Question why is it so easy today to build reusable rockets? Is it because the onboard cpu speed of the chips can solve more granular control problems with low latency?
replies(17):
If you know that something can be done, and there is a potential market for such a project, it then becomes easier to get the funding. Chicken or the egg...
One thing we also need to point out, is that SpaceX uses like 80% of their yearly launches, for their own communication / sat service. This gave a incentive for that investment.
Is the same reason why, despite SpaceX throwing those things up constantly, there really is a big lag of competitors with reusable rockets. Its not that they where / not able to quickly get the same tech going. They simply have less market, vs what SpaceX does non-stop. So the investments are less, what in time means less fast development.
SpaceX is a bit of a strange company, partially because they used a lot of the public funds to just throw shit at the wall, and see what sticks. This resulted in them caring less if a few rockets blew up, as long as they got the data for the next one with less flaws. It becomes harder when there is more oversight of that money, or risk averse investors. Then you really want to be sure that thing goes up and come back down into one piece from the first go.
A lot of projects funding are heavily based upon the first or second try of something, and then (sometimes unwisely) funding is pulled if it was not a perfect success story.
Dragon 9 was based on conservative and boring technology but it was cost optimized before it was reusable, then reusability crushed the competition.
For that matter, Starship is boring. "Throw at the wall and see what sticks" isn't "trying a bunch of crazy stuff" but trying a bunch of low and medium risk things. For instance, development of the Space Shuttle thermal tiles was outrageously expensive and resulted in a system that was outrageously expensive to maintain. They couldn't change it because lives were at stake. With Starship they can build a thermal protection system which is 90% adequate and make little changes that get it up to 100% adequate and then look at optimizing weight, speed of reuse and all that. If some of them burn up it is just money since there won't be astronauts riding it until it is perfected.
This is where I think the business acumen came into play. Because the govt is self-insured, it allowed SpaceX to pass the high risk off to the taxpayer. Once the tech matured, the risk was low enough to be palatable for private industry use.
And FWIW, I don’t mean that as disparaging to SpaceX, just an acknowledgment of the risk dynamics.
Falcon 9 didn't have three versions of which two were obsolete. Falcon 9 didn't put optional goals on the critical path, which are now delaying and preventing commercial launches.
SpaceX invested in reusability long before they had any idea about their own launch services.
> Its not that they where / not able to quickly get the same tech going. They simply have less market
BlueOrigin has been trying for nearly as long as SpaceX and have infinite money and don't care about market. Apparently having lots of money doesn't make you able to 'quickly get the same tech'.
RocketLab was to small and had to first grow the company in other ways. And the CEO initially didn't believe in large rockets. And their own efforts of re-usability, despite excellent engeeners didn't pan out to 'quickly get the same tech'.
Arianespace had enough market in theory, they just didn't want to invest money. And now that they do, they are completely failing at at 'quickly getting the same tech' despite them getting lots and lots of money. More money in fact then SpaceX used to develop the Falcon 9 initially. And at best they get some demonstrators out of it.
ULA has invested many billions in their next generation rockets, and they were absolutely not confident that they could 'quickly get the same tech'.
Tons of money flowed into the rocket business, specially if you include Blue. Japan, India, Europe, China and US market have all ramped up investment. And nobody has replicated what SpaceX did more then 10 years ago.
So as far as I can tell, there is exactly 0 evidence that people who can invest money can replicate the technology and the operations.
> partially because they used a lot of the public funds to just throw shit at the wall
The used all their costumers rockets to do tests after they had performed the service. Some of those rockets were bought by 'the public'. And the first reflown rockets didn't carry public payloads. Other companies could have done the same with not that much investment, they just didn't care to.
What result SpaceX caring less, is because they were already so good at building rockets that even their non-reusable rockets were cheaper then anybody else, even with reusable tech like legs attached. Falcon 9 was so much better then anything else that even without re-usabiltiy they were profitable.
Their business didn't depend on re-usability. I don't think the other rocket companies could even imagine something like that to be possible.
Where's the money?
It cost them more than Falcon 9 development.
Same with Starlink.
This isn't Concorde
SpaceX itself took the risk on reusability after expendable launch was proven.
Your comment seemed to me like the Feds bore most/all of the risk for this development.
I’m not making an argument about reusability. I’m talking about the business risk. Note my original statement is about business strategy.
The Feds do bear most of the launch risk. That’s exactly what “self-insured” means. If you have enough wealth, many states allow you to self-insure your car; that means if something happens the resulting financial responsibility is yours. In the case of spaceflight, when a govt loses its payload, the taxpayer just eats that cost; no insurance company reimburses them. Many in the govt aren’t thrilled with that risk dynamic because it subsidizes the risk but privatizes the profit. But when the risk of a new industry is too high for private industry to shoulder, the government is about the only game in town with that level of risk tolerance.