/sci/ - Science & Math

>>6968291
>>6968291
>SpaceX launches a new rocket
>Someone else who has been launching rockets for decades launches a new rocket
>SPACEX BTFO

...Can somebody explain to me this chain of logic?

>>6968296
its just dumb russian shills as usual, butthurt their economy is going down the toilet

here's the vid of launch:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BsQOpD4TIZM

impressive performance, and smart design
• 4 boosters identical to core
• core throttles to 30% after liftoff
• 24.5T into LEO
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fB0sBLL_d2E

2014 was a good year for spaceflight.

>>6968291
Delta IV has a higher payload.

/thread

>>6968291
Big deal, SLS is going to have 5 times the capacity.

>relatively non-toxic propellant
Even the Russians now?

I am curious why it specifically uses 'unsymmetrical dimethyl hydrazine' what difference would using symmetrical stuff make.

>>6968497
24.5 Tonnes to LEO is shit for a 5 common stage HLV.
The Falcon Heavy with 3 common cores is calculated to lift 53 tonnes to LEO.

>>6968559
Kerosene to Oxy reactions produce CO2, a lot of it...

>>6968624
Good question. 1,2 dmh has higher density...

Probably burning UDMH yields more energy cause the N-N bond is assymetric?

>>6968291
hell, yeah! Amazingly, this is the first new rocket design from Russia since the fall of the Soviet Union!

Although modular, they only plan to use two variants:

* Angara 1.2: single core, Soyuz 1.2b upper stage. Will replace the ICBM-based Dnepr and Rokot for light launches.

* Angara A5: five cores + second stage + optional Briz-M, Blok-DM, or new hydrolox KVTK upper stages. This will replace the aging and unreliable Proton for heavy launches, which Kazakhstan keeps threatening to ban from their territory.

They will keep using the successful Soyuz for medium and manned launches.

>>6968627
>Real rocket compares poorly to notional rocket

>>6968516
At completion date of year=infinity

>>6968627
What this guy said.

>>6968515
Delta 4 is a nice rocket

>>6968515
SLS will have a MUCH bigger payload and to HEO.

>>6968516
it better, since it is so expensive they can only afford one launch every five years

>>6969061
See
>>6968814

You can't compare the planned performance to an actual performance. It may have zero payload because it never gets built. Or they may have to reduce scope as they build it and find problems.

>>6968516
>Big deal, SLS is going to have 5 times the capacity.

HAHAHAHAHAHHA

it will never be built. next administration will cut NASA's budget even further and just tell private sector to fill in gaps. SLS is DOA.

>>6968291
>muh superior Russian tech
>SpaceX BTFO!
>Actually caring more about what country is spacefaring rather than the advancement of humanity as a whole

haha oh wow

>>6968627
That's a bullshit comparison. Cores aren't equivalent. It's like saying falcon 9 is shit because Angara can launch twice as much with half the engines.

Don't compare apples to potatoes.

>Angara 5

Mars when???

I want humanity to get on Mars and I don't give a fuck who does it first. Please, just go on Mars already!!! Hope Chinese or Russians pick up some slack now that NASA is stagnating.

>>6969215
If you think NASA is stagnating you will hate RKA. They have just as many cancelled projects and proposed missions that will never even get a whiff of funding. They just have less money and smaller plans.

>>6969087
>>6968814
Falcon Heavy is hardly "notional", and Angara 5 hasn't taken anything to orbit yet either. This was a suborbital test flight.

The main reason Falcon Heavy didn't fly this year is that SpaceX has a backlog of Falcon 9 launches to do, and until they start landing stages for reuse, every time they launch Falcon Heavy it means they're not doing three Falcon 9 launches.

I think the main hold-up now is that they're trying very hard to get permission (from the FAA mainly) to attempt flyback landings of the side boosters before they launch Falcon Heavy. With that permission, each launch is at least two (and possibly three) valuable experiments in flyback reuse. Without it, they're not getting the value of those landing attempts.

>>6969263
>This was a suborbital test flight.
You're thinking of the earlier Angara 1.2PP flight. This one was to geosynchronous transfer orbit, but with a dummy mass simulator.

Next year will be both the Angara single and five core's first working payloads.

>>6969273
Thanks. My mistake.

>>6969263
>zero launches

That is notional. Late stage accidents or shows stopping engineering hurdles come up frequently in rocketry. When they've got some test flights it will be fair to compare.

I have high hopes for spacex but hopes alone do not put cargo in space.

Few weeks ago, some anon recommended this book, pic related, in a space thread and said it was one of the best books on rockets he's come across. Does anyone have an epub copy by any chance?

Reviews look great too: http://www.amazon.com/Russia-Space-Anatoly-Zak/dp/1926837258

ps: author is the guy who runs the site in OP's link..

>>6969263
>SpaceX has a backlog of Falcon 9 launches to do.
And it's growing because their achieved flight rate for 2014 was less than half what was on the books at the start of the year.
Falcon Heavy has been delayed not just this year but officially since late 2012.

>I think the main hold-up now is that they're trying very hard to get permission
SpaceX's scheduling concerns are much deeper than this. If this were the main problem they would have 12 launches a year.

While waiting SpaceX are only damaging themselves not flying FH soon. DoD is the big customer and they will not buy without an initial flight.

wow
are we really to the point where spacex is too mainstream and there are hipster options now?

>>6969276
>That is notional.
Just because it hasn't launched yet doesn't make it "notional", you illiterate. A "notional" rocket is one that exists only as a notion, like the expendable shuttle variants described in A Case For Mars, or similar napkin-sketch concepts.

If you mean "unflown" say "unflown". When you say "notional" you imply that no serious work has been done on it, that it exists only on the drawing board. They've built launchpads for Falcon Heavy. I'm pretty sure they have at least one Falcon Heavy built already.

>>6969280
>And it's growing because their achieved flight rate for 2014 was less than half what was on the books at the start of the year.
This is their first real year of production launches, and not all of the delays have been due to factors under their control. When they have more of their launchpads working, one delayed launch won't push all of the other launches back behind it. Construction takes time.

>Falcon Heavy has been delayed not just this year but officially since late 2012.
That's a different Falcon Heavy, based on the 1.0 cores. There was a general delay of a couple of years when they realized they could build flyback boosters. That wasn't some failure, that was a dramatic increase in the ambitiousness of their plans.

>SpaceX are only damaging themselves not flying FH soon.
What really matters for SpaceX now is the flyback booster. The Heavy will be important when that's done. Before they have flyback reusability, they're going to have a very limited ability to do Heavy launches, which consume three cores at once.

>>6969430
>This is their first real year of production launches, and not all of the delays have been due to factors under their control.
I don't think delays really explain going from 14 launches to 6 in 12 months.

>That's a different Falcon Heavy
Even if you ignore that excuse the first launch date turned out to be before the VAFB pad was even complete. More bad planning.
Also v1.1 had much more to do with F9 v1.0 being too small for the GEO market and FH being too large and non-existent.

>What really matters for SpaceX now is the flyback booster.
I don't buy that. If the anti-trust suit goes though and SpaceX still don't have a flight what will be the point? Zero. They will loose their biggest customer. It doesn't matter how limited their capability would be, the DoD will pay over and above the commercial price for three F9's by a long way.

>>6969480
>antitrust law suit

They have one ? can't find anything in a quick search.

>>6968291

> humans building giant space-penises

That's the reason superior beings doesn't visit us.

>>6969430
They have a rocket, but only a notion that it can fly.

>>6969489
The ULA/DoD dodgy deal of the decade.

http://nasawatch.com/archives/2014/04/ula-responds-to.html

>>6969512
Okay, thanks. I doubt it will go througth, tho (In my country it wouldn't but maybe the US are different)

>>6969480
>I don't think delays really explain going from 14 launches to 6 in 12 months.
Isn't it obvious that if you want to do something 14 times in 12 months, you can't have long delays between them?

They've had a range down (not their fault, beyond their control until they build their own range). They've had a launchpad damaged by a launch, which took time to repair and modify so it wouldn't happen again. One launch was delayed by a helium tank bursting inside a propellant tank, so of course they didn't only have to fix that, they had to figure out why it happened and make sure it wouldn't happen again.

This is not surprising stuff with a new vehicle. They didn't stand up at the start of the year and say, "Come hell or high water, we will launch 14 rockets this year." They just listed all of the contracted flights that could have been launched in 2014, if all went well.

Their customers aren't shocked and demanding refunds. They understand it well enough to be patient. There's an amount of delay that will lose them customers, and they've got to avoid hitting it, but they're not there yet.

>They will loose their biggest customer.
SpaceX isn't going to "loose" customers because they don't rush a demo flight out. They get customers with low prices and reliable rockets.

You mention the antitrust case. It's doubtful that DoD is going to be an interesting customer for them at all. SpaceX has to win legal action against them to be allowed to compete for a significant amount of their business, and most of the launches could just go on a Falcon 9 anyway.

>the DoD will pay over and above the commercial price for three F9's by a long way.
Ridiculous. The one thing that is clearly not going to happen is SpaceX getting paid as much as ULA for launches. The whole justification for SpaceX butting in on the arrangement ULA has is that their prices are much, much lower.

The DoD won't pay anything near the commercial price for three F9s for one Falcon Heavy.

>>6969538
When schedules slip, everyone has an excuse. The trick to meeting your schedule is to have enough margin and good contingency planning to deal with the things that inevitably come up.

The space shuttle was going to be super cheap if they could make an ambitious launch schedule too. Obviously they never reached that scheduled rate and it was never as cheap as planned.

Please, re-usability will allow SpaceX to dominate. Russia can have their soon to be outdated tech, the rise of Skylon and the Falcon models will allow the west to destroy the competition...

>>6969543
>When schedules slip, everyone has an excuse.
As excuses go, "It's our first year of production launches and we're still working the bugs out." is a good one.

It's not like they're not launching, they're just having some delays. Several of them have been of the, "We're actually pretty sure the rocket would work, but launching fast is a lower priority than being sure we don't lose a payload, so we're triple-checking this anomalous reading." variety.

And remember, doing these launches isn't their real business. This is just how they get paid on the way toward their real product: a fully reusable launch vehicle which can fly for little more than the cost of the fuel. And this has been an excellent year of progress toward reusability.

They've got legs on their rocket now. They've demonstrated deploying them and "soft landing" at sea level, after successful orbital launches. They've built a barge to actually land their rocket on, and the first attempt at a real solid-surface landing barely slipped past the end of this year.

It hasn't been a perfect year for them, but it has been a good one.

>>6969278
No, but get your library to buy a copy. It is huge, with luscious illustrations. Zak's website actually has a lot of draft quality versions of many of the illustrations; the book is kind of his website all polished up.

>>6969403
oh, absolutely. There are tons of small space startups that are too cool for school.

"I knew Interorbital Systems before they made orbit/went bankrupt."

SpaceX is kind of like that spotty geek in high school that no one took seriously, then grew up risking it all to become a tech billionaire.

>>6969495
go ahead, build a vagina shaped rocket and see where it gets you.

>>6969582
I don't want to be that guy but a vagina shaped rocket (abricot vagina) could work even better (nearer the optimal form for supersonic objects)

>>6969576
That is one challenge of the Falcon 9 design. Nine engines on the first stage means they have to be nine times as reliable in order to launch on time. That is one reason most other rockets don't do that. Elon is gambling that he can eventually achieve that reliability, reaping benefits from mass production and an architecture that allows powered vertical landing.

>>6969587
>Nine engines on the first stage means they have to be nine times as reliable in order to launch on time.
That's not the kind of trouble they've been having.

With nine engines and engine-out capability, if they've got some problem in their design or quality control so there are random engine failures, they get to see it happen without losing a payload, and then they don't have that same kind of failure again because they figure out why it happened and fix it.

They don't need to be nine times more reliable. They could have an engine fail on every second flight and never lose a payload.

SpaceX has new production lines, a new vehicle, new launch pads, new test facilities, new payload integration facilities, tons of new staff. It takes time to get everything running smoothly. That's the kind of trouble they've been having. It's not an indication that they're going about things the wrong way.

>>6969640
>SpaceX has new production lines, a new vehicle, new launch pads, new test facilities, new payload integration facilities, tons of new staff. It takes time to get everything running smoothly. That's the kind of trouble they've been having. It's not an indication that they're going about things the wrong way.

Jeez... it will take them a decade to get their shit together and by then, someone else will get all the contracts.

>>6969656
>Jeez... it will take them a decade to get their shit together
What is with this jumping from extreme to extreme to find negative things to say about SpaceX?

Yeah, it is taking them a decade to get their shit together. But they've been at this for more than ten years. They're just about ready to dominate the global launch market, and there are going to be naysayers right up until the competition is utterly crushed.

>>6969750
> They're just about ready to dominate the global launch market, and there are going to be naysayers right up until the competition is utterly crushed.

nigga plz. they're not ready to dominate shit. FH is still pie in the sky dream and their plans just keep on changing and getting more and more complex.

>>6969811
they don't need FH to dominate anything. That is only there for the fat NROL spysats.

They are gearing up for more than one F9 launch a month. That's going to be their money maker, especially if they realize savings from reuse.

(Anyway, congrats to Russia for their first brand new launcher!! AND a new engine contract for the RD-181 on the Antares! Russia strongk!)

>>6969869
>gearing up for more than one launch per month

That is what they said last year....

I hope they meet their goals, but space engineering is littered with optimistic promises and pessimistic results.

>>6968296

sls hugging spacex haters pushing their agenda

Bitches don't know Angara's current launch site is too high for commercial GTO missions and is only for milsat missions, and Angara won't have a lower inclination launch site until years after Falcon 9/Heavy's Texas and KSC pad is complete and smoothly running. It is not even in contention versus SpaceX's rockets in the near term.

The Russian ruble devaluation means Proton launches are cheaper now though so they got that going for them.

>>6969869
>they don't need FH to dominate anything. That is only there for the fat NROL spysats.
No, Falcon 9 isn't big enough for many of the GEO comsats.

You see them saying that Falcon Heavy can take over 21 tons to GTO, but they only advertise a price for up to 6.4 tons to GTO. That's pretty much the maximum payload needed to launch a comsat, and it will allow them to land and reuse the central core of the Falcon Heavy, as well as the side boosters.

>>6969053
>>6969154
Pls, the SLS program has already survived getting dicked by Obama when he canceled Ares & the Constellation program, I wouldn't get your shitty hopes up.

>>6968516
is still a faget however because SLS is a different class of rocket altogether and is not a valid comparison

>>6970389
>the SLS program has already survived getting dicked by Obama when he canceled Ares & the Constellation program
Uh... there was no SLS program before Obama dicked Ares/Constellation. The SLS program is the dicked version of Ares/Constellation.

And it doesn't look like SLS is going to do anything before there's a new president with a licence to dick.

If SpaceX demos the Falcon Heavy, the Dragon V2, flyback reusability, and a ground test of Raptor before a partial SLS does one cheesy unmanned test flight with a borrowed upper stage, I think there's a very good chance that the next president will get NASA out of the rocket business and back to serious space exploration.

>>6970417
>If SpaceX demos the Falcon Heavy, the Dragon V2, flyback reusability, and a ground test of Raptor before a partial SLS does one cheesy unmanned test flight with a borrowed upper stage, I think there's a very good chance that the next president will get NASA out of the rocket business and back to serious space exploration.
SLS will be substantially more capable than Falcon Heavy, and is a lot further along than people on here admit (though I wouldn't expect it to be ready any time before 2020) so there's not much reason right now to think it would be cancelled. Of course, that can all change pretty quickly.

Beyond SLS I do agree with you, however.

>>6970417
>Uh... there was no SLS program before Obama dicked Ares/Constellation. The SLS program is the dicked version of Ares/Constellation.
Also, what I meant was that a lot of the same people that worked (and got screwed over) on Ares are now working on SLS (for obvious reasons) and learned some lessons on how to stay under the political radar.

>>6970427
>SLS will be substantially more capable than Falcon Heavy,
Not in any way that matters. Orion was designed to be launched to LEO on Ares I (a pretty heavy-duty rocket in its own right), and dock with an Earth departure stage, habitat, lander, etc. lifted by at least one launch of Ares V (at least twice as powerful as SLS).

Orion's designed for a multiple-launch mission architecture. SLS is drastically underpowered for a single-launch mission with Orion, but at the same time too uneconomical and otherwise unsuitable for the high launch rate needed for multiple-launch missions.

SLS/Orion doesn't go anywhere interesting. A high lunar orbit is pretty much their only option. That's why they're talking about the asteroid rendezvous in high lunar orbit. It's not a worthwhile mission, it's just the only thing they could think of doing with SLS/Orion.

Falcon Heavy, on the other hand, is designed for a high flight rate at a very low cost, with a whopping big payload to LEO. Maybe you need two to four times as many launches as Constellation, but it can do it, and it'll be a lot cheaper than Constellation would have been.

The bottom line is that SLS can't be a replacement for Constellation, and do moon landings and build a moon base and assemble a huge multi-launch Mars mission in LEO, but Falcon Heavy can.

And that's why SLS is likely to be cancelled.

>>6970486
>The bottom line is that SLS can't be a replacement for Constellation
It's not intended to, otherwise Constellation would never have been cancelled.

I don't want to do any math because it's Christmas, so I'm going to being using Wikipedia's numbers. If you have a better source handy, I'd be happy to see it.
>SLS/Orion doesn't go anywhere interesting.
You can say that about the Block I SLS using the DCSS/ICPS for the upper stage, but the Block IA with the EUS will be capable of sending 31.7 tons on a TMI trajectory, which at a glance seems to be about the mass of Orion + a fully loaded service module (let's not even get into landers here). You're absolutely right about the wicked capabilities of cheap & rapidly-launched Falcon Heavy payloads assembled in orbit, but that's still a long way off.

However, everything above is irrelevant, because none of it supports your assertion
>And that's why SLS is likely to be cancelled.
The fact of the matter is that the SLS is very much in development, and will remain in development for as long as NASA is allowed the money to pay for it. Barring another major economic recession that causes Congress or the President to put NASA on the chopping block, the SLS program will not be cancelled.

>>6970486
>asteroid rendezvous
>not interesting

say goodbye to your economy you commie fuck

>>6970708
>commie fuck
lulz. Russia's less commie than US these days.

>>6970658
>>The bottom line is that SLS can't be a replacement for Constellation
>It's not intended to, otherwise Constellation would never have been cancelled.
You seem to be reasoning on the assumption that SLS is part of some rational space exploration plan. It's not.

Constellation was downsized to SLS/Orion because it was taking too long and costing too much. And despite the "Ares" name and its implication of some connection to Mars, Constellation was really just designed to recreate the Apollo landings, on a slightly larger scale.

They downsized Ares to SLS without downsizing Orion to something SLS could put somewhere interesting. If they cared about actually using SLS, they would have reduced Orion to a two-man capsule.

>the Block IA with the EUS will be capable of sending 31.7 tons on a TMI trajectory, which at a glance seems to be about the mass of Orion + a fully loaded service module (let's not even get into landers here)
What do you mean "let's not get into landers"?

Orion is just a capsule, a return vehicle. It's not a long-stay habitat or a lander. With the service module it has a small amount of orbital maneuvering capability and can keep humans alive in it for under a month.

Even attached to a habitat, it's not designed to survive in space for over six months. It has absolutely no role to play in a Mars mission. It's not for going to Mars, it's not for coming back from Mars. It's strictly for Earth-Moon space.

>>6970661
Dude, it's a tiny asteroid, which they are bringing to a convenient location for a manned rendezvous with a robotic mission. There is no reason they couldn't do it in LEO, or even bring the damn space boulder directly to the ISS.

The only reason they're talking about doing it in a high lunar orbit is because that's the farthest that SLS/Orion can go. It's a way of pretending that SLS/Orion has a reason to exist.

Anyway, it's not actually going to happen. It's Obama's baby, and he didn't get it done in his 8 years. Do you think the next president is going to keep NASA raising Obama's baby?

>>6971419
Why don't they crash the asteroid onto the moon and then investigate the site?

>>6968291
god all the amerifags and spacexfags in this thread getting butthurt is hilarious, please do continue.

>>6971411
>It has absolutely no role to play in a Mars mission. It's not for going to Mars, it's not for coming back from Mars. It's strictly for Earth-Moon space.
Could Orion aerobrake and land from Mars return trajectory?

>>6971758
Yes.

>>6971419
>There is no reason they couldn't do it in LEO, or even bring the damn space boulder directly to the ISS.

If deltaV and EOM wasn't a thing. The benefit of the Moon is that the orbit will naturally decay being about a safe end of mission. The same cannot be said for earth where you then need to get rid of it. More deltaV to get to LEO, more still to get it out again.

>>6969495
sometimes I hope someone reading this thinks "omg a flying vagina, that's brilliant" and starts to work on plans/a prototype immediately and in 30 years the standard spaceflight vehicle is a giant flying vagina shaped craft

>>6971783
Well then Orion could serve as passenger taxi between Mars expedition ship and Earth. Though it is only minuscule part of mission and it needs much more to be developed.

>Russians now have a rocket that brings up 24.5T to LEO
>SpaceX now has a rocket that brings up 53T to LEO

Wow, that couldn't even reach the moon with any real load, let alone mars where Elon Musk wants to go.

It's a shame NASA's budget got cut this bad. They could achieve more in 1960s with the Saturn V than we can today.(118T into LEO, and about 40-50T to mars)

>>6972039
>>SpaceX now has a rocket that brings up 53T to LEO

lmao