Content deleted Content added
→Space Shuttle: new section |
→Space Shuttle: cmt |
||
Line 79:
== Space Shuttle ==
Strange page, as the Space Shuttle is mentioned only once, despite being the benchmak of all the spacecraft that want to achieve reusablility. (post left by IP editor: 181.126.211.193)
:Not sure I've ever seen a source that supports your assertion: Space Shuttle "being the benchmark of all the spacecraft that want to achieve reusablility." But do feel free to find that source or those sources; after all [[WP:ANYONECANEDIT]].
:It did achieve a (very expensive; >$1B per flight) reusability of the upper stage and human capsule, but it expended the main orbital flight structure and propellant tanks. The Solid Rocket Boosters were recovered following parachute descent into the water, but were essentially just recovering the steel cases, with the entirety of the SRBs needed to be rebuilt from the multiple segments. In short, the Space Shuttle and it's rebuilt SRBs and new main rocket structure cost much more for each flight than an equivalent [[expendable launch vehicle]] would have cost, even at the high costs of US government cost-plus contracting launch costs, which the GAO had said the average exceeded US$200 million per orbital launch, and perhaps 300-400 million per launch for the larger [[Delta IV]] LVs that would have been required for the heaviest payloads.
:That is rather hugely unlike an entirely intact first stage liquid propellant booster that is now recovered routinely by SpaceX, and then the company does future flights for < c.US$50 million dollars per future orbital flight. Musk is on record saying he would have failed if Falcon 9 booster reuse ended up costing more than equivalent payloads on expendable rockets would have cost. Cheers. [[User:N2e|N2e]] ([[User talk:N2e|talk]]) 20:45, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
| |||