Grumman is a toast for not finishing the LM in 1965
Well, actually, I'm giving you some props for that. You were pretty quick to latch on to Musk's prediction without any hesitation, so to see you now pulling back just a bit is to your credit. Edit: so there. Take the rest of the day off.
Any one know/wanna guess where this guy is working now? Has a B.O. vibe to him, but he disses people working fr billionaires, so maybe not?
The SpaceX of today (2023) can afford to do incremental rocket testing, and in fact has to with the Starship because it is so big and complex.
Quote from: matthewkantar on 04/29/2023 12:44 amAny one know/wanna guess where this guy is working now? Has a B.O. vibe to him, but he disses people working fr billionaires, so maybe not? There's no need to guess- it's a short search away from the URL in the OP of this thread (URL authored by Ben Kellie ) to this:https://www.launch-company.com/Or specifically:https://www.launch-company.com/about
Quote from: RoadWithoutEnd on 04/28/2023 07:34 pmQuote from: Robotbeat on 04/28/2023 04:44 pmSpaceX also would’ve had to wait 3 more months to get the better solution installed. So if repair and finish building that solution takes no more than 3 months, then SpaceX is actually STILL ahead and they couldn’t have done better even with hindsight (although I do think extra layers of refractory cement probably would’ve been worth doing with the benefit of hindsight).Plus, whatever solution was in work wouldn't have had the benefit of all this empirical data, so could have still been inadequate while costing more time and money to fix than what they do now.Basically, they just have to stop Stage 0 from digging itself a Stage -1. The jury isn't in on all the ways the rocket was compromised by its own ignition, but initial appearances are that it's a certified beast that got most of the way to MECO even after having taking a shotgun blast of concrete magma to the gut. So, depending on how well the OLM and OLT faired, things like reflected shockwaves and heat that normally have to inform GSE development might be a retired risk, and only the pad itself is left to deal with. Fix that one thing and the rest might be straightforward.Model verification is always good. I am rather interested in the counter-question (with the image of the enormous flame diverter of Soyuz in mind): Given the size of the rocket, has the pad worked better than assumed by people always expecting a flame diverter?
Quote from: Robotbeat on 04/28/2023 04:44 pmSpaceX also would’ve had to wait 3 more months to get the better solution installed. So if repair and finish building that solution takes no more than 3 months, then SpaceX is actually STILL ahead and they couldn’t have done better even with hindsight (although I do think extra layers of refractory cement probably would’ve been worth doing with the benefit of hindsight).Plus, whatever solution was in work wouldn't have had the benefit of all this empirical data, so could have still been inadequate while costing more time and money to fix than what they do now.Basically, they just have to stop Stage 0 from digging itself a Stage -1. The jury isn't in on all the ways the rocket was compromised by its own ignition, but initial appearances are that it's a certified beast that got most of the way to MECO even after having taking a shotgun blast of concrete magma to the gut. So, depending on how well the OLM and OLT faired, things like reflected shockwaves and heat that normally have to inform GSE development might be a retired risk, and only the pad itself is left to deal with. Fix that one thing and the rest might be straightforward.
SpaceX also would’ve had to wait 3 more months to get the better solution installed. So if repair and finish building that solution takes no more than 3 months, then SpaceX is actually STILL ahead and they couldn’t have done better even with hindsight (although I do think extra layers of refractory cement probably would’ve been worth doing with the benefit of hindsight).
I do think it’s a good point that a highly engineered flame trench would’ve allowed more static fires, BUT the overall dismissive tone in this article is really off-putting. I think he’s trying to distance himself from E, but geez.
Getting it done at SLS prices will never change things.
Starship may be the last chance for SpaceX engineers to make big mistakes that look really dumb. None of this stuff would be allowed on the Falcon 9 side of things.Starship is the last hurrah for crappy or even scrappy at SpaceX.
