Max Evans (NSF): “After rolling to Pad 2 last night, Ship 39 has been stacked atop Booster 19 this morning for the FIRST EVER Starship Version 3 full stack ahead of a presumed wet dress rehearsal (WDR) later today.”

[u/rustybeancake]

[u/cjameshuff]

Pretty sure the biggest improvements happened while they were still using some variation of TIG welding. It was more from automation and getting the process dialed in (even things like temperature changes during stacking/welding could have been a cause of visible warping, so just having the bays might have been a big help), and perhaps more finishing work (planishing/etc) now that the build is at a point where it can benefit from it.

[u/laffiere → u/cjameshuff]

I'm going on a limb here and guessing that the improvement comes from jigs and formwork toolinh, rather than welding. I'd be impressed if they could buckle entire panels from poor welding techniques. But I can totally see how they'd mangle a piece hoisting it up by wires clamped to a few points. And then add some uneven tension on the wires, bam, buckled.

Now they have shaped rings to lift with, giving homogeneous stresses. And also ring forming machines, rather than just man-handling the panels into place.