BFR Developments

**Yazata** · (This post was last modified: Oct 29, 2022 03:49 AM by Yazata.)

And this truck from McGregor arrived at Starbase this morning: Fresh new rocket engines, direct from their acceptance test-stand hot-fires

Photo by Kevin Randolph from WAI media (Felix's 'What About It' youtube channel)

[Image: FgK6vfMWQAAFGN0?format=jpg&name=large]

**Yazata** · (This post was last modified: Nov 1, 2022 11:07 PM by Yazata.)

There was an Artemis press conference yesterday, and NASA was asked about Starship progress. They are tracking it since it's necessary for HLS and Artemis Moon landing success. And NASA was ready for the question with these slides. They contain a great deal of information on what has been accomplished and what remains to be done before both first Starship flight, and HLS readiness for its Moon mission.

The bombshell was NASA's Mark Kirasich revealing that they are shooting for first orbital test flight next month, December 2022!!!

https://twitter.com/SciGuySpace/status/1...1999676416

[Image: FgaB7JIWQAEPHoR?format=jpg&name=large]

[Image: FgZ7x5TXgAYNuQX?format=jpg&name=medium]

**C C** · Nov 1, 2022 05:42 PM

(Nov 1, 2022 04:02 PM)Yazata Wrote: There was an Artemis press conference yesterday, and NASA was asked about Starship progress. They are tracking it since it's necessary for HLS and Artemis Moon landing success. And NASA was ready for the question with these slides. They contain a great deal of information on what has been accomplished and what remains to be done before both first Starship flight, and HLS readiness for its Moon mission.

The bombshell was NASA's Mark Kirasich revealing that they are shooting for first orbital test flight next month, December 2022!!!

https://twitter.com/SciGuySpace/status/1...1999676416

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FgaB7JIWQAEP...name=large

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FgZ7x5TXgAYN...ame=medium

Hopefully that means NASA itself has stepped in to circumvent whatever "loose ends fussiness" of the FAA environmental review was putatively still hounding the Boca Chica operation. Otherwise, assurances from SpaceX alone could just be the usual over-optimism of Musk, even when flying in the face of Biden's grudge against him.

**Yazata** · (This post was last modified: Nov 2, 2022 06:35 AM by Yazata.)

Extraordinary photograph of the Orbital Launch Mount by local photographer Carlos Nunez. Carlos posts a photo every day that he calls "Your Daily Booster Shot"! Give Carlos a like and a follow. (There's lots of pixels here, so you can blow the picture up.)

One thing that the photo makes clear is the complexity of the OLM. Starting a rocket engine isn't a simple thing. Turbo pumps have to be spun up, preburners lit and all kinds of technical things like fuel/oxidizer ratios have to be right. And the SuperHeavy booster has 33 Raptors so the start process has to be multiplied 33 times.

One option would be for the rocket to carry the startup gear for all 33 engines. But most of the engines (some 30 of the 33) are only lit for launch and ascent. Only 3 engines have to relight during flight for landing. So SpaceX decided that putting 30 of the starters in the launch mount instead of carrying them inside the rocket would save a huge amount of weight in flight. Make the rocket simpler by making the launch pad more complicated. The starters for the inflight engine relight are inside the strakes/chines, the ridges along the sides of the booster. These also have an aerodynamic purpose for atmospheric flight.

The second stage ship has to carry its own engine starters because all of its engines light in flight.

The big black shape on the right side is the BQD (Booster quick disconnect) in its protective steel hood to protect it from rocket blast. It's where fuel, oxidizer and electrical lines run from the pad to the booster. There's a similar SQD (Ship quick disconnect) on an arm reaching from the tower up above that supplies similar commodities to the starship second stage. They are called quick disconnects because they disconnect quickly when the vehicle launches.

And there's a silver boxlike thing with round Starlink antennas on it on the side of the booster to the left. This houses a hydraulic power unit to power the thrust vector steering controls of the center engines. This has been deleted in later booster iterations because they have gone to electric thrust vector control instead of hydraulic. More weight savings. Every kilogram saved means an additional payload kilogram.

[Image: Fgfsq-UXEAEbaTf?format=jpg&name=4096x4096]

**Yazata** · Nov 3, 2022 05:47 AM

Sometimes I feel like this!

[Image: FglfhZjXoAAkxY5?format=jpg&name=large]

**Yazata** · (This post was last modified: Nov 5, 2022 04:40 AM by Yazata.)

Wonderful little 90 second view of Starbase by SpaceX.

Includes what I believe are the first views inside the Stargate control room (looks like the Falcon9/Dragon control room in Hawthorne) and of what's become of Boca Chica village, including restaurants, parties and a new Texas branch of Elon's Ad Astra School, the private K-8 school that he started at SpaceX in Hawthorne for his own and SpaceX employees kids. There's the Turtle Lady (whose turtle-shelled ATV is familiar to viewers of Lab Padre) and dogs! And giant rockets too.

Speculation is that this video is intended for recruiting. Who wouldn't want to work here??

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/KQBVOQ79G2s

(Edit - This video has only been out 8 hours and it's already had a million views on Twitter and 6.12 million views on youtube!!!

The Starbase control room. It's inside the Stargate building in front of the parked ships in the Rocket Garden, and behind the 'watch on youtube' thing in the lower left. Stargate was there before SpaceX arrived and once was a University of Texas radio astronomy thing. Today SpaceX occupies it with Starbase offices and the control room. The large video monitors in the control room have views inside the propellant tanks of whatever vehicle they were testing at the time.

[Image: Fgvdk9vUcAAsSZo?format=jpg&name=4096x4096]

[Image: Fgvdk9rVEAAWgeh?format=jpg&name=4096x4096]

Inside a Starship propellant tank during a test

[Image: FgveBZOXkAAw4CA?format=jpg&name=large]

Two of "the kids" working on a Raptor up under the skirt of a Starship. A thrust vector control actuator (the green thing is part of it) very visible. I believe the worker on the left is handing a flashlight to the one on the right.

[Image: FgveQh5UcAE-imv?format=jpg&name=4096x4096]

**Yazata** · Nov 7, 2022 06:06 AM

Lab's latest weekly update video

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/bFAB9JCZzYk

**Yazata** · (This post was last modified: Nov 8, 2022 07:53 PM by Yazata.)

Starbase in November 2019. The only permanent structure is Stargate, then still occupied by the U. of Texas, the building with the step in its roof behind and just to the left of the old Mark I nosecone. (Look how bad the build quality was on this first approximation of a giant nosecone essentially built out in a field! When they tried a pressure test on the Mark I tank section, it burst.) When this photo was taken they had just gone from trying to build spaceships from welded steel plates to using rings and their first ring-machine is visible in the tent.

(Screenshot from Lab Padre's early livestream)

[Image: FhA7zO5WAAAXGc3?format=jpg&name=small]

Starbase in November 2022, just three years later! (Stargate is still there, now housing Starbase offices and the control room, in the lower left corner) The construction bays are new, as are the giant tents that are now being replaced by permanent factory buildings. There are new payload integration buildings. The launch area a mile down the road is totally different today with the addition of the Tower, Launch Mount and Orbital Tank Farm:

(Video by SpaceX)

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/KQBVOQ79G2s

Lots of big engineering everywhere you look.

What will Starbase be like 3 years from now?? The huge Starfactory complex will be completed. Orbital flights should be increasingly routine with development concentrated on things like orbital propellant transfer and perfection of NASA's HLS. The tower should be catching giant rockets for reuse. The first uncrewed Mars flights and Mars landing attempts might be near. There will likely be a second Tower and Launch Mount, with tankage to support it.

And a second similarly mature facility with its own launch towers and factory buildings will be up and running at Cape Canaveral!

**Yazata** · Nov 10, 2022 04:52 AM

While we hope that SLS isn't destroyed by an oncoming hurricane at Cape Canaveral, a truck was photographed unloading at the Payload Integration building at Starbase by Kevin Randolph of WAI. Stacks of Starlinks!

[Image: FhKfoHHXwAEpI_3?format=jpg&name=4096x4096]

**Yazata** · (This post was last modified: Nov 13, 2022 01:05 AM by Yazata.)

Many Starbase employees would prefer to live in South Padre Island or maybe Port Isabel, but the drive from there to Starbase was a long loop around the Port of Brownsville. The straight line distance is only about five miles, except that it's all tidal wetlands and the Brownsville ship canal.

But in the last few days SpaceX has put in a predictably futuristic hovercraft commute line for its employees. It appears to be making several trips a day back and forth. It's a very picturesque ride.

Drone video from a new youtube channel by local guy Michael Farrell. He managed to scoop everyone else with the SpaceX hovercraft commute line, so give him a like and a follow.

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/5-P1JC31CgY