[ktpecot]

Calling the shuttle reusable is such a massive stretch. It’s like the shuttle of Theseus they basically had to rebuild it every time and it cost something like 1.5 billion dollars. Basically could’ve built a brand new rocket every time.

[dylan604]

Recovery of the first stage of SpaceX rockets is not even close to being the same thing as reuse of the shuttle. Surviving re-entry is a completely different set of specs than floating through atmosphere at a much much slower rate of descent.

[ktpecot]

I mean from a technological point of view sure, but that just shows how bad the design was(compared to what we know now). The falcon program shows that it’s obviously way more economical to just ditch the 2nd stage and reuse the booster. F9 launches cost sub 20 million and a shuttle launch costs on the order of a billion. Squabble over whatever details you want about performance or who had to do what R&D but F9 is clearly in a different league.

[dylan604]

> Squabble over whatever details you want about performance or who had to do what R&D but F9 is clearly in a different league.

Falcon 9 First launch attempt 2007 [0]

Shuttle First launch 1981 [1]

I wonder if there's an advantage to having 26 years of watching someone else before designing yours? You also act like the rockets from the shuttle were not reused. They always (except for 2 instances) came back with the shuttle. The SRBs were also recovered, so it's not like these were wasted.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Falcon_9_first-stage_b...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle

[ktpecot]

I’m not disputing SpaceX had the advantage of learning from peoples mistakes. And I’m not arguing that they didn’t physically get the engines and boosters back I’m just saying that calling the space shuttle and F9 both reusable may be semantically true but is really not giving an accurate representation.

[dylan604]

SpaceX is also contributing to the increasing amounts of space junk. How long is the second stage just floating around after delivering payloads? Once the shuttle delivered payloads, it just left nothing but space.

[mlindner]

A brief look would have you find that for most (but not all) launches the second stage de-orbits after one or two orbits and isn't even left in orbit for a day. (For some launches it's impossible to de-orbit the stage and no matter which provider you launch with will leave a second stage as junk in orbit.)

Also, this isn't just SpaceX, every launching country/company leaves second stages in orbit, some, unlike SpaceX, don't even try to dispose of their second stages and leave all second stages in orbit.

I'd recommend reading up more on the topic as I think you read something at some point and think that SpaceX is an especially bad actor in the space when in fact they are one of the most responsible actors, if not _the_ most responsible actor, in the space launch sector at the moment.

[Robotbeat]

Almost Immediately after the payload is deployed, the second stage does a deorbit burn. So maybe an hour? Each Shuttle launch ended with ditching the enormous external tank into like the Indian Ocean, far more dry mass in the atmosphere/ocean than a Falcon 9 upper stage. (Also, the ET was about $100-150 million apiece.)

[ktpecot]

Lol are you just making stuff up now? The second stage re enters the atmosphere and burns up.

[mlindner]

They also lugged a large amount of extra dry mass into space because of the mass of the orbiter. The part that was least important to re-use and most expensive to re-use is the part that was re-used the most.

[dylan604]

maybe, but it was the coolest part to re-use. whatever inefficiencies the shuttle had that people squabble over, it was a very inspiring program. not sure how much inspiration to a small kid a SpaceX launch is, but i know exactly how much the shuttle was.

[drusepth]

>not sure how much inspiration to a small kid a SpaceX launch is, but i know exactly how much the shuttle was.

From what I've seen, it sounds like many kids these days feel the same way about SpaceX launches now as you did about the shuttle (incredibly inspiring). I hope that's reassuring.

[dylan604]

it is. i know that i flew my shuttle around my room much more than my apollo rockets. my fighter jets had a hard time keeping up with the shuttle in my room too. i once saw footage of the "chase" planes as the shuttle screamed past them on approach. just so much more "cool" to the shuttle than a capsule.

[Robotbeat]

This video showing kids’ reaction to the Falcon Heavy inaugural launch is pretty fun. The dual-landing is absolutely insane. Straight up science fiction. https://youtu.be/A0FZIwabctw

[zugi]

> inefficiencies the shuttle had that people squabble over, it was a very inspiring program

Exactly. The shuttle program was designed by bureaucrats to be "inspiring." Which explains why it was such a dismal failure economically and in turns of safety - killing 14 people which is far more than any other rocket, and costing insanely more than expendables.

The shuttle program set the U.S. space program back by decades. We are only now finally starting to recover from its dismal failure.

[panick21_]

It wasn't designed to be inspiring. That is nonsense. Non of the designers involved would ever claim that's what they did.

It was designed in an environment they couldn't iterate and test, and tried to go from very little knowlage directly to a massively complex system.

And no only that, they were very limited in terms of funding, so anything that required to much development had to be kicked.

[mannerheim]

What do kids have to do with anything? The goal is to get to space affordably and reliably; the shuttle failed on both fronts SpaceX is succeeding at.

[dylan604]

>What do kids have to do with anything?

What do kids ever have to do with anything? They are the next generation that may or may not want to be involved in whatever they might be getting inspired by.

>The goal is to get to space affordably and reliably; the shuttle failed on both fronts SpaceX is succeeding at.

Shuttle had ~135 missions (number from memory) with 1 failure at launch. The second failure was at re-entry, so assumption is that the mission deployed whatever was being deployed (if that was part of the mission). How many missions has SpaceX lost payloads on? >1? If we do percentages, sure, but to say that 1 failure at launch is unreliable is just farcical.

[ktpecot]

Are you actually trying to say the mission when Columbia came apart on re entry and killed 7 people was successful? And you’re gonna say the challenger mission failure that killed people is the same as SpaceX losing a satellite and a dragon cargo capsule.

That’s one of the worst takes I’ve ever heard

[mannerheim]

The space shuttle killed 14 people because it was a poorly-built, designed-by-committee piece of garbage.

[mlindner]

Rockets landing vertically is the most sci-fi thing ever and has been a staple of science fiction since the early 20th century. I think that's plenty more cool than landing it horizontally.

Anyway, coolness factor doesn't really matter for space. Economical things also tend to end up looking cool over time anyway simply because streamlined designs which are efficient tend to also look cool..

[SilverBirch]

Daddy, when I grow up, I want to grab massive government subsidies and attack trans-people, just like Elon…

[_0w8t]

The first stage of SpaceX is the most expensive part with nine engines. The second stage is just single engine. Plus SpaceX reuse fairings and the Dragon is also reusable. So re-usable parts are like 95% and expendable parts are vastly cheaper than Shuttle refurbishing.

[sdifognoinio]

This number is total nonsense. It is derived from simply dividing the total cost of the program by the number of launches. This is useless. First, the R&D costs were sunk all the way back in the '70s. Second, the cost of personnel, operations, and facilities do not necessarily scale with the number of launches.

NASA put the cost of a launch at about $450 million in 2011, but that is pessimistic. That is simply the years cost divided by the number of launches in that year. The marginal cost, i.e. the cost of going from N launches to N+1, will always be lower. The Shuttle was designed to fly 24 missions per year and actually flew an average of under five missions per year. The lack of demand was a substantial reason for the high cost.

I find it tedious that every conversation on this topic has to start with the same tired old memes. No, the Shuttle did not cost $1.5 billion per launch. No, reusable launch vehicles are not new. No, not even reusable launch vehicles that land vertically under power are new. No, the price to LEO has not fallen by an order of magnitude. No, ULA is not dead in the water. No, neither is Ariane. Yes, the Shuttle program was badly mismanaged. Yes, the Falcon 9 is pretty cool.