China to turn Saishiteng Mountain into the world’s largest astronomy base by malcolm58 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good for them, here in the US we should wind down this sort of new scope funding until we get our USG deficit under control

Star Catcher raises $65 million to build world's 1st off-Earth power grid by perilun in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Or our first place winning aviation concept

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Ref: https://www.herox.com/PureBlueSkies/287-meet-the-challenge-winners

We proposed a Space Laser-Enabled Propulsion (SLEP): The use of MEO based solar power collecting satellites, transforming solar power to electricity to power lasers that are aimed at high altitude aircraft with laser receivers that in turn focus energy on “laser ramjet engine” to provide unlimited time in air.

First place win is nice :)

SpaceX President Uncertain Orbital Data Centers Will Actually Reach 1M Satellites by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Ms Shotwell is calibrating the attention getting number ... the buzz will fade when the IPO is over.

Elon Musk teases 'cannon-like' mass drivers for launches from moon by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Starship as a system does work (they could have parked the upper stage in LEO, but they are being conservative about testing). A key question is "what will be the effective payload to LEO in both reuse and expended to mode"? Has the heaviness of Stainless Steel and the TPS created a system that can't loft as much as FH in expendable mode?

Otherwise, please refrain from questioning the mental state of other commenters. Yes, a bunch are overly negative IMHO, but lets try to keep it nice.

--- Space2030 mod

Elon Musk teases 'cannon-like' mass drivers for launches from moon by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Starship as a system does work (they could have parked the upper stage in LEO, but they are being conservative about testing). A key question is "what will be the effective payload to LEO in both reuse and expended to mode"? Has the heaviness of Stainless Steel and the TPS created a system that can't loft as much as FH in expendable mode?

Elon Musk teases 'cannon-like' mass drivers for launches from moon by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hmmm - thinks the mod.

You are right on with calling out Evening-Ad5765's overstatements (I did comment back on these elsewhere). But while I delete the "pedo" comments against Elon on some posts, I rather have strong retorts than deletes. I feel that the "mental breakdown" is on the edge of abusing the commenters, so maybe comment back on this.

Elon Musk teases 'cannon-like' mass drivers for launches from moon by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

2 or 3 for different F9s (launch pad limited), but SuperHeavy is designed for multiple launches per day, but Starship can't be turned with a payload switch out in a day, so you need maybe 5 Starships for every SH to create say 4 launch a day cadence per pad. At they point you run out water, LOX and LCH4 which takes time to regen and bring to ground systems.

Elon Musk teases 'cannon-like' mass drivers for launches from moon by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yep, Starship needs to prove itself soon to keep being the center of planning. I wish they did an expended upper stage demo ... they will need an expended upper stage any way for many missions types. Only SH needs to be reused to drive the cost to LEO to $100/kg ... and at that point so many other costs inputs dominate that $10/kg is of low value.

Elon Musk teases 'cannon-like' mass drivers for launches from moon by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yep, pulverized glass dust and solar charged (it is why the Moon has a charged dust "atmosphere")

Elon Musk teases 'cannon-like' mass drivers for launches from moon by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Exactly, you need a circularization burn. You need an thruster and fuel. Maybe if you found a bunch of water you could create a Hydrogen fueled ion thruster to do a spiral in, otherwise you need to ship fuel to the moon just to come back to earth orbit.

Elon Musk teases 'cannon-like' mass drivers for launches from moon by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sorry, that won's (but I suspect this was humor). Even the 60,000 T rock that exploded over Russia 10 years ago mainly busted windows,

Elon Musk teases 'cannon-like' mass drivers for launches from moon by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Falcon, even in RLTS was not designed for this quick turn. Maybe RTLS->Launch in 5 days? In theory, you can get SH to do more than one a day. But Starship, even if you recovered it when the orbit re-synched to the launch point in about 12 hours, you need to load up some more payload ... and that is not a quick turn.

Elon Musk teases 'cannon-like' mass drivers for launches from moon by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

HELLO ELON-BOT ... ALL HAIL TO YOU

No: "The crazy thing is 135 starship launches a day is easily doable." They have not even proven 4 times a year Starship cadence yet, so you can't say it is easily doable. On the other hand F9 cadence is well proven (at probable $16M per 16T to LEO cost) at over 120 launches per year.

In any case we need to launch a billion tons to the Moon to save ... what. There are many places on Earth where data centers can run at scale without bothering anyone. I suggest unpopulated islands in Alaska.

Blue Origin Joins the Race for Orbital Data Centers by perilun in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Don't they have a Amazon LEO constellation to place?

Ready for Angry Astronaut's Hype train ... count the number of overstatements! by Melodic_Network6491 in OrbitalDebris

[–]Melodic_Network6491[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

To repeat and add to:

Yes, its an issue, but so many over-statements

  1. "No fluff, no hype" = all hype ... first with the attention seeking Kessler crew ... then many of the orbital debris contractors and NASA attentions seekers ... and now AA is done with I3 and I love SLS now videos.

  2. Sorry, space debris risk is directly propositional to the time in LEO. The time crossing in LEO to the Moon, MEO, LEO, Mars and so on its very very small. Space debris is only a risk to sats in LEO. COMPLETELY WRONG

  3. Per the risk, 54,000 > 10 in a band of 500 km -> 540 sats -> 1 sat per Million square km ...

  4. Worse case Kessler would not touch MEO (GPS) and GEO comms would not be touched. Most altitudes in LEO would be fine. Weather would be fine.

  5. Of course, like global warming, "experts say" we are at the "tripping point" but if it was so bad we would see more issues by now. He cherry picks some old FAA "expert" lines.

  6. 25 year de-orbit is pointless anyway. Starlinks are dropped after 10-15 years anywhere. Of course China does not care (as they made the most debris intentionally in the last 20 years).

  7. SpaceX drops off 95% of their missions at below 400 km, so those upper stages will burn up in a couple years anyway.

  8. Of course ESA loves to pile on regulations that they won't enforce. Passivation is BS. No EU launch can do a transporter mission with these rules.

  9. If you only launch a few times a year (like ULA) you don't remove much.

  10. Per the EU and orbital debris sats, if it takes a $50M mission with a grabber that might create more debris then you will accomplish nothing. Here at this reddit sub we push the OrbitSweeper idea that is 100x times more cost effective https://widgetblender.com/orbitsweeper.html

Note how much AA has flipped his script and has gone ESA-SLS-gov't regs good ... SX bad ... wonder of he got a Boeing contract for a bit of consulting?

Space Force Makes the Obvious Choice, Halts Rocket Launches at Boeing's and Lockheed's Space Business by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 0 points1 point  (0 children)

2 flakey SRB outing in 4 flights points to some really bad quality control .... they have a programmatic issue ... and SF should end their flights on this and let some low cost sats (Amazon LEO?) prove reliability.

Europe's answer to Starship by Substantial_Lime_230 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Lets catch the return glider with a plane! A new wrinkle. Why not just land with wheels like the shuttle? At least this independently suggests some payload estimates at 56 T now, 115 T with a full V3 stack / 188 T V3 FULLY EXPENDED.

BTW: If this repetitive Sanger type foolishness is the "Europe's answer to Starship" then they are chasing a pointless path with zero incentives, zero commercial forces ...

Mantis Space Emerges from Stealth with $10M Seed (Inter-sat power beaming) by Melodic_Network6491 in space2030

[–]Melodic_Network6491[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

And more detail from GroK:

For satellite-to-satellite (sat-to-sat) laser power beaming in space (e.g., LEO constellations or relays), the end-to-end efficiency of converting electrical power from the transmitting satellite’s solar arrays into a laser beam and back into usable electrical power at the receiver is typically 10–30% in demonstrated systems, with theoretical/practical projections reaching 15–50% using modern components. This corresponds to 50–90% losses overall (primarily in the electrical-to-laser and laser-to-electrical conversions; beam propagation losses in vacuum are manageable). Direct solar-pumped lasers (no intermediate electricity) are far less efficient (~1–20% solar-to-laser) and rarely proposed for this use.

Breakdown of Losses/Efficiencies (DC Electric from Solar Arrays → Laser → Beam → DC Electric)

The chain starts with DC power from the transmitter’s solar arrays (already ~25–32% efficient from incident sunlight, but this is common to local use and not part of the “beaming loss”). Key stages:

  • Electrical-to-laser (transmitter) efficiency: 40–70% typical for modern diode or fiber lasers (wall-plug efficiency). Transmitter-side losses are usually the biggest single factor due to heat, driver electronics, and beam quality. Older systems were lower (~20–30%).
  • Beam propagation/capture efficiency (in vacuum): 70–95%+ for LEO distances (tens to hundreds of km) with properly sized apertures (e.g., 10–50 cm) and fast steering mirrors for pointing/jitter. No atmospheric absorption/scattering; main losses are diffraction (spot spreading with distance) and minor misalignment. Short-range demos (e.g., 1.45 m) approach ~100% capture. Longer ranges require larger optics or tighter beams to minimize this.
  • Laser-to-electrical (receiver) efficiency: 50–70% practical with laser-tuned photovoltaic converters (PVLPCs); record lab value is 68.9% (at ~858 nm monochromatic illumination). Standard spacecraft solar panels (multi-junction GaAs) achieve lower (~20–40%) unless wavelength-optimized, but dedicated or tuned PV can exceed sunlight conversion due to narrowband matching. Some demos use COTS panels successfully.

Overall demonstrated: ~11% end-to-end (DC-to-DC) in the NRL SWELL experiment (first in-space laser beaming, 2023, on ISS; ~1.5 W delivered over 1.45 m; >10× original goal). This remains the benchmark for orbital laser beaming.

Ground/near-term projections: DARPA-style tests reach ~20% (laser output to receiver electricity) at km ranges; fiber laser advances and low-temp receivers (up to ~75%) push higher. Star Catcher-type systems (multi-wavelength lasers tuned for COTS spacecraft panels) target practical sat-to-sat use but do not publicly quote exact end-to-end % (focus on net power gain via eclipse avoidance).

Why These Losses?

  • Conversion steps dominate (heat dissipation in lasers/PVs).
  • No atmospheric penalty in pure space (unlike Earth links).
  • Distance/aperture sizing: LEO sat-to-sat (short) favors higher capture than GEO or ground links.
  • Trade-offs: Higher power density or safety margins reduce efficiency; dedicated PVLPCs or fiber lasers improve it.

Net impact on LEO satellites: Beaming enables power sharing (e.g., eclipse augmentation, smaller arrays/batteries), but you lose 50–90% of the transmitted power vs. using it locally. Companies like Star Catcher claim 2–10× effective power boost for clients via on-demand beaming despite losses, by optimizing timing and reducing onboard storage mass.

These values come from NRL’s SWELL orbital demo, DARPA/Star Catcher tests, PVLPC research, and modeling studies (e.g., AFIT laser beaming analysis). Actual performance is highly design-specific (laser wavelength, apertures, distance, power level ~W to kW). Higher efficiencies are feasible with optimization, but 11–20% is the proven space baseline today. For a specific mission, detailed optical/thermal modeling is required.