Update on Starship/Superheavy development
Link here.
The article first provides a detailed review of the past year’s effort, which leads to laying out the possibilities for 2022. Key quote:
With the FAA citing its plans to issue the Final Programmatic Environmental Assessment (PEA) for the SpaceX Starship / Super Heavy project no earlier than the end of February, SpaceX can claim the review process is the schedule driver. However, [Superheavy] Booster 4 [intended for Starship’s first orbital flight] has yet to conduct a Static Fire test, likely including an eventual full 29 engine firing. Further evolutions of the Ship and Booster are yet to come online, with a plan to go to nine engines on Ship and 33 engines on the Booster, all moving to the Raptor 2 variant.
In other words, there is a lot of work that needs to be done before SpaceX can actually fly that first orbital flight of Starship/Superheavy, and that even if the FAA rubberstamped the approval of its environmental reassessment of the Boca Chica site today, SpaceX would likely not be able to launch that orbital flight for several months anyway.
The article also suggests that SpaceX has made big progress in rethinking the Raptor manufacturing process, and has aimed those changes for the production of the Raptor-2 engine, which will also be about 20% more powerful than the Raptor engines presently being installed.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
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Link here.
The article first provides a detailed review of the past year’s effort, which leads to laying out the possibilities for 2022. Key quote:
With the FAA citing its plans to issue the Final Programmatic Environmental Assessment (PEA) for the SpaceX Starship / Super Heavy project no earlier than the end of February, SpaceX can claim the review process is the schedule driver. However, [Superheavy] Booster 4 [intended for Starship’s first orbital flight] has yet to conduct a Static Fire test, likely including an eventual full 29 engine firing. Further evolutions of the Ship and Booster are yet to come online, with a plan to go to nine engines on Ship and 33 engines on the Booster, all moving to the Raptor 2 variant.
In other words, there is a lot of work that needs to be done before SpaceX can actually fly that first orbital flight of Starship/Superheavy, and that even if the FAA rubberstamped the approval of its environmental reassessment of the Boca Chica site today, SpaceX would likely not be able to launch that orbital flight for several months anyway.
The article also suggests that SpaceX has made big progress in rethinking the Raptor manufacturing process, and has aimed those changes for the production of the Raptor-2 engine, which will also be about 20% more powerful than the Raptor engines presently being installed.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
filed under- Musk related stuff:
Elon Musk recap
Q&A with Lex Fridman (1-2-2022)
https://youtu.be/1ltt_L8KGXY
1:00:05
Lex follows up on his 2 & 1/2 hour long talk with Elon Musk (Lex Fridman podcast #252)
Environmentalists are working to shutdown Boca Chica.
https://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/texas-news/the-spacex-effect-on-the-lone-star-state/2814910/
( the environmental segment of the report starts around 10 minute mark )
https://www.ckwri.tamuk.edu/talk-wild-side-houston-wildlife-has-spacex-problem-part-1-s1e11
You have to give China this-if these Thunberg Greens tried this crap there-they would vanish. Maybe Elon just needs a “fixer.”
This SpaceX launch authorization issue is such a gift to the republican party. Do not even have to mention Elon. Or claim him as a republican. Just beat Biden over the head by showing how incredibly important it it that the US stay ahead of China in heavy lift, reusable rocket technology.
How little Mars emperor Elon Musk is really interested in real environmental issues can be seen from his behavior in Boca Chica and at the Tesla Berlin location. He doesn’t give a damn about the local nature. His talk about saving the world is hollow.
NASA launch facilities in Florida coexists quite well with the local wildlife and in many ways protect the coastline from real estate development. It’s worth noting SpaceX is in the process of creating similar launch facilities in Florida in addition to it’s offshore launch interests.
Looking on a map, of the launch facility in Texas, provides a nice size reference – it’s actually a rather small footprint. And it has less impact on local wildlife than the dangerous and ineffective electrical wind generation towers that clutter the landscape.
jburn:
I listened to one of those interviews with a reasonable biologist linked above. He explained how SpaceX had repeatedly exceeded what the FAA allowed and expanded it arbitrarily and ruthlessly. He also told how Musk kept saying that there was nothing worth protecting in Boca Chica. That certainly annoys the people there.
Questioner:
It’s my understanding the FAA is not involved in environmental oversight and it seems a desperate stretch on the part of this “reasonable biologist” to juxtapose their roles.
If significant damage has occurred, it should be easy to document. That’s certainly the case with those dangerous wind turbines which “arbitrarily and ruthlessly” destroy incredible amounts of wildlife. We should focus on getting those shut down if environmental impact is really the issue of concern versus an imagined impact you allude to.
A vast majority of people in the area welcome the contributions SpaceX brings to an impoverished area of Brownsville Texas.
The FAA delay won’t slow spacex down much. They will continue building more starship and booster prototypes with improvements on each new model. By the time they have permission to fly, they will be better prepared. They won’t waste this time.
It seems crazy. If that works in the long run, I’ll eat a broom.
“How realistic is SpaceX’s idea of catching the LARGEST rocket ever built?”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3XK-xhpAbIM