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Elon Musk embarrasses US, Russian, and Chinese space agencies by launching the most powerful rocket

The rich and genius are overshadowed by the corrupt and criminal who manipulate the system to milk it off..like what is being exposed in anti corruption drive in Pakistan..Nawaz. Zardari. all corrupt..

Hmm, you make an interesting point.

And I will add that the when the rich in South Asia ( and most parts of the world ) are intelligent, they have different priorities. If I again take Elon Musk as example, he built up SpaceX because it was he who wanted to go to Mars. A company created for his personal goal.

In India, Azim Premji and N.R. Narayanamurthy of Wipro and ex-Chairman of Infosys, respectively, are intelligent but, well, different priorities and not much out-of-the-box vision. There will be similar people in Pakistan too.

South Asians need to stop fighting for money, religion and nationalism; and start thinking literally out of the world.

Tom Mueller caught Elon Musk’s eye because he was building rocket engines in his garage (like those British Sabre engine people)

I wonder which will reach orbit sooner - Dragon v2 or Skylon-Sabre. I suspect it to be Dragon.
 
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Falcon Heavy successfully launches!!!
Elon Musk to buy Volcanic Island lair.:-)

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WOW!!!!

Video Details to follow.

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Double landing

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Yes, he sent his Tesla as the payload.

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Building large stations like this are now almost within our grasp.


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Volcanic Island lair in "You Only Live Twice"

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SPECTR


SpaceX: Falcon Heavy
Payload to LEO 63,800 kg (140,700 lb)
Payload to GTO 26,700 kg (58,900 lb)

The embarrassed contenders...

US: Delta IV
Patload to LEO 28,790 kg (63,470 lb)
Payload to GTO 14,220 kg (31,350 lb)

Russia: Angara 5
Payload to LEO 24,500 kg (54,000 lb)
Payload to GTO 7,500 kg (16,500 lb)

China: Long March 5 (cz5)
Payload to LEO 23,000 kg (51,000 lb)
Payload to GTO 13,000 kg (29,000 lb)
Overly dramatic headline.
USA had a rocket in the 60s which could send 140 mt payload to LEO - Saturn 5 , which was the mainstay of their moon trips.
Total 15 were built.
 
Overly dramatic headline.
USA had a rocket in the 60s which could send 140 mt payload to LEO - Saturn 5 , which was the mainstay of their moon trips.
Total 15 were built.

Well remember SpaceX is a private company and doesn’t have 10’s of $Billions in budget money.
They haven’t been around long yet have achieved things that government Space agencies have not been able to accomplish.

I wonder which will reach orbit sooner - Dragon v2 or Skylon-Sabre. I suspect it to be Dragon.

Pretty sure the Dragon V2. I don’t think they have a Skylon spaceplane prototype yet.
 
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Private companies were building rocket engines for NASA. The major one was RocketDyne. He wouldn’t have had access to all their engine knowledge. He was working for a competitor just like SpaceX is a competitor to ULA and isn’t going to tell them how their engines work. So yes SpaceX didn’t start with a bunch of clueless rocket designers building things from scratch. However they didn’t start with the guys who were designing items like the space shuttle engines.

Tom Mueller caught Elon Musk’s eye because he was building rocket engines in his garage (like those British Sabre engine people) not because he worked on something cutting edge like the Space Shuttle engines. The guy was obviously talented.


Tom Mueller is a SUPER STAR. Born in a poor family, worked as logger during summers, went to low ranking colleges. A self made man in every sense.
 
Well remember SpaceX is a private company and doesn’t have 10’s of $Billions in budget money.
They haven’t been around long yet have achieved things that government Space agencies have not been able to accomplish.

That is what I keep stressing.

@bloo , I am not taking away the intelligence and hard work of ISRO scientist/engineers ( or for that matter Roskosmos or CNSA or JAXA ) but we must also credit SpaceX for its achievements.
 
https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2018/...japan-and-europe-for-future-launches.html/amp

SpaceX in talks with Japan and Europe for future Falcon Heavy launches

Japan’s Space agency is considering SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy as the main launch for its HTV-X. Thie HTV-X would be used to supply a new Lunar Orbital Platform-Gateway

The European Space Agency is looking to launch a six-ton lunar station module around 2024. The European Space Agency is also considering the SpaceX Falcon Heavy.

The SpaceX Heavy would cost between $100 to 150 million to launch instead of the $400 million for the Delta IV Heavy or the potential $1 billion for the Space Launch System.
 
https://spacenews.com/swedish-firm-buys-falcon-heavy-launch/

Swedish firm buys Falcon Heavy launch

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A Swedish company with plans for a geostationary communications satellite announced Oct. 16 a contract with SpaceX for a Falcon Heavy launch no earlier than the fourth quarter of 2020.

Ovzon of Solna, Sweden, has not yet purchased the satellite, but paid Eutelsat $1.6 million earlier this year to move one of its satellites to an unspecified Ovzon orbital slot to preserve spectrum rights at that location.

In a statement, Ovzon CEO Per Wahlberg said procurement of the company’s first satellite is “in the final stage,” and that production of an advanced onboard processor started earlier this month.

“Contracting the launch supplier of our first Ovzon satellite is an important and exciting step for our company. SpaceX offered a very competitive solution with the Falcon Heavy launch vehicle which will gain us access to space in a timely and reliable manner,” he said.

Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX’s president and chief operating officer said the company is “honored that Ovzon has chosen SpaceX to launch the first of its satellites.”

“We look forward to working closely on the execution of this important direct-to-GEO mission,” she said in the statement.

Ovzon cautioned that the Falcon Heavy contract is “subject to certain contingencies and mutual termination clauses.”

A launch in late 2020 will require a geostationary satellite to be built in roughly two years, an achievable but tight deadline for most of the world’s top manufacturers.

Wahlberg co-founded Swe-Dish, a satellite communications terminal manufacturer, in 1994. DataPath purchased Swe-Dish in 2007 for $56 million, and then Rockwell Collins purchased DataPath in 2009 for $130 million. In 2014, Rockwell Collins divested from DataPath selling the company for just $10 million.

SpaceX launched the first Falcon Heavy in February 2018 with a red Tesla Roadster as a practice payload. The company’s growing queue of Falcon Heavy customers include the U.S. Air Force and fleet operators Arabsat, Intelsat and Inmarsat.
 
I know. I admire Wernher von Braun. But this Germany is long gone. Its sad to see a once proud nation not being able to build an airport anymore. To build crap cars and miss evry new technology.

I hope they find the right way before its too late.
Totale Niederlage in 1945....still to recover....
 
https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-back-to-back-falcon-heavy-launches-same-rocket-boosters/

SpaceX to attempt back-to-back Falcon Heavy launches with booster reuse in 2019

SpaceNews reports that SpaceX is planning an impressive duo of Falcon Heavy launches in the first half of 2019, the heavy lift rocket’s second and third missions. According to Nicky Fox, NASA’s heliophysics division director, SpaceX intends to recover and reuse all three Falcon Heavy first stage boosters for both launches and apparently believes that it can recover and prepare them for a second launch in as few as 60 days.

Following a highly successful February 2018 launch debut, SpaceX has targeted the launches of commercial satellite Arabsat 6A and the USAF’s Space Test Program 2 (STP-2) in the second half of 2018, a schedule that rapidly realigned to H1 2019. If the unofficial plan described above turns out to be true, the USAF will apparently become the first commercial customer to launch on a flight-proven Falcon Heavy.

A Reddit user was lucky enough to spot one of SpaceX’s next-gen Falcon Heavy side boosters – coincidentally just one day after Dr. Fox’s comments – on its way East through rainy Louisiana, undeniable evidence that the heavy lift rocket’s second (and third) launches have a real chance of happening in early 2019. According to Dr. Fox, SpaceX is seriously targeting a very rapid turnaround of Falcon Heavy’s next three first stage boosters, stating (admittedly without official confirmation) that SpaceX would be reusing the boosters from Arabsat 6A’s March 2019 launch on the planned April 2019 launch of STP-2.

Whether or not this officially unconfirmed information is correct, it certainly sounds like just the thing that CEO Elon Musk might challenge SpaceX to pull off, not to mention the fact that this would place the US Air Force in a situation requiring it to become the first commercial customer to launch on a flight-proven Falcon Heavy. This would be a truly dramatic change in attitude compared to comments made in just the last week, brought up in the context of SpaceX’s planned December 18 (now Dec 22) launch of the USAF’s first next-gen GPS satellite, GPS III SV01. In official comments provided to the media, the Air Force was extremely “uncertain” about allowing SpaceX to even attempt to recover its Falcon 9 booster, let alone allowing the company to fly Air Force payloads on flight-proven rockets.

Admittedly, the intentions behind STP-2 differ drastically from GPS III SV01. As the name suggests, the missions falls under a program explicitly designed to test and prove out new launch vehicles in the context of fast-tracking their certification for higher-value Air Force spacecraft. Falcon 9 could almost certainly launch STP-2 in a reusable configuration, but the USAF chose Falcon Heavy – and included literal dead weight – because the military branch is very interested in the rocket’s potential utility for more serious National Security Space missions.

paceX’s first Falcon Heavy launch famously featured flight-proven side boosters that performed jaw-dropping simultaneous landings at LZ-1 and LZ-2. Chances are good that Falcon Heavy Flight 2 and 3 will both feature additional attempts at simultaneous LZ booster landings. If SpaceX can find a way to launch Falcon Heavy twice in barely two months while still reusing all three first stage boosters, it’s hard to imagine a better way to demonstrate the economic and technological viability of both Falcon Heavy and Block 5’s reusability upgrades.
 
https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-falcon-heavy-milestone-three-boosters-arrive-in-florida/

SpaceX’s next Falcon Heavy reaches milestone as third booster arrives in FL

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A new SpaceX rocket was spotted traveling into Florida yesterday on its way to one of the company’s several Cape Canaveral booster storage and processing hangars. More likely than not, this particular booster is the second Falcon Heavy center core ever built, a heavily modified variant of Falcon 9’s first stage.

With the presumed center core’s arrival, all three Falcon Heavy boosters are now at or near SpaceX Launch Complex 39A, a major step forward for the second flight of the super heavy-lift launch vehicle, currently NET March 2019. Aside from the first stage, it appears that Falcon Heavy Flight 2’s payload fairing may have also arrived at Cape Canaveral around the end of January.

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SpaceX Facebook group member Joshua Murrah also captured what is likely the third Falcon Heavy booster’s Florida arrival. (Joshua Murrah, 02/11/19)
Captured by SpaceX Facebook group member Joshua Murrah on the morning of February 11th, the shrinkwrapped Falcon booster and truck were stopped at a weigh station on the border of Alabama and Florida, a now-common location for core spottings thanks to its adjacency to Mr. Murrah’s daily commute. No more than an 8-10 hour drive from Florida’s East Coast and Kennedy Space Center, the rocket likely arrived at its destination sometime within the last 12 or so hours.

While Falcon Heavy hardware would normally be expected to head straight for SpaceX’s hangar at Pad 39A, the only facility currently capable of launching the triple-booster rocket, the company faces a mild logistical challenge thanks to the terminally delayed launch debut of Crew Dragon. As of now, Crew Dragon, Falcon 9, and 39A’s transporter/erector (T/E) are integrated inside the pad’s hangar, leaving very little space for additional rocket processing as a result of the sheer scale of the T/E. Past photos of SpaceX’s 39A hangar illustrate that it can nominally house 4 or 5 Falcon boosters with ease, but space becomes far more limited once the T/E is rolled inside.

In essence, Falcon Heavy Flight 2 will likely have to wait until Crew Dragon has completed its launch debut before SpaceX technicians and engineers can begin integrating its three boosters and verifying that all is healthy, only the second time SpaceX will have performed those procedures. Crew Dragon’s uncrewed demonstration mission (DM-1) is currently scheduled for NET March 2nd, although there is a high probability that it will slip at least a few more days into March, if not further. Prior to its latest March 2nd launch target, Crew Dragon was expected to launch sometime in mid-to-late January as of December 2018, a date that has effectively remained 30+ days away ever since.

It’s ambiguous what the causes of those delays are and SpaceX and NASA clearly have no interest in directly tackling an explanation, but the most likely reason can be found in a painfully mundane reality: paperwork, worsened by a record-length US goverment shutdown. While both partners are likely culpable in some way, the fact remains that SpaceX has a long history of doing difficult things faster and cheaper than the old guard perceives as possible, while NASA has its own decades-long history of doing difficult things with extreme caution (for better or for worse).






With any luck, Crew Dragon will successfully launch into orbit for the first time in the first several days of March, leaving enough buffer for SpaceX to rapidly integrate, checkout, and static-fire Falcon Heavy for an operational launch debut – carrying communications satellite Arabsat 6A – near the end of March. If all goes well, Falcon Heavy’s third launch – the USAF’s second Space Test Program mission (STP-2) – could occur as early as April 2019, potentially just a month after Flight 2.
 
SpaceX: Falcon Heavy
Payload to LEO 63,800 kg (140,700 lb)
Payload to GTO 26,700 kg (58,900 lb)

Russia: Angara 5
Payload to LEO 24,500 kg (54,000 lb)
Payload to GTO 7,500 kg (16,500 lb)

China: Long March 5 (cz5)
Payload to LEO 23,000 kg (51,000 lb)
Payload to GTO 13,000 kg (29,000 lb)


NASA to attempt to take crown back and exceed the power of the SpaceX Super Heavy with an 8:30am EDT Monday August 29th with a SLS Block 1 launch


Payload to LEO
Mass
  • Block 1: 95 t (209,000 lb)
  • Block 1B: 105 t (231,000 lb)[8][9]
  • Block 2: 130 t (290,000 lb)[10]





Payload to trans-lunar injection
Mass
  • Block 1: > 59,500 lb (27 t)
  • Block 1B Crew: 83,700 lb (38 t)
  • Block 1B Cargo: 92,500 lb (42 t)
  • Block 2 Crew: > 94,700 lb (43 t)
  • Block 2 Cargo: > 101,400 lb (46 t)


 
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