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posted by martyb on Friday April 03 2020, @10:12AM   Printer-friendly
from the how-long-has-it-taken-the-SLS-so-far? dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

[Editor's note: SN3 is SpaceX parlance for "Serial Number 3"; Elon Musk is not just working on building rockets, he's building an assembly line and plans to build one Starship a week. This helps explain the use of serial numbers. --martyb]

For almost a year now, SpaceX has been building a series of Starship prototypes that will test how the system fares when launched to orbit.

[...] Musk recently shared images of the components for the SN3 prototype undergoing assembly.

Shortly after these images were shared, the assembled components were seen on their way to the company's test facility at Boca Chica, Texas, on the morning of March 29th. They were then seen being transferred to the launch pad by roll-lift and crane as of late afternoon. Footage of both these events was captured by the LabPadre and shared via Twitter.

SN3 pic.twitter.com/bM1wzzd4Zg

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk)

Like its predecessors, the next step for the SN3 will be cryogenic loading trials in which the spacecraft's methane and oxygen tanks will be filled with a cryogenic liquid (most likely liquid nitrogen).

[...] In a previous statement, Musk announced that the SN3 would be used for static fire tests and short flights, whereas longer test flights will wait for the SN4. [...] There is [...] documentation that indicates that SpaceX will be conducting tests as early as next week.

The documents, which were shared on NASASpaceFlight, reference a permit issued by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) for the "Starhopper" vehicle, which is valid until June 2020. They further suggest that a static fire of the SN3's engines could take place between April 1st and 3rd, followed by a 150-meter (500 ft) hop test between April 6th and 8th. This was the maximum height achieved by the Starship Hopper.

[...] Once the Starship is finished and integrated with the Super Heavy booster, Musk hopes to begin conducting payload runs to the moon by 2022, followed by crewed missions to the surface by 2024. In between, Musk also intends to conduct the first lunar tourism mission (#dearmoon), which will involve sending a crew of artists around the moon in 2023.

-- submitted from IRC

Previously:
(2020-04-01) SpaceX Releases a Payload User's Guide for its Starship Rocket
(2020-03-10) Another Starship Prototype Explodes, but SpaceX Isn't Stopping
(2020-02-19) SpaceX Announces Partnership to Send Four Tourists Into Deep Orbit
(2020-01-18) Elon Musk Discloses Details for SpaceX Mars Mega-Colony


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  • (Score: 2) by takyon on Friday April 03 2020, @11:04AM (4 children)

    by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Friday April 03 2020, @11:04AM (#978654) Journal

    https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-starship-destroyed-cryo-test-next-ship/ [teslarati.com]

    This one should be interesting because they've already had successful cryo loading tests.

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  • (Score: 2) by coolgopher on Friday April 03 2020, @12:33PM

    by coolgopher (1157) on Friday April 03 2020, @12:33PM (#978672)

    Elon had a tweet up briefly saying it might've been a test configuration fault, but they'd have to wait for the data analysis to know for sure.

  • (Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday April 03 2020, @02:38PM

    by Immerman (3985) on Friday April 03 2020, @02:38PM (#978713)

    Indeed, and because the failure was of an entirely different nature to the previous ones. Rather than a tank rupturing under pressure, it seems that the lower tank crumpled - either due to excess loading, or perhaps an internal pressure drop. I don't think such crumpling would have been possible if the lower tank was filled with liquid, and there was certainly no frost build-up to suggest it was filled with liquid nitrogen, so whatever gasses were in it would have been steadily cooling and losing pressure. Perhaps they wit a critical point and began condensing rapidly to cause a sudden pressure drop? Being cooled from above would seem to facilitate such a scenario - you'd get a lot of vertical mixing from cold gasses sinking to equalize tank temperature, right up until the gasses started raining out instead, causing a rapid pressure drop that could have caused the initial crumpling.

    I don't really know enough about the failure modes of cylindrical structures to hazard a guess as to whether loading alone could cause such a sudden crumpling and slow fall.

  • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday April 03 2020, @03:54PM (1 child)

    by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Friday April 03 2020, @03:54PM (#978756) Journal

    I seemed to remember in the early days, pre Falcon 9, SpaceX had a lot of failures. But then they got it right.

    Then I remember a lot of booster landing failures. And they seemed endless. Failure after failure. And industry experts saying it was impossible. Then they got it right. First on land. Then at sea. Then two boosters at a time. Amidst a string of successes with few failures.

    So, as long as SpaceX has the bankroll to endure a string of losses, I'm inclined to believe they will pull it off. In the previous strings of failures, Elon described every failure as a learning experience.

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    People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
    • (Score: 2) by takyon on Friday April 03 2020, @04:05PM

      by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Friday April 03 2020, @04:05PM (#978762) Journal

      FTA:

      While unfortunate, it’s critical to remember that this is all part of SpaceX’s approach to developing new and unprecedented technologies. Be it Falcon 1, Falcon 9 booster recovery, or Falcon 9 fairing recovery, all groundbreaking SpaceX efforts have begun with several consecutive failures before the first successes – and the first streaks of consecutive successes. Given Musk’s September 2019 claim that SpaceX is putting just ~5% of its resources into Starship, prototypes like Mk1, SN1, and SN3 are being fabricated for pennies on the dollar.

      They are quickly becoming experts at making these cheap metal structures. Cost target of $5 million (might not include booster). And once they get it right, they could potentially reuse the same one hundreds of times for testing and LEO payload launches.

      Falcon 9 fairing recovery is actually a recent success, although it seems to be far from consistent.

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