Maybe it's just the sci fi nerd in me, but I feel like a better use for Starship's lift capacity (whatever it ends up being) would be to lift components for a dedicated interplanetary ship (say, something with a nuclear engine) into orbit rather than use Starship itself for interplanetary journeys.

@BACA01

12 күн бұрын

Interplanetary nuclear ships would tow starships for interplanetary journeys. They also would decelerate them for entering atmosphere without the necessity in heatshields. Russia is currently building one.

@Jogeta5

12 күн бұрын

When something like that is built and operational a future cargo Starship can launch it.

@effervescentrelief

12 күн бұрын

If Starship could not go, then I'm sure that's the contingency plan.

@redcougarjgw

12 күн бұрын

I thought you were talking about a Tesla truck for a minute there.

@Kr0N05

12 күн бұрын

I think NASA and SpaceX will develop a nuclear 'Tug' , but one that will push a Starship.

Startship and Super heavy have not even entered the optimization phase.

@nicolasrouvreau8365

12 күн бұрын

The super heavy can be built in carbon fiber for exemple (no need of high temperature resilience).

@flewdefur

12 күн бұрын

Yea, if you think this is rapid iteration now, imagine how fast it will be once they are catching the booster reliably. It will be like taking a car out for a test drive. And if they get really good at building starships and engines, disposable starships is still possible. Imagine how much simpler a disposable starship would be if it didnt have to land.

@wombatillo

12 күн бұрын

@@nicolasrouvreau8365 The questions are 1) will it actually be lighter? 2) will it be reuseable for 100 flights? 3) how much will it cost 4) what kind of fabrication spaces are required? and 5) will a carbon fibre tank be ok for LOX use given at least a hundred pressurization and heat cycles over the life of the rocket? SpaceX tested the carbon fibre back in the day when they are starting out and decided it's not worth the hassle.

@Danny-bd1ch

12 күн бұрын

@@flewdefur You are delusional.

@Smiles10130

12 күн бұрын

​@@flewdefurthey already make 1 daily for raptor engines. In the starbase tour, I saw engine 390 for raptor 2. Raptor 3 is gunning for 335 tons of thrust before it gets released, that's almost 2x raptor 1. Currently at 285. I think musk wants to perfect raptor 3 before using them on a starship.

OMG!!! Why cant you be totally honest with acknowledging that Starship is still in IFT Phase! There are 2 more iterations of the future ship that take all these issues in account.... Stop Gaslighting on a TEST Article!!!!

@JacquesMartini

11 күн бұрын

Meanwhile at Apollo, 50 years ago . . .

@jasongoodacre

10 күн бұрын

I agree. SpaceX are doing something never achieved by NASA in over 50 years. And they are close to solving it. And this numbnuts is talking about payload mass, when everyone knows this is a TEST vehicle. You solve the main problems before finalising design and payload optimisation.

@T1hitsTheHighestNote

9 күн бұрын

It will need several more test flights before we have a functioning system. We've only seen the v1 of the basic shell lift off so far. We haven't seen the tanker design, the the moon lander version. Mastering space docking/tanking will take several tests. How fast can you refly a ship and/or booster? How do you even refill Stage 0 fast enough?

@MarcStollmeyer

8 күн бұрын

Maybe SpaceX should stop gaslighting NASA.

@timchance2002

7 күн бұрын

@@MarcStollmeyer I really wasn't even going to respond to this: But I changed my mind. I'm sure you have this backwards. SpaceX isn't gaslighting anything. At all. Nasa, and by the way, The DOD are the ones choosing the only regularly available contractor to use, therefore gaslighting SpaceX to the entire world of who is the only consistent reliability right now. SpaceX's primary goal is star link. Everything else is secondary. Hence the Pez Dispenser door.

Starship is still deep in the prototype stage. There is a long way to go before most people would view it as "Version 1.0". Let's give SpaceX a bit longer before we write of their performance ambitions.

@DeepDeepSpace

12 күн бұрын

They claimed Starship would be landing on Mars this year.

@ProjectManagementPercontation

12 күн бұрын

That would be fine if it was supposed to be rapidly reusable 5 or 6 years from now.

@owenc.8288

12 күн бұрын

The thing is made out of steel. I guess thats why they call it super heavy.

@davidlang4442

12 күн бұрын

@@Rod_Knee At least another decade of work to set things right. Mars is at least 15 years out. Maybe Twenty. A whole new ship will need to be developed. One with artificial gravity. Starship isn't going to cut the mustard as it currently is. One like the ship in the movie 2010. That will take another 25 years to develop and another 5 years to build in orbit around Earth. This ship will be good to explore the solar system with. Musk's heavy lift rocket will get the stuff up there. That's what it's good for. Starship is good to get someplace fast on Earth.

@marimuthu14

12 күн бұрын

Meanwhile China just pulled in their Long March 10 launch date from 2027 to 2025-2026... This rocket is very similar to Falcon Heavy with a Hydrolox 3rd stage with 27t TLI. Twin launches will deliver a crew module and a lander to low lunar orbit for rendezvous, crew transfer and landing. Such a clean, low cost and practical design. Two launches with rockets around the same cost as Falcon Heavy. Instead of this messy nonsense. I'm telling you the Chinese are going to land first and setup moon base long before SpaceX can get Lunar Starship working flawlessly.

So as a long time view I remember Angry's rant about the raptor 3 and why Space X just needs to settle on a design and get it fully developed.... Looks like they knew what they were doing. Booster 10 for ITF-3 was first spotted in July of 2022. We are working on 2 year old prototypes. Trust the Hardware rich design process, 1. SpaceX, has a working prototype, which looks like it will be either partially reusable and rapidly refurbished at worst by the end of the year. 2. SpaceX is cash flow positive due to star link 3. SpaceX has a mass production factory built and already partially operating 4. The last test said 2 layers of ablative heat shield survived reentry. Which means if you had to you could ditch the tiles and settle for rapidly refurbishable. If you read the full comment make your prediction where they will be in 18 months (Jan 2026)

@Rod_Knee

12 күн бұрын

I think they'll have had successful recovery of both Super Heavy and Starship by then, and possibly reuse of Super Heavy.

@shadowlordalpha

12 күн бұрын

I agree, but really... getting it developed is the different iterations. Most companies just don't number them before they settle on a final one

@jeremynew6449

12 күн бұрын

I kind of expect HLS tanker flights will be expendable just so they can "get it done faster".

@charleslivingston2256

12 күн бұрын

Expending Super Heavy with its 33 engines is pretty expensive.

@charleslivingston2256

12 күн бұрын

I think they will have flown the stretched version of both Super Heavy and Ship by the end of the year. SpaceX is nothing if not relentless in their pace.

Bezos: I'm tired... ULA: tag me in!

I dont find the rapid refueling hard to believe. The recent EverydayAstronaut tour of Starbase really showed how big the factories are going to be. They're preparing to ramp up production big time... As long as they can deliver a huge amount of a Starships and they have a framework that works for rapid reusability, then rapid refueling will become quite easy. There's a few ifs in there, but I'm sure SpaceX will figure it out. Starship is their new main product, SpaceX falls with Starship if it fails to do what it's supposed to.

@jarredeagley1748

12 күн бұрын

Agreed, though I imagine the ground equipment for rapidly fueling multiple starship superheavy stacks is going to take a while to get rolling. That's a lot of methane and LOX!

@nujum24

12 күн бұрын

I don't think its the starship turn around time that's the problem, more so that the OLM turn around time is worrisome. As it is right now the OLM takes over a month to get it ready for the next flight, that needs to change fast.

@jarredeagley1748

12 күн бұрын

@@nujum24 If I were to guess, they might build multiple OLM's and rotate them. The new OLM they're building will have a flame trench too, so they're definately improving on the design.

@nujum24

12 күн бұрын

@jarredeagley1748 Even if they do that, the time it takes each of them to get ready for a single flight is too long. And we don't really know if upgrades they are doing or fixes.

@robertthomas9564

12 күн бұрын

So long as the booster can achieve rapid reusablity, we are good to go. The starfactory can easily crankout 10 S26 type, expendable tanker ships in a few months; no heat shield, flaps, header tanks....... All of that weight savings goes towards more fuel delivered to HLS on each launch.

You called SLS “operational”. You must be talking about the Lego set 😂

Just like Falcon, this will be a steady development process of incremental mass reduction and increases in payload. Right now the design focus is mission success. Mass optimisation comes later.

@benjaminmeusburger4254

10 күн бұрын

"mission success" for what mission? their focus at the moment was testing a garage door in orbit = deploying satelites if their highest priority would be landing on the moon, then they wouldn't bother with a heat shield for the first 3 tests but simply tried to orbit and refuel simply accept the loss of the upper stages and don't bother with a heat shield

@johnanderson2550

10 күн бұрын

@@benjaminmeusburger4254 Elon said during his interview with EDA that they're not doing any payload development this year.

"Keep things as real as possible", Listen, I fully admit my bias about SpaceX, but sitting there and pretending that it's some kind of a shock that iteration 1 of starship does not have the capabilities of a fully operational starship is insane, of course an early prototype is not as capable as the final design. Wait for them to figure out how to launch and catch it, then they can work on improving the design to get the weight down.

@Inspace_noone_can_hear_u_honk.

12 күн бұрын

Agreed. V1 is overbuilt to insure it survives for data and proof of concept. Then they can skim off the extras with every prototype thereafter.

@keithrange4457

12 күн бұрын

Agreed. Our Angry fellow sometimes seems to have some glaring blind spots. This isn't to say I don't enjoy his channel and videos. Just something I've perceived

@yomanyo327

12 күн бұрын

@@keithrange4457 I feel that sometimes he purposefully makes videos like these just to rile his community up, because he's "the angry astronaut"

@Smiles10130

12 күн бұрын

@@Inspace_noone_can_hear_u_honk. Remember in ift 1 the starship was doing flips. That seems to me to be too much steel. I've heard him say they're going to make the next version thinner.

@crooklynx972

12 күн бұрын

True, he soundsmore like an angry and biased astronaut!

And hey, is this really doubt or is this drama? drama....These aren't the ships that are going to be used...but you knew that

@somaliskinnypirate

12 күн бұрын

well, hey, gota pump up them (view) numbers! lol

@Pieman10101tx

12 күн бұрын

Bros gotta pay the bills somehow. I listen cause sometimes he digs up stuff I haven’t seen yet even if he is somewhat over-exaggerated while doing it sometimes.

@MyLifeThruTheLens

12 күн бұрын

This is click bait, the last interview by Tim addressed all this

@ryandavis4448

12 күн бұрын

Yea it's still in prototype phase. In fact, SpaceX has already said they're gonna increase the size of the Starship.

@xponen

11 күн бұрын

If this isn't the Starship they're planning to use, then the next two larger versions will cost more than the $2 billion already spent on this relatively "small" one. It's becoming impractical. This Starship is already bigger than the Saturn V.

I think that SpaceX' success has jaded us. We may be losing sight of the ambitiousness of what they are doing. The science and engineering needed to create the technologies for almost every system being used is mindboggling. Despite what NASA, politicians and even Elon himself love to forecast, the technology will take as long as it takes to be developed and proven.

@matfax

12 күн бұрын

I guess they had to make optimal promises so the project wasn't canceled in its infancy, and maintain the story so that it doesn't end like the Dear Moon project. Compensating for the deficiencies of our society and politics...

@DeepDeepSpace

12 күн бұрын

@@matfax in other words, SpaceX lied about how far Starship was in development in order to get that government funding.

@petersuvara

11 күн бұрын

I think you need to accept when something is not working. Falcon is great, Falcon Heavy is also. It's not looking good for Starship, sorry.

@benjaminmeusburger4254

10 күн бұрын

"create the technologies for almost every system being used" their mission to land on the moon - that was already done in 1969 and is for Artemis just bigger by a factor of 2-3 nobody forced SpaceX to reinvent a reusable upper stage (the old one would be the SpaceShuttle) and write into a contract that they can do it within 4 years Projects that take multiple years are always a horror - however a timelines needs to be adjusted and targets to be reset. At the moment SpaceX talks about new version and new engines. TBH I don't know if they are any further now then 2 years ago. At least they now know that a slab of concrete is not enough for a launch pad, their termination system now termines flights and that garage doors in vacuum can be tricky

Im still positive space x will reaches his goals in the future

@lostpony4885

12 күн бұрын

Im not positive that goal isnt supporting Putins conquests.

@jonathangibson4778

12 күн бұрын

@@lostpony4885 SpaceX has hurt Putin, both with Starlink and Starshield, as well as Crew Dragon making Soyuz obsolete for Nasa

@Jogeta5

12 күн бұрын

@@lostpony4885 🤦‍♂

This video's logical fallacy is CATEGORY ERROR. These are prototypes. Starship can't yet lift 1 TON to orbit. Much less "only 50 tons". The goal here is to build a rapidly reusable system. AND THEN fine tune it to achieve its objectives. Not the other way around. For example, Falcon 9 has doubled its lift capacity since it first flew. You are just mindlessly criticizing a prototype for not being the end product yet.

@matfax

12 күн бұрын

Technology demonstrators. They need a safety record for these engines, the methane fuel, the steel-based structure, the heat shield, the maneuverability, the launch tower catching, the fuel transfer in orbit. Why overenginneer it when the results might force their hands so that they have to start over?

@just_archan

11 күн бұрын

​@@matfaxtechnology demonstrator on ALREADY obsolete tech. We knew about raptor 3 before IFT1. Same with electric TVS. Or having longer booster ship. Or that ship will have 9 engines instead 6. Or that front flaps will be smaller and more leeway. Even double heatshield was mentioned to Tim dott a day before IFT4. V1 is pathfinder and is just good enough to gather data to adjust V2.

@farmerpete6274

11 күн бұрын

And a click-bait title... You can do better than this, Angry.

@fteoOpty64

11 күн бұрын

​@@just_archanSpaceX have simulated all of those and more. The restriction is to choose which to physically build and test, then iterate. If SpaceX can clone 5 of itself, it will but it can't. We all have physical limitations and make compromise base on overall cost. Lowering cost as a design factor is important. If we use the SLS model, we will not get to the moon in another 2 decades in any serious number of humans, meaning hundreds not tens of people.

@avgjoe5969

10 күн бұрын

Angry astronaut plays devil's advocate (its in the name). Regardless of how early, its still worth discussing. Frankly, I'm waiting on V3 as the workhorse. Even 50t short, that's 150t to LEO. So there are solid margins for success. That said, going from 50t to 100t w/o extending fuel tanks is a big ask and worth looking at. Raptor 3 brings 50t extra per engine, more engines, even better and we still don't know what the new ISP for Raptor 3 is... 300>350bar has to make it more fuel efficient. In the end, stretching the rocket will help a Lot.

50 metric tons is still 7.5 elephants in low earth orbit.....its that .5 elephant that scares me.

@GreggyBoop

12 күн бұрын

I mean, of all the elephants involved, the .5 elephant is the least dangerous 😂

@woodym2

12 күн бұрын

I'm not sure which is more scary, the front half or the back half.

@verypleasantguy

12 күн бұрын

@@woodym2 The trunk

@PlanXV

12 күн бұрын

Need one million elephants to colonise mars

@jmwoods190

12 күн бұрын

​@@GreggyBoop Or could it actually be the .5 elephant in the room? 😉

It's still in development don't get your pants in a twist!

@nonowayjose9159

12 күн бұрын

Grumpy AstroNUT cannot help that... low T likely.

@isakoqv

12 күн бұрын

Doesn't mean that there aren't fundamental design limitations that are yet to reveal themselves. Elon himself commonly refers to it as "success is one of the possible outcomes".

@user-vo8zx2uj1p

11 күн бұрын

​@@isakoqvright? You can "optimize" all you want that doesn't mean you can beat physically possibles limitations

The current version of starship is a test article,you know that, you even know the upgrade path, what the hell are you trying to assert here with click bait like this?

@gojidoh

12 күн бұрын

It really feels like willful ignorance at this point

Elon spoke on this last month. You're a day late and a dollar short.

It's a PROTOTYPE not the completed version 🤦🚩 THE END 🙀

Based on a technical assessment from ULA? Given their recent years of utterly abysmal performance why would anyone assign credibility to THEIR ASSESSMENTS?

@FB0102

12 күн бұрын

Ad Hominem logical fallacy. You can assess the validity of the claims independent of who said them.

@slartybarfastb3648

12 күн бұрын

It turns out the Angry Astronaut is Old Space after all. Elon must have refused to give him an interview or stuck him with the bar tab maybe?

@Hiser23

12 күн бұрын

You can’t put anymore into the ULA comment than you can this dipstick, he’s jealous of SpaceX. If he wanted to hang with losers he could’ve saved his breath begging for money on here so he could as he says “hob nob” with the Brits and went to Decater Alabama and rode on Tory Bruno’s nob.

@harmankardon478

2 сағат бұрын

when it suits his story, he goes with whatever.. Jordan is not to be taken seriously, he has no idea what he is talking about... having bfast with rocket scientists lol classic stuff!

One thing to mention is that hot-stage ring is temporary. As I understand it, newer boosters will just have the main body include the structure, which should remove some weight as this would be just part of the hull and thus doesn't need to be independently strengthened. And the same goes for extra engine shielding--as Raptor reliability improves, there's no need for it, just like there's no shielding around Merlins.

Every problem is always SOLVED only by people who think how TO DO IT, not how it is impossible to do it ... :)

@ProjectManagementPercontation

12 күн бұрын

Every cancelled project is making progress right up to the day it is cancelled.

@crp9985

12 күн бұрын

That is a loaded statement and shouldn't be used in any argument. Lots of people went bankrupt thinking they couldn't be wrong. On the other hand many people made a fortune doing things people thought couldn't be done. There is a fine line between crazy and genius.

@GreyDeathVaccine

11 күн бұрын

​@@crp9985 10 years ago head of ArianeGRoup ridiculed SpaceX that they were dreamers and that launching 100 rockets a year was a pipe dream. In 2023, SpaceX successfully launched 98 rockets.

@crp9985

11 күн бұрын

@@GreyDeathVaccine Doesn't mean they will continue to succeed everything they say they are going to do.

Naa, It's way too early to assess the final stats for starship. Really, they are still trying to nail down the design requirements. I am surprised they say the payload is data. They dont even have a final design, how can they worry about the flight/glide envelope? Version two will help build a thrust table that will clarify numbers of engines versus higher champer pressure improvements that will impact version 3.

@Jogeta5

12 күн бұрын

The data they get from V1 ship/booster launches is critical. Calculations and simulations need to be tested.

@benjaminmeusburger4254

10 күн бұрын

@@Jogeta5 how is the V1 data criticel, when V2/V3 have completely different parameters and engines?

this is no different to the nay sayers who said SpaceX would never land a Falcon 9 rocket, Starship is still a prototype, its likely the end product will look totally different to what we see today. I think your beef is more about the ambitious time-frames

I think should concentrate on making the Starship system fully reusable, even semi- rapidly reusable. Even if it can get just 30 tons to orbit. That will be game-changing enough in the space industry and allow incredible things to start happening.

@matfax

12 күн бұрын

For what though? How many potential consumers exist for this product who wouldn't prefer Falcon 9 or Falcon Heavy for its safety record? This leaves Starlink as the primary use. And Starlink has bad rep now, due to harming the Ozone layer. I believe that a Moon expansion might open a new market eventually, but this takes time. Who knows, SpaceX might - just as with Starlink - find their own way to monetize it with a new industry, like space energy. Once an infrastructure exists, the market will follow.

@isakoqv

12 күн бұрын

This makes sense to me. We really have no idea what a fully and rapidly reusable vehicle entails. Might be easier to focus on weight reduction once we do.

@xponen

11 күн бұрын

@@matfax True, with a 50-ton payload, even the smaller Falcon Heavy can outperform Starship 1, which is as big as the Saturn V. That's crazy to think about!

@stephenfidler1005

11 күн бұрын

​@@xponen Cost. If fully reusable no more throwing second stages away.

@xponen

11 күн бұрын

@@stephenfidler1005 Falcon Heavy second stage cost less than Starship, look at the size difference.

Elon was planning a version 3 of Starship/Super Heavy. So I am not worried about it's future.

@Smiles10130

12 күн бұрын

I think musk should skip v2 and go to v3 directly.

@Jogeta5

12 күн бұрын

@@Smiles10130 That won't happen as the V2 boosters and ships are already being built. Due to their increasing production capacity and launch cadence, skipping large numbers won't really occur anymore.

@kingfairytale4306

10 күн бұрын

​@@Smiles10130 While I understand your viewpoint, rushing this process will only lead to failure in the future, so it's best to go one step at a time. (Even SpaceX has been going one step at a time, albeit while running around like a maniac, and I mean that in the best way possible, but still one step at a time.)

@Smiles10130

9 күн бұрын

@@kingfairytale4306 You're correct that is the space x way. But v3 is what will be necessary for a Mars colony and the sooner it comes out, the sooner we can start that discussion.

whatever the problem maybe, I'm sure SpaceX will figure it out.

@dianerios880

12 күн бұрын

😂😂😂

@Danny-bd1ch

12 күн бұрын

They will eventually run out of investors and Govt milk.

This is early days for new technology, we did not have gigabyte internet connections straight off the bat. The main goal here is full reusability. Then they will apply the Musk algorithm, rinse and repeat until she is unstoppable.

Forget about Mars: human kidneys will not survive the voyage back...

@matfax

12 күн бұрын

@@Sodomis666 Artificial Gravity should do the trick

I feel like a larger starship will actually make reentry easier as the mass to surface area ratio will be lower.

Falcon 9 has increased payload to LEO a lot since first orbital version, 10.4 t, to current 17.5t. There will be plenty of time and opportunities to iterate on optimizations once they have rapid reuse, heat shields, booster catching etc figured out. This is not the space shuttle.

@Steven_Edwards

11 күн бұрын

Yeah, except they have a contract to meet.

@davidstevenson9517

10 күн бұрын

Falcon 9 has not, can not and will never lift more than 10tn payloads. Falcon Heavy is also limited to10tn payloads, but it can lift them higher. That's why the US Space Force employs ULA disposables to launch their heavy payloads to high orbits despite costing 2-3 times more than SpaceX; because the Falcons can't do it.

I don't think it really makes sense to say that a prototype underperforms. That's like saying the Wright brothers couldn't carry 20 passengers with them when inventing the first airplane. Elon is trying to crack the problem of a fully reusable rocket which has never been done before. So there will be weight penalties first to reach this goal. Optimization of weight will be done later. Additionally the shielding of the engines is rather for them to survive reentry. So far they have a lot of little tubes on them which would be torn away during reentry of Super Heavy otherwise. Only with Raptor V3 those shields will become obsolete and weight will be reduced by that.

@jgunther3398

8 күн бұрын

he;s talking about where starship stands right now. not what name you want to give it

well is "cheap" so you can still lauch a ton of those and archive the mass in orbit

@randomasian8715

10 күн бұрын

Englis

@skedaritou8138

8 күн бұрын

@@randomasian8715 No se joven, aveces se me va el ingles a las 4 am por eso aunque lo domine , estando medio dormido no es mi lenguaje materno

Well, the refueling protocol would not be the Lunar Starship waiting in orbit for dozens of refueling Starships to come feed it, as you seem to suggest. There would be a large tank in orbit that would be fed by Starships until full. This tanker satellite would have the sunshield, insulation and cooling system. Then Lunar Starship would launch and dock with the tank satellite, fuel up, and go on to the Moon.

Hasn’t Elon said multiple times that this is “Starship 1.0”?

23:55 Hey that's me 😁

"OH NO! The current prototype version can ONLY lift 50 metric tons into LEO as a fully reusable vehicle" Wow! Epic fail on SpaceX's part. ONLY 50 ton?!?! What losers!!!

@literallyshaking8019

11 күн бұрын

Saturn V, a smaller booster built in the 1960s was capable of carrying 85 tons into LEO. I will concede that Starship is still in the prototype phase so numbers don’t mean much, but if they can’t lift 100 tons with such a massive booster then that’s a pretty major fail considering it’s future mission objectives. I hope they get it sorted out and succeed.

@stephenfidler1005

11 күн бұрын

​@@literallyshaking8019 how about not comparing apples with oranges. I don't see any evidence of Saturn 5 reuse You think 50 tons is the end game? Also 50 tons reuse is the cheapest current strategy for LEO

@GreyDeathVaccine

11 күн бұрын

@@literallyshaking8019 85 tons to LEO? How did Saturn V did this? Different fuel used?

@literallyshaking8019

11 күн бұрын

@@GreyDeathVaccine it was during the Skylab mission

@JacquesMartini

11 күн бұрын

Up to now, it liftet excatly ZERO tons of payload to LEO . . .

Yeah. The original payload to LEO for Falcon 9 was only 9 tons whereas block 5 can now go 22.5 tons. 50 tons is worst case at the moment on a vehicle still in heavy development. Lets see where future iterations performance lands.

ULA: SpaceX's Starship program isn't feasible Also ULA: We don't know when (or if) it'll be safe for our Starliner crew to come home

There is absolutely no way that SpaceX didn't know about a 50% engineering deficit, not with today's modern engineering tools, this HAS to be planed versioning/iteration in the pipeline, I would get a upto 15 - 20% deficit, not 50, not as an unknown "surprise"

@gojidoh

12 күн бұрын

It is, and they've said so themselves

@RyanMcCarvill

12 күн бұрын

They've been hinting at it for several months with discussions about raptor 3, more engines, and stretching the platform. They've known about it for awhile.

@davidstevenson9517

10 күн бұрын

Elon Musk is an habitual liar; he is, after all, a salesman.

They need a nuclear starship.. as youve mentioned prior.. raptors are truly amazing but the efficiency of liquid gas propellants is a huge problem for space travel

@viarnay

12 күн бұрын

The USSR tried nuclear planes once but they never worked...

@ReiseLukas

12 күн бұрын

The problem I see with that is a lot of these theoretical tech we can use in the future requires huge infrastructure in space. Starship is the best solution for getting a ton of material to space quickly so that infrastructure can be constructed. I don't see nuclear engine rockets launching from the surface, that could be more risky than chemical rockets

@Smiles10130

12 күн бұрын

@@soapbar88 I don't believe nuclear engines have enough thrust. Which is a problem. Isp is important but only if there's enough thrust

@peterkawa9869

12 күн бұрын

Radiation is the problem

@Smiles10130

12 күн бұрын

@@peterkawa9869 from cosmic rays or the engine?

The capacity of spacex to achieve the seemingly impossible isnt to be underestimated

I consider myself a spacex fan, but not a delusional fan, they have challenges ahead, I hope they can optimize super heavy and starship at the same degree they did with F9.

i think with new design, shields en hot stage dome, will help to the goal of 100 tons

@Smiles10130

12 күн бұрын

That's why they use hardware rich design. Build, test, modify repeat

I think it comes down to whether they NEED full reusability of the tankers to get to the Moon and Mars. From what I gather, they don't. It seems like they can build stripped-down upper stages fast and cheap. A backup plan would just be to build 6-8 of those for every Mars or Moon bound spacecraft. No, not nearly as cost-effective, but they can still do the mission and you can likely get far, far more than 100t of propellant in each.

@slartybarfastb3648

12 күн бұрын

The entire purpose of Starship is to fully reusable, rapidly reusable, and reliable. There will be no expendable Starship booster or orbiter, unless you include lunar Starship.

@Jogeta5

12 күн бұрын

@@slartybarfastb3648 Like Falcon 9 and heavy, if it's required the ship can be expendable. Like Elon has mentioned for the Lunar base. The Starship platform is designed for mass production after all.

@slartybarfastb3648

12 күн бұрын

@Jogeta5 The reason Musk sees Falcon 9 as obsolete is precisely due to the second stage being expendable, as well as the booster for many launch profiles. Starship will not be expendable. If it can't fly on Starship without any part being expended, it will not fly at all. And Lunar Starship is not truly expendable as it also serves as the lunar habitat as well. Return the Starship, you lose your habitat.

@Hokie2k11

12 күн бұрын

@@slartybarfastb3648 of course it'll fly regardless. If it is cheaper to launch, particularly expended, than a F9, it makes sense to use SS. Every indication is that it's an extremely budget friendly design if you keep the second stage stripped down - I'm talking under $10 million for an expendable 6 emgine second stage. Probably under $7million if they get production to under once a week. At those prices they'll use SS regardless of its reusability.

This was some great journalism AA! I read the comments from BO and ULA as well, and it was an interesting insight from them that Starship is underperforming. The V2 is being developed to restore the original payload capacity, given all the extra mass they've had to add. It's a real shame most journalistic outlets haven't reported on this. But you are right - the fanboys have no appetite for actual news if it's bad.

I think the degrading of Starship performance relates to the weight of the heatshield tiles. I remember at a time when Starship was going to use WD-40 to "sweat" their way through reentry. I also remember they were looking at 'feathering" used by Space One and VSS Unity and late VSS Enterprise. I'm no way qualified to evaluate any of these methods but as an engineering student, I find the case study... fascinating...(Spock 🖖)

Thought this was going to be about BO/ULA's attempts to prevent Starship from achieving its intended launch cadence, but it's _this?_ This is bizarrely alarmist, but at least it might give the anti-SpaceX cult a shot of dopamine. Let's be perfectly clear on one thing at least: Raptor has had major design updates in the workings for literally years. The extra Isp provided by Raptor 3 _literally_ mandates changes to the fuel profile in order to take advantage of that, hence the inevitable changes to Starship that we see in Block 3. There's your 200 tons. The additional weight from unanticipated modifications to Block 1 is exactly the kind of dross that gets shaved off as prototyping segues into mature designs-as happened, for example, with Falcon 9.

@DraftedByTheMan

12 күн бұрын

Every KZread content creator has his/her own schtick…AA’s is doom & gloom. I remember when he thought Starship shouldn’t even launch 🚀

@Danny-bd1ch

12 күн бұрын

You calling serious people "anti-SpaceX Cult" is extreme projection.

@rolanddeschain965

12 күн бұрын

Honestly it's along the same lines.

@Smiles10130

12 күн бұрын

​@@DraftedByTheManexcept European launch or companies that are smaller.

Trash talk from ULA, they are competitors. Without an actual fact full analysis, I'm not going to waste my time and listen to them.

The great thing about Starship is there's a business case for it in Starlink alone. That business drive and funding will keep them optimizing until they get the thing that can land 150 tons on the moon.

Why are you doing this, this version of starship will never carry payload...

@shaung949

10 күн бұрын

There are only three left of this version then his argument is completely redundent.

Thank you AA for not being a insufferable fanboi of Musk.

I think you may be right. I realise that the standard refrain is 'its just early days', but the problem is that there is a contract that they have to complete by 2026. That's not much time to double the lifting capacity and that's not to mention the challenge of orbital refueling and the actual landing itself. Despite the very impressive rate of development so far, it still looks a bit undoable. With the Chinese competition looking at around 2030, it would be reassuring to having a more certain path to getting back on the moon.

@ludwigvanzappa9548

11 күн бұрын

Orbital refueling will be the wall they hit... Not going to happen. Imagine refueling one ship in orbit but you have to launch 15+ ships in a short amount of time... How they will pull that off with those horizontal reservoirs? How long does it takes to fill them all? How much time maximum to fill the orbiting ship before it loses to much fuel? Starship is starting to prove useless.

@irrefudiate

11 күн бұрын

We're not competing with China, this is not a race. China's doing their own thing.. using our technology.. but, still.

Thanks! I appreciated your very clear and detailed reports. Well done. I am also a Patreon subscriber/member and I encourage everyone to support you and your efforts. Great stuff!

@TheAngryAstronaut

12 күн бұрын

Thanks so much for your ongoing support!! Viewers like you make all the difference to this channel!! :)

Dr Houbolt was correct in the early 1960's, he may well still be right in the 2020's 😮 en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Houbolt

If you’re referring to Tory Bruno’s Medium post, this is designed to make Vulcan look better than Starship. Tory isn’t being dishonest, he’s just trying to make his product look as good as possible. First, it will be fully reusable, having a huge impact on launch cost. Second, optimization will happen next, once function is demonstrated.

@sophie-ny3nj

11 күн бұрын

You should buy and hold tech stock Crypto investment

@mohmmedtolba

11 күн бұрын

There are many interesting stocks in many industries that you might follow. You don't have to act on every forecast, so I'll suggest that you work with a financial advisor who can help you choose the best times to purchase and sell the shares or ETFs you want to acquire

@rorrito9912

11 күн бұрын

You should know it's easy and hard to make that much profit. I say EASY because it's very possible to make that much, and Hard because you'll need professional assistance to do it, I'd suggest you get assisted by a market advisor.

@lazyas8016

11 күн бұрын

I'm an advocate for having a diverse investment strategy. I grew to a 5 figure mark with my portfolio having exposure to different areas of the market, including small and large-caps of the ETF index, blue chip stocks, coins, grade bonds and alternatives like cryptocurrency markets, as this helps manage the overall risk on my portfolio managed by my FA.. Credits to my adviser, Jonathan, i have no doubt investing more

@EstherLage.

11 күн бұрын

This is impressive how could someone go about getting investment guidance from a coach like that, would you mind sharing your coach~info?

Not quite sure why anyone would write a critique of development and testing hardware as if it were a finished article. The 100+ tons to orbit hardware is a design requirement, based on assumptions of ongoing engine development and expected dry mass of safe reusable hardware. The fact that they still think this is achievable is implicit in the "Starship 2" design stating 100+ tons to orbit, which will ( perhaps ) be the first hardware that is not a test article. Personally, I think the "version numbers" applied to both test articles and engines are arbitrary and subject to change. If the first flight of a commercial Starship ( possibly Dear Moon ) can still only put 50 tons in orbit, THEN you should worry.

Some time ago I heard that the test vehicles could put fourteen tons into orbit. That might have referred to the first version of the raptor engine and the ship that didn't launch. At the time I thought, "they got a ways to go."

For the booster, additional engines help, because the faster they burn prop, the lower the gravity losses (and the less prop needed for boost-back.) The number of R.vacs engines on the ship only matters because R.vacs have higher Isp than R.sl. If the ship only had one type of engine, the number wouldn't matter, because the rocket equation only considers Isp, not how many engines are running. More engines just let you complete a burn faster (if you don't have any payload g-force restrictions.)

We should never be going directly to Mars in Starship. Instead, we should focus on building giant, mobile stations capable of providing the shielding, artificial gravity, and food generation necessary to ensure the success of a fledgling base on a hostile new planet. These stations could be built from inflatable segments that would fill starship's fairing and expand to roughly double the size. Say its 8m x 15m in the fairing. The segment would expand to 16m x 30m fully inflated. Take a hundred launches, launch up 100 segments and connect them end-to-end in a ring. You'd need more launches for equipment, water, engines and fuel. The design of each segment would include a bladder surrounding the crew areas for water storage and to provide radiation shielding. The ring would be 3km in circumference, and nearly 1km in diameter. Large enough to accommodate a large crew, grow plenty of food, and rotate slowly enough to minimize Coriolis to acceptable levels while providing ~1G. Attach a docking bay that also features ion thrusters at the center, and then get this thing working and self-sufficient in LEO. After it's ready, take it to the moon. And then send another one to Mars. If the shielding is done right, they can take their time and not worry about overdosing on radiation. Once in Martian orbit, the station can send landing craft, provide materials, food, and the starter kits for Martian conquest, and critically, provide rehab for pioneers when they need to recharge their bones and biology. If things go haywire, the station is a perfect platform to regroup and try again. Women can have babies on the station, and raise them under 1G until it's safe to gradually increase exposure to 2/3G. These stations would also enable mining operations in the belt, or on Psyche. I've thought long about this, and this is the ONLY way that conquest would make sense. We must walk before we can run. And to walk, we need these stations. The one drawback is that this will take years longer, since the R&D of the station will be extensive. But consider this: before Starlink was begun, people were loudly proclaiming how impossible, how impossibly long it would take to launch thousands of satellites and manage the fleet in LEO. Obviously, they were wrong. In 2023, SpaceX had 91 Falcon9 heavy launches. When Starship is in full swing with dozens of vehicles and multiple pads, they could loft the mass for such a station in under a year. And the loft costs would be less than the cost of a single SLS launch.

@nate_rndm

12 күн бұрын

It's always seemed a bit odd to press a LEO-optimized heavy lift vehicle into other roles. Even for a fin-less, shield-less lunar lander it seems wasteful to drag starship's excess mass all the way there and back. That said, a direct-to-Martian-surface flight saves the fuel needed for an orbital insertion burn as well as the massive development cost of a specialized Mars-transit craft or orbital station. It makes sense to set records and kickstart Mars exploration with Starship even though, as you show, long term there are probably better options for building a civilization there.

@Smiles10130

12 күн бұрын

You can't send a space station to the moon or mars that's kms in size because there's not enough thrust,especially ion thrusters. You can't stabilize an orbit with them either. You would need some serious thrusters to stabilize and move the station. Where will you store the fuel?

@jklappenbach

12 күн бұрын

@@Smiles10130 One option: you'd use Oxygen as the ejection ion. Since you'd have much more water than needed to support the station in store for radiation shielding in the walls of the ship, if it's possible to use oxygen and or hydrogen ions, there's an enormous supply. If only noble gases will work, then consider the fact that you have 21,000 cubic meters of volume onboard the station. You also have the option of additional storage exterior to the crew area. Perhaps extending from the central axis. Ion engines are highly efficient. And while they provide much lower thrust, this compounds over the length of time that they can be used. We'd also have several 100 MW fission reactors to provide the energy to power this. The engines could leverage as much power as needed. If we need to scale this up, I don't think that's an issue. I'm confident that this solution would work, that the station could carry enough ejection mass to satisfy the delta-V needed to transit from LEO to Mars. The unfortunate aspect of Mars is that its atmosphere is fairly low on Nobel gasses. They could be collected over time in order to refuel. But thruster designs built around other, more highly available elements might be a wise choice. They'll suffer from increased maintenance, as non-Nobel ions will interact and cause corrosion. But the fact that we have humans on the ready to repair mitigates the concerns that may have necessitated Nobel atoms for autonomous designs.

Have they even loaded the thing up?

@Smiles10130

12 күн бұрын

Nope. It's not operational yet.

@Jogeta5

12 күн бұрын

No payloads for V1 ships, just data.

@kingfairytale4306

10 күн бұрын

The only thing ever being put on a starship is monitoring equipment as of right now, so likely barely a ton, let alone the two hundred they are planning.

And this is one of the reasons why most launch providers behave less publicly. Every video and comment SpaceX makes about Starship should be prefaced with the same statement game devs put on their EA titles, "Product is still under development and is not representative of the final product. You may experience many bugs and features may change at any time."

Somehow they misunderstood a lot of things. At the moment the aim is to test as many aspects as possible as cheaply as possible. It is intentional that the proportions of the first stage to the shuttle are incorrect. so the first stage stays closer to the starting table and doesn't rise as high. The shuttle has to be large because it will be refueled later in space.

Elon knows space is hard. He is probably is underestimating the challenges because a sane man who correctly estimated them would have walked away. Yet here we are catching boosters on a drone ship in the ocean. It took longer than he was expecting but he still has like 90% of humanities up-mass to orbit. This challenge is proving difficult, but he is the only one with a realistic plan that could work so... Yeah, SpaceX may struggle to get the propellants to orbit, SpaceX may struggle to fill a depot, SpaceX might struggle to land HLS, but there are not a lot of other options that can fit in our tiny NASA budget.

The official numbers are : Mass - Reusable: 100-150 t (220,000-331,000 lb) Expendable: Up to 250 t (551,000 lb)

You dont sound very angry! Enjoy your stay. Sounds like fun! What I wonder is how they plan to deploy that 100 ton payload. Theres no fairings? Only a "Pez" dispenser door? No structural mechanisms? Im sure they'll figure it out and its still way early in the development stage.

As I understand the current situation at SpaceX, they are already sunsetting version 1 and building version 2. They won't have any version 1 rockets left by the time they need to launch HLS.

For the fueling missions, seems like an expendable aluminum version of starship (upper stage) would make a lot of sense. Loose the TPS, Loose the grid fins and actuators (might need something like it for stacking), loose the four fins and actuators. Leave the engine count at minimum and loose any additional thermal protection for them mandated by reentry and flips, etc. Seems like that could get the current version up near 100K ton to LEO.

@matthewota3647

12 күн бұрын

"Loose?" I think you mean "Lose" Two different meanings. Loose: free or released from fastening or attachment: a loose end. Lose: to come to be without (something in one's possession or care).

@protean15

12 күн бұрын

@@matthewota3647 I stand corrected.

I was always thinking this Starship project was overkill, but that it would lead to spinoff that could be used elsewhere. But thinking of the Shuttle and the Buran and how the Americans as well as the Russians are struggling now to get something to the moon, half a century after Apollo and the Lunokhod missions, I am beginning to have doubts. As we see now, a space project requires a whole lot of specialised people that develop very typical knowledge, and if this 'knowledge center' is not looked after, all this very specialised knowledge vanishes like the knowledge how to build megalithic structures. Space exploration requires longtime vision and strategy, something completely absent in the West, where people have the consciousness of a firefly these days. Democracy is not very well fit for such a task. A centralised system with very long term vision and strategy like the Chinese have almost always been used to, looks way more promising, than all these Western short-lived initiatives, that look more like hobby projects.

Your videos have come a long way in the past couple of years. This was really well done.

Im space X fans, but the real problem with starship is RETURN CAPACITY is only 50 ton(including payload and fuel) If starship launch and bring 100-150 ton stuff before reach orbit and something bad happen and need starship to return to earth. That huge weight payload will become real problem and disaster for the rocket. Also starship is limited when it carry resource from moon or mars if we are success mining moon or mars

@SCComega

12 күн бұрын

Why would you use starship to carry things from mining on the moon / mars? Everything that are on either body is going to be easier and cheaper to get on earth, outside of maybe shooting material off the moon to earth orbit for processing... But even then, space elevators would do the deal with regular steel and other traditional materials, which just means building up infrastructure on the planetoids for 20-40 years. Any missions with starship would be for developing ground infrastructure, not economic colonization. Any of that is going to be done in the asteroid belt, and any of that is probably going to be done via custom unmanned 2nd stages that grab a moderately sized asteroid and tugboat it near earth for processing.

Well let’s see. Heavy stainless steel, extra fuel weight to land boosters, non-aerodynamic grid fins, over-structured fuel tanks, heavy tiles and ablative covering, hydraulics systems to control fins. I can’t imagine what the problem is.

Keep bringing the truth, no matter if its good or bad. Honest and unbiased information is in short supply these days.

@thomaswakefield6889

12 күн бұрын

This guy is a clown. Starship will make the moon long before Dream Chaser. He needs to stop listening to SpaceX haters and deniers.

Thank you, Angry. In the software world we call this performance issue 'technical debt'. Getting the project prototype fully operational is the primary goal. Later versions will address the technical debt where it's possible. It was never going to be the same vehicle as was designed on paper.

The staging ring is temporary, it's intended to design the need out in later test versions.

So that means the current valuation of SpaceX is excessive ..

You are coming across as a SpaceX decenter for some reason. Starship is experimental in its current version. Don't forget that Starship will go threw several changes before we see the one that will go to Mars.

@dalethelander3781

12 күн бұрын

Lunar Starship HLS was supposed to be ready for Artemis III in 2026. That's not going to happen.

@zmblion

12 күн бұрын

​@@dalethelander3781 ya and NASA planned to have SLS up and going by 2016 reusing old parts doing the same stuff they always have and it didn't fly til 2022. No SpaceX isn't going to be ready with a new design and vastly different rocket than anything ever made. It would take NASA 25yrs and they would scrap it halfway thru if they tried and it's really NASA themselves have unrealistic timelines

@Smiles10130

12 күн бұрын

​@@dalethelander3781 are you betting against space x. Who have 2/3 medium/heavy lift orbital vehicles currently flown in the western world. Who will put up 90% of the payload this year. Which is worth 215 billion? That has musk and Shotwell. That's not a bet, I'd be willing to make. A lot can happen in 2 years.

@DeepDeepSpace

12 күн бұрын

@@Smiles10130 It took four launch attempts just to accomplish what they planned to accomplish in the first launch. SpaceX has yet to prove Starship's recoverability, its rapid reusability, its ability to carry payload, orbital rendezvous, orbital refueling with cryogenic fuels, relighting Raptor engines in space after they've been off for a few days, landing on the moon and launching from the moon. All of this needs to be accomplished in two years. Not going to happen.

@timothygermann780

12 күн бұрын

He is pointing out how long it is taking to get Starship to work. It was originally supposed to be ready by 2024. then postponed to 2026 with 2028-2030 more likely. Musk originally said Mars by 2024 too... and humans on Mars by 2030. Musk now says humans on Mars between 2040 and 2050.. Why incredulously ask why someone is "betting against SpaceX"? like they can do no wrong? That's cult thinking.

How about shrinking down the starship for the Lunar ship.

So we're concerned that the version of starship that is currently used for flight tests is under performing? Did it not occur to consider that there are exactly 3 ships of this version left or that they are years out of date from an iteration standpoint? This version of starship will not be the one flown to the Moon so the whole video is pointless. The version 2 of starship will had ALL the upgrades and refinements that current testing has highlighted not just the critical hotfixes to allow continued testing.

I am very skeptical that the current starship is able to carry any cargo. It has never carried cargo and doesn’t look like it’s designed to. Therefore it can’t carry any. If it could they would put a block of concrete in it to ensure their calculations are correct

Rumor from ULA? How about lets wait and see. That is an awful grand claim from Unlimited Launch Aborts. I don't care for rumors started by competition.

The optimum shape for a low-gravity orbital and sub-orbital transport is the Space 1999 Eagle. It's stable, has good redundancy and is modular in design. Starship is a freighter, not a low grav lander and certainly not until level, flat, blast-resistant pads are available. Come on Elon, you know this as well as I do. Can Starship do the job? Yeah, probably but not as well or as safely as a lander/transporter specifically designed for the role.

@fionajack9160

11 күн бұрын

Light, wide, retractable legs and it’ll land fine until pads possible

I figure it makes most sense to use a cartridge design for the fuel resupply tanks, no pumping. The design of the cartridges can be focused on minimalization rather than re-use. Avoids the need for a Starship upper stage reuse. They can also be designed for on the way capture, or capture of cached cartridges at destination.

Is it a pitfall to focus first on getting to orbit, then on recovering both stages, and THEN on minimizing vehicle mass to maximize payload capability? The Starship design itself is still evolving, based on what they're learning from these test flights. It seems premature at this point to be sounding the alarm about payload capacity.

Starship don't seem practical, needing to refuel 10 to12 times.

Very cool they fixed you up with accommodations! Kudos to Saxavord! Thank you for your fair reporting on this. It's possible to recognize the challenges and still be a fan. I was unaware about the payload limitations. Nice to see Spacex is being transparent about it.

It makes sense when you think about it to start 'small' for proof of concept and then enlarge. But an alternative propulsion for space would be much better.

@Smiles10130

12 күн бұрын

There's nothing else that can propel a spacecraft of this size. Unless you develop nuclear technology which they don't have clearance to work with and will take years to develop.

YOU know this is an ongoing and developing process. These ships arent the ships that are going to be used. ATM theyre slapping upgrades onto ships and boosters eithout much weighr conscern because they know the next gen ships (which they are starting to produce) will have these upgrade baked in to them. Youre being seriously dense if you think otherwise

@ReiseLukas

12 күн бұрын

He always comes off very selective in his research on space and rocketry. He's got a lot of knowledge on Britain and Europe's developments for space but has moments of ignorance regarding SpaceX. I've caught him making criticisms about SpaceX like they haven't already addressed those issues. I love Angry Astronaut when he talks about Cornwall, Dream Chaser and most space topics but everytime he does a critic on SpaceX I face-palm because he addresses stuff SpaceX has already addressed and made moves to fix.

@gojidoh

12 күн бұрын

@@ReiseLukas it's very strange, especially for how long he's been covering SpaceX

Angry, you usually provide unique comments on Space and are not afraid to express a different viewpoint, and are ahead of all other comentators, which is very much appreciated ! But c'mon Angry, please try to not be so negative against Spacex unless it is required - be a little +ve once in a while! Thanx.

You might as well be bitching that Starhopper was failing to meet Starship's ultimate goals. So what? it's a prototype. This version isn't the consumer version.

At one time Elon was talking about using a thinner new stainless-steel alloy. It would be difficult to do so now, everything would need to be re-tested. Good video that recognizes the changed realities which are hard to accept. Starship is very experimental, and I am sure it will eventually be a success.

I look at Starship as nothing more than a tech demonstrator. I never believe Starship can make it anywhere but orbit to deliver payloads. It is generating good hard data for the next generation of spacecrafts. We need another tech jump in engine design.

@Hokie2k11

12 күн бұрын

That doesn't make much sense given how quickly they can build them. Odds are, at the current rate of production and launching, Starship will be the second most active rocket in the world next year (6-8 launches?), surpassed only by the Falcon 9. Thats quite a bit more than just a tech demonstrator.

@viarnay

12 күн бұрын

@@Hokie2k11 Even a half of launches would be a giant step forward...

Your looking a bit cold up there 😅

Math: sheer numbers of Starships to deliver logistics and personnel to planets will be what makes it possible.

Version 3 is when the 150t to orbit comes. Versions 1 and 2 are just versions 1 and 2. Now that they have v2 they should be able to calculate amount of fuel / engines to get the 150t.

Frankly, even at 50 tons to LEO at full reusability it is revolutionary. And who really believes they exhausted their optimization options after doing only 4 test flights :) Falcon 9 at version 1 could only take 10 tones to LEO. Current version takes 22 tons. If you assume that similar level of optimization is possible, they will easily reach 110 tons with Starship (2.2x of the initial lift capacity). But I think they can optimize Starship way more ten they were able to optimize Falcon 9. 200 tons to LEO are not out of question.

A realistic assessment of Starship. FH with a larger fairing can get the job done. A 100tn stainless steel tube is too cumbersome and complex. 15 refuelling ships to land 2 astronauts on the Moon simply ain't gonna happen.

The current starship is a v1 prototype. Obviously there are going to be improvements and upgrades

One of the optimisations will be on v2 booster where the hot stage ring will be included in the design and NOT weigh 10 tonnes like it does now. This article is old news, it was written well before flight 4. We know the heat shield will get heavier, but on V2, I suspect it will get much lighter. If they can find 50 tonnes of weight savings between the booster and the ship from V1 with all its modifications, and V2 with those modifications built in from the get go, then they will then hit thier target. One has to imagine that Raptor v3 with all the bits that kinda look like they are missing which have been integrated, those engines will probably be lighter by themselves, when you have say 35 engines on the booster, and 9 on the ship, 44 x even 500kgs = lots of weight (20-odd tonnes) loss. Add to that they weight loss on the hot stage hardware, and any efficiencies they can gain from the heat shield on V2 after they do a couple more reentry flights on V1 and you can easily see that 50 tonnes could quite easily be doable. For me its far too early to talk payloads, the payload for this year is data, not hardware. By next year I think they will be flying V2. We will see how many tonnes of Starlink V2 they launch on the 1st full payload flight, then we can know what the capabilities are and not before. If your talking 2028 min, I think you still are living on NASA time frames. While 2024 was never going to be a thing, even if Starship was ready, the suits, the lunar gateway... None of the other stuff except SLS is ready anyway. My bet is by 2026, Starship will be waiting for others to do the first crewed landing, at the very least they would complete and uncrewed test flight with starship on or before then. It might be a bit optimistic, but I say give it a year, and SpaceX will likely either be running V2, or be scrapping anything from V1 left to prepare for V2 flight. Catching the booster at least will be sorted if not close to sorted all hinges on if they RUD Stage 0 on the first attempt, because if they do RUD on the first attempt you can be sure the lawyers will come out of the background again, there will be a mishap investigation, and likely many groups trying to delay or shut down SpaceX's activities in Texas again. If Flight 5 with a catch goes badly, and they cant demonstrate the booster being able to change its trajectory and splash down instead even if that means throttling up into a mini hop over to the ocean to save Stage 0. Then Flight 6 may not happen this year at all. If Flight 5 goes smoothly and the catch is done without mishap, flight 6 will likely happen this year and maybe even flight 7 as well.