Given that a turbojet-powered first stage gets you to about the same altitude and speed as max-Q on a straight rocket, it seems the tradeoff is: an extra and complex system (the jet/ramjet/rocket flying wing) versus the simplicity of many extra tons of liquid oxygen. I can see why this concept was never developed. The more interesting part is the **second** stage. I would like to see a Starship Booster first stage with an AstroClipper on top. Simplicity in launch, safety in return.
It's all about safety Mark. At every point of AstroClipper flight you can abort and come back to land... Starship does not have this function... at least not provably yet.
There was a development line over decades on this idea with the SABRE engine, which recently seems to be showing promise of working, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SABRE_(rocket_engine) But the basic idea is, what if instead of using three different engines we manage to make it all work from a single engine design. Which obviously would vastly simplify the craft layout and weight. Admittedly it was conceived for a Single Stage To Orbit, but there really is nothing stopping you from using it in a two stage system like this either.
@@terranspaceacademy Ejection seats maybe, but if the second-stage fails to disconnect because it hit a patch or turbulence on the way up, and the locking mechanism a bit warped then you'd have serious issues.
Yeah. The linear stack of a vertical rocket aligns all the forces of gravity, acceleration and aerodynamics until most of the onboard mass is expended and then it's not long before the gravity turn is offsetting normal gravity with centrifugal force. In contrast, short of any kind of aerial refueling, this maximizes stress perpendicular to the line of thrust on takeoff and shearing forces on the connection between stages especially if they try to use the second stage nose gear for takeoff (which would also make that nose gear unnecessarily heavy and cut into orbital cargo.) If they employ ram collection of atmospheric O2 to fuel the second stage and even stock the first stage while on route to it's release point then it might be doable though piggy-back still makes more sense than their configuration imo, though that would be more likely to operate near major airports than any vertically launched version.
or just made superheavy carrying a second stage equivalent of space plane. pretty sure it way safer on landing compared starship but it may not have the lifting capabilities of starship
Entertaining thought experiment. Enjoyed the video as it has many facts I didn’t know. I want to see a pathfinder or prototype before believing it’s more than vapor ware.
Another excellent video. Thanks. I cannot see why the AstroClipper could not be scaled dramatically to compete with Starship's cargo carrying capacity. A bit of trivia: I think that you'll find that 'hypersonic' was defined as the speed at which diatomic molecules in the atmosphere start to dissociate. It is easier to simply say, "Mach 5 or greater."
Another excellent video , thank you. This Astroclipper is very interesting. The Artemis/Gateway/Starship airlock shuffle sounds like lots of opportunities for failure . The issues of crew transfers in space between Earth-appropriate /Lunar-appropriate/Mars-appropriate vehicles seems to be a continuing design issue, and if history is any indicator, there really isn't one vehicle that can do it all...yet.
Between the AstroClipper and Skylon, it will be interesting to see which one gets the furthest in development and if all goes well, which one works the best. Both are quite innovative but also have a history in the early days of rocket design. At the time though, the manufacturing, technology and engineering weren't quite up to the task of actually making these kind of vehicles a reality as I understand it.
Skylon is a sad joke man. They need to switch fuels but are entrenched with senior management stuck on hydrogen. They could make it work tomorrow of they switch to methane and get rid of the helium tanks.
Astro clipper will never leave the computer concept stage. So many computer renderings at these companies come out with and they never get past the computer generated model.
I can hardly see any rationality when I look at a horizontal take-off space plane with THREE different engine types and a hull form that is impossible to manufacture cheaply. At this point would make more sense to "just" modify Starship to land horizontally for passenger transport. That is *if* the vertical landing turns out to remain too dangerous for tourists.
Starship will collapse the second it is placed in a horizontal position on Earth... Three different engines equals increased complexity but also increased redundancy for safety.
@@terranspaceacademy _"Starship will collapse the second it is placed in a horizontal position on Earth"_ Why? It also need to survive a reentry from interplanetary flights. The forces there are much greater. The tanks have to be pressurized anyway to survive reentry so they can support a horizontal Starship as well. The current "balloon" tanks can (barely) support themselves already when empty. You can see that on the chopped up hulls of the RUD prototyps. _"Three different engines equals increased complexity but also increased redundancy for safety."_ Maybe. But economy dictates a different route. Airliners don't have propeller engines as backup. They have 2-4 jet engines for redundancy (and a small jet engine for emergency electrical power). That's is very similar to Starship. There are no systems on earth that I can think off which _have_ to use three different engine types for one trip and are ergonomically viable.
It would indeed be a useful ship... cost of operation would determine long-term viability but the technology developed would be worth the expense... and the UK would have its own way to get to orbit again...
Yes, you need much less oxidizer. OTOH, jet engines have a much lower thrust-to-weight ratio than rocket engines. You also have landing gear, and structural penalties related to the shape. I prefer the advice of Jerry Pournelle: fuel is cheap, and structure is expensive. And if something goes wrong during landing, the likely landing speed means everyone will die.
@@terranspaceacademy I feel like the bloated and cumbersome nature of the typical aerospace/NASA government contracting is what made the shuttle expensive. Hypothetically, SRB's should be cheap enough to overcome weight penalty. Even with it's high cost, I'm sure they would have been happy to keep operating it if it was safe and not approaching design life.
What is the ratio btwn hp and kn? How many horses in kilo-newton? I'm still trying to calculate the engine power, able to change a trajectory of 0.5 mil ton asteroid (stadium size) and move it into space. Can you help me, Chief?
The units are not directly compatible. kN is a measure of force but horsepower - as the name suggests - is a measure of power. 1 hp is the equivalent of 745.7 watts. A kilonewton of force is capable of changing the acceleration of a body of 102kg by 1 m/s^2. How much horsepower you will need will depend on the total efficiency of the engine involved in translating that power directly into thrust on the body. Hope that helps.
We had to answer this with another viewer... This is a very good point... the answer is simple... cheating. Kilonewtons is a measure of force. Horsepower is a measure of work... They are not the same. Work and energy have the same units... Joules. The same is true of saying "tonnes of thrust"... this statement assumes everyone knows we mean "on Earth"... dividing by 9.807m/s^2. These are simplifications to aid understanding but can cause confusion and should probably be avoided. .. I have also said kg per square meter for pressure... this is always wrong. Pounds per square inch is a valid measure of pressure because pounds are a measure of weight... kilograms are a measure of mass. To get mass from pounds we go to slugs... and nobody likes slugs... :-)
@@terranspaceacademy & Mr. Khurazi -- Thanks a lot, gentlemen, for explanation that I've asked to compare 2 different physics departments. I understand it now!
You had me rolling over laughing at the 2:20 mark... "Y the F Dad" on Elon's son's A-12 name. I think Moon Zapa had that same discussion with her dad too!!! I also love the rest of the video and concept ECC has on a hybrid rocket plane concept. Thanks for sharing that rare D-12 footage, never seen that, Talk about a scary drop until the crew could get out... Sad to hear one didn't make it. While in AFG, I had the chance to work with a former U2 pilot, and he shared some interesting stories of his missions, etc... A very unique and brave group of skilled pilots for those types of missions. My hat is off to them. Keep up the great work on these topics and videos...
Great video! The Astroclipper is a great complement to Starship (really anything is) or on its own. I still think it comes down to the Raptor engines and how efficient and reliably they can operate. The maneuvers of Starship aren’t that crazy it’s the reliability of the engines and supporting systems. Eventually, liquid powered engines will be a thing of the past so we’ll take what we can get…for now.
Basically this astroclipper has 4 different types of engine, thus 4 different types of possible failure... It's way to complex to be economically and safely use and more important to maintain as the maintenance will involve so different tech... and that just for the engines, not even speaking about the different consoles, controls, redundancy of critical components, and so.
We disagree... this astroclipper has four different types of engines... four different means of saving itself in case of a failure... it is not significantly more complex than other aircraft that have flown. Airplanes have flown with nuclear reactors and rocket engines in the past. With fly by wire and automated systems a human being won't be deciding when to go from turbojet to ramjet to rocket and back... the Astroclipper will...
You talk about astroclipper (or dragon) being used to ferry people to Starship in orbit for deep space missions. I really think starship is not the best option for long haul space travel. Maybe to land on the moon (since that requires propulsive landing) but mars is really far. Starship's real advantage is cheap launch cost. It will be amazing for cargo (or launching but not landing people). What is needed for Mars trips is a dedicated cruise liner type spaceship, which never lands anywhere. Basically a spacestation which can be boosted from Earth to Mars orbit and back. Or a large cycler which can be intercepted by a small ship, with seating but no other facilities. You need good facilities and shielding for a long trip to Mars. Before people can realistically colonise Mars a lot more infrastructure is needed in space. Launching something carrying people directly from Earth to the Moon makes sense to me. But not any further. Edit: grammer
Starship's real advantage is cheap launch cost AND that it makes any additional transport system between earth and mars (and anything in between) obsolete. Why build some additional system that costs additional money in development instead of using what you already have? There is about no financial incentive to develop a "cruise liner" for flight between planets until there are millions of people on either planet. Because who would pay for it?
What would be the characteristics of a spaceplane capable of landing on Mars? With a surface pressure of 0.6 % of that of the earth, this is around 33,000 m equivalent. What would the shape of such a modification be? The U2 was capable of some control at 400 knots and a little below that altitude - what dimensions of a wing would be required?
You would need a lighter than air... is it still called air on Mars?... craft... a massive very light flying wing... I'll see if anyone has done the math.
The dream is alive and in stealth mode. Many of the advantages are not patented so the video is only part of the story. There is development work by small tams still ongoing. Good to see intereste is still fresh. Stay tuned!
winged aircraft crash far to often, one of the space shuttles brock up on re-entry. the point is that when failure occurs wings are not safer by default, the safety of any system is not the type, but the design of that system, winged or not
We disagree Don. A Starship can never have an unpowered landing... and aircraft can... this alone makes it inherently safer. Though Starship may prove itself to be safer in operation.
@@terranspaceacademy yes we do disagree. flight controls fail plane crashes, rocket engine fails rocket crashes, heat shield fails both crash. you can "what if" anything, like what if on the Vergin Galactic ship the thing will not feather at the parabola, or will not return in atmosphere. the advantage to the Astro Clipper is fuel consumption, pollution, and launch/landing locations, far more versatile. don't get me wrong, I would love to see this in the sky, sooner rather then later
@@dunsel5887 You're assuming a disaster on re-entry, but I'd be expecting more disasters between take-off and separation than any time after separation. That connection just looks terribly dangerous.
@@GoranXII the one thing I like about the Delta Clipper, single stage to orbit. but I would prefer full re-tanking in orbit, and a long de-orbit burn from mock 25 down to mock 5 and drop altitude to 60-70 miles
@@dunsel5887 Hey, I'm not complaining about the Delta Clipper, that looks like a reasonably solid design. I'm just extremely cautious about the promises made by the AstroClipper team. That separation mechanism looks, to me, like a disaster waiting to happen.
The SR71 had Boron in suspension in the JP7 fuel it burned, one Boron atom can hold what? Something like 7 oxygen atoms? Like many other details in the old tech, it's easy to miss the possibility there was an oxidizer enriched fuel being used by these planes... even though there was a clever trick of having both the fuel and some oxidizer both mixed and being held in the same tank being used... professor, do you know if there is any chance of using browns gas, or other clever means of storing both a viable fuel and oxidizer mix in a single tank or compartment in liquid or gas form that could make things simpler for a space plane? The Long March uses a solid propellant, but I don't know if the fuel and oxidizer is all mixed in one place... it would seem more convenient for a reusable vehicle to use a liquid fuel, I don't know if there's enough fuel density possible for a compressed gas like browns gas to be used, or if it would or could be formulated to remain separate hydrogen and oxygen components in the same tank if it was compressed or condensed to a liquid form.... But the SR71 family of planes is still an incredible engineering marvel all packed into each plane, even by today's standards...
Thank you for the feedback Scott! The SR-71 was indeed astounding... not just for its time but even today. The boron issue is very important to consider. I would suspect that there are other similar technologies that have continued in development... Something is running around at high altitudes and velocities over the US. We have been looking at other fuel/oxygen options that would be more concentrated and allow better performance. Right now I think the hybrid option has the best potential to realize this concept.
They are indeed... I'm wondering about this new paint that reflects almost all wavelengths of light almost perfectly... heating on reentry is mainly due to the heat lamp effect...
This is a stupid question and before you say it, yes there are. Why do we accept the pull of gravity on re-entry? Must we? Can we not fight back by slowing before we hit atmo. Is the speed necessary? Could we not fire thrusters u[on entry (assuming enough fuel) and minimize the heating? Very basic answers I'm sure. Thanks in advance.
To counteract the velocity we have accumulated would require the same amount of fuel that got us up to orbital speeds... that's not feasible due to the tyranny of the rocket equation... until we have fusion... then we will gently reenter without heat shields like the shuttles do on Star Trek :-)
I have thought about this. The problem I hit is say look at the Boeing 747. 30% of its starting mass with max fuel and payload is structure and engines. Something like the Astroclipper with its variety of engines to get above the atmosphere and extra structure to hold its wing shape with pressurized cryogenic propellant plus heat shielding and ability to withstand the stresses of launch with an airplane shape will probably be more like 50% structure and engines, making it just too heavy. In contrast Starship will be like 5% structure and engines as it is a pressurized soda can, which is rather ideal for launch loads, with just one set of highly advanced and amazingly compact rocket engines to do the job. Jet engines are just not compact nor light for the job they do, especially at altitude. Ramjets do better, but this is still an extra set of engines just for one small part of the first stage flight. Then rocket engines have to be on the first stage to get high enough for a safe separation, but for the rest of the flight is just dead weight, plus the pressurized propellant tanks squished into a wing shape is no where near as mass efficient as the pressurized soda can shape of Starship. I had an idea of how to make things better. What you do, especially if you are going to use tanker Starship, is build a giant inflatable tower to launch Starship from. The reason an inflatable tower is better than a solid tower is high tensile strength materials can work with air pressure to go up really high where stacking material up, like say a traditional building, breaks down before any appreciable height is reached. While an inflatable tower cannot directly impart speed, starting higher up allows the rocket engines to throttle up more as you don't have to slow down as much or at all for max-q. So then you build the rockets with maximum engines in mind running at full throttle all the way to orbit, reducing hang time and reducing atmospheric drag. Rocket engines are also more efficient at altitude, developing more thrust and more ISP. So yeah, just starting higher up, say 20 km up, would make the rocket a lot more efficient and greatly increase its capacity to orbit. With NASA's plan to use 4 astronauts for the initial Moon landings, Starship will likely complete its tasks and non professionals will also go up and live. Then there will be pressure on NASA to ditch things like the SLS and just have their people take the whole ride on Starship as SLS is crazy expensive. This may not happen until the late 2020's, so something like the Astroclipper, even if the concept could work, would take a number of years to get a crew rating. By then Starship will have that rating by reputable outfits such as NASA.
At this point it would be far easier to modify Starship to land horizontally that to develop a first stage with THREE different engine systems and a difficult to build flying wing design.
Starship horizontal?? You would have to start over... and it would look nothing like Starship. These other systems will be developed over time... SpaceShipTwo is flying already... sometimes... with more deltaV and some thermal tiles it could work like AstroClipper.
@@terranspaceacademy Sure, Starship would need slightly bigger wings and landing skits. But it would look not too much different from now. If Starship can survive an aerodynamic entry on Mars, it is solid enough to survive a horizontal landing on earth. It would only need a L/D ratio similar to the Boeing X-37. Since Starship is basically a hollow tube at landing it can get away with very little additional aerodynamic surface area. So the wings would be smaller relative to the wings of the X-37 The engine skirt should be sturdy enough to take in forces of the rear skits and the forward dome is already in a good place to support the forward skit. Maybe a little reinforcement of the hull is necessary there. All skits would need doors like the wheels on the space shuttle. But wheels are no good here. They are too heat-sensitive (Starship is a hot structure reentry vehicle) and too expensive. Solid wood should do the job just fine. Its cheap enough to be replace after every flight. Or maybe the material braking-pads are made out of.
Can't help but think you could simplify the design quite a bit if the SABRE engine worked and you replace those three different engines with a singular one instead. But I will admit, it's not actually a fully running engine right now, so you can't really make something right now from it, unless you had plenty of R&D money to rapidly push it to completion.
That's a good question... we think the best refueling tanker would be an SHB SSTO refueled with Starships... 3400 tonnes in LEO... 17 lauches though :-)
That is an ok concept but I don't see anyone doing it. Actually, the idea of nuclear powered rockets (nuclear heat + hydrogen propellant) sounds like a winner to me. These would be very inexpensive to fly and re-fly and land. The Starship landings do look kinda terrifying. However, imagine if they had just put some legs with a good big of travel of them, to absorb the shock of a hard landing. And, imagine if the human occupied portion up-top had blast isolation and heat shielding. I think it could land in pretty rough situations and even crash and people would survive. I would put people in capsules, like Japanese capsule hotels, as their rooms but suited up and strapped down in them for launch and landing. I'd also make the capsules computer-controlled magnetically levitated. That way, they'd have maximum survivability and comfort.
Two episodes on Space planes back to back? Is it my birthday? Seriously though, it's sad that details about this thing are so few and far between, we don't even know if Exodus still exists or if they're working on it. The overall idea makes a lot of sense, to the point where I'm wondering why no one else seems to be working on something similar
As much as I want Starship to work for passengers, you make a very good argument. SpaceX is extremely bold and has made amazing progress. It's hard not to get excited about their plans.
SpaceX seems to be in the business of turning science fiction into science reality. I wouldn't be surprised if they presented plans to produce a Stargate!
Thank you for your feedback! We agree that they are making great progress! One crash of a Starship with humans on board will bring all the detractors out in force... why risk it when there are viable alternatives? As for a Stargat... that would be so awesome! Have to get past the negative energy thing first though... gives me headaches thinking about it :-)
How do you calculate the equivalency between KN and HP? It is my understanding that machines that propel with flow are difficult to accurately measure with units of mainly mechanical power (jet engines Vs piston engines) and that's why jets and rockets are measured in thrust while the turbopump of the same rocket is measured in HP
This is a very good point... the answer is simple... cheating. kilonewtons is a measure of force. Horsepower is a measure of work... Work and energy have the same units... Joules. The same is true of saying "tonnes of thrust"... this statement assumes everyone knows we mean "on Earth"... dividing by 9.807m/s^2. These are simplifications to aid understanding but can cause confusion and should probably be avoided. .. I have also said kg per square meter for pressure... this is always wrong. Pounds per square inch is a valid measure of pressure because pounds are a measure of weight... kilograms are a measure of mass. To get mass from pounds we go to slugs... and nobody likes slugs... :-)
I agree that Dragon sized capsules are often more practical for moving people than these giant ships! Could the Astroclipper upper stage land and launch anywhere but earth I wonder? I think Starship doesn't need to safely launch or land humans to be successful. In fact I'd say only certain Starships need a heat-shield and gimbaled engines personally, like the tankers.. The bulk of them could be left in space once they're there. I see no point in launching a Starship from the surface of Mars, unless its got hundreds of tons of rock samples on it. I think Starship plus Dragon 2 could handle most tasks - build an Aldrin Cycler out of a bunch of Starships and you can do even more.. :)
You will see Starbase 2 and possibly have the chance to go their I have no doubt... whether it is Starbase Two, Starbase Er, or Starbase Dva remains to be seen :-)
Now this is an awesome space plane!!!! Is it being developed? has anything been tested. I prefer this project because it seems the gents involved are not "nutty" meglamaniacs, instead they just want to explore space. Good looking machine. Very modern and much safer....👍
A very compelling case. Crew safety is always paramount and a plane, even an unpowered glider, will always be statistically safer on landing than a retropropulsive rocket. Please continue to insert logic into the space discussion. It might just catch on!
The stratolaunch is a working aircraft that can carry a 250 ton craft to about 35,000 feet. Why not build a super sonic, reusable, 2 stage shuttle that can launch from the stratolaunch. This would be very similar to the Astro Clipper only it would stage from stratolaunch instead of creating the biggest aircraft ever (which the stratolaunch already is).
Stratolaunch is slow. Its just to gain some altitude before the rocket takes off ,be less likely to be grounded for weather and allow take off from more area than a ground launch platform.
I loved Statolaunch... it is a thing of beauty... a high specific impulse spaceplane with scramjets and rockets would be a viable option with this amazing first stage plane.
@@terranspaceacademy 250 tons is a good size spaceplane. If Stratolaunch can get this much payload to 35,000 feet, then a scramjet should be able to carry a plane above 100,000+ feet to maybe mach 6-8 before Rocket engines need to take over. A space plane wouldn't need normal jet engines if launched from this altitude. The rockets could fire for a few seconds to get the craft above mach 1 then let the scramjets take over until they no longer function and then switch back to the rockets. This would require a very robust rocket engine but engines like this do exist (Perhaps a single Raptor Vac Engine engine would do the trick). As I'm sure you are aware, ram or scramjets don't work until past the sound barrier. I bet a craft of this sort could get 20ish tons to orbit. If the heat shield is done correctly, this craft could fly several times a week. Perhaps follow the SpaceX way and build it out of 304L stainless to help with aero heating, or at least just the belly and leading edges. If the Scramjet could be modified to run on Methane then both the Raptor and Scramjets could share the same fuel.
We've reached out to the company and they don't seem to want to talk. Either they have plenty of money and are working secretively or they have no resources and don't want to draw attention to it.
Starship is a different class and honestly can't compare the 2 one isn't necessarily better than the other and one of them is actually in development and breaking records in mankind's history everyday
@@terranspaceacademy Actually, I'd be more concerned about an asymmetry of lift causing the second stage to bend either up or down, damaging the release mechanism.
Makes good sense, safety first lol , but seriously it would be a bad day if something happened during the belly flopping maneuver , very bad for space flight
Without knowing the numbers I'd hold back on any criticism. Materials science is in exponential mode as we speak and the appropriate light weight and strong materials could very well make this concept possible. To argue one way or the other in the absence of facts (not knowing the numbers) is wasteful. SSTurbojet-rocket engines first, then ramjet to 6.5 Mach and then rocket there after. This is generally the agreed upon combo for this application....the rest is "an engineering problem". If the numbers indicate this is possible, I say give it a shot, not shoot it down in the absence of something better. Starship is indeed great for cargo, but even at it's conceptual incept many in the aerospace community were suggesting a third stage that could perform horizontal "gliding" landings. CDR KH
God bless the test pilots; great patriots all. When we do accomplish real space travel, monuments to these heroes should be placed on the moon and Mars. Their families should not be forgotten either, because they had to bear the loss more than any; and many never knew just what their fathers or sons were doing, often in secret. Go SpaceX. Go AstroClipper.
The purpose of Starship is to make mankind multiplanerary. Jet engines are great if your goal is just to reach earth orbit. They're completely useless if you intend your vehicle to operate on the moon and Mars as well.
My guess is that Starship will be safer. Flying thousands of launches and landings will provide more data than can be collected with a vehicle that makes so few flights. With Starship, everything that can possibly go wrong will already have gone wrong, multiple times, some of them intentionally as tests.
Almost certainly that will be the case... almost any problem can be solved with enough testing and refinement... it's when they try to build one perfect $10 billion dollar system that things go wrong... I have no doubt SpaceX can make the Starship safe and reliable.
AVIATION TRIVIA: The _Messerschmitt Me-163 Komet,_ the WWII German rocket propelled fighter aircraft shown in this video, is the *ONLY* _rocket propelled fighter aircraft_ to *EVER* be used in actual combat.
@@terranspaceacademy >>> They were used as _flying suicide bombs._ They did NOT perform air-to-air combat. They had no landing gear, and were only used _once._
@@Allan_aka_RocKITEman I guess you could take issue with the term "fought", but it does seem that they were used in combat just like you can say that a surface to air missile is used in combat. Once is all it takes to contradict phrases like "ever to be used"
The x-15 was a rocket. Not a jet. So it never used any oxygen from the earth’s atmosphere which was you original premise of why Jets are safer than rockets to get into space.
Very true but the X-15 doesn't work well without a jet... in this case a B-52 taking it up to launch altitude. The Astroclipper has a combination of engines because to get to LEO you will need more lateral velocity from the "1st" stage.
All innovation and development is always welcomed. Here's the rub. Nothing for the astro clipper exists , so that where the conversation ends. Great fictional video though.
Thank you John. The goal is to stimulate thought and consider alternatives but you are correct. I don't see them flying anything and they seem as secretive as Blue Origin...we know how that has turned out so far.
@@terranspaceacademy Blue origin is not shooting for the lofty expectations that Space X is shooting for. The New Glen will just let Bezo wet his beak and further his latest venture. Space hotels or the Reef as it was called. We are unlucky in that not many entrepreneur's are not willing to spend the amounts necessary to innovate in space travel and research and development. One thing that many people do not know is , the Current vendors who provide space fairing equipment are paid in advance of the products existence or being created. Right now Space X is exactly what we need.
Saturn 5 was safer than Starship. The Space Shuttle was safer than Starship. Nobody's going to be using Starship to launch people into space for *years.* They'll use Falcon 9. And *after* those years of Starship, we'll have a stronger sense of the risk, and more than likely it will be considered quite safe, and/or they will have developed systems that make it so.
NCC-1701 with shuttles and transporters is a much safer alternative than SpaceX's Starship but only because it is imaginary and exists only on paper and film. Just like the AstroClipper!
Ah yes. We can only discuss what has already been built therefore we can never consider building anything better than what we have because it has never been built... this type of circular reasoning would have resulted in Starship never being built...after all... it was once just paper also. How could it ever be better than the "real" SLS?
@@terranspaceacademy Sorry. Been totally spoiled by SpaceX's iterative approach to space vehicle design where hardware and software are constantly tested, evaluated, refined and either incorporated into the design or discarded as unworkable. This approach where failure is not only an option, but a valuable learning tool has completely spoiled me to other companies ( Blue Origin ) whose rockets exist only on paper or shoddy computer visualizations.
Great historic reveal on the D21, wow. I had never heard of it. The main thing that concerns me about Starship is the concept of taking a Semi Trailer to LEO when you need a pickup. So there are plenty of competitive opportunities for LEO needs. I see a slot for Exodus but the concept is simply too complex to survive scrutiny and funding by NASA. A redesign with simplicity would be interesting. Great concept but low viability.
_"The main thing that concerns me about Starship is the concept of taking a Semi Trailer to LEO when you need a pickup."_ Maybe, but you rent the semi trailer and buy the pickup which gets destroyed after the first trip. It's all about launch cost. Who cares if the rocket could actually carry 150tons if you sat weights 20 tons but this rocket is the cheapest ride?
@@3gunslingers Right but if the other rocket is developed to be a reuse as well, The cost would be lower. I love Starship and am a pathetic fan boy, but we need alternatives. If Varda or several others would develop reuse in their original design viola.
@@tekish7682 It would be nice to have a system that would cost less per flight than Starship. But Astroclipper has at least three different engine system in its first stage alone and will likely use horizontal take of which means heavy landing gear. It also features a hull that cannot be cheaply build. All this rises the development and building cost as well as the fight cost. I would be VERY surprised if that system manages to get its launch price below that of Starship, regardless of payload mass.
StareShip is going to orbit first but it is not the only possible configuration. This vehicle may never fly but it should be interesting to see if it does.
why did you mention german rocket planes that have no connection to the X-15 and the "silbervogel" which was austrian and was never even considered seriously? (They are overrated failures just like their ballistic missiles which were based on Goddard's design) Why not mention instead Antonio Ferri for example? He directly worked on the X-15 and influenced it with his designs which you can find online. He was an Italian who worked at the DSSE (basically Italy's NACA) in the ultrasonic wind tunnel and achieved faster speeds than the germans in their wind tunnels with his designs. He also worked on some projects that are still secret to this day while german projects are all known to the public, so i think we are all focusing on the wrong guys. Apart from that, good video. From what i understood the Starship will need multiple refuelings while in orbit so you could use multiple smaller rockets instead and carry the same payload with less difficulty
Thank you very much! Since I have been in the military with a high-level security clearance I try to avoid anything that might still be classified. I didn’t mean to neglect the Italian genius but wanted to focus on the Germans as they did build the first rocket planes. It is hard to accurately determine the influence of Goddard over on the V2 design but I have no doubt his work was an important factor.
@@terranspaceacademy Von Braun himself said that Goddard's work spared them many years of development, the germans were following his work and also Tsiolkovsky's. Yet Goddard is still pretty much unknown to the public, let alone Ferri! (btw there are old articles about Ferri on the Nasa website even tho they are hard to find). Italy definitely had its own pioneers and great scientists who even contributed outside of Italy (just think about Enrico Fermi), today with youtube we can give them the fame they deserve
@@MARK-gp9hb that is a very good point and a wonderful idea. Too many have contributed incredibly to the advancement of humanity but have been neglected by history. I will look in depth at Professor Ferri and see when we can work him in :-)
i like what elon musk is doing i salute him for it ..iam just not a fan of the design of starship to many things can go wrong..landing better be on a flat surface..then when you do getting down from that height if the elevator doesn't work...the wind on mars well whats gonna stop starship from falling right over ..i think mars is way in the furture ..i just think elon musk feels something bad is heading our way to me he was making escape pods .maybe 2029 apophis itll be lower then our satellite's..this astroclipper is on the right track for humans back and fourth..
Hello Jesse! Due the incredibly thin atmosphere of Mars the wind can't even knock over a balanced pencil my friend :-) I would agree that Starship is not optimized for interplanetary travel... but it is excellent at getting 100 tonnes to LEO reusable! :-)
A lot of talking, I see a starship I dont see this thing anywhere, so lets go with starship. I am sure the inovations will come once we get out there. in 10 years we will look at this as just another goofy idea from the 2020ies
We would land on one... if the FAA ever approves it... the idea is not goofy but a lot of work would need to be done to make it a reality... Starship should be flying regularly by the time this thing could actually hope to be built.
Yeah I can dream up some spaceship that will be safer than starship too. That doesn't mean anything, starship is real. These dreamlike concepts are not. It's easy to say this or that will be safer than starship, but they're just meaningless word's that have no weight to them.
The exercise is to stimulate thought and evaluate concept but your concern is valid... Like the Ariane 6 and Angora it will be obsolete before it flies...
why would you compare this vehicle to STARSHIP, when it's usefulness is completely viable for LEO? It it weren't for SN Dreamechaser, it would certainly up for consideration, maybe for the next phase of LEO Ops. the selling point of this ship is that it eases entry into space; easier than chemical rockets, not that it could do any better in space once it gets there. There's an extant niche for any vehicle that can do what Dragon does or any other small payload provider....but with a greater frequency of access. I would give them a 100 mill to flesh it out for a serious decision. certainly is cool-looking.
I'm still unclear why oh why people make things so complex. 😄 a BDB throwing a 2 stage module into a hyper ballistic trajectory, and high ISP vacuum engines for the rest. Resurrect the AJ260!!
Thank you , Terras space academy In my opinion , we dont need another old fassion space station . We need a nucleair rocket , at least 3 times the size of elon starship , whith good radiating shielding and some graffity some ours of the day to enjoy a travelling space station . Old fassion rocketfuel must not be used in space anymore , it needs to much room and at the end it is to dangerous and much to heavy . Nucleair power is a much safer powersource and can be used as many other types of enless different powersource for years of flying in space with less . In old fassion thinking , one nucleair powered spaceship is dangerous , but 10.000 nucleair weapons are not dangerous . Lol When i see elon make New Friends worldwide , i think , this is the way to prefend cold war and build a better world together by adapting and sharing new development worldwide . Elon Musk is the first time i hope a billionair will become a trillionaire as fast as possible because i believe in the next level to . Elon Musk is a power full Window to the next level , and it is open now , lets jumps outside and hear what hè can learn us without a New 30 years of cold war . It is better and more fun to build one nucleair starship together in space than have 10.000 nucleair weapons on our planet to defend old fassion against other old fassion ideas that are holding us back . I believe in a good China and i believe in a good amerika , and a good europe , i also believe , old fassion ideas are holding us back , in a dangerous state of nightmare chasing for 2000 years now . The only real , down to earth enemy , is SPACE and we have to concer it to become a free civelisation. Our planet feels like living in a fishtank full of nucleair weapons , and i dont want that , i want to learn to swim everywhere , before the fishtank breaks to preserve the live of my fishchildren in new fishtanks . Lol Lets learn to use nucleair power in a friendly way to Explore the only real enemy . One other thing , when i look at nasa and esa whith there old fassion , werner von braun , rockets , i can not understand that , it is like using a handsaw when there is a chainsaw around , and choose not to use it . Greetings from holland
Greetings! You make a number of good points. If after the fall of the Soviet Union the US had dedicated itself to advancing humanity in space instead of warmongering we would have cities on Mars by now. And only heavily shielded nuclear powered ships are truly practical for interplanetary travel.
@@terranspaceacademy Warmongering! That's ridiculous. What empire have we built? None. The US has spent the time pursuing the thugs of the world, making the planet a safer place to live. Kosovo--defending Muslims against the attempted genocide of their Eastern Orthodox neighbors. Iraq--coming to the aid of Kuwait after invasion. Afganistan-squishing the terrorist swine that bombed London and Paris among other targets, even when we were there as the best terrorist magnets on the planet. Without American "warmongering" thugs of the world would feel entirely free to rampage at will. Perhaps it's time for America to retreat inside its shell and let the world go to hell. But our obligations to friendly nations throughout the world and our interdependence with them, even including Russia and China, mean that we will have to continue "warmongering." A nation's first obligation is defense and the safety of its citizens and allies. Being too wimpy to do that means that there is no economy and there are no space programs, not even imaginary, non-existent programs like AstroClipper.
Maybe , if we could use starship for heavy lifting , to build a nucleair starship in space and if we could use astroclipper to send the astronautst , maybe we could have enough speed , and protection , for a perfect way to travel in our own starsystem . Nasa and esa are still throwing money in the trash whith old fassion rockets , seeing this it makes my head hurts like hell . In my opinion space x and China are at this moment the only serious hope of humanity , to succeed . In my opinion building one modulair nucleair rocket is at the end cheaper than many , throw away rockets . If we cant call space our New home , we never can call mars and the moon a safe home . The biggest problem , as always whith rockets , how big can we build , to big and it will not move easely , to small and we can never call it a New safe home to travel in our solarsystem . I dont know , but i hope someone will sometime . Greetings from holland
One perspective is that this whole video hinges on something that could very well work but that was not discussed in any meaningful way: Starship's landing sequence. To say that the AstroClipper is a viable alternative...would become instantly irrelevant if the Starship can be shown to stick its landings reliably. Just think about the unreliability of aircraft in the first few decades of flight. The problems were many (from the Wright Brothers to the Comet at least)...but eventually, slowly, incrementally, safety was improved. My bet is on the same general path happening with Starship. One problem with this video is that it doesn't look critically at the shortcomings of the AstroClipper. Some here have mentioned the different engine types. Another would be the matching of the AstroClipper with Starship in some sort of combination. Complex to say the least! That would go against the very wise principle of 'the best part is no part'. The combination idea, introduced so very briefly at the end of the video, compounds complexity - not to mention expense. Still, in an academy like T.S.A., it doesn't hurt to do thought experiments. I appreciate it. That rare footage was justification enough. Thanks!
Thank you for the feedback. It is very accurate to say that early airflight was extremely dangerous. Any undeveloped technology will at first be less safe than an older more developed one. Horses were much safer than automobiles, and if people have been drinking still are... that being said the AstroClipper is an airplane when it lands... that technology is well developed and the safest means of transportation humans have right now. Starship and its method of landing will one day be commonplace... but regulators must approve launching and landing humans. Elon is fighting launch his rocket with no one on board. Imagine the regulatory hurdles to launch or land with humans... to speed development. I think Starship should, at first, be launched uncrewed then dock with Dragon for crew transfer. The Dragon is already approved to take humans up and down from orbit. If AstroClipper is ever built, tested and proven safe. It too can be used to greater effect if the Starship landing is still being perfected. When Starship has proven itself safe it will carry humans to and from orbit. But waiting for that to happen before taking advantage of what's available now is... we think... a mistake.
@@terranspaceacademy The connection point is something I've never heard of from any other aerospace project, so I would be _extremely_ cautious about it. It probably wouldn't take much for AstroClipper to hit a malfunction and either fail to disengage, or tear itself apart.
@@terranspaceacademy "...taking advantage of what's available now..." is a critical point. What is needed is a follow-up video on the AstroClipper. At what stage of development is it now? This was not mentioned in the video but upon reflection it seems that favouring either the AstroClipper or Starship at this point really hinges on their respective stages of development. I look forward to a more detailed look at the current state of the AstroClipper!
Given that a turbojet-powered first stage gets you to about the same altitude and speed as max-Q on a straight rocket, it seems the tradeoff is: an extra and complex system (the jet/ramjet/rocket flying wing) versus the simplicity of many extra tons of liquid oxygen. I can see why this concept was never developed. The more interesting part is the **second** stage. I would like to see a Starship Booster first stage with an AstroClipper on top. Simplicity in launch, safety in return.
It's all about safety Mark. At every point of AstroClipper flight you can abort and come back to land... Starship does not have this function... at least not provably yet.
There was a development line over decades on this idea with the SABRE engine, which recently seems to be showing promise of working, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SABRE_(rocket_engine)
But the basic idea is, what if instead of using three different engines we manage to make it all work from a single engine design. Which obviously would vastly simplify the craft layout and weight. Admittedly it was conceived for a Single Stage To Orbit, but there really is nothing stopping you from using it in a two stage system like this either.
@@terranspaceacademy Ejection seats maybe, but if the second-stage fails to disconnect because it hit a patch or turbulence on the way up, and the locking mechanism a bit warped then you'd have serious issues.
@@terranspaceacademy None of them are proven yet. Still a lot of pudding to be made. Good to see a diverse field of dreams.
Yeah. The linear stack of a vertical rocket aligns all the forces of gravity, acceleration and aerodynamics until most of the onboard mass is expended and then it's not long before the gravity turn is offsetting normal gravity with centrifugal force. In contrast, short of any kind of aerial refueling, this maximizes stress perpendicular to the line of thrust on takeoff and shearing forces on the connection between stages especially if they try to use the second stage nose gear for takeoff (which would also make that nose gear unnecessarily heavy and cut into orbital cargo.) If they employ ram collection of atmospheric O2 to fuel the second stage and even stock the first stage while on route to it's release point then it might be doable though piggy-back still makes more sense than their configuration imo, though that would be more likely to operate near major airports than any vertically launched version.
Thanks for the D-21 footage, I'd never seen it before.
I like your nick, dude! 🤠
It was a fascinating concept. A little expensive to make a hyper sonic disposable drone though :-)
I love how other people know what Rumsfeld authorized to take out the server running hijacked software on 9-11. ;) We know.
or just made superheavy carrying a second stage equivalent of space plane. pretty sure it way safer on landing compared starship but it may not have the lifting capabilities of starship
Interesting concept... with a Superheavy Booster much is possible.
Entertaining thought experiment. Enjoyed the video as it has many facts I didn’t know. I want to see a pathfinder or prototype before believing it’s more than vapor ware.
Thank you very much. Indeed until something actually flies it’s just a pretty design.
Another excellent video. Thanks. I cannot see why the AstroClipper could not be scaled dramatically to compete with Starship's cargo carrying capacity. A bit of trivia: I think that you'll find that 'hypersonic' was defined as the speed at which diatomic molecules in the atmosphere start to dissociate. It is easier to simply say, "Mach 5 or greater."
Good point... but with everyone freaking out over hypersonic missiles it has a more recognized ring to it...
@@terranspaceacademy My thinking too
Another excellent video , thank you. This Astroclipper is very interesting.
The Artemis/Gateway/Starship airlock shuffle sounds like lots of opportunities for failure .
The issues of crew transfers in space between Earth-appropriate /Lunar-appropriate/Mars-appropriate vehicles seems to be a continuing design issue, and if history is any indicator, there really isn't one vehicle that can do it all...yet.
That's true Cliff. Until we have efficient fusion power I don't think any ship will be optimal for all of these missions.
Between the AstroClipper and Skylon, it will be interesting to see which one gets the furthest in development and if all goes well, which one works the best. Both are quite innovative but also have a history in the early days of rocket design. At the time though, the manufacturing, technology and engineering weren't quite up to the task of actually making these kind of vehicles a reality as I understand it.
Skylon is a sad joke man. They need to switch fuels but are entrenched with senior management stuck on hydrogen. They could make it work tomorrow of they switch to methane and get rid of the helium tanks.
@@rexmann1984 Yeah I get that, hence what I said.
@@rexmann1984 Why do they need to switch fuels?
@@GreyDeathVaccine hydrogen embrittlement. And the complexity of keeping hydrogen liquid. And it's volume to mass ratio.
That's a good point Rex... we might do the math on that...
There’s so many issues with this thing it’s strange they’ve made it this far
Not really... the quality of the team alone would get support. Nikola got billions for "clean" hydrogen powered trucks...
What are some of the issues...just 5 of the many you assert should do the trick. How 'bout a list? KH
@@terranspaceacademy Amen, Captain! LTCDR Hambsch
@@ritterkreutztrager Well the big one for me would be the separation point. It just doesn't look safe.
@@GoranXII Hmmm. You mean where the two stages "connect" with one another? Thank you for answering BTW
Astro clipper will never leave the computer concept stage. So many computer renderings at these companies come out with and they never get past the computer generated model.
These guys have skills and access to capital... if they want to get something done they can.
Another innovative concept needing someone with deep pockets. I wish them luck.
Very true... no bucks no Buck Rogers as they used to say... long before my time of course... Buck Who? :-)
10:32 you're welcome
Thank you??
lol can we all appreciate for a second that this man has replied to literally every single comment :O
hero
We love comments! Exchanging ideas is one of the best things about having a channel!
Best info I’ve heard No nonsense straight to the interesting stuff
Thank you Juan!
Great video and content as usual. things to think about. Thanks.
You are most welcome Sam! Thanks for watching!
Great vid again!! Time for me to become a supporter.
Thank you Andre! We really appreciate it!
That Exodus team is insane.
They are indeed impressive.
Thanks for covering the Astroclipper. Personally; I think they have it about right.
We love the concept... and this seems to be the best iteration of it.
Starship entry in the end, gave me chills!
As a bit of a thrill seeker I would personally pay extra for the swing and blast landing! :-)
Most rational analysis on this topic I’ve seen in a while thank you!
Starship is far too dangerous for landing humans. (Possibly even launching them)
I can hardly see any rationality when I look at a horizontal take-off space plane with THREE different engine types and a hull form that is impossible to manufacture cheaply.
At this point would make more sense to "just" modify Starship to land horizontally for passenger transport. That is *if* the vertical landing turns out to remain too dangerous for tourists.
Starship will collapse the second it is placed in a horizontal position on Earth... Three different engines equals increased complexity but also increased redundancy for safety.
@@terranspaceacademy
_"Starship will collapse the second it is placed in a horizontal position on Earth"_
Why? It also need to survive a reentry from interplanetary flights. The forces there are much greater.
The tanks have to be pressurized anyway to survive reentry so they can support a horizontal Starship as well. The current "balloon" tanks can (barely) support themselves already when empty. You can see that on the chopped up hulls of the RUD prototyps.
_"Three different engines equals increased complexity but also increased redundancy for safety."_
Maybe. But economy dictates a different route. Airliners don't have propeller engines as backup. They have 2-4 jet engines for redundancy (and a small jet engine for emergency electrical power). That's is very similar to Starship.
There are no systems on earth that I can think off which _have_ to use three different engine types for one trip and are ergonomically viable.
actually the procedure is still rough but it does not put a great amount of stress on the pilots
If you want to go to space for the purpose of making humanity a multi planet species there is neccesarily an element of risk
Great interesting video my friend!
Thank you!
If the Brits ever get the Skylon engines sorted, it might be a viable plan.
It would indeed be a useful ship... cost of operation would determine long-term viability but the technology developed would be worth the expense... and the UK would have its own way to get to orbit again...
Yes, a agree, starship right now appears way too dangerous for people.
Thank you!
I wouldn't easily trust my life to that thing either, the connection point looks awfully liable to failure.
None has flown with people so your statement is meaningless.
Yes, you need much less oxidizer. OTOH, jet engines have a much lower thrust-to-weight ratio than rocket engines. You also have landing gear, and structural penalties related to the shape. I prefer the advice of Jerry Pournelle: fuel is cheap, and structure is expensive. And if something goes wrong during landing, the likely landing speed means everyone will die.
Very true... the mass penalty doomed the Space Shuttle's affordability...
@@terranspaceacademy I feel like the bloated and cumbersome nature of the typical aerospace/NASA government contracting is what made the shuttle expensive. Hypothetically, SRB's should be cheap enough to overcome weight penalty. Even with it's high cost, I'm sure they would have been happy to keep operating it if it was safe and not approaching design life.
What is the ratio btwn hp and kn? How many horses in kilo-newton? I'm still trying to calculate the engine power, able to change a trajectory of 0.5 mil ton asteroid (stadium size) and move it into space. Can you help me, Chief?
The units are not directly compatible. kN is a measure of force but horsepower - as the name suggests - is a measure of power. 1 hp is the equivalent of 745.7 watts. A kilonewton of force is capable of changing the acceleration of a body of 102kg by 1 m/s^2. How much horsepower you will need will depend on the total efficiency of the engine involved in translating that power directly into thrust on the body.
Hope that helps.
We had to answer this with another viewer...
This is a very good point... the answer is simple... cheating.
Kilonewtons is a measure of force. Horsepower is a measure of work...
They are not the same.
Work and energy have the same units... Joules.
The same is true of saying "tonnes of thrust"... this statement assumes everyone knows we mean "on Earth"... dividing by 9.807m/s^2.
These are simplifications to aid understanding but can cause confusion and should probably be avoided.
.. I have also said kg per square meter for pressure... this is always wrong. Pounds per square inch is a valid measure of pressure because pounds are a measure of weight... kilograms are a measure of mass. To get mass from pounds we go to slugs... and nobody likes slugs... :-)
@@terranspaceacademy & Mr. Khurazi -- Thanks a lot, gentlemen, for explanation that I've asked to compare 2 different physics departments. I understand it now!
Interesting but if they need a safer human transport to meet up with starship they will probably just use falcon 9.
That is very true Wesley... They absolutely should right off the bat and until something larger is proven safe and reliable.
You had me rolling over laughing at the 2:20 mark... "Y the F Dad" on Elon's son's A-12 name. I think Moon Zapa had that same discussion with her dad too!!! I also love the rest of the video and concept ECC has on a hybrid rocket plane concept. Thanks for sharing that rare D-12 footage, never seen that, Talk about a scary drop until the crew could get out... Sad to hear one didn't make it. While in AFG, I had the chance to work with a former U2 pilot, and he shared some interesting stories of his missions, etc... A very unique and brave group of skilled pilots for those types of missions. My hat is off to them. Keep up the great work on these topics and videos...
We do indeed need those high adrenaline seeking explorers that nap on roller coasters and do things the rest of us cannot imagine.
Thank you sir for the program just awesome🔧🚀🇺🇸🌍
Thank you very much Jay :-)
Great video!
The Astroclipper is a great complement to Starship (really anything is) or on its own.
I still think it comes down to the Raptor engines and how efficient and reliably they can operate. The maneuvers of Starship aren’t that crazy it’s the reliability of the engines and supporting systems.
Eventually, liquid powered engines will be a thing of the past so we’ll take what we can get…for now.
Very true!
All you need is a superheavy airship (stage 0.5) to tug the first stage 5 miles up at 5 mph. Then launch.
I like it! Super SpaceRyde!
nice idea. Still no info on safety vs Starship - which is just a prototype.
That's true Brian... the goal is to get people thinking of alternatives so we don't stay in the box.
Starship is at least a prototype, this is just a set of fancy graphics.
Cool whatever safer keep moving FORWARD
Always forward Paul :-)
Basically this astroclipper has 4 different types of engine, thus 4 different types of possible failure... It's way to complex to be economically and safely use and more important to maintain as the maintenance will involve so different tech... and that just for the engines, not even speaking about the different consoles, controls, redundancy of critical components, and so.
We disagree... this astroclipper has four different types of engines... four different means of saving itself in case of a failure... it is not significantly more complex than other aircraft that have flown. Airplanes have flown with nuclear reactors and rocket engines in the past. With fly by wire and automated systems a human being won't be deciding when to go from turbojet to ramjet to rocket and back... the Astroclipper will...
@@terranspaceacademy The connection is a single point of failure.
A little old at 72, but still a dream for me to see humans off to another planet..
Easily possible John! No motorcycles or skydiving though :-)
You talk about astroclipper (or dragon) being used to ferry people to Starship in orbit for deep space missions. I really think starship is not the best option for long haul space travel. Maybe to land on the moon (since that requires propulsive landing) but mars is really far. Starship's real advantage is cheap launch cost. It will be amazing for cargo (or launching but not landing people). What is needed for Mars trips is a dedicated cruise liner type spaceship, which never lands anywhere. Basically a spacestation which can be boosted from Earth to Mars orbit and back. Or a large cycler which can be intercepted by a small ship, with seating but no other facilities. You need good facilities and shielding for a long trip to Mars.
Before people can realistically colonise Mars a lot more infrastructure is needed in space. Launching something carrying people directly from Earth to the Moon makes sense to me. But not any further.
Edit: grammer
Starship's real advantage is cheap launch cost AND that it makes any additional transport system between earth and mars (and anything in between) obsolete.
Why build some additional system that costs additional money in development instead of using what you already have?
There is about no financial incentive to develop a "cruise liner" for flight between planets until there are millions of people on either planet. Because who would pay for it?
@@3gunslingers The 1 million colonists. 100 people per starship would mean 10,000 starship trips. Sounds like a lot of money.
I think we will quickly have nuclear thermal or nuclear electric Starships for Mars and deep space operations.
We need the Astrocruiser!! An NTR Aldrin Cycler that holds up to 2,000 colonists...
@@terranspaceacademy Really? I'm never optimistic about things coming quickly. I'm sure we will get nuclear propulsion. But quickly?
What would be the characteristics of a spaceplane capable of landing on Mars? With a surface pressure of 0.6 % of that of the earth, this is around 33,000 m equivalent. What would the shape of such a modification be? The U2 was capable of some control at 400 knots and a little below that altitude - what dimensions of a wing would be required?
You would need a lighter than air... is it still called air on Mars?... craft... a massive very light flying wing... I'll see if anyone has done the math.
The dream is alive and in stealth mode. Many of the advantages are not patented so the video is only part of the story. There is development work by small tams still ongoing. Good to see intereste is still fresh. Stay tuned!
Thank you David! Have you heard of DarkStar?
@@terranspaceacademy Only a LM drone from 1996.
winged aircraft crash far to often, one of the space shuttles brock up on re-entry. the point is that when failure occurs wings are not safer by default, the safety of any system is not the type, but the design of that system, winged or not
We disagree Don. A Starship can never have an unpowered landing... and aircraft can... this alone makes it inherently safer. Though Starship may prove itself to be safer in operation.
@@terranspaceacademy yes we do disagree. flight controls fail plane crashes, rocket engine fails rocket crashes, heat shield fails both crash. you can "what if" anything, like what if on the Vergin Galactic ship the thing will not feather at the parabola, or will not return in atmosphere.
the advantage to the Astro Clipper is fuel consumption, pollution, and launch/landing locations, far more versatile. don't get me wrong, I would love to see this in the sky, sooner rather then later
@@dunsel5887 You're assuming a disaster on re-entry, but I'd be expecting more disasters between take-off and separation than any time after separation. That connection just looks terribly dangerous.
@@GoranXII the one thing I like about the Delta Clipper, single stage to orbit. but I would prefer full re-tanking in orbit, and a long de-orbit burn from mock 25 down to mock 5 and drop altitude to 60-70 miles
@@dunsel5887 Hey, I'm not complaining about the Delta Clipper, that looks like a reasonably solid design. I'm just extremely cautious about the promises made by the AstroClipper team. That separation mechanism looks, to me, like a disaster waiting to happen.
What's the name of the music in the end?
Parzival by Willian Rosati :-)
The SR71 had Boron in suspension in the JP7 fuel it burned, one Boron atom can hold what? Something like 7 oxygen atoms? Like many other details in the old tech, it's easy to miss the possibility there was an oxidizer enriched fuel being used by these planes... even though there was a clever trick of having both the fuel and some oxidizer both mixed and being held in the same tank being used... professor, do you know if there is any chance of using browns gas, or other clever means of storing both a viable fuel and oxidizer mix in a single tank or compartment in liquid or gas form that could make things simpler for a space plane? The Long March uses a solid propellant, but I don't know if the fuel and oxidizer is all mixed in one place... it would seem more convenient for a reusable vehicle to use a liquid fuel, I don't know if there's enough fuel density possible for a compressed gas like browns gas to be used, or if it would or could be formulated to remain separate hydrogen and oxygen components in the same tank if it was compressed or condensed to a liquid form.... But the SR71 family of planes is still an incredible engineering marvel all packed into each plane, even by today's standards...
Thank you for the feedback Scott! The SR-71 was indeed astounding... not just for its time but even today. The boron issue is very important to consider. I would suspect that there are other similar technologies that have continued in development... Something is running around at high altitudes and velocities over the US. We have been looking at other fuel/oxygen options that would be more concentrated and allow better performance. Right now I think the hybrid option has the best potential to realize this concept.
One is a pipe dream and the other is ready for a test flight to orbit....
Actually its a learning exercise...
NASA wanted "hot structure" spaceceaft badly back then. Tiles are problematic.
They are indeed... I'm wondering about this new paint that reflects almost all wavelengths of light almost perfectly... heating on reentry is mainly due to the heat lamp effect...
This is a stupid question and before you say it, yes there are. Why do we accept the pull of gravity on re-entry? Must we? Can we not fight back by slowing before we hit atmo. Is the speed necessary? Could we not fire thrusters u[on entry (assuming enough fuel) and minimize the heating? Very basic answers I'm sure. Thanks in advance.
To counteract the velocity we have accumulated would require the same amount of fuel that got us up to orbital speeds... that's not feasible due to the tyranny of the rocket equation... until we have fusion... then we will gently reenter without heat shields like the shuttles do on Star Trek :-)
It's not about altitude. It's about speed.
17000km/h for orbital velocity.
Most of the speed is accomplished by the second stage after separation at about 60 to 80km... not by the first stage...
@@terranspaceacademy and this needs a lot of propellant. And more propellant to accelerate this propellant and so on. The rocket equation.
I have thought about this. The problem I hit is say look at the Boeing 747. 30% of its starting mass with max fuel and payload is structure and engines. Something like the Astroclipper with its variety of engines to get above the atmosphere and extra structure to hold its wing shape with pressurized cryogenic propellant plus heat shielding and ability to withstand the stresses of launch with an airplane shape will probably be more like 50% structure and engines, making it just too heavy. In contrast Starship will be like 5% structure and engines as it is a pressurized soda can, which is rather ideal for launch loads, with just one set of highly advanced and amazingly compact rocket engines to do the job. Jet engines are just not compact nor light for the job they do, especially at altitude. Ramjets do better, but this is still an extra set of engines just for one small part of the first stage flight. Then rocket engines have to be on the first stage to get high enough for a safe separation, but for the rest of the flight is just dead weight, plus the pressurized propellant tanks squished into a wing shape is no where near as mass efficient as the pressurized soda can shape of Starship.
I had an idea of how to make things better. What you do, especially if you are going to use tanker Starship, is build a giant inflatable tower to launch Starship from. The reason an inflatable tower is better than a solid tower is high tensile strength materials can work with air pressure to go up really high where stacking material up, like say a traditional building, breaks down before any appreciable height is reached. While an inflatable tower cannot directly impart speed, starting higher up allows the rocket engines to throttle up more as you don't have to slow down as much or at all for max-q. So then you build the rockets with maximum engines in mind running at full throttle all the way to orbit, reducing hang time and reducing atmospheric drag. Rocket engines are also more efficient at altitude, developing more thrust and more ISP. So yeah, just starting higher up, say 20 km up, would make the rocket a lot more efficient and greatly increase its capacity to orbit.
With NASA's plan to use 4 astronauts for the initial Moon landings, Starship will likely complete its tasks and non professionals will also go up and live. Then there will be pressure on NASA to ditch things like the SLS and just have their people take the whole ride on Starship as SLS is crazy expensive. This may not happen until the late 2020's, so something like the Astroclipper, even if the concept could work, would take a number of years to get a crew rating. By then Starship will have that rating by reputable outfits such as NASA.
very interesting... look up the lenticular reentry device and the hydrogen balloons that were to carry it to altitude...
At this point it would be far easier to modify Starship to land horizontally that to develop a first stage with THREE different engine systems and a difficult to build flying wing design.
Starship horizontal?? You would have to start over... and it would look nothing like Starship. These other systems will be developed over time... SpaceShipTwo is flying already... sometimes... with more deltaV and some thermal tiles it could work like AstroClipper.
@@terranspaceacademy
Sure, Starship would need slightly bigger wings and landing skits.
But it would look not too much different from now. If Starship can survive an aerodynamic entry on Mars, it is solid enough to survive a horizontal landing on earth.
It would only need a L/D ratio similar to the Boeing X-37. Since Starship is basically a hollow tube at landing it can get away with very little additional aerodynamic surface area. So the wings would be smaller relative to the wings of the X-37
The engine skirt should be sturdy enough to take in forces of the rear skits and the forward dome is already in a good place to support the forward skit. Maybe a little reinforcement of the hull is necessary there. All skits would need doors like the wheels on the space shuttle.
But wheels are no good here. They are too heat-sensitive (Starship is a hot structure reentry vehicle) and too expensive. Solid wood should do the job just fine. Its cheap enough to be replace after every flight. Or maybe the material braking-pads are made out of.
Can't help but think you could simplify the design quite a bit if the SABRE engine worked and you replace those three different engines with a singular one instead. But I will admit, it's not actually a fully running engine right now, so you can't really make something right now from it, unless you had plenty of R&D money to rapidly push it to completion.
It would indeed and in some ways is a better design... the mass savings would be considerable.
Could this concept be used as a refueling tanker?
That's a good question... we think the best refueling tanker would be an SHB SSTO refueled with Starships... 3400 tonnes in LEO... 17 lauches though :-)
That is an ok concept but I don't see anyone doing it. Actually, the idea of nuclear powered rockets (nuclear heat + hydrogen propellant) sounds like a winner to me. These would be very inexpensive to fly and re-fly and land. The Starship landings do look kinda terrifying. However, imagine if they had just put some legs with a good big of travel of them, to absorb the shock of a hard landing. And, imagine if the human occupied portion up-top had blast isolation and heat shielding. I think it could land in pretty rough situations and even crash and people would survive. I would put people in capsules, like Japanese capsule hotels, as their rooms but suited up and strapped down in them for launch and landing. I'd also make the capsules computer-controlled magnetically levitated. That way, they'd have maximum survivability and comfort.
That sounds very interesting!
love the hacked up EvE Rifter Frigate on the intro, what mmo did that come off?
I'll see who the artist was and get back to you...
But what if the AstroClipper is used to get passengers to a starship ready in orbit, and the starship take the passengers to mars and lands there
That would be the only effective way to do it.
I'm surprised you didn't mention Reaction Engines' Sabre air-breathing hybrid rocket engine.
Lesson upcoming... must prevent spoilers :-)
Two episodes on Space planes back to back? Is it my birthday? Seriously though, it's sad that details about this thing are so few and far between, we don't even know if Exodus still exists or if they're working on it. The overall idea makes a lot of sense, to the point where I'm wondering why no one else seems to be working on something similar
It's certainly still around... every space company needs a motivated and inspiring leader to keep it focused on the end result.
As much as I want Starship to work for passengers, you make a very good argument. SpaceX is extremely bold and has made amazing progress. It's hard not to get excited about their plans.
SpaceX seems to be in the business of turning science fiction into science reality. I wouldn't be surprised if they presented plans to produce a Stargate!
Thank you for your feedback! We agree that they are making great progress! One crash of a Starship with humans on board will bring all the detractors out in force... why risk it when there are viable alternatives? As for a Stargat... that would be so awesome! Have to get past the negative energy thing first though... gives me headaches thinking about it :-)
How do you calculate the equivalency between KN and HP? It is my understanding that machines that propel with flow are difficult to accurately measure with units of mainly mechanical power (jet engines Vs piston engines) and that's why jets and rockets are measured in thrust while the turbopump of the same rocket is measured in HP
This is a very good point... the answer is simple... cheating. kilonewtons is a measure of force. Horsepower is a measure of work... Work and energy have the same units... Joules.
The same is true of saying "tonnes of thrust"... this statement assumes everyone knows we mean "on Earth"... dividing by 9.807m/s^2.
These are simplifications to aid understanding but can cause confusion and should probably be avoided.
.. I have also said kg per square meter for pressure... this is always wrong. Pounds per square inch is a valid measure of pressure because pounds are a measure of weight... kilograms are a measure of mass. To get mass from pounds we go to slugs... and nobody likes slugs... :-)
I agree that Dragon sized capsules are often more practical for moving people than these giant ships!
Could the Astroclipper upper stage land and launch anywhere but earth I wonder?
I think Starship doesn't need to safely launch or land humans to be successful.
In fact I'd say only certain Starships need a heat-shield and gimbaled engines personally, like the tankers..
The bulk of them could be left in space once they're there.
I see no point in launching a Starship from the surface of Mars, unless its got hundreds of tons of rock samples on it.
I think Starship plus Dragon 2 could handle most tasks - build an Aldrin Cycler out of a bunch of Starships and you can do even more.. :)
A similar design would probably work well on Titan but almost everywhere else there just isn't enough air for aerodynamics :-)
The safety record of lifting bodies is not quite as good as regular aircraft.
That's very true Calvin... but with further development maybe?
Where are the aerospike engines?
Working on that :-)
if you shorten Exodus Space, it could be wriiten xSpace. Sound familiar?
Oooohhh.... interesting...
Entertaining, how much could it carries? there isn't air in space.
It uses rocket past the Karman line... actually long before the Karman line :-)
I really like the thought of having Starbase 2 and Starbase 3. Being 36, I hope that my age doesn't put it out of reach for my lifetime
You will see Starbase 2 and possibly have the chance to go their I have no doubt... whether it is Starbase Two, Starbase Er, or Starbase Dva remains to be seen :-)
Now this is an awesome space plane!!!! Is it being developed? has anything been tested. I prefer this project because it seems the gents involved are not "nutty" meglamaniacs, instead they just want to explore space. Good looking machine. Very modern and much safer....👍
We like it too for those same reasons... these guys are serious... and have the skills.
@@terranspaceacademy I love it. Good professional video btw! Been a Space vehicle fan since the early 70's. I have my fingers crossed.🙂
A very compelling case. Crew safety is always paramount and a plane, even an unpowered glider, will always be statistically safer on landing than a retropropulsive rocket. Please continue to insert logic into the space discussion. It might just catch on!
Thank you! Our sentiments exactly!
I wouldn't call that connection safe, not without _a lot_ of testing.
The stratolaunch is a working aircraft that can carry a 250 ton craft to about 35,000 feet. Why not build a super sonic, reusable, 2 stage shuttle that can launch from the stratolaunch. This would be very similar to the Astro Clipper only it would stage from stratolaunch instead of creating the biggest aircraft ever (which the stratolaunch already is).
Sorry, I had to correct my numbers but my point is still valid.
Stratolaunch is slow. Its just to gain some altitude before the rocket takes off ,be less likely to be grounded for weather and allow take off from more area than a ground launch platform.
I loved Statolaunch... it is a thing of beauty... a high specific impulse spaceplane with scramjets and rockets would be a viable option with this amazing first stage plane.
@@terranspaceacademy 250 tons is a good size spaceplane. If Stratolaunch can get this much payload to 35,000 feet, then a scramjet should be able to carry a plane above 100,000+ feet to maybe mach 6-8 before Rocket engines need to take over. A space plane wouldn't need normal jet engines if launched from this altitude. The rockets could fire for a few seconds to get the craft above mach 1 then let the scramjets take over until they no longer function and then switch back to the rockets. This would require a very robust rocket engine but engines like this do exist (Perhaps a single Raptor Vac Engine engine would do the trick). As I'm sure you are aware, ram or scramjets don't work until past the sound barrier. I bet a craft of this sort could get 20ish tons to orbit. If the heat shield is done correctly, this craft could fly several times a week. Perhaps follow the SpaceX way and build it out of 304L stainless to help with aero heating, or at least just the belly and leading edges.
If the Scramjet could be modified to run on Methane then both the Raptor and Scramjets could share the same fuel.
I like the concept makes sense but is this a wing and a prayer or is it actually happening. I hope it is
We've reached out to the company and they don't seem to want to talk. Either they have plenty of money and are working secretively or they have no resources and don't want to draw attention to it.
Starship is a different class and honestly can't compare the 2 one isn't necessarily better than the other and one of them is actually in development and breaking records in mankind's history everyday
Our point was that one is better for cargo... the other is better for personnel transport.
Mm, it'd be nice if it worked, but that separation point looks like a _massive_ weak-spot to me.
It will indeed be an issue... the first stage is still under thrust... a separation and collision is the main danger...
@@terranspaceacademy Actually, I'd be more concerned about an asymmetry of lift causing the second stage to bend either up or down, damaging the release mechanism.
Makes good sense, safety first lol , but seriously it would be a bad day if something happened during the belly flopping maneuver , very bad for space flight
Very true... we'll have to expect some interesting landings until it gets perfected...
Methinks you are looking at more effeicant use of 100 tons and 39,000 cu ft
Always look to improve efficiency :-)
How many Dreamchasers would fit( and they would have built in escape systems) The image is foggy but comming into focus. lol
Astroclipper is e beautyfull way for a few astronauts .
For heavy lifting and the moon and mars , starship is the only way
We agree...
Concord cruised at 60,000 wit a full load of paying civilians. And that flew in 1969. Is it really such a big step?
Very true... the technology has been there for quite a while...
Without knowing the numbers I'd hold back on any criticism. Materials science is in exponential mode as we speak and the appropriate light weight and strong materials could very well make this concept possible. To argue one way or the other in the absence of facts (not knowing the numbers) is wasteful. SSTurbojet-rocket engines first, then ramjet to 6.5 Mach and then rocket there after. This is generally the agreed upon combo for this application....the rest is "an engineering problem". If the numbers indicate this is possible, I say give it a shot, not shoot it down in the absence of something better. Starship is indeed great for cargo, but even at it's conceptual incept many in the aerospace community were suggesting a third stage that could perform horizontal "gliding" landings. CDR KH
We have to agree... on all points... it would definitely be a viable consideration.
God bless the test pilots; great patriots all. When we do accomplish real space travel, monuments to these heroes should be placed on the moon and Mars. Their families should not be forgotten either, because they had to bear the loss more than any; and many never knew just what their fathers or sons were doing, often in secret. Go SpaceX. Go AstroClipper.
Truly... their names are rarely known but the knowledge they help give us will be eternal.
Gee another CGI that doesn't fly and costs billions.....I suppose the 'safety' rests in the fact it never flies.
The BO motto... if you don't fly you can't die! Works every time...
The purpose of Starship is to make mankind multiplanerary. Jet engines are great if your goal is just to reach earth orbit. They're completely useless if you intend your vehicle to operate on the moon and Mars as well.
That’s very true. And proves the point that an AstroClipper would be better on Earth while Starship is optimized for a different purpose.
"We'll forgive him for Boeing." 😄
...we must be merciful... he can reform I have no doubt :-)
All this sound great we know where Starship is but where is Astro Clipper
On the drawing board...
My guess is that Starship will be safer. Flying thousands of launches and landings will provide more data than can be collected with a vehicle that makes so few flights. With Starship, everything that can possibly go wrong will already have gone wrong, multiple times, some of them intentionally as tests.
Almost certainly that will be the case... almost any problem can be solved with enough testing and refinement... it's when they try to build one perfect $10 billion dollar system that things go wrong... I have no doubt SpaceX can make the Starship safe and reliable.
AVIATION TRIVIA: The _Messerschmitt Me-163 Komet,_ the WWII German rocket propelled fighter aircraft shown in this video, is the *ONLY* _rocket propelled fighter aircraft_ to *EVER* be used in actual combat.
Look up the Japanese rocket planes my friend :-)
They flew... and fought.
Yokosuka MXY-7
Ohka "Cherry Blossom"
@@terranspaceacademy >>> They were used as _flying suicide bombs._ They did NOT perform air-to-air combat. They had no landing gear, and were only used _once._
@@Allan_aka_RocKITEman I guess you could take issue with the term "fought", but it does seem that they were used in combat just like you can say that a surface to air missile is used in combat. Once is all it takes to contradict phrases like "ever to be used"
The x-15 was a rocket. Not a jet. So it never used any oxygen from the earth’s atmosphere which was you original premise of why Jets are safer than rockets to get into space.
Very true but the X-15 doesn't work well without a jet... in this case a B-52 taking it up to launch altitude. The Astroclipper has a combination of engines because to get to LEO you will need more lateral velocity from the "1st" stage.
@@terranspaceacademy I see what you’re saying now. So kudos then to Virgin Galactic for taking that same approach!
All innovation and development is always welcomed. Here's the rub. Nothing for the astro clipper exists , so that where the conversation ends. Great fictional video though.
Thank you John. The goal is to stimulate thought and consider alternatives but you are correct. I don't see them flying anything and they seem as secretive as Blue Origin...we know how that has turned out so far.
@@terranspaceacademy Blue origin is not shooting for the lofty expectations that Space X is shooting for. The New Glen will just let Bezo wet his beak and further his latest venture. Space hotels or the Reef as it was called. We are unlucky in that not many entrepreneur's are not willing to spend the amounts necessary to innovate in space travel and research and development. One thing that many people do not know is , the Current vendors who provide space fairing equipment are paid in advance of the products existence or being created. Right now Space X is exactly what we need.
Saturn 5 was safer than Starship. The Space Shuttle was safer than Starship. Nobody's going to be using Starship to launch people into space for *years.* They'll use Falcon 9. And *after* those years of Starship, we'll have a stronger sense of the risk, and more than likely it will be considered quite safe, and/or they will have developed systems that make it so.
We agree in principle except for launching people to orbit... I think SpaceX will work that out... it's the landing that will be the most difficult.
Since no Starship has been launched on any mission yet, you have zero evidence.
Turn starship into a Burt Rutan spaceship 1 concept.
Have you ever seen a Beechcraft Starship? A thing of beauty... I want to fly one into space!
I don't know, I really think it's not gonna take off.
Probably not... I don't see that they have the resources but they are quite secretive so no one is sure.
@@terranspaceacademy yeah
the answer is: all space programs of all goverments of the past was only a secondary product of nuclear weapon delivey systems.
Pretty much... that's what paid for it.
NCC-1701 with shuttles and transporters is a much safer alternative than SpaceX's Starship but only because it is imaginary and exists only on paper and film. Just like the AstroClipper!
Ah yes. We can only discuss what has already been built therefore we can never consider building anything better than what we have because it has never been built... this type of circular reasoning would have resulted in Starship never being built...after all... it was once just paper also. How could it ever be better than the "real" SLS?
@@terranspaceacademy Sorry. Been totally spoiled by SpaceX's iterative approach to space vehicle design where hardware and software are constantly tested, evaluated, refined and either incorporated into the design or discarded as unworkable. This approach where failure is not only an option, but a valuable learning tool has completely spoiled me to other companies ( Blue Origin ) whose rockets exist only on paper or shoddy computer visualizations.
Sure, build it
Love to! Just a few hundred million short on funds...
Great historic reveal on the D21, wow. I had never heard of it. The main thing that concerns me about Starship is the concept of taking a Semi Trailer to LEO when you need a pickup. So there are plenty of competitive opportunities for LEO needs. I see a slot for Exodus but the concept is simply too complex to survive scrutiny and funding by NASA. A redesign with simplicity would be interesting. Great concept but low viability.
_"The main thing that concerns me about Starship is the concept of taking a Semi Trailer to LEO when you need a pickup."_
Maybe, but you rent the semi trailer and buy the pickup which gets destroyed after the first trip.
It's all about launch cost. Who cares if the rocket could actually carry 150tons if you sat weights 20 tons but this rocket is the cheapest ride?
Good point...
Thank you Tekish... it would indeed need a lot of development.
@@3gunslingers Right but if the other rocket is developed to be a reuse as well, The cost would be lower. I love Starship and am a pathetic fan boy, but we need alternatives. If Varda or several others would develop reuse in their original design viola.
@@tekish7682
It would be nice to have a system that would cost less per flight than Starship.
But Astroclipper has at least three different engine system in its first stage alone and will likely use horizontal take of which means heavy landing gear. It also features a hull that cannot be cheaply build.
All this rises the development and building cost as well as the fight cost.
I would be VERY surprised if that system manages to get its launch price below that of Starship, regardless of payload mass.
It will be safer than starship because it's never going too exist.
StareShip is going to orbit first but it is not the only possible configuration. This vehicle may never fly but it should be interesting to see if it does.
It already does
Quite salty of you there Mr. Fox :-)
It would indeed Dean.
AstroClipper?? where?
why did you mention german rocket planes that have no connection to the X-15 and the "silbervogel" which was austrian and was never even considered seriously? (They are overrated failures just like their ballistic missiles which were based on Goddard's design)
Why not mention instead Antonio Ferri for example? He directly worked on the X-15 and influenced it with his designs which you can find online. He was an Italian who worked at the DSSE (basically Italy's NACA) in the ultrasonic wind tunnel and achieved faster speeds than the germans in their wind tunnels with his designs.
He also worked on some projects that are still secret to this day while german projects are all known to the public, so i think we are all focusing on the wrong guys.
Apart from that, good video.
From what i understood the Starship will need multiple refuelings while in orbit so you could use multiple smaller rockets instead and carry the same payload with less difficulty
Thank you very much! Since I have been in the military with a high-level security clearance I try to avoid anything that might still be classified. I didn’t mean to neglect the Italian genius but wanted to focus on the Germans as they did build the first rocket planes. It is hard to accurately determine the influence of Goddard over on the V2 design but I have no doubt his work was an important factor.
@@terranspaceacademy Von Braun himself said that Goddard's work spared them many years of development, the germans were following his work and also Tsiolkovsky's.
Yet Goddard is still pretty much unknown to the public, let alone Ferri! (btw there are old articles about Ferri on the Nasa website even tho they are hard to find).
Italy definitely had its own pioneers and great scientists who even contributed outside of Italy (just think about Enrico Fermi), today with youtube we can give them the fame they deserve
@@MARK-gp9hb that is a very good point and a wonderful idea. Too many have contributed incredibly to the advancement of humanity but have been neglected by history. I will look in depth at Professor Ferri and see when we can work him in :-)
i like what elon musk is doing i salute him for it ..iam just not a fan of the design of starship to many things can go wrong..landing better be on a flat surface..then when you do getting down from that height if the elevator doesn't work...the wind on mars well whats gonna stop starship from falling right over ..i think mars is way in the furture ..i just think elon musk feels something bad is heading our way to me he was making escape pods .maybe 2029 apophis itll be lower then our satellite's..this astroclipper is on the right track for humans back and fourth..
Hello Jesse! Due the incredibly thin atmosphere of Mars the wind can't even knock over a balanced pencil my friend :-)
I would agree that Starship is not optimized for interplanetary travel... but it is excellent at getting 100 tonnes to LEO reusable! :-)
A lot of talking, I see a starship I dont see this thing anywhere, so lets go with starship. I am sure the inovations will come once we get out there. in 10 years we will look at this as just another goofy idea from the 2020ies
We would land on one... if the FAA ever approves it... the idea is not goofy but a lot of work would need to be done to make it a reality... Starship should be flying regularly by the time this thing could actually hope to be built.
Yeah I can dream up some spaceship that will be safer than starship too. That doesn't mean anything, starship is real. These dreamlike concepts are not. It's easy to say this or that will be safer than starship, but they're just meaningless word's that have no weight to them.
The exercise is to stimulate thought and evaluate concept but your concern is valid... Like the Ariane 6 and Angora it will be obsolete before it flies...
Projects like that are simply not worth the fuel.
We must disagree... Transporting people safely to LEO will be worth the fuel...
@@terranspaceacademy Yes ... but not with Starship. :-)
why would you compare this vehicle to STARSHIP, when it's usefulness is completely viable for LEO? It it weren't for SN Dreamechaser, it would certainly up for consideration, maybe for the next phase of LEO Ops.
the selling point of this ship is that it eases entry into space; easier than chemical rockets, not that it could do any better in space once it gets there. There's an extant niche for any vehicle that can do what Dragon does or any other small payload provider....but with a greater frequency of access. I would give them a 100 mill to flesh it out for a serious decision.
certainly is cool-looking.
It's not for space though... just a safer way to get people to LEO :-)
I'm still unclear why oh why people make things so complex. 😄 a BDB throwing a 2 stage module into a hyper ballistic trajectory, and high ISP vacuum engines for the rest. Resurrect the AJ260!!
Thank you Timothy. You will love the next lesson... :-)
i don't see this happening
Probably not but it would be cool...
Thank you , Terras space academy
In my opinion , we dont need another old fassion space station .
We need a nucleair rocket , at least 3 times the size of elon starship , whith good radiating shielding and some graffity some ours of the day to enjoy a travelling space station .
Old fassion rocketfuel must not be used in space anymore , it needs to much room and at the end it is to dangerous and much to heavy .
Nucleair power is a much safer powersource and can be used as many other types of enless different powersource for years of flying in space with less .
In old fassion thinking , one nucleair powered spaceship is dangerous , but 10.000 nucleair weapons are not dangerous . Lol
When i see elon make New Friends worldwide , i think , this is the way to prefend cold war and build a better world together by adapting and sharing new development worldwide .
Elon Musk is the first time i hope a billionair will become a trillionaire as fast as possible because i believe in the next level to .
Elon Musk is a power full Window to the next level , and it is open now , lets jumps outside and hear what hè can learn us without a New 30 years of cold war .
It is better and more fun to build one nucleair starship together in space than have 10.000 nucleair weapons on our planet to defend old fassion against other old fassion ideas that are holding us back .
I believe in a good China and i believe in a good amerika , and a good europe , i also believe , old fassion ideas are holding us back , in a dangerous state of nightmare chasing for 2000 years now .
The only real , down to earth enemy , is SPACE and we have to concer it to become a free civelisation.
Our planet feels like living in a fishtank full of nucleair weapons , and i dont want that , i want to learn to swim everywhere , before the fishtank breaks to preserve the live of my fishchildren in new fishtanks . Lol
Lets learn to use nucleair power in a friendly way to Explore the only real enemy .
One other thing , when i look at nasa and esa whith there old fassion , werner von braun , rockets , i can not understand that , it is like using a handsaw when there is a chainsaw around , and choose not to use it .
Greetings from holland
Greetings! You make a number of good points. If after the fall of the Soviet Union the US had dedicated itself to advancing humanity in space instead of warmongering we would have cities on Mars by now. And only heavily shielded nuclear powered ships are truly practical for interplanetary travel.
@@terranspaceacademy Warmongering! That's ridiculous. What empire have we built? None. The US has spent the time pursuing the thugs of the world, making the planet a safer place to live. Kosovo--defending Muslims against the attempted genocide of their Eastern Orthodox neighbors. Iraq--coming to the aid of Kuwait after invasion. Afganistan-squishing the terrorist swine that bombed London and Paris among other targets, even when we were there as the best terrorist magnets on the planet.
Without American "warmongering" thugs of the world would feel entirely free to rampage at will. Perhaps it's time for America to retreat inside its shell and let the world go to hell. But our obligations to friendly nations throughout the world and our interdependence with them, even including Russia and China, mean that we will have to continue "warmongering."
A nation's first obligation is defense and the safety of its citizens and allies. Being too wimpy to do that means that there is no economy and there are no space programs, not even imaginary, non-existent programs like AstroClipper.
Maybe , if we could use starship for heavy lifting , to build a nucleair starship in space and if we could use astroclipper to send the astronautst , maybe we could have enough speed , and protection , for a perfect way to travel in our own starsystem .
Nasa and esa are still throwing money in the trash whith old fassion rockets , seeing this it makes my head hurts like hell .
In my opinion space x and China are at this moment the only serious hope of humanity , to succeed .
In my opinion building one modulair nucleair rocket is at the end cheaper than many , throw away rockets .
If we cant call space our New home , we never can call mars and the moon a safe home .
The biggest problem , as always whith rockets , how big can we build , to big and it will not move easely , to small and we can never call it a New safe home to travel in our solarsystem .
I dont know , but i hope someone will sometime .
Greetings from holland
That is exactly what would be an excellent plan. It breaks my heart also to see so much wasted when it could be put to much better use.
One perspective is that this whole video hinges on something that could very well work but that was not discussed in any meaningful way: Starship's landing sequence. To say that the AstroClipper is a viable alternative...would become instantly irrelevant if the Starship can be shown to stick its landings reliably. Just think about the unreliability of aircraft in the first few decades of flight. The problems were many (from the Wright Brothers to the Comet at least)...but eventually, slowly, incrementally, safety was improved. My bet is on the same general path happening with Starship. One problem with this video is that it doesn't look critically at the shortcomings of the AstroClipper. Some here have mentioned the different engine types. Another would be the matching of the AstroClipper with Starship in some sort of combination. Complex to say the least! That would go against the very wise principle of 'the best part is no part'. The combination idea, introduced so very briefly at the end of the video, compounds complexity - not to mention expense.
Still, in an academy like T.S.A., it doesn't hurt to do thought experiments. I appreciate it. That rare footage was justification enough. Thanks!
Thank you for the feedback. It is very accurate to say that early airflight was extremely dangerous. Any undeveloped technology will at first be less safe than an older more developed one. Horses were much safer than automobiles, and if people have been drinking still are... that being said the AstroClipper is an airplane when it lands... that technology is well developed and the safest means of transportation humans have right now. Starship and its method of landing will one day be commonplace... but regulators must approve launching and landing humans. Elon is fighting launch his rocket with no one on board. Imagine the regulatory hurdles to launch or land with humans... to speed development. I think Starship should, at first, be launched uncrewed then dock with Dragon for crew transfer. The Dragon is already approved to take humans up and down from orbit. If AstroClipper is ever built, tested and proven safe. It too can be used to greater effect if the Starship landing is still being perfected. When Starship has proven itself safe it will carry humans to and from orbit. But waiting for that to happen before taking advantage of what's available now is... we think... a mistake.
@@terranspaceacademy The connection point is something I've never heard of from any other aerospace project, so I would be _extremely_ cautious about it. It probably wouldn't take much for AstroClipper to hit a malfunction and either fail to disengage, or tear itself apart.
@@terranspaceacademy "...taking advantage of what's available now..." is a critical point. What is needed is a follow-up video on the AstroClipper. At what stage of development is it now? This was not mentioned in the video but upon reflection it seems that favouring either the AstroClipper or Starship at this point really hinges on their respective stages of development. I look forward to a more detailed look at the current state of the AstroClipper!
The answer to all these question and more is S K Y L O N
🤔 Maybe… I love Skylon… the engines are a work of art!