spaceX starship sn11 and DearMoon project update
It's been a week since SpaceX’s epic Starship Sn10 landing (and then explosion after 8 minutes) and
the company is already gearing up for another test flight. The latest starship prototype SN11
was rolled out to launch pads on Monday, March 8th at SpaceX’s launching grounds in Boca Chica Texas.
Videos from Spadre website showed the towering SN11 rocket being hauled to its launch site by
huge cranes. Starship Sn11 is the latest Starship prototype built by the private space company
SpaceX for its massive Starship and super heavy rockets to take humankind to trips to the moon,
mars and beyond. Before this, on march 3 SpaceX launched its Starship Sn10 prototype
for a high-altitude test with some changes in its design and it these changes were successful in
landing the rocket successfully. We have already made a video on the starship Sn10 landing and the
major changes made in it, we will link it in the description box, so make sure to watch it.
Though the design changes helped Starship Sn10 land but it couldn’t sustain it because
of another major failure and exploded in a massive fireball just like its predecessors SN8
and SN9. In this video we will discuss about the recent changes that were made in the starship SN11
and why we think it has the highest chances of succeeding completely.
Also, we will take a look at the Dear Moon project launched by Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa
which will take him and eight other passengers on a trip around the moon on SpaceX's starship.
But why is Starship so Important? Imagine a rocket that could launch and land 1,000 times a year.
Sounds unbelievable? Well, that’s what SpaceX is working on- The Starship. Its lifting capacity
of 100,000 kilograms is more than any rocket currently in operation, and the whole system
is designed to be reusable for frequent trips to space. It will launch atop a large booster called
Super Heavy. Super Heavy will be the backbone of getting Starship and its crew on a journey
to another world. The ultimate goal of starship is to launch up to 100 people at a time per flight.
Previously Starship SN10 made two significant changes.
SpaceX realised that relighting two raptor engines can also lead to failure as raptors
are not fully matured yet and are still in the development phase. SpaceX realised that they
can eliminate this by reigniting all the three raptor engines during the starship flip maneuver.
Starship Sn10 was the first high-altitude prototype to perform 3 raptor engine flip
burn. The second major change in the starship SN10 was the installation of
a flight termination system (FTS). We have discussed them in detail in our other video.
In the same manner there was a significant change made in SN11. After Sn10 recently
became the first starship starship prototype to successfully complete the high-altitude flight
test in one piece and then exploded because of the malfunctioning legs. For almost a year SpaceX CEO
Elon musk has been talking about an upgrade in the landing legs and the challenges posed by it.
So, after SN10’s failure because of landing legs, a new design for legs is a top priority.
An interesting point to note here is during sn10 spectacular landing at least two or three
of the starships six landing legs failed to properly deploy leaving the prototype with
just half of the landing legs required to fully withstand the momentum of a landing.
Starship Sn10 didn’t make life easy for the remaining legs either.
At the time of touchdown, the prototype was travelling at 15 to 20 miles per hour
velocity, much higher than expected. As a result of this, the starship crushed those landing legs
into oblivion leaving the rocket more or less resting on its skirt section with no more than
few inches of ground clearance. About 8 minutes later, the prototype violently depressurised
producing a massive fireball as the remaining propellant flashed into gas and reignited.
After the explosion Elon Musk recently wrote on Twitter that even with all the landing legs
deployed the momentum during landing was way past the load the landing legs were designed to absorb
and the fact that only half of the landing legs deployed made the matters even worse.
To freshen up your memory the first flight attempt of starship SN10 the lift-off of SN10 was aborted
with just fractions of seconds left in the countdown. The engines were ignited and ready to
lift-off, but then were shut off when the computer on board detected much thrust from one of the
raptor engines. Elon musk wrote on twitter that that contrary to what flight computers measured
the thrust from the raptor engine during final phase of sn10’s flight was in fact
lower than expected which ultimately caused the hard touchdown. Elon also added that the reason to
why this happened is still Unkown at the present moment. About eight minutes after what seemed at
that time as a successful landing the prototype violently depressurized producing a massive
fireball as any remaining propellant flashed into gas and ignited. It's unclear if the post landing
failure was caused completely due to the hard landing or if there was some other technical issue
also contributing to it but regardless of the explosion the flight test was still a spectacular
and historic success for SpaceX as flying a vehicle this big and then trying to recover it
is a very hard task. At the same time the failure of Sn10 also shed light on the shortcomings that
can be addressed with starship SN11 and beyond. As mentioned earlier, SN10 used a new landing
approach Relighting all the three raptor engines for the landing maneuver and step by step moving
down to a single engine for touchdown. This new method proved almost completely successful.
However, the still maturing technology of raptor engines and the temporary prototype landing legs
tells us that for the time being SpaceX still need to further refine the landing phase. These new
designs are very necessary so that the upcoming starship prototype SN11 can be a complete success.
After the failure of SN9 the SpaceX engineers switched to the three-raptor landing burn. In
a tweet we mentioned before Elon Musk added that for Sn11 they are going to use two raptor engines
all the way to touchdown and if any of the two raptor engines underperform the flight computer
will instantaneously re-light the third one to make sure the landing velocity remains low. A
mentioned before the major landing hurdle in the Starship SN10 landing was the landing legs, and
this has been a major problem for SpaceX since a long time now. Elon has been talking about a need
for the upgraded landing legs and the challenges posed by the seemingly straightforward goal
of landing starships. After seeing sentence malfunctioning landing legs, a new design capable
of significantly improving the reliability, stability and toughness of the landing legs
has likely became the major and topmost priority for SpaceX's starship team and its engineers. As
it turns out a series of new official SpaceX renders released as a part of an update for
the “Dear Moon” project may have revealed the latest glimpse of an updated landing leg design.
A bunch of starship new renders were newly added on the dear moon official website.
as you can see these renders feature a starship with outside mounted landing legs this updated
design is reminiscent of an earlier landing-leg concept released by SpaceX. The current landing
legs used by the starship prototypes were always made to be temporary and after this intense
flight maybe it's time that starship gets some powerful landing legs to stand on. Knowing how
SpaceX works, it is also possible if not likely that these renders are already months old and one
or several versions outdated, either way it is safe to say that significantly upgraded landing
lags could start appearing at SpaceX's Boca Chica rocket facility any time now. However, there might
not be any major hardware upgrade for the Starship SN11. The major upgrade for starship sn11 is the
landing burn which will now use two engines all the way to touchdown with these upgrades made
there is high probability that sn11 will be the first starship prototype to soft land after a
complex high-altitude flight. As o the making of this video Starship Sn11 is already rolled
out to the launching pad and begun ground testing. The prototype will undergo the usual cryogenic
proof Test and the static fire tests before eventually going for another high-altitude flight.
From buying land spaces on mars to building space hotels by 2027, people have been coming up with
strange, but interesting, ideas. One more addition to this list is an exclusive invite to a private
lunar expedition. Japanese Billionaire made an announcement two years ago in partnership with
SpaceX to take 8 people from different walks of life on a trip to the moon. Since then,
we haven't really heard much about the project, but that has recently changed. In a very recent
announcement Japanese Billionaire Yusaku Maezawa made an announcement of a ‘Dear Moon’ project.
As it stands right now, they are looking for 8 crew members to go to the moon.
The pre-registrations were recently closed and if you are someone who has a dream to go to the moon
and have applied to this project, we wish you all the best. Apart from this, it will be the first
civilian lunar mission to fly outpost the moon and as stated in the intro video by Yusaku, they will
fly out past the moon to such an extent that it will be the farthest the humans have travelled.
SpaceX owner Elon Musk, too, dropped in a message at the end of the video saying,
"I think we'll make a real difference". SpaceX has made incremental tweaks and upgrades
to its Starship design after each test flight as it works to perfect the new launch system.
The company has said that each Starship will be able to carry up to 110 tons (100 tons) to
low Earth orbit. These starship will help us fulfil our dream to become an
interplanetary species. And the dear Moon project is an exciting development for people as it will
be the first civilian lunar mission. So, what do you think about the new landing approach of SN11?
Will it be successful this time? Have you registered for the dear moon project?
How will it affect us? Do let us know your thoughts and ideas in the comment section below.
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