Launch News SpaceX Falcon 9 Return to Flight with 11 Orbcomm-2 satellites, December 21/22, 2015

[Urwumpe]

Come on, its Christmas, let them celebrate.

Also landing on the moon is a lot easier than landing on Earth, especially if you do so with a long pointy stick. It is a major achievement to perform such a landing with such a poorly designed vessel for the task of landing. Its a rocket stage for launching things after all.

Still, as you can read in my subtext, there are ways to do it better. For SpaceX as well as for anybody else in the world. And that does not even include the economy of reuse.

 

[N_Molson]

Come on, its Christmas, let them celebrate.

That's why I'm only 80% negative. The first paragraph was a huge effort from me, give me that. :lol:

Also agreed, the Moon is Newton's paradise, as you don't have random crosswinds that can ruin your landing in no time. But you also can't use parachutes or the air to decelerate. Everything has a price.

 

[Thunder Chicken]

Ask me what was the space event of the year, and I'll tell you that New Horizons is light-years ahead. That and the fact that the manned Soyuz combo achieved another perfect year.

I think both Blue Origin and SpaceX pulled off some amazing technical feats this year that deserve praise and are cause for celebration. I think Blue Origin will be sending tourists up pretty soon to get zero-G space experiences. I think SpaceX is going to be a regular access provider to NASA and others to get cargo and crew to LEO pretty soon. I don't see Blue Origin and SpaceX as direct competitors. They really are serving two completely different markets.

Both serve vital roles in the advancement of human spaceflight. SpaceX is essentially in the same place as air mail delivery in the early 1900s. Cool tech, provides a needed service, and advances our collective capabilities. I see Blue Origin as the retired air mail pilot giving rides in his Jenny at the county fair. It gives people a chance to taste spaceflight and see the potential. As air travel and cargo is now commonplace, maybe also soon will be LEO spaceflight because of these efforts.

 

[MaverickSawyer]

I think both Blue Origin and SpaceX pulled off some amazing technical feats this year that deserve praise and are cause for celebration. I think Blue Origin will be sending tourists up pretty soon to get zero-G space experiences. I think SpaceX is going to be a regular access provider to NASA and others to get cargo and crew to LEO pretty soon. I don't see Blue Origin and SpaceX as direct competitors. They really are serving two completely different markets.

Both serve vital roles in the advancement of human spaceflight. SpaceX is essentially in the same place as air mail delivery in the early 1900s. Cool tech, provides a needed service, and advances our collective capabilities. I see Blue Origin as the retired air mail pilot giving rides in his Jenny at the county fair. It gives people a chance to taste spaceflight and see the potential. As air travel and cargo is now commonplace, maybe also soon will be LEO spaceflight because of these efforts.

Blue Origin is looking at more than just tourism...

I do quote the Blue Origin webpage:

The orbital launch system is comprised of a two-stage rocket and capsule that will carry astronauts and payloads to low-Earth orbit destinations. Similar to our suborbital vehicle, the first stage booster will separate and land back on Earth. An expendable second stage will continue to propel the capsule into orbit, toward scientific research and exploration.

That is a DIRECT competitor to the Falcon 9. Granted, it's still very hush-hush, as Blue is prone to doing with everything, but still, they ARE looking to go to orbit, and in a big way.

 

[Unstung]

Blue Origin is really behind SpaceX in that case.

 

[Thunder Chicken]

Blue Origin is really behind SpaceX in that case.

Indeed. Blue Origin is really late to the party. SpaceX is already putting commercial and government customers into orbit and has a long manifest. Unless Blue Origin has a secret factory somewhere and is going to burst on the scene with orbital missions with stage flyback soon or with something else that beats SpaceX's cost point, they are going to be in the difficult position of begging for SpaceX's business scraps.

Maybe they can leverage their suborbital tourism for some R&D funding to develop a competitive orbital system, but I don't see it. The cash flows are completely different orders of magnitude, as are the intensities of the leaders toward the task. Musk pushed in a big pile of money and decided to go hard on this, and he did it. Jeff Bezos is running Blue Origin like it is a entry in a hobby rocket club.

If Bezos' intent was to engage in suborbital space tourism, I'd say he'd probably do fine and could probably make a tidy business of it. To say that they're headed to putting crews and payloads in LEO and beyond in competition with SpaceX is ridiculous right now.

---------- Post added at 11:09 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:01 PM ----------

Very apropos :lol::

 

[MaverickSawyer]

Blue Origin is really behind SpaceX in that case.

Which is just fine from their perspective... After all, the company motto is "Gradatim Ferociter", Latin for "Step-by-Step, Ferociously" or literally "Gradually Ferocious". They see themselves at the tortoise to SpaceX's hare.

 

[Frilock]

Blue Origin is really behind SpaceX in that case.

How many years behind did they start?

 

[RGClark]

The payload on this launch was only about 2,000 kg, much less than the 13,000 kg max for the reusable F9. Actually with the F9 upgrade, it's an even smaller fraction of the max payload. Then on this flight they could have saved an extra amount of reserve propellant in the first stage for landing.

And at about the 3 min, 14 sec point in the post-flight telecon Elon says this launch at MECO was going slower than will other RTLS flights, at approx. 5,000 km/hr compared to 8,000 km/hr for following flights. That's quite a significant difference that would result in a large amount of left over propellant compared to the following flights. Then this could have been used for ballast on landing to the extent it may have been able to hover.

Bob Clark

 

[RisingFury]

The payload on this launch was only about 2,000 kg, much less than the 13,000 kg

Useful payload of 11 sats. Not sure if the mass simulator is included in this, but the satellite adapter is not. Keep in mind that hunk of junk the satellites ride on while going to orbit also weighs a bit.

Another limitation is fairing size. Keep ind mind that just because you can lift 13 tons to orbit, doesn't mean that you always will, because you can't fit everything under the fairing.


I'm also not sure if the 13 tons to orbit is quoted for RTLS or for downrange landing on a ship.

 

[Thunder Chicken]

Which is just fine from their perspective... After all, the company motto is "Gradatim Ferociter", Latin for "Step-by-Step, Ferociously" or literally "Gradually Ferocious". They see themselves at the tortoise to SpaceX's hare.

Well, that is all well and good, but letting the competition get well off the mark early and claim superiority (and customers) before you decide to get around to it is a bad business model, unless you have something superior to bring to the table. Blue Origins needs to have something up their sleeve that is superior to what SpaceX is offering right now. If they do, great! But I doubt. I hope Blue Origin shocks me.

 

[RGClark]

This image seems to show there was significant tilt just before landing that had to be cancelled:

From:

http://www.theverge.com/2015/12/22/10649560/spacex-falcon-9-landing-launch-photos

Anyone know how much of an angle there was just before touchdown?


Bob Clark

 

[Thunder Chicken]

This image seems to show there was significant tilt just before landing that had to be cancelled:

From:

http://www.theverge.com/2015/12/22/10649560/spacex-falcon-9-landing-launch-photos

Anyone know how much of an angle there was just before touchdown?


Bob Clark

Well, it landed, so the angle just before touchdown must have been close enough to zero to not affect the landing. Remember that it is flying back from well downrange, so some approach angle is not unexpected.

In the initial descent an airliners's nose is often pointed into the ground; a certain recipe for disaster. This is only remedied during final approach and flare where the wheels touch the ground first.

 

[RGClark]

According to Chris Bergin of Nasaspaceflight.com, SpaceX will be releasing a camera view of the landing taken onboard a la the video taken at last years barge landing attempt:

Hopefully they have solved the ice buildup problem.

Bob Clark

---------- Post added at 11:52 AM ---------- Previous post was at 03:44 AM ----------

Nice simulation of this last F9 flight here:

In the video, the mass of the stage and other flight specs are indicated on the left throughout the flight. The amount of propellant left over could be 25 mT to 30 mT at landing, based on the total mass indicated at landing and the estimated dry weight of the stage. This amount of propellant left over could serve as ballast to allow hovering on landing.

In other words, if accurate, for this flight, suicide-burn or hover-slam wasn't used.

Bob Clark

 

[Thunder Chicken]

https://www.instagram.com/p/_-d28bQEc9/?taken-by=elonmusk

Falcon 9 back in the hangar at Cape Canaveral. No damage found, ready to fire again.

Looking pretty sweet. A good spacecraft should look burned in and ready for more IMHO.

---------- Post added at 12:07 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:03 AM ----------

Does anyone know anything about SpaceX's ground processing i.e. how do they pick up a rocket the size of the Statue of Liberty and lay it on its side? During initial assembly you have the luxury of an overhead crane; just curious how this is done. Rigging for big objects isn't cheap.

 

[Andy44]

https://www.instagram.com/p/_-d28bQEc9/?taken-by=elonmusk

Looking pretty sweet. A good spacecraft should look burned in and ready for more IMHO.

Just one flight and it already has that Millennium Falcon "used future" look. I wonder what one of these will look like after a few reuses.

 

[Urwumpe]

Does anyone know anything about SpaceX's ground processing i.e. how do they pick up a rocket the size of the Statue of Liberty and lay it on its side? During initial assembly you have the luxury of an overhead crane; just curious how this is done. Rigging for big objects isn't cheap.

The pictures by SpaceX show typical heavy-duty mobile cranes, like you also use for assembling wind turbines (Which is pretty much the inverse operation, take a part of the size of the Statue of Liberty from a transporter and move it into vertical.).

Maybe they will resort to special transporters later, when such an optimization saves more money than it costs.

 

[Thunder Chicken]

Just one flight and it already has that Millennium Falcon "used future" look. I wonder what one of these will look like after a few reuses.

Probably like the team bus in the movie Slap Shot:

---------- Post added at 08:07 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:54 PM ----------

Maybe they will resort to special transporters later, when such an optimization saves more money than it costs.

I'm seeing a time where they'll have a strongback that just grabs the stage, lays it down, and drives away within a few minutes. For the occasional, inevitable crash / explosion, they'll have a bulldozer and an army of Jawas to clear up the pad.

 

[MaverickSawyer]

I'm seeing a time where they'll have a strongback that just grabs the stage, lays it down, and drives away within a few minutes.

That's how Blue Origin did it. They used the same transporter/erector they use to transport the stack to the pad to pick the stage up.

For the occasional, inevitable crash / explosion, they'll have a bulldozer and an army of Jawas to clear up the pad.

Utinni!

 

[dman]

Thunder Chicken " Probably like the team bus in the movie Slap Shot"

Classic movie!

Personal note - filmed many of the crowd scenes in my home town of Utica
NY at the Auditorium

When in high school used to go to many of the games for minor league team
Mohawk Valley Comets

Scene where players go in the stands to beat up the fans is actually taken
from incident where one of the fans (not Me!) struck one of the players with
a thrown object!