SpaceX

[tnt22]

https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-falcon-9-block-5-landing-leg-removal-video/

SpaceX team spotted removing Block 5 landing legs prior to teardown analysis

By Eric Ralph
Posted on May 16, 2018

Teslarati photographer Tom Cross has captured SpaceX technicians removing the landing legs from the first Falcon 9 Block 5 booster, signaling that the end of recovery operations are near.

Of note, it appears that SpaceX chose to conduct this recovery much like previous ones by removing the rocket's legs instead of retracting them, a feature of the Block 5 upgrade prominently noted by CEO Elon Musk and other company officials. A brief time-lapse shows workers carefully removing the legs in a well-worn ballet of heavy machinery, skirting around the massive rocket with expertise developed over the better part of two years of sea and land recoveries of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy boosters.

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There are a number of possible reasons for SpaceX choosing to remove B1046's landing legs the 'old-fashioned' way, most relating to the fact that this particular booster is a critical pathfinder for the entire future of Falcon 9 Block 5. Musk described this attitude in a lengthy and detailed prelaunch briefing:

We are going to be very rigorous in taking this rocket apart and confirming our design assumptions to be confident that it is indeed able to be reused without being taken apart. Ironically, we need to take it apart to confirm that it does not need to be taken apart.

Both COO Shotwell and Musk have briefly discussed the new functionality of the upgraded legs in the past few weeks, indicating that they are capable of being rapidly and repeatedly stowed without being removed from the rocket, whereas all past booster reuse has required the slow removable and equally slow reattachment of landing legs, assuming Block 3 and 4 boosters even reuse their same landing legs. At a minimum, Musk's above comment already makes it clear that SpaceX has no plans to reuse this booster immediately, instead conducting an extremely thorough teardown analysis to verify that wear and tear from high-speed atmospheric reentry is within an acceptable range.


SpaceX technicians busy themselves removing Falcon 9 Block 5's massive recovery hardware. (Tom Cross)

Equally plausible, choosing to remove B1046's landing legs instead of testing the new retraction mechanisms may better preserve the leg hardware in its post-landing state, providing engineers and technicians cleaner and more representative data. One final obvious possibility is that the process of flight-testing new Block 5 leg hardware caused damage or led to some off-nominal telemetry and other visible faults, thus preventing them from retracting.

Because the next Block 5 booster (B1047) is likely nearing its own debut after a thorough round of testing in Texas, captured by an aerial photographer, SpaceX may be pushing hard to complete its post-landing analysis of B1046 as quickly as possible to make way for the imminent launches of several new boosters. If the company hopes to maintain its impressive 2018 flight rate of one launch every two weeks throughout the rest of the year, they will need to refly Block 5 boosters at least 10 times – the last flight-proven commercial Block 4 launch (CRS-15) is currently scheduled for early July, leaving roughly half of all 2018's upcoming launches manifested on Block 5 Falcon 9/Heavy rockets. Falcon Heavy's second launch has in fact been pushed back by several months per The Planetary Society, indicating that the construction of the first Block 5 center booster has taken a back seat to the more pressing concerns of Falcon 9 Block 5 boosters, upper stages, and fairings needed to avoid additional customer launch delays.


B1046's final landing leg is removed and carried off with a forklift, presumably for teardown analysis at a SpaceX facility. (Tom Cross)

Regardless, the first successful and nearly-complete recovery of a Falcon 9 Block 5 booster marks a huge milestone for SpaceX. So long as the imminent teardown analysis does not reveal anything especially unexpected, the rocket company is quickly closing in on true rapid reuse with Octagrabber/Roomba's steady routinization of robotic rocket saving, yet another intact fairing half recovery, and the good condition of B1046 after a relatively hot reentry and landing.


Just boopin' an orbital-class rocket with a huge metal component, NBD. (Tom Cross)


(Tom Cross)


A toasty Block 5 landing leg shows off a new patina for SpaceX's upgraded thermal protection material.


(Tom Cross)

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[Apollo13]

Попытка посчитать стоимость пуска различных конфигураций Фалконов, а также общие затраты за 2017 и 2018 год. Исходные данные взятые из открытых источников и Откровений Пророка отмечены полужирным. Остальное мои предположения. Не учитываются правительственные пуски за 90+ млн и "суперакции" типа Формосата-5 за 20 млн.

Вопросы, замечания, предложения приветствуются. Если кому-то интересно могу дать Эксцель файл.

[tnt22]

B1046

Falcon9 B1046‏ @Falcon9_B1046 20 ч. назад

Guys, I'm headed for home. Wish me luck!

[Дмитрий В.]

Забавное сходство.

[tnt22]

TIME-LAPSE SpaceX 'Block 5' Strut & Leg Removal at Port Canaveral

AmericaSpace

Опубликовано: 18 мая 2018 г.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9nVOn9Alm0https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9nVOn9Alm0 (2:30)

[Apollo13]

Интервью Гвинн:

[/li]
• Gwynne says that BFR is still on track for human trips to Mars in 2024. Source
• Raising funds slowly and as-needed. This will continue. Very picky about who invests in SpaceX. They MUST share their long term vision. Source
• Gwynne believes valuation is about $28 billion. Source
• Can't go public until they are regularly going to Mars. Source
• Shotwell sees BFR and Mars as big stepping stones to the long term search for alien life. Source
• SpaceX is profitable and has had many profitable years. Their difficult years are their years with failures. Source
• Market size for telecommunications is much larger than the launch market - thus the Starlink effort. Complimentary to existing work. Source
• Tesla, SpaceX, and The Boring Company share technologies as they can. Starlink could be used for Tesla. Tesla battery technology has been used on Falcon 9 and Dragon. The Boring Company tunnels could provide living spaces on Mars. Source
• 24-28 launches expected for 2018. 2019 will probably be closer to 2017 (18 launches) due to lower demand. Source
• Hawthorne has the capability to make 1 engine per day and 2 block V rockets per month. Source
• SpaceX believes about 10% of the population express some interest in being part of a Mars colony effort. Source
• SpaceX will produce roughly 14 first stages and 30 second stages this year. Source
  

[Apollo13]

https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/8lbgxy/notes_from_joshua_brost_at_space_tech_expo/

Josh Brost, Senior Director, Government Business Development for Spacex at Space Tech Expo:

[/li]
• Block V meets all NASA commercial crew requirements and all DOD requirements. Most reliable booster in the world. Source
• SpaceX sees the most compelling case for smallsats as being aggregated in one launch for the lowest cost. Source
• End stage is complete for rapid reusability of Falcon 9. Incremental approach with 25 boosters landed and 11 reflown. Lessons learned from each of these and applied to Block V. Block V will be flown 10x without major maintenance. Source
• BFR will be completely and rapidly reusable. In the meantime they are working on fairing recovery. The market is very comfortable with reusable boosters. NASA was the first government customer to approve reuse. Source
• The most risk-averse customers will end up being more comfortable flying on the 2nd flight of a booster. See the first flight as a check flight. Major paradigm shift coming on reusable boosters. Source
• When designing a booster to fly 10 times you add in more margin. Recovering boosters you learn an enormous amount about how the rocket operates and how to make it more reliable. Source
• A lot of payloads too heavy for Falcon 9, thus the market for Falcon Heavy. Eventually BFR economics will be so compelling that the market will switch over but until then the Falcon rockets are the workhorses for SpaceX. Source
• Really excited about launching crew. Still on track for doing demo launches of Crew Dragon this year. Source
• SpaceX wasn't started with the goal to be vertically integrated. They were trying to become a low-cost launch provider and that drove their decisions to make vs buy components. Source
• SpaceX doesn't compete directly with China for launches due to ITAR restrictions. However, China is putting a lot of money into their space program. Source
  

[Apollo13]

Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust May 22

Andreas Rittweger, DLR: we're investigating launch vehicle reusability, both with SpaceX-like approaches and with winged flyback boosters. Our research shows that, at 10 launches/year, reusability makes sense. #SpaceTechExpo

[tnt22]

https://spaceflightnow.com/2018/05/25/new-helium-tank-for-spacex-crew-launches-still-waiting-to-fly/

New helium tank for SpaceX crew launches still waiting to fly
May 25, 2018 | Stephen Clark


Credit: SpaceX

SpaceX is still working on a new, safer helium tank design needed for launches with astronauts, and the debut of the company's upgraded Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket earlier this month did not count as one of seven successful missions in "crew configuration" NASA says it requires before putting astronauts aboard the vehicle, officials said Thursday.

The upd ate on the development of the Falcon 9's new helium tank, which is scheduled to fly for the first time later this year, came a week after members of NASA's Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel said they were getting more comfortable with SpaceX's plan to load the rocket with super-chilled, densified propellant with astronauts strapped into their Crew Dragon spacecraft on top of the vehicle.

The inaugural launch of SpaceX's Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket May 11 successfully placed Bangladesh's Bangabandhu 1 communications satellite in orbit, and the launcher featured heat shield improvements, higher-thrust engines, and new landing legs, upgrades aimed at making the Falcon 9's first stage easier to reuse.

But it didn't carry a new helium tank design under development as a fix for the problem that caused a booster to explode during a ground test in 2016, according to a report by Quartz which has been confirmed by Spaceflight Now. NASA says SpaceX needs to introduce that change to the Falcon 9 rocket before it starts counting the seven successful launches before a mission with astronauts.

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The new helium bottles are known as composite overwrapped pressure vessels, or COPVs, and they store cold helium at high pressures for injection into the rocket's propellant tanks, maintaining their pressure as the Falcon 9's engines consume kerosene and liquid oxygen in flight.

SpaceX founder and chief executive Elon Musk told reporters before the May 11 that he believed the Falcon 9 Block 5 configuration that was set to debut with the launch of Bangabandhu 1 was the same version that will fly with NASA astronauts, but added that he "could be mistaken."

NASA and SpaceX confirmed Thursday that the modified COPVs were not on the May 11 launch, but will instead be flown for the first time on a test mission of the company's Crew Dragon capsule called Demo-1, currently se t for liftoff at the end of August without any astronauts on-board.

Only then with the counter start logging the seven flights of the Falcon 9 in a "frozen" configuration required before a second Crew Dragon demo flight, currently scheduled for December, at the earliest, with two astronauts who will fly to the space station.

"In aerospace, 'testing like we fly' is a long standing tenant for safe operations and understanding of critical systems," said Cheryl Warner, a NASA spokesperson, in response to an inquiry from Spaceflight Now. "We anticipate this configuration will be ready for Demonstration Mission 1.

"NASA will work with SpaceX following each Falcon 9 Block 5 launch to examine data and evaluate the components, systems and operations to add to the rocket heritage," Warner said in a written statement. "Early Falcon 9 Block 5 flights will provide important insight into the rocket, and will contribute to the certification efforts for the Falcon 9 Block 5 configuration for crew."

SpaceX and Boeing won multibillion-dollar contracts in 2014 to develop, build and fly commercial capsules to ferry astronauts between Earth and the International Space Station. Once the vehicles are certified by NASA, they will rotate station crews up and down several times per year, ending U.S. reliance on the Russian Soyuz spacecraft for astronaut transportation.

NASA officials have been cautious in their assessments of Boeing and SpaceX schedules, saying further delays in both vehicles are likely, with the first crew test flights potentially slipping into 2019.


File photo from a camera view inside the second stage liquid oxygen tank on a Falcon 9 rocket launch in 2015. The COPVs containing helium are mounted around the circumference of the tank. Credit: SpaceX

Problems with the Falcon 9's COPVs, or their associated hardware, were blamed for two rocket failures in June 2015 and September 2016.

In 2015, a strut connecting one of the helium vessels inside the Falcon 9's second stage liquid oxygen tank broke a few minutes after liftoff, rupturing the upper stage propellant tank and leading to the destruction of the rocket and a Dragon supply ship en route to the International Space Station.

SpaceX stopped using the type of strut that failed in 2015 when flights resumed later that year with an upgraded "full thrust" version of the Falcon 9 using colder-than-normal kerosene and liquid oxygen propellants, which are chilled and densified to provide extra engine performance.

Another Falcon 9 rocket mishap in September 2016, when a booster exploded during a launch pad test and destroyed a $200 million Israeli-owned commercial telecom satellite, was also blamed on a flaw with the upper stage's helium pressurant tanks.

SpaceX engineers believe that failure most likely started when liquid oxygen propellant froze in a buckle or void between the aluminum liner and carbon overwrap of one of the COPVs. While investigators were unable to pinpoint a "root cause," engineers concluded the solid oxygen likely ignited from friction or breaking fibers on the outside of the helium tank, causing the Falcon 9's upper stage to burst in a ball of flame.

SpaceX modified its fueling and helium loading procedures after the September 2016 accident to prevent solid oxygen from forming, and a new COPV design incorporates changes the company says will eliminate the buckles altogether.

The company has completed development, significant qualification testing and manufacture of the modified helium bottles that will fly inside the Falcon 9 rocket on the Demo-1 mission with the Crew Dragon spacecraft.

"Falcon 9 Block 5's first flight serves as an important milestone toward flying crew to the International Space Station later this year," a SpaceX spokesperson said in a statement. "Starting with our first Block 5 launch, and working closely with NASA, SpaceX will evaluate the components, systems and operations from each Falcon 9 Block 5 mission to document the vehicles flight heritage and assure our development of the most advanced, reliable and safest human spaceflight system ever built."

SpaceX has accomplished 28 consecutive successful rocket launches since the Falcon 9 resumed service in January 2017.


The Crew Dragon spacecraft for SpaceX's first commercial crew demonstration flight, which will launch without an astronaut crew, inside an anechoic chamber for electromagnetic interference testing. Credit: SpaceX/Elon Musk

"The amount of testing and research that's gone into COPV safety is gigantic," Musk told reporters May 10. "This is, by far, the most advanced pressure vessel ever developed by humanity. It's nuts."

"I've personally gone over that design, I lost count how many times," Musk said. "The top engineering minds at SpaceX have agonized over this. We've tested the living daylights out of it, and we've had deep, deep discussions about NASA about this. I think we're in a good situation."

Musk said SpaceX has a contingency plan to swap out the redesigned carbon-fiber/aluminum COPVs for Inconel spheres.

"I think that is unlikely to be necessary," Musk said.

NASA safety advisors say "load-and-go" fueling procedure is viable for crew launches

The redesigned helium bottles are one of the top technical issues being tracked by NASA managers and a panel of safety advisors charged with overseeing the agency's human spaceflight programs.

Some engineers and external reviewers have also raised concerns about SpaceX's proposal for astronauts to board the Crew Dragon spacecraft before fueling of the Falcon 9 rocket, and those worries were amplified after the 2016 explosion during a countdown for a static fire test at Cape Canaveral.

SpaceX typically loads super-chilled propellants into the Falcon 9 rocket in the final hour of the countdown, a timeline the company's managers have proposed keeping for crewed launches. In contrast, the United Launch Atlas 5 rocket, which will deliver Boeing's CST-100 Starliner crew craft to orbit, will be fueled several hours before liftoff, before astronauts board the vehicle.

Filling of the space shuttle's external fuel tank started nine hours before launch, but like with the Atlas 5, cryogenic propellants were slowly pumped into the shuttle to replace the liquids that boiled off during the countdown.

NASA is still considering the final-hour fueling plan proposed by SpaceX, known as "load-and-go," but agency managers are expected to decide soon whether to approve it.

SpaceX officials have said the risk to astronauts from a mishap during fueling would be mitigated by the Crew Dragon's launch abort system, which could be activated to push the capsule away from an explosion on the launch pad. Ground crews would also be evacuated before fueling, reducing their risk exposure during a countdown.

Brent Jett, a former space shuttle commander and member of the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel, said May 17 that a recent report completed by the NASA Engineering and Safety Center provided the safety committee and NASA managers "an in-depth analysis of the hazards and controls associated with load-and-go."

"This report, which identified a few previously unrecognized hazard causes, proved very valuable to the commercial crew program," Jett said in the safety panel's May 17 meeting at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

"My sense is that, assuming there are adequate, verifiable controls idenfitied and implemented for the credible hazard causes, and those which could potentially result in an emergency situation, or worse, loss of crew and vehicle, it appears that load-and-go is a viable option for the program to consider," Jett said.

Other members of the panel agreed with Jett's assessment.

"It appears that if all the approriate steps are taken to address the potential hazards, that the risk of launching the crew in the load-and-go configuration could be acceptable," said Patricia Sanders, chair of the ASAP.

"The other important factor as NASA considers recommendations on this topic, I think, is to look at this from a system point-of-view," said George Nield, former head of the FAA's commercial space office and now an ASAP member. "So not only crew safety, but also ground crew safety is an important factor."

Musk said May 10 that he thinks the load-and-go fueling question is "overblown."

"We certainly could load the propellant, and then have the astronauts board Dragon," Musk said. "That is definitely something we could do. But I don't think it's going to be necessary any more than passengers on an aircraft having to wait for the aircraft to be full of fuel before boarding.

"Obviously, our competitors are going to make hay of it, but I do not see this as a risk representing any materiality, and in a worst-case scenario, we've already demonstrated that Dragon is fully capable of a safe abort from zero velocity and zero altitude, and escaping whatever fireball may occur on the pad in a worst-case situation," Musk said.

"I really do not think this presents an issue for astronauts, but if, for any reason, NASA felt different, then we can adjust our operational procedures to load propellant before the astronauts board."

In his presentation to the ASAP on May 17, Jett emphasized the importance of the redesigned COPV.

"The panel has consistently maintained that understanding the behavior of the COPV in the densified cryo environment, and identifying all the potential ignition scenarios, was critical to controlling that potential hazards," Jett said. "Despite the challenges, and there still are some remaining, NASA and SpaceX are laser focused on this task, and the panel seems to be comfortable with their approach of defining the boundaries through test, and then establishing adequate safety margins for operations."

"Whether you load the crew first and then propellant, or propellant then crew, either way, the COPV issue has to be resolved," Jett said. "You have to be comfortable with the COPV situation. While some people like to sort of link those two issues, I think you just have to get comfortable with the COPV, and then look at the hazards associated with the transient of having the crew on-board during fueling. And if you can adequately control those hazards ... there are some very positive aspects to loading the crew first."

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[tnt22]

SpaceX‏Подлинная учетная запись @SpaceX 5 мин. назад

Falcon 9 fairing halves deployed their parafoils and splashed down in the Pacific Ocean last week after the launch of Iridium-6/GRACE-FO. Closest half was ~50m from SpaceX's recovery ship, Mr. Steven.

http://instagram.com/p/BjdAcCuFegz 

Спойлер

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[кукушка]

Судно Mr. Steven, используемое SpaceX для ловли головного обтекателя Falcon 9, получит сеть в 4 раза большего размера. 

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1003916871693791232

[Apollo13]

https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/8pgzvs/here_is_what_i_got_from_my_tour/

Got a lot of good information. Here's the major points

[/li]
• Work being done on FSS for crew. More clean looking.
• Some work being done on flame trench, no specifics.
• Zip line escape system from tower to west side of pad.
• Telstar will be a block 5 booster.
• In-flight abort will be a block 5 booster, will be that boosters third flight.
• New campus will be built for BFR housing.
• Dragon 2 arrives at the Cape around mid July (13th?)
• Dragon 2 will be reused many times.
• 3 Falcon 9's currently in the hangar, one is a brand new Block 5, two are flown. One is the TESS booster.
• 24 Hour turnaround demo will be in 2019
• Block 5 boosters are reinforced straight from factory for use on FH flights.
• Consistent 5 day turnaround(ish) within year and a half.
• No S2 recovery plans in work yet.
  

Let me know if you have any questions and i'll try to answer as best as I can. They didn't allow us to use our phones or take notes while in the hangar.

[Salo]

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1005577738332172289

 Elon Musk‏ @elonmusk
SpaceX option package for new Tesla Roadster will include ~10 small rocket thrusters arranged seamlessly around car. These rocket engines dramatically improve acceleration, top speed, braking & cornering. Maybe they will even allow a Tesla to fly ...
  15:29 - 9 июн. 2018 г.  

   Elon Musk‏ @elonmusk  9 июн.
19 years ago, when my 1st company got bought, I had to decide between buying a house in Palo Alto or a McLaren F1 (best car ever imo). Was no contest. I bought F1 & a small condo that was much cheaper than the car. New Tesla Roadster will exceed all gas sports cars in every way...
 
   Elon Musk‏ @elonmusk  9 июн.  
More background: I arrived in North America at 17 w $2000, a backpack & a suitcase full of books. Paid my own way thru college. Dropped out of Stanford Eng/Phys grad school w $110k in college debt. Created Internet startup w bro & Greg Khouri (love bro & loved Greg, may he RIP)
 
   Elon Musk‏ @elonmusk  9 июн.  
At Zip2, I wrote entire V1 of software for drawing vector maps & calculating point to point directions anywhere in US (first ever company to do so), as well as white pages & business listings w reviews (an early Yelp). Also wrote V1 of classifieds, autotrading & real estate apps.

   Elon Musk‏Подлинная учетная запись @elonmusk  10 июн.  
Zip2 also built a newspaper publishing platform that brought hundreds of regional & city papers online for the first time, and made major functionality advancements to the NY Times, Boston Globe & Knight-Ridder websites. NYT, KR & Hearst were all major investors in Zip2.
 
   Elon Musk‏ @elonmusk  10 июн.  
This is why I'm not impressed when reporters who were literally in junior high while I was in newsrooms all round the world say that if I only knew how newsrooms really worked, then I'd know everything's fine & no need for a media credibility rating system like Pravduh

[tnt22]

https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-falcon-9-block-5-texas-static-fire-tests/

[SIZE=8]SpaceX's third Block 5 rocket heads to Texas test site as launch marathon nears[/SIZE]

ByEric Ralph
Posted on June 13, 2018

A SpaceX Falcon 9 – almost certainly the third Block 5 booster to leave the company's factory – was spotted passing through New Mexico on the last leg of its trip fr om California to Texas. Although the shipment is a great sign, it begs the question of how exactly SpaceX plans to launch its next six launches penciled in for July and August.

Bear with me, as this post will dive into the specifics of orchestrating launches – namely having rocket boosters, upper stages, and fairings all ready at the same place and time. Fundamentally, the analysis that follows suggests two main possibilities: 1) two or three of those July/August launches will have to be delayed for booster availability or 2) the first (and perhaps second) truly rapid reuse of Falcon 9 Block 5 boosters will occur before summer's end.


The first Block 5 Falcon 9 lifts off on May 4, 2018. The upgrade's rapid reusability optimizations could be crucial for SpaceX's summer manifest. (Tom Cross)

After conducting routine static fire testing in McGregor, the booster spotted on Monday – B1048 – will likely be shipped West to Vandenberg Air Force Base for the first West coast Block 5 launch in mid-July. B1047, the second Block 5 booster to leave SpaceX's Hawthorne factory, was spotted miles from Cape Canaveral, FL near the end of May, while B1046's early May launch marked the debut of Falcon 9 Block 5 and was expected to undergo several months of disassembly and analysis to ensure the rocket upgrade was functioning as intended. Based on previous patterns, the fourth Block 5 Falcon 9 booster – B1049 – should not be expected to ship from the factory to McGregor until late June or early July. Finally, the last orbital Block 4 booster (1045) will conduct its second and final launch in the last few days of June, currently NET June 29.

Put simply, B1049 is unlikely to arrive at its first launch site until mid or late July and can thus be taken out of the July running. B1045 will be (presumably) expended after launch, also taking it out of the running for future launches. B1048 will almost certainly travel to Vandenberg Air Force Base (VAFB) for its first launch in July, effectively ruling out its availability for other July and August launches. Furthermore, Iridium's CEO Matt Desch has stated that both Iridium-7 and Iridium-8 are expected to launch on unflown boosters. Fundamentally, this leaves two Block 5 boosters readily available for four loosely scheduled July and August launches on the East Coast.


Falcon 9 B1045 prepares for its first launch in mid-April. (SpaceX)


B1046 returned to Port Canaveral shortly after its May 4 debut, and is now being carefully analyzed as pathfinder hardware. (Tom Cross)


Falcon 9 B1047 spotted in Florida just a short trip away from Cape Canaveral, wh ere it will likely launch Telsat 19V in mid-July. (Reddit /u/fatherofzeuss) (https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/8n950t/block_5_this_one_is_headed_south_parked_at_the/)


What is likely B1048 spotted heading to McGregor, Texas for static fire testing, June 11. (TeslaMotorsClub /u/nwdiver) (https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/8q2lkd/core_spotting_booster_seen_heading_to_mcgregor/)

Focusing on July's schedule as it currently stands, B1047 would be required to launch two high-energy geostationary transfer orbit (GTO) missions in as few as two weeks. The nature of drone ship recoveries would cut the time available between the booster's return to port and its second static fire to perhaps 5-10 days. In other words, there would be almost no time whatsoever for refurbishment, at least compared to the current prospective record of B1045, roughly 70 days between launches.

All things considered, two launches of the same booster in well under a month would be an act of heroics given that B1047's first launch will be the second or third-ever flight of Falcon 9 Block 5. An extensive upgrade to the venerable rocket intended to make it highly reusable and equally reliable, Block 5 is the culmination of more than half a decade of experience launching a wide array of Falcon 9 versions and 56 total launches. While I would place the odds of a sub-30 day back-to-back reflight happening less than two months from now at maybe 10%, my odds for the next six to nine months are closer to 95% – remember, Musk set SpaceX the goal of two flights of the same booster in 24 hours by the end of 2019. It may sound insane, but it quite literally was what Block 5 was designed to enable.

Although delays are more probable here, the alternative is a truly wild roller coaster of launches and historic reusable rocket milestones. Fingers crossed!


A rough sketch of SpaceX's launch schedule over the next few months. (Eric Ralph)


This summer's SpaceX manifest, brought to you by Falcon 9 Block 5. (Tom Cross)

[tnt22]

https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-15m-florida-falcon-refurbishment

[SIZE=8]SpaceX to receive $15m from Florida to build Falcon refurbishment facility[/SIZE]

By Eric Ralph
Posted on June 19, 2018

The state of Florida's Space Florida initiative is likely to award SpaceX nearly $15 million in support of the company's recently-publicized plan to build a new Falcon rocket refurbishment facility and launch control center on Kennedy Space Center property.

All things considered, such an investment would be an extremely savvy move for the state, potentially speeding up an expansion that will pave the way – quite literally in terms of infrastructure — for SpaceX to support a dramatically larger launch cadence in Florida. Writing in an environmental assessment (EA) for the Richards Road project discovered in early June, the company provided a rough estimate for what that growth could look like:

"SpaceX estimates a possible 150 construction jobs associated with the initial development of the Proposed Action, and approximately 70 new SpaceX employees to support additional operations on KSC. SpaceX plans to launch more than 4,000 satellites with the intention that most of these satellites will be launched from LC-39A and LC-40." (p. 39)

Спойлер

Satellite imagery from Google Maps shows the currently-abandoned site of SpaceX's prospective Florida expansion. (Google Maps)


SpaceX's Launch Complex 39A pictured in April 2018. (Tom Cross)


TomCross photographing Falcon 9 with the Zuma payload at SLC-40.

In the case of "most" of "more than 4,000 satellites" being launched from Florida, SpaceX is undoubtedly referring to the first phase of their Starlink internet constellation, a program that is also rapidly growing an R&D team to complete the system's production-ready design and build a state-of-the-art factory for the vast majority of the network's major components. For context, 70-90 additional new employees would grow SpaceX's Florida presence by as much as 20-30% from 2018 levels.

Teslarati reached out to SpaceX for further clarification on the Starlink-related comments in the EA, but the company could not be reached for comment on the matter. However, SpaceX was later able to provide a statement on their prospective Richards Road expansion, reprinted below.

"As SpaceX's launch cadence and manifest for missions from Florida continues to grow, we are seeking to expand our capabilities and streamline operations to launch, land and re-fly our Falcon family of rockets."

It's worth noting that SpaceX President and COO Gwynne Shotwell told CNBC reporters in May 2018 that the company expected 2019 to look more like 2017 (18 launches), suggesting that next year will likely be 30-50% slower than its busy 2018 launch schedule. Although the COO did state that "2019 [will] probably be closer to 2017 due to lower demand", she didn't explicitly include non-commercial launches in her figuring.


While SpaceX's 2018 manifest is likely to support more annual launches than the company has yet to achieve, the trend slopes a bit down in the 12-24 months that follow. The SES-12 satellite is shown here and was launched in June 2018. (SES)


Iridium NEXT satellites being attached to the payload dispenser at SpaceX's VAFB facilities. Iridium's contract for eight launches should be completed by Q4 2018. (Iridium)

Combined with SpaceX's official statement that its Florida manifest "continues to grow", an observation that at face-value plainly contradicts the Chief Operating Officer's on-record estimations, it seems almost impossible that that manifest growth is not largely a consequence of internal plans to dedicate a number of launches to Starlink satellites. As of June 2018, crowdsourced SpaceX launch manifests show a total of 20 possible launches in 2019 and 12 in 2020 – while plausible that a number of additional missions will be contracted or publicly announced as time marches on, it's somewhat less plausible that those missions will push SpaceX's commercial launch demand up to or above 2018 levels (24-28 launches).

Starlink launches thus make sense as a gap-filler for the one or two demand-sapped years likely to follow 2018, too near for SpaceX's reusability-associated launch price drops to make a difference and too early for the company's full-reusable BFR to come online. Rather conveniently, the production of roughly 12 new Block 5 Falcon 9s and Heavies per year would almost certainly keep all of SpaceX's rocket manufacturing facilities busy, while also leaving an unfathomably vast fleet of stagnant Block 5 boosters (and hopefully payload fairings) available for any internal missions required by the Starlink program. If Patricia Cooper's late-2017 statements are still roughly true today, SpaceX plans to begin the first dedicated launches of operational Starlink satellites in 2019, perfectly coinciding with their publicly anticipated lull in commercial launch demand.

Although it does depend on an extraordinarily rapid and successful ramp of the Starlink program, the paradoxical opportunity presented to SpaceX by launch demand lulls in 2019 and 2020 is hard to deny. Around the same time, one would expect the market for launches to begin to seriously respond to the arrival of a new, more affordable paradigm of orbital access, potentially culminating in an unprecedented demand for commercial launches as the price of entry begins to drop appreciably.

[свернуть]

[Чебурашка]

А как же Техас?

Надо Техасу собрать 2 миллиарда, чтобы Маск кинул Флориду 

[tnt22]

https://www.defense.gov/News/Contracts/Contract-View/Article/1557205/

Contracts for June 21, 2018

CONTRACTS

...

AIR FORCE

Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX), Hawthorne, California, has been awarded a $130,000,000 firm-fixed-price contract, for launch services to deliver the Air Force Space Command-52 satellite to its intended orbit. This launch service contract will include launch vehicle production and mission, as well as integration, launch operations and spaceflight worthiness activities. Work will be performed in Hawthorne, California; Kennedy Space Center, Florida; and McGregor, Texas, and is expected to be completed by September 2020. This award is the result of a competitive acquisition, and two proposals were received. Fiscal 2018 space procurement funds in the amount of $130,000,000 will be obligated at the time of award. The Contracting Division, Launch Systems Enterprise Directorate, Space and Missile Systems Center, Los Angeles Air Force Base, California, is the contracting activity (FA8811-18-C-0003). (Awarded June 20, 2018 )
...

[Apollo13]

Joy Dunn‏ @RocketJoy 3h3 hours ago

Happy Pride from @SpaceX Out & Allied! I'm proud to work for a company that is supportive of our LGBTQ employees! #PrideMonth #SpaceX

Придумайте подпись сами...  

[Настрел]

Включить бы движки на пару секунд.

[Старый]

Apollo13 пишет:
 Придумайте подпись сами...

Их всех давно бы надо
Собрать в большое стадо...