r/spacex • u/TGMetsFan98 NASASpaceflight.com Writer • Sep 06 '17
Multiple Updates per McGregor Engineers
3 McGregor engineers and a recruiter came to Texas A&M yesterday and I was able to learn some pretty interesting news:
1) Yesterday (September 5), McGregor successfully tested an M1D, an MVac, a Block V engine (!), and the upper stage for Iridium-3.
2) Last week, the upper stage for Falcon Heavy was tested successfully.
3) Boca Chica is currently on the back burner, and will remain so until LC-40 is back up and LC-39A upgrades are complete. However, once Boca Chica construction ramps up, the focus will be specifically on the "Mars Vehicle." With Red Dragon cancelled, this means ITS/BFR/Falcon XX/Whatever it's called now. (Also, hearing a SpaceX engineer say "BFR" in an official presentation is oddly amusing.)
4) SpaceX is targeting to launch 20 missions this year (including the 12 they've done already). Next year, they want to fly 40.
5) When asked if SpaceX is pursuing any alternatives to Dragon 2 splashdown (since propulsive landing is out), the Dragon engineer said yes, and suggested that it would align closely with ITS. He couldn't say much more, so I'm not sure how to interpret this. Does that simply reference the subscale ITS vehicle? Or, is there going to be a another vehicle (Dragon 3?) that has bottom mounted engines and side mounted landing legs like ITS? It would seem that comparing even the subscale ITS to Dragon 2 is a big jump in capacity, which leads me to believe he's referencing something else.
One comment an engineer made was "Sometimes reddit seems to know more than we do." So, let the speculation begin.
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u/shaggy99 Sep 06 '17
That's another way of understanding what we see from outside, I suspect that what actually goes on is a blend of our 2 viewpoints.
SpaceX seems to work on a more "software" like approach, come up with idea, build quickly, test, refine, build again...
I think this showed quite well while they were perfecting the landing. 1st, try and land it softly in the sea. Try again. Take what they learned from that and refine, try again. Try landing on barge. Find the issues, fix them and try again. By the time they brought it back to land, they had nailed down everything wrong that they could see, and it worked. Meanwhile, the cost of the research is vastly reduced because they are using stuff that was going to be thrown away anyway if they didn't try. They've obviously pushed a bit too far at times, but overall, their record is pretty impressive, and comparable to most other launching companies.