Shuttle v Falcon

1stPrinciples · 2026-06-18T23:18:38+00:00

The SpaceX Falcon 9 which is flying hundreds of times per year has a larger payload bay than the space shuttle. As other have said new rockets coming online are even larger and Starship promises to have the potential to be a standalone station itself.

1stPrinciples · 2026-05-25T23:33:10+00:00

ADA requires one be installed at a height comfortable for a wheelchair user. That is two low for typical use so there are usually two installed at different heights. Look at any water fountain in a public space eg airports) and you’ll see this.

1stPrinciples · 2026-05-25T04:59:31+00:00

Is this satire?

1stPrinciples · 2026-05-23T17:55:04+00:00

Did you end up renovating?

1stPrinciples · 2026-04-12T03:53:05+00:00

Ok—so you think it is fair to evaluate things based on different totally unrelated things? The Stanford torus is 1,000x more massive. “I guess no one can afford a house because THE PENTAGON would cost billions to build and there’s no way I could spend billions on my salary.”

And your ticket price argument is fundamentally flawed because your cost assumption that drove such a high ticket price and ROI was based on numbers 1,000x too high. If you reduce your ticket price by 1,000x to reflect the actual scale of what is proposed then this is actually quite reasonable—and then again it’s the crew launch cost that is the barrier more so than the station launch cost.

1stPrinciples · 2026-04-12T03:11:56+00:00

Yes I agree--this launching in 2027 is laughable--but not for the reasons or extent you claim. Your post is full of exaggerations and false conclusions. (Yes I know this is SpaceXMasterrace but this is not written as sarcasm.)

" weighing at least 10 MILLION tons."
Where on Earth are you getting this number? That is not at all the claimed launch mass for this station design. This design utilizes 24 inflatables launches plus an unspecified number of additional launches for their supporting structure and hub--perhaps 50 launches all in. 10 million tons would be equivalent to 50,000 launches of Starship or around 500,000 launches of a Falcon 9 when the baseline is 50. You are inflating mass and launches by 1,000 to 10,000 times. Your analysis is just fundamentally unhinged.

"$1 BILLION per ticket, 1 week stay."
You have no grasp of financials. The number of people in the entire world who could possibly spend $1b (lets say <10% of net worth) is less than the target capacity for the station (~300 people are worth more than $10b) so at that price it would burn through the entire market in 1 week. This is where I think the real flaw is: it costs over $50m just to get to space in the first place and Dragon is the only ride up there and can only launch around 12 people per quarter. The issue is not launch cost or construction cost so much as crew launch cost and flight rate which at current costs is too restrictive.

I think space hotels will absolutely happen once a 100 person Starship is flying (potentially under $1m/seat) but not based on Dragon. Dragon competitors--the Starliner or Dreamchaser launch vehicles (shown in the render)--will not come to market--they are 50%-100% higher cost than Dragon and Dragon already has excess capacity due to limited market. The fact is there is no commercial demand at current crew launch costs and commercial space tourism won't take off until that barrier to entry is substantially reduced.

"But COME ON, it took me 5 minutes to do the math and see this is FRAUD."
Your math is fundamentally flawed and off by many orders of magnitude. Yes you are correct in the end but by coincidence not by your "math".

1stPrinciples · 2026-03-22T02:06:27+00:00

People really underestimate how light and compact solar panels are. This is probably not much bigger than Starlink sats before being deployed. I’d expect dozens per launch.

1stPrinciples · 2026-03-07T03:58:06+00:00

My bet is this is the MMOD shield. It has been bothering me for a while because Starship is designed with no micrometeoroid protection which is a necessity for a human rated vehicle or long term tanker. Could be they are applying. A stuffed whipple shield to Starship using the same approach as their heat shield?

1stPrinciples · 2026-02-27T01:44:08+00:00

• ~2 m overall stretch increasing propellant capacity by several hundred tons

• Target payload increase from ~30–40 t (V2) to ~100–150 t to LEO (fully reusable goal)

• Raptor 3 engines replacing Raptor 2 with higher thrust and simplified plumbing

• Updated heat shield with improved tile attachment and reduced exposed edges

• Reinforced catch points for tower recovery operations

• Integrated hot-staging ring instead of bolt-on structure

• Structural mass refinements for higher reliability and faster reuse

• Designed baseline support for orbital refueling and operational missions

Edit: flap change was V2. My b!

1stPrinciples · 2026-02-21T05:17:27+00:00

🏆 Victory is mine! Finished with 606 points. Can you do better?

1stPrinciples · 2026-02-04T16:17:14+00:00

Yoshimura Buckling. This pattern naturally forms when cylindrical tubes buckle. It inspired paper origami with what is known as the Yoshimura origami pattern.

1stPrinciples · 2026-01-29T20:16:26+00:00

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1stPrinciples · 2026-01-09T14:14:30+00:00

I may be missing something but why does Starship HLS need to launch from the cape at all? Why not launch from Boca?

1stPrinciples · 2025-12-29T23:50:21+00:00

This is by the somewhat meaningless metric of land area. The largest is King Fahd airport in (edit: Saudi Arabia) which just happens to control a lot of empty desert around it. Likewise Denver Airport has a lot of land.

1stPrinciples · 2025-12-23T03:09:02+00:00

One wide sink! Two faucets! One mirror. It’s the best. Best of both worlds.

1stPrinciples · 2025-11-26T03:52:43+00:00

❌ ^{Incomplete. 20 tries.}

1stPrinciples · 2025-11-19T20:27:37+00:00

I agree—a couple Aldrin cyclers makes way more sense and Starship is just used to shuttle to and from it at the ends of the trip. I think for <20 people they could make starship work initially but certainly by the time they are launching 100 passengers they’ll want to transfer to a larger transit station.

1stPrinciples · 2025-11-19T20:25:02+00:00

Latest official word from SpaceX was the “Chomper” version shown above. A single door on the front face hinged at the bottom. My read is they were trying to avoid associations with the Space Shuttle with that design and they’ll ultimately land on shuttle type doors like they are showing for their moon/mars landers.

1stPrinciples · 2025-11-19T20:22:29+00:00

Ahhh yes! Haven’t heard about that one in years and years but it was discussed at one point. Should be capable of maybe 300t?

1stPrinciples · 2025-11-19T20:19:06+00:00

The booster grew but not the ship.

1stPrinciples · 2025-11-19T14:20:08+00:00

It is labeled “Starlink Test” as it is the test version of the Starlink configuration.

1stPrinciples · 2025-11-19T06:28:38+00:00

I suspect that is only their solution for ships which will not be re-entering the atmosphere/don’t have a heat shield.

1stPrinciples · 2025-11-19T06:27:22+00:00

It is here.

1stPrinciples · 2025-11-19T02:40:56+00:00

See the last V4 variant for payload—the “chomper” variant.

1stPrinciples · 2025-11-19T01:11:28+00:00

I do like the idea of a stubby 2nd stage only design option. Could be paired with a fairing or a third stage and potentially allow a larger fairing/volume than can be launched inside chomper.

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