/sci/ - Science & Math

L2 had some interesting info about starship hot-staging
>Decision to hot stage was made in late 2022, but didn’t plan on being implemented for a while, hence Booster 9 being modified to support it
>Decision was made to switch B9 to hotstaging right after IFT-1
>NASA HLS admins had no idea about B9 being retrofitted for hotstaging
>APPARENTLY! Booster 7 had anomalies with its staging mechanisms. B7 never made it to MECO, but even if it had, Ship 24 would’ve basically been stuck or something

More info
>Booster 9 rollout in 2-3 weeks
>SpaceX planning 8 starship launches in 2024
>Ship 25 static fire was good

>>15503644
I feel like the decision to static fire at half thrust also may have led to issues. It is scary to think how a Booster 4/Ship 20 flight would’ve fared with Raptor 1s (pic is B4)

Actually, does anyone have an image comparing the stacked B4/S20 with B7/S24