Starship - Human Rating and Orbital Refueling - Discussion

[Grendal]

The manufacturing buildup is impressive. I'll stand by my optimistic prediction based on what I've seen.

 

[Nikxice]

Regarding Starship testing and human crew, have to consider what Elon said only two years ago. He was speaking at the virtual 2020 'Humans to Mars' conference. I vaguely remembered a key quote, so looked it up.

"We've got to first make the thing work; automatically deliver satellites and do hundreds of missions with satellites before we put people on board."

 

[scaesare]

I'm with everyone here and believe that the chance of a 2023 Dear Moon Starship journey around the Moon is zero.

Let's walk through the steps needed.

1. Orbital Test launch - seeing if they get to orbit and a water landing where the Starship will be lost. There is a chance that the Super Heavy could come back for a landing. That is just a complex F9 booster maneuver that SpaceX is experts with from F9 booster recoveries. Optimistically, let's say they recover the Super Heavy booster. That is early 2023. You have to figure at least one to two months examination while a second Starship is being built.

2. Second Test Launch to Orbit - This will be carrying a payload. Probably Starlink 2.0's to test how that will go. This will be four to six months after OTL-1. Now we're mid to later 2023. Again, optimistic and both Starship and Super Heavy are recovered. One month.

3. Third launch - will be relatively quick (one month) after a thorough examination. Elon is eager to test full reusability. So another launch with both already flown segments and another Starlink load. Getting into late 2023.

4. Fourth launch - More Starlinks. Still using the original booster and Starship. A second booster and Starship is being finalized. I'd say we're in very early 2024 by now. They are also building a Starship fueling depot around now.

5. Fifth and Sixth launch - Early 2024 - One will be the fourth launch of the Starlink Starship and the other will be the newest one testing full orbit with a commercial satellite. The New Starship will also be the one to test orbital refueling.

6 Seventh launch - Still early 2024 - about one month later - launching the orbital fueling depot Starship.

7. Eight+ - 2024 will see as many launches as possible. Figure 10 to 20 at best. Orbital refueling will be tried. At least one or two more Starships and boosters built. Rumors of an improved Booster and Starship design will be talked about at the tail end of the year.

8. 2025 - Sometime in this year the improved version will launch - which will be more robust and have better reusability than the first generation. Maybe 20 to 40 launches this year. Testing will be done on the new design.

9. 2026 - The newest Block 5 design will be introduced which will incorporate everything SpaceX has learned. This will be the very stable version which will achieve human rating because SpaceX will have dialed in launching, landing, and orbital refueling.

So that's my WAG. It all assumes that no critical failures happen. If one or two does, then expect a six month delay for each.

That's a well thought out sequence, thanks for laying it all out.

With regards to:

9. 2026 - The newest Block 5 design will be introduced which will incorporate everything SpaceX has learned. This will be the very stable version which will achieve human rating because SpaceX will have dialed in launching, landing, and orbital refueling.

You only mention one previous design iteration (ignoring the continual minor improvements SpaceX makes between major versions), which I assume would have been block 2. I've always understood "blocks" to be design "versions"... or is "Block 5" always considered the final design?

Was Falcon 9 at block 5 when it was human rated?

 

[scaesare]

Regarding Starship testing and human crew, have to consider what Elon said only two years ago. He was speaking at the virtual 2020 'Humans to Mars' conference. I vaguely remembered a key quote, so looked it up.

"We've got to first make the thing work; automatically deliver satellites and do hundreds of missions with satellites before we put people on board."

Well... that certainly makes it harder for me to argue that the requirement for that many launches is unreasonable... lol

 

[mongo]

The manufacturing buildup is impressive. I'll stand by my optimistic prediction based on what I've seen.

Regarding item 2, I think they just welded the Pez door shut on another ship, so payload may not happen until 3rd flight. (but I lose track)

 

[Grendal]

You only mention one previous design iteration (ignoring the continual minor improvements SpaceX makes between major versions), which I assume would have been block 2. I've always understood "blocks" to be design "versions"... or is "Block 5" always considered the final design?

Was Falcon 9 at block 5 when it was human rated?

Yes. For NASA at least. NASA definitely had very strict rules when it came to human rating the rocket and capsule. Block 5 actually had a few early boosters that didn't meet the NASA human rating because they had the COPVs that didn't have the Inconel lining.

I still expect SpaceX to continue their ongoing improvements with Starship and SH. For my speculation I was focusing on the gross changes to the design based on the timing from recovery and reuse, and the information learned from recovery and reuse. I'm only using the Block 5 term to describe their historical process of achieving a more finalized design. Realistically, SpaceX needs to examine a booster after each additional launch. At this point it is speculation (based on decent information) of what a booster and a Starship will be like after 10 launches and recoveries. SpaceX needs to learn where the weak points are and make the improvements necessary.

 

[scaesare]

Yes. For NASA at least. NASA definitely had very strict rules when it came to human rating the rocket and capsule. Block 5 actually had a few early boosters that didn't meet the NASA human rating because they had the COPVs that didn't have the Inconel lining.

I still expect SpaceX to continue their ongoing improvements with Starship and SH. For my speculation I was focusing on the gross changes to the design based on the timing from recovery and reuse, and the information learned from recovery and reuse. I'm only using the Block 5 term to describe their historical process of achieving a more finalized design. Realistically, SpaceX needs to examine a booster after each additional launch. At this point it is speculation (based on decent information) of what a booster and a Starship will be like after 10 launches and recoveries. SpaceX needs to learn where the weak points are and make the improvements necessary.

Ok gotcha...

Another thought (and one I could probably figure out and answer with some research on Falcon 9): Is it possible for a rocket to have different ratings for human use depending on if it's new, or a "flight proven" one?. And if so, can there be thresholds on the latter (i.e. - Human rated up through the 5th re-use)?

I suspect rocket reusability is still too new for that sort of thing....