Yes. The booster could have been caught by the tower. The starship could have landed on a drone ship. They didn’t know until test 4, but they know now. The long-term investors in technology have been watching, and now they can build on this program. This test will go down as a turning point.
A Starship that can only reuse it’s first stage and 100 launches per year. What would be the result.
So 100 million to launch 200,000 kg payload, $500 per kg.
What do you do with all the second stages, why bring them back to Earth. Would anyone buy a second stage in LEO, for say 50 million dollar. Or why bring 6 or more raptor engine to Earth to destroy them. It seems reuseble raptor engine is worth more in orbit, then a new one on Earth. Take out all engines and leave 1 or two to get rid of “space debris”?? But second stage without removing the engine, in LEO seems it’s worth more.
What important would be if you have rocket fuel in LEO, that cost less than $1000 per kg.
With that you use rocket fuel to starship second stage for lunar bases or Mars bases.
One could tie to second stage together and make an artificial gravity station. Or maybe it takes 4 starships tied together. Maybe you like microgravity and don’t spin them.
Any case, you don’t have $200 billion dollar lunar bases or Mars bases, which appeared to the problem of why we aren’t exploring the Moon and Mars.
Anyway, if you buy rocket fuel in LEO at less $1000 per ton {or just water at less than $1000 per kg] and buy second stage Starship in orbit for $50 million, one could make a depot in Venus orbit, pretty cheap.
Yes. Lease an orbital Starship for whatever purpose. You pay cost to refuel, supply it with whatever mission hardware needed and then ultimately responsible for returning payload to Earth if needed. Starship flies from and back to LEO. In that configuration, a heat shield is not needed. Maybe the aileron flaps are also fixed or greatly simplified for a one way trip to orbit.
The biggest issue if the heat shield issue cannot be resolved would be perhaps some P2P profiles. And obviously cost and Mars. I don’t think Musk would be happy with only a partially reusable Starship.
I was surprised at Starship reaching a simulated landing. I will be shocked if it approaches the prices and flight cadence suggested by some. $10.00 kg and hundreds of flight daily I’ll have to see to believe.
I would be surprise if one can have hundred launches of Starship per year, within 10 miles of residential areas.
I think Starship and suborbtial launches should be done from the ocean. It could done a little as 10 miles from the shore.
It seem people might tolerate it for a year or two, but otherwise launch from the ocean. And anyone residing near it, will be working there.
But I think one could make an ocean settlement, a launch site, and surfing area, as cheap as one launch tower. And with freshwater lakes. But you don’t want to crash rocket into it.
But if you think ocean launch tower is a oil rig- worth a lot money. And crashing rocket into.
It’s a lot cheaper starting with them on land.
Yes, Starship Flight 4 was the key turning point in that it demonstrated that no argument for SLS remained potentially valid. But the apparent key remaining argument (i.e. safer to launch people on) is not currently valid because crew can be safely launched to LEO, dock with a refueled HLS there and then everything else for an Artemis mission could continue without the need for SLS, & Gateway provided that either Orion be taken to lunar orbit or sufficient propellant is used to return an HLS-Dragon back to LEO. Propellant transfer in LEO is needed for both architectures and so that demonstration is not needed to distinguish between them.
Yes. The booster could have been caught by the tower. The starship could have landed on a drone ship. They didn’t know until test 4, but they know now. The long-term investors in technology have been watching, and now they can build on this program. This test will go down as a turning point.
Well, the Starship was several km off-target.
A Starship that can only reuse it’s first stage and 100 launches per year. What would be the result.
So 100 million to launch 200,000 kg payload, $500 per kg.
What do you do with all the second stages, why bring them back to Earth. Would anyone buy a second stage in LEO, for say 50 million dollar. Or why bring 6 or more raptor engine to Earth to destroy them. It seems reuseble raptor engine is worth more in orbit, then a new one on Earth. Take out all engines and leave 1 or two to get rid of “space debris”?? But second stage without removing the engine, in LEO seems it’s worth more.
What important would be if you have rocket fuel in LEO, that cost less than $1000 per kg.
With that you use rocket fuel to starship second stage for lunar bases or Mars bases.
One could tie to second stage together and make an artificial gravity station. Or maybe it takes 4 starships tied together. Maybe you like microgravity and don’t spin them.
Any case, you don’t have $200 billion dollar lunar bases or Mars bases, which appeared to the problem of why we aren’t exploring the Moon and Mars.
Anyway, if you buy rocket fuel in LEO at less $1000 per ton {or just water at less than $1000 per kg] and buy second stage Starship in orbit for $50 million, one could make a depot in Venus orbit, pretty cheap.
Yes. Lease an orbital Starship for whatever purpose. You pay cost to refuel, supply it with whatever mission hardware needed and then ultimately responsible for returning payload to Earth if needed. Starship flies from and back to LEO. In that configuration, a heat shield is not needed. Maybe the aileron flaps are also fixed or greatly simplified for a one way trip to orbit.
The biggest issue if the heat shield issue cannot be resolved would be perhaps some P2P profiles. And obviously cost and Mars. I don’t think Musk would be happy with only a partially reusable Starship.
P2P doesn’t do much to alleviate the entry problem. It’s almost orbital velocity.
I was surprised at Starship reaching a simulated landing. I will be shocked if it approaches the prices and flight cadence suggested by some. $10.00 kg and hundreds of flight daily I’ll have to see to believe.
I would be surprise if one can have hundred launches of Starship per year, within 10 miles of residential areas.
I think Starship and suborbtial launches should be done from the ocean. It could done a little as 10 miles from the shore.
It seem people might tolerate it for a year or two, but otherwise launch from the ocean. And anyone residing near it, will be working there.
Oh, I just realized all these land launch towers are a cheap way to test, the ocean ones.
Yes.
But I think one could make an ocean settlement, a launch site, and surfing area, as cheap as one launch tower. And with freshwater lakes. But you don’t want to crash rocket into it.
But if you think ocean launch tower is a oil rig- worth a lot money. And crashing rocket into.
It’s a lot cheaper starting with them on land.
Yes, Starship Flight 4 was the key turning point in that it demonstrated that no argument for SLS remained potentially valid. But the apparent key remaining argument (i.e. safer to launch people on) is not currently valid because crew can be safely launched to LEO, dock with a refueled HLS there and then everything else for an Artemis mission could continue without the need for SLS, & Gateway provided that either Orion be taken to lunar orbit or sufficient propellant is used to return an HLS-Dragon back to LEO. Propellant transfer in LEO is needed for both architectures and so that demonstration is not needed to distinguish between them.