SpaceX nailed another sat launch.

This one, very heavy, 6100 Kg into Geostationary orbit, quite a feat. They did not have enough fuel onboard however, to land it back on the platform like previous launches.

http://www.spacex.com/webcast

And we are all waiting patiently for Falcon Heavy. Potentially three first stage landings and a second stage landing.

They have up to four Falcon 9 launches booked for June. I wonder if they'll manage that pace.

The recent launch would normally go on a falcon heavy to allow recovery, but they are not quite ready with the development. Send three times as many boosters so as to get back your boosters. Interesting economy, but worth it in the long term.

Originally posted by twhitehead
And we are all waiting patiently for Falcon Heavy. Potentially three first stage landings and a second stage landing.

They have up to four Falcon 9 launches booked for June. I wonder if they'll manage that pace.

The recent launch would normally go on a falcon heavy to allow recovery, but they are not quite ready with the development. Send three time ...[text shortened]... ny boosters so as to get back your boosters. Interesting economy, but worth it in the long term.

The spec says 54 metric tons to leo. what about geo?

Originally posted by sonhouse
The spec says 54 metric tons to leo. what about geo?

Wikipedia says 63.8 tons to leo and 26.7 to geo. But given that it has never launched before, we won't know for sure till its in service.
The falcon 9 has improved over time originally being capable of only 4,850 kg (10,690 lb) to geo but now (according to Wikipedia) capable of 8,300 kg (18,300 lb)
Given that the recent launch Inmarsat 5 was listed as 13,000lbs there was room to spare on this launch, but previous versions of Falcon 9 could not have done it, which might explain why it was originally scheduled for Falcon Heavy.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_9
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_Heavy

Originally posted by twhitehead
Wikipedia says 63.8 tons to leo and 26.7 to geo. But given that it has never launched before, we won't know for sure till its in service.
The falcon 9 has improved over time originally being capable of only 4,850 kg (10,690 lb) to geo but now (according to Wikipedia) capable of 8,300 kg (18,300 lb)
Given that the recent launch Inmarsat 5 was listed as 1 ...[text shortened]... n Heavy.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_9
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_Heavy

Heavy still won't equal the thrust of the old Saturn V. My guess however, is it will still lift more because of decades of improvements in material sciences like lighter struts, skins of carbon fiber and more efficient engines. Could be wrong though. BTW, take a look at my post 'Writing in E prime'. Do you do that? It was written today by my son in law Gandhi, Phd in statistical physics. He talks about the clarity of Einsteins papers v Boltzman who had fundamental advances but took decades for scientists to suss out what he was saying because his writing was so dense. Writing without 'to be' and such.

Originally posted by sonhouse
Heavy still won't equal the thrust of the old Saturn V. My guess however, is it will still lift more because of decades of improvements in material sciences like lighter struts, skins of carbon fiber and more efficient engines.

According to one SpaceX, Saturn V could lift two and half times as much mass.

But SpaceX plans much larger rockets in future based on the Raptor engine.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raptor_(rocket_engine_family)

http://www.space.com/26025-spacex-falcon-heavy-rocket-explained-infographic.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interplanetary_Transport_System

It will take a while. Keep in mind that SpaceX is a private company and their primary focus as this stage must be launching payloads for customers to pay for all of the development. There is little real paid for demand for very big rockets at this time.

I want to book a flight.who do I call? Can I use my Amazon rewards card?

Originally posted by ogb
I want to book a flight.who do I call? Can I use my Amazon rewards card?

Hi and welcome to RHP. I see you have one game started. How long have you played chess? Where do you live? Don't need street address, just wondered what part of the world you inhabit.

You know people are booking flights to space now? All you need is 20 million bucks or thereabouts. No civilians have done it as up yet. Test pilots and such only so far, I am talking about civilian companies like SpaceX.

Originally posted by ogb
I want to book a flight.who do I call? Can I use my Amazon rewards card?

You can call SpaceX for a flight on their rockets. To use your Amazon rewards card, you may have to wait for Blue Origin and book with them.

Originally posted by sonhouse
You know people are booking flights to space now? All you need is 20 million bucks or thereabouts. No civilians have done it as up yet. Test pilots and such only so far, I am talking about civilian companies like SpaceX.

SpaceX has booked two private citizens for a trip around the moon. So, yes they have booked a flight, they just haven't yet carried out the flight yet.

I guess nasa will continue to send out robots, but space travel is private enterprise now.

Originally posted by ogb
I want to book a flight.who do I call? Can I use my Amazon rewards card?

You must have bought a hell of a lot of books if you've saved up enough reward points to get into space!

Originally posted by DeepThought
You must have bought a hell of a lot of books if you've saved up enough reward points to get into space!

Amazon does not just sell books. Presumably though he was only hoping to get a discount on his space flight.

He might be such a space nerd that he bought a set of Neil Armstrong Hairdressing Scissors & Comb at $36,641.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00F9B70Z8/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B00F9B70Z8&linkCode=as2&tag=aol.comhomepage-20&linkId=ZYJSHLH672QQYR5E

Or maybe he bought a Freaks 1932 movie poster at $850,000

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B011390NK8/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B011390NK8&linkCode=as2&tag=aol.comhomepage-20&linkId=BZ63TATE2L2EGZD5

Originally posted by apathist
I guess nasa will continue to send out robots, but space travel is private enterprise now.

NASA would do well to stop all of their own rocket development efforts and hire it out to private companies. Admittedly they are already doing so to some degree.

But they are spending 18 Billion dollars on their latest Space Launch System. (the official budget). Others have estimated 41 billion for four 70 t launches.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Launch_System

Given that a Falcon 9 currently launches for 60 million my guess would be a falcon heavy would be slightly less than three times that. (only one second stage, and reusable first stages are bringing down their costs, but SpaceX will want to pay off development costs).
[edit] Actually Falcon Heavy is only 90 million a mere 50% more than Falcon 9

So NASA would have saved a lot of money just hiring SpaceX (and possibly other providers to keep the competition going).

NASA should focus on things that only they want and have expertise in, such as long distance spacecraft and rovers. I personally think the manned space program is a total waste of money and should be held off for 20-30 years while we explore robotically. When we are reliably sending robots to Mars every few years, we can talk about manned missions again. Right now, a significant percentage of robotic missions fail. If we cant do it for robots with at least 99% reliability we really shouldn't even consider sending humans.