Bill, I don't know. And it would be an arcane discussion. You made a statement about what SpaceX has said. I corrected it. Period.
On 2014-04-02 20:12, Bill Claybaugh wrote:
No, really, do ask...if I know what flight rate is associated with what price claim I can calculate the production cost of the hardware. And who is the customer for 53 tons? Bill Sent from my iPhone On Apr 2, 2014, at 16:18, Rand Simberg <simberg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:It's no doubt a very high flight rate, from multiple sites. They are expecting to create demand with the low prices.On 2014-04-02 15:48, Bill Claybaugh wrote:Rocket back first stages cost 30% of payload. A HIAD and rocket landing costs a minimum of 30% of the remainder (this is, to my knowledge, the simplest way to return and recover and expendable stage). Which I believe totals to a 30% + (70% * 30%) = 51% payload hit. Ask Gwynne what flight rate that price requires.... Or you could just do the math yourself.I concur that Falcon 9H should be pretty low cost; who's the customer?Bill Sent from my iPhoneOn Apr 2, 2014, at 15:29, Rand Simberg <simberg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:List price for Falcon Heavy is already about a thousand dollars per pound, completely expendable ($120M for 53 tons). Gwynne recently said that a reusable Falcon 9 gets per-flight prices down to $5M-$7M. Even if reusability cuts payload in half (it shouldn't be that bad), that's on the order of a couple hundred bucks a pound.On 2014-04-02 14:31, Bill Claybaugh wrote:If you are going to make ridiculous assertions, please provide themath to prove them. Even SpaceX says rocket back will not get below$1000 per pound, and that takes hundreds of launches per reusable stage. If you are not going to provide proof of your silly claims, please stop making them. Bill Sent from my iPhone On Apr 2, 2014, at 14:00, marsbeyond@xxxxxxxxx wrote:It uses only 30% of PAYLOAD. Listen to Gwynne Shotwell's most recent interview on "The Space Show" very carefully. For what purpose would you ever fly it up range? Just land on a barge or land downrange. Actually $80 per pound is doable.Sent from my iPhoneOn Apr 2, 2014, at 12:53 PM, Bill Claybaugh <wclaybaugh2@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:Please.Landing the first stage downrange uses 15% of the payload; flying it back up range cost 30% of payload. Even if refurbishing and relaunch were free, propulsive fly back will take four launches just to cost the same as expending. Since they are not free, it is more likely to take something between 12-24 launches for this system to cost exactly the same as the expendable version. This also means that production rates will drop and so those cost will go up. And then there's the customers who want to know why they should fly on a used rocket....$100 per pound is not achievable with this system. Bill Sent from my iPhone On Apr 2, 2014, at 10:49, marsbeyond@xxxxxxxxx wrote:Kieth,When is Skylon supposed to fly? In less than two years, SpaceX will be using propulsive recovery to re-use the first stage, second stage, and capsule, and their cost to LEO will drop to $100 a pound!Sent from my iPhoneOn Apr 2, 2014, at 9:27 AM, Keith Henson <hkeithhenson@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:http://theenergycollective.com/keith-henson/362181/dollar-gallon-gasoline $350 million committed so far to the Skylon engines. Keith