This thing's gonna be an epitome of brute-forcing
Future SHs may have 35 raptors...And those were Raptor 1s, who knows if it would've even left the pad with S20 on top if they tried to send it
SpaceX has ‘ambition’ you can’t deny that !
Let's just go all the way to 42 engines the way ITS intended💀
Oldspace: "You can't just alter your engine configuration mid-development, the whole rocket is designed around the engines, and any change would invalidate the delicate-"
SpaceX: "lol, number go up"
Engine printing machine go brrrt
We had the tic-tac-toe Falcon 9, it's time for chessboard Starship.
More of the same engine type, help to minimises the design and control changes needed - just some rebalancing done in software.
We already know that they are using adaptive engine control software - designed originally to accommodate ‘engine out’ capability and automatic adjustment.
Well winding that control in the other direction - adding engines rather than taking them away, and tweaking the engine geometry, is then not so difficult.
Over 20 million pounds of thrust and more than twice as powerful as the next most powerful rocket to ever attempt a launch
If they eventually bring Raptor thrust up to 300 tonnes that they're aiming for, it will be 3 times more thrust than the next most powerful rocket to ever successfully launch (not counting prior iterations of Starship).
SH to N1: "Do you even thrust bro???"
SpaceX has much better control systems than were available back then..
(Pssst, it was a joke)
But I’ll stand by my correct statement, regardless.
Yes - but I am not sure where the limits lie - don’t forget, not only do they want ‘performance’ they also want ‘reliability’ too - so it does not do to push the engines too hard.
At the same time, you don’t want to leave safe untapped performance still on the table.
SpaceX have not been too shy at risking blowing up engines to test the limits of their present designs and mods.
And they are succeeding at it too !
I think you should put the middle ring closer to the outter ring, the 5 center engines don't have any gimbal clearance
When there's no engine cowling like there is now, there's plenty of space. People have checked. Only need Raptor v3 for it.
My thoughts exactly when seeing this.
Maybe gimbal the middle 10 away from the center 5 after the 10 have done their job during the landing burn?
wouldn't it be easier to not have them that close in the first place? IDK, spacex is very well capable of saying that center 5 could be 6
Since the middle 10 also gimbal, they need some space on the outside, since the outside ring doesn't gimbal. When the inside 5 want to gimbal, they get enough space because the middle 10 would gimbal in the same direction.
If you only operate the inner 5, you may still gimbal all 15, or statically gimbal the middle 10 towards the outside.
B F R
They keep adding dry mass to the ship, they gotta bring up the ratio.
Yep, just make it longer. If they add engines, they need it to be even longer still.
That's how one gets a rocket twice the height of the Saturn V.
I want it to be an even 150m long. 140m is for pussies.
We can see what levers SpaceX has to tweak things, to achieve the margins they want.
Meanwhile they are still using Prototype to learn how to metaphorically pass their Starship driving test… ;)
Imagine if they would have stuck with a 12 meter diameter design
Not too late to squeeze in a fourth ring…
The rocket they can afford and build, is worth more than the more fancy rocket that they can’t afford.
Affordability has enabled iteration.
Beside which when the get the nine-meter Starship working, that would make it easier to build larger at some later point.
On one level I agree. But on another, I disagree. Retooling the manufacturing process would be time consuming and expensive, and it would require the redesign of the launch mount at the very least, if not the tower, chopsticks, and other infrastructure as well.
That isn't to say they won't go with a wider diameter in the future of course. I just think it would have been a more future-proof design if they had gone 12 meters instead.
But not if they had to give up, because it was becoming too expensive.. The nine meter solution is not exactly free either - but it is more affordable. And even now, SpaceX cannot be sure just how many more iterations they will need to go through, before Starship is fully operational.
Better the bird in hand, than two in the bush..
I’m IOTL can someone explain I have been seeing this new booster design everywhere
There is a thrust ram design for superheavy that appears to be set up for a 35 engine superheavy.
Also the Environmental impact study for the Cape also lists 35 engines.
New testing hardware showing an arrangement of 15 inner core engines was spotted at boca chica. The current booster design we have seen has only 13 inner engines.
"only" 13 haha
Is anyone else worried about the pad not surviving the 2200 more tons of thrust with raptor 3 on block 3.
Heat tiles, held with duct tape, that will do.
I'd add some zip ties and hot glue for the gaps
Ablative launch pad
IFT-1 type launch pad is the best pad. It goes all over the place, just like a rocket.
Sounds like they may need to increase the deluge water pressure a bit more for that !
More MORE
MORE
That's just begging to squeeze another in the middle
Jep
I just love how axially- symmetric the layout is now. It divided into 5 sections of 1+2+3 engines. Perhaps it makes plumbing sections modular and more streamline to assembly.
Can someone tell me what the point of having more engines is when the fuel amount is the same? It's not like they are having trouble burning off all the fuel, and that fuel only has a finite amount of energy, so extra engines just gets you to space faster but less efficiently (due to additional engine mass). So what's the point?
More TWR (thrust to weight ratio) means more acceleration, and less time spent fighting gravity. Also they want to increase the amount of fuel in later booster and starship versions, as well as increasing the payload mass, so you will need more thrust for the same acceleration.
It has to do with orbital mechanics. "Gravity loss" is the term here. Essentially, a faster rocket, one that accelerates faster, with the same mass ratio, has a higher velocity at burnout. Less time for gravity to pull it down.
They are intending to stretch the booster and ship making them both longer.
But it allows rocket to leave dense atmosphere faster, then it can speed up with higher efficiency. So there is a balance and maybe current setup overall more efficient with more engines
Well more engines = more power,
More power = greater lifting capacity,
More lifting capacity = more payload capacity.
Also:
More power > greater acceleration.
Greater acceleration = Lower Gravity Losses,
Lower Gravity Losses = Increased fuel efficiency.
Increased Furl Efficiency > Increased Payload Capacity
So it’s all about Payload Capacity.
Considering something like Tanker Starship, it can mean requiring fewer flights.
Also more lift capacity means that more propellants could be carried.
In most cases more thrust is a good thing.
Exactly what I was thinking, I also don’t understand the point.
The main point is to increase payload capacity = more mass to orbit.
If you have a fixed middle ring you can have 13 engines in the middle ring instead of 10
You can easily have 37 engines, maybe more:
Maybe - but then you cannot gimbal the inner ring, which means that you now have less command authority, meanwhile the only reason for doing this is to increase payload capacity, which demands more command authority - so you are starting to box yourself into a corner.
Is'nt this gonna create a-simetric thrust during the landing burn since the only used 3 engines?
Don’t forget the gimbaling, that can allow for some off axis thrust differential. Plus they also have throttling at their disposal too !
Is this because they need to add thrust when they realize they need more structural elements? Those header tanks have to cost a lot. I know they’re eating into the payload space.
Also the Starship mass (Super Heavies main payload) is getting more massive with things like an enhanced heat shield, which carries some mass penalty.
SpaceX be fighting the tyranny of the rocket equation with Brute force.
I say we launch now and hope for the best
They can fit one in the center too
No, it’s not quite big enough + it would restrict gimbaling.
When you just discovered the symmetry tool in Kerbal
True, until the next still bigger thing comes along at some point.
I haven’t really been keeping up with future ships, is this the V2 engine layout?
They should go full Merlin vac and make the nozzles stubby for better space usage
Kerbify the SH! ADD MORE ENGINES!
It's a good start.
That’s what the Russians said about the N-1. N-1 troubles
The trouble with the N-1 was that they didn't have proper testing. And then when the systems didn't work, they had no way to fix the problems, because they didn't even know what went wrong.
They didn't have testing for the rocket and neither for the engines.
Remember the puny 29 engine design? Which was already bonkers...