SpaceX Starship page

FAQ

  1. When (first) orbital flight? First integrated flight test occurred April 20, 2023. “The vehicle cleared the pad and beach as Starship climbed to an apogee of ~39 km over the Gulf of Mexico – the highest of any Starship to-date. The vehicle experienced multiple engines out during the flight test, lost altitude, and began to tumble. The flight termination system was commanded on both the booster and ship.”
  2. Where can I find streams of the launch? SpaceX Full Livestream. NASASpaceFlight Channel. Lab Padre Channel. Everyday Astronaut Channel.
  3. What’s happening next? SpaceX has assessed damage to Stage 0 and is implementing fixes and changes including a water deluge/pad protection/“shower head” system. No major repairs to key structures appear to be necessary.
  4. When is the next flight test? Just after flight, Elon stated they “Learned a lot for next test launch in a few months.” On April 29, he reiterated this estimate in a Twitter Spaces Q&A (summarized here), saying “I’m glad to report that the pad damage is actually quite small,” should “be repaired quickly,” and “From a pad standpoint, we are probably ready to launch in 6 to 8 weeks.” Requalifying the flight termination system (FTS) and the FAA post-incident review will likely require the longest time to complete. Musk reiterated the timeline on May 26, stating “Major launchpad upgrades should be complete in about a month, then another month of rocket testing on pad, then flight 2 of Starship.”
  5. Why no flame diverter/flame trench below the OLM? Musk tweeted on April 21: “3 months ago, we started building a massive water-cooled, steel plate to go under the launch mount. Wasn’t ready in time & we wrongly thought, based on static fire data, that Fondag would make it through 1 launch.” Regarding a trench, note that the Starship on the OLM sits 2.5x higher off the ground than the Saturn V sat above the base of its flame trench, and the OLM has 6 exits vs. 2 on the Saturn V trench.

Quick Links

RAPTOR ROOST | LAB CAM | SAPPHIRE CAM | SENTINEL CAM | ROVER CAM | ROVER 2.0 CAM | PLEX CAM | NSF STARBASE

Relevant Reddit threads (though these likely won’t be accessible during the blackout).

Starship Dev 46 | Starship Dev 45 | Starship Dev 44 | Starship Dev 43 | Starship Thread List

Official Starship Update | r/SpaceX Update Thread

Status

Road Closures

No road closures currently scheduled

No transportation delays currently scheduled

Up to date as of 2023-07-09

Resources

I’ll attempt to keep this post current with links and major updates, but would be greatly helped by information supplied by the community. I hope this can be an alternate place to discuss Starship development. While the Starship Development Threads on Reddit are not party threads, Lemmy is still small enough that I don’t imagine that strict moderation will be needed in the short term.

    • LettuceTurnipTheBeet@lemm.eeEnglish
      4·
      1 year ago

      I’m really impressed by how quickly the plate is getting assembled. I didn’t expect the manifolds to get added for another week or so, and now they’re at 2 / 3.

      I’m not sure what the bottleneck is at the moment. Once everything is lifted in place they can move B9 over, but they might want to wait until they hit stage adapter is added.

      B9 could go through spin prime tests without the plane being ready, and the plate can get tested without all deluge water & gas tanks present. We’re also it sure how far along the other OLM repairs are (cryo pipes are still being replaced). So there’s a ton of stuff happening in parallel.

      • John_Hasler@lemmy.oneEnglish
        3·
        1 year ago

        Musk said that he thought that FAA approval of a new FTS design was likely to be the long pole.

  • pigeonberry@lemmy.worldEnglish
    10·
    1 year ago

    SpaceX @SpaceX on Twitter

    Ship 25 completes a six-engine static fire test at Starbase in Texas

    11 seconds. In the audio, only a little bit of HONK at the end.

    Someone pointed out that the flames start out as a triangle, but then switch rotated 60 degrees when the vacuum engines start - V to ^.

    A comment in The Other Place mentioned that it looks like a little spalled concrete at 4 seconds in.

  • LettuceTurnipTheBeet@lemm.eeEnglish
    9·
    1 year ago

    RGV Sneak Peek shows some nice shots of the steel plates, as well as the pour under the OLM. Looks like a lot more concrete is needed though, wonder when that’ll happen.

    The steel plates look ready for transport, so I bet this next pour will be soon — it seems to be the main hold up.

  • pigeonberry@lemmy.worldEnglish
    9·
    1 year ago

    More pour info, this time from tweets from Zack Golden @CSI_Starbase. The truck counts basically match those from @[email protected]’s post earlier.

    SpaceX has received their final load of concrete for today’s Orbital Launch Mount foundation work. Here are the totals after the 15.3 hour marathon:

    June 25th - 132 Truck loads

    July 3rd - 171 Truck loads

    Total Volume = 2,302 m^3 = 3030 yd^3

    Total Weight = 5,411 Tons

    For reference, a Fully loaded Starship ~ 5,000 Tons

    Note: There were 4 additional trucks that showed up but were turned back around without offloading.

    Shoutout to agents @VickiCocks15 and @SpmtTracker for keeping track of all these.

    4:11 PM · Jul 3, 2023

    and

    Obviously this number is significantly greater than we predicted. For those who asked, that previous number was not considering the area in yellow, which were also completed today. This area is technically outside of the true foundation of the OLM

    with a picture by RGV Aerial Photography.

  • roomey@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    8·
    1 year ago

    This is great thank you, I started following spacex Reddit in the echologic (was that his name?) Days, but the sub got a bit, I dunno, it started to lack a certain something. Just got too big maybe.

    I’m happy to see this here! Thanks for starting it, sorry for the off topic 😂

  • Decronym@lemmy.decronym.xyzBEnglish
    7·
    1 year ago

    Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I’ve seen in this thread:

    Fewer Letters More Letters
    FAA Federal Aviation Administration
    FTS Flight Termination System
    LOX Liquid Oxygen
    MECO Main Engine Cut-Off
    ~ MainEngineCutOff podcast
    N1 Raketa Nositel-1, Soviet super-heavy-lift (“Russian Saturn V”)
    NSF NasaSpaceFlight forum
    ~ National Science Foundation
    OLM Orbital Launch Mount
    QD Quick-Disconnect
    SPMT Self-Propelled Mobile Transporter
    Jargon Definition
    Raptor Methane-fueled rocket engine under development by SpaceX
    cryogenic Very low temperature fluid; materials that would be gaseous at room temperature/pressure
    ~ (In re: rocket fuel) Often synonymous with hydrolox
    hydrolox Portmanteau: liquid hydrogen fuel, liquid oxygen oxidizer
    iron waffle Compact “waffle-iron” aerodynamic control surface, acts as a wing without needing to be as large; also, “grid fin”
    ullage motor Small rocket motor that fires to push propellant to the bottom of the tank, when in zero-g

    13 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 4 acronyms.

    [Thread #0 for this sub, first seen 15th Jun 2023, 07:42] [FAQ] [Full list] [Contact] [Source code]

  • pigeonberry@lemmy.worldEnglish
    7·
    1 year ago

    John Kraus @johnkrausphotos:

    In a Twitter Space with @ashleevance, @elonmusk shares that Starship will hot-stage during the next flight, lighting engines on the ship with some engines still running on the booster, as to Never Stop Thrusting!™️

    “Hot staging” is firing the upper stage engines while it’s still nominally attached to the lower stage (like resting on or loosely attached). The advantages that I gather exist: It’s fast. It takes care of stage separation without needing springs or little rockets or a flip or anything. Before firing a liquid-fueled stage that may have gases in a tank (“ullage”), you have to settle the contents so that the engine intakes suck only liquid (maybe using “ullage rockets”), but if you’re still accelerating at separation, that’s automatically taken care of.

    But if you intend to reuse the first stage, well, I wonder whether six engines igniting will be too hard on it.

    Apparently U.S. Titan rockets, a lot of Soviet / Russian ones (Soyuz, Progress, N-1), and (some?) Chinese Long March rockets were designed with hot staging.

    Joe Barnard @joebarnard replies: "‘okay so when I hot stage it’s “an anomaly” and I’ve “torched another flight computer” but when SpaceX does it it’s fine???’

    • subtle_inquisitor@aussie.zoneEnglish
      4·
      1 year ago

      Interesting, most of the Soviet rockets that uses hot staging had a truss between each stage to allow the exhaust to vent. As far as I know starship doesn’t have anything like this yet, I wonder if they’ll add some or if they’re just gonna see what happens without it 😂

    • John_Hasler@lemmy.oneEnglish
      3·
      1 year ago

      Hot staging also eliminates the gravity loss that otherwise would occur during the coasting phase during and after separation.

      They may ignite only three engines at half thrust for the first second or so.

      • few@sh.itjust.worksMEnglish
        2·
        1 year ago

        At stage separation how horizontal is Starship? If there was no vertical moment then how significant would the gravity loss actually be?

        AFAIK most of the gravity loss is in the first few second of a launch but I don’t have any idea what you are losing by the time you get to stage separation.

  • pigeonberry@lemmy.worldEnglish
    7·
    1 year ago

    So the big news of the day and night was what is believed to be the center plate of the water deluge system. It is thought that it will be placed directly under the Orbital Launch Mount.

    @[email protected] already posted (at top level) “CSI Starbase video on new Deluge system”, a deep dive part 1. The URL I see for the post is https://lemmy.world/post/879748 , because that’s how I access this. The canonical one is https://lemm.ee/post/530280 .

    CSI Starbase SPMT Tracker @SpmtTracker posted a tweet with a picture of what is very likely to be a vertical stand for the center plate. The image is on Imgur. The tweet is here. Ryan Hansen Space @RyanHansenSpace tweeted a rendering of how it might look under the OLM. This should be the image:

    @[email protected] posted below (if sorted by new) a link to a 13-minute video by Starship Gazer, of people working in the tent on the center plate. https://lemm.ee/comment/534238 . Someone commented that, from 4 minutes on, it’s comedy gold. People were grinning around them. I’m told that someone is standing on top of the cheater pipe at one point.

    NASASpaceflight posted a video of the rollout of the center. It’s about 1 hour 26 minutes long. The stand / jig was on the first truck; the center plate with some people on it was on the next truck. The clearest views are about 17 minutes on.

  • LettuceTurnipTheBeet@lemm.eeEnglish
    7·
    1 year ago

    New comment from /u/santacfan on Reddit:

    Starbase live-

    8:57am- Black pipe lifted over towards the dog house area (most likely a cryo pipe but couldn’t tell for sure)

    9:07am- LR11000 moves a deluge pipe. Lifted over to the work area by where the deluge stand is parked

    9:30am- Second deluge pipe lifted. Moved to the same area

    9:54am- 3rd deluge pipe moved

    10:12am-4th deluge pipe moved (So apparently all of the pipes they moved to the side a couple weeks ago, they’re moving back over to be worked on)

    10:20am- Looks like all of the boards have been removed and now they are starting to remove the metal poles of the scaffolding below the OLM.

    10:26am- 5th deluge pipe moved. Crane didn’t swing back over this time so the Y pipe looks like it will stay in it’s current position

    12:15pm- Scaffolding continues to be removed

    2:15pm- Crane is starting to use the bucket to lift loads off of the top of the OLM as well as underneath.

    5:15pm- Crane has lowered and left the OLM area. The 2 man lifts that have been working on the scaffolding have also lowered. Work continues around the base of the OLM.

    6:30pm- Crane and man lift back up working on the BQD side of the OLM

    9:15pm- Fireworks

    9:25pm- SPI fireworks

    (This gets synced)

    • LettuceTurnipTheBeet@lemm.eeEnglish
      4·
      1 year ago

      I guess I expected today to be a slow day, allowing the concrete to set and with it being a holiday and all.

      But nope, full steam ahead. I wonder when they’ll be ready to move that giant plate in?

    • pigeonberry@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      I also saw this in The Other Place:

      [Meta] Twitter is now throwing up a nag screen to force users to log in to view content, supposedly on a temporary basis. Since a lot of the content here links to Twitter, this could be inconvenient to those without an account.

      A simple solution is to link to the embedded version of the Tweet, like so. Simply type:

      https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?id=xxx

      And replace xxx with the Tweet id.

      The other solution is to link to an archived version of a tweet.

      (I think the last is like Internet Archive.)

  • mars2033@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    6·
    1 year ago

    Ship 25 completed a flight-like chill and spin of the Raptor engine pumps, stopping just before engine ignition. As a result of the test, cryogenic liquid oxygen formed a visible cloud beneath the ship. This checked out vital systems in advance of the upcoming static fire.

    source

  • pigeonberry@lemmy.worldEnglish
    6·
    1 year ago

    TheSpaceEngineer @mcrs987 has a thread on Twitter about hot-staging. A lot of people have been assuming that the lacy structure in his second picture will be the interstage that lets the exhaust out. He argues that it’s unlikely, because (1) it doesn’t look structurally sound, (2) it has been marked for scrap and no others have been seen, (3) the stringer pattern doesn’t match the booster.

    He advocates for another ring, which looks much more solid but has some reinforced holes. There have been two of them so far. He also says it resembles the hot-stage interstage of the Titan 2.

    • clothes@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      Also a fun bonus to this, if you make the vents able to open and close on command, you could use the thrust from the second stage to help flip the booster around (19/24)

      This is hilarious and I love it.

      • pigeonberry@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        1 year ago

        The best part is no part. The next-best part is a part somewhere else.

        I started out making a silly joke, but … hmm, actually, there’s something there. Starting your booster? Mostly stage 0. Flipping? Stage 2. Decelerating? Atmosphere, mostly. Landing? Ha ha, get this: stage 0 again.

  • pigeonberry@lemmy.worldEnglish
    6·
    1 year ago

    What about it!? @FelixSchlang tweet from 3:03 PM - Jun 29, 2023:

    It happened!!!

    SpaceX opened the wall to the inventory tent and revealed one of the water deluge plates to us up close and countless other things in there!

    High res pictures for supporters on all platforms coming soon!

    The image alone.

    In a reply, they said it looks to be upside down.

    In The Other Place, u/warp99 wrote,

    Looks like the segments are around 400mm thick and constructed from 40mm (38mm=1.5"?) steel plate The overall shape is a hexagon about 10m across the flats with each corner notched out.

    They also speculated on how to weld the edges together: maybe put them on a stand above the final location, weld them from above and below, attach cranes and remove the stand, lower into place.

    Starship Gazer (as seen on Nitter) had more pictures.