SpaceX's Fourth Launch Attempt RSN

jcgam69 writes "SpaceX's Falcon 1 is on the pad in the South Pacific Kwajalein Atoll ready for its fourth launch attempt, according to a blog post over the weekend from SpaceX CEO Elon Musk. The countdown is scheduled for Tuesday, Sept. 23, between 4 p.m. and 9 p.m. PDT, though the launch window will extend through Thursday if need be."

Not Today...

[crymeph0]

From an email I received this morning from the SpaceX news mailing list:

The static fire took place on Saturday [20 Sep 2008, CA time], as expected, and no major issues came up. However, after a detailed analysis of data, we decided to replace a component in the 2nd stage engine LOX supply line. There is a good chance we would be ok flying as is, but we are being extremely cautious.

This adds a few extra days to the schedule, so the updated launch window estimate is now Sept 28th through Oct 1st [CA time].

it is delayed a week

[Danny Rathjens]

The static fire took place on Saturday [20 Sep 2008, CA time], as expected, and no major issues came up. However, after a detailed analysis of data, we decided to replace a component in the 2nd stage engine LOX supply line. There is a good chance we would be ok flying as is, but we are being extremely cautious. This adds a few extra days to the schedule, so the updated launch window estimate is now Sept 28th through Oct 1st

http://www.spacex.com/updates.php

Saturday, with luck

[Geoffrey.landis]

Space.com says launch on Saturday [space.com] at the earliest ( Sept. 28 )

Good luck to them! Space-X has already won the stick-to-it award for persistence-- now let's hope they win the "great-success-after-hard-work" award.

Re:Learning from your mistakes

[crowtc]

I did some research and I guess these things cost like 10M each. Musk supposedly dumped 100M of his own money into the company, but they've apparently got contracts with NASA and the DOD to toss stuff into space. I'm guessing they're not exactly strapped for cash - this may be a throw-away rocket to them.

Somewhat

[WindBourne]

They did pay for the first 2. The last one and this one are on Spacex's dime. As to the # of failures, EVERY group that has started with rockets has a number of failures up front. Once they have their first couple of successes, then it tends to be with new versions (though the shuttle says otherwise).

Re:it is delayed a week

[Danny Rathjens]

launch window=oct 1 - sep 28= 4 days
oct 1 - sep 23 = 9 days
28 - 23 = 5 days
(9+5)/2 = 7 days. :)

Just messing around, though. Obviously if I meant exactly 7 days I would have said 7 days rather than a week. There is an implied margin of error when you use larger units. :)

Re:Let me know when they get one up

[michaelmuffin]

Seriously, while I appreciate their tenacity, these attempts weren't news the last time either. Please skip the "here they go again" post and just let us know how it went, ok?

in other news, ailing former dictator fidel castro is still alive

Re:Learning from your mistakes

[FleaPlus]

I'm all for learning from my mistakes, but how much do these things cost to build and launch

SpaceX charges $6.7 million for them. They apparently make a profit at that price, so the actual costs are presumably somewhat less than that.

It should be noted though that in general the per-launch costs (fuel, materials, etc.) tend to be quite low compared to the costs of paying the salaries of people in the company. One of the reasons SpaceX's prices are so low compared to the competition is because they designed from the get-go to minimize the number of people required to build and launch their rockets.

Re:Add an accelermeter to the stage seperation log

[Profane MuthaFucka]

The second stage fires relatively soon after the first stage is done burning, so there's little time for propellants to move forward in the tanks. The Saturn had a relatively longer gap between first and second stage burnouts so ullage motors were included. The later Saturns actually removed the ullage motors from the second stage, since that one lit off just under 5 seconds after the first stage burned out.