Falcon Heavy Demo Mission Payload Speculation

[Axiom]

Not to re-open a can of worms, but does anybody know WHEN they might announce what the demo "payload" is? Or will it remain "under wraps"  until after the flight like the cheese?

Someone needs to check with Blue Bird, IC Bus, and Thomas Built to see if any yellow school busses have been delivered to SpaceX

I'm hoping they'll launch a Tesla.

Or a TBM 

[vanoord]

Not to re-open a can of worms, but does anybody know WHEN they might announce what the demo "payload" is? Or will it remain "under wraps"  until after the flight like the cheese?

Someone needs to check with Blue Bird, IC Bus, and Thomas Built to see if any yellow school busses have been delivered to SpaceX

I'm hoping they'll launch a Tesla.

What's going to be on top of the second stage?

Alternatives are presumably a (used) Dragon or a payload fairing, with a mass simulator inside it. Both are going to be costly.

The advantage of a Dragon would be that they'd almost certainly get it back; and it could return a payload. There's surely a market for flying a Dragon loaded with a decent weight in commemorative coins (or similar) and selling them off after they've been recovered?

[Ictogan]

Not to re-open a can of worms, but does anybody know WHEN they might announce what the demo "payload" is? Or will it remain "under wraps"  until after the flight like the cheese?

Someone needs to check with Blue Bird, IC Bus, and Thomas Built to see if any yellow school busses have been delivered to SpaceX

I'm hoping they'll launch a Tesla.

What's going to be on top of the second stage?

Alternatives are presumably a (used) Dragon or a payload fairing, with a mass simulator inside it. Both are going to be costly.

The advantage of a Dragon would be that they'd almost certainly get it back; and it could return a payload. There's surely a market for flying a Dragon loaded with a decent weight in commemorative coins (or similar) and selling them off after they've been recovered?

I seem to recall that only launches with fairings count towards certification for national security launches, so it will likely be with a fairing. I can't find a source for this though, so I would appreciate if someone could confirm this or correct me.

Also Dragon probably couldn't land if it was loaded to anywhere near FH capability. You could still use the trunk for mass simulators though.

[mhalpern]

or they can strap thrusters to a Tesla (for deorbiting) and use that or just not put it into a stable orbit, or a campervan even even an inflatable campervan, considering the kinds of things Musk likes to reference in his products, it really could be anything Sci-fi. maybe an Inflatable NCC-1701 of some iteration or it could be a BSG Viper, built to scale.

[IanThePineapple]

It's scary that I can see that happening, if not on FH-1, then on some subsequent mission by someone else...

[KelvinZero]

I think this counts as a consensus.

Im still voting for a full scale inflatable version of Dr Evil's Big Boy space ship.

[Star One]

A giant Funko POP Elon Musk.

[intrepidpursuit]

Giant expandable naked space santa. Ideally with a microsat dispenser at the nipple.

[CharlieWildman]

Posted this awhile back in the party thread.  It clearly belongs in a more serious forum! 

At only 1/2km across, (according to my napkin calculations) Ducky would appear to be about a 1/4 the size of the full moon.  Volume will be something like .065 cubic km with a surface area of about .79 square km.  If we make Ducky out of 1/4 mil Mylar, the mass comes out to about 4369 Kg.  Quite doable with plenty of payload left over for stuff to inflate it. 

[wannamoonbase]

Free return trajectory payload that burns up in the Earth’s atmosphere.

With a large amount of cheese on board. 

Why not practice navigation to the moon and back?

[docmordrid]

Oh, what the heck....

Something akin to ESA's IXV reentry test vehicle, but with BFS's outer mold line and sized to fit inside the fairing like X-37B. Extra points if it has an  unexpected new thermal protection system. Big loop or circumlunar trajectory.

http://m.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Transportation/IXV/Reentry_technologies

[wannamoonbase]

Oh, what the heck....

Something akin to ESA's IXV reentry test vehicle, but with BFS's outer mold line. Extra points if it cast an unexpected new thermal protection system. Big loop or circumlunar trajectory.

http://m.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Transportation/IXV/Reentry_technologies

Oh nice, I like this one, a lot.

Low probability perhaps.  But still a HOT idea,

[Asteroza]

Free return trajectory payload that burns up in the Earth’s atmosphere.

With a large amount of cheese on board. 

Why not practice navigation to the moon and back?

Raclette Regolith Express? Since it would be a hot reentry from a lunar free return trajectory...

[jgoldader]

Is there anything that would preclude putting a Dragon inside a fairing for the FH demo flight?  I could imagine modding the top of S2 to allow that.  That would enable the fairing test, and also sending a Dragon either towards the Moon, or at least HEO, on a free-return trajectory.  Aside from the PR value, it would allow a test of the heat shield at higher return velocity.

[octavo]

Is there anything that would preclude putting a Dragon inside a fairing for the FH demo flight?  I could imagine modding the top of S2 to allow that.  That would enable the fairing test, and also sending a Dragon either towards the Moon, or at least HEO, on a free-return trajectory.  Aside from the PR value, it would allow a test of the heat shield at higher return velocity.

You'd need the trunk too for electrical power. I asked about this in the D2 thread. The answer I got there was D2+ Trunk will fit inside the fairing, but it would require an entirely new PAF which in all likelihood nixes the idea.

[woods170]

Is there anything that would preclude putting a Dragon inside a fairing for the FH demo flight?  I could imagine modding the top of S2 to allow that.  That would enable the fairing test, and also sending a Dragon either towards the Moon, or at least HEO, on a free-return trajectory.  Aside from the PR value, it would allow a test of the heat shield at higher return velocity.

No test needed for the heatshield at higher return velocity. All the info they need for lunar return velocities has been gained from Stardust, the operational Cargo Dragon missions and a lot of lab testing. SpaceX knows exactly what PICA-X can do and what not.

[intrepidpursuit]

Is there anything that would preclude putting a Dragon inside a fairing for the FH demo flight?  I could imagine modding the top of S2 to allow that.  That would enable the fairing test, and also sending a Dragon either towards the Moon, or at least HEO, on a free-return trajectory.  Aside from the PR value, it would allow a test of the heat shield at higher return velocity.

This has been gone over and over and over. The trunk attaches directly to the top of S2 with no separate payload adapter. To create a custom PAF that would allow attachment of a fairing and a dragon would be no small feat. Dragon also has direct attachment points to the strongarm which would have to be duplicated inside the fairing. It isn't impossible, but there would have to be very good reasons to spend the time and money on that and to add a big unknown element to the mission.

[philw1776]

S2 with experimental magnetoshell aerocapture re-entry experiment housed inside standard fairing so AF gets a qualification flight.

[rockets4life97]

It seems to me that FH is primarily for the DoD market. The number of commercial flights will probably be a far back second after 5 years of launches. So, the demo payload should ideally put something into a difficult orbit so SpaceX can demonstrate the capability for the DoD.

The question I have is whether this will be a dummy payload or will it be an actual satellite

[matthewkantar]

They have had years to think about it; what would be useful to have in orbit, inexpensive and most likely inert? I hope they come up with something exciting and not just a cheesy joke.

Matthew