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from the recycling-is-good-for-the-planet dept.
http://arstechnica.com/science/2017/01/spacex-may-be-about-to-launch-its-final-expendable-rocket/
After successfully returning to flight on January 14, SpaceX will make its next launch from Cape Canaveral no earlier than January 30. With this mission from a new pad at Launch Complex 39A, SpaceX will loft the EchoStar 23 communications satellite to geostationary transfer orbit. This is a heavy satellite, weighing 5.5 metric tons, and getting it out to about 40,000 kilometers from the surface of the Earth will require pretty much all of the lift capacity of SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket. This would leave almost no propellant for the Falcon 9 rocket to fire its engines to slow down, make a controlled descent through the Earth's atmosphere, and attempt a difficult landing on a drone ship.
On Saturday, in response to a question on Twitter, SpaceX founder and chief executive Elon Musk confirmed that the upcoming EchoStar launch will therefore indeed be expendable. "Future flights will go on Falcon Heavy or the upgraded Falcon 9," he added. In other words, in the future such heavy payloads will either be launched on the more powerful Falcon Heavy (consisting of three Falcon 9 cores, designed for return), or a slightly more powerful variant of the Falcon 9 rocket. Although SpaceX may launch one or two more expendable rockets, Musk is saying the plan here onward is to try and launch everything on reusable boosters.
(Score: 3, Informative) by DannyB on Monday January 23 2017, @08:17PM
> How many flights has any single SpaceX booster made?
For some boosters, it would be 1.
For other boosters, it would be 0 (eg, not flown yet).
In the future there might be a number greater than 1.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Monday January 23 2017, @08:48PM
Blue Origin got five launches out of one New Shepard booster.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DannyB on Monday January 23 2017, @08:59PM
The article is about SpaceX, so I wasn't considering anything else.
It seems to me that comparing Falcon 9 and New Shepard is like an Apples to Oranges comparison.
On the one hand, maybe SpaceX are idiots for not having gotten five launches out of a booster. On the other hand, call me when New Shepard is capable of orbital launches. It seems to me that SpaceX and Blue Origin are in different businesses.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Tuesday January 24 2017, @01:11AM
All I'm saying is that it I don't see any reason they won't be able to; there's precedent for reusable boosters, even though there's a difference in scale.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek