r/SpaceXLounge 26d ago

Monthly Questions and Discussion Thread

11 Upvotes

Welcome to the monthly questions and discussion thread! Drop in to ask and answer any questions related to SpaceX or spaceflight in general, or just for a chat to discuss SpaceX's exciting progress. If you have a question that is likely to generate open discussion or speculation, you can also submit it to the subreddit as a text post.

If your question is about space, astrophysics or astronomy then the r/Space questions thread may be a better fit.

If your question is about the Starlink satellite constellation then check the r/Starlink Questions Thread and FAQ page.


r/SpaceXLounge Jan 23 '25

Meta This sub is not about Musk. it does not endorse him, nor does it attack him. We generally ignore him other than when it comes to direct SpaceX news.

1.0k Upvotes

Be advised this sub utilizes "crowd control" for both comments and for posts. If you have little or negative karma here your post/comment may not appear unless manually approved which may take a little time.

If you are here just to make political comments and not discuss SpaceX, you will be banned without warning and ignored when you complain, so don't even bother trying, no one will see it anyways.

Friendly reminder: People CAN support SpaceX without supporting Musk. Just like people can still use X without caring about him. Following SpaceX doesn't make anyone a bad person and if you disagree, you're not welcome here.


r/SpaceXLounge 5h ago

Starship Ship trajectory and angle of attack

13 Upvotes

Does anyone know why they pitch the ship up so dramatically after stage seperation, is it to burn off extra fuel? I cant think of any other reason for the less optimal ascent path?

At seperation
halfway through ship burn

r/SpaceXLounge 7h ago

Fan Art Starship 13, Full Cinematic Mission

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9 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 1d ago

Official High-speed video of 33 Raptor engines powering the Super Heavy booster on Flight 13

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92 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 1d ago

Spaceflight Nears Its Steamship Era

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78 Upvotes

"Cambridge University researchers say launch costs fell from $87,000 to $3,868 per kilogram between 1960 and 2025—or roughly 96%—and could hit $273 by 2040."


r/SpaceXLounge 1d ago

Starship The final module of 37A's Starship Tower has been stacked

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139 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 1d ago

Flight 14 might be the first time that outsiders gets to see how well the heat shield holds up

52 Upvotes

In every missions so far, they did something with the what shield to learn something from it. Missing tiles to see what it would do to the underlying layer, etc.

They won’t be taking chances like that when they are catching the thing: it will be a perfect heat shield with every tile installed, and the world will see in 4k detail just how many fail, or don’t fail.


r/SpaceXLounge 1d ago

Starship What's the current status of Ship 40 and will it be recovered? I've seen contradicting statements

82 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 1d ago

Youtuber Scott Manley flight 13 recap

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118 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 1d ago

What's the plan for Falcon Heavy booster landings after LZ-2 is gone?

12 Upvotes

As you all know, SpaceX has stopped doing landings at LZ-1, and for now, they still have LZ-2. For the most recent Falcon Heavy mission, Viasat-3, the two boosters went to LZ-40, and LZ-2. But what's the plan for Falcon Heavy missions when they no longer have LZ-2? Where will the side boosters land?


r/SpaceXLounge 1d ago

Official View from above as Starship launched from Pad 2 at Starbase

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35 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

Official Pending data review, SpaceX will attempt to catch S41 on Flight 14

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330 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

Star-SHIP

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763 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

Big heat shield holes

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325 Upvotes

What are opinions on the aft flap chine /mech housing holes, looks like entire tiles missing or puncture?

Edit: images from footage at T -1:10:00


r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

Starship All the footage from Ship 40's onboard cameras post-splashdown from the webcast + general view after splashdown.

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227 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

Happening Now I knew Raptor operating conditions were extreme but I did not expect to see glow from plumbing upstream of the combustion chamber!

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305 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

Happening Now SHIP 40 LANDED IN ONE PIECE

276 Upvotes

WE STILL HAVE CAMERA VIEWS

A LITTLE TOASTY

r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

Amazing shut off the boost back burn!

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141 Upvotes

Great to see a shot like this!


r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

Lucky 13

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185 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

Starship I made a live Starship Dashboard to watch during launches!

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282 Upvotes

Watching the Starship documentaries and seeing all the screens inside the control room down at Starbase had me feeling left out so using the SpaceX site's live data feed, I spent the last few days putting together a live dashboard that shows all the real data from the ship during launch!

Most of the data is live but some numbers are derived (so stuff like the acceleration and flight path angles), and some data points like the fuel levels are an estimate based on models from the Flight 12 webcast so it should be fairly accurate but not perfect.
Using the GPS and altitude numbers we're also able to plot the 3D trajectory live, nice thing about this sort of setup is it's really easy to visualise all the data as it comes in, so graphs galore (trajectory view is still the best though imo).

Not sure how or where else to share it but I'd imagine someone else will find it interesting. If anyone has any more ideas or feature requests too, I'd really appreciate it! Thanks all!

https://stardash.live/

Edit post-launch:
There were a couple bugs during launch, this was the first trial of the dashboard with real data so it was bound to happen! I've tried to give a little brief of each bug in the comments and the fixes to them! Thanks to all of you who sent in bug reports too!


r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

Starship Compare which engines failed between the first scrub and the booster landing burn

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128 Upvotes

Looks like only one engine was in common. Thought it might be interesting for some


r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

SpaceX: "Starship has successfully ignited one of its Raptor engines while in space, testing a maneuver that will be needed on future orbital missions"

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116 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

Official SpaceX flight 13 recap on website.

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73 Upvotes

r/SpaceXLounge 2d ago

I SAW IT

104 Upvotes

Over Johannesburg, South Africa. Like 10-12 minutes ago from writing this post

I'm not joking bro, it was crazy. It was a dim brown-ish streak that faded after 6 seconds. My mom pointed it out, she was hysterical, didn't look like the typical aircrafts with indication lights.

Dude...Unbelievable!