• JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      They created reusable rockets. Lots and lots of concepts on the drawing board, but theirs was unique and the first one to get made.

        • JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          We can argue about semantics, but they were moreso rebuilt from the same parts than reused as is. NASA found that it would have been much cheaper to build new SRBs after each launch than rebuild them.

          • chiliedogg@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            The SRBs used on the final shuttle mission were the same boosters used on the first mission. That set was used a total of 60 times. Only 2 sets of boosters were never recovered for re-use. The set from STS-4 had a parachute malfunction, and the set from the Challenger exploded.

        • Strykker@programming.dev
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          1 year ago

          SRB boosters are quite close to literally just a big steel tube, and they reused them by dropping them into the ocean under a parachute.

          They still had to clean out and refurb every booster launched. And that was without the complex rocket engines that would get destroyed by being submerged in the ocean.

      • Dr. Dabbles@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Creating isn’t inventing, and there’s wasn’t the first to be flown. Man, the SpaceX fans don’t really know the history of the industry they make these claims about.

        • JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          You referring to the DC-X subscale tech demonstrator?

          I think inventing is a less well defined term, since anyone with a napkin can claim to invent something to a very low fidelity. The details are the hard part, not the idea itself. So that’s why I specified created, since that is inventing to a very high level of fidelity.

          • Dr. Dabbles@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            There’s several other examples. I also don’t think inventing is an ill-defined term. That’s an absurd thing to even say.

                • JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works
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                  1 year ago

                  So it needs to be created in real life, rather than just a drawing or design? Or does creating it only as a design without building it count?

                  Also, all technology is built on previous work, especially rocketry. That would seem to eliminate the possibility of invention in rocketry due to the clause of your own ingenuity, etc. What’s the cutoff for invention vs refinement?

          • Dr. Dabbles@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            I’ve had experience with Musk Fans in the past. They all read from the same script, including the “I don’t even like Musk” lie.

      • Dr. Dabbles@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I mean, just basic research would answer this for you. But I’ll start you off with an easy one. The SRB on shuttle launches was reusable. Now go forth and look up rocket history.

        • JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          It depends how you define your terms. The parts were disassembled, cleaned, inspected, and reassembled. That’s not what most people think of as reusable, more like refurbishable. And anyway, they didn’t save any cost or time doing that vs building new ones, hence why SLS is using them as single use.

          • Dr. Dabbles@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            It doesn’t depend on how I define my terms. It was reused. You literally just fucking said it was reused. What you just described is the exact definition of what everyone considers reused. This is such a stupid conversation to have, and only the SpaceX sense are the ones that ever want to have it.

            Also, because you don’t seem to know anything about anything, what you described is exactly what SpaceX does. How the fuck did you get this so wrong?

              • Dr. Dabbles@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                Yeeeah, so, you didn’t read your own link I guess? Because it says, on a Tesla simp blog, that it was a refurbishment. Not an inspection.

                Here’s a nice write-up from NASA on what the SRB refurb process was. Feel free to read it.

                https://llis.nasa.gov/lesson/836

                • JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works
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                  1 year ago

                  Again, I’m not trying to say these words have a single defined meaning. I’m saying that SpaceX’s reusable rockets are in a different category compared to SRBs. Call those reusable and refurbishable if you like, or call them anything else. I just use the reusable refurbishable terminology because that’s what everyday astronaut uses.

                  Do you know the turn around time on an srb? I couldn’t find it in your doc or in the wiki.

                  • Dr. Dabbles@lemmy.world
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                    1 year ago

                    The only difference is propulsive landing. You’re obviously attempting to backpedal here, and it’s not working. SpaceX also refurbishes their units, you’re just bullshitting at this point. It’s painfully transparent.

        • MaggiWuerze@feddit.de
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          1 year ago

          Sure, fishing a burning bucket out of the ocean is the same as an actual rocket that lands by itself and just needs to be refueled.

        • noUsernamesLef7@infosec.pub
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          1 year ago

          The shuttle SRB’s were really only reusable in the same sense that the engine from a wrecked car can be removed, stripped to a bare block, bored out, rebuilt, and placed into a new car is reusable. Hard to say exactly how long it took to turn around SRB segments, but just the rail transport between Utah and Florida was 12 days each way. SpaceX has turned around Falcon 9 boosters in under a month.

          And even with all of that, the most reused reusable segments barely flew a dozen times. There is one Falcon 9 first stage that has now flown 18 times.

          You’re not wrong about parts having been reused in the past but the scale of what has been done before really doesn’t compare to what SpaceX does now.

          • Dr. Dabbles@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Looks like you also need to review the publicly available NASA documentation for refurbishment.