There’s a certain amount of pointlessness to the theoretical argument; SpaceX
semi-reusable Falcon 9 and Heavy are far cheaper to buy than any competition,
and have been for some time.
Whether more fully reusable, bigger, methane vs RP-1 next step works or not
there today are only companies and agencies and countries who understand the
current Market and who don’t.
IMHO
Boemart seem unclear. ULA gets it but is hampered by parents. NASA is in
parts aware and in parts unclear. ESA and Arianespace are politically blinded.
China is aware but continuing national programs of record while it experiments
with innovation and gave up on foreign commercial launches. Russia... hard to
tell. But politically hampered.
-George
Sent from my iPhone
On Apr 4, 2020, at 2:08 PM, William Claybaugh <wclaybaugh2@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Henry:
When RLV’s will be more economic than ELV’s remains unclear to me and many
others. I doubt I have ever suggested that they would never be lower cost.
Our dispute has always been about when, not if.
Bill
On Sat, Apr 4, 2020 at 3:03 PM Henry Vanderbilt <hvanderbilt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Bill,
And you've never disputed the matter with me or anyone else here since?
Okay...
best
Henry
On 4/4/2020 11:46 AM, William Claybaugh wrote:
Henry:
You really need to revisit your assumptions about me. Griffin and I proved
that in 1994.
Bill
On Sat, Apr 4, 2020 at 12:44 PM Henry Vanderbilt
<hvanderbilt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Ah! We agree that reuse is a benefit!
This is progress...
best
Henry
On 4/4/2020 11:21 AM, William Claybaugh wrote:
Henry:
Have it your way if you wish.
I am certain that Elon will tell you that the first benefit of reuse is
in spreading depreciation; and, that spreading amortization is a very
second order effect.
Bill
On Sat, Apr 4, 2020 at 12:10 PM Henry Vanderbilt
<hvanderbilt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Bill,
Terminological quibbling aside, what I'm talking about is something
alien to the cost-plus trad space industry: Commercial businesses
ferociously controlling their costs, both upfront and ongoing.
Up-front costs are like poison, while ongoing operating costs are merely
like heroin. Both are worth considerable effort and ingenuity to
minimize. And SpaceX, in successfully going for reusability, has
avoided both a big initial chunk of poison and a fair-sized heroin
habit, both implicit in the trad cost-plus approach to eventually flying
circa sixty booster cores a year.
Given we once again seem to be talking past each other - it's good to be
back! - perhaps best we simply continue to disagree about this being a
significant part of why SpaceX is cleaning the trad industry's clock.
cheers
Henry
On 3/24/2020 8:19 AM, William Claybaugh wrote:
Henry:
Terms matter: what you are talking about is depreciation, not
production savings.
I’m will to be educated but I would be shocked if making 1/5 as many
vehicles resulted in a production system 1/5 the previous size: that is
simply not how production works.
There are high fixed costs in any production line as well as minimum
costs.
Bill
On Tue, Mar 24, 2020 at 8:49 AM Henry Vanderbilt
<hvanderbilt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Bill,
The long-term production difference in question, by definition, is a
factor of five times. Not 2:1 either way around a base of 12/year.
SpaceX knew this going in. Being sensible people not locked into the
established way of doing things, they likely would have set up a
production establishment for sixty expended cores a year very
differently than they did the plant for ~12 5X reused cores. Twelve a
year, as you say, is pretty much craft production - modest production
tooling and a lot of very skilled hand labor, low plant investment but
relatively high ongoing personnel cost. 60X a year is still not
exactly Willow Run, but sensible people planning that would very
likely invest considerably more in plant and tooling so as to not
require 5X the skilled personnel plus 2nd and 3rd shift differentials,
working in
~2X the modest 12/year plant (assuming it was originally run
one-shift).
Yes, I oversimplified by saying "1/5th the size of production
establishment". Thought I'd allowed for that sufficiently with "(to a
first approximation)", oh well. And yes, "size" was not quite the mot
juste; "cost" might have been closer to what I was driving at.
My basic point: SpaceX gambled on 5X reusability to greatly reduce
their up-front investment in, and ongoing cost of, F9 booster
production. And they seem to have won. By a quick count, 92 F9
booster core flights so far, and already over half of those (51) have
been used boosters. The used proportion will only rise from here.
And they did this on the up-front investment for a dozen a year.
In other words, one of the reasons they're so far ahead of the game
now is they gambled and won bigtime on a major-capital saving shortcut
at the start. I hope that's clearer.
Henry
On 3/23/2020 2:00 PM, William Claybaugh wrote:
Henry:
It isn’t clear to me that there is all that much difference between
making 12 per year and making 6 or 24.
One saves the material costs and the marginal labor cost but the
infrastructure doesn’t (or at least shouldn’t) change much over that
range of production.
That said, if you optimize your system for four units per year you
will find making 24 more costly than a line optimized for twenty-four.
But rates of a few dozen per year—or a few hundred—all fall into
“craft production” and are not going to show economically significant
variation on production costs. The benefit of even a few reuses is
in the depreciation of the hardware cost over multiple launches.
Bill
On Mon, Mar 23, 2020 at 2:24 PM Henry Vanderbilt
<hvanderbilt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Another way of looking at this that I think is relevant: 5-reuse
boosters allows SpaceX to support a given flight rate with (to a
first approximation) 1/5th the size of production establishment
they'd need for fully expendable operations.
Henry
On 3/23/2020 8:12 AM, William Claybaugh wrote:
Robert:
There is too little data to make any assertion about stage
longevity at this point.
However, ignoring propellant and launch operations costs, five
flights per booster would indicate a cost per booster at 20% of the
manufactured cost, not including refurbishment between flights.
The former is around $30-35 million, so $6-7 Million per flight,
again, not including refurbishment. If an overhaul costs more than
about $6 million, it would make more sense to simply build a new
five launch lifetime stage.
We may note that compared to a $50 million price, these depreciated
stage cost estimates suggest either a good deal of profit or that
other costs (launch operations, refurbishment) are high.
Bill
On Mon, Mar 23, 2020 at 8:51 AM Robert Steinke
<robert.steinke@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
From hobbyspace.com about the latest Falcon 9 launch:
" A first stage engine shut down prematurely (just before staging)
but had no effect on the mission as the other 8 engines made up
the difference. The booster also failed to make a successful
landing on a sea platform. This was the fifth flight of this
booster."
That was after a previous launch attempt aborted due to slightly
high power.
Wonderful demonstration of engine-out fault tolerance, but it does
look like the rocket is showing some wear and tear after 5
flights. What does this do to their economics if stages need an
overhaul/have an increased chance of loss of vehicle after only 5
flights?
