[AR] Re: Re spacex falcon 9 landing
- From: Henry Spencer <hspencer@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: arocket list <arocket@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 26 Dec 2015 00:30:10 -0500 (EST)
On Wed, 23 Dec 2015, James Fackert wrote:
Blue origin landing is interesting but its intent is to some day be a rocket
amusement ride.
Hop up to the edge of space. No orbit no working payload.
Whether it's a "working payload" doesn't matter; what matters is whether
it's a *paying* payload. If what the paying customers get out of it is
amusement rather than, say, scientific knowledge, so what? (You might
also want to consider which of those might be the bigger market.)
Note also that there are a fair number of people who would like to be able
to fly "working payloads" up to the edge of space, if they can do it
rather more cheaply than flying them to orbit.
Falcon 9 is the 747 to orbit and back and is already trucking supplies to
iss and putting working satellites into orbit.
No comparison, imho.
Falcon 9 is certainly *ahead*, but otherwise, it's perfectly reasonable to
compare the two -- it's just a bit difficult. If your goal is cheap
orbit, then whether it's better to go suborbital first and then progress
to orbital, or to go expendable first and then progress to reusable, is a
perfectly reasonable question, although not simple to answer.
Remember that SpaceX doesn't *have* an operational reusable rocket yet --
just an initial proof of principle, achieved with some difficulty. Many
would say that Elon is doing things the hard way, losing much of the
benefit of reusability by treating it as a later add-on.
... Its amusing to see the doubters continue to
doubt that they will acomplish the "next" step as each is accomplished.
Do consider that SpaceX is on its second rocket (Falcon 1 having been a
technical struggle and a complete financial flop, although a useful
pathfinder for Falcon 9) and its second attempt at first-stage reusability
(the original splash-down-and-salvage-parts concept having been a complete
failure, as some of the "doubters" correctly predicted). The most notable
thing about SpaceX is not that it always succeeds, because sometimes it
doesn't, but that it's been persistent enough to amend its plan and press
on when some part of the original plan didn't work.
Henry
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