Comment on Second SpaceX Starship launch ends with explosion. What happens next?

• JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  They created reusable rockets. Lots and lots of concepts on the drawing board, but theirs was unique and the first one to get made.

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  • chiliedogg@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    The rocket boosters on the space shuttle were absolutely reused. Here’s video of one being retrieved.

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    • JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      We can argue about semantics, but they were moreso rebuilt from the same parts than reused as is. NASA found that it would have been much cheaper to build new SRBs after each launch than rebuild them.

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    • I_Has_A_Hat@startrek.website ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Retrieved, not reused.

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      • chiliedogg@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        The SRBs used on the final shuttle mission were the same boosters used on the first mission. That set was used a total of 60 times. Only 2 sets of boosters were never recovered for re-use. The set from STS-4 had a parachute malfunction, and the set from the Challenger exploded.

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      • drdabbles@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        Literally reused. What are you talking about.

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    • Strykker@programming.dev ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      SRB boosters are quite close to literally just a big steel tube, and they reused them by dropping them into the ocean under a parachute.

      They still had to clean out and refurb every booster launched. And that was without the complex rocket engines that would get destroyed by being submerged in the ocean.

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  • drdabbles@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Creating isn’t inventing, and there’s wasn’t the first to be flown. Man, the SpaceX fans don’t really know the history of the industry they make these claims about.

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    • JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      You referring to the DC-X subscale tech demonstrator?

      I think inventing is a less well defined term, since anyone with a napkin can claim to invent something to a very low fidelity. The details are the hard part, not the idea itself. So that’s why I specified created, since that is inventing to a very high level of fidelity.

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      • drdabbles@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        There’s several other examples. I also don’t think inventing is an ill-defined term. That’s an absurd thing to even say.

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    • interceder270@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Welcome to the Cult of Musk.

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      • drdabbles@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        I’ve had experience with Musk Fans in the past. They all read from the same script, including the “I don’t even like Musk” lie.

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• MaggiWuerze@feddit.de ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Who outside of TinTin comics has done a reusable rockets other than SpaceX?

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  • drdabbles@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I mean, just basic research would answer this for you. But I’ll start you off with an easy one. The SRB on shuttle launches was reusable. Now go forth and look up rocket history.

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    • MaggiWuerze@feddit.de ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Sure, fishing a burning bucket out of the ocean is the same as an actual rocket that lands by itself and just needs to be refueled.

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      • drdabbles@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        If you tried just a little harder, he’ll notice you.

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    • JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      It depends how you define your terms. The parts were disassembled, cleaned, inspected, and reassembled. That’s not what most people think of as reusable, more like refurbishable. And anyway, they didn’t save any cost or time doing that vs building new ones, hence why SLS is using them as single use.

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      • drdabbles@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        It doesn’t depend on how I define my terms. It was reused. You literally just fucking said it was reused. What you just described is the exact definition of what everyone considers reused. This is such a stupid conversation to have, and only the SpaceX sense are the ones that ever want to have it.

        Also, because you don’t seem to know anything about anything, what you described is exactly what SpaceX does. How the fuck did you get this so wrong?

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    • noUsernamesLef7@infosec.pub ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      The shuttle SRB’s were really only reusable in the same sense that the engine from a wrecked car can be removed, stripped to a bare block, bored out, rebuilt, and placed into a new car is reusable. Hard to say exactly how long it took to turn around SRB segments, but just the rail transport between Utah and Florida was 12 days each way. SpaceX has turned around Falcon 9 boosters in under a month.

      And even with all of that, the most reused reusable segments barely flew a dozen times. There is one Falcon 9 first stage that has now flown 18 times.

      You’re not wrong about parts having been reused in the past but the scale of what has been done before really doesn’t compare to what SpaceX does now.

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      • drdabbles@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        Looks like you also need to review the publicly available NASA documentation for refurbishment.

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