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Comment by joshrotenberg | Hacker News Reader

That was so cool. If you feel like launching one yourself, they have a user's guide: http://www.spacex.com/sites/spacex/files/falcon_9_users_guid...

And pricing information: http://www.spacex.com/about/capabilities

(edit: added pricing info which might be helpful)

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Where's the call to action? Who designed the page?

> SpaceX offers open and fixed pricing for its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launch services. Modest discounts are available, for contractually committed, multi-launch purchases. SpaceX can also offer crew transportation services to commercial customers seeking to transport astronauts to alternate LEO destinations.

With such big ticket items, I wouldn't have imagined there is a price list available. I would think these things are negotiated over expensive dinners. You almost expect to see a "Buy Now" button on the page.

This feels like one of those cases where the ticket is so big and so many are lined up to pay (because it is so much cheaper), that they just slap the price on it.

That's why websites that don't give a price quote for their products without contacting a sales rep now get frequently mocked with the words: "If SpaceX can do it, you can do it.".

> Where's the call to action? Who designed the page?

Assuming that that wasn't tongue in cheek...

Their target audience is "people who want to launch something into orbit". They don't need a call to action, they already have a rather well-defined need.

> I would think these things are negotiated over expensive dinners.

That sort of shit is exactly what Musk has been complaining about every time he talks about how fucked-up the existing space delivery industry is.

Think of it this way: You don't negotiate the price of delivery for something you're gonna ship via FedEx over a dinner.

One of the goals of SpaceX is to make the space delivery industry as much like every other delivery industry as is humanly possible.

Was most definitely tongue in cheek

It was tongue in cheek.

And I am completely on board with the open pricing model. It's incredible and probably makes their competitors very nervous.

That's the point. Space-X's pricing has terrified the industry. Now the question is whether you get a discount on used boosters.

What Space-X doesn't give you is a firm launch date. Spaceflight Now listed today's launch as "Delayed from Aug. 13, Sept. 2, Jan. 3, Feb. 7, March 20 and March 29. [March 16]" This is Space-X's biggest problem. They're about a year behind on their launch manifest. They don't even put dates on future launches any more. Customers don't like this; some have switched to Arianespace or ULA or Russia for their satellite launches.

Space-X is trying to catch up. Next launch date is April 28th, and there are two launches a month scheduled for the next few months. First Falcon Heavy launch is scheduled for November, but that may slip.

"We are backed up in how much stuff we have to deliver to space" certainly seems like one of the better problems have.

Sounds similar to Tesla's Model 3 "problem" (>375K preorders).

Clearly they need to be doing A/B testing to determine their optimum pricing.

It gets really interesting when you can put 5 people in orbit for under $80M (that is $16M apiece), Add a Bigelow module that they can spend a week in, and land back on land? I'm not sure where things are going, but it is the first time that I felt I could "see" non-NASA people going into space on a regular basis as an actual possibility. If you're re-using the boosters it could be cheaper still.

Now we need to figure out when an Amazon rocket with a BE-4 will launch (it needs a couple of BE-4s to get enough delta V to insert stuff into low earth orbit)

Perhaps space is the "next big thing" that everyone was wondering about?

The Falcon Heavy specs & pricing is fascinating. 12-13 tons to Mars for $85M? I wonder if we could see a human team on Mars within the decade.

> Perhaps space is the "next big thing" that everyone was wondering about?

When we will be able to generate value by being in space. Asteroid mining, for example, would make space travel expand a lot.

If you expand your time horizon enough, then yes, space is the next big thing.

They lost a golden opportunity to start this with "Congratulations on your purchase of a Space X Falcon 9..."

Once they start reusing them, it's really just a rental.

I'd rather rent the electric car!

It doesn't have to be either/or.

I'm expecting to see Teslas on Mars before I die.

Where's my rocket Tesla?

And given the Martian atmosphere, if you want to drive a car on Mars it has to be electric. It's all starting to make sense...

Actually, you could manufacture ethane out of the martian atmosphere, and it could be burned in an internal combustion engine using the CO2 atmosphere as oxidizer.

Or FedEx, even - SpaceX is doing the driving.

Interesting to see the margins of error on 3.6 - 10-15km in a 200x360km orbit. A lot less accurate than I would have expected, and makes standard mission designs (with separately-propelled payloads) make a lot more sense.

My KSP launches are similarly inaccurate

And it's the period that matter most of the time, not the actual ap/pe, I'd like to see the error on that.

Launch vehicles can't be controlled during atmospheric flight. All the control is in the first seconds with the roll and pitchover maneuvers and the rest of the way is maintaining a zero angle of attack during the gravity turn.

This causes errors to accumulate and they must be corrected with rocket burns with the payload satellite or space craft.

15 km may seem like quite far off, but it doesn't take a big rocket burn to correct.

This is absolutely not the case, angle of attack is not zero, but moreover most of the orbital insertion is exo-atmospheric and you can burn in whatever attitude you want. The factor determining the accuracy of the apogee of your orbit is how accurately you can shut the engine off at the right moment and control your velocity.

I like the bus for scale on pg 10.

Where's the Buy Now button??

...and PayPal integration.

Let's hear it for the Bitcoin address. :)

I'll pay with Ethereum!

My American Express card doesn't have a set spending limit... :)

Soon we will have "model rockets" which will do the same thing without reaching space....

Sounds like something SpaceX should sell. Maybe there's some value for them in miniaturizing the technology, and the small profit from the model rockets could offset the cost a bit? Or maybe just look at it as PR?

Edit: I was very much under the impression that there were concrete regulations against private individuals using active guidance on model rockets, but after searching around, I can't find any such thing. Goes to show, trust but verify, including your own memories.

While I totally get why actively guided rockets are prohibited, what I want to know is by what law are they able to enact this prohibition.

I'm glad they're not prohibited. Would think guided is a helluva lot safer than point-shoot-and-hope ;)

They're tons of fun but yeah, there's a reason they are done way out in the middle of nowhere.

My favorite was when you'd get a false start, enough to get you off the launch rod and flop onto the ground right as the main motor took off. We called those land sharks.

Active guidance on anything rocket-propelled is strictly prohibited/regulated by federal law.

This is widely believed, but not true. Here's a nice example of a small model rocket with active guidance.[1] It's launched at a 45 degree angle and then corrects to vertical. After beginning descent, it pops a parachute and lands safely. Built by a 13 year old girl.

For rockets above a certain size, you have to start talking to FAA air traffic control, and they're going to insist that you operate in some unpopulated area. But that's not about whether it has guidance technology.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTND_wot9zI

You know, memories are the only thing have to think back on...

The problem is getting a compact throttlable rocket engine. While you can throttle solid rocket motors[0], the solid rocket motors you can buy at your local hobby shop would not be very good for this, as they don't burn for very long. Hybrid rocket engines might be the thing to use for this and amateurs have built such things[1].

[0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8efpDBvTDE [1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5o4LIZ3i4o#t=23

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