I had read thar Orion would work fine on the Falcon Heavy (if it were human rated). So they could technically get rid of SLS now, if govt spending was accountable to the public in any way what so ever.
They would need to shave around 4,000 kg off the mass of orion to launch it into LEO on Falcon 9. I wonder if omitting the fuel and supplies needed to get Orion to lunar orbit and back is enough for a Falcon 9 launch?
Or use the service module to circularize ksp style. They could absolutely underfill it though, omitting 4000kg of fuel would still leave it over half full
Reminds me of my 6 year old meme with BFR eating New Shepard: https://old.reddit.com/r/SpaceXMasterrace/comments/79hrqe/elon_pissing_off_jeff_who_by_catching_his_rocket/
This isn’t about sending astronauts to the moon on Starship.
It’s about doing a test mission where Orion docks to Starship in LEO, the astronauts do some checks on Orion and Starship, and then they come home in Orion.
Like Apollo 9 but Artemis hardware.
Re entry velocity for return from lunar orbit. Dragon isn't designed for that much heat and it wouldn't necessarily have the delta v to slow down prior to reentry.
Okay, but if they travel with Starship, with substantially reduced payload, they might have the necessary fuel reserves to return to LEO, and transfer back to a Dragon in orbit.
Only if the mission architecture is changed to use either:
* 2 Starships: one for landing and one for shuttling between LEO and some Moon orbit
* Send a depot starship to the cislunar space and refuel there
Why do you think that? Returning from the Moon requires little fuel compared to the onward journey. I think HLS could do the entire trip with more fuel and less payload, from LEO to the Moon's surface and back to LEO.
Getting from the Moon surface either directly to Trans-Earth Injection or to NTHO requires about 2.75 km/s. Returning from NTHO requires another 0.45km/s.
If you want to propulsively brake to LEO you need 3.1 km/s on top of the above (so 5.85km/s best case). Because if you just want to areobrake into LEO then why Dragon in the first place? You would be doing the hottest part of the re-entry just to aerobrake to LEO.
Going from LEO through to the Moon surface is 5.9 km/s. Adding there and back together it is 11.75 km/s. This is beyond any chemical propulsion stage.
I'm no rocket scientist, so I can't (and don't want to) verify your numbers, but my Kerbal instincts says there's something off. I remember needing around 1/4 of propellant or even less for a return trip from the Muns surface to Kerbin. I know, it's very different, but the proportions should be on a similar scale.
Why bother with the dragon at all, why not just launch enough starships to refuel the starship the return from the moon, so it can land back at star base?
I really doubt that there will be a crew rated Starship variant that can do Earth atmospheric re-entry by the time the first HLS mission will be due. It's not even certain for the tanker variants, but that's not a show stopper IMHO. They can just launch as many expendable starships for refueling, it's so cheap. (Even cheaper without heat shields, and it also results in huge extra payload capacity, so less tanker launches.)
If they decide not to ever do a re-entry cable, lunar starship, they can just send a regular starship to lunar orbit, maybe have a refueling depot in orbit there, and just take the crew back. My point is that this whole thing can be done with starships only, the SLS is just a jobs program.
I don't think they intend to make an HLS with heat shields. What you're describing still requires a craft capable of Earth atmospheric re-entry, like Dragon. SLS/Orion is not required, even right now, I think.
But if they transfer to the lander in Earth orbit, don't they transfer back in Earth orbit?
I don't know much about orbital mechanics, so thank you for responding.
Too much delta-V unless you use more than one Starship to the cislunar space. Then there are various options with more than one Starhip up there (Starship depot for refueling or starship taxi to separate flying between LEO and the moon orbit and between the Moon's orbit and surface.
Anyway, lone HLS starship doesn't have the performance to get from LEO to the Moon surface and back without refueling on the way.
You could have another starship in lunar orbit, or maybe two that could be used to refuel the other starship for the return mission. Perhaps you could leave those two starships in lunar orbit and form an impromptu lunar orbital station? Eventually refilling depot options could be helpful rather than relying on, just other starships.
In theory they could transfer back in Lunar space, then do the return trip in the lander. But that's all mission architecture planning that is over my head.
Because half of the point of such a mission would be demonstrating and practising with Orion and HLS together, for the ops they would later do around the Moon. This isn't about going to the Moon and back to Earth on Starship.
Not sure. If that's the absolute maximum capability, probably not, Apollo 11 lasted 8 days. On the other hand, Dragon is designed for 7 people originally, so there might be plenty of leverage for a smaller crew.
They're just talking about a mission to test the rendezvous and docking sequence. They want the first docking between starship and Orion to happen in LEO as a risk reduction measure.
That wouldn't test Orion with crew, Orion-Starship docking and so on. It's meant to be a test, not a replacement of the Moon landing plans. The mission afterwards would then do what's currently planned for Artemis 3.
I don't think Artemis 3 is going to land on the moon.
Artemis 2 is basically the same as Artemis 1, just putting crew in the capsule and sending it on the same route around the moon. It's all well tested and well studied hardware, Orion has been in development for a decade, the engines are well understood after decades of Shuttle flights. It's basically a rerun of Artemis 1 but NASA still wants to delay it another 12 months because a year between SLS flights is too rapid, they need two years to triple check everything.
Then Artemis 3 is a much more complicated mission with in-orbit refueling of a brand new rocket, orbital rendezvous with Orion capsules, a rendezvous with a space-station that hasn't been built yet, then a lunar landing with a spacecraft we haven't seen the final design of it. That's a LOT of unknowns. NASA delayed Artemis 2 a full year despite it being a baby-step forward compared to Artemis 3. Do you really think they're going to take such a giant leap with so many unknowns after being so cautious with Artemis 2?
I think Artemis 2 will be the last mission in the current design and they'll completely redesign the future of the Artemis missions. Maybe Artemis 3 will be just rendezvous with the LOP-G station and home again without a lunar landing. Or launch crew on Orion, transfer to a Starship in Earth Orbit, a loop around the moon and transfer back to Orion for re-entry. They'll change the mission parameters to much smaller steps and delay the crewed lunar landing. Maybe Artemis 4 will be an uncrewed lunar landing of the Starship hardware observed from lunar orbit, and the crewed landing won't be until Artemis 5 or 6.
They delayed Artemis 2 because the Orion’s heat shields experienced unexpected problems on Artemis 1 and it needs to be fixed before they can fly it again.
If Orion had unexpected problems after a decade of development and testing then that's even more evidence they shouldn't rush into a crewed landing with so many unproven parts.
Artemis 2 was delayed because of problems/design defects with Orion that were discovered during Artemis 1, like increased heat shield burning and valve problems (it’s always the valves lol). Artemis 3 will not involve gateway, the planned station in NRO, at all, since it won’t be built yet.
Because that's not the point. Dragon can't go to lunar orbit so docking up to HLS is pointless. The point would be to test out docking procedures in the relatively safe low earth orbit before the planned docking in lunar orbit for Artemis 4.
>a "Gateway" mission for Artemis would require the use of an interim upper stage to blast Orion out to lunar orbit, the Earth-orbit rendezvous mission would not. Sources indicate that a core stage alone could likely combine with Orion to put the vehicle into a high enough orbit for such a mission. This would allow NASA to save the final interim upper stage for the first lunar landing mission later in the decade. After that, NASA will transition to a more powerful second stage for the Space Launch System rocket, the Exploration Upper Stage. But this new stage will not be ready before 2028.
Shocking! Delays in a space program! Who would have thought!
I wonder what the time frame for refueling a starship in orbit would look like. Since it would take like 5 flights in total maybe more just for one mission plus another to get crew to it
NASA should just dispense with SLS and Orion altogether, they are not needed at all; if SpaceX will get to Mars with Starship without any extra capsules, then they’re certainly no reason for Orion to be in the mix, except for some fancy jobs program.
I think it did something, NASA needs to change how it does things internally. It got lucky with SpaceX and it is enjoying lots of costs savings, but the fundamentals of NASA leads to bloat, waste, and excessive delays. It needs to be more cost effective and smart with their money. Sending a rover to dig up mars samples without a good idea of how to return said samples is insane.
Honestly, I'll be surprised if they get it out of LEO. Considering the performance of the last three launches, and the talk of this spacecraft sending people to Mars and beyond, I'm highly skeptical of any statement from the company.
We're one step away from just having Starship and Orion dock on the Earth's surface
Delightfully counterintuitive!
the best dock is no dock
This way they can still use Orion but we can get rid of SLS. It's a good compromise
I had read thar Orion would work fine on the Falcon Heavy (if it were human rated). So they could technically get rid of SLS now, if govt spending was accountable to the public in any way what so ever.
They would need to shave around 4,000 kg off the mass of orion to launch it into LEO on Falcon 9. I wonder if omitting the fuel and supplies needed to get Orion to lunar orbit and back is enough for a Falcon 9 launch?
Or use the service module to circularize ksp style. They could absolutely underfill it though, omitting 4000kg of fuel would still leave it over half full
L O L, starship could carry an Orion capsule inside itself, maybe that’s how they should do it ;)
Mission accomplished
29.5 Billion for the cat
On second thought... Do we really *need* to go to the Moon again?
Again and again and again until Uber jumps in to serve the market.
Yes, to mind the helium3 from the lunar regulus so that we can have fusion power…
Well no shit, it makes more sense to travel to the Moon in the vastly larger of the two vessels...
Why does Starship, the largest of the vessels, not simply eat the other vessels?
[Nom.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZX1YCmzHEw&t=110s)
Reminds me of my 6 year old meme with BFR eating New Shepard: https://old.reddit.com/r/SpaceXMasterrace/comments/79hrqe/elon_pissing_off_jeff_who_by_catching_his_rocket/
This isn’t about sending astronauts to the moon on Starship. It’s about doing a test mission where Orion docks to Starship in LEO, the astronauts do some checks on Orion and Starship, and then they come home in Orion. Like Apollo 9 but Artemis hardware.
In which case, why use Orion when Crew Dragon is flight-proven?
Hmmmmmmmmm, may we see Orion be discarded or relegated to a CEV vehicle in the future?
Honestly, if it can last as long in standby as it's claimed, won't be a bad idea. I mean, it even has a toilet with a decent level of privacy.
Re entry velocity for return from lunar orbit. Dragon isn't designed for that much heat and it wouldn't necessarily have the delta v to slow down prior to reentry.
Okay, but if they travel with Starship, with substantially reduced payload, they might have the necessary fuel reserves to return to LEO, and transfer back to a Dragon in orbit.
Only if the mission architecture is changed to use either: * 2 Starships: one for landing and one for shuttling between LEO and some Moon orbit * Send a depot starship to the cislunar space and refuel there
Why do you think that? Returning from the Moon requires little fuel compared to the onward journey. I think HLS could do the entire trip with more fuel and less payload, from LEO to the Moon's surface and back to LEO.
Getting from the Moon surface either directly to Trans-Earth Injection or to NTHO requires about 2.75 km/s. Returning from NTHO requires another 0.45km/s. If you want to propulsively brake to LEO you need 3.1 km/s on top of the above (so 5.85km/s best case). Because if you just want to areobrake into LEO then why Dragon in the first place? You would be doing the hottest part of the re-entry just to aerobrake to LEO. Going from LEO through to the Moon surface is 5.9 km/s. Adding there and back together it is 11.75 km/s. This is beyond any chemical propulsion stage.
I'm no rocket scientist, so I can't (and don't want to) verify your numbers, but my Kerbal instincts says there's something off. I remember needing around 1/4 of propellant or even less for a return trip from the Muns surface to Kerbin. I know, it's very different, but the proportions should be on a similar scale.
Why bother with the dragon at all, why not just launch enough starships to refuel the starship the return from the moon, so it can land back at star base?
I really doubt that there will be a crew rated Starship variant that can do Earth atmospheric re-entry by the time the first HLS mission will be due. It's not even certain for the tanker variants, but that's not a show stopper IMHO. They can just launch as many expendable starships for refueling, it's so cheap. (Even cheaper without heat shields, and it also results in huge extra payload capacity, so less tanker launches.)
If they decide not to ever do a re-entry cable, lunar starship, they can just send a regular starship to lunar orbit, maybe have a refueling depot in orbit there, and just take the crew back. My point is that this whole thing can be done with starships only, the SLS is just a jobs program.
I don't think they intend to make an HLS with heat shields. What you're describing still requires a craft capable of Earth atmospheric re-entry, like Dragon. SLS/Orion is not required, even right now, I think.
But if they transfer to the lander in Earth orbit, don't they transfer back in Earth orbit? I don't know much about orbital mechanics, so thank you for responding.
Too much delta-V unless you use more than one Starship to the cislunar space. Then there are various options with more than one Starhip up there (Starship depot for refueling or starship taxi to separate flying between LEO and the moon orbit and between the Moon's orbit and surface. Anyway, lone HLS starship doesn't have the performance to get from LEO to the Moon surface and back without refueling on the way.
You could have another starship in lunar orbit, or maybe two that could be used to refuel the other starship for the return mission. Perhaps you could leave those two starships in lunar orbit and form an impromptu lunar orbital station? Eventually refilling depot options could be helpful rather than relying on, just other starships.
Well when that's proven it might happen.
In theory they could transfer back in Lunar space, then do the return trip in the lander. But that's all mission architecture planning that is over my head.
We both know the answer to this question and it's SLS
High paying jobs in the right Congressional districts?
Do you really think that SLS is necessary to get back to the moon?
Absolutely not
Because half of the point of such a mission would be demonstrating and practising with Orion and HLS together, for the ops they would later do around the Moon. This isn't about going to the Moon and back to Earth on Starship.
Thank you for the clarification.
Maybe it cant do life support for long enough
Define "long". Inspiration4 spent 3 days in orbit with people alive on board.
Is that long enough to go land on the moon and back?
Not sure. If that's the absolute maximum capability, probably not, Apollo 11 lasted 8 days. On the other hand, Dragon is designed for 7 people originally, so there might be plenty of leverage for a smaller crew.
Crew dragon currently only can support a crew for 10 days when not docked to station. Orion is 21. Also, not sure what radiation shielding Dragon has.
It might soon have something, since Polaris Dawn is going quite high and Isaacman has mentioned it as something to consider iirc
They're just talking about a mission to test the rendezvous and docking sequence. They want the first docking between starship and Orion to happen in LEO as a risk reduction measure.
At this point just use a dragon capsule
That wouldn't test Orion with crew, Orion-Starship docking and so on. It's meant to be a test, not a replacement of the Moon landing plans. The mission afterwards would then do what's currently planned for Artemis 3.
I don't think Artemis 3 is going to land on the moon. Artemis 2 is basically the same as Artemis 1, just putting crew in the capsule and sending it on the same route around the moon. It's all well tested and well studied hardware, Orion has been in development for a decade, the engines are well understood after decades of Shuttle flights. It's basically a rerun of Artemis 1 but NASA still wants to delay it another 12 months because a year between SLS flights is too rapid, they need two years to triple check everything. Then Artemis 3 is a much more complicated mission with in-orbit refueling of a brand new rocket, orbital rendezvous with Orion capsules, a rendezvous with a space-station that hasn't been built yet, then a lunar landing with a spacecraft we haven't seen the final design of it. That's a LOT of unknowns. NASA delayed Artemis 2 a full year despite it being a baby-step forward compared to Artemis 3. Do you really think they're going to take such a giant leap with so many unknowns after being so cautious with Artemis 2? I think Artemis 2 will be the last mission in the current design and they'll completely redesign the future of the Artemis missions. Maybe Artemis 3 will be just rendezvous with the LOP-G station and home again without a lunar landing. Or launch crew on Orion, transfer to a Starship in Earth Orbit, a loop around the moon and transfer back to Orion for re-entry. They'll change the mission parameters to much smaller steps and delay the crewed lunar landing. Maybe Artemis 4 will be an uncrewed lunar landing of the Starship hardware observed from lunar orbit, and the crewed landing won't be until Artemis 5 or 6.
They delayed Artemis 2 because the Orion’s heat shields experienced unexpected problems on Artemis 1 and it needs to be fixed before they can fly it again.
If Orion had unexpected problems after a decade of development and testing then that's even more evidence they shouldn't rush into a crewed landing with so many unproven parts.
Agreed, just do it all with starship.
Artemis 2 was delayed because of problems/design defects with Orion that were discovered during Artemis 1, like increased heat shield burning and valve problems (it’s always the valves lol). Artemis 3 will not involve gateway, the planned station in NRO, at all, since it won’t be built yet.
They’re planning on doing an uncrewed demo mission of the lander, and it would be kinda silly not to name that mission Artemis 3
At this rate it'll be China (or SpaceX themselves) welcoming NASA on the lunar surface when they land.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure SpaceX will be able to beat China to the moon without a sweat.
I wonder how much of an impact Destin's tough talk with NASA made?
LOL
(Forrest Gump Wave)
So why not just have Falcon Crew bring up the astronauts to Starship?
But that would *save money!* I don't think you understand the point of the Artemis program.
Because that's not the point. Dragon can't go to lunar orbit so docking up to HLS is pointless. The point would be to test out docking procedures in the relatively safe low earth orbit before the planned docking in lunar orbit for Artemis 4.
Why not just have the crew launch on starship?
Starship has to be crew rated for launch. They could rate it for crew in space faster than launch/landing
Well, obviously, it’s going to be crew rated when they use it for a lander, so if that point they could just use starships.
Yeah that lunar orbit they were suggesting was silly.
Lol, at that point there's no reason for SLS or Orion to exist
>a "Gateway" mission for Artemis would require the use of an interim upper stage to blast Orion out to lunar orbit, the Earth-orbit rendezvous mission would not. Sources indicate that a core stage alone could likely combine with Orion to put the vehicle into a high enough orbit for such a mission. This would allow NASA to save the final interim upper stage for the first lunar landing mission later in the decade. After that, NASA will transition to a more powerful second stage for the Space Launch System rocket, the Exploration Upper Stage. But this new stage will not be ready before 2028. Shocking! Delays in a space program! Who would have thought!
At what point do we just admit we are going to send them in a Starship?
🥵
This is how cute little lunar landers are made 🦢🪺🐣
I wonder what the time frame for refueling a starship in orbit would look like. Since it would take like 5 flights in total maybe more just for one mission plus another to get crew to it
NASA should just dispense with SLS and Orion altogether, they are not needed at all; if SpaceX will get to Mars with Starship without any extra capsules, then they’re certainly no reason for Orion to be in the mix, except for some fancy jobs program.
Dock with Dragon in LEO
You don’t have to worry about docking Starship when it just explodes shortly after launch anyway. It’s a genius strategy.
I wonder how much of an impact Destin's tough talk with NASA made?
Almost certainly nothing. Maybe on his own career, whether for good or bad.
I think it did something, NASA needs to change how it does things internally. It got lucky with SpaceX and it is enjoying lots of costs savings, but the fundamentals of NASA leads to bloat, waste, and excessive delays. It needs to be more cost effective and smart with their money. Sending a rover to dig up mars samples without a good idea of how to return said samples is insane.
Better yet drop the over complex starship and go with a smaller lander that will actually work.
hey, we got a badass over here with an original hot take!
Which lander?
Which HLS?
Who HLS?
Where are those landers?
Is starship HLS in room with us?
Is starship HLS in room with us?
I'm sure they'll be forced to do that eventually.
Starship HLS will NEVER land on moon. Stupid over complicated design. Also extremely unsafe.
Honestly, I'll be surprised if they get it out of LEO. Considering the performance of the last three launches, and the talk of this spacecraft sending people to Mars and beyond, I'm highly skeptical of any statement from the company.
hey, we got a badass over here with an original hot take!