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SpaceX's Starhopper Prototype to Make First Untethered Hop Soon

posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday July 10 2019, @12:55AM   Printer-friendly
from the history-in-the-making dept.

martyb writes:

SpaceX's Starhopper Prototype to Make 1st Untethered Hop Soon, Musk Says:

The company has apparently fixed an issue with the vehicle's Raptor engine.

SpaceX is getting ready to let Starhopper off its leash.

Starhopper, a prototype for the company's future Mars-colonizing Starship vehicle, has conducted two brief test hops to date. Both occurred in early April at SpaceX's Boca Chica test site near Brownsville, Texas, and both employed a tether, which kept Starhopper very close to the ground (for safety's sake).

SpaceX had apparently been holding off on taking the next big testing step — removing the tether and letting Starhopper fly freely — until it could fix an issue with the vehicle's powerful, next-generation Raptor engine. But that problem seems to be solved, company founder and CEO Elon Musk announced via Twitter over the weekend.

Exciting progress in Boca! Hopper almost ready to hover. Based on tonight's test, looks like 600 Hz Raptor vibration problem is fixed. pic.twitter.com/9bLWOHG0sV July 7, 2019

Later that day, Musk sent out another tweet:

Will do Starship presentation a few weeks after Hopper hovers, so prob late July. If that timing works, free LJ chips for all present! July 7, 2019

Watching the progress of SpaceX and its rocket developments reminds me of the thrills of watching NASA's Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo development efforts. The 50th anniversary of the July 20, 1969 Apollo 11 landing on the moon is fast approaching. Were I on the SpaceX team, I know I would be doing everything I could to try and get the Hopper flying by then! Any bets?

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  • (Score: 4, Informative) by takyon on Wednesday July 10 2019, @01:33AM (3 children)

    by takyon (881) <takyonNO@SPAMsoylentnews.org> on Wednesday July 10 2019, @01:33AM (#865252) Journal

    Starhopper is basically a shiny test platform for the Raptor engine. Not that much to do with the final Starship design, and the hopping will involve none of the complicated procedures necessary for it to work (like in-orbit refueling, re-entry with one shielded side facing the atmosphere in order to reduce velocity, re-orientation and landing, and giant wings/legs that move). So if the Raptor engine wasn't working properly yet due to vibration issues (albeit under torture test conditions [teslarati.com]), it doesn't make sense to do a hover test. Maybe that has finally been resolved and we'll see some hovering soon.

    Two orbital Starship prototypes are in production, one in Boca Chica and the other in Cocoa, Florida, where there was a small fire that took out some equipment:

    SpaceX’s orbital Florida Starship yard suffers damage after catching fire [teslarati.com]

    They are starting to build/prep launch pads for it:

    SpaceX’s Starship/Super Heavy rocket needs a launch pad and work is already starting [teslarati.com]

    And here's a bonus embarrassment for Northrop Grumman:

    SpaceX’s flight-proven Falcon 9 snags NASA launch contract, second of 2019 [teslarati.com]

    IXPE was originally planned to launch on Orbital ATK (now Northrop Grumman’s) Pegasus XL but NASA never followed through with a launch contract. The move to SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket is likely related to the extremely disruptive and expensive launch delays NASA’s Ionospheric Connection Explorer (ICON) spacecraft has suffered at the hands of its Pegasus XL rocket. Capable of launching less than 450 kg (1000 lb) to low Earth orbit, Pegasus XL has been lucky to launch annually over the last decade or so and carries a price tag of no less than $50M-$60M today.

    [...] Again, for the small-scale performance of Pegasus XL, the rocket still carries a price tag of more than $50M – NASA’s ICON launch contract was valued at more than $56M. Conscious of this, SpaceX has managed to sway NASA to launch the small IXPE spacecraft on a flight-proven Falcon 9 at a cost of just $50.3 million, easily the lowest Falcon 9 launch contract cost ever publicized.

    Falcon 9 can launch over 10x the payload to LEO (reusable mode) for about the same price.

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  • (Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 10 2019, @02:31AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 10 2019, @02:31AM (#865261)

    Northrop should have stuck with making Lays potato chip vans.

  • (Score: 3, Touché) by khallow on Wednesday July 10 2019, @12:44PM (1 child)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday July 10 2019, @12:44PM (#865356) Journal

    Conscious of this, SpaceX has managed to sway NASA to launch the small IXPE spacecraft on a flight-proven Falcon 9 at a cost of just $50.3 million, easily the lowest Falcon 9 launch contract cost ever publicized.

    SpaceX charging NASA for another subsidized $100 mil launch, I see. \sarc