2020-02-07

@JaneidyEve You’re welcome! Was a fun recruiting event. Great to see all the excitement about helping build Starships.

@Teslarati @13ericralph31 Unmodified water tower machines do not work well for orbital rockets, as mass efficiency is critical for the latter, but not the former. Hopper, for example, was made of 12.5mm steel vs 4mm for SN1 orbital design. Optimized skins will be <2mm in places across a 9000mm diameter.

@nextspaceflight @chraveesh @Teslarati No, they’re SN1. SN2 to follow shortly. Aiming to be a little better each time.

@chraveesh @Teslarati Yes, we’re tuning weld parameters to reduce puckering & building a heavy duty planisher to flatten & cold work the weld area

@Teslarati That said, although substantial capital & engineering is required to achieve extreme precision, marginal production cost of the primary structure should actually be *less* than a water tower, because it’s built inside a factory in volume.

@Teslarati This isn’t quite correct. An orbital rocket needs precision that’s 3X to 4X better than a water tower, so super precise parts, fixtures & welding are needed. Suborbital is much more forgiving.

SpaceX started with a mariachi band party. Great vibes here in Boca Chica, Texas!