I don’t see why you’d ever partially fuel a rocket. The additional mass does reduce the sensitivity of the rocket to aerodynamic or other moments (which you can show with a little bit of easy rigid body mechanics), while, if the propulsion system is scaled to the mass (which it would be), the decrease on the actuator’s ability to impact ration is not as big.
Also, fuel cost is basically negligible in the grand scheme of things.
Logically speaking, the heavier the payload, the more propellant you would need to put it into orbit. If you only need a certain percentage of your maximum fuel capacity to put a payload into orbit, then any amount of fuel over that only adds to the weight of the rocket, and thus increases the fuel requirements to put that extra weight into orbit. In other words, you’re only lifting extra fuel into orbit at that point.
This is, however, exactly what they’re doing with the first stage because that extra fuel is used to reduce the cost of the overall mission by safely returning that part of the rocket. $ 1st Stage >>> $ extra fuel.
How Small Can You Make An Orbital Rocket? - Scott Manley discusses.
How Does Launching From Equator Help Rockets? - Scott Manley discusses
Hey guys!
Another launch tomorrow at 9:31 AM PST, 12:31 EST, and 16:31 UTC.
This is CRS - 12 launching dragon to resupply the ISS. There should be a return to landing site landing attempt accompanying this launch. As always, you can find the official SpaceX stream on their youtube channel, or as this is a NASA launch they will always be streaming it and may have extra camera angles. I also believe it starts earlier than the SpaceX stream so if you want to see the pre flight checks and all that jazz head there about 30 minutes prior to launch.
Successful launch and landing.
Landing back at the launch site is cool but we still haven’t seen the roomba in action.
This time around they caught a clear shot of stage 1 gliding back down around the 19:00 mark
’Major Pucker Factor’: Will SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy Ace Its Maiden Launch? - space.com
SpaceX says its Falcon Heavy, which is slated to make its maiden launch in November from the historic Pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida, will be the world’s most powerful operational rocket.
Booster basics: The Falcon Heavy’s Octaweb clustering of Merlin engines.
Credit: SpaceX
Are you cosmonaut?
I’am too. Just Incredibly, as we have a lot in common
Here’s the news, I can too. You love the news about the missiles, as well as me. We will be best friends in the world.
USA will purchase rocket engines from Russia till 2025, a media report said
Yeah I spotted that just after posting
How Gravity Assists Work - Scott Manley discusses
Just a heads up 4:30 UTC on the 29th Musk will be talking about their updated colonization architecture at IAC. There should be a stream you can find somewhere on the IAC website or maybe youtube.
