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Falcon Heavy Static Fire



 
 
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  #1  
Old January 24th 18, 07:05 PM posted to sci.space.policy
Fred J. McCall[_3_]
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Default Falcon Heavy Static Fire

Looks like with the end of the government shutdown SpaceX got to
static fire their Falcon Heavy launcher. No word yet on 'success',
but at least nothing blew up. :-)


--
"Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to
live in the real world."
-- Mary Shafer, NASA Dryden
  #2  
Old January 24th 18, 08:22 PM posted to sci.space.policy
Torbjorn Lindgren
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Default Falcon Heavy Static Fire

Fred J. McCall wrote:
Looks like with the end of the government shutdown SpaceX got to
static fire their Falcon Heavy launcher. No word yet on 'success',
but at least nothing blew up. :-)


https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/956233892637286400

Seems to indicate that they consider it a success.
  #3  
Old January 24th 18, 11:45 PM posted to sci.space.policy
David Spain
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Default Falcon Heavy Static Fire

On 1/24/2018 1:05 PM, Fred J. McCall wrote:
Looks like with the end of the government shutdown SpaceX got to
static fire their Falcon Heavy launcher. No word yet on 'success',
but at least nothing blew up. :-)



Video is up he

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

Looks to last approx 6 seconds from 0:10 to 0:17 in the above video.
Almost looks like two events, possibly 3. Each stack fired separately?

Dave
  #4  
Old January 24th 18, 11:51 PM posted to sci.space.policy
David Spain
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Default Falcon Heavy Static Fire

On 1/24/2018 5:45 PM, David Spain wrote:
On 1/24/2018 1:05 PM, Fred J. McCall wrote:
Looks like with the end of the government shutdown SpaceX got to
static fire their Falcon Heavy launcher.Â* No word yet on 'success',
but at least nothing blew up.Â* :-)



Video is up he

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

Looks to last approx 6 seconds from 0:10 to 0:17 in the above video.
Almost looks like two events, possibly 3. Each stack fired separately?

Dave


The "Everyday Astronaut" has a video up that times it out at closer to
11 seconds. See: 4:10 onwards he

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDiJh8loTOE


Dave
  #5  
Old January 25th 18, 06:33 PM posted to sci.space.policy
Fred J. McCall[_3_]
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Default Falcon Heavy Static Fire

JF Mezei wrote:

On 2018-01-24 14:22, Torbjorn Lindgren wrote:

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/956233892637286400

Seems to indicate that they consider it a success.


"Launching in a week or so". Internally, would they not have a set of
fixed dates where tghey have a launch window from the lauch site?


Are you stuck on stupid? How many times are you going to ask the same
question hoping for a different answer?


Is it correct to state that anything in the vicinity of the pad is
property of Space-X ? (aka: if Falcon Heavy goes kaboom all that it
destroys will be Space-X gear and Space X won't owe any money to anyone
else?


Pads are leased. No doubt their contract specifies what shape it has
to be in when they're done with it.


I wonder what the insurance contract is like for this launch,
considering that even Musk has set low expectations in public.


What's to insure?


--
"Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to
live in the real world."
-- Mary Shafer, NASA Dryden
  #6  
Old January 25th 18, 11:08 PM posted to sci.space.policy
Fred J. McCall[_3_]
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Default Falcon Heavy Static Fire

JF Mezei wrote:

On 2018-01-25 12:33, Fred J. McCall wrote:

Are you stuck on stupid? How many times are you going to ask the same
question hoping for a different answer?


Because we are no longer in a "sometimes after January 1", we are in a
"in a week or so" scenario.


We're still talking about exactly the same time frame.


If you don't know the answer, you don't need to insult those who ask.


Mayfly, noting your intellectual shortcomings isn't 'insulting' you.
It's mere observation.



What's to insure?


SpaceX's own pad, the tanks and pad equipment. (as well as the rocket
itself, but more importantly some liability insurance in case it damages
something else in the complex.


None of that stuff is typically insured on a 'by launch' basis. What
you can ensure is the launch vehicle, payload, performance, etc.
There's no reason to ensure any of that. The payload is a Tesla
roadster and there is no financial loss should it fail to 'deliver'
correctly. I seriously doubt there is any launch insurance at all on
this shot. There's no point to it.


--
"Some people get lost in thought because it's such unfamiliar
territory."
--G. Behn
  #8  
Old January 26th 18, 05:31 PM posted to sci.space.policy
Fred J. McCall[_3_]
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Default Falcon Heavy Static Fire

JF Mezei wrote:

On 2018-01-25 17:08, Fred J. McCall wrote:

correctly. I seriously doubt there is any launch insurance at all on
this shot. There's no point to it.


When is the next commercial lauch for that pad? Because if it is
destoyed by this "beta" launch, the next commercial launches could be
delayed significantly and SpaceX would not meet its total launch
commitments this year if it needs to fit them all inside its remaining
pads (with the extra costs of moving launches to remaining pads).


Launch insurance doesn't work like that.


--
"Ignorance is preferable to error, and he is less remote from the
truth who believes nothing than he who believes what is wrong."
-- Thomas Jefferson
  #10  
Old January 29th 18, 02:48 AM posted to sci.space.policy
Jeff Findley[_6_]
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Default Falcon Heavy Static Fire

In article ,
says...

On 2018-01-28 08:44, Jeff Findley wrote:
In article ,
says...

Musk just Tweeted that they are aiming for Feb 6 launch for Falcon Heavy


I saw that last night. So only a bit more than a week away. Exciting
times.



Would it be fair to state that in terms of "spectacular"
rocket-goes-kablooie" during launch and near the pad, majority would be
the engine turbines that go amok and break apart causing a great big
ball of fire ?

Considering the Merlin engines have been tested quite a bit, shouldn't
there be a good confidence level and Musk's "it will likely fail" is
just PR stunt to make the lanch more "interesting" ?


Three cores firing at once followed by the boosters falling away while
the core stage is still firing have never been done by SpaceX before.
Those are the problem areas, not the Merlin engines.

Space X web site shows that the stage 2 for Falcon Heavy will be
identical to Stage 2 from Falcon 9 (397s of burn time, 934kN thrust).


Yes. Falcon 9 is about as tall as it can be for its width. This does
not change for Heavy, so they're simply reusing the upper stage pretty
much as-is. There might be strengthening required for heavier payloads,
but for this flight the payload is deliberately light. Because of this,
my guess is it's pretty much identical to Falcon 9's upper stage. But
that's my guess; I don't know for sure.

So if Falcon Heavy is able to throw a car out of Earth orbit into Sun,
something Falcon 9 can't do, it would mean that Falcon Heavy will be
dropping stage2 and the car at higher orbit/velocity, right ?


I'm not sure what you mean by "into Sun". It is going into a solar
orbit with its furthest point from the sun at the same distance as
Mars' orbit. The second stage will go into solar orbit with the car
since the car has no propulsion system of its own. My guess is they
won't even bother to separate the car from the upper stage so the car
will be easier to track. Determining the exact (solar) orbital
parameters will verify the performance of Falcon Heavy.

Falcon 9 Stage 1 burns for ~160 seconds. Will the side boosters on
Falcon Heabvy burn for same amount of time and detach at roughly same
altitude/speed as Falcon 9 (somewhere between 80 and 100km altitude) ?


I think it likely that booster staging will be higher and faster. Three
cores instead of one means higher acceleration at take off than Falcon
9. This is doubly true since the payload on this test flight is
relatively light.

If this were a LEO payload at the heaviest end of what Heavy can lift,
then the boosters would stage at a much lower altitude and speed than on
this test flight.

If so, correct to state that this operation will occur in much thinner
almosphere than the Shuttle SRB separation and this far less aerodynamic
challenges?


Hopefully, but parallel staging is still a huge risk. You don't want
the boosters to get "hung up" or to "recontact" the core in any way.
NASA didn't take any chances with the shuttle SRBs. They had multiply
redundant separation motors at both the nose and on the aft skirt to
insure a "clean" separation.

Since the core stage will throttle down early on which will allow it

to
continue to push the stack after the boosters have left, it also means
that it will be dropping its payload at far higher and faster (and more
distance from launch site) than a Falcon 9 would have.


I would expect so. The core stage will be throttled back during booster
burn to conserve fuel, so it will obviously stage even higher and faster
than the boosters.

Does this imply that the core stage will have to keep a lot more reserve
fuel to "brake" to drop out of the sky? Would the barge be located
signifancly more downrange from the pad so that the core stage wouldn't
have to travel as much on its return trajectory?


Yes, it will surely reserve more fuel for the reentry burn compared to a
"normal" Falcon 9 reentry burn. But, since it will be landing on the
barge, it won't need a "boost back" burn, so that ought to balance
things out a bit.

Jeff
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These posts do not reflect the opinions of my family, friends,
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