has always looked weird to me anyway, when looking at the internals the amount of space for a payload seems pretty small.. how would you lift a Hubble 2 with it for example? You couldn't. I guess they could eventually change the form factor but at this point it seems designed only to launch Starlink satellites with the tiny payload door.

It’s totally something built in kerbal space program to look cool. Performance was maybe tertiary….

[Monahammer]

Originally Posted by photon

Cost basically. Costs far less to refurbish/re-certify one than to build an entirely new one. I've heard that it costs 10% the cost of a new Falcon 9 to refurbish one. That compounds pretty fast. Even if it isn't quite that good, and even if Starship never ends up in a same day turnaround the reusability reduces cost of putting things into orbit.

Just wondering how long until they just stick a normal expendable 2nd stage on the Starship booster and call it a day.

Starship has always looked weird to me anyway, when looking at the internals the amount of space for a payload seems pretty small.. how would you lift a Hubble 2 with it for example? You couldn't. I guess they could eventually change the form factor but at this point it seems designed only to launch Starlink satellites with the tiny payload door.

The tiny payload door is a very legitimate criticism!

[Locke]

Does it have a Thermal Exhaust Port? Asking for a friend...

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Locke

Does it have a Thermal Exhaust Port? Asking for a friend...

Not necessary, they self destruct on their own.

[Dan02]

Even if starship ends up being a complete financial disaster and becomes economically viable, good on SpaceX for pushing the envelope, the lessons learned will be used in future launch platforms.

SpaceX may have been kickstarted by NASA but the amount of private money being funneled into it and the revenue now being generated by Starlink is incredible. The entire world is benefiting especially Blue Origin and all the Chinese copycats.

the fact you can now have high speed internet essentially anywhere in the world including on airplanes is wild. The estimates for revenue for Starlink this year is 12 Billion USD. Thats nearly double what Telus and Rogers make from their internet services combined.

[Fuzz]

Starlink is another one of those things Musk was pretty underhanded about, and left the original guy behind.

https://qz.com/gateway/bby-earnings-may-29-1851782889


And none of this changes the fact that Musk is a racist sexist fascist.

[Fuzz]

Two days after the latest in a string of test-flight setbacks for his big new Mars spacecraft, Starship, Elon Musk said on Thursday he foresees the futuristic vehicle making its first uncrewed voyage to the red planet at the end of next year.

https://www.reuters.com/business/aer...c2bc0001fdf102


It's kinda hilarious how he just can't help himself at all. Starship hasn't even reached orbit yet, but by next year they'll have a reliable vehicle, capable of multiple launches to achieve the in-space refuelling that has never been achieved or tested by anybody, do that 10 or so times, and have his janky remote controlled robots fly the thing to Mars autonomously. And he gives that a 50-50 chance of happening.

The first flight to Mars would carry a simulated crew consisting of one or more robots of the Tesla-built humanoid Optimus design, with the first human crews following in the second or third landings. Musk said he envisioned eventually launching 1,000 to 2,000 ships to Mars every two years to quickly establish a self-sustaining permanent human settlement.

So 500 ships a year will require ~5000 launches for fuel. That's over 13 a day. Even at half that, it's silly.

[puffnstuff]

https://bsky.app/profile/wired.com/post/3lrxfuruum22n

SpaceX Starship 36 exploded ahead of a test flight in southern Texas on Wednesday night, sending a huge fireball high into the sky, followed by thick clouds of smoke and large flames.
In a statement posted on X, SpaceX said the rocket experienced a “major anomaly” while on a test stand.

[puffnstuff]

In other non-explodey news

Honda Conducts Successful Launch and Landing Test of Experimental Reusable Rocket

Honda R&D Co., Ltd., a research and development subsidiary of Honda Motor Co., Ltd., today conducted a launch and landing test of an experimental reusable rocket*1#(6.3 m in length, 85 cm in diameter, 900 kg dry weight/1,312 kg wet weight) developed independently by Honda. The test was completed successfully, the first time Honda landed a rocket after reaching an altitude of nearly 300 meters.

https://global.honda/en/topics/2025/...06-17ceng.html

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by puffnstuff

https://bsky.app/profile/wired.com/post/3lrxfuruum22n

SpaceX Starship 36 exploded ahead of a test flight in southern Texas on Wednesday night, sending a huge fireball high into the sky, followed by thick clouds of smoke and large flames.
In a statement posted on X, SpaceX said the rocket experienced a “major anomaly” while on a test stand.

I feel it is my duty to re-post this from the comments in that thread, because it's a banger.