SpaceX

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Blackhawk
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Blackhawk »

Hopefully it doesn't make future customers too leery.
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Re: SpaceX

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"The world is suffering more today from the good people who want to mind other men's business than it is from the bad people who are willing to let everybody look after their own individual affairs." - Clarence Darrow
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Kraken »

Don't ever accuse Elon Musk of small thinking: his BFS will take 100 people to Mars in 80 days.
The company's interplanetary spaceship is informally know as the BFS, or "Big Fucking Spaceship.” Though not finalized, the first spaceship will probably be named “Heart of Gold,” a reference to the spacecraft in Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. It will have a diameter of 17 meters.

The plan is to send about 100 people per trip, though Musk wants to ultimately take 200 or more per flight to make the cost cheaper per person. The trip can take as little as 80 days or as many as 150 depending on the year. The hope is that the transport time will be only 30 days “in the more distant future.”
If everything goes swimmingly, there'll be 1,000,000 Martians in 40-100 years.

There are a few details to work out. But if nothing else, we get a cool video.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by AWS260 »

I was looking forward to hearing how SpaceX will manage the problem of radiation exposure outside of Earth's magnetosphere. Apparently I shouldn't worry about it, since according to Musk "it’s not too big of a deal."

OK then.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Kraken »

AWS260 wrote:I was looking forward to hearing how SpaceX will manage the problem of radiation exposure outside of Earth's magnetosphere. Apparently I shouldn't worry about it, since according to Musk "it’s not too big of a deal."

OK then.
Like I said, a few details to work out. :lol:
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Re: SpaceX

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Mutation is a feature, not a bug.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Kraken »

Wait But Why delves into the full story.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Isgrimnur »

Now with (hopefully) fewer explosions:
SpaceX plans to resume launching rockets as early as next week, according to an announcement from the California-based firm.

The company, headed by entrepreneur Elon Musk, also revealed in a statement Monday the cause behind the Sept. 1 explosion at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida that destroyed the company’s Falcon 9 rocket along with an Amos-6 commercial satellite.

SpaceX suspended its flights after the accident, which significantly damaged the launch pad.

An investigation board — headed by officials at the Federal Aviation Administration, the U.S. Air Force, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the National Transportation Safety Board and several industry experts — found that the massive fireball occurred because “one of the three composite overwrapped pressure vessels, or COPVs, inside the second stage liquid oxygen tank failed,” according to the announcement.

“Specifically, the investigation team concluded the failure was likely due to the accumulation of oxygen between the COPV liner and overwrap in a void or a buckle in the liner, leading to ignition and the subsequent failure of the COPV,” the statement went on to say.

SpaceX said each Falcon 9 stage uses COPVs to store cold helium “used to maintain tank pressure.”

But the vessels — located inside the second-stage liquid oxygen tank — malfunctioned, triggering the explosion.

Investigators, who observed more than 3,000 channels of video and data, also determined that avoiding future anomalies “entails changing the COPV configuration to allow warmer temperature helium to be loaded,” the announcement stated.
...
The next scheduled launch will be from Vandenberg Air Force Base’s Space Launch Complex with the Iridium NEXT launch on Jan. 8.

SpaceX still needs approval from the Federal Aviation Administration before returning the Falcon 9 to flight.
It's almost as if people are the problem.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Zaxxon »

The first-ever attempt to re-launch a Falcon 9 is happening in about 20 minutes. Live stream is here.
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Re: SpaceX

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Success!
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Kraken »

Nice. Going to need a bunch more successes before customers are comfortable renting used rockets, but it's an important step. Musk's whole strategy depends on it.
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Re: SpaceX

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Customers are already lined up.
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Re: SpaceX

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I wonder if they get a discount for an used rocket or pay a premium for a new one, or if they have any say in the matter.
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Re: SpaceX

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I've seen estimates that right now it's sitting at like a 10% discount since re-use isn't very streamlined yet. SES has already volunteered to have two more 2017 launches go up on 'flight-proven' rockets.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Combustible Lemur »

Fucking Yuge. The next big step is for this to be routine. MARS OR BUST! Please don't bust, please don't bust.
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Re: SpaceX

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Re: SpaceX

Post by Zaxxon »

T-6 minutes to the next SpaceX launch. Webcast, in case anyone wants to watch. This one is a military space plane plus first-stage landing attempt. Weather may scrub it, but the launch window is a few hours long.

Hope they get it out before Irma!
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Re: SpaceX

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Good luck, Kerbals!
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Zaxxon »

Now that landings are starting to seem routine, they decided to release a Blooper Reel.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Zaxxon »

Making Life Interplanetary - Updated long-term SpaceX plan released today in Australia at IAC (last night for us Americans). Included: they are mothballing Falcon 9, Heavy, and Dragon 2 in the next couple of years and replacing the whole enchilada with the updated BFR. Crazy ambitious but also a great idea if they can make one design work for all use cases as that will bring the cost of Mars missions way down.

And perhaps the most intriguing new piece from this update: BFR - Earth to Earth.
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Re: SpaceX

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And Ars has a nice write-up summarizing the presentation if you don't want to watch 45 minutes...
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Kraken »

I've learned not to be skeptical of what Musk says, except where timelines are concerned. I will be pleasantly surprised if SpaceX actually lands humans on Mars in my lifetime...which is to say, within the next 10-20 years (optimistically). The moon is more doable, but that's not where Musk's ambitions lie except perhaps as a tech-demonstration sideshow.
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Re: SpaceX

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SpaceX now targeting 19 missions for 2017. This would likely beat every other global launch company, and would top SpaceX's total for 2014, 2015, and 2016 combined.

Couple this with the re-launch success & associated reduced rates, and anything resembling a 2018 successful launch of Falcon Heavy will mean a likely crazy marketshare for SpaceX next year.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Zaxxon »

Falcon Heavy static fire happened around an hour ago and appears to have been a success.
Won't be too long before this is a reality:


Remember how ridiculous that looked back when it debuted and SpaceX had successfully landed zero rockets, much less re-used them and built the Heavy?
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Re: SpaceX

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Conform or be cast out!
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Zaxxon »

Animation of tomorrow's launch assuming no RUD.

A bit misleading as the target is not Mars but rather a Hohmann transfer orbit that we'd use to go to Mars in the future.

Tomorrow should be exciting either way.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Biyobi »

A friend of mine that works for Disney here in L.A. was pissed he had to travel to Florida for a few weeks for work until he found out the launch is happening during his time there. Now he won't shut up about getting to go.
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Re: SpaceX

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Re: SpaceX

Post by LordMortis »

How do you forward past the intro to the launch? :ninja:
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Re: SpaceX

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At 1pm I looked at the clock and thought I gotta remember to watch the launch in 30 min or so. Then forgot and just now remembered at 3:20
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Daehawk »

WOOHOOOOOOO!!!!! That was AWESOME!!!!!! Hope the center landed. And a open convertible in space is cooler than I thought.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Kraken »

Oh man, what a show. I missed the launch but saw the boosters land. Still waiting for word on whether the core stage landed safely, but the test was a huge success either way.
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Re: SpaceX

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Re: SpaceX

Post by Zaxxon »

That was fuckin' amazing. Congrats to SpaceX. That was clearly the most important thing to happen on this planet today, by a wide margin.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Holman »

I love that the Tesla has "Don't Panic" on the dashboard screen.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by malchior »

Zaxxon wrote: Tue Feb 06, 2018 4:59 pm That was fuckin' amazing. Congrats to SpaceX. That was clearly the most important thing to happen on this planet today, by a wide margin.
+1. We watched as a group at work. A lot of hooting and hollering here.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by msteelers »

We were able to see the rocket from outside our office. I’ve seen a lot of launches over the years, and that might have been the fastest I’ve ever seen something lift off. Very cool.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Daehawk »

I captured and made a 2560x1080 wallpaper of it right before launch. Im using it now. Here it is if anyone wants to use it too.

Enlarge Image
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Re: SpaceX

Post by Daehawk »

msteelers wrote: Tue Feb 06, 2018 5:02 pm We were able to see the rocket from outside our office. I’ve seen a lot of launches over the years, and that might have been the fastest I’ve ever seen something lift off. Very cool.
Hahah ya ...from launch to recovery took 10 min or less. Amazing. I was just thinking if someone snuck into the spaceman suit ...nasty haha.
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Re: SpaceX

Post by msteelers »

Daehawk wrote:I captured and made a 2560x1080 wallpaper of it right before launch. Im using it now. Here it is if anyone wants to use it too.
Did you get a shot of the “Don’t Panic” sign?
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