Author Topic: Progress on rapid booster reuse  (Read 175472 times)

Offline su27k

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #260 on: 03/12/2021 02:00 am »
Continue to push for faster turnaround of F9 will also produce valuable lessons for Starship, F9 is the reuse pathfinder.

Offline Jansen

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #261 on: 03/15/2021 12:51 am »
https://twitter.com/spacexfleet/status/1371258068617543680

Getting underway around 12 hours after landing is one of the ways SpaceX is speeding up reuse.

Online FutureSpaceTourist

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #262 on: 04/14/2021 12:36 pm »
https://twitter.com/sciguyspace/status/1382307666400219136

Quote
Graphic from @edzapata showing clear trend lines in Falcon 9 reuse. Days between reuse going down, frequency of booster use going up. Big milestone later this month when humans launch on a used Falcon 9 for the first time.

https://zapatatalksnasa.com/2021/04/14/launcher-reusability-priceless/amp/
« Last Edit: 04/14/2021 12:36 pm by FutureSpaceTourist »

Online FutureSpaceTourist

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #263 on: 04/23/2021 12:15 pm »
twitter.com/sciguyspace/status/1385566159764819968

Quote
Musk says he is increasingly confident about the possibility of full and rapid reuse of orbital rockets: "It’s only recently that I feel like full and rapid reusability can be accomplished. I wasn’t sure for a long time, but I am now."

Edit to add:

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1385598863399129090

Quote
This is important
« Last Edit: 04/23/2021 02:23 pm by FutureSpaceTourist »

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #264 on: 04/23/2021 06:05 pm »
Limited launch windows may endup slowing SS launch rate.

Peter Beck said Wallops has 12 slots are year, while Mahia has 120 due to empty airspace. What is airspace like for launching out of Boca?.


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Offline freddo411

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #265 on: 04/25/2021 02:53 pm »
Limited launch windows may endup slowing SS launch rate.

Peter Beck said Wallops has 12 slots are year, while Mahia has 120 due to empty airspace. What is airspace like for launching out of Boca?.


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BC has some pretty tight limits on launches.   

These limits on launches are not based on physics, they are arbitrary administrative rules.   

One possibility is that these rules could be changed.   Granted, this is difficult to do.

I imagine that the flight rules for flying from an offshore platform won't be as problematic

Offline TrevorMonty

Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #266 on: 04/25/2021 08:46 pm »
Limited launch windows may endup slowing SS launch rate.

Peter Beck said Wallops has 12 slots are year, while Mahia has 120 due to empty airspace. What is airspace like for launching out of Boca?.


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BC has some pretty tight limits on launches.   

These limits on launches are not based on physics, they are arbitrary administrative rules.   

One possibility is that these rules could be changed.   Granted, this is difficult to do.

I imagine that the flight rules for flying from an offshore platform won't be as problematic
Still need clear air space and sea space. Why should other businesses put their business on hold to vacant sea and airspace so SpaceX can make money.




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Offline freddo411

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #267 on: 04/26/2021 02:49 am »
Limited launch windows may endup slowing SS launch rate.

Peter Beck said Wallops has 12 slots are year, while Mahia has 120 due to empty airspace. What is airspace like for launching out of Boca?.


BC has some pretty tight limits on launches.   

These limits on launches are not based on physics, they are arbitrary administrative rules.   

One possibility is that these rules could be changed.   Granted, this is difficult to do.

I imagine that the flight rules for flying from an offshore platform won't be as problematic
Still need clear air space and sea space. Why should other businesses put their business on hold to vacant sea and airspace so SpaceX can make money.


Sea lanes and airspace are used as commons as I’m sure you know.   It reasonable for it to be used by anyone with the usual coordination measures.   

Offline Norm38

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #268 on: 04/29/2021 03:06 pm »
B1060 has quietly become the 2021 workhorse.   2021 total:  12 flights, 6 different boosters.

B1061: 1 (Crew)
B1060: 4
B1059: 1 (Landing failure)
B1058: 3
B1051: 2 (Flight leader at 9)
B1049: 1

B1060 Flights this year:  01-07-2021,  02-04-2021,  03-24-2021,  04-28-2021.

It will be interesting to see what pace B1060 can hold and how many flights it racks up.
« Last Edit: 04/30/2021 01:13 pm by Norm38 »

Offline Norm38

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #269 on: 05/12/2021 02:32 am »
First third of 2021:  13 of 14 boosters recovered, 93%. 

Basically, they’re on track to build as few as 3-4 boosters a year as replacements.
DOD and NASA new booster purchases will cover their losses.

*Falcon Heavy not included
« Last Edit: 05/12/2021 02:38 am by Norm38 »

Online FutureSpaceTourist

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #270 on: 05/15/2021 11:18 pm »
Current state of booster fleet (including Starlink launch 20 minutes ago)

https://twitter.com/spacenosey/status/1393705040423104512

Offline whitelancer64

Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #271 on: 05/18/2021 02:45 pm »
Time for some statistics. There have been 15 launches by SpaceX so far this year. All flights have been with previously flown boosters - that will change within the next month, but that is remarkable nonetheless.

12 of the 15 launches have been Starlink satellites (plus some ride-alongs). Of the remaining three, one launch was a satellite for Turkey, one was a dedicated rideshare flight, and one launch was with crew for NASA. 

May 15th was the 135th day of the year, which means there have been an average of 9 days between launches in this calendar year. Again, remarkable.

The shortest turnaround between flights from the same launch pad was 10 days, which happened three times, twice on SLC-40 and once on LC-39A. First on SLC-40 betweeen the Transporter-1 and Starlink 18 launches. Then on LC-39A between Starlink 17 and Starlink 21. Then again on SLC-40 between Starlink 24 and Starlink 27.

The average turnaround time for the boosters that have flown this year is 58.2 days. A new record shortest turnaround time happened this year, with two different cores achieving a turnaround time of 27 days. First booster 1060 between Turksat 5A and Starlink 18, then booster 1058 between Starlink 20 and Starlink 23.
« Last Edit: 05/18/2021 02:48 pm by whitelancer64 »
"One bit of advice: it is important to view knowledge as sort of a semantic tree -- make sure you understand the fundamental principles, ie the trunk and big branches, before you get into the leaves/details or there is nothing for them to hang on to." - Elon Musk
"There are lies, damned lies, and launch schedules." - Larry J

Offline Jansen

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #272 on: 05/21/2021 05:52 pm »
The average turnaround time for the boosters that have flown this year is 58.2 days. A new record shortest turnaround time happened this year, with two different cores achieving a turnaround time of 27 days.

Average turnaround is a useless statistic when you have launches like Crew-2 and GPS III SV05 skewing the numbers. Those boosters were sitting around because of contractual obligations, not any kind of operational reuse limitations.

Offline rpapo

Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #273 on: 05/21/2021 08:19 pm »
The average turnaround time for the boosters that have flown this year is 58.2 days. A new record shortest turnaround time happened this year, with two different cores achieving a turnaround time of 27 days.

Average turnaround is a useless statistic when you have launches like Crew-2 and GPS III SV05 skewing the numbers. Those boosters were sitting around because of contractual obligations, not any kind of operational reuse limitations.
It is also a moving target.  Better than a whole fleet average turnaround, you might want to think about using a trailing average.  Pick a number of the most recent launches and average over that.  Plot a moving average.
Following the space program since before Apollo 8.

Offline niwax

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #274 on: 05/21/2021 08:33 pm »
The average turnaround time for the boosters that have flown this year is 58.2 days. A new record shortest turnaround time happened this year, with two different cores achieving a turnaround time of 27 days.

Average turnaround is a useless statistic when you have launches like Crew-2 and GPS III SV05 skewing the numbers. Those boosters were sitting around because of contractual obligations, not any kind of operational reuse limitations.
It is also a moving target.  Better than a whole fleet average turnaround, you might want to think about using a trailing average.  Pick a number of the most recent launches and average over that.  Plot a moving average.

Looking at the Starlink fleet of 1049, 1051, 1058 and 1060, there have been 13 launches this year (3.25 per booster) making it on every 43 days. Taking pad availability into account, I see no reason for turnaround taking more than 30 days regardless of booster age.
Which booster has the most soot? SpaceX booster launch history! (discussion)

Offline whitelancer64

Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #275 on: 05/27/2021 04:34 am »
The average turnaround time for the boosters that have flown this year is 58.2 days. A new record shortest turnaround time happened this year, with two different cores achieving a turnaround time of 27 days.

Average turnaround is a useless statistic when you have launches like Crew-2 and GPS III SV05 skewing the numbers. Those boosters were sitting around because of contractual obligations, not any kind of operational reuse limitations.

It's not useless, absent insider information from SpaceX, it's a reasonable indicator of general processing time, and discarding the outliers still gets you close to the average.

If you look through past posts you will see the overall turnaround time decreasing significantly. IIRC, the last time I posted the numbers in this thread it was 88 days. Now it's 58. It's a decreasing trend, which was expected, but it's nice to see that reflected in the numbers.
« Last Edit: 05/27/2021 04:44 am by whitelancer64 »
"One bit of advice: it is important to view knowledge as sort of a semantic tree -- make sure you understand the fundamental principles, ie the trunk and big branches, before you get into the leaves/details or there is nothing for them to hang on to." - Elon Musk
"There are lies, damned lies, and launch schedules." - Larry J

Offline whitelancer64

Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #276 on: 05/27/2021 04:38 am »
The average turnaround time for the boosters that have flown this year is 58.2 days. A new record shortest turnaround time happened this year, with two different cores achieving a turnaround time of 27 days.

Average turnaround is a useless statistic when you have launches like Crew-2 and GPS III SV05 skewing the numbers. Those boosters were sitting around because of contractual obligations, not any kind of operational reuse limitations.

It is also a moving target.  Better than a whole fleet average turnaround, you might want to think about using a trailing average.  Pick a number of the most recent launches and average over that.  Plot a moving average.

I should note, my average number there is based only on the boosters that have launched this year, it's not the whole fleet turnaround time.
« Last Edit: 05/27/2021 04:44 am by whitelancer64 »
"One bit of advice: it is important to view knowledge as sort of a semantic tree -- make sure you understand the fundamental principles, ie the trunk and big branches, before you get into the leaves/details or there is nothing for them to hang on to." - Elon Musk
"There are lies, damned lies, and launch schedules." - Larry J

Offline JamesH65

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #277 on: 05/27/2021 03:33 pm »
Why average at all? The important metric is what's the fastest time.

Offline klod

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Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #278 on: 05/28/2021 07:51 am »
Why average at all? The important metric is what's the fastest time.
Important metric - successful launch. Others - just for fun.

Offline whitelancer64

Re: Progress on rapid booster reuse
« Reply #279 on: 06/02/2021 03:28 am »
Why average at all? The important metric is what's the fastest time.

Record fastest is nearly never a useful metric for logistics, inputs based on record fastest X gives you unrealistic outputs. An average gives you a better sense of what to expect.

For example. The record pad turnaround times of 10 days implies you could get 36 launches per year from each pad, which is unrealistic. There's a whole host of separate things that make 72 launches per year from Canaveral / KSC combined effectively impossible.
« Last Edit: 06/02/2021 03:31 am by whitelancer64 »
"One bit of advice: it is important to view knowledge as sort of a semantic tree -- make sure you understand the fundamental principles, ie the trunk and big branches, before you get into the leaves/details or there is nothing for them to hang on to." - Elon Musk
"There are lies, damned lies, and launch schedules." - Larry J

 

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