Despite his impressive decor, planted in front of the launch site and his gigantic rocket, Elon Musk did not cause an earthquake with new announcements on his Starship
. However, he confirmed many rumours, and the teams can already prepare: they will still have to accelerate.
It will take that to aim for the red planet…
The Elon Show
Presentations from SpaceX’s founder and chief engineering officer are always a contest of superlatives. The company is ” the most efficient in the world “, its teams are the best, the SuperHeavy is the largest object that will be able to fly, and a single Starship, when it is able to arrive three times a week in orbit, will send more mass into orbit than all the objects already sent into space over the past 60 years.
At least, that’s what Elon Musk would like. The titanic assembly of Starship and its booster, 120 meters high all illuminated, gave a particular resonance to the speech he gave last night (3 am Paris) on the Starbase in Texas. In front of him, employees, journalists and cameras took advantage of 40 minutes of explanations before being able to ask their questions.
serious things
However, even if he took the time to go into detail on a few specific points, Elon Musk focused his remarks on the steps already taken for Starship (vessel testing, thermal coating, site support tower, etc.). ). He also dwelled on the long-term objectives of the program: take-offs several times a week and even every day, landings and reuses of gigantic SuperHeavy boosters every few hours, millions of tonnes sent each year to orbit, and the need for an imposing fleet to install an autonomous city on Mars.
Hammering his “vision” of human expansion, the billionaire reiterated that he did not believe that humanity should spend a lot of resources on the space domain (and rather focus on the climate challenge), but that ” 0.5% is not unreasonable compared to what it will bring us “. Above all, Elon Musk wishes “ motivate, instill dreams and new ambitions to explore space and understand its mysteries, in his own words.
Not too much need
Nevertheless, many reactions this morning show that many “fans” are disappointed. Indeed, the founder of SpaceX remained vague, even very elusive on several current topics, such as the horizon of his next flight, what he intends to send into space apart from Starlink satellites or quite simply the steps to come from his “Martian city”.
The billionaire of course released some figures for the occasion: current production of a Raptor V2 engine per day, expected production of a Starship and a SuperHeavy per month by the second half of the year, orbit as a major objective for 2022 and the recovery technique via the arms of the launch tower… But all of this was more or less already known to the general public through the tweets and observations of the teams that revolve around the Starbase 24 hours out of 24. Perhaps an announcement was missing to seal an effect of surprise, a grain of madness and ambition, like the lunar journey Dear Moon, presented in 2018.
A herd of Raptors
Beyond the launch objectives and even the final price of an orbital liftoff (10 million grand maximum if SpaceX succeeds technically, says Elon Musk), the presentation focused on the significant evolution of the Raptor engines that use SuperHeavy and Starship. The latter, which run on methane and liquid oxygen, represent a particular technical challenge. They are said to have staged combustion, a particular complexity, with internal pressures which today reach 230 bars in the main chamber…
But, for SpaceX, they must also be reusable, simple and compact, because a large number must be aligned under the skirt of the SuperHeavy booster (29 today, 33 soon). And Elon Musk would like to do without the heavy and expensive thermal protection around the engines which nevertheless undergo entry into the atmosphere.
For all these reasons, the evolution “Raptor V2″ more powerful, lighter, simpler and whose tests continue at a high rate (the combustion chamber would have a ” some tendency to melt according to Musk) represents the key solution for future Starship operations.
SimCity Starbase
It can be noted that Elon Musk gave perspectives for all lovers of construction, cranes and floor installers. Indeed, it plans to install a Starship production and launch site at the Kennedy Space Center as early as 2022. But it also has the ambition to use the Phobos and Deimos oil platforms, bought by SpaceX and equipped for offshore firing and recovery.
Finally, the “boss” was optimistic, but did not insist on the crucial results of the environmental report on the launch site of his base. The American FAA must decide at the end of February or the beginning of March on the viability and the impact of the Starbase on the region, or order an in-depth study. The latter would postpone take-offs on the site for a year or two, and would simply lead to the transfer of a majority of activities to Florida… Which did not seem to worry Elon Musk unduly.
This is perhaps what should be remembered from this presentation, which some will have found unproductive: Starship exists, and the teams, led by Elon Musk, are determined to make it fly, to take it into orbit, to the Moon and Mars, whatever calendar is imposed on them.
Source: SpaceX
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