SpaceX completes six-engine static fire test of Starship prototype #25
SpaceX yesterday successfully completed a six-engine static fire test of Starship prototype #25, the prototype that will be stacked on top of Superheavy prototype #9 and flown on the next orbital test flight.
Musk said in an interview on Saturday that more than a thousand upgrades were planned before the next flight of the Starship/Super Heavy. Including a significant change to the stage separation system that will see the Starship ignite its engines while still attached to the Super Heavy. Improvements are also being made to the Raptor engines to prevent leaks of super-heated gas which resulted in multiple engine failures during the April launch.
Major repair work and modifications are also underway to the Starship launch pad, after extensive damage occurred during the April 20 test flight.
Musk has also said the company will be ready to launch by August. While it is certainly possible that engineering will cause a slight delay to that schedule, more likely SpaceX will be ready, and then have to sit and wait for the FAA and the Biden administration to issue a launch permit. I am predicting it will not be issued by then, and likely not for months afterward.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
SpaceX yesterday successfully completed a six-engine static fire test of Starship prototype #25, the prototype that will be stacked on top of Superheavy prototype #9 and flown on the next orbital test flight.
Musk said in an interview on Saturday that more than a thousand upgrades were planned before the next flight of the Starship/Super Heavy. Including a significant change to the stage separation system that will see the Starship ignite its engines while still attached to the Super Heavy. Improvements are also being made to the Raptor engines to prevent leaks of super-heated gas which resulted in multiple engine failures during the April launch.
Major repair work and modifications are also underway to the Starship launch pad, after extensive damage occurred during the April 20 test flight.
Musk has also said the company will be ready to launch by August. While it is certainly possible that engineering will cause a slight delay to that schedule, more likely SpaceX will be ready, and then have to sit and wait for the FAA and the Biden administration to issue a launch permit. I am predicting it will not be issued by then, and likely not for months afterward.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Politically, the democrats have to stop Elon from achieving the public acclaim that an orbital launch would earn him. But it will not be easy. They do not have an FAA administrator in place who can take step forward and make a “non partisan” decision to block the launch. Elon is spreading his money around by hiring NASA officials. They have to prove their worth by working the system to the advantage of SpaceX. There is Gwen, who as a successful woman executive, can have her success claimed by women in the media and congress. Biden himself might be too distracted by his own problems – he has to remain politically viable to keep prosecutors from picking off members of the Biden circle.
What’s a year, or two? Compared to 50+.
Tent cities are more important than solar system resource utilization.
They most fear us leaving them on Earth without being able to be exploited.
Hey, at least they’ll have tents.
Ironically Starship/SuperHeavy is going more Soviet all the time:
Automated Dragon…grid fins…now hot staging.
SuperHeavy might need upward firing flank engines to ease separation.
In place of inert grid fins—have petal- like thrust deflectors open up at the top of SuperHeavy once Starship is away.
These thrust deflectors then act AS steering surfaces with the same actuators.
A two-fer.
I am intrigued by the idea (from another commenter) of using derivatives of the upper-hull mounted landing and takeoff rockets that SpaceX plans to use anyway on the HLS (Human Landing System). They would provide sufficient thrust to separate the two ships. Suitably developed, they might even provide the initial rapid response component of a launch abort system!
But the best part is that they are already required for the HLS version of Starship to avoid launching lunar regolith, so it reduces the need for design variation – all ships could benefit from them. As Elon almost said: “The best part is the part you already have for something else!”