Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[andrea]

Still, it is a rather novel situation, exploring the wear and tear of an intact falcon 9 just returned from an orital launch. Anything they find will be unexpected, because they have little to base their expectationon.
Before they refly, they need to know which parts are worn, which are ok, which needs to be replaced. That is how they can assess refurbishment costs, and estimate the number of times it can fly. Considering the kind of job rockets do, I can't see them having a service life as long as, lets say, airplanes. But even just 3-4 times, it would be an interesting change.

[RedKing]

And now I'm wanting to try something like this out in KSP.... 

[Morrigi]

Well, SpaceX just wrote itself into the history books.

[sneakey pete]

Still, it is a rather novel situation, exploring the wear and tear of an intact falcon 9 just returned from an orital launch. Anything they find will be unexpected, because they have little to base their expectationon.
Before they refly, they need to know which parts are worn, which are ok, which needs to be replaced. That is how they can assess refurbishment costs, and estimate the number of times it can fly. Considering the kind of job rockets do, I can't see them having a service life as long as, lets say, airplanes. But even just 3-4 times, it would be an interesting change.

Indeed, they may have to update some of their design to make it last longer. I'd imagine they'd want the not easy to replace bits (tanks, the body, etc) able to last all about the same amount. Engines may be easy enough to chop and change, stuff like the fuel pumps I imagine might not have any scope for re use considering some of the stress they would be under, but even then they may just uprate them. of course the trade off is weight, don't want to be lifting too much of it. I imagine that there's a whole bunch of really excited engineers looking at the booster right now though!

[Amperzand]

If you're suggesting replacing engines, you may have a few misconceptions. The engines are some of the more expensive parts of a rocket, what with needing all kinds of super-alloys and having extremely low production tolerances.

Hi, I'm new to the thread. It seems very relevant to my interests.

[TheBiggerFish]

Hiya.

[Amperzand]

Yo.

[TempAcc]

Just comming in to post what people already know: SpaceX was awesome and a huge success. Here's hoping commercial low/high orbit spaceflight becomes a thing eventualy.

[TheBiggerFish]

WOOOOOOOOOOO
SPAAAAAAAAACE GONNAGOTOSPACE GONNAGOTOSPACE GONNAGOTOSPACE
</spacecore>

[andrea]

It seems that Musk has confirmed that this first landed stage is not going to fly again.
linky

I suppose that after studying it as much as they can, they will keep it somewhere to remember the achievement.

[Sheb]

Or they will have to tear it apart to study it.

[Shadowlord]

It's not like it would fit in a museum anyways, right?

[TheBiggerFish]

*points at Endeavor*

[RedKing]

It's not like it would fit in a museum anyways, right?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Considering they have a facility down at Cape Canaveral that houses an entire Saturn V rocket, yeah I think they can find somewhere to put it. If they don't totally destroy it doing the analysis.

Spoiler: Kennedy Space Center (click to show/hide)

BTW, if you ever get a chance, you should visit this. It's pretty fucking epic to see in real life.

[mainiac]

How much payload was actually delivered to space and was it a low or high orbit?