When will the first Starship reach orbit?

[pochimax]

First of all somebody must set what everybody will accept as "Starship".

Second, the meaning of "orbit".

Third, if the fly is expendable or not (succesful landing).

Fourth, if that Starship must be reusable or not.

I see a lot of confussion about what really qualifies as a true orbital flight of a true Starship. Impossible to bet any date.

For me, a "true Starship" must go to orbit and safely land from a mach 25 reentry.

NET than 2027, in this case.

[DistantTemple]

July 2020, Probably 12th of July... a week late on an independence day event I imagine he might hold!
The SS doesn't have to land at all! it can stay in orbit for the time being. However I don't think landing is a big problem. The beautiful swooping change of direction can be done at a higher altitude at the expense of more fuel, and be tweaked to optimum pad-skimming lowness later!
Tesla has just started to do some things AHEAD of schedule! Will we see the Elon time factor slide from 1.5 to 0.9???
Also since the payload is 150Tonnes, SX still have all that to play with in over engineering prototype parts. July 5th 2020 just needs 10 or 20 tonnes payload for a fantastic gimmick, such as a TESLA Semi! ....
I think we will see a more conventional manufacturing facility spring up at Roberts road. And the currently invisible Super Heavy will hatch quickly, and be successful at first flight, having learned all its lessons from the SS development.

The achievement is the technical term orbit with a prototype SS.

[envy887]

First of all somebody must set what everybody will accept as "Starship".

Second, the meaning of "orbit".

Third, if the fly is expendable or not (succesful landing).

Fourth, if that Starship must be reusable or not.

I see a lot of confussion about what really qualifies as a true orbital flight of a true Starship. Impossible to bet any date.

For me, a "true Starship" must go to orbit and safely land from a mach 25 reentry.

NET than 2027, in this case.

The OP didn't say anything about landing, so you are answering a different poll.

As for what counts as Starship, I think most people would accept anything that's 9 meter main diameter, mostly stainless steel, and Raptor powered. There are several Starship variants (Crew, Tanker, Chomper, Starkicker) planned, but all share those features.

[pochimax]

Ok, first prototype to orbit... NET May 2021. Probably 2022.

[mmeijeri]

The OP didn't say anything about landing, so you are answering a different poll.

Do you think the first Starship to reach orbit will fail to make a successful landing? I'd expect them to try a landing on the first orbital flight, because the heatshield will be the biggest remaining unknown factor after they've got the 20km flight to land successfully.

[su27k]

If a Starship launches to the east from Boca Chica and lands 300 feet to the west of the launchpad 90 minutes later, will people say it wasn't a full orbit?

Due to the rotation of the Earth, at Boca Chica latitude, it will end up 2200 km west after 1 full circle. I don't think there should be any complaints if it continues east for 2200 km more to get back to within a few hundred feet of the launch site.

Actually didn't Elon say it lacks the cross range for one orbit mission? It needs to wait for a few orbits for the launch site to get back under it, so the less than one orbit scenario won't happen, at least not in a nominal mission.

[meberbs]

If a Starship launches to the east from Boca Chica and lands 300 feet to the west of the launchpad 90 minutes later, will people say it wasn't a full orbit?

Due to the rotation of the Earth, at Boca Chica latitude, it will end up 2200 km west after 1 full circle. I don't think there should be any complaints if it continues east for 2200 km more to get back to within a few hundred feet of the launch site.

Actually didn't Elon say it lacks the cross range for one orbit mission? It needs to wait for a few orbits for the launch site to get back under it, so the less than one orbit scenario won't happen, at least not in a nominal mission.

It depends on the orbit they go into. For simplistic trajectories, a due eat launch means you have to wait a whole day, only one point of the orbit touches the launch site latitude. If the orbit is more inclined you get 2 chances, one ascending, and one descending. If you start by launching southeast, you have to wait more than half a day. The same inclination but northeast (from Florida, since Boca Chica can't go that direction) would be less than half a day. With just the right inclination and a northeast launch, no crossrange would be required.

This ignores the fact that it takes time to get to orbit, and that dogleg trajectories can mess it up even more. There is a nonzero chance that I somehow got everything inside out. There is a very high chance that this is an over-analysis of my original over-analysis of what I believe was mostly a joke. A new thread would probably be a more appropriate location to continue this if desired.

[daedalus1]

If a Starship launches to the east from Boca Chica and lands 300 feet to the west of the launchpad 90 minutes later, will people say it wasn't a full orbit?

Due to the rotation of the Earth, at Boca Chica latitude, it will end up 2200 km west after 1 full circle. I don't think there should be any complaints if it continues east for 2200 km more to get back to within a few hundred feet of the launch site.

Actually didn't Elon say it lacks the cross range for one orbit mission? It needs to wait for a few orbits for the launch site to get back under it, so the less than one orbit scenario won't happen, at least not in a nominal mission.

If that's the case (not enough cross range for one orbit return) then it needs to wait 24 hours, one full rotation of the earth.

[Patchouli]

I'm going with April 2021 as I don't think they would even attempt getting into orbit until Super Heavy is finished.
In theory it could be a SSTO but only with practically no payload which probably also means completely stripped down.
Most of the TPS tests could be done simply reaching Mercury Redstone speeds.
Trying to make it act like a SSTO for a publicity stunt would be a waste of time and money that would divert funding away from the booster.
Plus got to remember Elon time he's always a little optimistic on the schedules.
This first orbital flight probably won't be a crewed version but the tanker and cargo variant.

[daedalus1]

I'm going with April 2021 as I don't think they would even attempt getting into orbit until Super Heavy is finished.
In theory it could be a SSTO but only with practically no payload which probably also means completely stripped down.
Most of the TPS tests could be done simply reaching Mercury Redstone speeds.
Trying to make it act like a SSTO for a publicity stunt would be a waste of time and money that would divert funding away from the booster.
Plus got to remember Elon time he's always a little optimistic on the schedules.
This first orbital flight probably won't be a crewed version but the tanker and cargo variant.

You would have to put on more than the announced six engines to launch fully fueled. I doubt very much that it could reach orbit with less than a full fuel load. So is impossible even with an empty cargo hold.

[Bubbinski]

I’m gonna say the very end of 2020 (a week or 2 before Christmas). They’re making astonishing progress but still need to finish building the Super Heavy. Gwynne said within a year, but I’m going to say they’ll need a little more time than that, just because it’s a new undertaking. (I don’t recall ever observing a new crewed spacecraft or rocket being on time from initial projections).

[TripleSeven]

2024 maybe

[c4fusion]

I’m gonna say the very end of 2020 (a week or 2 before Christmas). They’re making astonishing progress but still need to finish building the Super Heavy. Gwynne said within a year, but I’m going to say they’ll need a little more time than that, just because it’s a new undertaking. (I don’t recall ever observing a new crewed spacecraft or rocket being on time from initial projections).

While I am thinking of pushing my guess back to October 2020 from June 2020, I don't think the flight to orbit is going to be delayed because starship has a crewed version.  The version that is going up is going to be closer to a beta if not alpha test of the cargo version.

2024 maybe

This was the sort of pessimism/irrationality I was really thinking about. If you are going to put a date that far out, you might as well say that it's not going to fly ever and SpaceX should close its doors (I would accept that answer for more readily).  First of all we are not talking about a company that has never been to space at this point. And second of all, in order for it to be that long of a timeframe, spacex would have to blown up so many times on the way up to orbit that it would not be funny.  And if you are thinking of Falcon Heavy delay, it still doesn't make sense as Falcon Heavy became increasingly redundant throughout its development while Starship is a *potential* game changer for SpaceX.

Working out F9 reusability had the benefit that every launch was paid for. Starship won't have that advantage. Even if they would launch paying customers on Starship test flights, each Starship is far more expensive than an F9. You don't throw it away intentionally if you can avoid it economically. Although by writing this, I now realize there's a grey area where it might make sense to launch whatever you build, as you don't learn anything by not launching them either.

What I was trying to get at is that they would still have a lot of extra data about the hypersonic regime and heat shielding that the 20 km test does not provide.  Also the problem with additional 20 km tests is that they don't provide that much more additional data without really changing the risk profile that much.  If one of the prototype blows up, I am going to wager that it is either A: it  blew up basically on the launch stand or B: it couldn't right itself correctly and went smack into the earth, which is the same for either of the tests.

[philw1776]

My optimistic guestimate was December 2020.  Reasoning being that SpaceX likes to move aggressively without achieving implementation perfection before taking flight action.  They'll fly a SH ASAP.  And a SH with depleted # of engines, say 21 or whatever, is enough to launch a Starship into LEO.  That early SH should be available 2nd half of 2020.  Light the candle.

[Tass]

Now who's moving the goalposts?

I really don't know, since I can't even tell who you are addressing, nor which way the goal posts are supposedly being moved.

[shm6666]

I´m not entirely convinced about Elons monolithic Starship that will land on moon and mars. There was a reason why von Braun went for the Apollo solution. Also, at the time of writing MK3 will have to be built and tested to fly to 20km. That puts them at best to June 2020 for that. At worse Jan of 2021 or even later if they get a MK1 trouble again. But I think they will pull the plug on this earlier.

My biggest problem with Starship is that is based of a dream of having a ship like the Tintin:s Destination moon ship. Where’s Falcon 9 is based on science facts.

I think we will see a radical redesign again, so in this incarnation. Starship will never reach orbit…

[daedalus1]

My biggest problem with Starship is that is based of a dream of having a ship like the Tintin:s Destination moon ship. Where’s Falcon 9 is based on science facts.

Can you please explain more of what part of Starship is not science fact.

[ChrisWilson68]

There was a reason why von Braun went for the Apollo solution.

That choice was for a particular goal in a particular situation.  Von Braun most certainly thought the right choice for the future beyond Apollo was much different from Apollo -- in fact, much more like the SpaceX Starship design than Apollo.

https://www.wired.com/2014/09/wernher-von-brauns-fantastic-vision-ferry-rocket/

[su27k]

My biggest problem with Starship is that is based of a dream of having a ship like the Tintin:s Destination moon ship. Where’s Falcon 9 is based on science facts.

No, Starship is nothing like the Tintin rocket. It had some superficial resemblance on the outside in the past, but even that was removed in the latest design iteration.

In terms of basic design such as propulsion and staging, Starship is completely different. The Tintin rocket is a nuclear single stage to the Moon and back, while Starship is a methalox two stage to orbit, and can only go beyond LEO with orbital refueling. We do have advanced concepts like the Tintin rocket, for example John Bucknell's Air Enhanced Nuclear Thermal Rocket, but that's no where near what Starship is.

BTW, even John Bucknell's concept is based on science (or more accurately, it's based on known aerospace and nuclear engineering principles), it's not science fiction.

[high road]

There was a reason why von Braun went for the Apollo solution.

To get there quickly and within budget. And it took massive convincing. All of his ideas for space exploration use much larger rockets.