Quote from: steveleach on 06/22/2021 10:37 pmQuote from: AU1.52 on 06/22/2021 10:00 pmI would think it is likely one or more of his children will be very active in SpaceX by the 2030's to carry on his legacy.It's really quite unlikely that his ability to deliver on the Mars vision is something that can be inherited or instilled in his children. And children of successful people often (though not always) have a sense of entitlement that can be very counterproductive.The best that should be expected is handing over a smoothly running operation to a safe pair of hands, with the goal of drawing out the descent into mediocrity over the longest possible time.Not always. Take the J M Smucker company - it highly successful and has been run through four generations of the family now. The key to it working is getting the children involved early and working in different areas of the company. I would think with Elon's vision of making humanity multiplanetary which is going to take multiply generations, he would seek to have some of his children follow in his footsteps. They have been seen at Boca from time to time too.
Quote from: AU1.52 on 06/22/2021 10:00 pmI would think it is likely one or more of his children will be very active in SpaceX by the 2030's to carry on his legacy.It's really quite unlikely that his ability to deliver on the Mars vision is something that can be inherited or instilled in his children. And children of successful people often (though not always) have a sense of entitlement that can be very counterproductive.The best that should be expected is handing over a smoothly running operation to a safe pair of hands, with the goal of drawing out the descent into mediocrity over the longest possible time.
I would think it is likely one or more of his children will be very active in SpaceX by the 2030's to carry on his legacy.
Mars has very little to offer besides gravity, which can be substituted by sufficiently large spinning things. At some point, I expect Elon to have a big shift, wherein he abandons Mars and heads for near Earth asteroids. It'll be like when Starship switched from carbon to stainless steel: everyone will cry for a while but then it'll make sense so they'll carry on.
This seems quite ridiculous now. At some point, it'll be possible to fabricate solar panels in space using stuff from asteroids. Yes, that's a big jump from now. The energy needed to fabricate a solar panel is made back by that solar panel in just a month or two, when the panel sits in full sunlight 24 hours/day. Once the sorcerer's apprentice gets going in space you'll have absurd growth rates bounded by whatever the limiting resource shipped from Earth is. And energy in space will be significantly more abundant (i.e. cheaper) than on Earth.
The price of most physical things on Earth is related to how much energy is used to produce it. Yes, I know, software and services muddy this relationship. Once energy in space is more abundant than on Earth, people in space, the people who own stuff up there, will be by some measures wealthier than people on Earth. They will have better living standards. They will live in bigger houses and have bigger back yards. Those back yards may be inside large rotating pressure vessels and lit by LEDs, but that's not a huge loss.
What does SpaceX do next for the 2030s while Elon can still control the company?
Moore's Musk's Law.
I think the biggest risk to SpaceX is the leadership continuum. The vision and drive of Musk together with the maturity and competence of Shotwell have proven to be an outstanding combination. Musk will get old, and something could happen to Shotwell. These are big business risks, perhaps the biggest ones. SpaceX could milk the F9/FH for a decade or two, but to continue expanding, they need both of their leaders. I certainly hope they are working to identify and groom potential replacements for these two.
Quote from: IainMcClatchie on 06/29/2021 04:44 amMars has very little to offer besides gravity, which can be substituted by sufficiently large spinning things.Mars also has an atmosphere, functionally unlimited raw materials, a prebuilt surface, a more forgiving thermal environment, easier rad protection, potential for ISRU, and many other benefits. Settling Mars will almost certainly be far easier than settling an asteroid.
Mars has very little to offer besides gravity, which can be substituted by sufficiently large spinning things.
QuoteThis seems quite ridiculous now. At some point, it'll be possible to fabricate solar panels in space using stuff from asteroids. Yes, that's a big jump from now. The energy needed to fabricate a solar panel is made back by that solar panel in just a month or two, when the panel sits in full sunlight 24 hours/day. Once the sorcerer's apprentice gets going in space you'll have absurd growth rates bounded by whatever the limiting resource shipped from Earth is. And energy in space will be significantly more abundant (i.e. cheaper) than on Earth.Unlikely. Even in a world where we have asteroid mining, it will almost certainly be far cheaper to build solar on Earth or Mars, and thus have cheaper energy. Space panels will be harder to manufacture and install than Earth panels due to the need for rad hardening, operation in a significantly harsher environment, little opportunity for repair, and other such issues. Plus, using the power is also harder - you either have to beam it somewhere and deal with beam losses and collection inefficiencies, or build a space station attached to the panels, which would definitely be more expensive than building on-planet.
2002 -SpaceX established.2012 - F9 fully operational with a private Earth return capsule. A 5X drop in cost $/kg...2022 - Starship operational. A 5X drop in cost $/kg...2032 - Second generation Starship (Starship2) operational. A 5X drop in cost $/kg...
Quote from: Vahe231991 on 06/17/2021 12:43 amAll nuclear fuel for the upper stage of this Starship variant (which would only ignite in space) would be mined from the Morrison Formation in the western United States.Why does the source of the uranium matter?
All nuclear fuel for the upper stage of this Starship variant (which would only ignite in space) would be mined from the Morrison Formation in the western United States.
The only other alternative to improve $/kg is moving beyond chemical rockets entirely (build a space elevator or a giant railgun or some other sci-fi thing), but that's not a "Starship 2" -- or a serious topic for the next decade.
Quote from: 2megs on 07/01/2021 10:45 amThe only other alternative to improve $/kg is moving beyond chemical rockets entirely (build a space elevator or a giant railgun or some other sci-fi thing), but that's not a "Starship 2" -- or a serious topic for the next decade.I would bet you $100 that right now, Space X has a private "Raiders of the Lost Ark" Division set up to evaluate all sorts of crazy stuff for "breakthrough technologies", ranging from "can we commercialise VASMIR" to "EM Drive".I would also bet you $25 that SpaceX has actually flown some of these potential technologies in orbit, either on Starlink satellites themselves, or on Starlink-only Falcon 9 Upper Stages (the advantages of having your own internal payloads is that you can do risks with them that no paying customer would dare allow).
Some things to think about:2022 - Starship operational. A 5X drop in cost $/kg from $2,000/kg to $400100/kg (eventual to $20050/kg by 2027). 2032 - Second generation Starship (Starship2) operational. A 5X drop in cost $/kg from $200100/kg to $4010/kg (eventual to $205/kg by 2037). NOTES: SS2 would be a LV capable of 5X the payload capability of SS1 (possibly as much as 750 tons) for the same operational costs. Cost of a trip per person to the Moon or Mars from Earth <$400100K/person. A trip to LEO <$20,0005,000/person.
I think its possible that SpaceX will at some point think about building some large, nuclear-powered interplanetary transport ship, which is serviced and refueled on both ends by Starships, to further increase the "useful tons to Mars" metric (i.e., such a transport ship could increase useful payload to Mars for the same amount of fuel launched by an existing Starship / Super Heavy fleet, because an NTR makes more efficient use of fuel compared to a Raptor-powered starship).
Quote from: Bynaus on 07/01/2021 01:49 pmI think its possible that SpaceX will at some point think about building some large, nuclear-powered interplanetary transport ship, which is serviced and refueled on both ends by Starships, to further increase the "useful tons to Mars" metric (i.e., such a transport ship could increase useful payload to Mars for the same amount of fuel launched by an existing Starship / Super Heavy fleet, because an NTR makes more efficient use of fuel compared to a Raptor-powered starship).I think you are also right; and that we will see further specialization in Mars Orbit-only Starships for that end of the "transport route"; because Mars Orbit-only starships could have much cheaper/lighter/efficient heat shields due to Mars' thinner atmosphere.
Mars' atmosphere is useful for aerobraking, which saves thousands of m/s of delta-V per incoming transit. That's a big deal, as Earth-Mars transits cost less delta-V than Earth-NEO transits. But aerobraking puts severe structural constraints on anything. A shuttle going back and forth between LEO and an asteroid using solar electric propulsion and oxygen propellant has minimal structural constraints.
The atmosphere doesn't shield radiation sufficiently, so you have to build shielding, which isolates you from the surface. It is a handy supply of CO2, and C is hard to come by on basalt rubble asteroids, so that's good.
Mars' gravity is probably worse than useless. If 37% of Earth normal turns out to be okay, then it's temporarily useful, but dooms people who spend more than a few years on Mars to stay there forever, which means you can't ethically have kids on Mars. If 37% turns out to be too small, it makes building livable km-diameter centrifuges far more difficult than building centrifuges in space.
Mars' thermal environment is worse than space.
But for most of Europe and Asia and the northern half of the US, on-orbit concentrating solar power fabbed mostly at asteroids with cells from Earth will be cheaper than solar panels on Earth. The energy returned from energy invested is just so good in space.
And, I think Elon will eventually come to that conclusion also. And within a week he'll have turned SpaceX towards that new goal.