Rob is right, no one will insure a test run (they are done at the developer's cost) and no one would send their expensive equipment up on one either until that they know it works.

Cheers.

The Dragon module will deliver its load, by refilled with used equipment, including scientific instruments, and sent back to Earth. It's the only spacecraft, since the ending of Shuttle launches, that can carry equipment back.
Tullio

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The thing with Cubesats and other micro-sats is that they are often built by people who cannot afford the risk of having a failed launch, thus even if they were offered a free ride they wouldn't want to spend the money on producing the launcher/sat interface required. Also of course there is the selected launch profile, which in the case of Falcon Heavy was for a very high orbit, which is not favoured by the micro-sat brigade who generally prefer low orbits as these make the communications system much simpler and cheaper to install in their tiny load bays.

As you suggest, launching the car was undoubtedly a bit of an advertising campaign by Musk, who made use of a "wasted" launch (in commercial terms) to do something memorable.

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Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

Elon Musk's SpaceX is doing things that NASA could not or would not do, like reusing the first stage of a rocket. He has the right to do also some mistakes.
Tullio

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It was a test launch and needed the weight, rather than concrete he used a car..
Launching satellites that cost millions of dollars a piece on a test flight would have been silly had it exploded or crashed..

The satellite and the rocket can be insured.
There are mini and micro satellites that do not cost millions of dollars. Such satellites perform only one function. It could benefit the US and the World.

Remember, it was Elon Musk's rocket and car to do with as he wished.

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Bob DeWoody

My motto: Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow as it may not be required. This no longer applies in light of current events.

Among the equipment on the Dragon spacecraft heading to the ISS is a pair of legs for the R2 robot already on the ISS. The legs will be mated to R2 which will get a software update. Each leg has 7 joints and will be able to do a number of tasks.
Tullio
Sorry,that was an old news from 2014. The new AI module is called CIMON and is a sphere with a display with a smiling face resembling Tamagotchi. It should help astronauts in long missions.It was produced by Airbus and IBM, probably with the help of neural networks.

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Among the equipment on the Dragon spacecraft heading to the ISS is a pair of legs for the R2 robot already on the ISS. The legs will be mated to R2 which will get a software update. Each leg has 7 joints and will be able to do a number of tasks.
Tullio
Sorry,that was an old news from 2014. The new AI module is called CIMON and is a sphere with a display with a smiling face resembling Tamagotchi. It should help astronauts in long missions.It was produced by Airbus and IBM, probably with the help of neural networks.

D2 will arrive at a later date.. :))

Jokes aside, Elon Musk and Others has given the Space Industry (NASA) a very much needed kick up the A$$...(Just my thoughts)

That is the merit of Barack Obama, who opened space to private firms. This Falcon9 mission is the 15th to the ISS, and the Dragon can come back with its load.
Tullio

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Now this is why no one will risk sending anything of importance on a test flight.

Rocket developed by Japan start-up crashes and explodes moments after lift-off

Cheers.

yep..

I think there is a traffic problem in low earth orbit, it is already too crowded with satellites and remains of older satellites. This is dangerous for the ISS, which has already had a number of alarms. Even a small piece in orbit can be deadly to the astronauts and cosmonauts.You cannot just send up things hoping they will not kill anyone, there must be a traffic control.
Tullio

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Yes, but call him Musk, not Mask. When will a Russian rocket land its first stage?
Tullio

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NASA is testing the Falcon9 rockets to give them permission to carry human crews. I repeat my question: when will a Russian rocket land its first stage?
Tullio

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The first manned flight of Falcon9 is planned in December 2018. It will use the Dragon spacecraft which is now attached to the ISS and will return with a load of scientific instruments, besides junk. I've learned it from NASA conversations during the attaching of Dragon to the ISS.
Tullio

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Two very different functions - the first stage return has nothing to do with crew safety - With the Space-X system there is, as in the Russian space craft, a separate system to detach the crew capsule from the rest of the rocket and then (hopefully) return them to Earth in one functioning bit. I don;'t know if any of these "crew rescue" systems have ever been used in anger (rather than test), and if they were, I hope they worked as planned.

It was one of the failings of the US Shuttle - it had no such crew rescue system, and many of us saw the very sad outcome of that omission. It is worth remembering that while Challenger was a failure during launch, and thus a crew rescue system may well have been effective; Columbia broke up during re-entry, and, as far as I'm aware, nobody has a suitable crew-saver system for that phase of the operation.

The "first stage return" is the return of the first stage of the rocket once it has done its job and got the second stage and payload up to altitude - this is novel, because until recent the vast majority of medium and heavy lift rocket first stages have been "dumped" into the ocean, or some suitable bit of bare land, and thus rendered scrap.

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Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

Aside from SpaceX, which is owned by Elon Musk, not Mask, NASA is building and testing a large launch vehicle ,Orion, which will provide a safety option for astronauts. It will be launched by the Space Launch System. SpaceX is a commercial supplier, not a Government agency, same as Orbital Sciences Corporation which also has demonstrated the capability to land a first stage. One should not make the mistake of confusing commercial suppliers with US Government agencies.
Tullio

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I don't understand. Is Russia planning to build its own space station? China is certainly planning one in the Tiangong series launched by Long March rockets. As for the ISS, it is made up of 42 modules, 37 of which were orbited by the Shuttles, 5 by Russian rockets. Now Dragon has brought up ECOSTRESS, which is attached to the Japanese module and consists of an infrared radiometer capable of monitoring the Earth vegetation. It will fly back to Earth in August carrying scientific instruments and other loads. You say it is obsolete, but no Progress cargo rocket can do this.
Tullio

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I'm glad to see that the crew-rescue system has worked when needed.

Crew safety in both the USA and the Russian systems is accomplished by the use of a secondary rocket system attached to the crew capsule and has NOTHING to do with the launch rocket.

Dragon - the capsule part of the Space-X system - has undergone its launch pad abort test, which it passed. Next stage is the high altitude abort test, and if that goes well then we will see first humans on board. As for being an "old" generation, it is designed for use on low/mid Earth orbits, not journeys deeper into space - horses for courses. Of course Dragon has been flying un-manned to the ISS for a couple of years.

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Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

ISS is an international space station and has welcomed people and experiments fro many countries,excluding China due to a stupid American decision. Will the Russian space station do the same? And will it launch from Baikonur, Kazakhstan?
Tullio

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