[AR] Re: big rockets

  • From: Peter Fairbrother <peter@xxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: arocket@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2021 16:01:56 +0100

On 06/10/2021 14:28, Doug Jones wrote:

Perzackly. Who needs fancy-shmancy custom rad-hard featherweight liquid-cooled vacuum-rated electronics when you can buy standard 19" rack mount packages, put 'em in a steel pressure hull an inch thick with a polyethylene liner to catch the secondaries, blow the cooling fans through a flat plate heat exchanger, and call it good?

We're talking _literal_ battleship construction.

Yup. But that's true for any cheap launch system, whether it uses BFRs or high flight rate and on-orbit assembly.

If you want to use battleship construction for your lifter then bigger may be better, but I don't see that it makes much difference for cargoes after a minimum size.

Peter Fairbrother


On Wed, Oct 6, 2021 at 1:22 AM J Farmer <jfarmer@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:jfarmer@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>> wrote:

    I think one of the points being overlooked, inadvertently or not, is
    the
    sea change that the shear lift capacity StarShip will in have in size
    and mass.  To date, every payload has to watch every kg, every cubic
    cm.  What happens when you can throw another cubic meter, lift another
    100kg mass at a problem?  How much time and money will be saved when
    you
    don't have to sweat that last one percent of your lift budget?

    As Henry pointed out in an earlier thread about dealing with
    atmospheric
    & water leaks, with reliable lift schedules, just lift enough to
    replenish for several cycles while fixing the problem.  What changes in
    your planning when that supply run can be 50 or 100 tons of air or
    water?


    John




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