SpaceX Rocket

[SoreTween]

_{[1] This is as good a time as any to mention that Ignition is being reissued.}

Indeed it is, noted  ta

And honestly, if you've got any interest in chemistry—particularly the branch of it involving violent, energetic, and occasionally explosive reactions—it's a book you need to read.

Occasionally?

It's a good few years since I read that and yet his recommended method for dealing with a metal-flourine fire still has me giggling softly.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Maybe I should get out a bit more.

Mars far enough?

[simonp]

Methane is a very potent greenhouse gas.

[Asterix, the former Gaul.]

When I was little (-ish, about 55 years ago) all rockets (in stories) landed like those 2 boosters. It's taken this long to actually see it become real. Absolutely fuckin' brilliant!

[nicknack]

When I was little (-ish, about 55 years ago) all rockets (in stories) landed like those 2 boosters. It's taken this long to actually see it become real. Absolutely fuckin' brilliant!

Yes, I may have had that in mind.

[Andrij]

I’m a bit dubious about the launching a car into space bit. It’s a continuation of the sort of behaviour that has got us into the position of probably needing a new planet to live on sooner than ideal.

*party pooper*

They need to use something as a payload test. They sometimes have used actual satellites but that gets a bit expensive if the rocket goes bang rather than zoom. They could have used a lump of concrete or similar but a Tesla was a bit more whimsical. One of the smaller SpaceX rockets used a wheel of cheese as a test payload for some reason I cant recall. It's bit difficult to despoil space anyway as its already full of hard radiation and bits of rubbish left over from the formation of the solar system whizzing around everywhere. The worst you can do is become a navigational hazard and the Tesla is being sent way way out not left in orbit.

And at this point, it's a navigational hazard that's interesting enough that one day someone might actually bother to recover it and put it in a museum.  On Mars.

It seems wasteful that they didn't fill it with student cubesats, or strap an engineering model of Beagle 2 to the front of the Tesla or something, but that only seems like a missed opportunity because it didn't blow up.  Otherwise it would have been wasted effort.

Did someone mention space archaeology?

[rogerzilla]

Could it be the corpse of David Bowie at the wheel ?

I like the fact that it appears to have one elbow resting on the top of the door, which is de rigeur for roadsters.  In fact, it's one of the must-haves on the Ishikawa diagram for the original MX-5.

[Feanor]

I’m a bit dubious about the launching a car into space bit. It’s a continuation of the sort of behaviour that has got us into the position of probably needing a new planet to live on sooner than ideal.

*party pooper*

There's a precedent, thobut.

Didn't the Yankedoodles take a car with them to the moon back in the '70s?
I think it's still parked there, possibly clocking up a massive parking fine.

[ian]

Except the US don't pay parking fines (conveniently viewing them as a 'tax'). So the moon, like the Mayor of London, will be out of luck.

Unless the Lunarians have death rays, of course.

[Jaded]

I'm worried about the paint finish on that Tesla.

[Kim]

It's a good few years since I read that and yet his recommended method for dealing with a metal-flourine fire still has me giggling softly.

Ah yes...

(click to show/hide)

On chlorine trifluoride:

It is, of course, extremely toxic, but that’s the least of the problem. It is hypergolic with every known fuel, and so rapidly hypergolic that no ignition delay has ever been measured. It is also hypergolic with such things as cloth, wood, and test engineers, not to mention asbestos, sand, and water-with which it reacts explosively. It can be kept in some of the ordinary structural metals-steel, copper, aluminium, etc.-because of the formation of a thin film of insoluble metal fluoride which protects the bulk of the metal, just as the invisible coat of oxide on aluminium keeps it from burning up in the atmosphere. If, however, this coat is melted or scrubbed off, and has no chance to reform, the operator is confronted with the problem of coping with a metal-fluorine fire. For dealing with this situation, I have always recommended a good pair of running shoes.

[drossall]

I’m a bit dubious about the launching a car into space bit. It’s a continuation of the sort of behaviour that has got us into the position of probably needing a new planet to live on sooner than ideal.

Putting cars in space can only accelerate the need for a hyperspace bypass. And, given its orbit, if anyone else tries a stunt like that, Mars will be getting its first car crash.

Will they make astronauts taking space walks wear hi vis?

[Torslanda]

http://newsthump.com/2018/02/07/angry-cyclist-spotted-furiously-chasing-down-car-300000-miles-from-earth/

[simonp]

“He came out of nowhere.”

[Kim]

Wobbly should-have-switched-off-autofocus footage from an angle that really shows how fast the boosters come down, then hang in the air in exactly the way bricks don't:

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/Z_kfM-BmVzQ&rel=1" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/Z_kfM-BmVzQ&rel=1</a>
https://youtu.be/Z_kfM-BmVzQ

[mattc]

Was there any particular magic wand that enabled the engineering that lands them? (Given that NASA didn't bother with the Space Shuttle, or its bits.)

Just an increase in processing power for onboard electronics? Or accumulation of many Marginal Gains* over the years??


*TM British Cycling, obvs

[Kim]

The main difference in processing power compared to the shuttle is that it's not using a Mk 1 astronaut as a control system for the landing.   

I suppose the relevant sensors have got lighter and cheaper, and I assume there's precision GPS being used that wasn't available until at least the 90s.  But I expect there's also a cultural element where it really needed someone who didn't remember how crashy the LLTV was, and who could get over the "aerodynamic braking doesn't need any fuel" paradigm^[1] to come along and try it.


_{[1] Bear in mind, SpaceX have been working towards Mars from the outset.  They *need* the powered landing for that in a way that previous earth-based systems don't.}

[spesh]

I see the SpaceX recoverable rocket stages/cores as being the successors of the 1990s-vintage McDonnell Douglas Delta Clipper Experimental (DC-X):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonnell_Douglas_DC-X

Video of flight test #8: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wv9n9Casp1o

[Kim]

I think Blue Origin's New Shepherd is a more direct successor:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Shepard

[Jurek]

Wobbly should-have-switched-off-autofocus footage from an angle that really shows how fast the boosters come down, then hang in the air in exactly the way bricks don't:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=4&v=Z_kfM-BmVzQ
https://youtu.be/Z_kfM-BmVzQ

That footage is on par with that of Neil Armstrong's first steps on the Moon.
IMHO we're still a long way off leaving this planet to colonise elsewhere onna permanent basis.
I've almost given up on getting my spaceship fixed so that I can go home.

[Kim]

IMHO we're still a long way off leaving this planet to colonise elsewhere onna permanent basis.

Elon does at least appear to have made a decent attempt to work out how far.  This talk explains his thinking:

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/H7Uyfqi_TE8&rel=1" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/H7Uyfqi_TE8&rel=1</a>
https://youtu.be/H7Uyfqi_TE8

Obviously there's a fair amount of optimism involved, particularly regarding timelines, but so far SpaceX have mostly been delivering technology-wise.  AIUI the BFR is still just a massive experimental carbon-fibre oxygen tank, some successfully tested at less than full pressure engines and a whole load of designs/simulations, but it's a start.  They need the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launchers to pay for the thing.

[Jakob W]

I'd imagine CFD/FE codes have improved since the 70s as well (though as the torsional problems they had with the first landing attempts showed, things that you've not modelled are always waiting to bite you...)

On the humans v computers at NASA thing, this is a brilliant book on the subject: https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/digital-apollo ; I commend it highly to the house.

[Jaded]

The boosters landing are pure Thunderbirds. Without puppet strings 

[Torslanda]

Apropos of not a lot, great quote from Tony Stark Elon Musk I read yesterday.

'I want to die on Mars. Just not on impact...'

What I like is the sheer bollocks of the man. NASA spent a decade getting to the Moon (I understand they had to do all the R&D and that the USA system of contracting with top heavy management is clunky in the extreme) but this guy just thought it up and did it. In public.

He is either the Messiah or a very naughty boy . . .

[Beardy]

What I like is the sheer bollocks of the man. NASA spent a decade getting to the Moon (I understand they had to do all the R&D and that the USA system of contracting with top heavy management is clunky in the extreme) but this guy just thought it up and did it. In public.

He is either the Messiah or a very naughty boy . . .

To be fair to NASA, they were using carbon based computers in the first moon shots and they had to invent a lot of the mathematics involved. Tony Elon on the other hand has silicon based computers and a catalogue of mathematics and examples to work from.