SpaceX

>>8320506
Do they really? Do you have any numbers to back that up?

SpaceX's current record sits at a 93% success rate, which isn't far from the industry nominal rate of 95%. Op is being a faggot.

File: 1368622426938.png (298KB, 600x600px) Image search: [Google]

298KB, 600x600px

>>8320506
How many astronauts have they killed again?

spacex exemplifies everything that is wrong with modern western society

>>8320555
seriously this

even after challenger EXPLODED on takeoff

they still REFUSED to modify the shuttle with an early escape system

Setting aside OP's trolling, this is a huge setback for them.

Loss of payload, loss of launchpad, loss of a launch, loss of a reusable booster, and grounded again until they figure it out.

Last time, they were grounded for six months.

Orbital lost their launchpad in an Antares launch failure in October 2014, and still haven't returned to flight.

At least SpaceX has other launchpads. Their other Florida pad is supposed to be ready to go in November.

>>8320506
Well, it's not like NASA's never had full retard incidents. No wonder no one wants to fund this shit.

>>8320547

Boy, i wish everybody was like u.
Seems all anyone cares about are my fuck ups.

>>8320602
have you ever tried sending something into space? it's hard as fuck. doing that on a budget is harder. doing that while having people go "lol you aren't acing it on the first go" doesn't help either.

imagine the avionics, the telemetries that have to be read by ground operators in order to gauge the torque on the frame to assess how it should be moved. all these factors being fed back to a pilot and people get shocked someone makes a mistake.

literally try to write two different documents with each hand and tell me how far you go without messing up.

>>8320625
I mean, the Challenger was a special kind of fuck up, and seven lives were lost because some numb-nuts got tired of postponing. Does it justify SpaceX's failures? Probably not. But you might want to put a bit more thought on DUDE IT'S HARD LMAO before you send people to their deaths.

>>8320627
it's not a matter of sending people to their deaths. it's that there were millions of other things that would have killed them had they neglected.

>>8320628
Sometimes it's also hard to watch millions of dollars go up in flames. It would certainly rattle my bones if I were funding this.

it turns out the invisible hand™ of the free market™ can't fix it

>>8320631
what would you do? cancel it and basically squander decades of effort and also the lost lives? there are prices to pay for going outside our comfort zone. one of those things happen to be a few billion dollars.

>>8320635
Well, I don't think I'd be funding it in the first place. Or maybe give them a three strike kind of thing. Let them fail until it's no longer worth the spending, if I was to be generous.

>>8320625
>the telemetries that have to be read by ground operators in order to gauge the torque on the frame to assess how it should be moved. all these factors being fed back to a pilot
lolwut?

That isn't how rockets work. There's no pilot. They don't "gauge the torque on the frame". The ground operators don't do shit after lift-off.

Remember, they made this shit work in 1942, and the only ground control then was a radio signal to shut it off when it reached a certain speed and altitude (they later removed that control).

99% of rocket guidance is just keeping it in a straight line according to gyroscope readings. The other 1% is deviating slightly from a straight line to get to the intended orbit and choosing when to shut down and relight the engines. All 100% is done by computers with no ground control except for a big shiny red candy-like button that blows the rocket up if it goes off course.

>>8320566
>they still REFUSED to modify the shuttle with an early escape system

Was that even possible on a non-capsule system?

>>8320710
>Was that even possible on a non-capsule system?

Yes, but it would require redesigning the orbiter more or less from the ground up. They wouldn't give NASA the money.

>>8320597
Really wonder what caused it. Someone said possible grease or dirt in a pipe near the LOX tank, but thats the only suggestion i've heard.

>>8320737
>Really wonder what caused it. Someone said possible grease or dirt in a pipe near the LOX tank, but thats the only suggestion i've heard.

Every initial idea people have in high profile aerospace accidents tends to be wrong; it's the nature of the beast. One of the better looking hypothesis at the moment is ongoing troubles with the composite overwrapped pressure vessels that hold high density helium. Composite vessels don't much enjoy extended stays in deep cryogenic environments, and SpaceX was performing a study on how well their vehicle fairs with an extended hold.

>>8320597
except they have 2 other launch pads, with a third one getting ready soon, and how long does it take to rebuild this pad.. a few months?

Especially if it was just a ground side fuck up that blew up the rocket. I expect them to start launching again before the end of the year.

>>8320710
They had two ejection seats each on the first two shuttles built, and they were usable on the first four flights, after which they started carrying more than a pilot and copilot, and since there weren't enough ejection seats for everyone, they deactivated them as a matter of pilot ethics (didn't want to be in a position of bailing out with passengers in the craft who couldn't).

Ejection seats would probably have saved (ejecting is never a certain proposition) a Challenger crew limited to pilot and copilot. In fact, parachutes and a bail-out hatch might have saved some or all of the Challenger Crew, like in the SpaceShipTwo crash.

It would have done nothing for Columbia.

The idea that the shuttle would be safe enough without a launch escape system was never reasonable. It was a fantasy like thinking the shuttle would save money somehow. People talked about the ultimate potential of a system like that, then they just started pretending that they could achieve it with the first vehicle of its class ever built, after just a couple of flights.

>>8320752
>they have 2 other launch pads, with a third one getting ready soon
The only one I'm aware of that's currently in condition to be used is the one in Vandenberg (California) that's only for polar launches. There's a limited market for those. None of the geostationary comsats or Dragons can launch from there.

The Texas launch facility is only in the early stages of construction. They decided to settle an issue with earth too soft for a launchpad foundation by piling dirt on it and waiting for it to compact over a couple of years. (there are faster ways, but they're more expensive, and they had no reason to rush)

The one that got blown up is Launch Complex 40. They also have Launch Complex 39, which has never been used and was being worked on to prepare it for Falcon Heavy launches. They hope to have it ready for flights by November, but you know how this shit goes.

>>8320619
Attrubuted to SpaceX Founder Elon Musk

>>8320785
They are supposed to do 4 launches from Vandenberg by the end of the year.

If they can get a few launches from LC 39 before the end of the year, this won't have been such a set back.

>>8320798
They are grounded until the investigation is complete and a way to prevent a repeat incident is found. They are very likely finished launching for the year.

>>8320800
If they discover its a ground fuckup in the next 48 hours, they'll still be grounded?

Why do people believe they will be launching before the end of this year? It's already September..

>>8320831
Why wouldn't they be? They'd still have to fix their procedures and equipment to remove the risk.

>>8320506
It's because the bulk of the cost of providing launch services is quality control and since SpaceX intend to radically lower launch costs it's in this area where they have to cut corners with the expected results.

>>8320633
To be fair, Space operations isn't a free market at all. It's hugely distorted by government money. And without that it probably wouldn't exist.

Gotta love how normies think spacex is shit and tesla is shit because they explode and crash.

Conveniently ignoring the fact that the falcon is still in development, also you only seeing the explosions because of the media attention.

The tesla crashes are just beyond mind blowing, the car says you have to pay attention while in auto pilot and be ready to take the wheel. Also most of the crashes were caused by other drivers doing dumb shit. Also compared to annual crash fatalities, these few crashes are insignificant.

tldr: people are dumb, the media is retarded

who would have thought rocket science is hard

>>8320566
Fun fact:

The Challenger astronauts didn't die when the Shuttle exploded. The emergency air packs were activated and 2 minutes 45 seconds worth of oxygen was consumed.

They died when they hit the ocean.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Challenger_disaster#Cause_and_time_of_death

>>8321211
Nice read, didn't know that. God rest their souls.

>>8321211
>>8321514
more fun facts

>The song was composed by Jean-Michel Jarre to be played on a saxophone by Ron McNair, aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger. It would be the first song played and recorded in space.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtGG1WLP1pk

>>8320547
>success rate
Irrelevant. Proton also has a success rate near 90% but it's still a shit rocket because it always fails every now and then. Consecutive successes is what matters most. SpaceX is indeed shit in that regard. They would never be allowed to launch the JWST even if their perpetually-delayed falcon heavy was already in service. They're just not reliable.

>>8320506
>he thinks secondary mission landing of 1st stage blowing up counts as a mission failure

lol kid

>>8320880
There's a possibility that the problem isn't related to the F9 at all (e.g. equipment malfunction), in which case the FAA can't keep them grounded.

>>8321174
Yep, musk's companies are all negative media magnets. They're trying to do things different and/or change things, and there's little that people relish more than seeing such things fail. The entertainment value is off the charts and the media takes full advantage of it.

I don't envy the PR guys working at Tesla, SpaceX, SolarCity, etc. It must get nightmarish at times.

>>8320642
you've really been playing too much KSP haven't you

>>8322070
Though you've got to admit that the SolarCity deal is fucking stupid. It's hemorrhaging faster than a sliced open torso, it'll just end up diverting funds from Tesla and SpaceX in order to save it, thus decreasing the abilities of Tesla and SpaceX to innovate.

>>8320506
I don't see why people think this explosion was a loss. The Facebook satellite was destroyed as a result, I'd say that's pretty fucking great.

>>8322146
That's definitely a possibility, but if they can manage to turn it around and integrate it into Tesla's business, they'll be an unstoppable juggernaut. It's super risky but if it works to the payoff is huge.

>>8322070
>>8321174
Kek. The media is full of "Elon Musk Is Literrally God At This Point And Here's Why", especially the shitty clickbait-prone outlets that everyone reads, and yet, above all things, you morons complain that people have a bad impression of him. He's the most overrated person in the US, he's mediocre at innovating, he's mediocre at running a business, and he survives on government subsidies. His investment in PayPal at the right time was the only intelligent thing he ever did. No wonder that higher quality publications are more critical of him.

>tldr: people are dumb, the media is retarded
You conclusion, however, is correct.

>>8321534
>Consecutive successes is what matters most.
No it isn't. Consecutive successes are a matter of chance. You can have a 10% chance of failure on each launch, and still rack up 30 launches in a row without a failure, if you get lucky.

Probability of success is what matters most, and that's not simply a matter of statistics, it's a matter of understanding why failures happened and whether they're likely to be repeated, or whether different failures are likely to occur for similar reasons.

SpaceX is still suffering "infant mortality" failures. Their launch operations are not mature. Launches will be risky with them for a while, but should improve rapidly over time.

With Arianespace, ULA, and Roscosmos all transitioning to new vehicles, they should also start to suffer "infant mortality" again, as SpaceX's Falcon rockets reach maturity.

File: 1472935808691.jpg (10KB, 240x300px) Image search: [Google]

10KB, 240x300px

>>8321211
>some people died horribly
>"fun" fact

File: kiwi_bird.jpg (57KB, 460x287px) Image search: [Google]

57KB, 460x287px

>>8321211
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Challenger_disaster#Cause_and_time_of_death
Huh. You learn something every day.

File: ..jpg (31KB, 330x330px) Image search: [Google]

31KB, 330x330px

>>8320506
RUDs are part of the business, mate

>>8322321
>The media is full of "Elon Musk Is Literrally God At This Point And Here's Why", especially the shitty clickbait-prone outlets that everyone reads, and yet, above all things, you morons complain that people have a bad impression of him.
Yeah, this is called "polarization of opinions". Irrational worship on one hand, and irrational denigration on the other.

Your own opinions aren't reasonable or based in fact, you're just one more moron who decided to pick a side and take it to an extreme.

>he's mediocre at running a business
>His investment in PayPal at the right time was the only intelligent thing he ever did.
Elon Musk started from a middle-class background, took degrees in physics and economics, got accepted to a physics PhD program but left it to go into business, became a mlilionaire in his late 20s, a hundred-millionaire in his early 30s, and a billionaire by 40, now a 10-billionaire at 45 and one of the richest and most influential men in the world, all by working in unforgiving, competitive industries where most businesses fail.

File: but its indie.jpg (51KB, 900x600px) Image search: [Google]

51KB, 900x600px

you know, its people like you for there why are everything is wrong the with the world today...

spacex is a small indie rocket company

they dont have a large rocket team
they dont have much money
they dont have much time
they dont have much experience

but they have a lot of heart

its not fair to hold them to the same standards as AAA rocket companies like russia or china

they've won countless innovation awards and were ranked most hyped indie rocket company of the year so give them a break

having procedurally generated rocket plans is the most innovative idea of all time. the one they chose is over 18 quintillion other potential plans, so obvously its a good one.

every once and a while the rockets can explode, but thats the nature of indie rocket companies.

give them a break you owe them so much they are so brave

>>8322384
>>8322361

Found the Elon Musk dickriders. Lol
SpaceX are failling this is a fact. Hes managing all this business as a geek-fanboys fairytale. Sounds like a scam.

Shills always tries to defend the big fails. Nerds are stanning the Musk sins just like the chineses defended the imperator Mao.

Shame in you.

R.I.P. Megalomaniacs
R.I.P. government illusions
R.I.P. Geek masturbations

>>8322336
Yes, exactly. SpaceX simply hasn't launched enough F9s to have all the bugs worked out yet, a side effect of rocket launches being a low volume, expensive business. They're pushing hard to ramp up speed so the inevitable failures will be out of the way sooner, but there's only so much a small scrappy company can do. It's a wonder that they're getting along as well as they are.

>>8322436
>a small scrappy company
SpaceX is bigger than ULA. 5,000 vs. 3,400 employees. In terms of effect on the launch market, they're something of a monster gobbling up contracts.

This would have been SpaceX's 29th launch since the Falcon 9 debut in 2010, and they've got 40 launches on their manifest. ULA's Atlas V and Delta IV have only done about 100, starting in 2002, and in the 6 years after that, there were only 21 launches of these vehicles. Arianespace has only done about 200, all the way back to the 70s. Ariane 5 only flew 10 times in its first 6 years.

So far in 2016, Ariane 5 has flown 4 times, Atlas V has flown 4 times, Delta IV has flown 3 times, Proton has flown 3 times, and Falcon 9 has flown 8 times. Only Soyuz, the most prolific rocket series of all time, is ahead of Falcon 9 in launch rate this year, with 9 launches so far in 2016, and that's from four facilities and two entirely different operators.

With booster reusability and system maturity, maybe by 2018 or 2019, SpaceX should start being able to launch roughly once a week (since they only have to produce one upper stage, with one engine, for most launches rather than a complete rocket with 10 engines), have the biggest launch vehicle on the market, sell launches for half the prices of the next-cheapest competitor, and be responsible for the majority of orbital launches in the world.

SpaceX is a big, fast-moving company that has the rest of the launch industry pissing in their boots.

>>8322501
>launch roughly once a week
I think I would die from excitement if this actually comes to fruition. THAT is the kind launch rate that shows real progress being made and is the minimum I'd expect from a space-capable civilization.

>>8322501
Comparing the number of launches is misleading when is comes to Arianespace, because they launch mostly two satellites per launch. Just look at your 2016 example: True, the Falcon 9 flew 8 times this year already. But only 5 of those were commercial launches free for all to bid on. The other 3 were American only. Falcon 9 carried a cumulative 27.213 kg into orbit, 21.267 of it to GTO. Ariane 5 carried a cumulative 32.860 kg into orbit in half as many launches and all of it to GTO. Arianespace is still market leader with a 50% share of the commercial market. In fact, their launch manifest is so packed that they had to refrain from bidding on some, because they're fully booked.
Proton is the big loser in this story, although they have brought it unto themselves with launch failures. If SpaceX dont get their shit together they'll follow Proton.

>>8320547
>7% percent failure rate compared to 5%
That's 1.4x more failures.
Or in other words, 40% over the acceptable failure rate.
That's a huge difference.

>>8322572
>they launch mostly two satellites per launch
...and in December, a Falcon 9 carried 11 satellites. So what? Ask customers whether they want their payload stacked with a stranger's. Falcon 9 FT can throw 8 tons to GTO, Ariane 5 can throw 10 tons. Ariane 5 isn't nearly twice as much rocket.

>only 5 of those were commercial launches free for all to bid on
Totally irrelevant.

>Arianespace is still market leader with a 50% share of the commercial market.
Only because SpaceX isn't up to production speed. SpaceX and Arianespace are both booked up to foreseeable capacity. SpaceX was beating them for just about every launch contract until their backlog disappeared over the horizon, and some customers are still choosing to line up for a SpaceX launch.

>If SpaceX dont get their shit together they'll follow Proton.
Oh please. They've had one launch failure, one ground-handling incident, and one engine out incident which gave the primary customer the option of nixing a secondary payload insertion (which was exercised).

The Proton incidents are quality-control problems of a *very* mature rocket. The Falcon 9 incidents are infant mortality. Realistically, Falcon 9 1.0 was a development rocket. 1.1 was the first production model, and it didn't start flying until 2013, and the FT model (which has different tanking procedures, as the first rocket to ever use subcooled propellants) didn't start flying until last December.

>>8322669
>...and in December, a Falcon 9 carried 11 satellites. So what?
I was talking two fully grown com sats. This has been their bread and butter for decades.

>>8322669
>Falcon 9 FT can throw 8 tons to GTO
lol no

>Totally irrelevant.
Completely relevant. Market distortions from government money make American, Russian and Chinese launchers look better than they really are and European launchers worse than they are.

>>8322669
>around 20 launches
>infant mortality
Lol, the excuses some people make, amazing.

>>8322336
>they should also start to suffer "infant mortality" again
You hope they'll have infant mortality problems. The thing is that ESA and ULA both know what they're doing and have actually capable people working for them.

File: 1468655820357.png (314KB, 717x436px) Image search: [Google]

314KB, 717x436px

>>8320642
>deviating slightly from a straight line

>>8322698
There's no difference in capability. The difference in attitude. ULA and the ESA can take their sweet time and spend as much as they want, tiptoeing around and being absurdly careful. That gets you reliability but it's absolutely horrible for industry accessibility since launching with them will always cost an arm and a leg. It makes entire classes of missions impractical.

SpaceX is all about moving quickly and being affordable as possible. Reliability is of course a goal, but they will have failed if they're JUST reliable. There's no value there, since the market already provides that. On top of being reliable, they've got to be progressively cheaper and faster too, and that isn't simple and it isn't achieved overnight.

>>8320547
>93%
Fuck OFF revisionist redditors
>DEMO flight 1
>CRS-1
>CRS-7
>Amos-6
25/29
86% success rate

>>8320506
Failure is a part of success

File: for free.png (34KB, 200x200px) Image search: [Google]

34KB, 200x200px

>that same autist who relentlessly sharpshoots any post that portrays spacex in a bad way

>>8322735
No worse than that autist with a raging hateboner for everything outside of the traditional space industry

File: CZ-3B-I2S-40939.jpg (2MB, 2333x2174px) Image search: [Google]

2MB, 2333x2174px

>>8322669
China has perfect success records with rockets just as new or newer than Falcon 9

SpaceX has some serious Q/C issues that need to be resolved if they're to survive as a company.

File: av_muos5_l9.jpg (474KB, 1441x1800px) Image search: [Google]

474KB, 1441x1800px

>>8322710
>ULA and the ESA can take their sweet time and spend as much as they want
That is false

SpaceX has virtually unlimited capital to draw from compared to ULA
All of ULA's profits go to the parent companies, and they have to beg and plead just to get any of that money back.

They have a perfect success record and have pulled it off for far less money than SpaceX.

File: 1463016840584.jpg (47KB, 508x524px) Image search: [Google]

47KB, 508x524px

>>8322738
What has "new space" done aside from offer slightly cheaper launches for much higher risk?

>muh landed rockets
Doesn't mean anything until they re-fly one, and at this rate they never will.

>>8322738
I don't think that's one autist. I think that's just everyone else who gets tired of your bullshit

>>8322682
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_9_Full_Thrust
Payload to GTO (27°)
Expendable: 8,300 kg (18,300 lb)

File: Skylab-73-HC-440HR.jpg (654KB, 2205x3240px)

654KB, 2205x3240px

>>8322336
>Their launch operations are not mature.
top kek

SpaceX has launched more rockets than NASA did when NASA started flying astronauts

They literally have the lowest success rate of any provider in the industry

You redditors will go to any lengths to excuse any bad spacex behavior. Pathetic.

Spacex barely deserves the right to launch astronauts at this point

>>8322741
>>8322744
And neither are doing anything particularly new or interesting.

The only interesting thing ULA has going is the SLS, and that's becoming as big of a disaster as the shuttle program was. How many years will it be before ULA and the ESA really start opening up space to the little guys? I don't see that happening for a long time. In their hands, governments and megacorps will be the only ones launching anything for decades to come.

>>8322750
One step at a time. They've already brought costs down considerably, and SpaceX has a customer who's agreed to ride on the first reused booster (SES), and that flight is slated shortly after lockdowns have been lifted.


On a more general note, the cynicism /sci/ holds towards space in general is hard to understand. I've never seen such a large group supposedly science-loving people that hopes so much for launches to stay expensive, out of reach, and infrequent.

>>8322710
>SpaceX is all about moving quickly and being affordable as possible.
Sure.

>https://twitter.com/pbdes/status/771863918834806785
>70 missions backlog
>10 billion dollars
That's about $143M per flight. SpaceX just overprices government launches while underpricing their commercial ones, which allows them to remain afloat. They are as shitty as everyone else, don't be naive.

>>8322777
>And neither are doing anything particularly new or interesting.
What does it matter how "interesting" their shit is when it can't even get stuff into space?

Oh, by the way, while the SpaceX pad is burning, ULA will be launching a mission to return an asteroid sample to Earth for the first time.

>ULA
>SLS
Want to know how I know you have no idea what you're talking about?

>and that's becoming as big of a disaster as the shuttle program was
SLS will fly before falcon heavy at this point, and will probably cost less to, KEK

>They've already brought costs down considerably
Their prices haven't dropped since their first commercial flight. Their success rate has dropped dramatically however.

> I've never seen such a large group supposedly science-loving people that hopes so much for launches to stay expensive, out of reach, and infrequent.
There's no point in denying reality just because it lives up to your sci fi fantasies better.

File: BrFVUiXCIAAveRW.jpg (62KB, 600x600px) Image search: [Google]

62KB, 600x600px

>this triggers the spacex shills

>>8322783
>There's no point in denying reality just because it lives up to your sci fi fantasies better.
Having a goal for improvement isn't fantasy and thinking that the peak of rocketry has already been reached is just plain arrogant. The whole market is still in its infancy and won't leave that state until launches are boring, everyday occurrences.

If something isn't changing, it's dead, and the fact is spaceflight is dead until major changes take place, and the old guard won't enact those changes because there's no reason or profit in doing so. Something or someone has to force the issue.

File: 1435502507086.webm (1MB, 944x530px) Image search: [Google]

1MB, 944x530px

>>8322797
>thinking that the peak of rocketry has already been reached is just plain arrogant
When did I ever say that?

If the "future" of rocketry is a 14% failure rate, then it's a very depressing future.
SpaceX needs to step up their reliability before attempting to tackle this meme reusability stuff.

>>8322741
>China has perfect success records with rockets just as new or newer than Falcon 9

Not the best time for this example, considering they had a launch failure less than 24 hours before the SpaceX disaster.

File: long-march-rocket-launch-china-ap-693582315919.jpg (796KB, 2186x3000px) Image search: [Google]

796KB, 2186x3000px

>>8322806
Luckily China doesn't rely on 1 model of rocket

They literally have 9 or 10 iterations and still manage to be more reliable than Spacex

>>8321211
Thanks for that link anon, it greatly improved my opinion of Reagan, a man I truly despised for all the evil he has caused. But he still said one good thing that shouldn't be forgotten

>Sometimes, when we reach for the stars, we fall short. But we must pick ourselves up again and press on despite the pain.

I think that's a valuable lesson everybody needs to know today. Discrediting all of SpaceX's efforts because of a few failures isn't the way forward.

>>8322682
>>Falcon 9 FT can throw 8 tons to GTO
>lol no
You're arguing from a position of ignorance. In expendable mode, it can throw 8300 kg to GTO, and that's with a lox/kerosene, gas-generator upper stage. It could put a fully-fuelled Ariane 5 upper stage directly in LEO with some tons left over for payload. The LEO performance of Falcon 9 is superior to Ariane 5, and F9 outperforms all configurations of Atlas V to any trajectory, while falling only slightly short of Proton performance to LEO and outstripping it significantly to higher orbits. If they simply shortened the first stage a bit and added a Centaur to make a 3-stage rocket, it would probably outperform Delta IV Heavy, the current performance champ, to any trajectory.

Falcon 9's specific impulse might be unimpressive, but the FT version has spectacular mass ratios. 1.0 had pretty good mass ratios, and then they nearly doubled its fueled mass without adding any engine weight.

Expendable-mode launches are a special service now, which have to be specially negotiated, but it's still what the rocket's capable of, and so far they've still only been launching newly-built rockets.

>>8322682
>Market distortions from government money make American, Russian and Chinese launchers look better than they really are and European launchers worse than they are.
Arianespace is HEAVILY subsidized by European governments. Its prices have little relationship to its costs. Furthermore, they have started radically reorganizing in response to the competition from SpaceX, since the member states are starting to balk at paying for the discounts necessary to compete on price with SpaceX.

Frankly, Arianespace is in its death throes. They are hemorrhaging money.

File: unity not us kia.webm (1MB, 1280x720px) Image search: [Google]

1MB, 1280x720px

Nevr 4get

>>8322804
>SpaceX needs to step up their reliability before attempting to tackle this meme reusability stuff.
As noted before, they've got to tackle both at once, otherwise their offerings aren't very competitive. There'd be no reason to choose them over competitors if reliability is their only selling point, and that's a big problem.

File: shuttle.webm (3MB, 1280x720px) Image search: [Google]

3MB, 1280x720px

>>8322810
>shuttle failure rate
>2/135

>falcon 9 failure rate
>4/29
For a "flying coffin" the shuttle sure was safe compared to spacex's meme rocket

>>8322814
>In expendable mode, it can throw 8300 kg to GTO
Not that guy you're replying to, but not only are those numbers NOT accurate yet (they reflect an engine change that was supposed to change Q4 this year) but falcon 9 will never fly in expendable mode again.

>>8322783
>SLS will fly before falcon heavy at this point, and will probably cost less

both are so false. Heavy might be delayed a year, still two years before the first possible SLS launch. And SLS is projected to launch once a year max, with a program cost of over two billion annually. On the contrary, it will be the world's most expensive launch system by a large margin. This alarms nobody, since it is designed as a jobs program instead of to fulfill a particular mission. SLS is a rocket to nowhere.

>>8322815
>tfw /kspg/ is ded forever

>>8322788
kek. What a shitposty advertisement; just a blatant 'fuck you, attentionfag' to Elon.

ULA just gained some cool points in my books.

>>8322822
>Heavy might be delayed a year
Remember when it was supposed to fly in 2013?

>still two years before the first possible SLS launch
SLS will launch in mid to late 2018

>On the contrary, it will be the world's most expensive launch system by a large margin
It will be cheaper than every rocket on a kg to orbit excluding FH (which, as I said, will probably never fly)

>SLS is a rocket to nowhere.
Oh, you're just another delusional redditor?
http://www.boeing.com/assets/pdf/defense-space/space/sls/docs/sls_mission_booklet_jan_2014.pdf

Falcon 9 is the only "rocket to nowhere"
It can't even get into space without exploding.

>>8321521
They should've played oxygen

File: SeaDragon.jpg (1021KB, 4096x1532px) Image search: [Google]

1021KB, 4096x1532px

>>8322835
>SLS will launch in mid to late 2018
for block 1, with cubesats (LOL). First launch of anything approaching the targeted performance is three years later in 2021!

>cheaper than every rocket on a kg to orbit
except nobody needs 100 tons to orbit.

By that metric, the cheapest launch system ever designed was the Sea Dragon. 500 tons to orbit, baby! I wonder why nobody ever built it?

I don't care if FH gets delayed forever, since only the NRO needs that class of heavy payload.

>>8322854
>except nobody needs 100 tons to orbit.
Top kek, moron

SLS's primary purpose is to launch payloads to EML2, something that the FH cannot even do in expendable mode. It will never be used to launch stuff to LEO

>sea dragon
Nice paper rocket, just like Falcon Heavy.

>>8322819
>falcon 9 failure rate
>4/29
Wow, those are some made-up numbers. Falcon 9's failure rate is 1/28.

The engine-out incident with a 1.0 did not cause a mission failure, it activated a contract option which NASA exercised, causing the secondary payload to be deliberately abandoned.

This pad incident was not a launch failure, it was a failure in testing. It wasn't necessary for the satellite to be on top of the rocket for the test, or required by SpaceX, it was at the option of the satellite owner to save money on the launch. They could have conducted the test with no payload, returned the tested rocket to the horizontal position, integrated the payload, and then returned it to upright position.

Doing it this way, having it on top of a new rocket still being tested, was entirely the satellite owner's choice, to save the cost of these additional steps.

>not only are those numbers NOT accurate yet (they reflect an engine change that was supposed to change Q4 this year)
They reflect an engine change that happened Q4 last year. There's no further engine change coming.

>but falcon 9 will never fly in expendable mode again.
Oh bullshit.

>>8322858
the sls is a paper rocket too retard

What the devil is going to happen in EML2 that'll be worth the SLS? It's not like the orion can land on the moon.

>>8322709
Locally it is.

>>8322864
>Falcon 9's failure rate is 1/28.
Haha, no.

The very first flight had a failure that would have killed the payload if it wasn't just a boilerplate.
See 2:38 in this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAaNx8n9x-U

CRS-1 had an engine failure that directly contributed to the loss of a secondary payload
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvTIh96otDw

CRS-7 fucking blew up in mid flight

>This pad incident was not a launch failure, it was a failure in testing.
This is some moronic reddit-tier logic m8
The falcon 9 launch system includes everything, not just the rocket. When the satellite was handed over to spacex, it became their responsibility.
It was a failure.
Deal with it.

>They reflect an engine change that happened Q4 last year.
Wrong.
It reflects an additional thrust increase in the engines that was hinted at in April this year.

>Oh bullshit.
Post some expendable flights they have on their manifest then.

>>8322865
SLS has 60% of its flight hardware finished or under construction

FH has not even started construction yet

>>8322877
>FH has not even started construction yet
Only because they've had to integrate the stream of improvements made to the F9 into the FH so the FH won't be obsolete the day it's completed. F9 is already capable of several flights originally intended for the FH due to upgrades, making it stupid to build FH as originally specced.

FH is also low-priority. The number of customers waiting for it are far fewer than those queued up waiting for F9s.

>>8320506
They don't? Only the simulations have failed, never real rockets.

>>8322858
>SLS's primary purpose is to launch payloads to EML2, something that the FH cannot even do in expendable mode.
Where are you getting this? FH, even without crossfeed (which may not be developed), will be able to throw nearly 14 tons to Mars transfer. Lunar transfer orbits are somewhat less demanding.

It's true that SLS is intended to be more capable than Falcon Heavy, due primarily to its cryogenic upper stages, but that doesn't mean FH can't send stuff to EML2. In fact, any mission you want can probably be done sooner and more cheaply with FH, using modular storable-propellant propulsive stages that dock in orbit, due to FH's higher launch rates and lower prices.

Anyway, SLS missions are going to high lunar orbit, not an Earth-moon lagrange point.

>>8322900
FH + dragon will never be enough to send people to Moon orbit

>Anyway, SLS missions are going to high lunar orbit, not an Earth-moon lagrange point.
Wrong.

>>8322909
?
why wouldn't it be?
Think some trained astronauts couldn't spend a few days in the Dragon? It's not any different from apollo.

>>8322916
You clearly don't know the first thing about orbital mechanics.

>>8322917
less delta-v needed to go to high lunar orbit than mars

>>8322920
The moon doesn't have an atmosphere

Dragon uses aerocapture on Mars

>>8322806
>>8322809
Look at all the space bubbles
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=38ynHKGzplQ

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lBL98p0wZ7g

>>8322923
>FH + dragon will never be enough to send people to Moon orbit

What does that have to do with aerobraking?

>>8322927
You can't "just" send something to the Moon or Mars and be in orbit automatically

You have to slow down

Dragon does not have the dv to slow down into Moon orbit, and if it were modified to have enough, it would be too heavy for FH to send it there (even with crossfeed)

>>8322931
except Musk is on record saying he could send a Dragon to the moon if someone paid him.

And as far as I understand the altair lander was canceled, so NASA has no ability to send anyone to the moon either.

If the Lunar dragon needed a second FH launch to put a propulsion module/lander in orbit, thats something they very much COULD do via a fast launch rate/low launch cost.

>>8322877
>The very first flight had a failure that would have killed the payload if it wasn't just a boilerplate.
>See 2:38 in this video
It's fucking nothing.

>It reflects an additional thrust increase in the engines that was hinted at in April this year.
Stop making shit up. It's been an advertised capability since they upgraded to the FT. There's no proviso that it's contingent on some further upgrade.

>directly contributed to the loss of a secondary payload
>contributed to
Nice weasel-wording. The secondary payload was intentionally dumped at the option of the primary customer. The contracts all laid out that this was a possibility: the primary customer got SpaceX's best guarantee of a successful launch, the secondary customer only got a chance at a launch.

>The falcon 9 launch system includes everything, not just the rocket. When the satellite was handed over to spacex, it became their responsibility.
The customer chose to assume additional risk by having their payload on top of the rocket while it was being tested. It was their responsibility to assume that risk.

A failure in testing is different from a failure in actual launch. The reason you test is so this doesn't happen during a launch. Having the payload on the rocket was not required and put the payload at risk at the customer's option.

The difference between this and a real launch failure is that no customer has to accept this risk.

Again: this is not an ordinary risk borne by SpaceX customers. This, like being a secondary payload on an ISS mission, is a risky option offered by SpaceX to its customers.

>>8322935
>except Musk is on record saying he could send a Dragon to the moon if someone paid him
Sure, he could also put a schoolbus on the surface if someone paid him

The point is that it will never happen.

>If the Lunar dragon needed a second FH launch to put a propulsion module/lander in orbit
This is retarded and complicated bullshit

Blue Origin will eventually build a rocket specifically designed to send a capsule to the moon. No point in wasting money on this spacex bullshit before then (especially when spacex shit can't even launch without blowing up, lol)

>>8322950
u keep talking like this and i'll shoot a falcon 9 at ur house

>>8322947
>It's fucking nothing.
>I know literally nothing about rocketry

>Stop making shit up. It's been an advertised capability since they upgraded to the FT
kys stupid reddit moron
http://www.theverge.com/2016/5/1/11549456/spacex-falcon-9-heavy-launch-capabilities-weight-mars
https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?in_reply_to=726560848177561600

>The secondary payload was intentionally dumped at the option of the primary customer.
It was a loss of payload due to hardware malfunction, and thus, a failure.

>The customer chose to assume additional risk by having their payload on top of the rocket while it was being tested. It was their responsibility to assume that risk.
They also assume risk just by launching in the first place. Their biggest mistake was trusting Spacex.

>A failure in testing is different from a failure in actual launch.
They lost the payload. It was a failure of the launch process.

>The difference between this and a real launch failure is that no customer has to accept this risk.
see above
spacex destroyed their satellite

>this is not an ordinary risk borne by SpaceX customers
every flight of falcon 9 upgrade except 1 was "tested" in this manner

>>8322953
ok

>>8322909
>FH + dragon will never be enough to send people to Moon orbit
FH's reduced capability relative to SLS is comparable to Dragon's reduced mass relative to Orion.

Orion's a wallowing tub. 26 tons, 15 tons empty. Cargo Dragon's 4 tons when empty, Crew Dragon should be about 6, maybe 8.

All they'd have to do is replace the trunk space with fuel tanks and a single SuperDraco with a nozzle extension for enhanced Isp. Child's play for SpaceX. Falcon Heavy could throw at least 15 tons on a lunar transfer, so it could easily have a better propellant fraction than Orion.

Orion's only designed to operate for 3 weeks in space. Dragon's designed to function independently in space for up to 2 years, in the DragonLab configuration. Extending life support duration is simply a matter of supplies, and people consume little in just a few weeks.

Dragon on FH can go anywhere Orion on SLS could. The only real disadvantage would be less living space for the crew.

>>8322984
Orion has more than twice the dv than crew dragon and even it can't get into low Moon orbit.

>All they'd have to do is replace the trunk space with fuel tanks and a single SuperDraco with a nozzle extension for enhanced Isp
Doing that to add enough dv would make dragon too heavy for FH to send to the moon

>propellant fraction
Doesn't matter as much as ISP, and they can't "just" add a nozzle extension to super dracos

They would need a completely new engine.

>Dragon's designed to function independently in space for up to 2 years
only when docked to the ISS

>Dragon on FH can go anywhere Orion on SLS could
No.
And all of this is comparing the best FH to the worst SLS.

>>8322965
>>I know literally nothing about rocketry
How about you provide some fucking source for this claim that the first Falcon 9 launch, which all customers were happy with, would have destroyed any real payload?

I looked at the video. I looked at the time you specified. There was nothing of significance that happened.

>It was a loss of payload due to hardware malfunction
No, it wasn't. It was a loss of payload due to deliberate dumping of the payload. The hardware was perfectly capable of putting the secondary payload in the intended orbit. Engine out capability was an essential feature for the reliability of this design.

>every flight of falcon 9 upgrade except 1 was "tested" in this manner
>except 1
Customer. Option.

And what this insane shit of putting "tested" in quotes? Of course it was a test. They weren't going to launch that day. It was a hold-down test fire. They've had anomalies with these before, which have sometimes resulted in a month or longer delay before launching.

>>8323021
>which all customers were happy with, would have destroyed any real payload?
There were no customers on the first launch. It was a test of the first and second stages only, with a boilerplate dragon simulator on top. The second stage induced a roll on the payload that would have failed the mission if it were a real dragon.

>The hardware was perfectly capable of putting the secondary payload in the intended orbit.
But it didn't
Spacex put their secondary customer in a position that required a 100% flawless launch to succeed in, and they failed to deliver.

>Customer. Option.
The rocket fucking exploded, blew up their pad, and blew up their customer.
It is by every standard of measure an absolute failure.

>And what this insane shit of putting "tested" in quotes?
because you are attempting to imply that because it wasn't officially launch day, that it shouldn't be counted as a failure

Why are you even on this website anyways?
Reddit seems to be more your speed if I'm being honest.

Kayne was a female chimp since spilled and raped Jesu named Able. Snake to dinosaur in new skin.

>>8323034
Not that anon but I just want to know why would the roll have failed the mission if it was a real dragon where as the boiler plate did fine?

>>8323072
it would break the solar panels and be uncorrectable, amongst other problems

>>8323081
>it would break the solar panels
?

>and be uncorrectable
Looks like it was corrected in the video....

>>8322999
>>>FH + dragon will never be enough to send people to Moon orbit
>>FH's reduced capability relative to SLS is comparable to Dragon's reduced mass relative to Orion.
>Orion has more than twice the dv than crew dragon and even it can't get into low Moon orbit.
We weren't talking about low moon orbit, we were talking about the high moon orbits that Orion goes to.

>Doing that to add enough dv would make dragon too heavy for FH to send to the moon
No it wouldn't. Orion has only ~9 tons of propellant, and ~26 tons of mass. Only about one third of its mass is propellant. The onboard propulsion capability of Crew Dragon is pretty good to begin with, since it can use its launch-abort propellant for orbital maneuvering (as long as they're happy with landing by parachute), so significantly less than half of its mass would need to be added to equal Orion's delta-v.

If, aside from this additional propulsion system, the Crew Dragon is 10 tons or less, then with it it will be 15 tons or less, which FH can throw to a lunar transfer.

>all of this is comparing the best FH to the worst SLS.
No it isn't. It's comparing the FH without crossfeed or a cryogenic upper stage, as should be available next year, to the 2021 fantasy SLS that's throwing an actually-loaded Orion as specified, rather than the lighter, empty Orion going on the 2018 cobble job.

With crossfeed and a cryogenic upper stage, Falcon Heavy could probably equal the SLS Block 1B. Crossfeed alone would be enough to equal the Block 0 performance: the core and boosters. That means it could launch the ICPS and payload of the Block 1. Replacing the low-Isp Falcon Heavy upper stage with a high-Isp lox/h2 upper stage like the EUS would increase performance more for FH than SLS, which was already using a high-Isp lox/h2 upper stage to get to orbit.

>>8323081
Solar panels don't get deployed until the upper stage shuts down. Stop acting like you understand this shit.

>>8323034
>Spacex put their secondary customer in a position that required a 100% flawless launch to succeed in, and they failed to deliver.
This stupid reasoning would penalize SpaceX for offering customers additional low-cost, high-risk options.

SpaceX didn't put that customer in that position. They were perfectly willing to sell that customer a full-price, full-service launch as a primary payload. There was an opportunity to offer a chance of getting a launch at a lower price, and they offered it. The customer went into it knowing full well that they were not the top priority and the primary customer was getting contract options that could cause the secondary payload to be ditched.

SpaceX wouldn't be a more reliable launch provider if it had refused to sell that secondary payload slot, or if it had refused to offer customers the option of putting their payload on the rocket during the pre-flight test tanking and firing. It would simply be a launch provider which offered customers fewer options for accepting higher risks in exchange for lower prices.

These risky options make them more attractive overall, not less, to launch customers.

>>8320547
Falcon 9 (which they plan on crewing) has a 90% success rate, far below that of the Atlas V’s 100% and the Delta IV’s 97%. Even the Space Shuttle, which killed 14 astronauts, had a 98.5% success rate.

Not that I'm against commercial launches or even crewed commercial launches (they should know the risks). Point being that SpaceXs latest programs are more dangerous than NASAs.

>>8323181
spacex's 2 failures were due to sabotage

>>8323181
>Falcon 9 (which they plan on crewing) has a 90% success rate, far below that of the Atlas V’s 100% and the Delta IV’s 97%.
Falcon 9's success rate is 96.4%, and has never had a failure that would have resulted in a loss of crew if manned.

Delta IV and Atlas V have each suffered a failure which resulted in the total loss of the primary payload, and they have each suffered another alarming failure which affected vehicle performance but did not cause the loss of the primary payload. Just like Falcon 9.

The Atlas V's total failure was "classified as a success" only because of the corruption relationship between US defense contractors and US military and intelligence. The payload was placed in a rapidly-decaying orbit and lost, but acknowledging this as a failure would have hurt the career prospects of the people responsible for the classification.

Delta IV Heavy's total failure was a demo flight with a boilerplate payload. Delta IV Heavy has only flown 9 times, with one total failure, therefore it has an 89% success rate.

The most recent Falcon 9 incident was a failure in testing, not a launch failure. The loss of payload is only significant to the risks of choosing a contract which puts the payload on the rocket before pre-launch testing is completed, not to the risks of launching on a Falcon 9.

The space shuttle's failures were unacceptable not because it had a generally poor record as a launch vehicle, but because it was manned and there was no launch escape system.

Correcting myself here:
>>8323239
The NROL-30 launch on Atlas V, which I described as a total failure, was only a partial failure, at least according to public information. The payload satellites were delivered to the wrong orbit, but they had sufficient onboard propulsion to reach the intended orbit.

However, this propellant was intended for use during their operational lives, and the loss of it shortens the life and reduced the usefulness of these satellites. As these are classified spy satellites, the severity of these losses is not public information.

I stand by my statement that it should not be described as a successful launch. It's possible that the truth is roughly as I described, and the satellites were short-lived and effectively useless, but it's also possible that they were usable.

The other partial failure, the launch of a Cygnus, was as I described: alarming irregularity, but the mission was completed.

>>8320506
Shouldn't they...fix it? How has it blown up so many times? Why doesn't it just not ignite or topple

File: 1473038392528.gif (3MB, 377x372px)

3MB, 377x372px

>>8323239
>Falcon 9's success rate is 96.4%

>>8323239
All bullshit aside and saying a failure is any deviation in the rocket systems launching and delivery than the numbers speak for themselves. Falcon9 is more dangerous than NASA's family. SpaceX/Tesla shouldn't receive grants it should goto NASA. Obama is a traitorous liberal cucktard.

system missions success failure
Falcon 9 29 26 3
Atlas V 64 63 1
Delta IV 33 32 1

File: 84d[1].gif (1009KB, 245x184px)

1009KB, 245x184px

>start internship
>rocket exploded days before
I really didn't want more work on top of this slave driving

File: 2016.09.02_04.54.52.jpg (8KB, 600x490px)

8KB, 600x490px

oops.. maybe it wasn't only a facebook satellite

>>8323417
Make the rockets not blow up then.

>>8323418
>yfw it's an Israel spy satellite for spooking on China's african holding
>yfw China and Russia preemptively destroy the rocket using drone

>>8323370
27/28 by any honest reckoning.

I've pointed out repeatedly, this most recent incident was not a launch failure but a test failure, and there has only been one previous case of a Falcon 9 being physically unable to perform the mission. The ditched secondary payload after an engine-out event was a customer exercising a contract option.

>>8323403
>saying a failure is any deviation in the rocket systems launching and delivery than the numbers speak for themselves
The numbers for Atlas V and Delta IV are not public in the same way Falcon 9's are.

ULA mostly does defense launches. Many of their payloads are secret, and the successful or failed deployment of the system is sensitive strategic information, and also career-relevant information they might wish to skew a certain way in dealing with, for instance, congressmen. The handling is also done in secret, and if a payload is accidentally destroyed in handling, they might very well launch a boilerplate or alternative payload rather than make any public admission that an item of strategic significance did not launch. Similarly, a failed launch due to noncatastrophic lower or upper stage failure might be covered up.

There have been multiple publicly admitted irregularities on EELV launches, not just one per EELV family as you're claiming. Comparing apples to apples, by your stated standard it should be:
Falcon 9 28 26 2
Atlas V 64 62 2
Delta IV 33 31 2

Comparing pre-launch handling accidents which resulted in the loss of a vehicle, serious damage to pad facilities, or destruction of a payload, we know ULA has never had one so dramatic and public (although its parent companies certainly had many before the merger and name change), but we have no idea how many they've had and haven't shared with the public.

File: Burnt-Apollo-1-Command-Module.jpg (78KB, 794x500px) Image search: [Google]

78KB, 794x500px

>>8323460
>I've pointed out repeatedly, this most recent incident was not a launch failure but a test failure
and?

>>8323464
And nobody was in danger from it. It wasn't an irresponsible test of a manned vehicle.

Look, SpaceX hasn't killed anyone. You want to see at an unsafe NewSpace operation, look at Virgin Galactic: rushing to make a passenger vehicle, piloted even on the earliest test flights, no ejector seats, no launch abort, no way to land the passenger compartment if something happens to the wings. They even blew people up doing unsafe ground tests (three dead, three injured), running rocket systems with people in range of the blast if something went wrong.

And I've pointed out why, while this incident is obviously not a credit to SpaceX, it's not comparable to a loss of payload in actual flight: the customer had the option of not involving the payload in these pre-flight tests, in case something went wrong, it would have just cost more.

That was not a fully tested and qualified rocket, that was a rocket that could still go through the final test of tanking and engine start-up on the actual pad it would launch from, before the payload was put on it. The customer chose not to do that. They wanted to have their payload on top of the rocket for this test, rather than pay for the rocket to be tested first, taken down for payload integration, and re-erected for launch.

>>8320555
OXYGEN

>>8323873
MY

>>8323875
SHIT

I wanna see nuclear propulsion rocket going wrong during take off.

>>8320547
if i would have problems problems understanding every 13-th word i would be classified legally deaf

>>8323501
MISSION FAILURE
AMOS-6 had contracts and a mission to be orbited around Earth and the rocket had a critical propellent failure and exploded.
>Elon pay denbts

missions are so reported as either successful or failed (and reasons given for failure).
>>8323403
These are the current correct numbers for either success or failure for these different rocket systems.

>>8320506
>Why does SpaceX have such a shit track record?
That's what you get when you let silicon valley vegan hipsters work on real engineering such as rocketry.

>>8324068
I've explained why those numbers are bullshit and the information they're based on is incomplete and unreliable. Aside from skewing them with biased interpretation, you're comparing admitted failures from a secretive defense operation backed largely by the DoD with observed failures from a highly public operation backed largely by NASA.

You can repeat them all you like, you'll still just be pushing bullshit.

>>8320506
unsustainable turnover of engineers due to paying below industry standard wages and working them like slaves 120h/week

>>8324072
>real engineering such as rocketry
Put chemicals in metal, burn them, metal flies

Fucking engineers

File: 1472584032500.gif (497KB, 245x200px)

497KB, 245x200px

>>8324093
You are a prime example of why nobody will ever take spacex or their "fans" seriously.

>>8324183
>nobody will ever take spacex or their "fans" seriously.
Take a step back and just look at what an internet chimp you have become.

Yeah, nobody will ever take SpaceX seriously. Except all of the satellite operators lined up around the block to pay tens of millions of dollars for a ride on SpaceX launches. Except NASA handing out billions of dollars in development, launch, and service contracts to SpaceX, and approving a SpaceX vehicle to dock at their most costly asset. Except investors putting billions of dollars into SpaceX. Except all the best engineering talent fighting to get a job at SpaceX. Except the US military preparing to put payloads on SpaceX rockets. Except Arianespace drastically reorganizing, struggling to prepare to compete with an operationally-mature SpaceX.

File: 200_s.gif (56KB, 461x200px)

56KB, 461x200px

>>8324209
And yet, and yet, despite all the government money they've been showered with ... they still can't reach fucking Earth orbit without blowing up.

Get a job instead of licking Elon's dry cum everywhere on the floor ffs

>>8322735
>he's still here with us right now

>>8324209
seriously, shut up. people like you are the reason why spacex is hated more and more

>>8324227
>they still can't reach fucking Earth orbit without blowing up.
>30 successful orbital launches

>>8324254
>people like you are the reason why spacex is hated more and more by a smaller and more pathetic group of people
Yup. Rubbing reality in the faces of buttblasted cynics since 2008, pushing them to be ever madder and more frothingly offputting.

>>8324292
>reality
here's some reality for you m8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jlj2BW8AtUQ

>>8322669
>SpaceX was beating them for just about every launch contract until their backlog disappeared over the horizon, and some customers are still choosing to line up for a SpaceX launch.
Not at all. Firstly, SpaceX can't even bid in the same weight class as Ariane, which is why their launch manifest shows only com sats below 6 tons. The 2 or 3 above 6 tons are all to be launched with the Falcon Heavy which has yet to show that it can fly.
Secondly, many of SpaceX's customers are booking together with a Ariane 5 backup launch. Some switched after the last failure with CRS-7. And some switched because they simply didn't want to wait forever when it became apparent that there's a huge discrepancy between SapceX announcements and what they actually deliver.

>>8324302
>here's some reality for you m8
I'm well aware of it.

The rest of the reality is that they've launched to orbit 30 times, docked spacecraft at the ISS and then returned from orbit 9 times, and propulsively landed 6 boosters, this would have been only the 9th launch of an F9 FT (45 tons heavier at lift-off than the previous model, with unprecedented subcooled propellant and recovery technology), and it's completely typical for even the most reliable rockets to have a failure or two at some point. They have another launchpad in California, and a second one near the one that was damaged that will be ready to go in November.

They'll be launching again shortly. They'll find the cause, fix it, and carry on, as they've done before. Since this was a failure during a test, rather than a launch failure, the regulatory consequences and burden will be much less significant.

After their last major failure, they took advantage of their grounded time, and temporary freedom from the pressures of ramping up launch rates, to come back with a seriously upgraded launch vehicle. They will use this pad failure as an opportunity to revamp their pad procedures toward the streamlined launch process they've always said they'd be shifting to, in order to take proper advantage of the flight-proven reusable boosters.

>>8322710
>That gets you reliability but it's absolutely horrible for industry accessibility since launching with them will always cost an arm and a leg. It makes entire classes of missions impractical.
Before you spout nonsense you should inform yourself about the industry. The bulk of the cost of space operations comes not from launching stuff into orbit. Commercial satellites cost about two to three times as much to manufacture as it costs to launch them. Military and scientific satellites around ten times as much. Costs for operating these satellites over their lifetime come additionally on top of that. The launch cost reduction of ~25% that SpaceX may or may not deliver will therefore do virtually nothing to make space more accessible. And don't even try to parrot nonsense numbers like 99% cost reductions.

>>8324349
>SpaceX can't even bid in the same weight class as Ariane
SpaceX has been advertising Falcon Heavy as an option since 2011.

Regardless, they had so many customers for lighter launches that they backlogged their manifest for single-stick F9 launches, and it has made no sense to spend three cores on one launch until their launch rate was up.

SpaceX is roughly 2 or 3 years behind schedule (not unusual for a major new transportation system). They started doing in late 2013 what they intended to be doing in 2011. However, along the way they upgraded F9 to the point that, used as an expendable vehicle, it can launch pretty much any comsat, with Falcon Heavy needed only for reusability. Ariane 5 does dual launches with a 10.5 tonne to GTO capacity, F9 does single launches with an 8.3 tonne to GTO capacity.

>there's a huge discrepancy between SapceX announcements and what they actually deliver.
People like you, who weren't very interested in the launch industry and things like launch rates and ramping up new vehicles into production, and have only gone digging to find criticisms of SpaceX, don't understand that this "huge discrepancy" is pretty normal, and SpaceX has been doing very well by industry standards.

The only disadvantage they have is operating a new vehicle, at a time when the competition is operating mature vehicles nearing the ends of their program lives.

Delta IV single-stick has already been discontinued, with the Heavy only sticking around for a few more rare, special-case launches. ULA's rushing to get Vulcan ready to replace Atlas V. Arianespace is doing the same with Ariane 6 to replace Ariane 5. Both are talking about partial reusability, purely in imitation of SpaceX but years behind, having changed their tune about its cost-effectiveness as SpaceX has made progress. Proton is being replaced with Angara.

You will see all of these troubles with schedule and infant mortality playing out with SpaceX's competitors.

>>8324235
I think that's job tb'h

As far as this can be considered a proper job

>>8324422
>Delta IV single-stick has already been discontinued, with the Heavy only sticking around for a few more rare, special-case launches. ULA's rushing to get Vulcan ready to replace Atlas V. Arianespace is doing the same with Ariane 6 to replace Ariane 5. Both are talking about partial reusability, purely in imitation of SpaceX but years behind, having changed their tune about its cost-effectiveness as SpaceX has made progress. Proton is being replaced with Angara.
I don find it rather funny how people here keep shitting on SpaceX and calling their whole concept stupid, while at the same time the rest of the launch-industry has, in public, signaled a fear of being passed by them. Its almost as if the actual rocket scientists and CEO's around the world knows more about this than people on a Korean hand-knitting forum.

>>8324454
I do*

>>8324375
>The launch cost reduction of ~25% that SpaceX may or may not deliver will therefore do virtually nothing to make space more accessible.
They have already delivered larger cost reductions than 25%. Arianespace's future is in doubt since its state sponsors have had to step up with tens of millions in additional subsidies per launch to keep its prices competitive with SpaceX's, and they're getting antsy.

The Arianespace leadership's response to SpaceX's reusability plans was to laugh and say it would never work. Now they're sweating under the glare of their paymasters.

>And don't even try to parrot nonsense numbers like 99% cost reductions.
>And don't even try to parrot nonsense numbers like computers fitting in a closet instead of a large room.
90% reductions, relative to the pre-SpaceX first-world situation, are probably coming in the next two or three years, from the maturity of booster reuse. A further 90% reduction is likely to result from the maturity of their next-generation vehicle, which will combine economy of scale with total reuse optimized for long life and low maintenance.

>The bulk of the cost of space operations comes not from launching stuff into orbit. Commercial satellites cost about two to three times as much to manufacture as it costs to launch them.
More precisely, the bulk of the cost of space operations comes from not launching stuff into orbit. Things have to work without being tested in space, and without the possibility of maintenance, fitting into very tight mass budgets, with launch contracts signed years in advance of launch, long before the satellite is complete.

Dramatically lower launch costs and flights available on shorter notice will lead to dramatically lower satellite costs due to the effect on the development process.

>>8322769
>>8322814
Never trust SpaceX's numbers. They've been wrong many times and changed them frequently. The wayback machine can deliver quite some amusement when applied to announcements of SpaceX and Elon Musk.
You can't get 71% more payload capacity by making a rocket 4% longer and 8% heavier. You people need to learn basic rocket science so you can check claims for validity.

>Arianespace is HEAVILY subsidized by European governments.
Every LSP is. But the European is the least subsidized of all both in direct payments and in getting government sponsored launches. Consequently it adopted the most market oriented approach, while SpaceX is 70% government money.

File: 1472932256987.gif (2MB, 245x281px)

2MB, 245x281px

>>8324475
>They have already delivered larger cost reductions than 25%
Their prices have gone up since falcon 9 has started flying, and their service quality has gone down dramatically
>Arianespace's future is in doubt since its state sponsors have had to step up with tens of millions in additional subsidies per launch to keep its prices competitive with SpaceX's, and they're getting antsy.
Patently false. Arianespace will never go out of business because European satellite providers have to launch with them by law
>90% reductions, relative to the pre-SpaceX first-world situation, are probably coming in the next two or three years
hahaha
They will be grounded due to launch failures 30 out of the next 36 months
>A further 90% reduction is likely to result from the maturity of their next-generation vehicle
No such thing
>Dramatically lower launch costs and flights available on shorter notice will lead to dramatically lower satellite costs due to the effect on the development process.
None of what you're saying follows, logically.

>>8322947
>Nice weasel-wording.
Trying to claim dumping a payload due to engine malfunction as success for the rocket because of the legal framework involved now THAT is weasel-wording.

>>8324516
>You can't get 71% more payload capacity by making a rocket 4% longer and 8% heavier.
Are you an idiot? They previously did not give out expendable-mode capacity figures. Instead, they gave reusable-mode target figures, keeping the Falcon 9 1.1 advertised capacities similar to Falcon 9 1.0 figures, despite increasing mass 50% and improving efficiency, so they could reserve the additional performance for their own recovery experiments.

They didn't reveal most of the 1.1 performance gain until they got to the FT, so it was a 65% heavier rocket with improved mass-ratios and specific impulse.

Anyway, they didn't upgrade from 1.1 to FT just by making it longer and heavier. They got 12% more thrust without adding engine mass, and put more fuel in the tanks without making them bigger or heavier.

>>8324541
>>They have already delivered larger cost reductions than 25%
>Their prices have gone up since falcon 9 has started flying
Inflation increase only. The nominal price has gone up, not the inflation-adjusted price. Dollars are worth less over time because they keep printing more. And their prices are more than a 25% reduction on what you could get before SpaceX came along.

>Arianespace will never go out of business because European satellite providers have to launch with them by law
"European satellite providers" aren't paying the bills at Arianespace. European governments are making up the difference between costs and prices, and that burden will get much heavier if they can't win international launch contracts (allowing the program costs to be amortized over fewer launches), or have to match SpaceX's prices to do it.

Furthermore, satellite providers based in Europe aren't the only people who provide satellite services to Europe. The Amos-6 satellite was going to provide services to customers in Europe. If European service providers can't be competitive because of high launch costs, they will lose business to foreign satellites.

Laws like that aren't written in stone. When they start to look stupid, they can be changed.

>their service quality has gone down dramatically
>They will be grounded due to launch failures 30 out of the next 36 months
>None of what you're saying follows, logically.
Keep fucking that chicken.

>>8324584
>dumping a payload due to engine malfunction
>dumping a payload due to [activation of a contract option relating to an] engine malfunction [which was within the parameters of the mission requirements, and allowed for in the vehicle's reliability model as a many-engine design with engine-out capability]

>because of the legal framework involved
>because it was an intentional action undertaken at a customer's request when the vehicle was still physically capable of inserting the secondary payload in the target orbit

>>8324422
>>SpaceX can't even bid in the same weight class as Ariane
>SpaceX has been advertising Falcon Heavy as an option since 2011.
Wow, you omitted the next sentence in your quote which read "The 2 or 3 above 6 tons are all to be launched with the Falcon Heavy which has yet to show that it can fly" in order to make it look like you have an argument. That's desperate.

>F9 does single launches with an 8.3 tonne to GTO capacity.
It doesn't. It never has. It never will. The heaviest was 5.3t. The heaviest with successful landing was 4.7t. And everything above 6t in the launch manifest is planned for Falcon Heavy.

>People like you
Ad hominem doesn't constitute a valid argument, no matter how wrong your assumptions about me.

>>8324640
>>>SpaceX can't even bid in the same weight class as Ariane
>>>their launch manifest shows only com sats below 6 tons
>>>2 or 3 above 6 tons are all to be launched with the Falcon Heavy
>Wow, you omitted the next sentence
Wow, you contradicted yourself and I didn't respond to every mutually inconsistent position you held simultaneously and expressed in the same post.

You know where you belong.
>>>/trash/

>>F9 does single launches with an 8.3 tonne to GTO capacity.
>It doesn't. It never has.
It can, and they will if it ever makes sense, for instance if they get the F9 launch rate up and recovery working until they have boosters to spare, but they're having technical problems with Falcon Heavy.

>everything above 6t in the launch manifest is planned for Falcon Heavy.
1) Because they're backlogged to hell and back and contracted everything before the performance of the FT in expendable mode was established.
2) Because Falcon Heavy can launch those payloads in reusable mode, which, when developed, should be cheaper than expending a core.

>>8324475
>They have already delivered larger cost reductions than 25%.
Not really. They cost about $70M for a small to medium com sat which on an Ariane 5 would be the smaller of two which both share the cost according to their share of payload mass. That's pretty much the same price. They did rattle the cage but they have yet to deliver. Where they actually did deliver cost reduction was for US-only launches, i.e. NASA and DoD, albeit at lower reliability.

>The Arianespace leadership's response to SpaceX's reusability plans was to laugh and say it would never work.
They never doubted the possibility of reusability. They doubted various outrageous claims of the sort of reducing cost to 1% of today's cost etc. Long before SpaceX came on the scene studies by both NASA and ESA established that reusability can achieve 30% cost reduction. In the early days of SpaceX Musk spoke of 25%. But later claims just took off from reality.

>And don't even try to parrot nonsense numbers like computers fitting in a closet instead of a large room.
Are you aware of Moore's law? Rockets aren't like that. If you look at the history it's clear were reaching an asymptotic limit with chemical rockets.

>>8324375
You're not looking ahead far enough. If they can drop prices far enough, it starts becoming practical for universities and small organizations to start sending stuff up. Not just little cubesat shits, real satellites designed to stay in orbit for long periods of time. Once one notable university sends up a sat, it'll become a dickwaving contest and every university will want to send their own up. It'll keep snowballing until an individual can buy a picosat/cubesat in orbit for less than a low-to-mid range telescope, opening up orbital science like never before.

>>8324475
>More precisely, the bulk of the cost of space operations comes from not launching stuff into orbit. Things have to work without being tested in space, and without the possibility of maintenance, fitting into very tight mass budgets, with launch contracts signed years in advance of launch, long before the satellite is complete.
>Dramatically lower launch costs and flights available on shorter notice will lead to dramatically lower satellite costs due to the effect on the development process.
Over time com sat masses grew and grew. They became ever more capable by carrying ever more transponders. By your logic someone should have already come up with the idea of making a satellite less capable by, say, reducing the number of transponders, but cheaper to develop and produce by utilizing the remaining mass budget with a more rugged and cheaper design. Well, guess what, people who invest billions over the span of 15+ years calculate very carefully and look at all the options before they go ahead. Your scenario hasn't happened yet, because it doesn't work like that. Yes, the possibility of cheap maintenance could change that. But we're not even remotely there. And SpaceX isn't gonna change that. Full reusability is a completely different ballpark. Just look at the Shuttle.

>>8324706
I think the bigger problem is the lack of mass-produced, standardized satellite platforms. When each satellite is essentially bespoke, of course designing and building them isn't going to be cheap.

One of the things SpaceX's Seattle office is working on is a mass-produceable common satellite platform (which I'll refer to as CSP from here on). If they can produce 2-4 variations of the CSP to fit the bulk of customer needs, they're going to have something very appealing and will almost immediately see demand. Why risk spending billions designing and crafting your own satellite when you can buy an off-the-shelf model that does 90% of the same thing for a fraction of the price and just install custom software on it?

It's similar to what happened with the PC industry: initially, every company did their own thing and PCs were absurdly expensive, but then IBM clones and ATX rolled around and PC prices have been in a nosedive ever since.

>>8324586
>Are you an idiot? They previously did not give out expendable-mode capacity figures.
Are you an idiot? Never did they attempt a landing with the v1.1 when they were close to the advertised 4850kg payload capacity because that's the non-reusable limit. The heaviest successful landing was after deploying a 2.3t payload. The heaviest unsuccessful attempt was after deploying a 2.4t payload.

>so they could reserve the additional performance for their own recovery experiments.
They didn't do recovery experiments with the v1.1 when the payload was more than 2.4t despite having many opportunities to do so. That's because the heavier payloads were exceding the reusable payload capacity. And all payloads were below the advertised 4850 kg limit. The heaviest payload was 4.7t.

>Anyway, they didn't upgrade from 1.1 to FT just by making it longer and heavier. They got 12% more thrust without adding engine mass, and put more fuel in the tanks without making them bigger or heavier.
The latter improves mass fraction a tiny bit but as I said you need to learn basic rocket science so you can check claims for validity. The rocket equation is dominated by the exhaust velocity. The former gives a couple of dozen more m/s delta-v due to lower gravity losses but that's it. F9 FT can not throw 8.3t to GTO.

>>8324624
not that anon but
>The nominal price has gone up, not the inflation-adjusted price.
Last time we had an annual inflation rate of more than 7 percent for extended periods was in the 70s.

>European governments are making up the difference between costs and prices
About €100M annually. US LSPs get billions.
Also what the guy you replied to said about "European satellite providers have to launch with them by law" is flat out wrong. SES and Eutelsat have already launched with SpaceX. Inmarsat has booked a future launch. Even the German DoD did. It's the other way round: US government launches are mandated by law to be launched with a US LSP which adds to the direct subsidies.

Also, are you a lawyer by trade? The way you try to talk away that failure is hilarious.

>>8324665
>Wow, you contradicted yourself and I didn't respond to every mutually inconsistent position you held simultaneously and expressed in the same post.
Are you an autist or assburger by any chance? Making a statement about a general rule and then listing the few exceptions is common English.

>It can
nope

>1) Because they're backlogged to hell and back and contracted everything before the performance of the FT in expendable mode was established.
"Hey guys, our backlog is so full we need to launch more frequently. But, hey, let's not use these 3 rockets to launch 3 of those heavier than 6t payloads. Instead let's bolt them together to launch only one of them and reduce our launch frequency even more."
Are you retarded?

>2) Because Falcon Heavy can launch those payloads in reusable mode
YES, or in other words: because the F9 FT can NOT.

>>8324695
>If you look at the history it's clear were reaching an asymptotic limit with chemical rockets.
The fuel costs under 0.1% of the price of a launch, and the history of launch wasn't trending toward improvements in cost-effectiveness between 1980 and 2010.

The only asymptotic approach was toward an apparent limit of a 2% failure rate for mechanically-complex expendable rockets built with large amounts of fallible human labor, not toward some cost limit.

You have to look at where orbital rockets came from: ICBM development programs, for delivery of city-destroying nuclear bombs. There was an extreme cost-insensitivity in this application, which was inordinately attractive to profiteering contractors and state embezzlers. From the 1950s to the early 2000s, regulatory capture prevented any serious competition in cost-effectiveness, and despite major technological advancements, the cost of space rockets never significantly improved on those of the V-2 program of Nazi Germany (the 12,500 kg V-2 booster could lift a 1000 kg warhead to space, at an equivalent of $1.5 million incremental unit cost -- the Sputnik rocket which first achieved orbit in 1957 was comparable to 5 double-V-2s stuck together in a parallel-staging arrangement for an orbital payload of ~1000 kg), only the capabilities and reliability improved.

Since the high costs were the source of profit opportunities to the people responsible for building the rockets, and the source of prestige and career advancement to the bureaucrats responsible for keeping them honest, the only real counterpressure was a flat inability to find anyone to pay the costs if they got too high. Serious cost-reducing efforts were strangled in the crib (OTRAG) or subverted into profiteering bonanzas (Space Shuttle).

The key development was the 2006 U.S. National Space Policy, prompted by disgust with the excesses of the shuttle:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/microsites/ostp/national-space-policy-2006.pdf

>>8320627
I think the rocket and payload are far more valuable than the astronauts

>>8324699
>You're not looking ahead far enough. If they can drop prices far enough
An argument like that is like a request for belief. Which is not surprising considering SpaceX fanboys behave like religious zealots.

Continued: >>8324862
...particularly these lines of the policy:
>The United States is committed to encouraging and facilitating a growing and entrepreneurial U.S. commercial space sector. Toward that end, the United States Government will use U.S. commercial space capabilities to the maximum practical extent, consistent with national security.
>Enable a dynamic, globally competitive domestic commercial space sector in order to promote innovation, strengthen U.S. leadership, and protect national, homeland, and economic security;

Laws and executive orders also supported these principles, directing the FAA and NASA to promote entrepreneurship in the orbital launch industry, thereby giving companies like SpaceX, Orbital, and Blue Origin the grounds to sue and win if they were obstructive or sole-sourced launch contracts without a bidding process, which could also be challenged in court if the criteria weren't clear or applied fairly.

So the competitive private launch industry is about 10 years old now, and the old shitshow is crumbling in the face of it. Affordable booster recovery has been demonstrated and reuse is expected to be demonstrated in the next few months (it would have been next month, if not for the pad explosion).

>>8324736
Current com sats are already being produced in small series production. Hence the cost difference vs military or scientific sats. For larger series there's simply no market. What SapceX plans is already being done by Loral, Hughes, Astrium and many others. It's called a satellite bus. SpaceX ain't gonna reinvent the wheel.

>>8324859
>>1) Because they're backlogged to hell and back and contracted everything before the performance of the FT in expendable mode was established.
>"Hey guys, our backlog is so full we need to launch more frequently. But, hey, let's not use these 3 rockets to launch 3 of those heavier than 6t payloads. Instead let's bolt them together to launch only one of them and reduce our launch frequency even more."
Are you seriously this stupid? Previous interaction suggests: yes.

The point is that customers lined up around the block for their (demonstrated, working) single-stick Falcon 9 before they even started advertising a price for Falcon Heavy, then they lined up further until the front of the line disappeared over the planning horizon before SpaceX had validated the performance of the F9 FT with an actual flight so they could provide hard numbers above 6t to GTO.

>>8324776
>you need to learn basic rocket science so you can check claims for validity. The rocket equation is dominated by the exhaust velocity. The former gives a couple of dozen more m/s delta-v due to lower gravity losses but that's it. F9 FT can not throw 8.3t to GTO.
Oh my god, you absolute fucking chimp. Do you seriously believe that they would advertise a capability like that if it could be debunked just by applying the rocket equation?

The rocket equation is not "dominated by the exhaust velocity" any more than it's "dominated by propellant mass fraction" or "dominated by overall size". All three are essential characteristics for determining vehicle performance, and gravity losses and aerodynamics are also important.

Gaining thrust without adding engine mass and densifying propellant allowed both the increase of overall size and the improvement of propellant mass fraction. Propellant mass fraction is especially important for upper stages going to higher orbits, since every pound of dry mass on the upper stage is a pound which must be subtracted from the payload.

File: What?.gif (486KB, 475x347px)

486KB, 475x347px

>>8322418

File: Just.png (3MB, 3209x2405px)

3MB, 3209x2405px

I saw Elon Musk at a grocery store in Los Angeles yesterday. I told him how cool it was to meet him in person, but I didn’t want to be a douche and bother him and ask him for photos or anything.

He said, “Oh, like you’re doing now?”

I was taken aback, and all I could say was “Huh?” but he kept cutting me off and going “huh? huh? huh?” and closing his hand shut in front of my face. I walked away and continued with my shopping, and I heard him chuckle as I walked off. When I came to pay for my stuff up front I saw him trying to walk out the doors with like fifteen Milky Ways in his hands without paying.

The girl at the counter was very nice about it and professional, and was like “Sir, you need to pay for those first.” At first he kept pretending to be tired and not hear her, but eventually turned back around and brought them to the counter.

When she took one of the bars and started scanning it multiple times, he stopped her and told her to scan them each individually “to prevent any electrical infetterence,” and then turned around and winked at me. I don’t even think that’s a word. After she scanned each bar and put them in a bag and started to say the price, he kept interrupting her by yawning really loudly.

>>8324862
>>8324900
excellent posts

>>8324985
There's probably more insight in that post than in all of that spacex autistic fandoby's ramblings ITT. He just never gets tired of his bullshit, it's pretty amazing.

>>8324985
Dude this is the same exact copy pasta that someone wrote about that asian mathematician terrence tao or whatever lol

>>8321521

>Sweet dreams and flying machines in pieces on the ground.

Blue Origin is genuinely about to BTFO spacex fucking shits
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgqnlUifggw

>>8325281
I'm probably responsible for half the posts defending SpaceX ITT, and I have no problem with this. Thanks for posting, that was some good news about Blue Origin moving forward with their plans.

I've said in other places that I think Blue Origin might get to a fully-reusable rocket about the same time as SpaceX does.

>>8325281
this guy is a hillary supporter

>>8325699
I guess #I'mWithHer now

>>8325699
Amazon needs illegals to keep wages down for their warehouses, and H1Bs to keep costs down on the software side.

>>8322788
>bashing campaigns

I've never liked that in any form by any party for any reason. If you are a company or someone to be voted for, you need to stand on your merit.

>>8322804

You can get under 1% failure rate

SpaceX is doing it hard by using newly designed gear. It's easy to design this stuff, but hard to put it into practice.

I'm sure if the design is "ok", the failure rate will be as good as Soyuz.

>>8324996
>getting excited over stale pasta

File: 2016.09.02_05.02.27.jpg (13KB, 491x491px) Image search: [Google]

13KB, 491x491px

foreign intervention

>>8320506
>what is the media

SpaceX isn't a government agency so can't suppress failures in the media or prevent their employees from talking. I assure you NASA has had plenty of failures and exploding rockets you just don't hear about it unless they invite the media to watch a launch and it esploded.

>>8325951
>being this triggered

>>8326014
>SpaceX is doing it hard by using newly designed gear.
Falcon 9 has had 28 launches
It's hardly "new" at all
>but muh iterative design
All of the failures have been caused by the second stage, which has not significantly changed in over 20 launches

>>8327052
>Falcon 9 has had 28 launches
>It's hardly "new" at all
>All of the failures have been caused by the second stage, which has not significantly changed in over 20 launches
Falcon 9 FT has only had 8 launches, the helium tank supports were redesigned from the 1.1, the second stage was stretched to increase propellant volume, and now it uses high-density subcooled propellant, a technology not only new to Falcon 9, but unprecedented in operational launch vehicles, which requires different tanking procedures (particularly the fast loading of propellant into the poorly-insulated tanks immediately prior to launch, so it doesn't have time to warm up and expand).

>All of these failures
There has been one failure during launch, of helium tank supports which have now been totally redesigned, and one failure during a test involving tanking (and in fact, seemingly initiated at the point where propellant was being loaded into the rocket) using the new propellant technology and procedure.

Reminder: this was a failure during a test. The payload being on the rocket for the test was a cost-saving option chosen by a customer who willingly accepted the known risk.

File: 1473098994519.png (14KB, 701x701px)

14KB, 701x701px

>>8327195
>the helium tank supports were redesigned from the 1.1
No.
The first F9FT was built before the CRS-7 accident

>now it uses high-density subcooled propellant, a technology not only new to Falcon 9, but unprecedented in operational launch vehicles, which requires different tanking procedures
This is probably literally what caused the recent launch failure.

>seemingly initiated at the point where propellant was being loaded into the rocket
It's obvious at this point that the second stage suffered a structural failure of some sort, and that GSE was not involved
Spacex will not fly again this year.

>Reminder: this was a failure during a test
that destroyed the payload
And Apollo 1 was a failed test that killed the crew
What's your point?

>The payload being on the rocket for the test was a cost-saving option chosen by a customer who willingly accepted the known risk.
Patently false
The Spacecomm CEO just said this about it
>This was a decision made by IAI engineers. We were of course not just guests in the theater, but the front-line engineers were from IAI and SpaceX. I think they looked back on the latest launches to perform the engineering analysis.
>I learned one thing years ago: Engineering is not mathematics.It seemed a prudent decision, and I am not sure the decision would have been different even now.

Leave it to spacex nutters to try to downplay the latest failure

Go back to r.ddit m8
At least there you can ignore the facts in peace, and ban people who disagree with Musk worship.

File: 36565634543.png (271KB, 872x722px) Image search: [Google]

271KB, 872x722px

>the explosion video is now the most viewed spacex video in history
JUST

Looks like people are finally waking up to the sham that is spacex

File: 2016.09.02_04.46.53-360x360.jpg (16KB, 360x360px)

16KB, 360x360px

>>8327234
No, they just like esplosions. It's called firecracker propulsion for a reason.

File: images (3).jpg (4KB, 101x193px)

4KB, 101x193px

>>8327234
Or people like to see expensive shit blow up because we are collectively a bunch of cunts

Also half of the views are from /pol/ jacking off to Zuckerberg's satellite getting blown up

>>8327223
>The first F9FT was built before the CRS-7 accident
So are we talking about designation or actual construction? The F9FTs aren't all identical. Even if what you're saying is true, every one after that had the new helium tank supports.

>>Reminder: this was a failure during a test
>that destroyed the payload
>And Apollo 1 was a failed test that killed the crew
>What's your point?
You know damn well what my point was. I made it in the next sentence: it was not necessary, and was at the customer's option, that the payload be involved in the test.

>>The payload being on the rocket for the test was a cost-saving option chosen by a customer who willingly accepted the known risk.
>Patently false
>The Spacecomm CEO just said this about it
>>This was a decision made by IAI engineers.
IAI is Israel Aerospace Industries, who was responsible for building and operating the satellite. If Spacecomm was the launch customer (the holder of the actual contract with SpaceX to launch the satellite), then they delegated the decision to IAI, who made it as their representative to SpaceX.

You've posted a plain statement that it was SpaceX's customer's decision, as support for your claim that this is "patently false". Fucking chimp.

>>8327326
https://youtu.be/nCQGQ5qBQTA

Elon Musk will forget about SpaceX soon and sell it.
That's how he does business, promise big things to attract investor money then abandon the ship before it sinks.

Screenshot this.

>>8327380
>The F9FTs aren't all identical.
So? Atlas V has numerous combinations and is far more successful than falcon 9
>every one after that had the new helium tank supports.
The supports were changed you moron, they only changed the qualification testing for them.

>You know damn well what my point was.
You clearly do not.
You keep pretending that everyone here is calling it a "launch failure" because it makes your stance easier to defend by pretending that it doesn't count against falcon 9's reliability.
It was a failure.
Deal with it.

>You've posted a plain statement that it was SpaceX's customer's decision, as support for your claim that this is "patently false". Fucking chimp.
What?
There's no point in testing something if the test endangers the thing that the test is trying to protect
Do you think they'll have astronauts aboard dragon 2 during the static fire tests?

>>8324448
What do you think his salary arrangements are?
Does he do it for no monetary compensation?

>>8327417
weren't changed*

>>8327417
>The supports were changed you moron, they only changed the qualification testing for them.
I'll assume you meant "weren't changed". But they were. They are different struts, from a different supplier, that go through a different process between arriving at the SpaceX factory and being considered installed and qualified. SpaceX stopped using the supplier that gave them bad struts.

Anyway, you're splitting hairs. I've explained how there were major differences between the 1.1 and FT upper stages, and how the differences were very likely involved in this incident.

>You keep pretending that everyone here is calling it a "launch failure" because it makes your stance easier to defend by pretending that it doesn't count against falcon 9's reliability.
I've never said it doesn't count against F9's reliability. But there's a major difference between a failure in testing and a launch failure, and it's not just whether the payload was lost.

A launch failure would speak against the advisability of launching on Falcon 9. This test failure speaks against the advisability of choosing to have your payload on top of a Falcon 9 during pre-launch testing.

The point of testing before launching is the possibility that things will fail. That's why it was ultimately the customer's decision whether to have this test before or after payload integration.

>>8327467
>But there's a major difference between a failure in testing and a launch failure
There isn't when the payload is lost in either case

If the rocket had exploded without the satellite on top, you would have a point
The fact is that it didn't though

>>8327473
That makes it the same for immediate consequences, but entirely different for implications for later launches.

>>8322418
> not being able to detect blatant sarcasm

File: 1348764844816.png (2KB, 244x226px)

2KB, 244x226px

>>8327527

>>8320506
A UFO was used to destroy it, like the twin towers.

>>8320566
You can't schlep that on. It has to be designed in from the beginning.
>>8320627
The engineer that warned about the o rings has ptsd/survivor's guilt I heard.

I feel bad for him regardless. But he told management. I always say that the downfall of most companies is shit management. It's something I hate 27th a passion, pisspoor, dickhead managers.
REEEEEEEE

>>8324885
You're an idiot and an asshole. It takes a lot of time and money to train astronauts. And they start with the cream of the crop, not some hobos they picked up off the street.
tl;dr
You're wrong, faggot.

>>8327777
>You can't schlep that on. It has to be designed in from the beginning.
Well... They had ejector seats on the first couple of flights. With modifications, they could probably have had up to four people on board with ejector seats. Certainly two, since that had been done.

Emergency re-entry gear for if the shuttle was damaged on launch and unlikely to survive re-entry (as in the Columbia disaster -- the impact was noted and the damage could have been confirmed) could also have been provided.

A vehicle strictly for re-entry from space doesn't need to be huge:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOOSE

The one-man Project Mercury capsule was only 1400 kg, and the two-man Project Gemini capsule launched at weights as low as 3220 kg, and neither of those was a stripped-to-the-bone emergency backup like MOOSE, which was planned to be only 90 kg and suitcase-sized, including de-orbit rocket.

Another option would be to shorten the cargo bay doors, and move non-cockpit passengers back into the forward part of the cargo bay, sitting in escape pods covered with blow-off panels.

Ejector seats have also been upgraded in the past to work at higher speeds and altitudes:
https://twitter.com/AeroDork/status/773019559532105728

File: 1472808570089.jpg (338KB, 2048x1152px)

338KB, 2048x1152px

>>8322321
>He's the most overrated person in the US, he's mediocre at innovating, he's mediocre at running a business, and he survives on government subsidies. His investment in PayPal at the right time was the only intelligent thing he ever did.

t. Fox and the grapes

>>8321534
Fucking retard detected.

>>8322534
Hell yeah. We need to get the space program to the next level.

>>8322741
>china
>being honest

>>8322777
>the cynicism /sci/ holds towards space in general is hard to understand

It's jealousy, plain and simple.

Nice digits btw

File: A15.jpg (228KB, 2455x3447px) Image search: [Google]

228KB, 2455x3447px

>>8327981
>China is lying because it hurts my feelings if they aren't

>>8328355
>2 yuan has been deposited to your account.

>>8322741
>China has perfect success records with rockets just as new or newer than Falcon 9
SpaceX also had perfect success records with Falcon 9 when it was as new or newer than it is now.

China has had failures of every line of rockets that it's launched more than 1 of. Long March 6, 7, and 11 have each had only one flight. Long March 1 and 2 date back to the 70s, Long March 3 and 4 to the 80s. All of these older series have had failures. Their limited experimentation with all-solid rockets has also had failures.

China's rockets are boring old-fashioned missiles. They never even used liquid oxygen in a first or second stage until last year. They haven't been pushing hard for labor-efficiency, worker safety, public safety, performance, environmental non-horribleness, or reusability.

Long March 2, 3, and 4, which account for nearly all China's launches, are essentially one big 4-decade-old family, which all use minor variations on the same engine for every booster and stage except the LM3 3rd stage, which is a LOX/H2 engine (which also dates back to the 70s and 80s). They've had ages to work the bugs out, hypergolic propellant rockets are generally less technically challenging (though they are environmentally appalling and tend to kill workers in horrible ways), and China launches from inland locations with consistent good weather rather than stormy coastlines (because fuck the little people).

>>8328355
China's space program is secretive, with launch sites closed to foreign observers, and aside from official releases from the generally-less-than-upfront Chinese government, can basically only be spied on.

>>8320506
>all these faggots in this thread
If I give you a 10 shot .22 and told you to play roulette with one bullet in the chamber would you do it? How many times would you respin & pull?

>>8328472
Also, look at Long March 7, for example. Weighs about 10% more than Falcon 9. Takes advantage of parallel staging like Falcon Heavy, giving an efficiency benefit. Uses a high-Isp staged combustion engine cloned from an already-mature Russian design acquired in a dodgy deal 20 years ago.

Still has a lower payload capacity than Falcon 9 to LEO!

China's not catching up to the state of the art. They're still working hard to catch up to the 1970s Soviet Union.

File: 1470355840035.jpg (65KB, 344x475px) Image search: [Google]

65KB, 344x475px

>>8322864
>it was at the option of the satellite owner to save money on the launch.

Literally pic related. And zuckerberg wrote the most butthurt Facebook post about it. Even calling out spaceX by name. Fuck him and fuck those penny pinching jews. You should know better that it's worth it to minimize the risk as much as possible. How much did they "save"
Fucking legit angry at cuckerberg and those cheap kikes.

File: cz-4_cbers1_foto10_high.jpg (262KB, 1239x874px) Image search: [Google]

262KB, 1239x874px

>>8328472
You talk all this shit about China, but they will overtake the US in number of launches this year thanks to spacex's little debacle

It doesn't matter how "cool" or "cutting edge" or "reusable" spacex shit is if it can't even get into orbit

>>8320633
checked, comrade

>>8328576
It wasn't a "facebook" satellite. I don't think they even bought more than 40% of the bandwidth capacity of it

What's with you /pol/tards recently? I thought you all hated Musk

File: 1472751921576.jpg (23KB, 439x290px) Image search: [Google]

23KB, 439x290px

>>8329046
I know it wasn't a Facebook sat. It was built by a jewish company and then purchased by another jewish company.
It's just annoying, they're living up to their stereotypes.

>>8329046
>/pol/ hating musk
He's not a minority, and is a successfull businessman. He's everything you SJWtard mouthbreathers hate. You can stop projecting now.

>>8329023
>they will overtake the US in number of launches this year thanks to spacex's little debacle
Heh. Like without SpaceX, the US would be some dominating figure in launch numbers?

SpaceX is the US commercial launch market. ULA was formed as a result of the existing American launch industry giving up on competing in the commercial market, and going to the government to beg for an exception to antitrust law so they could form a subsidized cartel that would survive on government launches and support payments. They first raised the price on and then phased out their most popular and affordable rocket, the Delta II, in favor of the more costly EELVs. They made the American government dependant on a global rival for a key component for defense launches.

China outstrips the US in building empty cities of false-front buildings (that are uninhabitable and will crumble in 20 years) to meet GDP targets, too. They've got more people. They can throw labor at things.

There isn't a competition to do the most orbital launches. China launched more than the USA did in 2011 and 2012. This wouldn't be some new milestone. And Russia launches more than the USA almost every year.

File: iss-3.jpg (56KB, 640x480px) Image search: [Google]

56KB, 640x480px

>>8323133
How much extra does it cost to install a satellite after a static test fire?

>>8329644
I don't think that's public information. It probably varies on a case-by-case basis.

>>8323418
The initial explosion looks like it's in the payload area, right? I hope the payload failed and fuckerburg apologizes to spaceX for being a butthurt faggot.

Based ayy lmaos saved us from millions of african scammers and shitposters having freee internet access

>>8324310
That was an amazing episode. Too bad it failed, it looked so good launching. I'd love to see them try again.

>>8329727
lol
Yeah, we have enough Nigerian "princes" in need of financial assistance. I honestly don't know how people fall for that. They deserve it desu.

>>8329644
-$250,000,000 apparently

https://youtu.be/VXnAP6YUwZU

Yeah, right?
It's not rocket science, they just need to make non-exploding ones.

>>8330335
Starts off with a lie about the american education system being bad
And this is some weirdo asian guy talking like he's american.

>h1b is our secret weapon
closed, cya.

>>8330830
>t. butthurt american brainlet
Don't worry I'm sure Pajeet will do your engineering for you.

File: 4564536453.png (29KB, 960x235px) Image search: [Google]

29KB, 960x235px

How can redditors be this delusional?

>>8331514
and they shadowban everyone who disagrees from that subreddit lol

File: 7.png (10KB, 875x140px) Image search: [Google]

10KB, 875x140px

>>8331518
tell me about it

>>8321098
>cut on Quality Control
Whoever made that decision should be shot

>>8331529
Remember when Musk said that he discovered the cost of materials to make the rocket was 1% of the cost of a launch, and wondered what the catch was? Well I think he just found it.

>>8331537
Well probably cheaper to have a couple rocket blow ups than to spend endless hundreds of millions proofing everything.

I don't think you can speak in generalites about failures caused by very specific problems either.

File: 4754336544.png (47KB, 633x323px)

47KB, 633x323px

IT'S HAPPENING!

>>8320566
Because no viable system for evacuating a human from a rocket travelling mach fuck existed that didn't also run the likelihood of killing the crew.
Spending hundreds of millions of dollars to redesign a spacecraft from the ground up with a escape system that still had upwards of an 80% chance of killing the crew to prepare for the .001% of launch failures didn't make sense then and doesn't today.

>>8331620
Yes, while reducing the number of failures is important, the number isn't ever going to be zero, so the answer isn't to spend inordinate amounts of time of money to eliminate failures entirely, but instead to handle failures gracefully, e.g. jettison the payload/crew at the first millisecond of a hint of trouble. Crew dragon can do this, so that problem is already taken care of… they just need to phase out the current model of Dragon in favor of the new one.

>>8331976
You know the challenger crew probably survived until they impacted the ocean right? If the crew compartment had had parachutes they would have survived, ignoring the feasability of actually making that work

>>8331522
>>8331518
Ah, that's why we're getting these chimps here. Redditors who got themselves banned for being morons, who wanted to go on being morons somewhere.

>>8320506
Eli Musk is rich enough to make profitable progress by trial and error alone. He could higher more competent scientist and mathematicians but he likes it when things explode. He basically makes minor changes to each rocket then scratches that type of rocket off a list of viable travel methods when it fails. He honestly considered predicting the likely hood of rocket failure but he enjoys this way more.

>>8331518
They don't mind disagreement and criticism from what I've seen, but it has to be constructive. You can't be an edgy memelord and you can't make negative posts unless they're solidly provable and backed up. It's how they prevent shitflinging.

File: 1.png (11KB, 752x116px) Image search: [Google]

11KB, 752x116px

>>8332698
I just go there for the trolling

I can get around 800-1000 dislikes per day on the spacex reddit depending on how many times I'm willing to change my IP, especially at a time like this

File: 3.png (10KB, 596x118px) Image search: [Google]

10KB, 596x118px

>>8332729
>They don't mind disagreement and criticism from what I've seen
You haven't seen much apparently
I got banned for posting this

>>8332741
Because it doesn't add anything to the conversation and with that kind of tone, it's looking for a fight, especially in the context of a dramatic event. The only place it can possibly lead to is a useless chain of hairsplitting about definitions and technicalities.

You could've easily made a post carrying the same information without the trollish feel and opened up discourse, but you didn't.

>>8332741
Yeah, that is blatant shitflinging.

First point: technically true but totally irrelevant. ULA was formed by a merger of two rocket programs that date back to the 60s.

Second point: meaningless gibberish with a side of racism.

File: xo0oSNP.jpg (738KB, 1920x1280px) Image search: [Google]

738KB, 1920x1280px

>>8332763
>Because it doesn't add anything to the conversation
What do you mean by that?
People on that sub like posting non-facts (like "ULA is older than spacex" or "China is a less reliable launch provider than spacex"
I'm simply correcting them.

>it's looking for a fight
How?

>especially in the context of a dramatic event
If anyone gets upset by a comment on the internet then they need to grow up

>The only place it can possibly lead to is a useless chain of hairsplitting about definitions and technicalities
This is only true because spacex "fans" cannot deal with facts (like the fact that falcon 9 is second only to antares for least reliable launch vehicle in the business today)

>trollish feel
What?
What are you even doing on this site m8?

I got banned for that comment because it called out these kids' precious meme company and they got butthurt about it

>>8332765
>Yeah, that is blatant shitflinging.
How? Calling out someone's BS is not shitflinging

>ULA was formed by a merger of two rocket programs that date back to the 60s
and 70% of spacex is made up of industry veterans who should know better than to let their rockets explode like that

>Second point: meaningless gibberish with a side of racism.
lol, what?
You don't take China seriously because all you know about them or their space program is what you read from trash writers like Eric Berger
or sites like Wired or Popular mechanics, and you're calling me "racist?"

top kek

Both of you should go back to your home site, as you are incapable of handling bantz

>>8332765

where's the racism? China is a country. The Chinese aren't a race.

>>8332784
>bantz
Look, this is /sci/. This isn't a place for "bantz", trolling, shitflinging, deliberate misinformation as a joke, or "joke's on you, I was just pretending to be retarded".

People come here to talk seriously about things, and to learn. When someone posts things that are wrong and stupid, other people try to set them straight, so the conversation can continue on the basis of accurate information and sound reasoning. So if you come here and intentionally post things that are wrong and stupid, you're wasting our time.

If spending your time to waste our time feels like a victory to you, makes you feel significant, isn't that an understanding on some level within you that our time is more valuable than yours? ...that we are your betters?

You are garbage. This is a place for people who are not garbage. Go be garbage somewhere else.

File: 2132132131.jpg (122KB, 1332x704px)

122KB, 1332x704px

>>8328508
>Uses a high-Isp staged combustion engine cloned from an already-mature Russian design acquired in a dodgy deal 20 years ago.

It's actually very hard to clone a rocket. As Spacex is learning right now. It all has to do with the metallurgy needed for crafting. The Russians are experts at this and are the best in the world. Hence why they rarely suffer any major explosions in the last 30 years.

File: 1441251673853.jpg (88KB, 622x562px) Image search: [Google]

88KB, 622x562px

>>8332807
>/sci/
>People come here to talk seriously about things, and to learn.
haha

>When someone posts things that are wrong and stupid, other people try to set them straight, so the conversation can continue on the basis of accurate information and sound reasoning. So if you come here and intentionally post things that are wrong and stupid, you're wasting our time.
Did you even read my post?
>People on that sub like posting non-facts (like "ULA is older than spacex" or "China is a less reliable launch provider than spacex"
I'm simply correcting them.

>You are garbage.
You are upset by comments on the internet.
You have the maturity of a 12 year old girl.

>If spending your time to waste our time feels like a victory to you, makes you feel significant, isn't that an understanding on some level within you that our time is more valuable than yours? ...that we are your betters?
How ironic
see >>8322735

>>8332813

Just wanna add one more thing

>It may have been designed decades ago, but there is simply no equivalent engine ever produced in the US. This only one that comes close would be the Space Shuttle Main Engines, which use a different fuel. It is one of the best, and highest performing engines ever produced. It's so tough to reproduce because of the metallurgy. The RD-180 runs an oxidizer rich, staged combustion cycle, meaning that all of your propellant is def through a pre-burner, where some of it is ignited to run the turbopumps, then the rest of it is ignited at high pressure in the combustion chamber. This kind of cycle produces extremely hot, extremely high pressure oxygen gas flowing through the rocket engine, which is capable of causing steel to burst into flames. The Russians figured out a precise and proprietary alloy that can withstand these harsh conditions. The US doesnt have that formula, they dont have engineers experienced in building these engines, and they dont have the manufacturing facilities capable of churning out up to 10 of these engines per year. Its a very expensive and time consuming process.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/06/22/why-does-the-usa-depend-on-russian-rockets-to-get-us-into-space.html

https://www.reddit.com/r/space/comments/28sjih/why_does_the_usa_depend_on_russian_rockets_to_get/

>>8332784
"SpaceX isn't the broke startup it used to be. The years are piling on and it needs to start taking things more seriously or its reliability (or lack thereof) will render whatever advantages it's trying to sell moot and it'll lose its business to other countries. China has been making some real strides lately, I wouldn't be surprised if it took a sizable portion of said business."

There. Same thing said, no inflammatory tone, and it opens the topic up for actual discussion. Hell, you might even get people agreeing with you. It most certainly wouldn't have gotten you banned.

>>8332822
Russia is still easily the best in staged combustion engines

The RD-181 is their third generation of that class of engine, and spacex and blue origin are still years away from the first generation of American staged combustion engines

Russia has also launched more rockets into space each year than the US every year since 2003

>>8332828
Nothing of what my original comment said was contained in your revision of it.

>>8332834
Mostly because your comment had no actual content or value

>>8331620
>Well probably cheaper to have a couple rocket blow ups than to spend endless hundreds of millions proofing everything.

Tell that to the customers.

>>8332864
>Tell that to the customers
They probably do

>>8331976
Launch escape systems existed in the 60s. The shuttle was actually a step backward in that regard.

>>8332715
Musk's wealth is in the value of his companies, he pretty much sunk everything into SpaceX and Tesla, he can't afford to bankroll it.

>>8332849
>Mostly because your comment had no actual content or value
only because you're triggered by its truth

>>8332822
It's all PR spin, of course. LM had to prove they could produce the engines in the USA to get permission to use an import engine on an EELV. The reason ULA won't do it is the same reason LM wanted to import them in the first place: the skilled labor costs are far lower in Russia, and Russian laborers are not represented by a strong lobby in Washington.

When Washington started sanctioning Russia and told ULA to prepare to launch without Russian engines, Aerojet Rocketdyne (AJR: the provider of all ULA's other engines) said, "Yes, we can do that!" and ULA shot back, "NO, WE DON'T WANT YOU TO!"

Hence, both AJR's AR1, a straight replacement of the Atlas V engine, and Vulcan, a more extreme redesign using Blue Origin's BE-4 and requiring a change to unprecedented cryogenic methane fuel, under development. AR1 is proceeding against ULA's objections, because the US military views the Atlas V, their only remaining fully qualified and proven launch vehicle (aside from the excruciatingly costly and low-flight-rate Delta IV Heavy), as a strategic asset not to be cast aside lightly. Vulcan is proceeding as an option that doesn't require ULA to let AJR's nose into the tent, doesn't require any major outlays of cash or commitments in the near term, and can suffer unlimited delays with plausible excuses, justifying the prolongation of Atlas V as-is and more engine import waivers.

Note that both AR1 and BE-4 are staged combustion engines with comparable performance profiles to RD-180. Both companies report that the development is going smoothly, and ULA additionally still reports that domestic production of the RD-180 is an option.

The idea that Soviet metallurgy of the 1970s is beyond the reach of modern materials science is laughable at first glance.

>>8332880
Theres nothing to be triggered by, its a just a troll post

>>8332890
how is it a troll post?

>>8332882
>science

Metallurgy isn't really a science but craftsmanship. No one here is arguing Americans can have their own metallurgists helping to build rockets american rockets, it would just be more expansive, unreliable and would take tons of time for R&D.

>>8332882
>The reason ULA won't do it is the same reason LM wanted to import them in the first place: the skilled labor costs are far lower in Russia, and Russian laborers are not represented by a strong lobby in Washington.
Are you serious m8?

Congress literally mandated that Lockheed use a Russian engine on Atlas III, for the sole purpose of keeping former Soviet engineers employed working for us rather than disappearing to work with Iran or N. Korea.

Also, the engines were (and still are) better than any American engine. As far as I'm aware, AJR's alternative is more expensive than the RD-180 for slightly less performance.

>but muh evil corporations!
This is a congress-created debacle, ironically being "solved" by some of the very same people who created the problem in the first place.

>The idea that Soviet metallurgy of the 1970s is beyond the reach of modern materials science is laughable at first glance.
Not really. The US has yet to create an engine that can handle oxygen-rich environments like that. Arguing about whether or not it is "science" just semantics.

>>8328355
>that picture

COWBOY BEBOP IS COMING BABY CANT WAIT

>>8332765
>it's racist to criticize china

you're the problem

File: 0013729c0025088a2f544f.jpg (515KB, 1980x2840px)

515KB, 1980x2840px

>>8332959
Wha?

>>8332911
>Metallurgy isn't really a science but craftsmanship.
I referred to "70s metallurgy" vs. "modern materials science" for a reason. In that span of time, a great deal of what was guesswork and black art has *become* a science.

>>8332829
>Russia is still easily the best in staged combustion engines
Perhaps. It's still not clear that they're a good idea, though, particularly when it's only for an expendable booster.

What you gain in specific impulse, you lose in thrust-to-weight, thrust-to-material-cost, thrust-to-labor, and thrust-to-design-effort. For instance, RD-180 has a thrust-to-weight ratio of about 80, while Merlin 1D has a thrust-to-weight ratio of about 180. So Falcon 9 has less mass of engines than Atlas V 401, and lower specific impulse for both stages (much lower for the upper stage), yet it ends up being able to take over twice the payload to LEO, and more payload to any orbit, because it can lift bigger fuel tanks.

>>8332964
>>it's racist to criticize china
That wasn't a criticism of China. It was an implied dismissal of anything China has done as inherently unimpressive simply because it's China. It's triple-shitposting because it's also implying China has had some results that would be considered impressive by any reasonable standard, and it doesn't make any fucking sense because it's based on fundamentally backward reasoning (less failures after fewer tests is better?).

>>8332925
>Congress literally mandated that Lockheed use a Russian engine on Atlas III, for the sole purpose of keeping former Soviet engineers employed working for us rather than disappearing to work with Iran or N. Korea.
Gonna need a citation on that claim, chum.

Particularly since the official plan from the beginning was to transition to American production after a few years (a process which was supposed to be complete years ago).

>>8320555

Shhh, nasa disasters are a taboo subject on sci

>>8331620
>Well probably cheaper to have a couple rocket blow ups than to spend endless hundreds of millions proofing everything.
nope.
The satellite costs several times as much as launching it. Meaning a couple of millions of dollars extra for QA don't weigh much. And, similarly, cutting launch costs by 25% through reusabilty isn't doing much either. If the customers wanted cheap they could have had that in the pre-SpaceX era with ILS and SeaLaunch. They overwhelmingly chose Arianespace and still do. They just keep other LSPs alive with a contract here and there so Arianespace won't have a monopoly. But it's clear they'd rather have alls LSPs be more like Arianespace than like SpaceX.

>>8332813
>The Russians are experts at this and are the best in the world. Hence why they rarely suffer any major explosions in the last 30 years.
lol. You have no clue. Proton alone makes them look like complete amateurs.
The reason they have to launch more often is a) less reliability of their tech in general and b) their military satelites have shorter lifespans, to a great degree because of a), so they have to replace them more often.

Meanwhile Ariane 5 is one launch before the 74th consecutive success, thereby tieing the record of Ariane 4, and on its way to to a new all time record.

>>8333643
>>endless hundreds of millions
>a couple of millions of dollars extra for QA don't weigh much
SpaceX is more than a couple million dollars cheaper.

>The satellite costs several times as much as launching it.
In some cases, yes, but it's normally much cheaper to build a second copy. All the design, software, and tooling has been done, all the bugs have been worked out. Furthermore, cheaper launch means you can build a cheaper satellite, and plan to replace it sooner.

>cutting launch costs by 25% through reusabilty isn't doing much either
The roughly 30% price reduction will be for initial reflight experiments. In fact, the current advertised price already factors in the value and cost of an experimental recovery attempt. Routine, reliable first-stage reusability, coupled with an increase in launch rate, is expected to cut the launch price about 90%.

>They overwhelmingly chose Arianespace and still do.
They overwhelmingly chose SpaceX over Arianespace until the lineup got so long nobody knows when a newly-signed SpaceX contract will launch AND Arianespace cut its prices without significantly reducing its costs, to the great displeasure of its subsidizing governments.

You've got to realize when you see some Arianespace bigwig out in public insisting that SpaceX is going to crumble any moment now, he's fighting desperately to keep his subsidy-dependent job for a few more years.

>>8320602
Last time a NASA rocket blew up during fueling was like half a century ago.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3bos-z8Cng

File: commercial_launchers_web_1.12.15.jpg (938KB, 3154x2021px)

938KB, 3154x2021px

>>8332829
http://spacenews.com/arianespace-surpassed-spacex-in-commercial-launch-orders-in-2015/

If Russian stuff was that good, you'd think there would be an actual market for their services.

>After drawing even with Hawthorne, California-based SpaceX in 2014, with nine commercial orders each, Arianespace’s count for 2015 showed its Ariane 5 rocket winning 14 contracts for geostationary-orbit satellites, compared to nine for SpaceX and one each for International Launch Services of Reston, Virginia, which markets Russia’s Proton; and for the Atlas 5 rocket of United Launch Alliance of Centennial, Colorado.

>>8333989
>If Russian stuff was that good, you'd think there would be an actual market for their services.
Russia and its (no pun intended) satellites are politically unstable and rife with government corruption and organized crime. Lots of your workers will just refuse to travel to the Russian sphere.

Would you travel to Kazakhstan to get your dental work or surgery done for half the price you'd have to pay in a first-world country?

The quality of their launch services are far from the only factor to consider.

>>8323403
>advocating for a corporate solution instead of a government one
>traitorous liberal fucktard
>snake_at_his_computer.gif

>>8324227
>And yet, and yet, despite all the government money they've been showered with ... they still can't reach fucking Earth
>orbit without blowing up.

>literally lying to make up reason to hate spacex
Are you just shitposting ironically at this point? There are plenty of real reasons to hate them

>>8333942
>SpaceX is more than a couple million dollars cheaper.
Nope.
Falcon 9 costs about $60M for a small to medium com sat, which would be the smaller partner of two com sats on an Ariane 5 and thus apart from a couple million dollar about the same price.

>it's normally much cheaper to build a second copy.
That's the case with com sats. They are being build in small series production and still cost two to three times as much as the launch. Military and scientific sats cost about ten times as much as the launch. Hence, the impact of differences in launch costs on overall costs ist one third to one fourth at best one eleventh at worst.

>The roughly 30% price reduction will be for initial reflight experiments. In fact, the current advertised price already factors in the value and cost of an experimental recovery attempt. Routine, reliable first-stage reusability, coupled with an increase in launch rate, is expected to cut the launch price about 90%.
The first number is something that others have independently assessed. The second number is purely wishful thinking.

>>8333942
>They overwhelmingly chose SpaceX over Arianespace until the lineup got so long nobody knows when a newly-signed SpaceX contract will launch AND Arianespace cut its prices without significantly reducing its costs, to the great displeasure of its subsidizing governments.
Nope.
The big loser of SpaceX's success was ILS. Arianespace kept at least 50% of the market in all these years. And, now, with SpaceX's failures it's ILS who will most likely profit. SpaceX got a few contracts that normally Ariane 5 would have gotten only because Ariane 5 was fully booked, particularly after they won the OneWeb contract. Customers are increasingly weary of the long waiting time at SpaceX. A transponder loses money every month its launch is delayed. And some have been waiting for years.
2014 was the last year SpaceX published year dates on their launch manifest. For that year they had planned 14 launches. They achieved 6. Same in 2015. And 2016 will be no different.
At some point its more economical for the satellite operator to book a more expensive but more punctual launch. SpaceX struggled to win new contracts after the last failure and after this one they will continue to struggle to win new ones. They only won 3 contracts this year. Two customers rebooked launches from Falcon Heavy to Ariane 5 and Proton respectively. They are currently ILS-tier, a league below Arianespace.

>>8324699
so you dream of an irresponsible use of earth's orbit ?

>>8334071
>Falcon 9 costs about $60M for a small to medium com sat, which would be the smaller partner of two com sats on an Ariane 5 and thus apart from a couple million dollar about the same price.
That's for up to 5.5 tons to GTO, over half the Ariane 5's max payload of 10.5 tons and good enough for all but the biggest primary payloads, and Ariane 5 only lowered their secondary payload launch price (with additional, and unsustainable, subsidy money, not cost reductions) to compete with SpaceX's price.

Note as well that a secondary slot is only available when there's a primary customer, and as a secondary customer, it's your job to be ready when the primary customer's ready.

Prior to SpaceX coming along, a full Ariane 5 went for about $250 million, launching less to GTO than two Falcon 9s now available at half that price.

A fairly typical Ariane 5 primary payload is about 6.5 tons. Not because it has to be, but because the capacity is there. If the reward for cutting a ton off the satellite mass is halving the launch cost, customers may find a way to do it. You can do a lot with 5.5 tons.

>The first number is something that others have independently assessed.
Not for the kind of reusability that SpaceX is doing, nor in combination with the low cost and high production rate of the upper stage, or the availability of new services like affordable super-heavy launch and launch and return of personnel in a highly reusable capsule, or the launch company getting into the satellite business themselves to make use of surplus launch capacity.

The analyses that reusability would only save a small amount of money have been based on the assumption of no significant increase in launch rate.

>>8334072
Well they've had 8 launches this year, which is an improvement, and there is still a few months for them to launch a few more.
No reason for them to go awol for as long as the failure in 2015.

It's not a bad thing for SpaceX to be overbooked.

>>8333989
>spacenews
literally paid arianespace shills

>>8334072
>They only won 3 contracts this year. Two customers rebooked launches from Falcon Heavy to Ariane 5 and Proton respectively. They are currently ILS-tier, a league below Arianespace.
Looking at booking rates is nonsense if you don't consider the manifest. There was a huge rush to get in line for SpaceX's services, until that line got absurdly long because SpaceX's vehicle and operation are still new and getting up to speed.

SpaceX has customers lined up around the block. When they clear their current manifest, they'll have no trouble signing new customers, especially since they'll be selling at reusable prices.

Remember that Falcon 9 is only 6 years old. They've done 29 launches with 27 total successes, one total failure, and one additional late-stage test failure which destroyed a payload which was unnecessarily atop the vehicle for this testing, at the customer's option. When Ariane 5 was 6 years old, it had done 14 launches with 10 total successes and two total failures.

SpaceX shows every sign of being the more competent operation than Arianespace. They're ramping up the launch rate faster, with fewer failures, at lower prices, while pursuing loftier goals. They're just at an earlier stage in their vehicle lifecycle.