Given how many lunar landers have tipped over, both the Mark 1 and 2 look rather top heavy with narrow landing gear. That seems unwise given recent experience.
They don’t need this booster back – Block 2 (or 3, depending how you count ’em) boosters are coming soon, and the current version is not compatible with the new pad. They might not even fly all the current boosters on hand.
What will be more interesting is how they dispose of booster 14 – will it perform a boostback and ditch like Booster 13 did, or will they burn it almost dry to push Starship further downrange?
Exactly. The next three to six missions will likely be devoted to proving out Pez dispensing, de-orbiting and ship catching plus ironing out the last few booster re-light niggles, making more progress on ship TPS and perhaps even an initial go at on-orbit ship-to-depot propellant transfer. That will give extant boosters 14, 15, 16 and 17 a couple of missions each before being splashed/scrapped. There is limited space in the Rocket Garden and new-version Super Heavies will soon be completing. With V3 Starlinks in the on-deck circle and Golden Dome to get up on a three-year timeline there will be no reason or room to keep around any prototype relics.
Shotwell has already said she expects the LC-39A Starship pad to see at least an initial launch this year. The rapidly-completing Pad B at Starbase should see an initial test launch by summer. If we see parts for a second such pad begin to appear at the Sanchez construction yard, then we can assume an as-fast-as-possible replacement of the current Starbase Pad A with a twin of its newer siblings to support a higher cadence than the extant design would allow.
Starship progress to-date, as impressive as it has been, will, I think, be put in the shade by what’s coming.
Exactly – most of the flights to date were done with ships built in a factory that was incomplete… now it’s coming up to full capacity (new gigabay about a year out), we haven’t seen anything like their cadence capability, much less with reusability.
Losing an outdated booster design while testing engine out capability makes sense. Also, avoiding the risk of tower damage if anything goes wrong is also, at this critical point in time, not such a bad idea.
FYI:
Blue Origin Artemis architecture update:
https://www.leonarddavid.com/blue-origin-lunar-plans-detailed/
Given how many lunar landers have tipped over, both the Mark 1 and 2 look rather top heavy with narrow landing gear. That seems unwise given recent experience.
But that’s hydrogen. Top is fluffy
They don’t need this booster back – Block 2 (or 3, depending how you count ’em) boosters are coming soon, and the current version is not compatible with the new pad. They might not even fly all the current boosters on hand.
What will be more interesting is how they dispose of booster 14 – will it perform a boostback and ditch like Booster 13 did, or will they burn it almost dry to push Starship further downrange?
Exactly. The next three to six missions will likely be devoted to proving out Pez dispensing, de-orbiting and ship catching plus ironing out the last few booster re-light niggles, making more progress on ship TPS and perhaps even an initial go at on-orbit ship-to-depot propellant transfer. That will give extant boosters 14, 15, 16 and 17 a couple of missions each before being splashed/scrapped. There is limited space in the Rocket Garden and new-version Super Heavies will soon be completing. With V3 Starlinks in the on-deck circle and Golden Dome to get up on a three-year timeline there will be no reason or room to keep around any prototype relics.
Shotwell has already said she expects the LC-39A Starship pad to see at least an initial launch this year. The rapidly-completing Pad B at Starbase should see an initial test launch by summer. If we see parts for a second such pad begin to appear at the Sanchez construction yard, then we can assume an as-fast-as-possible replacement of the current Starbase Pad A with a twin of its newer siblings to support a higher cadence than the extant design would allow.
Starship progress to-date, as impressive as it has been, will, I think, be put in the shade by what’s coming.
Exactly – most of the flights to date were done with ships built in a factory that was incomplete… now it’s coming up to full capacity (new gigabay about a year out), we haven’t seen anything like their cadence capability, much less with reusability.
I think they want to simulate a chopstick landing minus one engine.
From what I read, they’re going to simulate a water landing and then drop it in the drink.
Losing an outdated booster design while testing engine out capability makes sense. Also, avoiding the risk of tower damage if anything goes wrong is also, at this critical point in time, not such a bad idea.