Space X

Jurgis · December 23, 2015

One thing everyone who's a proponent of space elevators seems to miss is this. They require an extraordinary amount of engineering and materials science to construct on Earth. If we're to the point where constructing one is a possibility, why not just build it on the moon where construction and design requirements would be orders of magnitude easier and then just use lunar resources for construction.

Because we need to get out from Earth to space, not from Moon to space? ;)

Of course, if you have everything you need out of the gravity well, then you don't need space elevator. You don't need it on Moon either although it's possible/cheaper to build it there. Likely capturing/using asteroids for materials is cheaper than getting them even from Moon's gravity well.

TwoCitiesCapital · December 23, 2015

Ultimately space elevator is the way to go.

Probably won't happen for another 20 years or so. Possibly longer.

Space elevators are probably a non-starter, neat idea though. You'd have "anchor" it in geosynchronous orbit (22,000 miles) while low earth orbit is quite a bit closer for example the ISS is at about 250 miles. You can't exactly ride the elevator up to the LEO floor and hop off either since you need horizontal speed to stay in orbit.

If I were forced to bet on our next path to orbit after chemical rockets it would be a very long coil "gun" up the side of a mountain at the equator. Chemical rockets will probably still be our only ticket off this rock for the next couple decades though which is why getting their cost down is such a monumental achievement.

With current technology you are correct a space elevator is not possible. I think you will see one in your lifetime however. The rail gun method will only work for cargo, never for humans. The acceleration would kill you.

A coil gun is a series of railgun, each providing acceleration which could be scaled to achieve the necessary velocity over a long track theoretically making the acceleration survivable for cargo and humans.

One thing everyone who's a proponent of space elevators seems to miss is this. They require an extraordinary amount of engineering and materials science to construct on Earth. If we're to the point where constructing one is a possibility, why not just build it on the moon where construction and design requirements would be orders of magnitude easier and then just use lunar resources for construction.

Wouldn't the problem with any of these "static" location ideas be the non-static nature of orbits? Maybe an elevator to space would still be energy efficient even if it points you in the wrong direction and you have to traverse half the circumference of the globe to head the right direction, but I really have no idea on such things. Just seems strange to have a static elevator shaft always pointing in a single direction when the direction that goods/people would need to be heading always changes with the orbit and rotation of the earth.

adesigar · December 23, 2015

I don't know what club he thinks he belongs to, but SpaceX doesn't have a club, it stands alone.

Maybe the ego club?

The launch and landing was incredible. I watched most of it live, then watched it again with my sons this morning. My oldest loves space and to see this stuff happening monthly is incredible. My wife commented that there was no progress for so long, and now suddenly it's going crazy. This is how it should be. I'm excited to see where we are a few years out at this pace.

I agree, it is certainly exciting to think about where we will be in a few years. But that also causes some consternation/melancholy for me. Some of the greatest advancements in science came from our government's investment in the space program, and because this was funded with taxpayer money, these advancements were generally shared with everyone such that society benefited. Now we spend so much money on entitlement spending that we can barely scratch together money for our space program, and thus we rely on commercial enterprises to do the work. This is a poor reflection on us as a society, that we over-invest in our past at the expense of our future and our children... Wouldn't it be something if we could invest in our future, and give society (especially our children) something to aspire to (i.e. in the same way that Kennedy challenged the United States to reach the moon within a decade)?

I have the exact opposite reaction. I think it is wonderful to see a private company, sending a private rocket, loaded with private satellites into orbit. And the only thing that would make it better is if it was done from a private spaceport and had private astronauts going to a private space station or even better a private settlement on Mars the moon or an asteroid. The government needed to drain an enormous amount of money from the private sector (the only way government gets money is either taxing the private sector or printing more which is just a tax on savings) to get into space and to the moon. How much quicker would private industry have been able to do it if $Trillions haven't been sucked out of the economy over the years fighting wars, drugs, poverty (ironically), and subsidizing everything under the sun. We will never be a space fairing society if the final frontier is left to government bureaucracies (with no incentives to succeed or not waste time and resources) funded by stolen money. Watching that rocket touch down last night gave me the chills, it is finally happening. The first important step to opening up space to humanity.

I would have not responded to you comment, except that you stated that taxpayer money is stolen. Your political biases are very apparent from your post, and thus I now I feel the need to point out a few basic facts:
1. If you look back at history, government has generally been responsible for opening up frontiers using taxpayer money. The Wright Brothers would never have been successful without that initial contract from the US Army Signal Corp. The United States would have struggled to settle the Western Frontier if not for the taxpayer-funded Lewis and Clark expedition to map the territory, the taxpayer-funded army outposts in the West, the Transcontinental railroad, etc.
2. We would not be in space in the first place if it wasn't for the government. Don't forget that the entire reason SpaceX is able to fund this adventure is with taxpayer money that is funding future resupply of the International Space Station. Remind me, did private companies fund Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, the shuttle, the ISS or SpaceLab, or did the taxpayer? Most of these commercial companies (with the exception of Virgin) are innovating precisely because they are competing for government contracts.)
3. If you compare the amount of money spent on the space program to the scientific advances directly attributed to the space program, the ROIC is substantially positive. However, government is generally not allowed to patent taxpayer-funded scientific advances, so the private sector takes them and exploits them. If you look at the American aviation industry over the last 50 years, the primary reason we have been competitive is because private companies were able to exploit taxpayer-funded R&D in hard science and avionics (funded by DoD, NASA, NOAA, etc). If you look at the renaissance in biotech that is occurring right now, a big reason that is happening is because many of these companies are exploiting taxpayer-funded R&D that was conducted to answer basic fundamental questions. The entire reason this taxpayer money was spent on R&D @ NIH and HHS is because commercial enterprises were unwilling to do this science in the first place.

Just like space, and just like the moon, the Martian frontier will also be opened up by the government, using taxpayer money, because commercial firms will be unable to show a positive ROIC. But don't worry, commercial firms will come along for the ride, because they will benefit financially from the government contracts.

Just to clear up a few things.

1) What was done with the money afterwards has no bearing on whether or not it was stolen. If I put a gun to your head and steal your money, and then proceed to do something wonderful with it, it doesn't mean that the money wasn't stolen. When you take money from someone against their will that is theft. Always.

2) If I steal your money and do something that has never been done before, that doesn't mean that only I could have done it. It probably means that the private economy wasn't ready to spend its money on that yet. Money is always put to its most useful current purpose. What you don't see in all of your above scenarios is what didn't happen with all of the money spent by government on those things and what all of the people involved didn't spend their time doing. If that was the absolute best use of those resources then the private economy would have produced the same results, if that wasn't the best use of those resources then the world was a poorer place for those events occurring, not a richer one.

3) I don't want to go to Mars until it is profitable for the human race to do so. The best way to make sure that is the case is to keep the government out of it.

Go back thousands of years in the history of civilization Indian/Chinese/Egyptian/Roman anywhere you go it has been the Kings/Pharaohs/Government who have built the infrastructure and pushed the development of technology. They have done it through taxes. You are deluded if you think that private enterprise would have achieved anything without government infrastructure and help. The private economy doesn't put money to the best use. It puts money to the most greedy and selfish use. Private enterprise cant see beyond their current lifetime (if that long). Elon Musk is just ok. Hes a businessman and leader but theres nothing special about what he is working on. Hes just retooling/refining/improving technologies that already exist, similar to what Steve Jobs did at Apple. Hes not doing anything innovative. The innovation and research takes place at NASA. In a few decades the "private economy" will takes the successful research of NASA and speak about how they can do it better.

Now if Elon Musk was working on something like the IXS Enterprise id say he was doing something innovative. No private money will be put for this until the science is confirmed and the technology is developed because till that happens there is no money. Then the greedy "private economy" will take over.

http://100yss.org/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IXS_Enterprise

http://techland.time.com/2012/09/19/nasa-actually-working-on-faster-than-light-warp-drive/

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2655105/Engage-warp-drive-Nasa-reveals-latest-designs-Star-Trek-style-spacecraft-make-interstellar-travel-reality.html

augustabound · December 23, 2015

Brings me back to another question. Where is Lockheed, Boeing and all the rest of them?

Boeing is supplying a crew vehicle to NASA for missions to the ISS.

http://www.boeing.com/space/crew-space-transportation-100-vehicle/index.page

And Lockheed is supplying the vehicle for NASA to go to Mars.

http://www.lockheedmartin.com/us/ssc/orion-eft1.html

Pelagic · December 23, 2015

Wouldn't the problem with any of these "static" location ideas be the non-static nature of orbits? Maybe an elevator to space would still be energy efficient even if it points you in the wrong direction and you have to traverse half the circumference of the globe to head the right direction, but I really have no idea on such things. Just seems strange to have a static elevator shaft always pointing in a single direction when the direction that goods/people would need to be heading always changes with the orbit and rotation of the earth.

The theoretical elevator would get you to geosynchronous orbit, 22,000 miles which would be anchored over a point on Earth, from there going anywhere in the universe is a lot easier than if you're starting on Earth. As a general rule of thumb, about 90% of a rocket's weight is fuel used to escape Earth's gravity. If you can skip this step with a space elevator, coil launch track, high altitude balloon platform or some other method, you can put a lot more stuff into space and use the fuel to start them in the right direction rather than use 90% of your fuel to just get off Earth. Maneuvering in space requires significantly less fuel than fighting gravity and to a smaller extent, Earth's atmosphere.

rkbabang · December 23, 2015

I don't know what club he thinks he belongs to, but SpaceX doesn't have a club, it stands alone.

Maybe the ego club?

The launch and landing was incredible. I watched most of it live, then watched it again with my sons this morning. My oldest loves space and to see this stuff happening monthly is incredible. My wife commented that there was no progress for so long, and now suddenly it's going crazy. This is how it should be. I'm excited to see where we are a few years out at this pace.

I agree, it is certainly exciting to think about where we will be in a few years. But that also causes some consternation/melancholy for me. Some of the greatest advancements in science came from our government's investment in the space program, and because this was funded with taxpayer money, these advancements were generally shared with everyone such that society benefited. Now we spend so much money on entitlement spending that we can barely scratch together money for our space program, and thus we rely on commercial enterprises to do the work. This is a poor reflection on us as a society, that we over-invest in our past at the expense of our future and our children... Wouldn't it be something if we could invest in our future, and give society (especially our children) something to aspire to (i.e. in the same way that Kennedy challenged the United States to reach the moon within a decade)?

I have the exact opposite reaction. I think it is wonderful to see a private company, sending a private rocket, loaded with private satellites into orbit. And the only thing that would make it better is if it was done from a private spaceport and had private astronauts going to a private space station or even better a private settlement on Mars the moon or an asteroid. The government needed to drain an enormous amount of money from the private sector (the only way government gets money is either taxing the private sector or printing more which is just a tax on savings) to get into space and to the moon. How much quicker would private industry have been able to do it if $Trillions haven't been sucked out of the economy over the years fighting wars, drugs, poverty (ironically), and subsidizing everything under the sun. We will never be a space fairing society if the final frontier is left to government bureaucracies (with no incentives to succeed or not waste time and resources) funded by stolen money. Watching that rocket touch down last night gave me the chills, it is finally happening. The first important step to opening up space to humanity.

I would have not responded to you comment, except that you stated that taxpayer money is stolen. Your political biases are very apparent from your post, and thus I now I feel the need to point out a few basic facts:
1. If you look back at history, government has generally been responsible for opening up frontiers using taxpayer money. The Wright Brothers would never have been successful without that initial contract from the US Army Signal Corp. The United States would have struggled to settle the Western Frontier if not for the taxpayer-funded Lewis and Clark expedition to map the territory, the taxpayer-funded army outposts in the West, the Transcontinental railroad, etc.
2. We would not be in space in the first place if it wasn't for the government. Don't forget that the entire reason SpaceX is able to fund this adventure is with taxpayer money that is funding future resupply of the International Space Station. Remind me, did private companies fund Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, the shuttle, the ISS or SpaceLab, or did the taxpayer? Most of these commercial companies (with the exception of Virgin) are innovating precisely because they are competing for government contracts.)
3. If you compare the amount of money spent on the space program to the scientific advances directly attributed to the space program, the ROIC is substantially positive. However, government is generally not allowed to patent taxpayer-funded scientific advances, so the private sector takes them and exploits them. If you look at the American aviation industry over the last 50 years, the primary reason we have been competitive is because private companies were able to exploit taxpayer-funded R&D in hard science and avionics (funded by DoD, NASA, NOAA, etc). If you look at the renaissance in biotech that is occurring right now, a big reason that is happening is because many of these companies are exploiting taxpayer-funded R&D that was conducted to answer basic fundamental questions. The entire reason this taxpayer money was spent on R&D @ NIH and HHS is because commercial enterprises were unwilling to do this science in the first place.

Just like space, and just like the moon, the Martian frontier will also be opened up by the government, using taxpayer money, because commercial firms will be unable to show a positive ROIC. But don't worry, commercial firms will come along for the ride, because they will benefit financially from the government contracts.

Just to clear up a few things.

1) What was done with the money afterwards has no bearing on whether or not it was stolen. If I put a gun to your head and steal your money, and then proceed to do something wonderful with it, it doesn't mean that the money wasn't stolen. When you take money from someone against their will that is theft. Always.

2) If I steal your money and do something that has never been done before, that doesn't mean that only I could have done it. It probably means that the private economy wasn't ready to spend its money on that yet. Money is always put to its most useful current purpose. What you don't see in all of your above scenarios is what didn't happen with all of the money spent by government on those things and what all of the people involved didn't spend their time doing. If that was the absolute best use of those resources then the private economy would have produced the same results, if that wasn't the best use of those resources then the world was a poorer place for those events occurring, not a richer one.

3) I don't want to go to Mars until it is profitable for the human race to do so. The best way to make sure that is the case is to keep the government out of it.

Go back thousands of years in the history of civilization Indian/Chinese/Egyptian/Roman anywhere you go it has been the Kings/Pharaohs/Government who have built the infrastructure and pushed the development of technology. They have done it through taxes. You are deluded if you think that private enterprise would have achieved anything without government infrastructure and help. The private economy doesn't put money to the best use. It puts money to the most greedy and selfish use. Private enterprise cant see beyond their current lifetime (if that long). Elon Musk is just ok. Hes a businessman and leader but theres nothing special about what he is working on. Hes just retooling/refining/improving technologies that already exist, similar to what Steve Jobs did at Apple. Hes not doing anything innovative. The innovation and research takes place at NASA. In a few decades the "private economy" will takes the successful research of NASA and speak about how they can do it better.

Now if Elon Musk was working on something like the IXS Enterprise id say he was doing something innovative. No private money will be put for this until the science is confirmed and the technology is developed because till that happens there is no money. Then the greedy "private economy" will take over.

http://100yss.org/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IXS_Enterprise
http://techland.time.com/2012/09/19/nasa-actually-working-on-faster-than-light-warp-drive/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2655105/Engage-warp-drive-Nasa-reveals-latest-designs-Star-Trek-style-spacecraft-make-interstellar-travel-reality.html

All I can say is that you have, without exception, the most warped view of history that I have ever read. Just, wow.

All innovations come from kings, emperors, dictators and bureaucrats? I'm sorry but that is just nuts.

adesigar · December 23, 2015

All I can say is that you have, without exception, the most warped view of history that I have ever read. Just, wow.
All innovations come from kings, emperors, dictators and bureaucrats? I'm sorry but that is just nuts.

Learn to read. Besides the biggest leap in improving the human race is the move from Anarchy to government(Democracy/Monarchy/etc).

rkbabang · December 24, 2015

All I can say is that you have, without exception, the most warped view of history that I have ever read. Just, wow.
All innovations come from kings, emperors, dictators and bureaucrats? I'm sorry but that is just nuts.

Learn to read. Besides the biggest leap in improving the human race is the move from Anarchy to government(Democracy/Monarchy/etc).

"learn to read" really? Does your mom know you are using the computer?

Human technological progress has been expanding at an exponential rate ever since the first protohuman picked up the first stone. At some point agriculture was the next step in our progress, this had the effect of planting previously mobile human groups in one place, allowing more free time and the accumulation of more wealth than one can carry on his person. This also had a side effect of attracting parasites which we have been fighting for thousands of years now.

Merry Christmas.

rkbabang · December 24, 2015

Short Musk video from September

Liberty · April 9, 2016

SpaceX finally successfully landed a rocket on a floating drone ship. Amazing.

https://twitter.com/ow/status/718547064955781120

Apparently Elon tweeted this one but then deleted it (some swearing):

JBird · April 9, 2016

Hahahaha! Thanks for posting Liberty.

Just phenomenal work by SpaceX-- such a pleasure to watch.

Picasso · April 9, 2016

>>> Tesla bears screaming they can't build a bunch of Model 3's or turn a profit

5 minutes later...

>>> SpaceX lands a booster stage on a floating barge in the middle of the ocean

Remind me to buy some more convertible Tesla bonds on Monday...

ERICOPOLY · April 9, 2016

>>> Tesla bears screaming they can't build a bunch of Model 3's or turn a profit

I can sort of understand why there are Tesla bears. Basically, it's because there are so many long established car companies and put together, they comprise the entire auto industry. The bears are conditioned to this level of industry ambition and execution. It becomes fairly reasonable for them to assume that if the best car companies can't achieve X, then how could a newcomer upstart possibly achieve it?

The difference here is that Tesla has a much higher level of ambition and execution. Much higher than the rest of the industry.

So the question could be turned around... how can the existing industry leaders survive long term under this newly higher level of ambition and execution? How are they going to reinvent their cultures?

JBird · April 10, 2016

So the question could be turned around... how can the existing industry leaders survive long term under this newly higher level of ambition and execution? How are they going to reinvent their cultures?

Good thinking

rkbabang · April 11, 2016

So the question could be turned around... how can the existing industry leaders survive long term under this newly higher level of ambition and execution?

The same way they survived when Asian companies produced higher quality vehicles at lower prices ... government bailouts.

How are they going to reinvent their cultures?

They won't. They don't have to.

shalab · April 11, 2016

rk - what is your opinion of the quality of German made vehicles? I think they have the lowest quality of any manufacturer at the moment. I have heard from both BMW and Volkswagen owners. However, these brands are doing extremely well in the US - contributing to 75B trade deficit with Germany.

So the question could be turned around... how can the existing industry leaders survive long term under this newly higher level of ambition and execution?

The same way they survived when Asian companies produced higher quality vehicles at lower prices ... government bailouts.

How are they going to reinvent their cultures?

They won't. They don't have to.

rkbabang · April 11, 2016

rk - what is your opinion of the quality of German made vehicles? I think they have the lowest quality of any manufacturer at the moment. I have heard from both BMW and Volkswagen owners. However, these brands are doing extremely well in the US - contributing to 75B trade deficit with Germany.

I've never owned a German vehicle, so I have no personal experience. But of course I have an opinion :), it is that they market their vehicles in the US as luxury vehicles, so they can get away with having poorer dependability. A high net worth individual will buy/lease a Mercedes or BMW new, then trade it in for another one after 3 years. So the people who buy them used are the ones getting screwed and the people who buy them new never really notice that they don't last very long. I have no problem with any company as long as they survive in the market without subsidies and bailouts, something which the american companies haven't been able to do.

boilermaker75 · April 11, 2016

rk - what is your opinion of the quality of German made vehicles? I think they have the lowest quality of any manufacturer at the moment. I have heard from both BMW and Volkswagen owners. However, these brands are doing extremely well in the US - contributing to 75B trade deficit with Germany.

We have had several German made cars (VW and Mercedes) and have found them to be of low quality. More details in this post,

http://www.cornerofberkshireandfairfax.ca/forum/investment-ideas/tsla-tesla-motors/960/

nodnub · April 12, 2016

In my anecdotal cases, people bought their vehicles new and had subpar experiences. It prevented me from even considering those models :- ).

The experience gets much worse after about 10 years. So many beautiful bmw and mercedes priced around the same amount as similar aged Toyota Matrix. Example is a Mercedes or BMW top of the line wagon or estate car selling for ~$12,000 and the sellers say stuff like, I recently spent $3000 in repairs this year and $2000 last year. Lol, that is probably the run rate for the next five years. Compared to the Toyota, maybe $300 per year in repair work. You don't buy an old merc or BMW for the value. Purely about driving experience and status..

randomep · April 12, 2016

Go back thousands of years in the history of civilization Indian/Chinese/Egyptian/Roman anywhere you go it has been the Kings/Pharaohs/Government who have built the infrastructure and pushed the development of technology. They have done it through taxes. You are deluded if you think that private enterprise would have achieved anything without government infrastructure and help. The private economy doesn't put money to the best use. It puts money to the most greedy and selfish use. Private enterprise cant see beyond their current lifetime (if that long). Elon Musk is just ok. Hes a businessman and leader but theres nothing special about what he is working on. Hes just retooling/refining/improving technologies that already exist, similar to what Steve Jobs did at Apple. Hes not doing anything innovative. The innovation and research takes place at NASA. In a few decades the "private economy" will takes the successful research of NASA and speak about how they can do it better.

Now if Elon Musk was working on something like the IXS Enterprise id say he was doing something innovative. No private money will be put for this until the science is confirmed and the technology is developed because till that happens there is no money. Then the greedy "private economy" will take over.

http://100yss.org/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IXS_Enterprise
http://techland.time.com/2012/09/19/nasa-actually-working-on-faster-than-light-warp-drive/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2655105/Engage-warp-drive-Nasa-reveals-latest-designs-Star-Trek-style-spacecraft-make-interstellar-travel-reality.html

I have heard some libertarian and other free-market views on this forum. The thing I like to point out is that over the planet of 6B people and 5000 yrs of history, lots of things have been tried. If you want no government we have that today, in Liberia, Somalia/Ertria(sp?). Those countries have no taxation and no laws.

We have also tried blind free markets w/o much government intervention with Greenspan/Summers and the gang. Theory is great but in practice we see that people w/o regulation would skirt the law and break the law, which is unfair and benefits almost no one. Don't forget the lesson. Most countries are gravetating towards democracy because it is the best middle ground. People are pissed today but they don't know what they want. When you listen to Trump you realize he actually stands for very little except rudeness in politics which I guess appeals to many. If a politician says go left, well lots of countries have been stagnant going that route. If a politician says go right, well look at 2008.

Middle ground seems to please no one but we gravetate towards it.

Liberty · April 12, 2016

http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/04/how-to-land-a-rocket-on-a-robotic-barge/

http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/25787998624_d77cd1b381_k-980x653.jpg

http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/25728668373_cec4f9ef74_k-980x653.jpg

http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/26239020092_d28d741951_k-980x653.jpg

Morgan · April 13, 2016

The above photos are just absolutely ridiculously amazing. Elon and Space X are totally changing the world.

ERICOPOLY · April 13, 2016

How about a rocket that can drop a bomb on your enemy and then return to base?

JBird · April 13, 2016

The above photos are just absolutely ridiculously amazing. Elon and Space X are totally changing the world.

+1!!

rkbabang · April 13, 2016

How about a rocket that can drop a bomb on your enemy and then return to base?

Oh god no, I hope Space X continues to focus on getting to Mars and doesn't decide to become a military contractor focusing on helping the megalomaniac ruling class destroy the Earth.

Then again this is unlikely anyway. The only thing reusable rocket delivered bombs does is cut the costs of war. Since when does the government care about how much it spends on war? This isn't even a concern.

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