Comment by GuB-42 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by GuB-42 | Hacker News Reader

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I agree with the cheap launch platform argument but from another, perspective.

I don't believe SpaceX numbers and BFR (it will always be BFR for me) is still a paper rocket (Raptor looks good though). But it is still cheap compared to traditional launches.

The problem is: SpaceX has now plenty of cheap, reusable Falcon 9s but not a lot of stuff to launch. There are not that many companies who want to build and launch satellites: it is expensive no matter what and the cost has to be justified. Falcon 9 rockets (including heavy) are also limited in capability: small fairing space and not the most efficient beyond LEO. Also, it may not be suitable for some sensitive payloads (military, etc...).

Ii means that SpaceX has good rockets, they already have the "culture and skills for rapid relaunch" but not enough market for it. So they did the obvious thing: create their own.

As for BFR. I made the choice not to take SpaceX communication into account, it is worthless. Same thing with everything by Elon Musk. I only believe what they show, which is already impressive enough.

By no definition is Starship a paper rocket. Either you have not been paying attention or you don't know what the definition of a paper rocket is.

> small fairing space and

Its not actually small. Its a little smaller then the biggest that you could launch on Delta 4 (that you can't buy) or a New Glenn (that you can't buy), but to just say its 'small' is just not accurate. Essentially its size is big enough for 99% of payloads.

There are like a few military sats in the next 5 years that need a slightly bigger fairing and they will have that for those launches.

> not the most efficient beyond LEO

By what definition? Just because it doesn't use hydrogen doesn't mean its not the suitable for beyond LEO. There is a reason the alternative for SLS is Falcon Heavy and not anything else.

> Also, it may not be suitable for some sensitive payloads (military, etc...).

That is just false. Falcon rockets are fully qualified for all military orbits and payloads.

The only thing they can't do right now is vertical assembly and that will be built by the time they have the first contract.

I think there is still a pricing problem with reusability because spacex doesn’t have any competition that is reusable.

There is no downward pressure on pricing because spacex only has to be slightly cheaper than the cheapest non-reusable rocket. So for a marginal cost of, let’s say, $2m for a reflown booster, there are still able to charge $50m+.

But since their customers are seeing prices of $50m, space is still expensive... nothing much has changed.

(I’ve simplified this by omitting the fact that the upper stage is not reusable)

A lot of BFR development is being done in the open in Boca Chica, and you can follow along because it’s being live-streamed almost 24/7. BFR has had small incremental hops recently and will try for a 15km flight this week. We’ll see what happens.

Hopefully Bezos and Blue Origin can get New Glen on the launch pad soon. It is the only viable competitor to SpaceX that I see at the moment. One other possibility is for some company in China to appear on the scene.

Elon Musk has said he would love some competition because it helps increase the pace of progress. He even tried that internally for a bit by developing StarShip in two locations for awhile. I heard him in an interview saying that SpaceX might have too many great engineers and that it would be better for his goal of a city on Mars to have them spread over many companies.

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