/sfg/ Spaceflight General

[Anonymous No.11170333]

Tank weld edition

Previous Thread:
>>11165915

[Anonymous No.11170352]

>>11170333

[Anonymous No.11170377]

>>11170352
Oof

[Anonymous No.11170399]

>>11170117

based

[Anonymous No.11170402]

>>11170352
I dont get it

[Anonymous No.11170439]

>>11170402
Don't worry, you can be pilot.

[Anonymous No.11170448]

https://youtu.be/y4ADXLk3weU

[Anonymous No.11170472]

>>11170439
*shrug*
i still dont get it

[Anonymous No.11170496]

>>11170399
Screenshotted just because the claims of "we were never planning to FLY it" after saying "20k hop in 2 months". Smells fishy as fuck.

[Anonymous No.11170531]

>>11170496
It just seems like the whole Starship program is a massive cluster fuck. As instead of being at the mercy of Congress like other rockets, it’s at the mercy of Elon’s autism...

[Justin Ramsey No.11170540]

[Anonymous No.11170545]

>>11170531
Nah it's more at the mercy of Gwynne Shotwell, Musk wanted enough money to develop Starship the same way they did the Falcon 9 but she said it would put the company in too much financial danger.
That is why they are building it outside with tank welders, they don't have a huge RnD budget and it's being fully funded by SpaceX. Worse case senario is Starship goes nowhere until Starlink is raking in profit and then Musk is given more play money.

[Anonymous No.11170578]

>>11170545
>Nah it's more at the mercy of Gwynne Shotwell, Musk wanted enough money to develop Starship the same way they did the Falcon 9 but she said it would put the company in too much financial danger.

Holy fuck, my theory that Gwynne has gone crazy is actually true. Ever since she recently started parroting Elon time, instead of forecasting more realistic schedules like she was known for, I’ve thought something was wrong. I thought it was Elon’s influence and she’d drunk his Kool Aid....but poor guy, I apologise Elon.

[Anonymous No.11170648]

>https://twitter.com/ACRVasquez/status/1197585655842377728
NASA charges $19 million to just fly from their launchpad. So looks like SpaceX is building their own in Boca.

[Anonymous No.11170649]

>>11170496
>The stories and information posted here are artistic works of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact.

[Anonymous No.11170651]

>>11170496
>>11170399
>>11170531
>>11170545
>>11170578
What's with rumors and speculations lately?

[Anonymous No.11170700]

>>11170496
Wait so are the no longer flying Starship from the Cape? Like at all?

[Anonymous No.11170704]

>>11170700
They'll fly there when they're confident because its very expensive.

[Anonymous No.11170726]

>>11170700
nobody knows
Cape will probably be too expensive to launch anything but NASA stuff from, and even the tanker missions come from Boca in that scenario

[Anonymous No.11170729]

will spaceX now go the same route as NASA and scrap or change half finished projects indefinitely?
if they don't at least fly Mk2 once, they basically wasted three quarters of a year on it.
by now i come to think that thats an inherent problem of the space industry

[Anonymous No.11170738]

>>11170704
>>11170726
I don’t buy this, so their just going pack up and leave the Cocoa site and dismantle the half-built launch mount?

[Anonymous No.11170755]

>>11170738
No. They're just delaying it in Cape until their Boca starship can prove out the core flying capabilities. Cape cost more money to operate, so they will fly in Cape after core capabilities are proven in Boca.

They're not closing up Cape. Where are you reading that?

[Anonymous No.11170762]

>>11170578
What are you talking about? Elon is a perfectly sane man.

[Anonymous No.11170765]

>>11170496
>here's my proof: screenshot of 4channel post about a suspected 'leak'

[Anonymous No.11170775]

>>11170729
The NASA way would have been to stick with the original design concept even after it proved to yield unconscionable results on time/price. Scrapping, redoing, reworking shit is pretty much what sets SpaceX apart.

[Anonymous No.11170779]

>>11170755
>They're not closing up Cape. Where are you reading that?

What are they gonna actually do at the Cape then?

[Anonymous No.11170819]

>>11170779
>What are they gonna actually do at the Cape then?
They have an actual launch facility at Cape. So they'll fly when most of the core kinks are worked out.

Boca is just like New Mexico when F9 was being developed. On top of that Boca may have full scale launch capability if things pan out properly.

[Anonymous No.11170825]

>>11170819
most of the core flight kinks*

[Anonymous No.11170850]

>>11170779
fly falcon, duh

[Anonymous No.11170858]

>>11170496
>Only leaks on 4chan.
>Uses reddit spacing.
hmmm

[Anonymous No.11170880]

>>11170399
>>11170496
>2.1 bar
>ejecting the dome that high

Interesting.

[Anonymous No.11170893]

>>11170880
The pressure needed to actually eject it that high is estimated at 4.5, and SpaceX closed shop at Vandenburg for being charged $9 million to land. I find these posts deeply dubious and untrustworthy.

[Anonymous No.11170909]

>>11170893
$9m to land, $19M to launch.

[Anonymous No.11170916]

>>11170130
Clearly SpaceX went the internet service provider route.

[Anonymous No.11170920]

>>11170909
>$9m to land, $19M to launch.
Source on that? Is that related to the USAF fining SpaceX for every landing they do?

[Anonymous No.11170925]

>>11170920
For reusable landing fee, USAF charges SpaceX $9m for some "insurance fee". I think the source was a USAF general on some podcast.

For flying charge, NASA charges $19M >>11170648

[Anonymous No.11170930]

>>11170689
Has anyone in the past half century bothered with any hydrocarbons except RP-1 (or similar kerosene like fractions) and methane?
The nazis had the tonka fuel line, made up mostly of triethylethamine, xylidine and sometimes throwing octanes, benzene, xylenes, aniline, vinylmethylether and methyl/ethylamine into the mix. The soviets and frogs used it a bit after WWII I think, mainly in missiles. And that was it for more complex hydrocarbon fuels as far as I know.

[Anonymous No.11170931]

>>11170925
>I think the source was a USAF general on some podcast.
Was that ever confirmed beyond what he said?

[Anonymous No.11170935]

>>11170930
there's some brits fucking with propane I think
butane is probably worth investigating for an HTP booster thing

[Anonymous No.11170936]

>>11170930
Gasoline (especially with HTP as an oxidizer) was tried a whole bunch of times but nobody could get it to work reliably

kinda unfortunate

[Anonymous No.11170937]

>>11170930
>Has anyone in the past half century bothered with any hydrocarbons except RP-1 (or similar kerosene like fractions) and methane?
Before RP-1, gasoline was used by some research rockets. And while RP-1 was still being figured out, Rocketdyne was looking into Diethyl cyclohexane. IDK how good it was though.

[Anonymous No.11170955]

[Anonymous No.11170977]

>>11170935
propane/butane would make sense since they're easily storable I guess.

>>11170936
why is it unfortunate? performance difference to RP-1 should be negligible, shouldn't it?

>>11170937
Looking into as actually developing engines and concrete plans? In the 50s and 60s JPL and other labs were looking at everything they could get their hands on.

[Anonymous No.11170979]

in other news, the long march 3B launched half a day ago had one of its boosters drop onto some poor farmers

tank with nitrogendioxide cloud

[Anonymous No.11170982]

YF-25 engine

[Anonymous No.11170985]

>>11170982

[Anonymous No.11170987]

[Anonymous No.11170988]

>>11170979
the virgin "American range safety" vs the chad "Chinese inland launch pad"

[Anonymous No.11170990]

[Anonymous No.11170993]

>>11170979
It's like they aim them at peasants on purpose or something.

[Anonymous No.11170995]

>>11170977
>Looking into as actually developing engines and concrete plans?
The only source I can find was in Ignition and it doesn't mention any plans. It probably didn't reach to any useful point before RP-1 became standardized.

>>11170979
pic related

[Anonymous No.11170996]

[Anonymous No.11171000]

[Anonymous No.11171003]

[Anonymous No.11171011]

I hope someone tells them to not eat the now UDMH infused rice they were growing. And I wonder if they'll get reimbursed

[Anonymous No.11171014]

>>11170979
>>11170982
>>11170985
>>11170987
>>11170990
>>11170996
>>11171000
>>11171003
I'm surprised that there hasn't been an uproar in China nor internationally over this.

[Anonymous No.11171016]

>>11171014
why whould there? this happens every couple of years. at least they didn't flatten an entire village this time

[Anonymous No.11171021]

>>11171016
>>11171014
yeah this is fairly contained for typical chinese rocket launch

[Anonymous No.11171028]

>>11171014
>>11171014
>>11171016
>>11171021

I know right. Imagine if someone did this in America Jesus Christ.

Also I would not mind snagging a piece of rocket debris as a souvenir provided I didn't die from the orange cloud of death

[Anonymous No.11171033]

>>11171014
if you're in China and you start uproaring you get stripped for useful spare parts

[Anonymous No.11171034]

>>11171028
the orange cloud of death will just cauterize your moucous membranes. you should be more wary of the colorless cloud/liquid of death that will give you cancer

[Anonymous No.11171038]

>>11171028
>I know right. Imagine if someone did this in America Jesus Christ.
I mean, there's already people in the US complaining that rockets put too much pollution into the air.

[Anonymous No.11171040]

>>11171014
Apparently most city people (the people in power) in China are either completely uncaring or down right antagonistic in regards to country/village people. So why would they care?

[Anonymous No.11171042]

>>11171014
I wonder what if anything the government compensates the owners with

[Anonymous No.11171043]

>>11171014
State media controls all information. Only ones coming out are amateurs anonymizing their information and releasing it via social media.

[Anonymous No.11171049]

>>11171040
lol they got that in common with America at least

[Anonymous No.11171094]

>>11171042
probably some bullets

[Anonymous No.11171112]

>>11171014
HAHAHAHAHA

[Anonymous No.11171113]

>>11171094
>rocket lands on your house, destroying your meager possessions and flattening your wife and child
>"10 points have been added to your social credit score"

[Anonymous No.11171143]

>>11171113
>posts images of the aftermath on the internet and they find their way beyond the great firewall

[Anonymous No.11171152]

>>11171040
China is a Classless society they don't differentiate people by petty things like where they happen to live.

[Anonymous No.11171161]

>>11171143
>gets organs harvested

[Anonymous No.11171164]

>>11170402
https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2017/05/sls-core-stage-recovering-weld-pin-change/

[Anonymous No.11171165]

>>11171152
Ok winnie.

[Anonymous No.11171173]

>>11170979
>>11170982
>>11170985
>>11170987
>>11170990
>>11170996
>>11171000
>>11171003
>>11171011

LOOK AT THE DANGER OF REUSABLE ROCKETS LOOK AT THE DEVASTATION MY HEART IS IN PAIN MY PRAYERS ARE WITH THE VICTIMS OF THIS TERRIFYING TRAGEDY. THIS IS NOT AMERICAN THIS IS NOT THE WAY OF OUR GREAT NATION THIS SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED. I PROPOSE 100 MILLION DOLLAR TAX FOR EACH PIECE OF ROCKET HARDWARE THAT TOUCHES AMERICAN SOIL AFTER ITS FIRST FLIGHT EXCLUDING NASA CERTIFIED CAPSULES.

[Anonymous No.11171179]

>>11171173
7/10, needs less screaming and more RANDOM emphasis.

[Anonymous No.11171183]

>>11170979
At this point it has to be on purpose.

[Anonymous No.11171190]

>>11171152
>everybody is equal, so everybody should live the same way, which is the way we live here in the city

[Anonymous No.11171231]

[Anonymous No.11171257]

>>11171164
lol just fill it with liquid nitrogen anyway and see what happens

[Anonymous No.11171273]

>>11171231
When does it fly?

[Anonymous No.11171284]

>>11171257
That's actually not too far off from what they did with the bad LH2 tank. The welds held, but they also were never pushed to full flight pressures, just testing pressures.
They had to completely throw out the bad LOX tank though, since it had to be tested at full flight pressures. So they took the one that was originally meant for the first core stage and used that instead, and welded a new one as a replacement. This is part of the reason the first SLS core took so goddamned long; they had to essentially build two of 'em because of the bad welds.

[Anonymous No.11171285]

>>11171273
anon that's a water tower

[Anonymous No.11171289]

>>11171285
Yes. When does it fly?

[Anonymous No.11171293]

>>11171289
as soon as the engines are ready

[Anonymous No.11171351]

Opinions on the Lunar Gateway?

[Anonymous No.11171369]

>>11171351
Better than nothing, orders of magnitude worse than what could be.

[Anonymous No.11171373]

>>11171351
It's politically necessary but a little silly, they could do the Artemis missions without it

[Anonymous No.11171379]

>>11171351
The minimal version of it (PPE and MHM modules only) should be fairly low risk for what they're getting

if it spirals up into ISS 2 Lunar Boogaloo it'll fail

[Anonymous No.11171389]

>>11171369
>>11171373
>>11171379
Do you think it's necessary as a "launchpad" to Mars and/or as a refueling station?

Should we be making some kind of Lunar station instead?

[Anonymous No.11171398]

>>11171389
It will be neither of those things. It's a rendezvous point for lunar landings, that's all. Orion sends a crew there, meets up with a lander, maybe a Cygnus-like resupply ship, that's it

Refueling a reusable lander will happen elsewhere (no need to unnecessarily have that happen right next to where the squishy humans are).

Assembling a Mars ship would be more efficiently done in LEO.

[Anonymous No.11171410]

>>11171398
>It's a rendezvous point for lunar landings, that's all.
So there's not much point to it?

[Anonymous No.11171412]

>>11171389
>Do you think it's necessary as a "launchpad" to Mars and/or as a refueling station?
No. Fuel d*p*t in LEO would do the same trick. But that's politically nonviable. Also, if Starship pans out, it would be unnecessary but old space companies might still require it.

[Anonymous No.11171413]

>>11171351
It's mostly pointless and a tool for NASA to get around putting an actual base on the Moon which would be far superior but beyond their capability and risk tolerance.

[Anonymous No.11171416]

>>11171410
not much, but that's okay if it stays small and relatively cheap

like, you could just have Orion and the lander rendezvous in that halo orbit, call it a zero-module gateway. They might do that for the first landing. But it would be convenient if you had a small staging area there to pre-position some resources, so, minimal hab module and power/stationkeeping module. Don't need anything more than that really

[Anonymous No.11171419]

>>11171351
useless piece of trash with no purpose

[Anonymous No.11171420]

>>11171351
Active siphon of human willpower and enthusiasm for spaceflight.

[Anonymous No.11171424]

>>11171419
No, that would be Starship Mk1...

[Anonymous No.11171432]

>>11171413
>but beyond their capability
So what's stopping them from doing this?

[Anonymous No.11171434]

>>11171416
Initially Gateway is a rendezvous point and communications beacon for Orion and landers, once stuff like Canadarm 3 and the European refuelling depot module gets added, it becomes much more.

[Anonymous No.11171445]

>>11171389
No, any proper Mars mission aught to firstly be composed of multiple redundant vessels, secondly each one aught to be several times the internal pressurized volume of Gateway and propelled by some form of nuclear drive. For Gateway to be an effective stopping off point for refueling, crewing, etc, it would probably have to be several times the size it currently is planned to be. Why bother slowing down at such a tiny station in the first place anyways?

[Anonymous No.11171486]

>>11171432
So what's stopping them from doing this?
Low risk tolerance and incompetence, mostly. They would need an extremely high budget to make up for that but it would delay the next moon landing by years. For them, it's just easier to put in a lunar gateway as a moon placeholder so they can pretend that they didn't waste tens of billons of dollars on the Artemis missions, as well as SLS, on a few quick missions. They call it lunar access, but it's really just bullshit marketing.

[Anonymous No.11171511]

>>11171486
So when should we expect an actual base on the surface of the Moon then?

[Anonymous No.11171512]

>>11171351
Good way to perform cheap inclination changes that allow global lunar access that triggers idiots who just want to do Apollo 2.0 and limit themselves to equatorial landings.

[Anonymous No.11171564]

>>11171511
I think that is heavily dependent on if Starship succeeds or not. It isn't the cost of lunar habitation modules or rovers that is the problem, it's the cost of getting there in the first place. That cost is so expensive that until this point only an agency like NASA could fund a human program there, but those programs then subverted by lobbying, like what happened with Boeing's SLS, and it eats into the budget so much that it's hard for them to do anything there besides land and come back.

If Starship succeeds and becomes human rated, I think very quickly you'll see a moon base. Maybe within a year or two of that. There are some other challenges, like the lack of existing lunar spacesuits, but they're small programs compared to accessing the moon in the first place.

[Anonymous No.11171572]

>>11171564
starship (or any other potential reusable super heavy lift vehicle) doesn't need to become human rated, a cheap truck to cart material and fuel to LEO would be more than enough.

[Anonymous No.11171595]

>>11171564
So NASA is very reliant on third-party commercial space industry companies to develop technology then?

So you're saying that this is still a possibility? Sweet. Whatever helps us get to Mars sooner.

[Anonymous No.11171626]

>>11171445
That's just your opinion of what a mars mission needs to be. In reality you don't need nuclear drives, for their cost and red tape bullshit you could likely build several more chemical rockets.

[Anonymous No.11171631]

>>11171626
That's why I used "aught" instead of "must".

[Anonymous No.11171637]

>>11171631
But you are supposing that nuclear rockets would be superior to chemical ones despite a massively increased cost and inherent lack of reusability. Nuclear rockets also cannot launch from Earth so you are having to shoot up multiple components and assemble them in orbit, again massively increasing the cost.

[Anonymous No.11171644]

>>11171637
in orbit assembly is a viable goal for any human mars missions and nuclear engines can be reused

[Anonymous No.11171649]

>>11171434
>much more
>a robot arm to add more modules easily
>another tank of xenon and hydrazine to push around more weight

sounds like a self licking ice cream cone

[Anonymous No.11171660]

>>11171644
>Nuclear engines can be reused
>Neutron bombardment raping every component
>Whole engine glowing like a motherfucker after use making it impossible to handle

Yeah, no.

[Anonymous No.11171667]

>>11171660
>>Neutron bombardment raping every component
not a problem
>>Whole engine glowing like a motherfucker after use making it impossible to handle
No one ever said it needs to be servicable by humans. Of course it's going to irradiate everyone that gets close to it to shit. Have we been changing fuel elements in nuclear powerplants by fucking hand until now? Besides that depending on engine type and design you might not need to change fuel elements to enable a long life cycle anyways. Just add some fresh propellant to feed it.

[Anonymous No.11171670]

>>11171644
Or for the price tag of this you could simply send many more earth launched chemical stages.

[Anonymous No.11171676]

>>11171667
>Neutron bombardment of many small and sensitive rocket engine components
>Not a problem

Ok

[Anonymous No.11171684]

>>11171670
probably, it will depend on how the launch vehicle market evolves. If payload capacity to LEO is limited nuclear is the way to go. It also helps with return if in situ fuel production on mars is limited.

>>11171676
>all nuclear rocket engines have many small and sensitive components
most of them are a nozzle attached to a glorified kettle used to boil fuel in. even more complex designs do not have intricate components in areas with high neutron flow because well, that would be retarded.

[Anonymous No.11171778]

>>11171637
>inherent lack of reusability
nuclear reactors on Earth work for decades, why can't nuclear reactors in Space?
obviously you're going to need to build a jank mechanical telepresence thing or something to avoid getting cooked by radiation for repairs, but whatever

[Anonymous No.11171808]

>>11171778
nuclear reactors on Earth aren't temperature cycling between 150 Kelvin and 3000 Kelvin and back again on the regular

but a nuclear thermal rocket in space will do that every time you fire it

it puts some strain on the materials!

[Anonymous No.11171855]

>>11171778
>nuclear reactors on Earth work for decades, why can't nuclear reactors in Space?
Because space has a special property that makes reusability impossible and you should never ask about it again!

[Anonymous No.11171857]

>>11170762
>frozen hellhole
>colonizable

[Anonymous No.11171866]

>>11171857
At least it'll be cheaper to live there than California.

[Anonymous No.11171880]

>>11171857
he means there's no keffirs

[Anonymous No.11171881]

>>11171857
>Frozen, near vaccuum with poisonous soil
>But
>No niggers

[Anonymous No.11171884]

>>11171857
whether or not a specific area can be "colonized" is simply a measure of how much infrastructure you throw at the problem

Imagine a scale of 0-10, where 0 is interstellar space, literally fucking no resources, everything must be brought in, including habitat space. 10 is the Pacific Northwest, where you can absolutely just live in your underwear year round and create an entire complex tribal society without even learning agriculture. Everything, including Mars, is on the scale between these two. Unbearable heat means you need infrastructure, no water means desalination or shipping it in. So Dubai is only like, a 6 or 7. Take away the air and you need to make that too, as well as complicating infrastructure development (everything must be airtight). So Mars, with more water than Dubai but less air than Everest, is a 4 or 5. Venus is probably negative, because it would be harder to colonize the surface of Venus than literally colonizing empty space.

[Anonymous No.11171918]

>>11171880
>>11171881

[Anonymous No.11172007]

>>11171884
You forgot mars has no magnetosphere. You would need artificial sunlight for both plants and the humans, and tons of fertilizer. And after all that, just to live like a subhuman. You will do literally nothing all day but eat, shit, study rocks, but instead of doing in in the comfort of earth with slow robots, you do it in a shithole inside and underground box drinking recycled piss and shit. And because it's a one way trip, you get cancer and die like a third world shithole, because its not practical to bring medical infrastructure to heal every cancer patient. There will be no terraforming and skiing on olympus mons, but only jello babies and dying like a nigger in a cave.

At least venus doesn't have the radiation and vaccum problems mars does if you live in balloons floating the upper atmosphere.

[Anonymous No.11172032]

>>11172007
go FUD yourself

[Anonymous No.11172045]

>>11172007
The day cycle is the same as earth and if you were to look at all into the past about crop yields vs today this entire argument shits the bed and fucks the dog, and even trying to meme
>it costs too much energy to run an LED bulb
proves you are retarded. The dust storm season is just that a season like the other 2 we cant grow in, but alot shorter.
>you get cancer and die
I need proof of this because your retarded ass thinks people will walk upon the surface of mars in our birthday suit all day everyday
>its a one way trip
that is a lot of conjecture when every single fucking mars mission doesn't state that except for mars 1 the start up retards who went bankrupt.

Im done answering you are a fucking retard

[Anonymous No.11172064]

>>11172045
don't talk to me or my wifes mars mission ever again

[Anonymous No.11172152]

>Years between Martian rovers
>"it has to work perfectly or we're doomed" mentality of missions
>No Neptune nor Uranus probes since Voyager
>Decades of "exploration" and no definitive answer of alien life in the solar system
>JWST taking forever
>Heaviest probe was a mere 2 tons
How can scientific interest and pace in space be boosted? Should something like Mars Surveyor (fast and cheap probes) be resurrected?

[Anonymous No.11172171]

>>11172152
>How can scientific interest and pace in space be boosted?
Same way it was boosted last time.
We need an enemy to fuck up.

The majority of Americans were ardently against going to the moon because of how costly it would be. JFK was considering a joint mission with the soviets to offset the cost. But we had to rape the Soviets. Based off of some documents Khrushchev would have likely accepted it had JFK offered. But once Johnson took over it was done. Khrushchev did not trust the man, and vice versa.
Linked to this is all the media. The space race lead to TV/movies all about space. This lead to a whole new generation of impassioned scientists.
We're not the same country we were back then, though. Back then, we all came together. I don't see that happening any day soon.

Best thing to do - more science fiction. Fiction inspires people.
Also, NASA really needs to do/discover something big. Something that gets the whole nation watching.

[Anonymous No.11172172]

>>11172152
Cheaper rockets is the only way. What good is a fast cheap probe if it costs gorillions of dollars to launch?

[Anonymous No.11172191]

>>11172171
>Best thing to do - more science fiction. Fiction inspires people.
Interstellar, The Martian, and Gravity all made me super interested in space travel desu.

More shit like that needs to be made.

[Anonymous No.11172192]

>>11172171
>had glowniggers not assassinated kennedy we might've gotten a joint US/USSR moonlanding and improved relations instead of further escalating cold war
oh what could have been

[Anonymous No.11172205]

>>11172152
US gov space industry is run by interest groups right now. So we are paralyzed by it. Let NASA talk a deal with Elon to send dozen small sats(like the ones he's using for Starlink) to Mars orbit via mars using falcon heavy to setup mars GPS/imaging system. For $300M total (including launch cost). That will prepare future mars landing missions.

[Anonymous No.11172207]

>>11172191
Ideally, watching any will send you down the rabbit hole of watching more and more.
Until, one day, you end up teaching yourself klingon.
Qapla!

[Anonymous No.11172213]

>>11172171
when it comes to asteroid mining, the only economic reason to go to space, what can men do better than robots, besides being a giant legal liability?

if we lived in a glorious ancap utopia we could send poor people in cheap rockets to die and suffer for the chance of making a lot of money and then we could get some results but because of government every person in space is a potential lawsuit

[Anonymous No.11172234]

>>11172152
>Years between Martian rovers

Building something as big and complicated as a Curiosity-Class rover takes time, who would’ve guessed it? Couple that with the Mars transfer window only opening every two years.

>"it has to work perfectly or we're
doomed" mentality of missions

Lots of NASA probes have redundancy built into them and many experience small failures during their careers, just look at what happened to Kepler.

>No Neptune nor Uranus probes since Voyager

NASA doesn’t actually decide where their probes go, the decadal survey does. It sets out NASA’s planetary exploration goals for the decade and NASA builds probes to fulfil them.

>JWST taking forever

JWST was a poorly conceived mission built around technology that didn’t even exist at the time of conception, of course it has faced massive delays. The spacecraft is complete now, but has to go through numerous tests because of it’s ‘all or nothing design’. Also, if you think JWST is bad, I’ll be happy to enlighten you that Hubble’s development started in the 1970s and it was launched in 1990...

>Heaviest probe was a mere 2 tons

Cassini launch mass: 5,712 kg

>Should something like Mars Surveyor (fast and cheap probes) be resurrected?

No, NASA tried that again in the 90s and it failed horribly. The current batch of ‘slow and expensive’ probes have a stellar reliability record.

>>11172172

When your one of a kind spacecraft costs several billion to build, you tend to care more about the reliability and performance of the launcher, than saving a relatively tiny sum by picking a cheaper ride. ULA consistently bags the multi-billion dollar flagship missions because of vertical integration, Centaur’s performance and their near stainless reliability record. SpaceX has started winning the launch contracts for smaller, cheaper exploration-class payloads because NASA can save a decent fraction of the overall mission cost by picking a cheaper launch service provider.

[Anonymous No.11172243]

>>11172207
>Until, one day, you end up teaching yourself klingon.
I've already started Star Trek, kek. Almost done with TOS, then it's on to the movies, then TNG (thank fuck, not that I'm not enjoying it).

Anything else in the same vein as the movies I mentioned btw?

[Anonymous No.11172263]

>>11172243
Ever see Moon? You'd probably dig it, I did.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lAfMT5FIZE

[Anonymous No.11172264]

>>11172243
>Anything else in the same vein as the movies I mentioned btw?
Couldn't tell you, tb h. I haven't seen any of those movies.

Besides, I've always been a bigger fan of classic sci-fi. To give you some suggestions:
>Movies: Forbidden Planet (1956), The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), Starship Troopers (1997) - read the book
>TV: Stargate SG1, Stargate Atlantis, Farscape, Babylon 5, Outer Limits (1963), Twilight Zone (1951)

There's just something so entertaining about shitty science and science fiction.
Soviet stuff is pretty decent, too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AauMjr5MKTE

[Anonymous No.11172276]

>>11172263
That's a good one that I've never seen for some reason. Must've slipped my mind.

>>11172264
Thanks, anon. I've always wanted to watch pretty much all of these at some point. Already saw Starship Troopers though, remember liking it.

[Anonymous No.11172287]

>>11172264
>Twilight Zone (1951)
1959*
>>11172276
>Thanks, anon. I've always wanted to watch pretty much all of these at some point. Already saw Starship Troopers though, remember liking it.
Np. I'm assuming you've seen the classics, like 2001 A Space Odyssey. If not, that too.
And as this guy >>11172263 said, Moon is alright.

[Anonymous No.11172301]

>>11172276
>Must've slipped my mind.
Put it on your list, I think you'll be glad you did.
Also it's not quite a movie, but BBC made a two part special some years back that's a documentary of a fictional manned round-trip mission to all the planets. It tries pretty decently to be realistic, the least realistic part being the landing on and launch from Venus, but it still manages to be entertaining imo.
Voyage to the Planets is what you'd wanna look up if any of that sounds interesting to you.

[Anonymous No.11172310]

>>11172287
Never seen 2001 desu. I should get on that real soon.

>>11172301
>Also it's not quite a movie, but BBC made a two part special some years back that's a documentary of a fictional manned round-trip mission to all the planets. It tries pretty decently to be realistic, the least realistic part being the landing on and launch from Venus, but it still manages to be entertaining imo.
Never heard of this one but it sounds really damn good, huh. Thanks man.

[Anonymous No.11172328]

>>11172243
I dug The Europa Report.

[Anonymous No.11172336]

>>11172310
No prob anon, hope you enjoy, might have to dig around a torrent site to find it though, I see part 2 on dailymotion but didn't see part 1 when I checked.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uonRIB3vbtw
>>11172328
I just rewatched this for October since it's a sort of horror, would recommend to anon.

[Anonymous No.11172352]

>>11172328
>>11172336
I'm gonna third Europa Report.
It was a box office bomb, but not because it's bad. It's just a niche film.

[Anonymous No.11172361]

>>11172352
On the topic of space horror, what did /sfg/ think of Apollo 18? I thought it was fun enough.

[Anonymous No.11172364]

>>11172361
Any movie that makes NASA stop letting people use their logo can't be good.

[Anonymous No.11172366]

>>11172364
That happened? Shit I'm out of the loop then.

[Anonymous No.11172371]

>>11172366
After shooting the movie, they claimed it was a documentary, which made NASA cautious about letting other films use their logo. It's why the NASA logo in Interstellar is just white text on a blue circle.

[Anonymous No.11172374]

>>11172371
>After shooting the movie, they claimed it was a documentary
Ah, they tried to pull a Blair Witch Project, I can see why NASA would not be amused.

[Anonymous No.11172475]

>>11172243
Check out The Expanse.

[Anonymous No.11172591]

>>11172475
Despite the poz I thoroughly enjoy the Expanse. Amos is 10/10 kino and Drummer best girl.

[Anonymous No.11172718]

>>11172371
On the other hand, NASA let the Martian use their logo, so I wonder what their holdup with Interstellar was.
Maybe they felt the future-world was portrayed as too dystopian or something? I dunno.

[Anonymous No.11172744]

>>11171014
Anon, I...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_EnrVf9u8s

[Anonymous No.11172783]

>>11171014
Anon, Tier 4 villager populations would be literally sub-human in the eyes of Tier 1 and 2 cities if it weren't for the existence of non-Chinese human beings on this planet.

[Anonymous No.11172803]

>>11172207
>Until, one day, you end up teaching yourself klingon.

[Anonymous No.11172859]

>>11172718
Maybe the moon landing being a hoax being taught in school?
The ending was incredibly stupid as well

[Anonymous No.11172896]

>>11172744
Man, China does not give a fuck. The footage of stages crashing down is pretty cool though.

[Anonymous No.11172935]

Is it a car? Is it a truck?
>It's a cuck, baahahahahaha

[Anonymous No.11172943]

>>11172152
>"it has to work perfectly or we're doomed"
Kind of true for most missions due to the extreme launch cost, hopefully we will live to see that become a dead meme as launch prices fall.

[Anonymous No.11172953]

>>11170729
>will spaceX now go the same route as NASA and scrap or change half finished projects indefinitely?

uhh, Shuttle flew for 30 years despite being a failure from the beginning. NASA way is sunk cost fallacy way.

[Anonymous No.11172959]

>>11171351
Good if it leads to more commercial launcher involvement in Artemis, similar to what ISS did for LEO. Waste of time otherwise.

[Anonymous No.11172962]

Why don't the Chinese just launch from Hainan? Seems like a no-brainer.

[Anonymous No.11172963]

>>11172591
What is pozzed about it? The female MC being a mulatto? That's entirely inoffensive.

[Anonymous No.11172966]

>>11171857
People live in the Arctic. Frozen hellholes are indeed colonizable. So is Mars with modern technology.

[Anonymous No.11172969]

>>11172962
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wenchang_Spacecraft_Launch_Site

[Anonymous No.11172970]

>>11172007
>You forgot mars has no magnetosphere.
Magnetosphere is a meme. Atmosphere is what actually protects us. Hence why frequent flyers get a radiation dose.

[Anonymous No.11172971]

>>11172152
>How can scientific interest and pace in space be boosted?

Mass production of probes. Literally the only way.

[Anonymous No.11172977]

>>11172970
>Hence why frequent flyers get a radiation dose.
true, the magnetosphere is the reason pilots are limited in the number of polar flights they can do. They represent 'gaps' in the protective magnetic field through which charged particles can pass (hence the auroras)

[Anonymous No.11172978]

>>11171164
alright thanks

[Anonymous No.11172979]

>>11172977
*but the magnetosphere

[Anonymous No.11172997]

>>11172213
>what can men do better than robots,
generally speaking, everything by orders of magnitude

robots really suck

[Anonymous No.11173003]

The rumour about them scrapping the Florida Starship prototypes is likely true:

From L2- Focus on Boca Chica. No longer a race between Florida and Texas. Combined team.

[Anonymous No.11173008]

>>11172213
>what can men do better than robots

[Anonymous No.11173024]

>>11173003
This program continues to look more and more like a shitshow. First competition was supposed to improve performance. Now they're throwing that out the window.
What the hell are they doing?

[Anonymous No.11173074]

>>11173024
rapid change of course. Better to fail fast than to go hard down an unpromising route.

I've seen this in practice at work. Our productivity went way up when we took to rapid prototyping and development, instead of attempting to get things perfect first time.

[Anonymous No.11173081]

>>11173074
i get that, but what i don't understand is why they would scrap a near finished prototype and build a new one which will take them at least half a year.

[Anonymous No.11173086]

>>11173081
possible radical design change?

[Anonymous No.11173111]

>>11170729
>if they don't at least fly Mk2 once, they basically wasted three quarters of a year on it.
If at first you don't succeed, give up and become NASA? LOL

[Anonymous No.11173122]

>>11173111
thats what they are apparently doing with the Mk2 Starship and i was criticizing that.
they won't get any flight data out of Mk3 until at least early summer of next year. sure they can optimize the production process but there is nothing which would stop them from doing that anyway

[Anonymous No.11173125]

>>11173122
Why waste time on Mk2? That's all the way in florida. If the first two Mk1/mk2 are same designs and suffers from same flaws, why sink in more resource? The more efficient is to move to a newer Mk3 and go about the fast iteration design process.

[Anonymous No.11173141]

>>11173125
my point is that they already "wasted" most of the required ressources so by now they could at least get some data from one flight.

[Anonymous No.11173147]

>>11172963
The whole lesbo preacher storyline was Liberace gay and ridiculously heavy handed

[Anonymous No.11173150]

>>11173141
No, if they changed the design due to structural/engineering issue, then flying is pointless and dangerous.

[Anonymous No.11173172]

>>11173150
fair point. but we don't know if that is the case. let's hope for the best i guess

[Anonymous No.11173200]

>>11172935
This car has almost literally broke my brain over the past few days. I think it may turn into a huge success. The utility of the exoskeleton design may force people to accept this new "aesthetic"

[Anonymous No.11173207]

>>11173141
Sunk cost fallacy.

[Anonymous No.11173220]

>>11173200
> I think it may turn into a huge success
You see by the reaction that most people are not rational and they may not chose the superior vehicle, even when it's better in nearly every single way, has more features, and way cheaper to own on top of it. It's very hard for them to except a new design like this because it's so unlike what they've seen before, despite most trucks being ugly anyway, so they revert to posting the same shitty memes about childhood drawings instead of talking about its features and the advantages of electric drivetrains. It's something that is very easy for them to discount. It may still become popular, but first it has to become accepted. Hopefully there's enough initial buyers to create the public acceptance.

[Anonymous No.11173223]

>>11170352
Is that really the most reasonable way to make a fuel tank for a rocket? Am I wrong for imagining that SpaceX have a process that costs x10 less or something?

[Anonymous No.11173230]

>>11173220
I will put it to them that the cybertruck has a genuinely divisive design, and I'm still not sure if I like it. But it's just so god damned different. It's like someone making a brutalist concrete building for the first time when every other building is in some decorative victorian style.

I think good aesthetics derives from simplicity and elegance. I think when people try driving the cybertruck and compare it to what's already there, they'll notice how much more fucking space is inside due to the exoskeleton design, and how awesome it is for a work truck to have such *true* durability. I think if anyone else tries to use the exoskeleton design they may be hard pressed to make something as appealing as the cybertruck.

I guess I'm just excited to see how this thing evolves.

[Anonymous No.11173250]

>>11173223
SpaceX also use friction stir welding to build the Falcon 9/Heavy’s fuel and oxidiser tanks.

[Anonymous No.11173257]

>>11173250
with a 16 story robot?

[Anonymous No.11173259]

>>11173008
Stuff like this is what I use against anti-NASA/space/moon landing people. Why make things that are failures then make it public if it wasn't true in the first place and you evidently have the power and resources to make it appear successful for better chances at more funding?

[Anonymous No.11173298]

>>11173259
>Why make things that are failures then make it public if it wasn't true in the first place and you evidently have the power and resources to make it appear successful for better chances at more funding?
The conspiratards would just say that (((they))) are testing the brainwashing of their subjects or giving hints to those who are in on it.

[Anonymous No.11173323]

>>11173086
I think they are changing to wood now.

[Anonymous No.11173328]

>>11173257
nah, they use horizontal construction.

[Anonymous No.11173334]

>>11173259
Is this Beagle2?
Is it edited?
No wonder this shit failed.

[Anonymous No.11173341]

>>11173323
Elon just made a statement on the redesign:
>The new design incorporates new studies into material feasibility and will considerably reduce cost per kilogram to LEO. Rather than wasting precious time and resources building our spacecraft at painstakingly slow speeds compared to our antiquated colleagues, we will now be constructing Starship entirely out of wood. This will allow for rapid construction™ of Starship to allow full colonization of Mars by 2024 and will drastically reduce the high costs associated with traditional methods.

[Anonymous No.11173343]

>>11173323
Not as crazy as it may sound.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gtxYP9fLMmk

[Anonymous No.11173404]

>>11173341
All he really needs is a few stage tree seeds.

[Anonymous No.11173540]

They are building a new one.

[Anonymous No.11173568]

>>11173540
Those pieces have been their for ages, they just started putting them together.

[Anonymous No.11173596]

>>11173540
That's just scrap. It's been confirmed from insider info any future welding will be done robotically because hand welds fail at roughly half the operational pressure. Supposedly the fuel tank exploded at 2 bars which is absolutely pathetic. If you expect any more work you'll have to wait for a real factory first so around 6-24 months.

[Anonymous No.11173668]

>>11173596
They (the insider) didn’t specifically say that all the welds would be done by robots, maybe it’s just the circumferential tank welds which the machines will be used for?

[Anonymous No.11173673]

>>11173596
Also, the insider said nothing about a factory/building being built. We’d probably know if that was the case already because of environmental fillings and stuff being in the public domain.

[Anonymous No.11173677]

>>11173250
>>11173223
>>11173257
>>11173328
I thought stir friction welding was for aluminum, and was almost impossible on steel - especially stainless

[Anonymous No.11173679]

>>11173677
> It was primarily used on wrought or extruded aluminium and particularly for structures which need very high weld strength. FSW is capable of joining aluminium alloys, copper alloys, titanium alloys, mild steel, stainless steel and magnesium alloys. More recently, it was successfully used in welding of polymers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friction_stir_welding

[Anonymous No.11173681]

>ITT we don't understand the vision of Elon Musk

[Anonymous No.11173683]

>>11173668
Fwiw the top vertical weld apparently failed first

[Anonymous No.11173703]

>>11173677
it's extremely possible on steel, but it's a massive pain in the ass and the benefits aren't there in exchange for the massive tool wear

[Anonymous No.11173721]

>>11173677
The Falcon family tanks are aluminum.

[Anonymous No.11173753]

>>11173334
lol ikr

[Anonymous No.11173771]

>>11173753
Sojourner was the first time I remember paying attention to current events in space when I was a kid. I still have the little hotwheels toy of it too.

[Anonymous No.11173773]

>>11173753
That video takes me right back to 1991 when Quicktime was new.

[Anonymous No.11173820]

>>11173721
“The Falcon 9’s propellant tank walls and domes are made from aluminum-lithium alloy. SpaceX uses an all friction-stir welded tank, the highest strength and most reliable welding technique available.”

Atlas V: “The first stage tanks no longer use stainless-steel monocoque pressure stabilized "balloon" construction. The tanks are isogrid aluminum and are structurally stable when unpressurised.”

Delta 4: “Above the thrust structure is an aluminum isogrid (a grid pattern machined out of the inside of the tank to reduce weight) liquid hydrogen tank, followed by a composite cylinder called the centerbody, an aluminum isogrid liquid oxygen tank, and a forward skirt.”

Ariane 6: “During the last decade, MTA has developed and successfully demonstrated its competences focusing on aluminium lithium technology and friction stir welding (FSW) together with their related damage mechanics. These competences have turned into sound heritage and will now be applied for the realization of the new generation launcher Ariane 6, which will include FSW applied to all aluminium tank structures, shot peen forming performed on domes and cylinder segments made of aluminium lithium and automated riveting for the assembly of the structures.”

[Anonymous No.11173954]

>>11173820
SLS uses aluminum tanks as well. Interestingly, they went full circle from the Shuttle program in choice of alloy.
When the Shuttle program started, they used a more-or-less standard aluminum alloy to make external tanks. As time went on, they transitioned to a special Al-Li alloy to make "super-lightweight" tanks.
When SLS was being designed, it was decided that the Al-Li alloy was too expensive and wasn't strong enough for the much larger core tank, so the SLS went back to using conventional aluminum. Orion still uses the lightweight Al-Li alloy, though.

[Anonymous No.11173965]

>>11172935
>100% cpu usage irl
the hell were they thinking?

[Anonymous No.11174054]

>>11173954
>When SLS was being designed, it was decided that the Al-Li alloy was too expensive and wasn't strong enough for the much larger core tank, so the SLS went back to using conventional aluminum.

Interesting, but that makes a lot of sense though if you think about it. As not only is the SLS tank larger, but it also has to support the entire stack’s weight unlike the external tank (the Shuttle and SRBs were responsible for this originally).

Actually, it seems like I was right, the decision to drop the super-light alloy was to strengthen SLS’ tanks. As the super-light alloy was too brittle to machine into the isogrid pattern SLS uses to greatly strengthen it’s tank walls; regular aluminium is apparently far more suitable for this.

Here’s a detailed article on the decision:

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2013/02/sls-new-buckling-standards-drops-super-light-alloy/

[Anonymous No.11174111]

[Anonymous No.11174123]

>>11174111
>the goyim literally beg elon to give them more to consume
And people wonder how Jews got so rich. Now, obviously Elon is not Jewish but we all get that they were the first to practice capitalism as the white nobles just enriched themselves from state control until too many heads started rolling.

[Anonymous No.11174132]

>>11174123
>the onions literally beg elon to give them more to consume

[Anonymous No.11174165]

>>11174111
Why are Elon cultists like this? I love his rockets, but fuck this.

[Anonymous No.11174186]

>>11174054
>but it also has to support the entire stack’s weight unlike the external tank (the Shuttle and SRBs were responsible for this originally).
Not quite.
While it's true that the SLS core has to handle heavier loads than the Shuttle ET, the core still "hangs" from the SRBs like the ET, so it only has to be strong enough to transfer the loads through the SRB thrust beam.
I believe this is done as a mass-saving measure. Since the SRBs are jettisoned early in flight, beefing up their structures to support the entire rocket is less punitive than making the ET/core load-bearing.

[Anonymous No.11174203]

>>11174165
It's a fun idea if you are a fan of Tesla and SpaceX. No need to overthink it.

[Anonymous No.11174211]

>>11174123
>Being a fan of someone's work makes you a consumerist drone
At least Elon just makes shit that people want to buy. Jews not despised for making lots of money on capitalism, but doing so via cronyism.

[Anonymous No.11174212]

>>11174203
But why are these people attracted to electric cars and space. I can understand 1 or the other, both seems like cultish behaviour to me. I mean everyone I know only has 1 main hobby, either watching fortnite on twitch or on facebook all the time. Are these cults fake? Don't they have normal lives like the rest of us do?

[Anonymous No.11174224]

>>11174212
>But why are these people attracted to electric cars and space.
Technology enthusiasts. Both companies are very exciting from the tech point of view.

> I can understand 1 or the other, both seems like cultish behaviour to me.
This is because you have a small brain, and you rushed to get outraged by something someone said on twitter before you thought about it.

[Anonymous No.11174228]

>>11174212
>both seems like cultish behaviour to me
Why? You wouldn't be itt if you weren't interested in spaceflight, is it such a stretch to also be interested in electric cars?
>>11174224
>and you rushed to get outraged by something someone said on twitter before you thought about it.
This, I think.

[Anonymous No.11174232]

>>11174228
>Why? You wouldn't be itt if you weren't interested in spaceflight, is it such a stretch to also be interested in electric cars?
How do they make time for two? I don't understand. Tey don't have normal lives?

[Anonymous No.11174236]

>>11174232
> I don't understand
Yeah that's becoming clear

[Anonymous No.11174241]

>>11174232
>How do they make time for two?
I want to believe this is trolling. But there's a sad tinge of genuine skitsopost to this...

[Anonymous No.11174249]

>>11174232
>How do they make time for two?
It doesn't take long to read about something. Especially if one is a casual fan.

[Anonymous No.11174292]

>>11173773
WEBM for Retards wasn't very good in 2016 and I think /sci/ had a 2mb limit on WEBMs then too. Too long ago to recall exactly across so many boards that had different restrictions.

[Anonymous No.11174342]

>>11171014
Kek. When people discover corpses in China they either don't give a fuck and move along or they make jokes about how he died while taking a few pics with their smartphones. Only the rarest Chinks have empathy.

[Anonymous No.11174354]

>>11174342
god damit Winstant go back to doing videos and stop shitposting here

[Anonymous No.11174366]

>>11174354
Judging from all the shit online they are posting it is true.

[Anonymous No.11174529]

>>11171881
Kek

[Anonymous No.11174538]

>>11174212
I'm into space but gas is $4/g here and my next car probably won't be combustion. I don't really care about Tesla or follow it closely, but a tie-in between the companies would be cool.

[Anonymous No.11174549]

>>11172007
>magnetosphere
Long term problem for atmosphere building, where "long term" means centuries at the quickest
>You need artificial sunlight for humans
Thankfully, we invented electric lighting a while back
>And plants
I grew weed in my garage once
>After that, to live like a subhuman
But on Mars, which is neat
>you get cancer and die
So, you're contradicting yourself here. Do we live in tunnels, or do we get cancer? Because the tunnels are the solution to the cancer.
>There will be no terraforming
Correct
>or skiing on Olympus Mons
Just wear a suit lmao
>Only jello babies
Meme unsupported by evidence
>Dying like a nigger in a cave
In space.

>Muh venus
You need a pressure suit on Venus too, retard, because even at the 1atm level the air is poisonous and corrosive. Venus is literally worse than a vacuum, because a vacuum won't eat all your seals.

[Anonymous No.11174551]

>>11169802
Update on that. I found a very crude way to model film cooling, and tested it with four fuels so far (RP-1, methanol, gasoline, and ethanol). What I've found is that methanol is the best coolant out all of them, with gasoline being the worst. Anyone who has worked on similar things, does this make sense?

Also, before you suggest it, I don't have CFD software.

[Anonymous No.11174573]

>>11174551
Just having a read it looks like methanol is a good option but I can't find nitrous oxide / methanol ISP as everyone seems to use ethanol.

[Anonymous No.11174579]

>>11174573
>Just having a read it looks like methanol is a good option
What are you reading exactly?

>but I can't find nitrous oxide / methanol ISP as everyone seems to use ethanol.
If RPA can be trusted, then methanol+nos would have very slightly better ISP than ethanol+nos (by about 2%). My guess is due to methanol being a lighter fuel than ethanol.

[Anonymous No.11174587]

>>11174579
>What are you reading exactly?
Just combustion temp and products, only catch is it corrodes aluminium so tanks / plumbing will need to be something else.

[Anonymous No.11174627]

>>11174587
Thanks! I wasn't aware of the corrosion issue.

[Anonymous No.11174713]

>>11174228
Fuck electric cars. We should build a Mars rover that runs on a big fucking internal combustion engine fed with methane and oxygen, riding shiny and chrome in space

[Anonymous No.11174721]

>>11173820
Falcon and Ariane both use a skin/stringer setup, where the thin tank walls are made from sheet aluminum and then all the internal features are welded on by robots

Atlas and Delta (and Vulcan) use a milled technique -- the tank wall starts out as a 5 inch thick slab of aluminum and everything that isn't the isogrid (or orthrogrid, for Vulcan) is milled away.

[Anonymous No.11174729]

>>11174721
>Atlas and Delta (and Vulcan) use a milled technique -- the tank wall starts out as a 5 inch thick slab of aluminum and everything that isn't the isogrid (or orthrogrid, for Vulcan) is milled away.
That sounds very time consuming and expensive. Is that method really worth it? Or is it a case of it being necessary due to limited rocket size?

[Anonymous No.11174748]

>>11174729
it gets the same structural strength for less weight, and before FSW it was more reliable. downside is the expense of scrapping so much metal (80% !!!)

but ULA has gotten kind of good at it, it's their area of institutional competence, so they'll try to make that process more efficient rather than switch to a new one

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJr3PMFEPRw

[Anonymous No.11174758]

>>11174165
AGAIN, Anon, I...

[Anonymous No.11174762]

>>11174748
I wonder if it would be possible to make isogrid-reinforced structures, either by another process (forging, etc) or straight up making the wall and grid in two separate pieces, processing the grid from an easily manufactured flat plane to the shape it needs to be in, and then welding it on. With robotic welding tech and several robots, it should be possible to weld an isogrid onto a curved sheet without fucking it all up.

[Anonymous No.11174788]

If we hadn't had experimented with the Space Shuttle, would we have already gone to Mars by now? And set up bases there as well as the Moon?

[Anonymous No.11174790]

>>11174721
I believe the Space Shuttle used both methods at different times as well, with it initially being a skin/stringer setup and later transitioning to a hybrid system as part of their efforts to reduce mass for the super-lightweight tanks.
SLS, on the other hand, went fully orthogrid for the core.

[Anonymous No.11174800]

>>11170333
is atremis one actually going to launch on time?

[Anonymous No.11174804]

>>11174788
It would require the US government to give more funding to NASA to develop a new launcher to replace the Saturns. One of the big reasons why the Shuttle was a disaster was because there was very little development funds for it. If a better launcher was developed with the larger development budget, then probably there would be a semi-permanent lunar base by now. Not sure about the manned Mars missions though, it seemed like America lost interest in spaceflight after Apollo with little interest left for such a mission.

[Anonymous No.11174809]

>>11174800
At this point, the SLS doesn't really have a launch date anymore. It'll launch whenever, never late, nor early, just precisely when it means to.

[Anonymous No.11174810]

>>11174804
People need to keep in mind that post-Apollo NASA was in a REALLY rough place financially. It was the lowest funding levels in real terms NASA's ever experienced.

[Anonymous No.11174836]

>>11172718
what do we think of the martian
i generally really enjoyed it
i thought it was cool how they incorporated the pathfinder mission into the story

[Anonymous No.11174865]

>>11174804
>>11174810
So we didn't fuck up THAT much is what you're telling me? Cool.

>>11174836
It was kino. Same with Interstellar, though I liked that one a lot more.

Those space suits were aesthetic as fuck. The tech in those movies in general was.

[Anonymous No.11174868]

>>11174836
Very well done hard sf, especially for a big budget mass market thing, usually they feel the need to add in a bunch of retarded starwars tier magic to make it more palatable to normies.
The wind thing was obviously bull but that was in the source material so you can't blame them.

[Anonymous No.11174870]

>>11174762
Modern trains and planes are made out of an aluminum honey comb sandwich glued together.

[Anonymous No.11174875]

>>11174836
>Same with Interstellar
Interstellar has a bunch of inconsistencies that make it hard to enjoy it for me, its in the same place as gravity, it tries to be accurate but fails in just enough ways to find its way into a sort of uncanny valley.
Also, what the fuck is that ending, what were they thinking?

[Anonymous No.11174877]

>>11174875
was meant for
>>11174865

[Anonymous No.11174879]

>>11174870
I'm aware of that. Hell, in high school one of the classes I had was making a 8"x8" sheet of that material. My question is if an Isogrid-style structure can be built without having to machine the damn grid and panel out of a solid block of metal and with the minimal use of composites as they're a pain in the ass to work with.

[Anonymous No.11174886]

>>11174836
I liked it. It displayed alot of the science of spaceflight in seemingly simple terms. The drama was nice. I especially liked how there wasn't really any villains, rather it was just people with different views and approaches 'bumping heads'. One scene I found funny and stuck out for me was when Purnell was doing orbital calculations on a super computer and it returned "Calculations Correct!" without any additional info. I wish the software I worked on was that straightforward.

If I had to nitpick, I didn't like how some of Watney's comedy scenes played out, it felt like it robbed the film some of it's suspense and feel. Maybe it was Watney's way of dealing with stress, but it felt like the film played it like a straight comedy to it's detriment. But overall a minor issue. I'd recommend it.

[Anonymous No.11174887]

>>11174809
im just seeing steady progress and with a launch date no earlier then Nov 2020 it seems like they might actually hit their goal. If testing for the core stage and orion go well, what else is really left besides assembly and manufacturing the SRB's.

[Anonymous No.11174891]

>>11174886
One thing that bugged me about the Martian was how lame its soundtrack was. I know that's a weird thing to complain about, but I didn't even realize that was bugging me until someone pointed it out.
A good soundtrack can really enhance the feeling of a scene. Likewise, a bad or mediocre one can do the opposite. The Martian's soundtrack wasn't bad, but it didn't exactly do anything for my enjoyment of the film either.
Say what you want about Gravity, but that film made some amazing use of its soundtrack, especially in the soundless in-space scenes.

[Anonymous No.11174892]

>>11174886
my biggest problem with watney was i felt like i was watching matt damon, rather than watney.

[Anonymous No.11174893]

>>11174892
I think that's a problem with any super popular actor.

[Anonymous No.11174897]

>>11174891
Gravity's OST is the shit. So few soundtracks can do long tension filled build ups and then deliver in perfect order.

[Anonymous No.11174900]

>>11174165
>Elon cuItists
>Estronaut
Nah, he's just "special". He's a cultist of anything to do with space. I think he even goes soi every time he presses the space bar on his keyboard.

[Anonymous No.11174910]

>>11174292
If only there was some web site where you could upload a video, and have it linked into a 4Uchannel post. They could call it something like "YouTeeVee".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GN6AyCywPPU

[Anonymous No.11174921]

>>11174836
Not even the first movie to do that though.

[Anonymous No.11174934]

>>11174292
Personally I think it's a travesty that webm files gets treated like a second-class citizen, with its own limitations and file size limit that's often far smaller than that of the other formats. And we're stuck to using the archaic vp8 codec as well. With AV1 around the corner, when are we due for an upgrade?

[Anonymous No.11174954]

>>11174762
You could perhaps weld a quarter-isogrid inside the tank wall.
https://hackaday.com/2019/11/12/cardboard-longboard-uses-quarter-isogrid-structure/

[Anonymous No.11174961]

>>11174875
>its in the same place as gravity
What was as bad as completely ignoring orbital mechanics and zipping around between various space stations like going to the corner convenience store?

[Anonymous No.11174987]

>>11174961
Did you see the end of Intersteller

[Anonymous No.11175005]

Oh nvm, I thought you were talking about The Martian.

[Anonymous No.11175080]

FH's TLI performance is REALLY hurt by the Kerolox upper stage.

[Anonymous No.11175086]

>>11174800
If by on time, you mean H1 2021, then yes.

[Anonymous No.11175091]

>>11175086
Q4 2020 isn't impossible right now either, but it's not something I'd put money on. If there's any kind of issue or delay, it moves into 2021.

[Anonymous No.11175094]

>>11175091
Nah, I'd say early 2021 will be it since that is the new internal deadline, even if it's ready before then, they will check every nut and bolt 50 times. Also Artemis 2 is progressing extremely well and that launch is not affected by Artemis 1 happening in june 20 or june 21, for example

[Anonymous No.11175240]

Starship de geso

[Anonymous No.11175271]

The prototype blowing up is a damn shame-let's hope they can punch past this and keep up the rapid cadence.

[Anonymous No.11175275]

>>11174961
Nothing really comes to mind. The launch sequences from planets (mainly the first one with the rocket from earth) are fucked as they keep going up instead of tilting sideways, Cooper and Brand lean their head the wrong way during the spinny docking scene and the firing sequence and staging during the swing by at the black hole are reversed (main engines->lander 1 engines->lander 2 engines->drop lander 1->drop lander 2).
Nothing of that ruins the movie nearly as much as the faults in gravity did but with how much effort allegedly went into the movie I wonder how they managed to miss these mistakes.

[Anonymous No.11175277]

>>11170578

Sit down little one. She comes from a minimum cost design background. What you're witnessing is the glory of absolute rock bottom cost minimization infused within the project. To hell with your delicate sensitivities and notions of properness. This is a meritably effective way to do this with plausible timelines within the context of how it is being done. Your frame of reference is worthless.

[Anonymous No.11175281]

>>11175094
Artemis 1 feels like such a useless waste anyways. Obviously they can't put humans on the first flight but just launching a Orion/EM1 around the moon in a useless test is just worthless. SLS already has so little reason to exist, at least give it something useful to haul to space

[Anonymous No.11175301]

>>11175281
It's a test flight, Anon. Hauling the payload to space and having it come back IS something useful: It shows everything works.

[Anonymous No.11175303]

>>11175275
I mean aside from the plot device orbital debris that defy any realistic explanation, Gravity is really not all that bad.
You just have to remind yourself that this is an alternate universe (the protagonist is an astronaut on STS-157, afterall), and that in this one every nation in this world decided to have their stations orbit in extremely close proximity to each other for whatever reason.

[Anonymous No.11175396]

>>11175301
Having it hauling a payload to space that would stay there to actually do something useful would be far better. I'm sure they could've had some mission to the saturn/jupiter moons ready for it considering how long it was planned. Instead we're doing little more than shooting a glorified payload simulator around moon.

[Anonymous No.11175399]

>>11175080
A CH4/LH2 second stage for it would be really nice but chances of that happening are slim.

[Anonymous No.11175407]

>>11175303
Sure. But Gravity had other plot devices as well. De Niro needed to die so he needed to let go while they could've easily just hauled themself in. Its a fucking parachute tether, it won't break if you give it a gentle tuck in space. And you already managed to arrest your motion relative to the space station, absolutely no reason to let go after that.
Interstellar had a harder scifi setting but at the same time it feels like it took itself more serious (which is a good thing, I liked the tone of the movie very much). I guess that's why the little mistakes they made irk me more than gravity space boogaloo choosing some unrealistic options for plot points.

[Anonymous No.11175468]

>>11175396
thats what testflights are for. The Tesla Roadster didn't do anything useful either.
also they want to test the thing yeeting stuff around the moon, not towards jupiter

[Anonymous No.11175472]

>>11175468
testflights don't have to be conducted using a mass simulator. The first ariane V flight (that failed) was supposed to deliver a scientific payload for example. Where the second stage sends shit is absolutely irrelevant for a test of the launch vehicle
>yeeting
yeah fuck of back to where you came from

[Anonymous No.11175493]

>>11175472
maybe since testflights have a higher chance of blowing up people don't want to put expensive scientific payloads on them?

[Anonymous No.11175511]

>>11175493
considering the apparent objective of the past half decade was to throw as much money at the SLS program as possible I'm sure they could've found the pocket change for a jupiter/saturn mission.

[Anonymous No.11175541]

>>11171000
>>11171011
>>11171003
>>11170996

Jesus that tank is massive

What the fuck, so China launches its rockets and just lets the spent stages fucking land on random people’s houses? That’s nuuuuuuts

How do they get away with this shit?

[Anonymous No.11175544]

>>11175472
>>11175493
>>11175511
Artemis 1 will carry scientific payloads: a bunch of lunar cubesats attached to the second-stage and human spaceflight experiments inside Orion (e.g. the anti-radiation vest from Israel). The whole point of Artemis 1 is to not only test that SLS works, but that Orion can survive a trip to lunar orbit and back.

[Anonymous No.11175580]

>>11175396
Wut. Unless you've got a high-energy transfer, it takes multiple years to get to Jupiter, even if you're in a transfer window. Mars is every two years, and it's only one slot over. And if you've got enough dV to get there quickly, then you have kill that dV thrust to stay there.

[Anonymous No.11175584]

>>11175493
>maybe since testflights have a higher chance of blowing up people
commas, man

[Anonymous No.11175588]

>>11175584
it kind of would still be correct for manned testflights.
behold the age of expandable astronauts is upon us

[Anonymous No.11175652]

>>11175580
You wouldn't want to go by hohmann transfer anyways but use a gravity assist from venus

>>11175544
what does it matter where it goes? The only thing that could reasonably require testing is the capsule itself (including reentry) and the transfer module. There's no need to waste an expensive SLS for that.

[Anonymous No.11175660]

>>11175652
>a gravity assist from venus
Ah, even more months around the sun, and you still have to find a way to stop once you reach Jupiter.

[Anonymous No.11175666]

>>11175660
yeah, an impossibility. juno and cassini-huygens were a hoax after all

[Anonymous No.11175672]

>>11175666
The guy was talking about Musk just having a Jupiter mission collecting lint in his pocket and "hey look what I just did!", which was a stupid concept.

[Anonymous No.11175676]

>>11175652
>what does it matter where it goes? The only thing that could reasonably require testing is the capsule itself (including reentry) and the transfer module. There's no need to waste an expensive SLS for that.

Because SLS needs to be tested before it can fly crew? Orion has already been partially tested during EFT where it launched on a Delta 4H. I don’t get what your insinuating? Also, Orion can’t be tested in a lunar environment (where it is designed to operate) without launching on SLS, as no currently operating LV can send 27 tons to TLI.

[Anonymous No.11175683]

>>11175672
where did you get that from? Follow the reply chain. It was about using the first SLS launch for something useful instead of hauling an empty capsule to space. SpaceX wasn't mentioned at all. They could of course to it for cheaper I guess. Wasting a delta IV heavy for a test like this doesn't feel right either.

[Anonymous No.11175684]

The Chinks have finally released some HD pictures from their Chang’E 4 Lunar far-side mission:

http://moon.bao.ac.cn/mul/index/list

[Anonymous No.11175687]

>>11175684

[Anonymous No.11175689]

>>11175676
>Because SLS needs to be tested before it can fly crew?
Right, with any payload. That could include some interplanetary probe of your choice.
>Orion has already been partially tested during EFT where it launched on a Delta 4H.
I know. Which makes the next test even more useless.
>Also, Orion can’t be tested in a lunar environment
The lunar environment is the same environment you have everywhere around earth past the van allen belts. You don't need to haul it to the moon to test how it can deal with a bit of solar radiation. It arguably doesn't even have to leave earth for that since we know pretty well what to expect.

[Anonymous No.11175691]

>>11175683
>where did you get that from?

>>11175396
>I'm sure they could've had some mission to the saturn/jupiter moons ready for it considering how long it was planned

[Anonymous No.11175694]

>>11175691
where does it say that musk has a jupiter mission collecting lint in his pocket? It says that NASA should've had one ready for the first SLS test.

[Anonymous No.11175758]

>>11171424

Any updates on MK3 so far?

[Anonymous No.11175774]

>>11175758
>Any updates on MK3 so far?
They're experimenting with machine welded tank dome gores.

[Anonymous No.11175842]

>>11175774
what does that mean? and source?

I can't tell what's memes and what's actually happening anymore.

[Anonymous No.11175855]

>>11175842
They have a tank dome being put together on an assembly jig. The components of a tank dome are called gores. The source is BocaChicaGal's photos.

[Anonymous No.11175899]

>>11175855
Glad to know progress is continuing.
Hopefully we can have pic related in the future.

[Anonymous No.11175939]

>>11174804
>One of the big reasons why the Shuttle was a disaster was because there was very little development funds for it.

~$4 billion per year, inflation adjusted, is plenty of dev money. Imagine what SpaceX could do with such funding. So this sounds like another excuse for NASA incompetence to me.

[Anonymous No.11175961]

>>11175939
>~$4 billion per year, inflation adjusted, is plenty of dev money. Imagine what SpaceX could do with such funding. So this sounds like another excuse for NASA incompetence to me.

You don’t really understand how NASA budgets work. As Wayne Hale highlighted in his recent blog post that $4 billion wasn’t just for Space Shuttle development, it was used to pay for maintaining the program’s extensive infrastructure (as Hale states, entire space centers were solely dedicated to the Shuttle) and 32,000 employee paycheques (that’s nearly 5 times SpaceX’s entire workforce) as well. Therefore, when you combine that with the 450 million+ cost per launch of the Shuttle, you realise you have fuck all money for R&D left over.

[Anonymous No.11175972]

>>11175961
I don't get it. Are you saying it was wasted on the infrastructure? Because if so that would be backing up the point that there was plenty of money, but it was wasted.

Or are you saying that that infrastructure was good value for money and necessary, and SpaceX or anyone couldn't achieve the goals the shuttle was designed to do, but cheaper.

[Anonymous No.11175981]

>>11175972
NASAs job isn't just to develope a launch vehicle. They need teams for extensive research related and unrelated to that launch vehicle, teams for building the missions the launch vehicle is supposed to be used for in the first place, teams to operate these missions and teams to do something with the data they produce.

[Anonymous No.11175996]

>>11175972

>>11175939 is implicitly implying that NASA got $4 billion to develop the Shuttle’s capabilities. When in fact that sum also covered maintaining the expensive Shuttle, vast amounts of infrastructure and funding thousands of employees’ paycheques. This left NASA with a tiny amount of money to develop the Shuttle further, which is why the design changed so little over the decades.

[Anonymous No.11175999]

>>11175996
But surely that's his entire point. There was plenty of money, but NASA made the Shuttle too expensive to develop and maintain. So they basically wasted the money that others probably could have spent much more efficiently.

[Anonymous No.11176017]

>>11175999
>There was plenty of money, but NASA made the Shuttle too expensive to develop and maintain. So they basically wasted the money that others probably could have spent much more efficiently.

That’s a completely different argument, he implied that they got a $4 billion blank cheque for R&D, which they incompetently misspent. Also, who do you mean by “others”? Lockheed with their Titan and Atlas rockets? MD/Boeing with the Deltas?

[Anonymous No.11176022]

>>11176017
Well I guess. I'd imagine they still got plenty of dev money to not design something that was garbage though. Never seemed like a program left wanting for money when it needed it.

[Anonymous No.11176036]

>>11176022
>I'd imagine they still got plenty of dev money to not design something that was garbage though. Never seemed like a program left wanting for money when it needed it.

They had enough money to keep the flights flowing and introduce incremental improvements like the super-light tanks. But not enough to make significant design changes.

[Anonymous No.11176043]

>>11176036
I more meany the had enough initial r&d to build a good initial shuttle, which they fucked up.

One could argue they had plenty of r&d money to improve the shuttle plenty over it's lifespan, but they had to spend it all on the much higher than expected maintenance and launch costs.

[Anonymous No.11176055]

>>11176043
the design of the shuttle got fucked just like the bradley by a thousand people that had nothing to do with the original design feature creeping it. The airforce pushing for ridiculous, unnecessary cross range capability for example.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXQ2lO3ieBA

[Anonymous No.11176066]

>>11176043
>I more meany the had enough initial r&d to build a good initial shuttle, which they fucked up.

As >>11176055 stated the original Shuttle design got a bit fucked up by feature creep. The original design wasn’t meant to be the last iteration, it was initially considered an interim design until Challenger happened, which completely destroyed the Shuttle’s political capital. There was no congressional will for a big upgrade...

[Anonymous No.11176083]

>>11176066
>"it was initially considered an interim design until Challenger happened, which completely destroyed the Shuttle’s political capital. There was no congressional will for a big upgrade..."

>be Congress
>demand that NASA make a cheaper launch vehicle
>that vehicle would be the Shuttle
>NASA is struggling to design it
>deny their requests for more development time and budget
>Shuttle starts flying
>it's immediately clear that it won't meet it's cost goals
>continue to deny requests for more development
>Challenger happens
>investigation reveals how flawed the Shuttle is and how poorly it was managed
>fire a bunch of engineers that had no decision power in the program
>keep the managers who killed 7 astronauts
>continue flying the Shuttle
>continue denying requests to develop on it or replace it
>it kills 7 more

I'm starting to wonder that maybe the Shuttle was allowed to be the way it is because it handicapped NASA. IIRC, the US government was afraid that NASA would push for another Apollo-like program that would've cost much more than Apollo. Pushing for a flawed vehicle while scrapping all Apollo equipment would definitely keep NASA in check.

[Anonymous No.11176139]

Hopefully Dream Chaser fills in the roles the shuttle could not.

[Anonymous No.11176154]

>>11176066
indeed. so wasted money.

[Anonymous No.11176162]

>>11176083
>I'm starting to wonder that maybe the Shuttle was allowed to be the way it is because it handicapped NASA

I mean the Shuttle was deeply flawed but it also introduced new capabilities like recovering satellites, carrying 7 astronauts (a number still unbeaten) which enabled it to carry more people in total into space than any other craft has to date, repairing spacecraft like Hubble and assembling a space station on-orbit. In the terms of crewed spaceflight past LEO it definitely crippled NASA, but it brought it’s own set of capabilities to the table which won’t even be replaced by Crew Dragon and Starliner when they start flying crew. However, It’s potential capabilities were severely handicapped by Congress’ refusal to fund further significant development.

[Anonymous No.11176166]

>>11175899
>LEGO Mars Mission
based and themepilled

[Anonymous No.11176171]

>>11176083
It's kind of crazy how anti-NASA the Congress of the 70s was. I get that NASA as an organization really didn't realize it had fuck-all political capital until all their big post-Apollo dreams came tumbling down, but it's hard to imagine the political situation where NERVA was cancelled solely because it could enable a Mars mission and was therefore seen as a threat.
Ironically though, NASA's funding actually INCREASED after Challenger, to about the levels where it's remained since.

[Anonymous No.11176176]

As >>11176162 states, it won’t even be able to fulfil the roles the Shuttle did, apart from being much cheaper and potentially carrying humans to space in a safer fashion, in the future. It’s a simple cargo and crew vehicle that lacks the utility of the Shuttle.

[Anonymous No.11176179]

>>11176176
*In regards to Dream Chaser

[Anonymous No.11176186]

>>11176162
Recovering satellites was barely ever used. Hubble repair is also a rare event. Space station assembly could have been done without the Shuttle (see Mir), and done less expensively, too.

>However, It’s potential capabilities were severely handicapped by Congress’ refusal to fund further significant development.

There were no improvements that could have saved it short of a total redesign.

[Anonymous No.11176189]

>>11176162
>carrying 7 astronauts (a number still unbeaten)

And lacking unmanned mode. Significant disadvantage.

[Anonymous No.11176193]

>>11176139
Dream Chaser is so cute and chubby

[Anonymous No.11176245]

>>11176189
Astronauts still had a problem with the idea of being mere passengers. At least Russia didn't have those concerns when they made Buran.

[Anonymous No.11176257]

>>11175684
Cool, I was wondering whether news on this was being suppressed outside China. Turns out they just weren't saying much I guess.

[Anonymous No.11176264]

>>11176186
I think it's fair to say that the capabilities of the space shuttle were unmatched by any current spacecraft. I think it's also fair to say that many of those capabilities were never actually used.

[Anonymous No.11176281]

>>11175684
That's a pretty picture, I love how the feet dug in just a bit, for some reason that looks nice to me.

[Anonymous No.11176283]

>>11176264
Like the Shuttle-Centaur, thanks Challenger...

[Anonymous No.11176292]

>>11176283
How did the Challenger disaster end that?

[Anonymous No.11176305]

>>11176292
NASA were already and justifiably a bit weary about putting a Centaur in the Shuttle’s payload bay, because of it’s thin skin, structural strength and the volatility of LH2. Then Challenger happened, so any slightly risky proposal was immediately scuppered.

[Anonymous No.11176346]

>>11176305
If i recall correctly. some of the shuttle astronauts were super fucking sketchy about that plan.

Truly it was just a matter of time before there was a major shuttle disaster. It felt like there was huge pressure to push the safety boundaries hard to make the to make the Shuttle look like a slightly less embarrassing waste of money.

[Anonymous No.11176368]

Orange rocket bad
>but unironically

[Anonymous No.11176373]

>>11176346
>It felt like there was huge pressure to push the safety boundaries hard to make the to make the Shuttle look like a slightly less embarrassing waste of money.

I’m pretty sure it was just the attractiveness of being able to lift a fully-fuelled Centaur stage into Orbit with a payload attached. Which would give a massive performance boost over the usual hypergolic and solid-fuel kickstages the Shuttle typically used. It would have been great for probes. Remember a single RL-10, dropped just short of orbit can send nearly 30 tons to the Moon and over 6 tons to Jupiter without any gravity assists.

[Anonymous No.11176404]

>>11176373
Imagine if Shuttle C had been approved.

[Anonymous No.11176412]

>>11176404
I wish they would've just gone for what the soviets did with energija/buran. Imagine the missions a heavy lift vehicle like that could have made possible.

[Anonymous No.11176415]

>>11176404
It wasn't cost effective compared to other launchers of the era. The first version would send 45t to LEO for $424M (IDK if that's in 80s, 90s, or today's money), while Proton could send 23t for $65M. Proton is more than 3 times cheaper than Shuttle-C.

[Anonymous No.11176437]

>>11176415
>It wasn't cost effective compared to other launchers of the era.

Considering it’s closest American competitor for heavy payloads would be the Titan 4, which had a similar price for half the payload capacity. It would have been beneficial to the US/NASA.

[Anonymous No.11176506]

>>11176437
Fair enough. Although, I thought Titan was mostly a USAF launcher?

[Anonymous No.11176575]

>>11176506
Yes, Titan was primarily a military launcher, specifically for the NRO’s heavier stuff (think of it as the predecessor to the Delta 4). But it also launched some heavier NASA payloads (e.g. Viking, Cassini) and ones that required higher-energy trajectories (e.g. Helios, Voyager).

[Anonymous No.11176587]

>>11176575
The Titan looks cool af.

[Anonymous No.11176626]

>>11176587
Too cool to ignite it’s first-stage engines on the ground...

[Anonymous No.11176656]

Another unannounced launch of Soyuz-2-1v aka single stick Soyuz with unspecified payload.
According to pretty murky statement from Russian military "it is able to observe other vehicles on orbit and earth".

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2019/11/soyuz-2-1v-lofts-mystery-military-satellite/

[Anonymous No.11176780]

New Thread:
>>11176779