On August 27, 2019, the first vehicle of the Starship test program
took flight and made headlines around the world.
Starhopper, little more than a flying test stand for a Raptor Engine, flew to height of
150 meters before gracefully descending and touching down on the pad a few meters away.
Let's look at the story of how it came to be, how it lost its nose,
and why it's still standing in Starbase today.
This is the history of Starhopper.
In December 2018, users on the NASASpaceflight forum started discussing a new structure
at the Boca Chica build site which was initially referred to as a “Water Tower”.
An early picture to the NSF forum by Mary aka BocaChicaGal,
showed the “Tower” standing in front of the only tent that was present on site at the time.
The user “Johnnyhinbos” posted a long theory about
WHY this might hold more than just water after all,
and is in fact a “Big Falcon Hopper", which was confirmed just days later.
Though hilariously, it was in fact, built by a water tower company.
Elon Musk tweeted a picture of the structure with a caption saying “Stainless Steel Starship”
In it, the main tank of Starhopper's structure was visible next to a nose cone,
which ultimately was never used for flight. But we'll save that for later
All of this happened just weeks after Elon announced that SpaceX would no
longer pursue a reusable second stage for their Falcon 9 rocket
instead, opting to accelerate "BFR" which was the name of the Starship system at that time.
In that same tweet, is the now notorious mention of a
"delightfully counter-intuitive design change"
It wasn't long before we found out what that change was.
A switch from carbon composites to 300-series stainless steel,
which showed great promise in terms of price, availability,
strength at cryogenic and high temperatures,
as well as ease of manufacturing which allowed for much faster iteration on prototypes
In the next few days the beefy steel tank would grow more and more, while the main
methane and liquid oxygen tank were built. It also received unlike current Starship prototypes,
which have a tank wall thickness of 4mm,
Starhopper's tanks were
made with 12mm thick steel - that's nearly half an inch!
It also received bulky fixed legs,
without any retraction mechanisms or the intention of saving weight.
It is perhaps this extremely robust construction
that has resulted in Starhopper surviving, not only it's own test campaign
but all subsequent Starship test launches,
including proximity to FIVE test vehicles exploding nearby
On January 5, 2019 this first prototype of the Starship program
received three demo Raptor engines.
While it never had the opportunity to fly with a three engine Raptor configuration
and these engines were refered to by Elon “a blend of Raptor development & operational parts”
it was still the first time the public would see three Raptor
Engine-like structures next to each other on a vehicle.
In retrospect, this seems more like a fitcheck of Raptor parts, and to make sure that all three
engines fit well into the structure, which at this point in time still had a three engine
flight planned. The stacking of the Nose Cone onto the vehicle followed a few days later,
which led to the first sight of the fully stacked Starhopper Prototype. The plan in early 2019
was to fire up Hopper in “4 to 8 weeks” which ended up being another example of “Elon time”,
ultimately it would take them 6 months from that date to conduct the first two flights.
Around this time Elon confirmed on twitter that the planned test campaign would be incremental.
Similar to SpaceX's previous Hopper vehicles like Grasshopper and Falcon 9-R.
These vehicles were used to learn about and develop technology for the vertical landing and
reuse of Falcon 9 first stage boosters that we now see as common place
The difference this time being,
Starhopper was a design meant to mimic the second stage of the Starship Launch System,
while Grasshopper was a first stage test prototype. you may not know that Grasshopper
is still standing outside of SpaceX's McGregor, Texas engine testing facility today,
While the follow up vehicle, which was the F9R, had a different fate.
Only time would tell which of the two outcomes was in store for Starhopper
Late January marked the unfortunate end for Starhopper's Nosecone.
Winds of 50 mph blew the nose over and it was destroyed. While at this time
Elon indicated it would be repaired, That never happened.
The nosecone section that was built after that, turned out to be for a
new “Orbital Starship" vehicle, which later would be called Mark 1
The good news about the weather related incident was that the tank section suffered no damage.
At around the same time, preparation work at the launch
site 2 miles down Hwy 4, increased significantly.
On March 8 this launch site would see it´s first big visitor, with Starhopper rolling
down Highway 4, to find a new home at the Launch Site for testing and a flight campaign. The plan
was to outfit it with a real Raptor engine one week later, to start a campaign to fire up the
first Starship test vehicle. It even arrived sooner than originally thought, after only 3 days.
On March 14, Hopper saw it´s first of many tests with the vehicle venting out of its tank body.
This might have been the very early version of an ambient pressure test, that is observable
even on today's vehicles. In this test, Nitrogen at ambient pressure is filled
into the vehicle to check for leaks, and verify it can hold the pressure. That
test was an apparent success with a Raptor engine getting installed on the next day.
After more fueling and tanking tests in the next few days, the Starhopper finally
breathed it´s first “burp” with a Raptor engine Pre-Burner test on March 25. In this very early
episode of “Texas Tank Watching”, Mary posted a video to the NASASpaceflight Youtube channel,
which showed the Preburner spinning up. The test seemed to be successful as Hopper on the
next day got chained down in preparation for the first static fire with one Raptor Engine.
It would take some time to finally get the first hot fire test right. Elon Musk confirmed
on Twitter that the Team of SpaceX had issues with ice forming in the pre valves
of the engine, after a Series of aborted and unsuccessful tests. Finally, on April 4 at 8PM
local time, fire emerged from below Hopper as the Raptor fired for the first tethered hop.
Elon confirmed on Twitter that the test was successful and another Static Fire test was
performed just days Later on April 6. This time it hit tether limits, which means that the chains,
attached to the Hopper, would not release it any further. A good sign that future tests
would happen without these chains. Around this time, Elona lso first acknowledged the
Name “Starhopper” for the vehicle, in a tweet with a fancy picture of the vehicle attached.
After the two successful static fire campaigns, the Raptor Engine was removed, most likely for
inspections, and Hopper was once again without an Engine attached. A longer time without static
fire would follow this campaign, as Elon confirmed that they need to prepare the area
for untethered hop tests. Of course work on the vehicle did
not stop during that time. A lot of work on the plumbing and tanking, and Starhopper
also got some fancy new shoes that would work as shock absorbers during landings.Starhopper
also received a Set of cold gas thrusters for orienting itself during flight.
On May 22, Elon increased the adrenalin in the tank watchers bodies again, with a Tweet that
confirms, SpaceX plans to do the first hop test just 10 days later. A tanking Test on May 24
without a Raptor engine was conducted and a Raptor engine , Serial Number 4, was delivered on the
first of June, and installed onto Hopper, altho it was removed just hours later again.The next engine
that would get them ready for flight was Engine Number 6, which was installed on July 11. after
a big delay of over a month. The flight profile for the first flight was also confirmed by Elon
a day later. Starhopper would go 20 meters up, sideways, and touchdown in the launch area again.
The landing pad would not be used for this first flight, which was confirmed in another tweet.
A gimbal test of the Raptor engine was performed prior to the flight test. In this,
the engine would move and wiggle around. Mary captured a video of this happening.
With the chains still attached, a Preburner test was performed as well with a static fire
test. The test sparked a big shock to the tank watcher community, as the Hopper was engulfed
in a huge fireball just seconds after ignition related to a fuel leak, altho on the next day,
it looked as fine as it ever did. This was underlined by a tweet chain by Elon,
in which he confirmed that the Hopper was fine, and the test was still on for next week.
On July 25, SpaceX started a Stream called “20 meter Starhopper Test” which showed the
last few minutes before T-0 before the first Starhopper hop attempt.
Sadly this test was aborted at Engine ignition. At least, Starhopper could show its
potential as a Flamethrower for a future career path, following the abort. Elon later confirmed
that the propellant was not in the right conditions for the flight, hence the abort.
The big day would arrive just a day later. On July 26,2019, Starhopper left the Launch Pad
for a few seconds, hovered to 20 meters, relocated to the designated landing spot, and performed a
soft touchdown using the SN6 Raptor Engine. After the small fire that started at the launch pad was
extinguished as well, Elon confirmed that the 200 meter hop was now planned for “in a week or two”.
The day after, it was visible in the shots by Mary that Starhopper was
overall in a good state. Only the crush cores at the end of the legs suffered some damage.
Just a day after its hop. Starhopper was already moved back to the launch pad on
a Self Propelled Modular Transporter, or in Short SPMT. On August 10,
Starhopper performed another tanking test to prepare itself for its last big hop, as Chris
Bergin in the NASASpaceflight forum confirmed, that the current plan seemed to be to retire
Hopper after the next flight and jump to the next Starship prototype, called Mark 1.
A bit of delay occurred for the final hop, as the Federal Aeronautics Administration,
or in short FAA, delayed the launch licence for the Starhopper 200 meter hop.
In the following days, Elon gave a few updates about the current status of the Launch licence,
as SpaceX seemed to be ready from a technical standpoint. It was at this time that Elon also
mentioned a possible future path for Starhopper, after the 200 meter hop, in the function as a
vertical Raptor Engine test stand. This however, was not executed after the Hop.
Finally, after a days long waiting game, Elon confirmed that the FAA launch licence was at
the horizon with the hop happening as early as Monday, August 26. However, the flight height was
reduced to 150 meters in the final launch licence, with a maximum propellant load of 30 metric tons.
NSF´s Jack Beyer filmed another indicator that the test was imminent,
with a thruster test on August 26. The road was closed, the pad was clear, and everything was
ready for the big test on monday. The countdown progressed smoothly until the very last moment,
with the Raptor abort happening just before Raptor ignition. Later SpaceX confirmed in their
own live stream that the hop will not happen on August 26, and was scrubbed for the day.
The next day, the same procedure. SpaceX walked the vehicle through
the countdown on August 27 2019. Everything looked smooth while the vehicle started to
get fueled from the ground support equipment with Methane and Liquid oxygen. This time the ignition
worked! The vehicle came to life under the roar of Raptor Engine 6, as it ascended to 150 meters,
did a small roll program during that, hovered over to the landing pad, and gently descended. However,
right before touchdown, the engine turned orange, as Starhopper most likely started “Engine Rich
Combustion”. The engine and plumbing was starting to get burned and damaged, which resulted in
a slightly harder landing. Overall this still was a huge success. Hopper was still standing,
in one piece and just completed a 150 meter hop.
Hopper was a testbed for the Raptor Engines, and some of the building and testing challenges
that SpaceX would face in the later stages of the Starship program. It proved its worth and
also helped SpaceX to complete the first flight of a Full Flow Staged Combustion engine. A milestone
that no engine of this kind ever reached before. While it never became a testbed for future Raptor
engines, and was never converted into a vertical Raptor test stand, it is still standing at the
Launch site in Boca Chica. As a water tower and host for many sensors, cameras and communication
antennas, and as a landmark of the first steps to a fully reusable orbital vehicle, that might
be the key to support a meaningful sustainable infrastructure on the Moon, Mars and beyond.
Starhopper was a major milestone, and one of the first steps to a fully reusable orbital launch
vehicle which is key to some day supporting a meaningful infrastructure on the Moon,
Mars and beyond.
Thanks for Watching and Thanks to all the people who supported this video with
imagery. Special Thanks to Jack Beyer and Mary @BocaChicaGal, who provided a majority of the
photos and videos used for this video. And thanks to all the people in the NASASpaceflight forum,
who helped track and document the history of the Starhopper vehicle.