This is an archive of past discussions about SpaceX Starship. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
I reverted the edit by 70.51.201.106 (talk) because this is about a specific rocket called Starship. This is a name chosen by Elon Musk. I know it doesn't describe its capabilities any more than Boeing CST-100 Starliner describes the capabilities of that craft.
Starship as a generic term for any kind of interstellar transit vehicle is different from this.
In recognition of Starship as a alternative interpretation of Starship (rocket) I have followed the practice used with Super Heavy (rocket) and have place the following message on the BFR (rocket) page:
"Starship (rocket)" redirects here. For the hypothetical interstellar vehicles, see Starship."
I have created an start-level article on Starship, largely using the material that I and other editors had previously built up as (first) a section, and then later, multiple sections, in the BFR (rocket) article.
This vehicle design, the SpaceX Starship, is clearly notable, and meets WP:GNG for notability, and has many reliable sources.
Moreover, the first two particular instances of Starships, are under construction in South Texas, the Starship flight test rocket or "Starhopper", and also a second test article, the Starship orbital prototype. The first is already nearly complete, and began system integration testing with propellant loading, engine attachment, and firing of the rocket engine preburners in the past weeks. The second test article, the orbital prototype, began construction in late February 2019, and Musk has indicated could be flying as early as Juen 2019. We'll see.
But clearly a notable spacecraft and rocket in any case. And the detail on the Starship design and the Starhopper test article in the BFR was moving toward "too much" for a two-stage-to-orbit launch vehicle article; especially with the test program for test article 1 underway, with flight tests around the corner. Cheers. N2e (talk) 12:40, 27 March 2019 (UTC)
First, the term common in rocketry is VTVL; whereas VTOL is the common term in aircraft (helicopters, mostly).
The nuanced bit is that while that is a perfect use of the long-time term for the Starship test flight rocket and also the Starship orbital prototype, it's arguable for any Starship launched on top of a Super Heavy in a BFR LV launch. Why? Just 'cause there has been no prior use of the term to describe a second stage, which leaves the ground (takeoff) on some other means, and that means might be anything (e.g., VTVL or HTVL, and then it lands with the VL part of the thing. So I'm quite mixed on that.
So I think you'd just need to develop some consensus here first. But maybe just discuss it with other editors for a while before making a firm proposal. Cheers. N2e (talk) 23:14, 29 March 2019 (UTC)
Maybe it's to early to tell, we could reflect/clarify this as SpaceX releases more info or as the public finds out more info. 173.52.238.41 (talk) 05:24, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
Table Format (versus what it is now)
Test №
Date
Vehicle
Orbital/Suborbital (height)
Duration
Remarks
1
3 April 2019
Starhopper
Suborbital (a few inches)
a few seconds
First Static fire and a tethered hop of the Starhopper. Only had one Raptor Engine.
2
5 April 2019
Starhopper
Suborbital ("hit tether limits", about 3 feet (1 m)).
a few seconds
Second tethered hop which hit tethered limits. Only had one Raptor Engine.
3
sometime over the rainbow
Starhopper
Suborbital (500 m)
time
sample, did not occur yet
4
sometime over the rainbow
Orbital Test Vehicle
Orbital
time
sample, did not occur yet
Will this work as there are orbital tests mentioned in this article? Or should we create separate tables for both suborbital and orbital tests? 05:33, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
Earth to Earth starship is happening, by Gwynne.
In addition, SpaceX has mentioned the theoretical ability of using a boosted Starship to carry passengers on suborbital flights between two points on Earth in under one hour, providing commercial long-haul transport on Earth, competing with long-range aircraft. However, SpaceX has announced no concrete plans to pursue this use case.
Not true. Gwynne clearly said on the TED talk, "we are completely doing this", and clearly explained the rationale after it. :There is no single doubt here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.219.55.41 (talk) 23:03, 19 April 2019 (UTC)
So do feel free to find a source for that, and edit the article, so as to keep the article improvement moving forward. After all, on Wikipedia, WP:ANYONECANEDIT. N2e (talk) 00:25, 15 May 2019 (UTC)
Third prototype, and second orbital prototype, under construction
Internet sources are saying that, in addition to the two prototypes being built in South Texas, there is a third Starship structure under construction in South Florida (Cocoa Beach, to be specific). I've now seen this in multiple sources, but none of them would (yet) meet Wikipedia standard as a reliable source. Here is one source with video of the ship construction in Florida. SpaceX Starship Prototype Cocoa Florida Construction Site Revealed!!, was posted on YouTube today. The first two prototype ships are well explicated in the article already, with many secondary sources.
Let's all keep looking for reliable secondary sources that will support improvement to the article. N2e (talk) 00:25, 15 May 2019 (UTC)
We have confirmation. From the SpaceX CEO. Expect to have secondary sources within 24 hrs. Have just updated the article and added this source: <ref name=musk20190514>[https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1128448308970541056 SpaceX is doing simultaneous competing builds of Starship in Boca Chica Texas & Cape Canaveral Florida], Elon Musk, 14 May 2019, accessed 15 May 2019.</ref>N2e (talk) 03:19, 15 May 2019 (UTC)
Infobox
Starship
Artist's concept of the Starship following stage separation
@N2e:, what issues are there with the {{Infobox spacecraft class}} that prevents it from being used in this article? Why not simply mirror the Rocket Infobox shown at BFR? The first and second stage are clearly labelled. Cheers, Rowan Forest (talk) 18:15, 29 March 2019 (UTC)
The tricky part is that this SpaceX Starship is a new kinda thing. It's not just a spacecraft; and it's not just a second stage. (which are the traditional Wikipedia:WikiProject Spaceflight infoboxes. It is both a spacecraft and a second stage; so neither InfoBox is perfect for this "dual-function" nature, which has never been seen in launch vehicles previously.
I'm not sure of the solution. Maybe it's an InfoBox of each, in the near term. Until some future time for when this new class of "2ndStage+Spaceship" thing is an established class of spaceflight things. YMMV. Will be interesting to see how others are thinking about it. N2e (talk) 23:22, 29 March 2019 (UTC)
I have an idea, embedding {{Infobox rocket stage}} in the {{Infobox spacecraft class}}. Sorry, I failed to embed, but I have used some tricks to place the characteristics similar to the {{Infobox rocket stage}}. Also, Space Shuttle orbiter was technically a second stage.
—Your's sincerely, Soumyabrata 05:21, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
Total number of engines
The text states that the spacecraft will have 7 engines, yet the Infobox states 6. Please review the latest architecture for the accurate number. Thank you. Rowan Forest (talk) 01:29, 27 June 2019 (UTC)
Maybe we should leave the number of engines blank until the design stabilizes. Or at least add a note saying the configuration is rapidly evolving and the number given may be out of date. Fcrary (talk) 22:55, 27 July 2019 (UTC)
I fixed the inconsistency. As you note, the SpaceX design has been very fluid to this point with 6 engines (mix of sea-level and vacuum), 2017; then 7 (mix of sea-level and vacuum, but adding one SL for double engine redundancy on engine out during landing), late 2017; then just 7 sea-level as a way of getting the lunar Starship on a faster development path, late 2018; then, most recently, in May 2019, back to 6 (mix of sea-level and vacuum), in part because of the end of the development program for Raptor and SpaceX has a better idea of the thrust/Isp they are working with in the SL engine, and how hard it will be to develop/test the vacuum version.
The current publicly-released number is 6, per source from the SpaceX CEO who is certainly authorized to make statements about the evolving design. I believe the article is now 1) internally consistent and, 2) had the history of the engine design fluidity explicated in the History section. Cheers. N2e (talk) 12:00, 29 July 2019 (UTC)
I have added some specs of Starship by {{aircraft specs}}. What are your opinions with this edit?
—Your's sincerely, Soumyabrata 06:06, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
I do not believe that the "aircraft specs" template is a good template to use in this article. This odd technology of a dual-function "second stage" and also a "spaceship" is hard to fit into any existing category, simply 'cause "this is not how spacecraft or second stages have tradtionally been done in the first six decades of spaceflight technology. But is is certainly not an aircraft. Perhaps other editors recently on this Talk page might comment? Fcrary? Rowan Forest? Cheers. N2e (talk) 12:08, 29 July 2019 (UTC)
Not an aircraft. I think that in the case of the BFR system, we need a computer wizard to update the existing Spacecraft Type Infobox template (and maybe the Spaceflight Infobox template too). We would need to submit a list of extra parameters or fields to add. Rowan Forest (talk) 13:16, 29 July 2019 (UTC)
Space Shuttle comparison
Regarding the current conflict, I never heard the Space Shuttle referred to as a "second stage". It was always called a spaceplane with an external tank and side boosters. I see no need to invoke the Space Shuttle for comparison in this article. Cheers, Rowan Forest (talk) 19:52, 29 July 2019 (UTC)
I don't really see it either. I'm not sure how often I heard it called a "spaceplane", and to me that would imply some use of lift during takeoff. But this article does discuss Starship as both a second stage and a orbital vehicle. The Shuttle might not have been a spaceplane, but it wasn't a "second" stage. Maybe a first stage without the fuel tank. At the same time, I'm not sure why this unusual second state/orbital vehicle character of Starship is a big deal. Fcrary (talk) 23:22, 29 July 2019 (UTC)
The sentence (after the parenthetical was added by the recent edit) reads:
"Unusual for previous launch vehicle and spacecraft designs (with the exception of the Space Shuttle orbiter), Starship is to function as both a second stage for the BFR launch vehicle that provides acceleration to orbital velocity on all launches from Earth, and yet will also be used in space as an on-orbit long-duration spacecraft.[3][16]"
In my view, having a space shuttle reference is simply WP:UNDUE for the this article, which is not about the Space Shuttle. Beyond that, it also does not have a source provided for this specific claim about the Space Shuttle, so would also be subject to challenge on that basis; without a source citation, it is merely original research.
In my view, the recently added parenthetical comment about the Space Shuttle ought to be removed until there is a consensus on this Talk page that it belongs. Cheers. N2e (talk) 04:34, 1 August 2019 (UTC)
Done It has been over a week, and per consensus of the three editors who commented, there does not seem to be a reason to mention the Space Shuttle in the section of this article where it was recently added as a parenthetical comment. Nor was a source provided for the assertion. So I have removed the recently added prose. N2e (talk) 03:22, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
MK1 and MK2
The section "Starship orbital prototypes" states they will not be orbital flights but sub-orbital. Should you change the title of this section? If not, it must be clarified that the "orbital" engineering prototypes won't reach orbit. Rowan Forest (talk) 13:44, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
Like many SpaceX descriptors, SpaceX makes this kinda difficult. Musk referred to it (the first one, in Texas) as a "Starship orbital prototype" but has also used other descriptors since (Mk 1, Mark 1 prototype, etc.) It is often not clear if SpaceX has even settled on a name, before even considering our WP editors ability to ascertain a WP:COMMONNAME from the sources.
However, just parsing the words, it is certainly possible for a "prototype" for an "orbital vehicle" to never go fully orbital itself (say if the booster is not built in time to be used on the first two orbital prototypes?; or if they should be destroyed or rendered not flightworthy prior to completion of the Super Heavy prototype), and thus the name "orbital prototype" can be correct. These prototypes need to leave the ground and land (in good shape) many times before going orbital velocity is a top SpaceX concern.
SpaceX are trying to do something not done before, and that is design & build orbital class vehicles (the booster, and the second stage) and yet never crash any of them, if possible. That is, they are trying to fly them like a new aircraft, with slow/gradual and reasonably safe expansion of the flight envelope. So very hard to say what the common name of these might actually settle out to be in the grand evolutionary experiment of SpaceX vehicle naming. Cheers. N2e (talk) 05:17, 18 August 2019 (UTC)
Requested move 12 August 2019
The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The result of the move request was: No consensus, therefore move not enacted. Closing instead of re-listing as the discussion stalled on 17 August with no activity since then, suggesting re-listing would not achieve further productive discussion. User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 01:32, 22 August 2019 (UTC)
Starship (rocket and spacecraft) → Starship (spacecraft) – This spacecraft is not a launch vehicle as the term rocket usually implies. It is strictly a spacecraft. A similar comparison would be the Apollo spacecraft and the Saturn V rocket. I have found no evidence of plans to launch the Starship into space without being attached to a launch vehicle. Rather, it is strictly intended to operate as a 2nd stage. What they do to test it in the prototype stage is irrelevant. And, while it is true that this spacecraft obtains thrust from rocket engines, this is true of every spacecraft, and labeling it as both a rocket and spacecraft is redundant at best. PuzzledvegetableIs it teatime already?13:45, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
The difference is that Starship is a single vehicle that does not use disposable modules like Apollo. I think that why Musk and the press refer to Starship as a "rocket ship". Rowan Forest (talk) 14:13, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
Support — On second thought, the description of "rocket and spacecraft" belongs to the short description template, and for disambiguation purposes, the title of "Starship (spacecraft)" should suffice. Rowan Forest (talk) 15:59, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
Oppose: I'm not overjoyed with using both "rocket" and "spacecraft", but Starship will take off on its own. As Rowan Forest noted, on the return from the Moon or Mars, and also as a point-to-point suborbital (terrestrial) vehicle. In addition, "rocket" isn't limited to launch vehicles. Our rocket article starts with the sentence, "A rocket (from Italian rocchetto "bobbin") is a missile, spacecraft, aircraft or other vehicle that obtains thrust from a rocket engine." Fcrary (talk) 20:13, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
Precisely. The word rocket simply refers to a vehicle with rocket engines, so using both is redundant per the very sentence you quoted. However, even according to the more common usage of rocket, in sentences like The Falcon 9 rocket is used to carry the Dragon spacecraft, where it refers to a launch vehicle, it's still inaccurate. Unless SpaceX has released newer, updated plans, their concept videos show the Earth-Earth transport being done with the Super Heavy. Lastly, what the craft does in space is irrelevant. That is simply a technicality in its design. Certainly worthy of mention in the article, but including it in the title itself in parenthesis intended only to disambiguate from other uses of Starship is a bit much. It's not like there is another thing called the Starship (spacecraft) that we need to distinguish from this. --PuzzledvegetableIs it teatime already?20:42, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
Oppose – Contrary to the assertion in the nomination, Starship is not "strictly a spacecraft": it is designed to lift itself up from the ground on its own, and possibly even reach orbit as an SSTO vehicle. Operational plans include independent ascent to orbit from the Mars gravity well, and possibly enough lift to conduct suborbital flights on Earth for intercontinental transport. Admittedly, the "rocket and spacecraft" disambiguator sounds a bit awkward, but either just "rocket" or just "spacecraft" would miss a key part of this vehicle. Perhaps Starship (space vehicle) or Starship (spaceship) would work better? — JFGtalk22:37, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
I see your point about "spacecraft" and "rocket". But I'd prefer "space vehicle" to "spaceship". First, I don't know if we've ever used "spaceship" as a disambiguation for anything. Second, we'd be starting down into the debate over "ship" versus "craft" versus "tug" (and space tugs have been proposed) or even "boat." Even for maritime vessels, those terms are poorly and vaguely defined. I'd rather put off that discussion when it comes to space. Fcrary (talk) 22:52, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
Its capabilities or features don't have to be explained in the title. I am sure that a one word disambiguation would be enough, traditionally, we have used "spacecraft": Starship (spacecraft) sounds good to me for an uncomplicated Wikipedia title. Cheers, Rowan Forest (talk) 23:28, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
Support – It is true that Starship is indeed a launch vehicle. It is capable of lifting off on its own terms from many celestial bodies such as the Moon and Mars. It is, by definition, a launch vehicle. However, as Rowan stated above, we don't need to specify all its functions in the title of the article. It is a spacecraft too, and Starship's main and most recognisable function is that of being an interplanetary spaceflight vehicle, rather than a launch vehicle. Therefore, there is nothing wrong with calling it "Starship (spacecraft)" – you'd have to convince people that it's not a spacecraft for this title to be incorrect. In the event of a consensus against reverting it to "Starship (spacecraft)", I would support a move proposal to change it to "Starship (space vehicle)" instead, per JFG's suggestion. – PhilipTerryGraham (talk·articles·reviews) 02:49, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
Support (spacecraft) or (space vehicle) or similar. These brackets are added to distinguish the topic from other "Starship" entries. As this is the only Starship that will enter space a very short addition with "space" in it should be sufficient. --mfb (talk) 01:12, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
Oppose – The reality is that the new 9-meter 2nd stage of SpaceX BFRtwo-stage-to-orbit launch vehicle, is truly an unusual beast. It is not only a rocket, as in Starship (rocket), nor is it merely a spaceship, as in Starship (spacecraft). It is both; and redirects from both exist, so the Wikipedia reader who types only one of its applications will still get to the article. It just labels the article wrong to call it only one of those. Starship (rocket and spacecraft) is therefore more accurate and better helps the reader, which is what this encyclopedia is all about. Both uses of this vehicle (rocket, and spacecraft) are well explained, and cited, in the prose of the article.
NEAR FUTURE: It is the 2nd stage of the launch vehicle (with a quite independent life beyond that very important role), and will also be a long-duration spacecraft; but both of those uses are plans, they'll happen in the (near) future. They are in design and under development at present. But because SpaceX is developing this rocket to be fully and rapidly reusable, they are developing it in an entirely new way (using a process of methodical expansion of the flight envelope). To avoid attempting to execute the "perfect" design, and then flying the rocket for the first time on an orbital launch and then throwing the vehicle away (as has been done by all manufacturers during the six early decades of spaceflight), SpaceX are working in an entirely new way for (eventual) orbital rockets.
TODAY: They are flying the rocket, by itself, as a VTVLsuborbital rocket now! (just like a dozen or so other VTVL rockets of the (mostly) past 20 or so years; there is a decent list of examples here. They will gradually expand the flight envelope of the test vehicles as they have engineering and economic reasons to do so. But it is a rocket already, with first test flight just last month, and it is clearly being designed to fulfill a role as a spacecraft as well in future days: as a cargo craft carrying satellite payloads, Lunar or Mars cargo, or propellant), and as a spaceship (when carrying humans for long-duration spaceflight expeditions). N2e (talk) 02:00, 15 August 2019 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.
Starhopper first hop: 18 meters? needs a source
The article has in two places that the first Starhopper flight test was to an altitude of 18 meters above the ground, but I'm not finding a source for that in either of the two source citations that have been provided? Does anyone know where "18 m" came from? .... and have a source? N2e (talk) 11:41, 25 August 2019 (UTC)
I replaced it by a sourced 20 meters, which might or might not be rounded but it doesn't matter. --mfb (talk) 15:54, 28 August 2019 (UTC)
I was looking at various sources last night. From what I can gather it was intended to fly "around 20m", as reported beforehand, and was subsequently reported by some as having flown 18m. I can find nothing to suggest that it didn't achieve its desired altitude, and these hops seem pretty precisely dialled in. Perhaps the 20m figure was the ceiling imposed by the FAA and they left a small margin. Who knows? I've edited the text to admit some ambiguity. Does anyone have a source on the horizontal distance covered in last night's test flight? Seems like it landed right on the bullseye, which was "around 100m" away from the launchpad, though I can't find an exact figure. nagualdesign19:42, 28 August 2019 (UTC)
Requested move 28 August 2019
The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The result of the move request was: SNOW Moved. Recently no consensus close noted as consensus to move, but not consensus on target; consensus on target reached here quickly. User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 01:31, 30 August 2019 (UTC)
Support - The name 'SpaceX Starship' side-steps the current explanations of its capabilities in between parenthesis, and does not require disambiguation. Consistent with the naming of other spacecraft. Rowan Forest (talk) 13:33, 28 August 2019 (UTC)
Support I previously argued against calling it either "only a spacecraft" or "only a rocket", especially with a planned Musk talk to clarify it (then) in mid August. Now, with that talk postponed to 28 September, I don't believe we should wait "that" long. The SpaceX Starship disambig title is a good compromise, clearly disambiguating from all the many many "Starship" articles on Wikipedia, and sidestepping the rocket vs spacecraft vs both argument entirely (at least in the title). Cheers. N2e (talk) 20:17, 29 August 2019 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.
There was just an edit putting "Starship" in italics. I thought the common usage was to put names of individual vehicles in italics, but not the name of a model or line of vehicles. (E.g. the B-29 Superfortress and the Enola Gay, or the NG Cygnus and the Roger Chaffee.) Since SpaceX is planning on building more than one Starship, should the model name be italicized? Fcrary (talk) 18:50, 1 September 2019 (UTC)
Concur with that. Starship not in intallics, as a class name for the vehicles. But notably, the first named vehicle has already flown and retired (prototype vehicle Starhopper), and the next two are named (Orbital prototype Mk 1 in Texas and Orbital prototype Mk 2 in Florida). With SpaceX's typical odd and uncareful nomenclature, we might need a discussion consensus on the exact names of the 2nd and 3rd prototypes. But, arguably, we have some vehicle names today. N2e (talk) 10:27, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
I think I'd accept that logic for Starhopper. But I'm not convinced about prototype Mk 1 or 2. In that case, I think the convention on italics is a little bit blurry. Is that a name or a serial number? For the Space Shuttle, or most vehicles where we have both a name and a number, the number isn't italicized (e.g. OV-103 and Discovery or CVN-65 and Enterprise.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fcrary (talk • contribs) 19:54, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
It is a number (it is sequential), but effectively it is used like a name. I would be surprised if there is a Mk 3 in the future, by that time SpaceX will probably use a different scheme to address the "production" Starships. --mfb (talk) 01:11, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
I propose we skip the italics for MK1 and MK2 because it is more like the traditional serial number of test vehicles, and we use italics only for the actual names of future functional Starships. Rowan Forest (talk) 14:48, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
I can go either way on the Mk1 thing. I did notice we use italics for Voyager 1 and Beagle 2. So there is definitely room for ambiguity, when it comes to a name containing a number. Fcrary (talk) 21:02, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
Not so much because of the number, but because the words Mark 1, Mark 2, etc (MK1, MK2...) are used by various manufacturers on their test models. It is not unique to SpaceX or to Starship. Rowan Forest (talk) 21:16, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
Concur with Rowan Forest on not italicizing "Mk n" etc., but am with Fcrary in that I could live with either way. I couldn't quite tell which position on the "Mk ..." question that mfb was preferring. N2e (talk) 18:54, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
The number 55 m is mentioned 5 times in the article, but Musk recently confirmed that Mk1/2 are taller (probably by one double ring in Texas) due to better than expected Raptor performance. I guess we'll get a new number on Saturday. Trying to find better references now will likely be a waste of time. --mfb (talk) 11:25, 23 September 2019 (UTC)
55 m is a number that has been around fro a while, for the "BFR spaceship"/BFR second stage/Starship. Now, we have a number that the very first test article, the Mk1, will be 50 meters tall in a Musk tweet yesterday. I suspect the new info is quite right. But it doesn't tell us exactly what the Mk2 or Mk3/4 or ... the "final" Starship will be. So we kind of just need to go with the sources.
I suspect we may get a new number for the overall Starship concept in the update coming soon. But maybe not. This is SpaceX/Musk. N2e (talk) 11:38, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
Mass
In recent tweets Musk wrote
Mk1 ship is around 200 tons dry & 1400 tons wet, but aiming for 120 by Mk4 or Mk5. Total stack mass with max payload is 5000 tons.
Not quite. It seems those numbers are for the "full stack", which would be the Mk 1 and the Super Heavy first stage (not yet built) to power it to orbit. So it seems we don't really have a mass number yet for the Starship itself. Is suspect we'll have update numbers when Musk gives the update in a few days. Cheers. N2e (talk) 11:43, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
Mk1 is the Starship only. There is no Super Heavy around to have a mass (and it will be more than 200 tonnes). This is also supported by the wet mass, which can only apply to Starship (as combined wet mass is 5000 tonnes). --mfb (talk) 11:55, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
Well then, we could add the mass then, if people think it is clear. I started to add that mass number for Mk1 yesterday, but then became sufficiently confused by Musk's locution in the tweet that I chose to not do so. I left it in a hidden comment in the "Characteristics" section waiting for a couple of days to get clarity. But if someone takes off the comment syntax, I won't have an issue with it. N2e (talk) 12:02, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
Any idea what this was meant?:
SpaceX however announced no concrete plans to pursue this two stage "Earth-to-Earth" possibility.[54][82] use of BFR.[18]
Probably not. I couldn't find anything in the references. To me, it looks like someone did an edit to say "use of BFR" instead of "possibility" (or vice versa) and accidentally left both versions in. By the way, the Rolling Stone interview only has a two or three sentence mention of point-to-point transport, in a much, much longer article. Also, they don't support the statement that SpaceX hasn't pursued the idea, but I think that's self-evident enough that I don't mind. Fcrary (talk) 00:25, 28 September 2019 (UTC)
Masses: Mk1 has 200 tonnes, goal is 120 tonnes (maybe even 110). 1200 t propellant mass, 150 t payload, typical return payload 50 t.
50 m length for Starship (68 m for booster, 118 m total)
6 engine layout as before. Sea-level raptors (3 installed on Mk1) have g*200 t thrust, 330 s Isp at sea level and 350 s Isp in vacuum. Vacuum raptors have g*220 t thrust and the goal is 380 s Isp.
Some aft cargo in 3 boxes, was only shown and not discussed
Heat shield concept: Mainly stainless steel, some ceramic tiles in areas of maximum heat
6 landing legs, independent of the wings fins.
Super Heavy has 3300 t propellant, 37 raptor engines, and 6 legs as well.
Pressurized volume is still 1000 m^3.
Plans: 20 km flight of Mk1 "in 1-2 months". The next flight after that might directly go to orbit, but not with Mk 1 or 2. Musk first suggested Mk 3 (to start construction in Texas in 1 month) but in a later answer he said Mk 4 or Mk 5. As estimate for completion dates he said 3 months for Mk 3, 4-5 months for Mk 4. Super Heavy construction (one in Florida/Texas each) would be built after Mk 4. Going to orbit "in 6 months" or so.
They plan to have crewed flights quickly after that, Musk said "next year". How: Fly often to demonstrate reliability. He discussed the option of having 10 flights in 10 days. The booster is designed for even faster turnaround.
All this can be included in the article referencing the presentation, but we should also get most of these things discussed in secondary sources in a day or so. --mfb (talk) 04:11, 29 September 2019 (UTC)
Thanks. It's original research, so we can't use it, but those numbers are consistent with a 150 tonne payload to LEO, for a Starship/SuperHeavy launch and dry tanks once in orbit. (SuperHeavy gets itself and Starship to 3 km/s, Starship get itself and the payload 5 km/s beyond that; 3.4 and 5.7 if they can get from 200 tonnes to 110 tonnes and do something similar with SuperHeavy.) As I said, that's original research, so it doesn't belong in the article. But it means I'd want a real good source before we put in an unqualified statement about 150 tonne payload to the lunar surface. Fcrary (talk) 18:28, 29 September 2019 (UTC)
Remove BFR from lead and elsewhere?
This article starts with a sentence describing Starship as "part of SpaceX's BFR launch vehicle." In the discussion on the BFR talk page, Rowan Forest noted that Mr. Musk did not use "BFR" in his Sept. 28 presentation and the company hasn't used "BFR" for a long time. mnw2000 even declared it dead, by adding a section titled, "The term, BFR, no longer exists." I think (hope) the consensus there is moving towards making BFR (rocket) into a page about a past, historical design, as we did for ITS launch vehicle.
In any case, I think it's clear that "BFR" is no longer the company's name for Starship, Super Heavy or the combined, two-stage launch vehicle. I'd like to remove "BFR" from the lead and from everywhere else but the history section (and there, mostly make it a link to the BFR article.) I'm not sure about the phrasing, since I'm not sure what the combined two-stage is actually called, but we can work on that. Another advantage is that, if Starship is the main article and makes minimum reference to BFR, we might reduce the drive-by edits about what it stands for... Fcrary (talk) 19:57, 29 September 2019 (UTC)
@Rowan Forest: 2/3 of that section is not about life support but ionizing radiation. I think that part is questionable. Musk did mention the topic in the past, highlighting that he didn't discuss it at one specific event is misleading. He also didn't mention toilets, that doesn't mean there won't be toilets (and unlike the radiation shielding, they are actually part of the life support system). Expected exposure to radiation during the flights (two-way) would be acceptable under NASA's current regulations for their astronauts even without dedicated radiation shelters, it can't be that bad. Shielding on Mars is beyond the scope of this article. It is disingenuous to say "It is unclear how this emergency shelter would address the constant high-energy Galactic cosmic radiation" as if this would be a problem. It doesn't address it. It also doesn't address the need of astronauts to go to the bathroom. Neither one is its task. Which of the references describes SpaceX's approach as "casual"? --mfb (talk) 05:46, 9 October 2019 (UTC)
"as if this [radiation] would be a problem." -mfb
I would love to discuss that, along with flat Earth conspiracies, but I favor science, biology, and the scientific method.
Radiation shielding for Starship is a key hardware of the life support systems (keep the living alive), and that is undeniable. This is more so since he plans to use the Starships as habitats on Mars for several years. The fact that numerous aerospace experts criticize his dismissal of the need for radiation shielding is a very notable status and is extensively referenced. Take time to read the references. Adjust the text as needed (this is a collaborative effort) but complete deletion (censoring) of the shielding hardware status would not be justified on a multitude on grounds. To begin: it is extensively referenced and notable, so I do not accept your claim that Starship's radiation shielding hardware is irrelevant or out of topic just because Must said it is not important and/or not needed. This is not Musk's diary or fan club. Be objective. Rowan Forest (talk) 16:36, 9 October 2019 (UTC)
"Which of the references describes SpaceX's approach as "casual"?"- mfb
I would say that a discussion of radiation hazards of space is not specific to Starship, and has no reason to be in this article; and in fact the entire Life Support section really has no content specific to Starship, since apparently there are zero references available on that specific part of the Starship design, other than Musk stating that it hasn't been designed yet. Geoffrey.landis (talk) 18:04, 9 October 2019 (UTC)
So, I just edited this down to just the single sentence that is specific to life support system for Starship. If you think the rest of the text should be kept, I suggest moving them to an article where they are appropriate Geoffrey.landis (talk) 18:46, 9 October 2019 (UTC)
Don't misquote me please, especially not in such a misleading way. Was this on purpose? "This" clearly referred to the quote - the radiation shelter not helping against galactic cosmic rays. Which is correct but entirely irrelevant, writing that in the article misleading. See the bathroom comparison. How Starship deals with radiation is relevant, but that is NOT what you wrote in the part I criticized. It is unclear for how long Starships are planned to serve as habitats on Mars - clearly not that long, he discussed underground habitats and all the renderings of Mars stations show non-Starship buildings. Anyway, that part is too speculative for the article, at least in the way you wrote it. I couldn't find "is not significant" in any of the references given for that claim. If you put in a literal quote with 6 (!) references you would expect that quote to appear in them. I rephrased the section to stick to the facts and actual quotes. --mfb (talk) 15:25, 10 October 2019 (UTC)
@Mfb: I apologize for misquoting you, it was not my intention to twist your words and I honestly assumed that "it" was radiation. The wording and length have been adjusted and am pleased with it, and I do not think that a couple of lines merit a separate section.
I couldn't find "is not significant" in any of the references given for that claim. --mfb
Correct. I originally had ≥10 references because of the opposition in WP dealing with this notable issue and hardware, but then I felt it was an overkill and I deleted some references. The quote comes from:
[1] "Ambient radiation damage is not significant for our transit times"
[2] “Ambient radiation damage is not significant for our transit times,” Musk replied
The Businessinsider article is an example how not to write headlines. "The first Mars settlers may get blasted with radiation levels 8 times higher than government limits allow". They compare the radiation exposure to the 50 mSv/year limit for radiation workers on the ground. Astronauts have higher limits, otherwise they couldn't stay on the ISS for long. The limit actually interesting here is NASA's lifetime exposure limit, given as 2500-3250 mSv (but it depends on gender and age). Which is ~2-3 times the estimated dose for a mission to Mars assuming a long flight and no shielding while on Mars. Even under this worst-case scenario the expected dose is well under the limit. I guess "the first Mars flight won't have a problem with NASA's radiation regulations" wouldn't get as many clicks. --mfb (talk) 03:57, 11 October 2019 (UTC)
FWIW, Paul Wooster, SpaceX Principal Mars Development Engineer, gave a talk at the Mars Society Convention a few days ago. It included a few details beyond what Musk or the SpaceX website have previously released; and it was recorded. Video recording.
One of the questions in the Q&A was about radiation protection, and I believe I heard him clarify some design considerations and passenger practices during parts of the Mars transit with a few details we had not heard before, or heard as explicitly. I'll leave it to others with more concern for the much-farther off passenger-carrying aspects of Starship to consider for how this might help the discussion above in this section of the Talk page. But I just wanted to mention it 'cause now we have an Oct 2019 mention of that aspect and design concern. Cheers. N2e (talk) 13:08, 25 October 2019 (UTC)
Poorly Named Vehicle
Off-topic
Elon Musk is a sensationalist phony, the word 'starship' refers specifically to an interstellar spacecraft, usually meaning one that is capable of traveling to other solar systems using FTL travel and not simply a spacecraft that would eventually reach another solar system when traveling at light or sub-light speeds... Freighttrain, The (talk) 07:01, 17 November 2019 (UTC)
Maybe, maybe not, but that's not up to us to decide. Everyone calls it Starship, we have to follow that (WP:COMMONNAME). By the way: You are a train carrying freight, certainly? --mfb (talk)
Falcon 9 has only two fairing halves, I doubt they'll get more ships (west coast launches are probably too rare for that). --mfb (talk) 14:20, 19 November 2019 (UTC)
Starship doesn't currently exist in any form, not even as an engineering drawing. It is nothing more than a concept under development. And, more specifically, it may fail entirely as a concept. There is no information available to support that it:
Is viable as a two stage to orbit vehicle.
Is viable with a stainless steel hull.
Will ever be economically feasible.
The conflation of the shiny, proof of concept vehicles with the proposed concept is highly dishonest at best. For example, during Apollo, there were a number of special vehicles that were built to try to give pilots flight experience with the Lunar Lander. No one conflated these vehicles with the actual Lunar Lander. Starship currently has much more in common with Venture Star than with Falcon Heavy. I can't even compare Starship to SLS since almost everything on SLS is proven hardware and the configuration itself simply moves the Space Shuttle main engines to the bottom of the fuel tank. Finally, this notion of playing up risky, conceptual development is not really fair in regard SpaceX's actual successes and near term development such as Dragon 2. There is a scheduled in flight abort for Dragon 2 in just a few days. In contrast, it could take years for a Starship concept to be proven impractical and it may never make it to orbit.Brehmel (talk) 21:16, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
SpaceX is assembling a spacecraft that is planned to go to space. That's far beyond an engineering drawing. Will the same spacecraft deliver payloads to orbit? Certainly not. SpaceX is constantly iterating on all their designs. But that doesn't make the first design less real. We don't say Falcon 9 didn't exist in early 2010 just because Block 5 was not around at that time. They more than doubled their payload from v1.0 to now. The article doesn't claim that the prototypes will achieve all the goals of SpaceX. Of course it will not. Given how "proven" everything about SLS is, it really makes you wonder why it is years behind schedule and needs tens of billions of dollars. --mfb (talk) 12:39, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
Brehmel is spot on. It's bad enough that the media conflate development prototypes and test articles (plus some world-class PR) with unprecedentedly rapid progress, and carry on as if something that was once considered impossible is now going to happen before our very eyes, but for Wikipedia to jump on the bandwagon is unacceptable. As it stands the article is all about what Starship is, when in fact it isn't yet. Some parts definitely need to be rewritten in future perfect tense, not only to be grammatically correct but to avoid any insinuation that the prototypes are Starship or that any of this will come to fruition. It is what it is, not what anyone says it's going to be. That is actually the only way to satisfy NPOV. The current construction, so we are told, is the "SN1". There are no plans for the SN1 to go into space AFAIK. And in 2010 the Falcon 9 v1.0 was a completed rocket ferrying commercial payloads, which is absolutely no comparison to the stainless steel rings currently sitting in Boca Chica! Also, let's leave any discussion of SLS out of this altogether. Cheers. nagualdesign06:05, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
What they are building is SN1, older name Mk3, unless SpaceX changed plans recently and didn't tell us this one is expected to fly to space. The article is about (a) future plans, labeled as plans, and (b) existing prototypes, not claimed to satisfy the plans. Do you have a specific case where existing prototypes are claimed to have features they do not have? Bremel, who is "spot on" according to you, introduced the SLS comparison. --mfb (talk) 08:13, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
By way of example I've made a number of small edits to the article to improve the grammar. I trust that other editors can understand the need for accuracy and that any future edits will bear that in mind, and those that don't have a strong grasp of grammar will defer to those who do without construing this as some sort of agenda. People just want to read facts. nagualdesign18:10, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
I think there is some design philosophy confusion here. The idea of having a final design before starting to build something, or the distinction between prototypes and test articles, is very common today. But SpaceX isn't doing things that way with Starship. As far as I can tell, their approach is much more like aircraft building around 1910 or 1920. Even aircraft was unique and the builders were fiddling around with the design constantly, incorporating things they learned from the last vehicle they built and flew. I don't think there were two, identical JN-4s but that didn't stop Curtiss from calling them "JN-4"s. Starship seems a lot like that to me. Fcrary (talk) 20:50, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
Do you mean that the article confuses SpaceX's design philosophy or that you think one of us is confused? I think we can all agree that SpaceX is doing things differently with Starship development, attempting a fast-track, minimal cost approach to prototyping in order to save funds for the final production model. By "final production model" I mean the first flight-ready production model (equivalent to the Falcon 9 v1.0) made after extensive development, once the design has been finalized. At the moment Starship is a reasonably well-defined concept, and what we see in Boca Chica are evaluation prototypes which are part of the development process. The Mk1 was part mockup, part functional prototype. The SN1 will be more functional and more similar in appearance to the Starship concept but with less engines and other cost-saving differences. We all know this, I assume. But I've seen plenty of people online who think that the rings currently stacked in Boca Chica will be launched into orbit as part of the first Starship, and don't understand how much more work there is yet to do before even reaching the design phase. I trust that no one here thinks that. nagualdesign23:05, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
I was referring to original statement that "Starship doesn't currently exist in any form, not even as an engineering drawing". That sounds like the vehicle doesn't exist until they have the blueprints for the first orbital vehicle. I also don't think there will ever be a "final production model", unless "final" means the last one they ever build. As far as I can tell, their approach really blurs the distinction between prototypes, test articles and flight articles. How would you describe it if they just keep building more, fly each subsequent higher and faster, start marketing suborbital hops at some point, and eventually evolves into an orbital vehicle, and then evolves even further to have more and more payload. They aren't exactly clear and unambiguous, but (at least to me) that's what it looks like what they're doing. If so, where would you draw the line between a prototype and a production model? Fcrary (talk) 23:18, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
Correct; Starship does not currently exist in material form, nor even as an engineering drawing. It's at the concept phase. I've already explained what I meant by "final production model" but I'll try again; in the context of product development once they've built and tested all the evaluation prototypes they will be able to 'finalize' the design (ie, move from conceptual design to actual blueprints) and begin building production models. It's the final stage of development before production. That does not imply that development cannot continue ad infinitum. I see nothing that blurs the distinction between prototypes and what will be the flight article. They're trying to build something that's never been built before, but they're not reinventing the way things are made. To be clear, they have a concept (Starship) and one day they hope to build one. When they do, that will be (a) Starship. nagualdesign01:12, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
I think that is an artificial definition of "final". What if the Mk 3 version does get into orbit? What if it doesn't, but that exact design is good enough to be produced and used as for suborbital point-to-point transport? What if the Mk 5 gets to orbit, but with nothing close to the payload (or planetary capabilities) SpaceX wants? They might start producing Mk 5 copies for low Earth orbit production service. Would you say the Mk 3 was, then, both a prototype for the Mk 4 and 5, and also the "final product" for suborbital point-to-point? And the Mk 5 the "final product" for low Earth orbits flight and the prototype for the Mk 6 and later? For many applications, a "final product" makes sense. If something is mass produced, there is clearly a distinction between the one-off development items and the design which goes into mass production. But if the design is constantly evolving while the earlier versions are in commercial service, I just don't see it. Fcrary (talk) 22:11, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
I love semantic digressions as much as the next man, but you're arguing with me about what I meant when I used a phrase, which I clarified twice. I know full well what I meant, and if I've failed to explain myself well I can only apologize. nagualdesign22:25, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
I didn't mean to dispute what you meant. That would be obnoxious. But I am not convinced that meaning is, in all cases, an applicable, useful or even meaningful one. It is in many cases, but I'm not sure if it is for Starship. Fcrary (talk) 23:02, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
Re. SpaceX plans (or at least announced as plan). "orbital vehicle SN1", "will conduct high altitude test flights, including an orbital flight"
Thank you for hitting the nail squarely on the head. On 16th January Musk tweeted, "Starship orbital vehicle SN1, liquid oxygen header tank & nosecone", along with a photo of them. Starship SN1 is a prototype of the Starship orbital vehicle (essentially the top half of the planned rocket). The journalist, Evelyn Arevalo, appears to have seen the phrase "orbital vehicle" differently and wrote, "Starship SN1 will be the first prototype that will conduct high altitude test flights, including an orbital flight." This is not only a baseless extrapolation, it contradicts the fact that without the Super Heavy booster there can be no orbital flights! Then of course the Great Internet Echo Chamber kicks in, with people who've read this nonsense posting YouTube videos and wotnot. Case in point, Musk was simply posting a photo of some hardware, not making an announcement that this prototype was going to do something that even the finished Starship isn't intended to be capable of! We need to shield Wikipedia from this bullshit.
Incidentally, later in the article she writes, "Through testing, trial and error, they will eventually develop a flight approved spacecraft. The final version of Starship will be capable of performing long duration voyages to the Moon and Mars." I couldn't have put it better myself. nagualdesign22:14, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
An "orbital vehicle" is a vehicle that goes to orbit. Can we agree on that? It's literally the definition of an orbital vehicle. Yes, SN1 will need Super Heavy to go to orbit - they will build that, there is no contradiction. The "final version of Starship" will be the equivalent of Block 5 for Falcon 9. It's in the distant future, but that is irrelevant for the discussion here. --mfb (talk) 04:07, 10 February 2020 (UTC)
Of course that's what an orbital vehicle is. And SN1 will be a prototype of the Starship orbital vehicle, with the stated goal of completing a 20km hop and maybe a 100km hop (aside from being a fabrication testbed and further proof-of-concept). Do you honestly think that the rings currently stacked in Boca Chica will be launched into orbit? If so, what are you basing that on? If you can point me to some evidence I'll gladly pipe down, but AFAIK people (yourself included) are drawing their own conclusions based on each other's speculation. To be clear, you specifically wrote earlier that SpaceX had "announced" that they were planning orbital flights with SN1, but you linked to a tweet which was nothing of the sort, and a dubious article. I'd like to read or hear that announcement please. Cheers. nagualdesign05:45, 10 February 2020 (UTC)
Musk called it "orbital vehicle". There is zero ambiguity: This is an orbital vehicle under construction. There is no prototype in that tweet, and especially no "prototype that never flies to orbit". That is purely made up by you. I expect SN1 to fly to orbit if it is not destroyed in a test before or something unexpected comes up. Despite me providing a reference the need for a reference is reversed here, by the way: You claim that SN1 will be very different from the first spacecraft to fly to orbit. And you have nothing to back that up apart from your own disbelief that SpaceX can do something revolutionary again. --mfb (talk) 12:48, 10 February 2020 (UTC)
Simply referring to the latest prototype of an orbital vehicle as "Starship orbital vehicle SN1" does not constitute an "announcement" or "plan" by any normal standards, and without the Super Heavy (yet to be developed) and vacuum-optimized Raptor engines (yet to be developed) achieving orbital velocity simply isn't possible. You cannae change the laws of physics!
Re. There is no prototype in that tweet, and especially no "prototype that never flies to orbit". That is purely made up by you.; Please do not invent quotes! I have clearly stated that there are no plans for orbital tests using the SN1 as far as I know, and I sincerely invited you to disabuse me. So far you haven't managed to convince me, though the offer is always open.
I've spent several hours now scouring the Internet for any evidence of some sort of "announcement" by SpaceX that SN1 is intended for orbital testing, and can find nothing of substance. I did find a few third-party reports though, all of which exemplify the problem I have here, which is that if I try to dig deeper I get nowhere. For instance, techcrunch.com wrote, "The CEO answered a volley of questions over Twitter on Thursday evening, providing more details about Starship", ending the article with, "now it has moved on to a third version with a refined and improved design, which the company says will be used for orbital flight testing this year." I've poured over Musk's twitter feed throughout 16th January (the day in question) and can find nothing to back up this assertion. themonitor.com also wrote, "The SN1 is being designed for orbital flight, which the company is aiming for this year." Again, seemingly apropos of nothing.
Oddest of all inverse.com wrote, "Anticipation for the capsule has been growing since late 2019, when Musk announced on Twitter on December 27 that SpaceX had started constructing a new prototype test vehicle. “We’re now building flight design of Starship SN1, but each SN will have at least minor improvements, at least through SN20 or so of Starship V1.0,” Musk stated. As Inverse reported at the time, the new prototype design is scheduled for an orbital test flight in 2020, which Musk claims could be within the next two to three months." In fact, Musk has stated that it will be a 20km suborbital flight. Moreover, their previous article (which they link to) does not mention anything about orbital test flights.
So can somebody pretty please with a cherry on top provide a link to something in which SpaceX or Musk himself supposedly announced the intention of performing an orbital test using SN1. If nothing is forthcoming then can we please have a serious discussion about what constitutes a reliable secondary source. As far as I can tell, none of these sources have any special insight or inside information, they're just reading the same tweets and wotnot as the rest of us and then putting 2 and 2 together to make 5. nagualdesign05:16, 11 February 2020 (UTC)
On 6th February Teslarati tweeted, SpaceX wants to build Starships in days with off-the-shelf water tower manufacturing tech, along with a link to an article reporting that SpaceX plan to build Starship and Super Heavy using commercial off-the-shelf equipment typically used by the oil and gas industry to make industrial storage tanks, writing, SpaceX has confirmed that at least a subset of the available COTS solutions can be used to build Starships (theoretically) capable of orbital flight. On 7th February Musk tweeted in response, This isn’t quite correct. An orbital rocket needs precision that’s 3X to 4X better than a water tower, so super precise parts, fixtures & welding are needed. Suborbital is much more forgiving. In other words COTS equipment isn't good enough. Later when asked, Was the SpaceX director that said "[OTS] water tower machines work really well for making rockets" wrong, in that case? Or are COTS solutions viable but only if SX tweaks them for greater precision?, Musk tweeted, Unmodified water tower machines do not work well for orbital rockets, as mass efficiency is critical for the latter, but not the former. Hopper, for example, was made of 12.5mm steel vs 4mm for SN1 orbital design. Optimized skins will be <2mm in places across a 9000mm diameter. In other words, COTS technology worked for making the first hopper but will require substantial modification to meet requirements. This does not constitute an announcement of a plan to send SN1 into orbit.nagualdesign05:38, 11 February 2020 (UTC)
Vacuum-optimized engines are not needed to reach orbit, they just increase the payload. That's something Musk said something like a year ago when they wanted to use sea level engines only for early flights. I'm unsure what your point is because it seemed to change over time. Initially the question was if Starship - a spacecraft that can go to orbit when put on Super Heavy - is closely related to what they build now (SN1). If SN1 goes to orbit the answer is trivially yes, and Musk's tweets suggest that this is the plan. Okay, we interpret this differently, I don't think we'll change that (note that we don't write it in the article anyway), so let's focus on a weaker statement that is still sufficient: Even if it doesn't make it to orbit: It is "orbital design", i.e. something of the type that will go to orbit. Even if SN1 is not the equivalent of Falcon 9 flight 1, it is at least a rocket closely related to it. --mfb (talk) 16:25, 11 February 2020 (UTC)
I just noticed that the SpaceX Starship is very inconsistent about primary units. Half the time we've got a mass in pounds followed by a parenthetical mass in kg. As in 260,000 lb (120,000 kg). Half the time, it's the other way around, 120,000 kg (260,000 lb). The same is true about meters/feet and thrust in kN and lbf. I'm not going to get into using pounds as a unit of mass... But we ought to be consistent about the primary unit. The manual of style says to use imperial units as the primary unit for articles "non-scientific articles with strong ties to the United States" and SI metric for other articles. I'd prefer SI metric, but I guess it depends on whether or not Starship amounts to "rocket science"... Fcrary (talk) 20:40, 22 February 2020 (UTC)
This is clearly a science-related article. SpaceX usually publishes metric values, US units might be mentioned but don't have to (e.g. Falcon 9). --mfb (talk) 06:15, 23 February 2020 (UTC)
SN1 destroyed
At least the tank section. Presumably during a pressure test, we know SpaceX planned to do them. Tested to destruction, clearly - but not intentionally. I expect news reports within a day, so far all we have is this video. --mfb (talk) 05:33, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
Starship naming in wikidata : full rocket or 2nd stage only ?
I'm curious on claimed the cost per launch. Looking at "Propellant mass 3,400,000superheavy+1,200,000starship kg", dividing propellant alone comes out to $0.43/kg. How much does that much fuel really cost? I guess the source says $900k/launch for fuel ($0.20/kg?!). And still, I imagine the $2M/launch claim is some hype number, imagining 1000 launches/year to divide out all the fixed costs. And 1000 launches per year means $2B/year, a small fraction of NASA's budget, but I guess that's the whole point. If you can get prices that low, lots of people are going to start imagining what they can do with it, whether larger space stations, unmanned orbiter probes to every planet, or people to the Moon or Mars or Asteroids. Tom Ruen (talk) 16:33, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
Cost estimates at this point are about 90% hype and another 90% fevered imagination. If you notice that those numbers don't add up to 100%, you are correct. Even when we see a working version launched and recycled, we probably still will not see accurate cost numbers, as SpaceX is private and not inclined to share such data. Tarl N. (discuss) 16:59, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
Seems to me that anything more than a simple reference to Musk's aspirational cost (not price) target, with a good source, in the prose of the article is probably undue since, as you note, it is very speculative at this point in the development cycle. I'd be okay with removing any of the cost info from the infoboxes entirely, since it's all too speculative to be putting in numbers that are 1/100th or 1/1000th of the adjacent competition for delivering such payloads to Earth orbit. Cheers. N2e (talk) 04:25, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
Is history getting too detailed?
The history section describing 2020 progress is getting fairly granular, which I am not opposed to in the abstract, except that seeing as the page Starship development history exists, that sort of thing might best be reserved for there. Whether we're at a point where the summary on this page should be cut down is a ymmv thing, I guess. Thoughts? BlackholeWA (talk) 05:37, 5 September 2020 (UTC)
Yes, agreed, BlackholeWA. We had a previous Discussion that led to the creation of that other article, Starship development history; but a lot of fairly detailed history stuff on testing is being added to this article (SpaceX Starship) by various editors, and it appears no editor has been catching it, reverting it, and suggesting to the editor adding it that it belongs in another article. Now, will take some editor with a bit of time willing to cull the extraordinary detail from this article, and move the appropriate bits to the development history article.
I've noticed that I can't find anything on the subject of Starship (SN) static fire tests or the implosions/explosions caused by them. I'd have thought that these were quite important pieces of information to include? It could just be that there aren't enough reliable sources to cite; I haven't checked, but I thought I'd take note of it here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vgj843df (talk • contribs) 10:35, 3 August 2020 (UTC)
isnìt better to say "partial success"? it is only the last part a failure, and the test was about all. a failure would be an explosion on the launch pad. --Dwalin (talk) 23:10, 9 December 2020 (UTC)
SN8, not SN9. We should describe it however WP:RS describe it. It's still very early, and I'm sure more will come in, but here's one example: [3]. SpaceX Starship SN8 explodes after first successful high-altitude flight. "successful". And looking at others, I see a lot using the word "successful", but also a lot using the word "exploded on landing". I don't see much of anything describing it as a failure yet.
If I had to call it right now, I don't think that this table will end up calling it an unequivocal failure nor an unequivocal success in the end. Right now I'd say "Partial success" is best supported. Leijurv (talk)
Currently on Wikipedia for spaceflight and rocketry related lists, this is described as a failure because it was a destruction of the launch vehicle during the primary mission. This is why Falcon 9 landing failures aren't classified as failures because landing is a secondary objective or why 2nd stage fragmentation in orbit aren't classified as launch failures, because they occurred after completing the primary objective. Launches like Astra's Rocket 3 are classified as failures as the vehicle was destroyed during the primary mission, even though it was a high risk R&D flight. Since the landing of SN8 was a necessary part of the flight and was not a secondary objective, this test is labeled as a failure. (partial failures are missions where an anomaly in the primary mission occurs, but is still able to meet all objectives (like Atlas V L-no.10), so SN8 doesn't qualify). --Jrcraft Yt (talk) 01:07, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
(humorous response) What makes you say that the launch vehicle destruction happened during the primary mission? I don't think anyone can disagree that it was the impact with the ground that immediately caused the explosion, no? So it landed in one piece, THEN exploded.
(actual response) Thanks for sharing that, I didn't know. I think we might need to think about what the mission goal was here then? You are assuming that landing was a necessary part of the test, and because it didn't land, today was a failure (i.e. it did not succeed at its mission goal). I don't think that's true. From everything I've seen, the goal was always to collect data without an overriding intent or goal to land. In other words, I don't agree that landing was the primary mission objective. E.g. see this (imagine citing a meme tho). Leijurv (talk) 02:41, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
The Dragon In-Flight Abort Test is listed as a success, although the launch vehicle was obviously lost. The survival of the Falcon 9 was not critical to the test. So the test was a success despite the loss of a vehicle. Fcrary (talk) 04:40, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
Right now, it's listed as a partial failure, I say keep it like that. It shouldn't be marked as a success since the starship program revolves on being able to recover both stages. Test flight or not, it should be classed accordingly. We don't give test flights any special success/fail criteria on any other page, so we shouldn't here. --Bvbv13 (talk) 02:56, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
I disagree. The purpose of the test was to obtain flight data and learn how to improve future (preliminary, test) versions of Starship. SpaceX never said a successful landing was necessary for a successful test. In fact, they said exactly the opposite. We should use the same criteria for success as the criteria the operator announced in advance of the test. We did that for the Schiaparelli EDM Mars lander. It crashed, but the success criteria announced in advance said a landing was not required. Success simply required getting enough data to determine how the EDL system worked, and, if it didn't, why it didn't. Fcrary (talk) 04:40, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
We've catalogued rocket launches equally the for every rocket. We either have successful launches, partially successful launches or launch failures. There is also the "other outcome" data point. Unless we want to go back to ALL entries that contain launch stats, it stays like this. Every time a failure occurs, data is collected. That doesn't constitute revising launch catalogues for all of Wikipedia. We don't need separate "collected data before failure" and "didn't collect data before failure" tags. There are going to be launch failures and they need to be categorized as such instead of trying to find a way to claim 100% success. Yes, the point was to collect data and that part was successful, that doesn't mean it didn't explode upon landing failure. Recovering the vehicle is an integral part of the starship system. Same reason why the first launch of Astra's rocket 3 isn't classified as a success. Yes, the point was to get data, but the rocket still failed. There is no reason to make starship launches any different from all previous ones. There are going to be some non-green boxes in the chart and that's ok, that's how this kind of rapid prototyping works. (We didn't do that for the Schiaparelli EDM lander, in charts , it's listed as spacecraft failure). --Jrcraft Yt (talk) 05:11, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
Yes, the point was to collect data and that part was successful Okay good. Then: This is why Falcon 9 landing failures aren't classified as failures because landing is a secondary objective or why 2nd stage fragmentation in orbit aren't classified as launch failures, because they occurred after completing the primary objective. The rocket exploded after completing the primary objective. This is exactly like a Falcon 9 failing to land in that case. Leijurv (talk) 08:14, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
This isnt orbital launch not even a suborbital launch. As it was lower than some amateur rockets. Whats more important this test was more of proof of concept, that you can do it, that you can control rocket on its side, that you can do belly flop. It was never done before. We should not mistake program goal with test goal. Even if program goal is to land from orbit or suborbital space flight, this test was none of them. In fact there is Elons tweet where he writes test goals: "Good Starship SN8 static fire! Aiming for first 15km / ~50k ft altitude flight next week. Goals are to test 3 engine ascent, body flaps, transition from main to header tanks & landing flip."), by it its full blows success. Altitude was later changed to 12.5km. There is nothing said about successful landing. Janncis (talk) 08:56, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
yes. a SN20 that ends like that will be a complete failure. a SN8 is, it you don't want to say a success, a partial success. --Dwalin (talk) 10:55, 10 December 2020 (UTC)--Dwalin (talk) 10:55, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
REVERTED EDITS
The last edits left the article in an illegible state - since it's in HIGH demand right now - I did a quick revert - on grounds that having something that people can actually read is a good thing!
SteveBaker (talk) 19:52, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
BRD on launch success for test articles and prototypes
The launch success criteria in the Infobox rocket are intended for operational flights of a rocket. They are not intended for, and have not traditionally been used for, tracking what happened with each test article in the runnup to operational flights.
Since a lively Discussion has been undertaken here on this Talk page, I've invoked WP:BRD to Return the article to the state it was in a few days ago, prior to the recent brouhaha that has been stirred up over how to "count" the recent Starship test flight, the first to a middle altitude.
So let's complete the Discussion first, and see if a consensus might be obtained, before we have a lot of editors in edit wars as as been the case in recent hours with changes of those numbers. Cheers. N2e (talk) 20:02, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
Test flights are difficult to judge as we dont know test plan. But its also ridiculous to judge test flights as operational flights. My suggestion would be to use proposed test system with additional entries to shown, that test plan is not known. In case of SN8 flight and by going with Elon's tweet (reference with nr. 1) I would say it was fully successful flight. Janncis (talk) 09:16, 11 December 2020 (UTC)
is it correct to put in the general page the outcomes of the prototype? spacex is not NASA. there will be at least 50 launch before first payload. (if i don't remember whrong elon). NASA is "good the first". --Dwalin (talk) 17:36, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
I like it. My only concern is using the word "all". I don't think any test is ever 100% successful, and I'd hate to see arguments about a 99% success not accomplishing "all" of the goals. But I can't think of a better way to phrase it. Fcrary (talk) 19:34, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
if falcon 1 was a "normal" rocket. starship is totally another kind of rocket. they uses lauches as "test". nasa don't make "launch tests". apollo 1-7 are not as SN1-9, they were all known. apollo 1-9 will be more like comparable as SN25+--Dwalin (talk) 19:48, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
First off, glad you have started a Discussion here on the Talk page about this. Much better we get it sorted here first, then have many editors keep changing the numbers in the Infobox rocket infobox. I have invoked WP:BRD to put a halt to the frequent edit changes (edit warring?) on those numbers, until after we develop a consensus here first. I'll be back with substantive thoughts on what Infobox success/failure criteria might be invoked on test articles]in the next half day. But pleased to see the discussion has been joined by other interested editors. N2e (talk) 20:12, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
To answer the question by Dwalin that started this section, I would say no, it is not correct to have Wikipedia articles show "success" or "failure" on all of the various tank tests, pad tests, or even flight tests of an incomplete and not-yet-operational test articles. There are several reasons for this. First, the tests seem to have many test objectives (as shown both by company statement and also per space media sources), and it incorrect to try to sum them up in a single success/failure call made by Wikipedia editors with incomplete information. It would require some sort of a reliable secondary source, and then find some sort of rough agreement among all those sources. As the recent spate of clickbait headlines following the first high-altitude flight test shows, this is unlikely, as the various media sites covered the outcome quite differently; likely 'cause these media outlets have quite diverse reasons for even existing.
Second, since these tests are not a part of normal in-service operations, the test details are typically kept proprietary by the company, with only the parts the require permits being preannounced to the public. Examples include closing the adjacent state highway and beach for tank pressure tests, or needing a temporary flight restriction from the FAA for actual flight tests. SpaceX simply does not provide a list of such test objectives, although sometimes, some details have been tweeted out (often incomplete) by Elon Musk. But to determine binary "success" or "failure" as some sort of infobox metric, Wikipedia editors would need to have access to information we simply do not have. What we can do is have prose in the body of the article describing notable tests and test outcomes in way that are well cited by reliable secondary sources. But an article-level count in the infobox is not actually a correct way to explicate the information in the encyclopedia of human knowledge; not for tests of mere test articles and prototypes, and not as a general rule. N2e (talk) 12:56, 11 December 2020 (UTC)
A new way to present the outcome of testing instead of success or failure
I see the other previous discussion on whether the test is a failure or success. The problem is a test can be classed as a success by just getting some data but failing to achieve anything. I propose instead of labelling the prototype tests as a success or a failure, it is instead labelled as "All test objectives achieved,' 'Most test objectives achieved,' 'some test objectives achieved' and 'failure.' Green would be for all test objectives achieved, red for failure, yellow fo most test objectives achieved and light red for some test objectives achieved.
Input on changes to wording is welcome of course -AndrewRG10 (talk) 02:34, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
I agree in spirit that the breakdown of "primary mission objective achieved or not" just does not work well with what SpaceX is doing here. When they do a launch into orbit, it's clearly applicable, such as the examples above of F9. For a test that is explicitly for data gathering (stated beforehand), a test that was explicitly stated as having a 1/3rd chance of completing in full ([4])? I don't think we can say what the primary mission objective is. If it's data gathering, SpaceX has said very clearly that that was successful ([5][6][7][8]). I think we would need an alternate reliable source to support the idea that the primary mission objective was to land, and not to collect data. Leijurv (talk) 02:51, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
Right now, it's listed as a partial failure, I say keep it like that. It shouldn't be marked as a success since the starship program revolves on being able to recover both stages. Test flight or not, it should be classed accordingly. We don't give test flights any special success/fail criteria on any other page, so we shouldn't here. --Bvbv13 (talk) 03:00, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
I didn't say it should be listed a success. I said we should completely change how the test flights are categorised instead of success failure or partial success, it should be listed as a failure, all test objectives achieved or partial test objectives achieved. Obviously, SN8 would go into partial objectives achieved. -AndrewRG10 (talk) 04:43, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
I disagree. What if the goal of the program is to build, test and crash vehicles until SpaceX learns enough to build one which can land safely and reliably? Landing is the goal of the program not the goal of any single test within that program. If a particular test's goal is to gain information for future use, and it produces that information, then the test is a success by any reasonable standard. Even if it only gained the large majority of the desired results, it would still be considered a success. Note that the Galileo mission is considered a success, despite the fact that the spacecraft's high gain antenna problem meant that it only accomplished 80-90% of its planned objectives (as estimated by NASA.) We don't need to list "partial success" for activity which falls short of 100% Fcrary (talk) 04:51, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
That breaks how we've cataloged all rocket flights on Wikipedia. When we have a launch that doesn't meet all requirements, it goes under partial failure/partial success. Unless we want to change every rocket entry on Wikipedia, it stays like this. We either have successful launches, partially successful launches or launch failures. There is also the "other outcome" data point. Test flight or not, they need to be catalogued the same way. It's the same reason why the first launch of Astra's rocket 3 isn't classified as a success. Yes, the point was to get data, but the rocket still failed. All entries in Wikipedia don't need to change because a Starship prototype crashed into the ground. Creating a disparity in this article from the accepted norm so that we don't have to see something other then a green success box for a launch outcome is absurd. --Jrcraft Yt (talk) 05:11, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
Actually, that is not how we categorize all rocket flights. For the Falcon 9, we list launch success/failure and landing success/failure separately. From what I've seen on the Electron talk page, that's also the plan for Electron. Perhaps we should describe the Starship SN8 flight as a successful mission but a landing failure. Fcrary (talk) 06:03, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
That is a good point, we could do that, one reservation I have though is that for F9/H or Electron, recovery isn't mission critical. Starship is another story. It is mission critical, like shuttle. When it's carrying people back to Earth or to Mars, landing is mission critical. It's up to the talk page to decide. Personally, I believe that the landing of Starship is mission critical since it's designed to land humans on the Moon, Earth and Mars aswell as be quickly refueled and relaunched. So it should be factored into overall mission success. Whether or not the Space Shuttle Orbiter returned was directly connected to mission success so I don't think Starship should be any different. --Jrcraft Yt (talk) 06:18, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
We should decide on the talk page, but I think you are mixing up mission critical for the final, operational Starship, and mission critical for a test of the SN8 vehicle. SN8 is nothing like what an operational Starship would be like. So the mission success criteria for its test flight should not be confused with what an operational Starship would need to do. If they hadn't put landing gear on SN8 at all and just dumped it into the ocean, rather than attempting to land it (which was speculated about before today), would you call the test a mission failure? Because they didn't do something they never intended to do with this prototype? For the Starship program, eventually developing safe and reliable landing systems is a mission goal. But for the SN8 test, simply getting data which contributes to that goal is a mission success. Fcrary (talk) 06:50, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
The launch outcome ended and explosion during the failed landing. Just like we don't characterize the Schiaparelli EDM lander (even though it's primary purpose was to collect data for future probes) as a success. Just because it's a test flight, we shouldn't claim success simply for getting data. Every launch gathers data. The fact is that this was a mostly successful test where most of the mission went as planned. Only one part went wrong and that was the landing burn. Hence why it's classified as partial failure, because only one part failed. You can't claim 100% success on a mission that had aspects fail on the vehicle leading to a total destruction of the rocket (no matter how high the risk was). At most, you could change it to "mostly successful". But not full success. Even on risky test flights, there hasn't been an instance where we've categorized a total vehicle destruction as fully successful. With that same logic, Astra's rocket 3.2, Virgin orbits demo flight, Electron's first flight and more were all 100% successful because they prioritized data collection over payload. --Jrcraft Yt (talk) 07:02, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
I think you are getting fixated on the idea that "success" means "100% success". For some things, like launching a satellite into the intended orbit, that can make sense. But for any sort of test or experiment, there is no such thing as 100% success. If 100% is the criteria, then no one has ever launched a successful scientific spacecraft. Hubble wasn't (due to the initial problems with its optics). Kepler wasn't; pointing stability wasn't quite as good as planned, and they needed an extended mission to achieve their prime mission goals. Even the most wildly successful ones haven't managed better than 99%. So I think we should just drop the whole idea of 100% success being required to say a mission or a launch was "successful." 90% is (as in the case of Galileo) close enough to 100% to call it a success.
And you didn't comment on the criteria for success. Look, the Starship SN8 did not successfully test landing, but it also did not test other things the final, operational Starship will need. It did not test life support systems. It did not test reentry or heat shields. It did not test in space refueling. It did not because the SN8 test was not supposed to do so. SN8 was purely intended to collect data for future iterations of the design. If we judge a mission or a test by its intended goals, as I think we should, SN8 was a success. The got data on all the things they were interested in, and all but one part of the test worked. The landing didn't, but since the goal was to collect data on whether or not the system worked, the test accomplished its mission. Fcrary (talk) 08:20, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
Will comment here to, there is Elons tweet [1] about tragets, if we go by them, its full success as altitude was later changed. Janncis (talk) 09:04, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
Disappointing that I have to restate my proposal because people turned this into a what is a success discussion, that's for the talk section above.
I propose that in the testing section, (not anywhere else on Wikipedia or in the real launch section) that success, partial and failure are removed and replaced with 'all test objectives achieved,' 'most test objectives achieved' and 'failure.'
It would look like this.
Outcome
All test objectives achieved
Most test objectives achieved
Failure
This system is designed to make it impossible to have an argument over what category the test goes under because it's pretty clear if it didn't get all of the test goals complete, ie, SN8. -AndrewRG10 (talk) 10:27, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
Sounds great, lest do it. SN8 flight then should be All test objectives achieved as per Elon's tweet, But I will suggest in that case adding an other choice of "Test objectives unknown" since no one here will publish test checklist. All we have to go by is Elons tweets and words.Janncis (talk) 18:03, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
I don't think we should, it's just more wordy, and they mean essentially the same thing. If we want, we could put "all test objective achieved" in a note. N828335 (talk) 04:10, 16 December 2020 (UTC)
This article is a mess
There's so many sections that go into way too of minute details. A lot of stuff needs to be removed and re-summarized and content moved into a Starship history page. Ergzay (talk) 02:56, 12 December 2020 (UTC)
Found something that could probably be linked in. If we look at the yellow boxes at the top of the talk page, there was in fact a page that used to be Starship Development History. Maybe we restore that one since there's a lot more, well, development now? XFalcon2004x (talk) 14:16, 16 December 2020 (UTC)
Ah, but there's also supposed to be those 3 VacRaptors installed eventually for when Starship makes its way up into orbit, whenever that may be. So perhaps with those extra engines added, it may indeed end up being closer to 150 than to 100. XFalcon2004x (talk) 14:23, 16 December 2020 (UTC)
Starship main photograph.
The current photo is from SpaceX's Flickr, and not allowed on Wikipedia. Similarly, most other photos I find are also under copyright. If someone could find a good photo of SN8's flight without copyright restrictions, that would be great.
Good idea. I know there are all kinds of people who took shots on Twitter, including a couple residents of Boca Chica who still do photographs and such for private companies/enterprises. Of those, the most prominent that I can remember is @BocaChicaGal on Twitter--I know that in addition to her taking a live video of the full six-minute-plus hop, she also got a load of good photos onto her Twitter. Maybe reach out to her? XFalcon2004x (talk) 14:10, 17 December 2020 (UTC)
I've uploaded my photo of the SN8 launch; it's not a great photo, but it's more representative of the final Starship design than the current SN5 image. I'll leave it to others to decide whether or not the current SN5 image should be replaced with this. SpaceX Starship SN8 launch as viewed from South Padre IslandForest Katsch (talk) 02:33, 24 December 2020 (UTC)
Thanks so much, several articles needed this. I never was able to reach out to a launch photographer for SN8, but I plan on doing so for SN9.N828335 (talk) 05:19, 24 December 2020 (UTC)
Sometimes, "Superheavy" is spelled as one word by SpaceX
FWIW, SpaceX is sometimes spelling Superheavy as a single word, unlike the earliest mentions of the name when it seemed always to be "Super Heavy". One example is here, at 14:40 in the video, on the signage at the Boca Chica launch site, where it is written on signage: "Starship Superheavy Orbital Launch Pad".
I'm not suggesting we should change the article text at this time; but SpaceX names have a way of evolving by the company, and of course emerging in the spaceflight media and vernacular usage. So, just something to be aware of and watch. Cheers. N2e (talk) 14:17, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
Exactly, it has been spelled as two separate words in most cases for the last couple of years. I just pointed out we have one instance of the other use. Changes in these things take time, and this section is just to capture instances of the other spelling if/when we see them. Def not suggesting any change, as I said. But the way names are fluid at SpaceX with Muskian naming conventions (BFR became Mars Colonial Transporter became Interplanetary Transport System became BFR became Starship/Super Heavy but is also referred to (by SpaceX) as the Starship system), it won't be surprising to this observer if, over the next couple of years, we see SpaceX simplify spelling of Super Heavy to Superheavy. Examples abound of such changes when word or concept usage increases; for example in the cryptocurrency domain, the terminology "a hash of a block of items to be timestamped ..., forming a chain" stated in a cryptography research paper in 2008, was frequently referred to as a "block chain" (two words) for the first several years as the concept got built into technology that was in actual use, but by 2015 was widely spelled blockchain, and "blockchain" is the only way you find the word used today. With it being SpaceX usage that will heavily matter, such a change could certainly come much faster in this instance. N2e (talk) 12:11, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
Starting to collect instances seen reading the news: [9], 17 Jan 2021. "... paired with the Superheavy rocket"
Reorganizing Prototypes and testing section
I recently renamed the Prototypes section Prototypes and testing and have been adding content there. I want to layout my ideas for what I'd like to do next and get feedback and suggestions before going any further.
My goal is to transition the content in this section away from anything that looks like a history of prototypes and testing processes. We would keep the link to Starship_development_history#Prototypes_and_testing to preserve that. The subsections would instead focus on descriptions and purpose of each prototype and test type.
Proposed section layout:
Prototypes and testing — SpaceX design and testing philosophy (build, test, fly, fix, test, fly...)
Pad only prototypes — description and accomplishments of MK1/MK2, SN1-5
Low-altitude prototypes — description and accomplishments of starhopper, SN5-6
High-altitude prototypes — description and accomplishments of SN8-10, Super Heavy
Orbital prototypes — currently known information about SN15+
Pad Testing — description and purpose of ambient, cryo & static fire
Suborbital flight testing — description and purpose of launch, ascent, descent, landing
Orbital flight testing — description and purpose of stable orbit, reentry orbital refueling
This is the basic outline, please let me know if you support these proposed changes. Also speak up if you are opposed to anything you see here. If you see problems with it, or see something I forgot please offer that up. For example, if you believe that Starhopper just needs its own section please speak up, I'm iffy on that and your preference would tip me in that direction. Thanks. JaredHWood💬23:19, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
Thank you for trying to fix this. I agree that the section as of now is quite confusing. I like your proposal, but since we are talking about the prototypes and the testing procedures separately, why not split the section in two? Something like "Prototypes" and "Testing procedures". --Ita140188 (talk) 10:49, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
As an editor who lived through the previous multi-week discussion in 2019 that led to the (unfortunate, in my view) merge of the article Starship (rocket) (an obviously notable rocket on its own, totally separate from the eventual two-stage launch stack that SpaceX would build a couple years in the future), with all the material on the MCT/ITS/BFR/Starship-Super Heavy stack, into a single article on the stack; while hiving the development history off into a different second article called Starship development history, I'll just offer this perspective. Starship has a very high level of interest, by both the general public and by rocket and spaceflight aficianados. We should thus expect editors to continue to frequently come to this article and endeavor to add detail of many many quite notable events in the iterative development lives of all of this related technology to this article; all of which will continue to make this article a bit of a mess. I think this article, as (now) the main article for the two-stage orbital launch vehicle, the Starship system, is definitely the wrong article for the massive detail of the prototypes and testing of Starship as you are proposing.
Starship as just the-upper-stage of the Starship system is "the" upper stage that is heading toward perhaps becoming the most notable upper stage ever built. The 50-meter Starship upper stage has 2+ yrs of history on its own, with many hundreds of media articles published about it, its (many) future uses, and its current development&testing; details are gonna proliferate. Much of that is of interest, and Wikipedia can certainly have more detail on just about anything, as long as the article is notable and verifiable. Heck, the Starship second stage is already likely the most notable second stage since the two Saturn rocket upper stages, and they both have articles on them as individual stages: S-II, and S-IVB. I just don't believe all that detail you are thinking about fits in this article, the main article on the Starship system. But that's not to say such detail, well-written and well-sourced, would not fit elsewhere in the large emerging Wikipedia. N2e (talk) 14:10, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
Thank you Ita140188 and N2e great points. After reading this I went over and took a look at the Space Shuttle article and its layout. What if we did something similar the Design and Development section over there. Here is another proposal based on that:
Design and Development
History — Move the current History section here
Design Process — SpaceX design and testing philosophy (build, test, fly, fix, test, fly...) differences from other launch providers, factory around the rocket, etc.
Development — all the prototype stuff goes in several paragraphs here
Testing — all the testing stuff goes here
With this outline, any section that gets too large could be expanded to it's own article at some point in the future. JaredHWood💬16:05, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
I feel that this sectioning is not very intuitive. For example, I would think that Development and Testing should be part of History. Maybe better have something like this:
Design and Development
Early concepts — Move the beginning of the current History section here
Design process — SpaceX design and testing philosophy (build, test, fly, fix, test, fly...) differences from other launch providers, factory around the rocket, etc.
Development — all the prototype stuff goes in several paragraphs here, together with parts of current History section
Testing — all the testing stuff goes here
But I still think that it would be best to keep the current structure and have a History section separated from the development. The History section should be a summary without all the details of the development process. --Ita140188 (talk) 02:36, 27 January 2021 (UTC)
I think that @N2e:'s recent change where he created a specific section for Starship upper stage is a very good direction to go for this article. That will easily become it's own article in the not to distant future. I am going to let this proposal rest for a while and just focus on making small changes to the Protoypes and Testing section to make it more about "Starship" and less about "all the starships". JaredHWood💬19:23, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
@N828335: I saw your revert of the flight table. No worries on my part. Take a look and see if you approve of the way I combined the testing section after your revert. JaredHWood💬00:31, 30 January 2021 (UTC)
This may not be the best place for it, but since the topic has been broached here, and because at present, the Template:Starship flights/suborbital is used in this article, I will respond to the comment. I think N828335's post about drastically reducing the amount of detail in the table template, and leaving the main detail in the Starship development history article, is a very good idea. I wholeheartedly support a reduction of the info overloading that has developed in that table.
Moreover, it is possible that with a major reduction of detail in that template, then the table of prototype test flights might continue to fit, and therefore be included, in this article. But that may be a whole separate discussion, so I'll not cloud this discussion section further at this point. N2e (talk) 21:31, 30 January 2021 (UTC)
Great stuff. Thanks for all your feedback and suggestions for the Prototypes and testing section. The result has been better than what I originally proposed. I'll keep whittling away at writing intro sentences in that section. Thanks for the collab! JaredHWood💬03:18, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
SN8 & Safety
Originally brought this up on the SpaceX talk page. Earlier we didn't have much information, only that some FAA launch licensee "violation" occurred. Per the The verge. But now it looks like SpaceX intentionally did it. Per NASASpaceflight/Micheal Baylor they didn't get a waiver & but still launched. Seems they intentionally violated "public safety". Whether or not this should be included in the controversy section or not - or just the SN8 section I'm not sure.
I don't think its worth noting FAA-SN9's issues tho. OkayKenji(talk • contribs)14:37, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
@OkayKenji: My recommendation would be to add this content to Starship development history. This is important information about Starship development and testing, but it is new and emerging information. I think adding it there to document it as part of Starship history would be good. Then if it continues to be a notable issue, like if a long term suspension occurs or if Starship is associated with notable FAA policy changes it could be added here. JaredHWood💬15:22, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
The new infobox image shows Starship itself more closely but it's pretty low quality. I prefer the previous image with the plume. @LeVanTuan1998: Assuming you took the photo yourself, do you have a full-resolution version that might be reworked into a more useable image? nagualdesign03:22, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
@Nagualdesign: Nope, they took the image straight from NASA spaceflight's recent video, [10]. I have already reverted their edits and flagged their photo for deletion on the commons. Not to mention the same user had previously uploaded over 20 other photos with copyvios: commons:User talk:LeVanTuan1998.
@N828335: Could you also mark File:Falcon 9 Demo-2 Launching 6 (3).jpg for deletion. I'm not an administrator or reviewer on Commons but I have reviewed the license on Flickr and it's CC-BY-NC-ND-2.0, which is not allowed on Commons. I'm surprised that they haven't been banned already. Smacks of wilful ignorance to me. nagualdesign05:05, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
Not sure about the specifics in this case, but photos by NASA are generally OK. Also note there is a "nominate for deletion" button on the sidebar in commons, anyone can do it. N828335 (talk) 05:24, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
SN9 Failure
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
In multiple discord servers and websites, they say that SN9 was a failure since the main goal was to land it, but it exploded. I think the page should say Failure.
That was not a failure. The main goal was to gather data, not to just land. The same is with SN8, SN9, and SN10. Literally, SN10 did the mission objectives, so it should be a success even though it RUDed 8 minutes later. — Preceding unsigned comment added by LeviathanOwO (talk • contribs) 21:49, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Primary sources tag
I am working on consolidating and replacing primary sources so the template tag can be removed from the page. I will try to replace every Elon Musk twitter quote with a reliable secondary source. Question: Is referencing the official SpaceX Starship page acceptable use of a primary source if it is only used for vehicle specifications such as length, diameter, capacity, etc? JHelzer💬04:12, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
@JHelzer: That should be OK. Per WP:Primary, the thing to avoid is mainly the interpretation of primary sources. "A primary source may be used on Wikipedia only to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the primary source but without further, specialized knowledge." In my opinion, this definitely includes direct vehicle characteristics. I would also argue (although not by a wiki policy) that a primary source for these details would be the best option. Thank you for your work fixing the other, more problematic cases. N828335 (talk) 05:03, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
I thought I was careful to remove only twitter sources that were duplicates of the information found on the official SpaceX starship page. I will have to double-check the history when I have time to do another source session here. If I have removed a source that contained unique information, I am sorry. That would have been unintentional. JHelzer💬21:38, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
@JHelzer: The source you cited would be fully expected to have that information, but, unfortunately, it never has. It has lots and lots of other technical information, but not that tidbit. It's not surprising that you missed it. — Greg the Guru 2600:8801:8002:4700:A110:8E27:5AFE:9AE4 (talk) 11:02, 18 March 2021 (UTC)
Thanks Greg, for your understanding and assumption of good faith. I am planning to continue working on primary sources to justify the removal of the tag at the top of the article. I'll be watchful as I go. JHelzer💬17:53, 18 March 2021 (UTC)
SN10 had landing leg failures. It touched down at 10m/s which is too fast. The engine was commanded to increase power and was unable to comply. Numerous fixes are being put into place for SN11. Stated simply; it landed, but it landed too hard. All of this describes a partial success. JHelzer💬15:09, 19 March 2021 (UTC)
It dose not matter what I or you would call it. Wikipedia discurages original research. We should look for third party references and see what it is called there. Gial Ackbar (talk) 13:46, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
The dry mass of both stages both source a page with lots of information about the stages, but not the dry mass.
The dry mass of the second stage is available from a number of sources, but the root of all of them is a presentation given by Elon Musk on 29 September 2019 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UUtNR6BhjE) when the weight of the orbiter went from 85t to 200t. Musk stated that his goal was to iterate his way to a dry mass of 120t or less. (For what it's worth, I think he will make it, but it's still a goal.) The gross mass of the second stage is the sum of three integers (dry mass, propellant mass, and payload), so if the three source numbers are OK, then this ought to be OK as well.
The dry mass of first stage booster has never been authoritatively stated since that date. I've hunted and hunted, since I calculate profiles based on the weight of stages, and I can't find anything. All of the values since then have been calculated, and my question here is if the logic described below counts as original research.
The initial calculation was based on this tweet from 26 September 2019: "Mk1 ship is around 200 tons dry and 1400 tons wet, but aiming for 120 by Mk4 or Mk5. Total stack mass with max payload is 5000 tons." If you assume 5000 tons is exact, you can subtract out the first stage propellant (3300t), the second stage dry mass (120t), the second stage propellant (1200t), and the maximum payload (100t) and get 280t. If you assumed that the maximum payload was still the goal weight from before of 150t, you get 230t, and this was the value in the page for a while.
Almost six months later, Musk tweated this on 16 March 2020: "Slight booster length increase to 70 m, so 120 m for whole system. Liftoff mass ~5000 mT." You can look up the mass per volume of the propellants, so this stretch of 2m is around 100t. When recalculated as above, this yields 130t, and there's a comment in the page that this is too low, so Musk must have been using a payload of 100t, and therefore the value must be 180t. This is the value in the page now.
Note that both calculations assume that the 5000t is exact and not rounded. Instead, I believe the number is rounded, since "five thousand tonnes" is so much better in a sound bite. If it's not exact, then none of the numbers above can be accurate, and the best you can do is give a range. Two years ago, long before the weights increased, I was using 180t as the value. The number is in my notes, but I didn't write down where I got it. Thus, I believe 180t is likely to be significantly low, and the most likely range is 230t to 280t.
If the above counts as original research, both the dry weight and the gross weight of the first stage should be removed (or commented out?). If it isn't original research, is the range I suggest above reasonable? — Greg the Guru 2600:8801:8002:4700:3C00:94CD:C328:6F43 (talk) 11:15, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
Greg, I do remember removing the source for the tweet about Mk1 statistics. My thinking is that Mk1 is not a good representation of the current prototypes or the final Starship specs. I was also thinking that information posted on the SpaceX Starship website would be better maintained and more reliable than an aging tweet. I also replaced older sources that predicted future performance in favor of more current sources that recounted the event after it occurred. You suggest that the calculations above may constitute original research and I believe they do. I love following Starship progress, but at the current stage of development, I think it is too early to post predictions of what the mass specification of Starship will be. I assume they are currently changing from prototype to prototype. JHelzer💬22:11, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
5000 looks too much like a rounded number to end up with that precision. It could easily be 4900 or 5100 and the other numbers have the same problem. In addition the design is still not completely fixed yet so numbers are likely to change - mixing numbers from different times isn't going to work. WP:CALC allows uncontroversial calculations but this isn't covered. --mfb (talk) 04:28, 18 March 2021 (UTC)
@JHelzer:@Mfb: I am inclined to think the Mk1 number is OK, as Musk has continued to use it in off-the-cuff tweets. I marked it as a goal to reflect what he said at the time. (And based on the one weighing that they accidentally leaked, the weight is on track to meet the goal.) I commented out the dry and gross mass for the booster, and left a comment about what to do when a valid source is added. — Greg the Guru 2600:8801:8002:4700:A110:8E27:5AFE:9AE4 (talk) 11:34, 18 March 2021 (UTC)
I've removed an authoritative statement of the 3680 tonnes gross mass for the first stage, as (a) it's incorrect since it was calculated as 5000t - 1200t propellant - 120t second stage dry mass, ignoring payload and (b) we can't give a figure with that much accuracy using this method anyway. Denvercoder9 (talk) 12:32, 20 April 2021 (UTC)
A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:
I came to this article trying to find some details about HLS. This article has a short paragraph, and links to Artemis program § Human Landing System, which has a short paragraph and links back here. Ideally (imo), HLS would have enough information to merit its own article. But a substantial section in either existing article would be fine too. (Either way, I don't know enough about it to write that article or section without an inordinate amount of work.) --Dan Wylie-Sears 2 (talk) 14:19, 20 April 2021 (UTC)
User:Gfox88 made a number of changes in a recent edit from "crewed" to "manned". Unfortunately, intervening edits by others are preventing a simple undo. Gfox88, please change these back as they were, as we use modern English language in Wikipedia, not the language of 1950s-1970s English. N2e (talk) 00:43, 29 April 2021 (UTC)
The one reference they changed used "crewed". I fixed that. It's not just against the MOS, it's inventing a fake title which is worse. I found the same pattern in several other articles and reverted them, too. --mfb (talk) 03:02, 29 April 2021 (UTC)
This was my bad. I have a browser extension that changes that wording because it personally annoys me, but I didn't intend to change it for everyone else in the edits. I wasn't aware that this was happening until now, so I am disabling that extension when I edit now. Gfox88 (talk) 15:10, 29 April 2021 (UTC)
Article-level "Primary sources" tag
In March 2021, some editor added a {{Primary sources|date=March 2021}} tag to the top of the article. The problem is that this was an article-level cleanup tag, so it is challenging to try to find what the editor thought needed cleaned up.
Wikipedia allows the use of WP:PRIMARY sources, but only with limitations. Near as I can tell, this article does not have a problem with misuse of primary sources. The vast majority of sources used are WP:SECONDARY sources. But without the editor clearly identifying where they believe the problem to be, we can't really discuss it, nor fix it.
I would propose that editors who have problems with particular uses of primary sources identify them with the {{primary source inline}} cleanup tag, rather than slapping a general article-level tag. This would, helpfully, leave a [non-primary source needed] tag near the specific source that an editor feels is unwaranted. Unless someone can identify a more general problem in the article, and build a consensus here on this Talk page for keeping the article tag, I'll plan to remove the article-level tag in a week or so. N2e (talk) 20:45, 1 May 2021 (UTC)
It's in development so naturally there are statements like "SpaceX said X" with a primary source. I support the removal of the article-wide tag. More specific tags can be added as needed. --mfb (talk) 01:49, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
Removed the tag, per consensus. No one put up any argument to the contrary in a full week for discussion. Cheers. N2e (talk) 17:37, 8 May 2021 (UTC)
Oops I missed this discussion, sorry. I added the tag because there are many statements that are referenced to self-published or primary sources in a way that is not allowed on Wikipedia. For example, the thrust figure in the infobox cannot be referenced to a tweet. There is also a lot of primary+OR combo statements that are problematic in my opinion, such as the mass figures in the infobox --Ita140188 (talk) 07:45, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
I agree this will be needed at some point, just as the Space Shuttle had articles referring specifically to the separate components. N828335 (talk) 13:40, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
Citizen journalism of Starship
It might be a good idea to add a section for Starship's following of various live streamers and social media people such as Everyday Astronaut, NASASpaceflight, etc. at Boca Chica, which as far as I know is the first time such hobbyists are independently covering the development of a vehicle and providing the world with ample footage and commentary, often for hours on end before an unscheduled launch.[1]Pencatpigpus (talk) 17:10, 13 May 2021 (UTC)
Agree on both points N828335, but between the two, if we wanted to write a passage citing primarily [11] (I'd imagine), it should go on the dev history page instead of this one. Leijurv (talk) 05:41, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
After days without any discussion, the consensus is clear — the pages should not be split.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Concerning the tag above the page, the discussion on separating the section on Super Heavy (link), and the large page size, I propose that the section "Starship upper stage" be split into a new article titled SpaceX Starship (Second Stage), and the section "Super Heavy booster" be split into SpaceX Super Heavy or Super Heavy (Booster) or something similar. Splitting the rocket into multiple stages has been seen for other launch vehicles, for example, the Saturn V. That way, this article can focus on talking about Starship as a whole instead of Starship, Super Heavy, and the system as a whole. -- LemonSlushie 🍋 (talk) (edits) 20:35, 13 May 2021 (UTC)
As of : Currently, consensus is to not split the sections, as there is an issue with repetition and over-written sections. As a result, I propose the following changes to my original proposal.
Wait to split Super Heavy until there is more information on it.
To make things clear, only the sections would be split. That way, the current article (SpaceX Starship) would be the article on the system as a whole, and the other pages would talk about the stages separately.
Before any splitting can be done, the issue with repetition must be addressed & fixed.
Support – I support the split, as well as an overall article about the combined system's capabilities, and a proposal to split out HLS that I saw somewhere above. Personally, Starship would've been far easier to understand in at least three articles. Nelsonblaha (talk) 00:28, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
Oppose
Strong oppose, this would create the impression that Starship and Super Heavy are two different systems when they are clearly two components of the same launch vehicle.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Osunpokeh (talk • contribs)
Oppose for now. Almost the entire article is about the combined system, with a few short paragraphs about the booster. I could see an article about the combined system, plus an article about starship, but I don't think that a solo article just about superheavy would make sense. In order to make this page shorter, I think it would make much more sense to do things like: Heavily shorten the "prototypes and testing" section (e.g. starhopper) moving it to development history page. Also why are there two different sections, one called "prototypes and testing" and the other being "prototypes testing"? They have virtually the same content. Leijurv (talk) 05:47, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
Oppose for much the same reasons as Leijurv, and I'd suggest there's too much detail in this page for an encyclopedia entry. We don't need multiple paragraphs for the Starhopper testing campaign, for instance. There's also a high-level issue with repetition; for instance, Prototypes testing and Prototypes and testing. I think those issues should be addressed before we entertain a page split, especially one that would (if I understand it correctly) would leave us without an article on the Starship system as a whole. Polymath03 (talk) 06:29, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
@StarshipSLS: Yes, that is what I'm proposing as well. The sections would still be there, but go in less detail then their assoiated main articles. Sorry if that wasn't clear in the main proposal. -- LemonSlushie 🍋 (talk) (edits) 19:05, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
Oppose for now. Agree with Polymath03, the article should be significantly summarized and reorganized, removing excessive details. After that we can see how much actual encyclopedic information is left and if a split is needed. --Ita140188 (talk) 09:21, 16 May 2021 (UTC)
Comment
Comment Some of the existing sections could be shortened. Move more of the history and the prototype status to the development history article (if it's not there already), shorten the HLS section as it has its own article now. Certainly the SN15 flight is relevant for Starship, but not relevant enough to be discussed in the lead, in the history section, and again in the prototype section (together with the discussion in the development history article). That would fix the length of the article. There is still not that much on SH apart from the prototype testing which is covered in the development history article. --mfb (talk) 01:11, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Deduplication discussion
User:LemonSlushie is right that substantial portions of the article are duplicated and this needs to be fixed. That being said, the most egregious example of this is the "prototypes testing" section under "History" and the "prototypes and testing" section under "Starship upper stage".
One way to potentially fix this is to:
1. Drastically cut down the History section, e.g. remove all level 3 headings and only record significant milestones such as Starhopper, SN8, SN15, and the orbital flight test.
2. Leave more nuanced details to the "Starship upper stage" section, or omit them entirely (Starship development history exists for a reason).
Strong support for your proposed fix. As you said, the dev history article is there for a reason. Even then, I think the existing dev history is much too detailed -- a layperson viewing it would quickly get lost in minutia. Polymath03 (talk) 23:40, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
Understandable, but I'd ask: as SpaceX keeps pumping out Starships, where do we draw the line for inclusion in this article? Heck, even dev history would get full before too long. Polymath03 (talk) 23:46, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
Check the state the article is in right now — does this work, with single-sentence-ish descriptions for each of the high-altitude flights in the History section? osunpokeh (talk) 07:16, 16 May 2021 (UTC)
Agreed (with osunpokeh and others) that there has gotten to be way too much detail on individual Starship prototypes in this article, and also agree with Polymath03 that there is probably too much arcane detail in that Starship development history article (but that is probably a topic for the other Talk page).
Having said that, it seems like major shifts of the design approach, locations of builds (Florida/Texas), etc. for this program is probably something worthy of inclusion in a high-level summary of the history of the design and build of this notable new vehicle. For example, the shift from a year or two where the design was a carbon fiber based launch vehicle structure to where it switched to stainless steel is probably worthy of a mention here. Other examples could be given. So I think all the detail about individual test articles can be removed/left out/lightened up in this SpaceX Starship article on the entire system, the 2-stage-to-orbit launch vehicle. So its just a question of what gets cut and how we edit that summary info. N2e (talk) 09:11, 16 May 2021 (UTC)
Support: since there is a main article on development history, we can keep just a short summary section here. Also agree with other suggestions to significantly trim non-encyclopedic details. --Ita140188 (talk) 09:25, 16 May 2021 (UTC)
The answer is no, soft splashdowns may be attempted for first OFT. It seems unlikely that will ever happen, else why do they need converted oil rig platforms? Also per [12] "Of note, SpaceX also has not plans to recover the first space-proven Starship, instead (nominally) performing a soft-landing in the Pacific Ocean if the prototype makes it through its inaugural spaceflight without issue. If that “Orbital Test Flight” is a perfect success, SpaceX will likely have enough confidence – and regulators enough data – to proceed to the first attempt to recover an orbital Starship on land.". As to whether this detail is needed in this article, I would suggest it would be more appropriate in either SpaceX Starship development history but that seems to deal with what has happened not future test or List of Starship flights which does has a brief section which already mentions a soft ocean landing. C-randles (talk) 13:50, 27 May 2021 (UTC)
Removal of text from criticism section
I've just removed a large amount of text from the Criticism section of this article. It was about radiation risks, and seemed to give undue weight to issues which have either been resolved or which pre-date Starship and are not clearly relevant to Starship.
Specifically, the text I removed contained:
A statement by Eugene Parker from 2006, about the needed shielding for a spacecraft taking people to Mars. This appears to be a statement about what level of shielding would be required to reduce the dose to Earth-normal levels, not the shielding required to keep the risk of cancer later in live down to the few percent level Mr. Musk considers acceptable. And since Starship didn't even exist as a concept in 2006, Dr. Parker was clearly criticizing the idea of sending humans to Mars in general, not criticizing Starship in particular.
Additional text involved a (false) claim by Mr. Musk that shielding from solar particle events would only be required in the direction of the Sun, on all around a "storm shelter". And a refutation, and a retraction of his earlier statement by Mr. Musk, and a statement by him that a "storm shelter" would require more than just directional coverage. I think that means this issue is no longer relevant.
Imbedded in that text were objections to a promo image of Starship landing astronauts on Jupiter's moon, Europa. That was, as noted in the text, absurd given the radiation environment of Europa. But I think that is irrelevant, since it was just a one-shot throw-away image. And human landings on Europa are not something has any announced plans for. Mr. Musk simply said, as one or two sentences and one figure in a presentation, that it might be possible. So I don't think that's relevant. Includes in this, in the text I removed was a somewhat abusive quote by Phil Mason, basically saying that this proves Mr. Musk doesn't know what he's talking about. Since Phil Mason is a blogger who focuses on refuting pseudo science and a chemist by profession, it was not clear to me why his opinions on a subject he is unfamiliar with should be given any weight.
Finally, there was an objection to the fact that SpaceX has not yet unveiled any interior designs showing a "storm shelter". That's not constructive, since SpaceX hasn't unveiled any interior designs of Starship at all. If SpaceX had released interior designs which did not include a "storm shelter", I could see the point. In the absence of such information, there is no evidence that the design lacks such a feature.
If anyone objects to the edits I've described, I'd prefer to talk about it on this talk page, rather than editing and reediting the article itself. Fcrary (talk) 01:45, 26 May 2021 (UTC)
That's not correct. In 2017, Starship did not exist. It was a substantially different vehicle called "BFR". SpaceX has made major changes to the vehicle since then, as well as changing its name. And the the youtube video you linked does not show interior diagrams of the BFR. It shows an extremely vague, and external layout for a generic payload section. I will stick with my previous statement: SpaceX has not said anything about the detailed layout of their current plans for an operational Starship. Since SpaceX is fond of changing their designs, I think we have no evidence that a Starship going to Mars will not have a storm shelter. Fcrary (talk) 04:08, 19 July 2021 (UTC)
The diameter changed, the material changed, the aerodynamic surfaces changed, the payload capacity changed multiple times. The only things that stayed the same are rapid reusability as goal, the general use cases of the rocket, and the use of Raptor. An interior design from 2017 is irrelevant today. Please add a signature to talk page comments so it's clear who wrote what when. --mfb (talk) 16:25, 25 July 2021 (UTC)
Added signature for that paragraph with "{{subst:unsigned2|08:18, 25 July 2021|1.145.40.133}}". It's a rare case where modifying text added by someone else is allowed. Tarl N. (discuss) 17:40, 25 July 2021 (UTC)
That's bullshit. You either have a working shield or you don't. Simply saying you have a solar storm shelter without telling us what said shelter is doesn't address the problem nor does it make the problem go away. For comparison sake, the cancelled Apollo Mars-Venus flyby mission proposed for the 1970s is considered a death trap today because it had was essentially Skylab with nothing to shield the astronauts against the massive solar flares it would have encountered.
For example: "An even more important reason why the Manned Venus Flyby would have been a bad idea (even if Congress had been inclined to fund it—which it was not) is that the interplanetary environment was more challenging than folks in the ‘70s understood. The Apollo-moon-mission-era solution to spacecraft radiation shielding was to hope very, very hard that no major solar storm would occur on the way to and from the Moon. As it turned out, this worked—which is good because a major storm would have definitely killed the Apollo astronauts. Hoping for good space weather would have been a no-go for a four-hundred- day mission, so a Manned Venus Flyby would have required a radiation shelter, yay. What the proposers could not have known, however, is that their mission would have run into a coronal mass ejection in July 1974, one major enough to overwhelm any currently implementable shelter. This would have been fatal for the astronauts."[1] [Emphasis added]
You read Parker's paper, he clearly states that five meters of water is needed to protect against solar and cosmic radiation on a flight to Mars. Does Starship have such protection or not? Simply saying you have a "solar storm shelter" does not address the criticism unless you provide a detailed explanation and design of what this shelter is made of. Is it a 5m shield? A 1m shield? 10cm?
The Verge has an article that hammers home this criticism: "SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has now given four presentations about his company’s Starship rocket, but all of those updates mostly focused on the vehicle’s external stats. Musk has barely touched on the technologies needed to keep people alive and healthy while on Starship — technologies that need to be developed relatively soon if the spacecraft has any hope of carrying people to deep-space destinations like the Moon and Mars in the near future.
[...]
But if SpaceX wants to put people on Starship for an extended period of time, things become much more complicated. Life support systems add weight and complexity to the vehicle. Astronauts need places to exercise and sleep, air to breathe, and water to drink. And if Starship is supposed to start a lunar base, which Musk has proposed numerous times, then the higher radiation environment on the Moon will require advanced forms of shielding.
[...]
In reality, some kind of radiation shielding will be needed, and Starship’s stainless steel exterior may not be enough to protect astronauts for a long time on the surface. Experts have proposed lining long-term lunar habitats with water or ice to slow down these particles, but there are some elements within cosmic rays — known as heavy ions — that might be able to pierce through even that."[2] [Emphasis added] — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:8004:5100:2540:e41a:b1c5:1a34:43bf (talk • contribs) 16:00, July 26, 2021 (UTC)
SpaceX is currently working on getting the uncrewed Starship version ready. Even that one did not have any space flights yet. And they clearly stated that they will only launch humans on starship once the uncrewed version has proven reliable in many flights. And even then, missions to low earth orbit and then the moon will be first. Starship can and will probabaply still undergo several desing changes before the first interplanetary launch. That gives them enough time to impelement a solar storm shelter until then. Asking for exact desings of the shelter now is like asking for the exact desings of the airbag of a new car befor even the full desing of the car has been finalized. Gial Ackbar (talk) 16:51, 26 July 2021 (UTC)
The current Starship vehicle is a prototype. Nothing about the interior has any resemblance to what the interplanetary version will be like, except for the volume. As well as lacking a storm shelter, it does not have any life support systems, which is even more critical for passengers. But that doesn't seem to be a source of criticism. It also doesn't have any solar panels, which are also critical for an interplanetary trip. I think there is a common misconception, that SpaceX is taking the NASA-style approach of developing and building the final design before testing. That's not how they do things. They have a design with is constantly evolving as they go. It would be a mistake for the article to imply the current prototypes are the final design, so we shouldn't include criticism based on the irrelevant fact that the current prototype lacks features the eventual, interplanetary version will need.
As far as Dr. Parker's paper is concerned, five meters of shielding is what it takes to get the radiation dose down to that at Earth at sea level. SpaceX isn't planning to do that. NASA, in their reference mission concepts for human Mars missions, isn't planning on doing that either. They're planning to keep the dose from a trip to Mars below NASA career limits for astronauts. That requires far less shielding. It involves a shelter for radiation from the occasional flare, and accepting the dose from cosmic rays (rather than trying to stop them and the secondary particles generated by stopping them.) Fcrary (talk) 18:32, 26 July 2021 (UTC)
Since Starship is still very much in the prototype stage and has a long way to go before carrying crew, I think the criticism section should focus on criticism of the development process for now - like questions over the environmental impact their "hardware rich" development process may have to the surrounding environment. It's difficult to offer an in-depth criticism of SpaceX's recitation shielding when such a thing hasn't even been developed yet, or even talked about by SpaceX outside of some vague Q&A answers by Elon (the same Q&A which offered some rather "aspirational" dates to when they plan to reach orbit which have already passed). I think once they release some more in-depth plans for the crew compartment and how they plan to deal with the radiation problem, then it makes sense to talk about that aspect. Otherwise it's just speculation over a couple of Q&A answers made in 2019.
Also, it's worth noting that these answers were made prior to SpaceX winning the HLS award. Or the HLS program even being a thing really. Whatever plans they have for the interior will now have to be something that meet NASA's requirements, so statements made a few years ago about that area of development are probably well obsolete by now, much like the ITS and carbon-fiber BFR designs are. 82.15.131.45 (talk) 19:23, 8 August 2021 (UTC)
The infobox currently lists a payload to the Moon of "100 t (220,000 lb) (HLS without refueling)
200 t (440,000 lb) (HLS with refueling)". This makes no sense; the infobox also lists 21 t to GTO without refueling, and the payload to the lunar surface without refueling has got to be less. It isn't even clear if Starship can get from low Earth orbit to the Moon without refueling. Fcrary (talk) 18:33, 26 May 2021 (UTC)
Pay load to GTO is reusable launch (Starship will return and will have heatshield) but Starship lunar lander won't return to earth, that's why it doesn't have heatshield, It's also the reason why it's 100t (without refuelling) and additional 100t if refuelled in orbit. Chandraprakash (talk) 21:52, 6 June 2021 (UTC)
This should be sufficient enough to clarify all doubts. Also attached website to SpaceX, where you can see this in Page 5.
I had also changed the GTO payload capacities accordingly.
Starship, Starship system, and other nomenclature issues
The article refers to the "Starship system" as the entire 2-stage-to-orbit launch vehicle, which it kind of has to since SpaceX uses "Starship" to refer to just the second-stage/spaceship, but also, sometimes, as the entire 2-stage stack. "Starship system" is also a term SpaceX has used, as shown in citations in the article, for the entire 2-stage stack.
There is a Wikipedia category for Category:SpaceX Starship, which is a subcategory of Category:SpaceX spacecraft. This makes total sense if it means just the second stage Starship, which is after all also a spaceship. But the cat Category:SpaceX Starship seems to have a number of articles in it that are related to the entire launch vehicle stack, to the Starship system, and of course the entire system is not a spacecraft. Wondering if anyone has good ideas on how to improve it for the global reader of the Wikipedia, to enhance understanding. Should we editors on Wikipedia consistently refer to the second stage/ship as "Starship" and the 2-stage stack as "Starship system"? What other ideas are there? N2e (talk) 17:23, 5 June 2021 (UTC)
The problem isn't solvable until SpaceX comes up with a consistent nomenclature. For them, Starship refers to both the orbiter AND the launch system. Tarl N. (discuss) 20:44, 5 June 2021 (UTC)
Done It has been over a week, and per consensus of the three editors who commented, there does not seem to be a reason to mention the Space Shuttle in the section of this article where it was recently added as a parenthetical comment. Nor was a source provided for the assertion. So I have removed the recently added prose. N2e (talk) 03:22, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
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