Author Topic: What Will "BFS Grasshopper" Look Like?  (Read 43461 times)

Offline Hominans Kosmos

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Re: What Will "BFS Grasshopper" Look Like?
« Reply #140 on: 04/01/2018 10:43 am »
Weight saving and simplicity are both very valid concepts when building a spaceship, but there is another concept which is important: redundancy. A few more thrusters than the minimum needed, and some perhaps running on alternative fuels, might come in handy one day.

There is no forward looking potential for alternatively fueled thrusters. There's only the prospect of temporary-use for alternative fuel thrusters. Dracos or cold nitrogen thrusters from the Falcon family would only be put on BFS grasshopper temporarily as part of the test program, they are not part of the greater design.

Methane and oxygen provide for all the hot gas and cold gas thruster needs in the long term, even for testing. You just fly with excess thrusters and redundant, independent fuel supplies.

Offline aero

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Re: What Will "BFS Grasshopper" Look Like?
« Reply #141 on: 04/01/2018 05:12 pm »
Test like you fly.
Retired, working interesting problems

Offline su27k

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Re: What Will "BFS Grasshopper" Look Like?
« Reply #142 on: 04/05/2018 01:56 pm »
Regarding that - will the RCS be at fore AND aft - on both ends of the center of mass?

Looks like it......

http://www.spacex.com/sites/spacex/files/making_life_multiplanetary-2017.pdf has much higher resolution image of the BFS, you can see it has two sets of RCS, one big, one small.

BTW, I wonder what are those short black tubes at the engine section.

Offline speedevil

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Re: What Will "BFS Grasshopper" Look Like?
« Reply #143 on: 04/05/2018 06:03 pm »
BTW, I wonder what are those short black tubes at the engine section.

Which short black tubes?
The diameter of the large refilling tubing is around 10".
If you mean the 4"*18" or so slightly offset in the middle parts, those are valves.
There are two in each fuel and oxidiser line.
The shape is about two 4"*6" largely cylindrical motors offset by about an inch with a gearbox in the middle.

Offline su27k

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Re: What Will "BFS Grasshopper" Look Like?
« Reply #144 on: 04/06/2018 06:17 am »
BTW, I wonder what are those short black tubes at the engine section.

Which short black tubes?
The diameter of the large refilling tubing is around 10".
If you mean the 4"*18" or so slightly offset in the middle parts, those are valves.
There are two in each fuel and oxidiser line.
The shape is about two 4"*6" largely cylindrical motors offset by about an inch with a gearbox in the middle.

This is the part I was referring to, I guess you're right, they're the valves.

Offline FutureSpaceTourist

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Re: What Will "BFS Grasshopper" Look Like?
« Reply #145 on: 08/28/2019 11:15 pm »
Seems like a good place to post this:

https://twitter.com/justpaulinelol/status/1166828107967488000

Quote
6 years difference!
It's an incredible development that SpaceX has made in recent years!
And all this thanks to the passion and the goal in mind!
We appreciate it! 👌🏼

twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1166834776294248448

Quote
Can’t believe it’s been 6 years since our first vertical landing!

Edit to add:

https://twitter.com/notericralph/status/1166842243656773632

Quote
Grasshopper flew for the first time on September 21st, 2012 :) Just shy of seven years.
« Last Edit: 08/28/2019 11:20 pm by FutureSpaceTourist »

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