Starship Orbital Test Flight - 4/20 Launch

[Ogre]

They found the problem.

 

[Ogre]

Next time they should give the videographer’s a Cybertruck, not some fragile mini-van.

 

[JBee]

Next time they should give the videographer’s a Cybertruck, not some fragile mini-van.

That was in the video I posted. You can even see it coming in the full frame video if you watch it at quarter speed. The energy of the bits is nuts, especially considering that that was in every direction, in 360 degrees around the launch site. It's nearly a miracle it launched at all and the bits flying around didn't destroy it.

 

[SparkChaser]

I would love to see the insurance claim on this. Or better yet when they return it to the rental place. LOL

 

[Sirfun]

I would love to see the insurance claim on this. Or better yet when they return it to the rental place. LOL

Farmers has it covered "maybe".

 

[Coolbreeze704]

The seperation is actually a bit different on Starship in that it needs to rotate it to keep both vehicles stable while they seperate. The seperation occurs purely from the inertia difference between the Starship which is 5x as heavy as the booster at the time of seperation, because the booster is empty of fuel and Starship is still full.

So there's no mechanism that actually pushes the two apart, there's just a ring that contracts and releases the mechanical connection between the two, and they drift apart, with Starship travelling clear of booster before igniting its engines, to avoid damaging booster. Booster has to remain functional and rapidly reusable without repairs.

In all the test was a massive success, it cleared the pad despite loosing 3 engines on launch, then another 3-4 on the way up to 38km, shy of seperation altitude that has to happen in a partial vaccum. For Falcon 9 that's at 80km.

It looks like it was burning something hydrocarbon based, from just after launch like hydraulic oil etc, because methane burns clean and clear without white/grey smoke. There were also a series of flashes on the way up, where I think some major parts dropped off and burnt up in the plume.

After throttledown and passing through MaxQ, (which it survived with flying colours!) It then seemed to lose the ability to accelerate further, most likely because of the loss of so many engines, and then it ran out of fuel, lost attitude control (the ability to steer) and started doing barrel rolls, without achieving seperation. After tumbling down a bit venting fuel they set off the self destruct and that was it.

Overall they would of had heaps of new data, which was the purpose of the test. But I think they might need to have a look at Stage 0 (the ground part) and lock down all that debris and dust cloud because I think the engine blast is causing damage to the site and the ship as well. Apparently, Lapadre said there was a 25ft hole in the concrete under the pad....to much heat, force and vibration. The sound vibrations alone can break apart concrete and seeing they don't have a water deluge system yet, it was surprising to see how well it mostly still worked without it.

The other thing is I think the seperation method needs to be good enough to sperate whilst it's unstable, especially for a manned launch, so they have an escape vehicle...that is if at all they have that functionality planned. Apparently EM isn't fan of it, but in this situation seperation would of meant another Starship test, with in flight high altitude engine ignition, flight control on the way down from 40km etc.

Anyways, I'm certain we'll find out more over the next few days. Hopefully they can build a electric instead of hydraulic actuated booster in the mean time, and get it ready to test for the 4th July...

Ever think of starting your own YouTube channel? I would follow it>

 

[charliemagpie]

I think the first thing Optimus is going to have to learn is how to make reinforced concrete pads on Mars.

 

[hridge2020]

[/QUOTE]


Using strong filters, thru the smoke, dust, rocks flying, and Youtubers camera equipment being trashed..

I was able to get this image out..

It was the Elon Boring Company tooling trying to grab the spot light / advertisement during this
Great coverage.. LOL..

 

[JBee]

Ever think of starting your own YouTube channel? I would follow it>

No not really, but thanks for the compliment. I don't have the time for video production and making myself pretty, but I am thinking of starting my own blog/wiki on various subjects in which some relevant information could be shared and condensed into a digestible package.

 

[JBee]

I think the first thing Optimus is going to have to learn is how to make reinforced concrete pads on Mars.

Yeah, it will be an issue, but I think it will be some sort of steel landing pad, like what EM mentioned was meant to be installed on the Starship pad before launch. I think there will be some sort of modular steel panel fabrication (mars is red because it's iron ore) for all building projects, that could also be used for surfacing roads and launch pads. That's why the the moon Starship has thrusters on the top as well so it doesn't dig it's own grave in the moon dust:

Essentially there will be different versions optimised for different moons and planets and you ferry between them. I haven't seen much on how they are proposing to transfer bulk cargo though.

In the end I'm not sure why they are bothering to use other Nasa infrastructure for orbital docking. I think the easiest way would be to have a Starship used as a orbital dock, with multiple docking hatches to attach other Starships. Would be useful for long trip to Mars as well. There is also some talk about tethering two by the nose, and spinning them around a center point on the tether, to produce artificial gravity.

 

[charliemagpie]

Might be a bit of a bootstrapping approach

Firstly parachute/balloon /special craft robots and equipment down, and build the platform.

Or the first landing could be a doozy lol

Whatever happens it will usher in a new frontier.

 

[JBee]

Might be a bit of a bootstrapping approach

Firstly parachute/balloon /special craft robots and equipment down, and build the platform.

Or the first landing could be a doozy lol

Whatever happens it will usher in a new frontier.

I think they will be launching multiple Starships at a time. The first ones will be unnmanned, probably with a selection of Starlink Satelites etc, and then manned. That way they get enough fuel reserves there, and multiple vehicles for a return flight. Potentially, they might even use a manned orbital Starship, like on the moon missions. Possibly even with a smaller, escape capsule to bring up people.

The critical thing is that the shear size of the Starship makes freight to Mars affordable, meaning that many more options are available to solve various problems.

 

[charliemagpie]

Yea, the window is open, so take advantage and send a few

Its nerd excitement, that's for sure.

 

[Ogre]

Mars is an entirely different problem space. Lower gravity and less atmosphere means they don’t need near as much thrust.

Also, I don’t think they will be lifting much weight from Mars at first, mostly just getting people and empty ships back to orbit where they would transfer to another ship that goes to earth.

 

[Crissa]

Since you developed your heat tiles for the Starship, you might what to test then for the top surface of your launch pad, plus rocket flames/smoke diverter. (of course make the heat tiles, larger)

Heat tiles are very brittle, and would just shatter from the concussion of the rocket motors.

-Crissa