[shazmosushi]

Good point on the carbon fiber thing. I forgot it's max operating temperature is 150 degrees Celsius (bursting to 180 degrees), while stainless steel can go to 820-870 degrees Celsius.

Rocket Lab never wanted to do first stage recover on the Electron, but they later chose to and have succeeded in soft ocean landings under parachutes and will soon try and catch the parachutes with helicopters.

I fully expect they're are running the numbers on second stage reusability but unlike SpaceX [1] they don't tend to announce things until they are sure that's what they will pursue.

Rocket Lab only promised the Neutron will do 8,000kg to low-Earth orbit, and people are suggesting the rocket tanks can be stretched for added performance.

If SpaceX wasn't pursuing Starship they would continue to spend resources on second stage reusability for the Falcon 9. Even less than 2 years ago Elon Musk was still talking about using a ballute to recover the Falcon 9 second stage [1], but they later decided to put all their resources into the Starship.

But yeah 2024 far enough away that Starship (and New Glenn) should be operational by then, so the competitive landscape may be different. But that's all the more reason for Rocket Lab to pursue second stage reusability.

[1] https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/985655249745592320

[nickik]

The good thing about the first stage is that you can go 'ass' first and fly the rocket threw a corridor of relativity ok environment.

The problem with second stage re-usability is that it is like 25x harder then first stage.

> Rocket Lab only promised the Neutron will do 8,000kg to low-Earth orbit, and people are suggesting the rocket tanks can be stretched for added performance.

Like the Falcon did too.

> If SpaceX wasn't pursuing Starship they would continue to spend resources on second stage reusability for the Falcon 9. Even less than 2 years ago Elon Musk was still talking about using a ballute to recover the Falcon 9 second stage [1], but they later decided to put all their resources into the Starship.

Yeah but a big part of that choice was that they realized they would reduce their payload so much it not really worth it in the majority of cases.

> But that's all the more reason for Rocket Lab to pursue second stage reusability.

Agree overall. Personally I am kind of a fan of the idea to try to reuse them in Orbit. I think there are a couple interesting things that could potentially be done.