No Excuses Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn28695-spacex-rocket-is-first-to-put-satellites-in-orbit-and-land-again/ Last night’s launch, carrying satellites for communications company Orbcomm, was the first time an orbital rocket’s booster stage has been brought back to a landing site near its origin. Most rockets are designed for a single use, and dumped in the sea after separating from their payload. “It’s been a very celebratory atmosphere here at SpaceX. I think people are really overjoyed,” Musk said in a media conference. Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield said on Twitter the achievement “opens a brand new door to space travel”. Really incredible stuff and down the line will be a game changer for space travel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burgold Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 Very cool. They've had a bumpy road, but really excited for where this can go. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjah Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 About 30 years ago I checked out a 1950s-era Tintin cartoon compilation book from the local library. One page of the book illustrated a rocket landing on Earth, intact, on its fins. Even as a kid I scoffed at the idea that any part of a rocket would land that way after reaching space. Ridiculous. Ridiculous no longer! Given the dollar value of those 9 first-stage engines -- to say nothing of the stage built around them -- this does indeed change the game. Amazing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GoSkins0721 Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 About 30 years ago I checked out a 1950s-era Tintin cartoon compilation book from the local library. One page of the book illustrated a rocket landing on Earth, intact, on its fins. Even as a kid I scoffed at the idea that any part of a rocket would land that way after reaching space. Ridiculous. Ridiculous no longer! Given the dollar value of those 9 first-stage engines -- to say nothing of the stage built around them -- this does indeed change the game. Amazing. Funny, I was thinking the exact same thing as I watched that. Actually, I thought it was the liftoff being played in reverse. Awesome! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
China Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 SpaceX Launch Live Webcast and Explanation (12.21.15) And a video of the successful landing: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PF Chang Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 If you want more information on why this was so incredible and important, I recommend the article below: How (and Why) SpaceX Will Colonize Mars Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PokerPacker Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 I wish there was a like button for threads Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corcaigh Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 Given the dollar value of those 9 first-stage engines -- to say nothing of the stage built around them -- this does indeed change the game. Amazing. Incredibly cool. What's known about how much refurb is required before they can be used again? While most of the shuttle was resuable the launch and refurb costs were horrific. SpaceX Launch Live Webcast and Explanation (12.21.15) And a video of the successful landing: Incredible energy and emotion on that video! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warhead36 Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 Only a matter of time before man takes that next step and starts to colonize other planets. This is that first step. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PokerPacker Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 Incredible energy and emotion on that video!I like the two guys front-and-center jump-hugging. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjah Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 What's known about how much refurb is required before they can be used again? While most of the shuttle was resuable the launch and refurb costs were horrific. It probably remains to be seen. SpaceX is already the least expensive per pound to orbit in the game and they surely will cut out millions of dollars per launch with a reusable first stage. The true savings will depend on how many times a stage can be reused and how inexpensively/quickly they can turn it around. There are some numbers out there, but lazily off the top of my head... the first stage must cost $10 million or so per launch if you lose it to the ocean. Maybe more. Landing it instead of losing it means that in terms of first-stage physical assets, you're out $0 because you only lost the $200k of consumable propellant. Use the stage three-plus times and its amortized cost per flight is roughly $3M or less. Refurb and turnaround, especially the first few times when they're doing a massive amount of testing to prove that the engines and stage are still operable, might cost a few million but quickly fall to lower levels as flights continue. So I think the lowest estimate on savings per flight, assuming most boosters prove reusable a few times, would be on the order of $3-5M per flight. If turnaround is pretty quick and the first stage's engines/structure don't require extensive rebuilds, then I suppose the upper limit on cost savings would be $10M. You can't reduce the first stage's physical cost per flight to zero no matter how many times it flies, but quick turnarounds would substantially reduce the fixed cost per flight, which (plus the cost of the upper stages, etc.) currently pushes SpaceX's price to $60M per launch. So a 15-20% reduction in launch cost seems like a good target figure down the line. That said, I think my numbers are too conservative. Right now SpaceX can launch at about $2,500/lb to orbit with Falcon 9. Surely they are aiming for sub-$2,000/lb., which is a 20% reduction at least. (And I think their big-ass Falcon Heavy rocket is targeting an ideal of perhaps $1,000 to orbit due to the economies of a much larger payload.) Either way, it's a price others can't touch as far as I can tell. Lockheed Martin/Boeing haven't exactly designed their systems with cheap access to space in mind; NASA isn't going to do their own thing to low Earth orbit anymore as they've set their sights farther out, and certainly wouldn't have done it inexpensively anyway; and Blue Origin can't even orbit yet, despite the copious amounts of free energy Jeff Bezos' outsized ego continuously radiates. SpaceX is the best player in the commercial game. Space companies' fortunes can turn on a dime, but I'm not sure who could even catch SpaceX in the near- to mid-term future. They'd not only have to run as fast as SpaceX, but substantially catch up first -- and do so economically. Hard to imagine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Renegade7 Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 I look up to Musk sort of the same way I imagine some of ya'll did watching Armstrong take those first steps on the moon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PokerPacker Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 I look up to Musk sort of the same way I imagine some of ya'll did watching Armstrong take those first steps on the moon.Musk is a visionary with the brains, bank, and balls to see his grand vision through. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daveakl Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 I'm working on a space elevator. We are 10ft off the ground so far and everything is holding together. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
China Posted July 18, 2016 Share Posted July 18, 2016 SpaceX launch a 'booming' success CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Central Florida residents had a bit of a rude awakening early Monday as a cracking sonic boom shook people out of sleep, set off car alarms and caused general panic. But, it turns out we’re not being invaded by Canada. The boom many heard at about 12:50 a.m. was the latest SpaceX launch’s first-stage Falcon 9 booster rocket returning to earth. The launch of a Falcon 9 Dragon spacecraft happened at about 12:45 a.m. Monday from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Minutes later, the booster rocket was screaming back to Earth faster than the speed of sound, which is what caused the sonic boom, NASA officials said. The rocket landed safely back at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Click on the link for the full article Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bang Posted July 18, 2016 Share Posted July 18, 2016 That is completely awesome. Go Elon Musk! ~Bang Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DogofWar1 Posted July 18, 2016 Share Posted July 18, 2016 Musk 2020. The businessman outsider America needs, but not the one it deserves right now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
No Excuses Posted January 14, 2017 Author Share Posted January 14, 2017 http://www.spacex.com/webcast Video of the landing is in the above link. Really cool stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
China Posted June 17, 2017 Share Posted June 17, 2017 Elon Musk Publishes Plans for Colonizing Mars Elon Musk has put his Mars-colonization vision to paper, and you can read it for free. SpaceX's billionaire founder and CEO just published the plan, which he unveiled at a conference in Mexico in September 2016, in the journal New Space. Musk's commentary, titled “Making Humanity a Multi-Planetary Species,” is available for free on New Space's website through July 5. “In my view, publishing this paper provides not only an opportunity for the spacefaring community to read the SpaceX vision in print with all the charts in context, but also serves as a valuable archival reference for future studies and planning,” New Space editor-in-chief (and former NASA “Mars czar”) Scott Hubbard wrote in a statement. [SpaceX's Interplanetary Transport for Mars in Images] Musk's Mars vision centers on a reusable rocket-and-spaceship combo that he's dubbed the Interplanetary Transport System (ITS). Both the booster and the spaceship will be powered by SpaceX's Raptor engine, still in development, which Musk said will be about three times stronger than the Merlin engines that power the company's Falcon 9 rocket. Click on the link for the full article Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
China Posted February 5, 2018 Share Posted February 5, 2018 SpaceX has received permission from the US government to launch Elon Musk's car toward Mars CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida — SpaceX this week is preparing to launch Falcon Heavy, the biggest rocket in the company's history, for the first time. The 230-foot-tall three-booster launcher is scheduled to blast off Tuesday between 1:30 and 4:30 p.m. ET. SpaceX says Falcon Heavy is the most powerful rocket in the world. SpaceX's founder, Elon Musk, wanted this test launch to happen as early as 2013, though he recently said it could end in an explosion. Instead of putting a standard "mass simulator" or dummy payload atop Falcon Heavy, Musk — who once launched a wheel of cheese into orbit — will put his personal 2008 midnight-cherry-red Tesla Roadster on top of the monster rocket. In an Instagram post over the weekend, Musk also revealed that the car would carry a dummy driver, which Musk is calling "Starman," wearing a SpaceX space suit. "Test flights of new rockets usually contain mass simulators in the form of concrete or steel blocks. That seemed extremely boring," Musk said in an Instagram post in December, adding that the company "decided to send something unusual, something that made us feel." ... The FAA permit mentions a "hyperbolic orbit," the eccentric path Musk hopes his car takes through space. Also known as a Hohmann transfer orbit, it would send the car out to Mars orbit and back toward the sun on a nearly infinite loop. "The payload will be ... playing Space Oddity, on a billion year elliptic Mars orbit," Musk said in December. Click on the link for the full article Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tshile Posted February 6, 2018 Share Posted February 6, 2018 Anyone watch the launch? They recovered two boosters and apparently landed the core on a drone barge in the ocean. Seems to have been successful. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corcaigh Posted February 6, 2018 Share Posted February 6, 2018 Love the reaction live from SpaceX. I've set the video to just before launch. You can also see the two boosters landing simultaneously at about 37:50. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sacks 'n' Stuff Posted February 6, 2018 Share Posted February 6, 2018 27 minutes ago, tshile said: Anyone watch the launch? I’m at my parents’ condo in Mount Dora, FL. Watched it from the balcony. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Destino Posted February 7, 2018 Share Posted February 7, 2018 Can you imagine being so rich that you can just launch your car into space? I know it was a part of a test but it's not like they forgot the usual test payload and used his car in a pinch. He sent it up there, complete with a dummy driver and cameras, just for a laugh. Elon Musk is doing it right. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.