Falcon Heavy Demo Mission Payload Speculation

[deruch]

SpaceX could just destroy the satellites on the ground and save the trouble of integrating and launching them on a rocket that has a high chance of failure. Same outcome. See how dumb that argument is?

Electron also had a high chance of failure on the second flight, and it carried satellites. SLS will carry satellites on its first flight. What's the difference?

Electron got paid to do so and given where they are in their development, I'd bet the additional money was welcome.  Plus it gave them operational experience in an area that will need to be a core competency for them in the future.  i.e. They got paid to train-up their payload integration teams.  etc.  None of these are really valid for SpaceX, who doesn't need the money and apparently considered the hassles of integrating customer (paying or not) payloads to be not worth it on this one.  And their integration teams get as much training as the company wants them to have already.

[Robotbeat]

SpaceX could just destroy the satellites on the ground and save the trouble of integrating and launching them on a rocket that has a high chance of failure. Same outcome. See how dumb that argument is?

Electron also had a high chance of failure on the second flight, and it carried satellites. SLS will carry satellites on its first flight. What's the difference?

Those payloads weren't free. Electron very nearly reached orbit on the first flight. The second flight had a high success probability.

And also, Electron had to prove they were doing something useful and didn't have much to lose as the previous flight hadn't reached orbit. SpaceX has a flying Falcon 9.

But regardless, I was addressing your incorrect logic: that "no matter what the risk," they should integrate cubesats for free.

Clearly there is a probability of success too low that it isn't worth it.

[Robotbeat]

Electron also carried the Humanity Star instead of another cubesat.

[Lars-J]

There are dozens of cubesats waiting for their launch on ground. I'm pretty sure certain people would be happy to have their satellites fly on Falcon Heavy for free, no matter the risks.

Those cubesats would be useless in interplanetary space.

[hektor]

Was it feasible to send the car on a Solar system escape trajectory ?

[speedevil]

Those cubesats would be useless in interplanetary space.

Perhaps.
A 15cm class mirror aimed at earth with a 5W class LASER may get a data return out to quite interesting distances, if using a ~1m scope on the ground.

Starlink coincidentally has dishes of this class, and prototype hardware might enable relayed communication to earth.

[Skyrocket]

There are dozens of cubesats waiting for their launch on ground. I'm pretty sure certain people would be happy to have their satellites fly on Falcon Heavy for free, no matter the risks.

But very few which can be flown on a trajectory like this (only the two INSPIRE Cubesats come to my mind). Most require low earth orbit.

[ugordan]

But very few which can be flown on a trajectory like this. Most require low earth orbit.

Playing devil's advocate here, but it's virtually guaranteed the 2nd stage would perform two burns so the cubesats could be released into a parking orbit, albeit probably a very low one (200-ish km).

Frankly, I don't understand where the idea of a direct TMI injection burn comes from. It would be severely constraining in terms of launch window.

[LouScheffer]

Awright, new tack.

That report from a few days back about the Roadster not being in the fairing for reasons that will become apparent...

Struck me as odd just like it did most readers, but since some folks expressed confidence in the reporter, then just as a thought experiment, let's assume both parts are true, and that the source of the rumor knew what the plan is.

The only scenario that comes to mind and fits the nuances is that there may be a propulsion/cruise stage that will go under the Roadster.

How about this boring engineering reason?  If I were SpaceX, I'd do the static fire with an 8000 kg comsat sized lump with comsat mass properties, completely covered with accelerometers, strain gauges, microphones, and pressure sensors.   Not photogenic at all, but gives great data on environment at startup.

[Jim]

Roadster was mated to the standard fairing PAF and with one half a fairing mated.

Why couldn't the speculative payload booster stage be constructed using the same PAF ring size, both upper and lower, as whatever rig the Roadster is bolted to?  I would do it so the sep mechanisms, and electrical/electronic controls, would be as identical as possible for both rings.

No, it would be sitting on the structure that the car was.  And the structure that the car is going to mounted to on the kick stage would be smaller.

[IanThePineapple]

Roadster was mated to the standard fairing PAF and with one half a fairing mated.

Why couldn't the speculative payload booster stage be constructed using the same PAF ring size, both upper and lower, as whatever rig the Roadster is bolted to?  I would do it so the sep mechanisms, and electrical/electronic controls, would be as identical as possible for both rings.

No, it would be sitting on the structure that the car was.  And the structure that the car is going to mounted to on the kick stage would be smaller.

Wait, the Roadster has a kick stage? What is it even for?

Since it's probably not going to Mars itself, what would they need the extra stage for?

[llanitedave]

It's like when hoodlums "tag" a wall with their colors, declaring it "theirs".  Also very common in the animal kingdom, especially among males.

With his Tesla, Musk is tagging the entire effin solar system.

"Mine!"

More like just trashing the solar system.

Says the guy who sneered when Musk first announced his goal of not throwing first stages away.

[deruch]

Wait, the Roadster has a kick stage? What is it even for?

Since it's probably not going to Mars itself, what would they need the extra stage for?

No, it doesn't have a kick stage.  Jim's comment was a reply to a prior unquoted post from meekGee talking about that as a potential solution to the apparent incongruity between what everyone thought was going on and that article claiming that the roadster wasn't in the fairing during the static fire.  It was talking about ways to square the circle and make everything fit by hypothesizing other new things like an undisclosed propulsion element, etc.

[Jim]

It's like when hoodlums "tag" a wall with their colors, declaring it "theirs".  Also very common in the animal kingdom, especially among males.

With his Tesla, Musk is tagging the entire effin solar system.

"Mine!"

More like just trashing the solar system.

Says the guy who sneered when Musk first announced his goal of not throwing first stages away.

nothing wrong with making reefs

[tvg98]

Isn't it traditional for the payload for an untested rocket to be a boiler plate of some sort? Why is having the Roadster on top causing such an outrage?

[AncientU]

Isn't it traditional for the payload for an untested rocket to be a boiler plate of some sort? Why is having the Roadster on top causing such an outrage?

Because Elon Musk is f...ing with the status quo... annoys the establishment.

[PreferToLurk]

 ...whereas the Roadster is useless from the get-go.

Oh wait, that is not correct. The roadster is useful: it's a mass-simulator.

I think Elon may disagree with you that the Roadster is useless.  Remember, his original business plan with SpaceX was to land a greenhouse on Mars for the explicit purpose of inspiring others. Inspiration is hardly a useless pursuit, and a basic mass-simulator definitely has less inspirational value.

[Roy_H]

Isn't it traditional for the payload for an untested rocket to be a boiler plate of some sort? Why is having the Roadster on top causing such an outrage?

What outrage? I just think it is a lost opportunity to get more out of it. Like testing long-range communication.

[mrhuggy]

They may be some creedance to there been something more than the Tesla.

RED camrea has  built a special camrea for use in space for this mission to shoot 4k in near darkness. It is belived that it was Spacex that ordered them for use on this mission. So they might be a power system onboard and sat coms system to handel a 4k download.

http://www.newsshooter.com/2018/01/28/red-gemini-custom-s35-low-light-sensor-for-outer-space/

The name Gemini is undoubtedly paying homage to the NASA space program of the same name. Project Gemini was NASA’s second human spaceflight program, that took place between projects Mercury and Apollo the 1960’s.

That “very special customer” RED is talking about, is undoubtedly Elon Musk, founder, CEO, and lead designer of SpaceX, and co-founder, CEO, and product architect of Tesla. There are not too many people with their own space programs, and it’s probably not NASA, as they been using Canon cameras for capturing video footage in space for quite a few years now.

[The_Ronin]

I imagine that is going to be mounted between the seats pointing out the windshield.  LOL!