Moderators: richierich, ua900, PanAm_DC10, hOMSaR
Nomadd wrote:A bomber that you can see on radar 500 miles away would probably not get to target or return home to be reused very often. It takes more than a few trucks of fuel to fill a Starship for the return trip, and the methane and LOX need to be much higher grade than normal gas plants can put out.
But the Air Force is very interested in getting certain payloads to any place on Earth in an hour. As cheaply as they can build Starships, disposable ones might be more practical for military uses.
Everybody is waiting to see how the thing works out before they make any detailed plans.
kurtverbose wrote:Nomadd wrote:A bomber that you can see on radar 500 miles away would probably not get to target or return home to be reused very often. It takes more than a few trucks of fuel to fill a Starship for the return trip, and the methane and LOX need to be much higher grade than normal gas plants can put out.
But the Air Force is very interested in getting certain payloads to any place on Earth in an hour. As cheaply as they can build Starships, disposable ones might be more practical for military uses.
Everybody is waiting to see how the thing works out before they make any detailed plans.
You talk about Starship, but I'm talking about rapidly reusable rockets generically, and the first stage of a rocket, not starship. I can't imagine the requirement would be for a rocket anywhere near the size of super heavy. That has a payload of 1200 tons. I don't know what the payload of the B-21 is, but probably less than 20 tons. I guess the size of it would depend on the requirements.
As for being seen 500 miles away - well maybe, but there's no SAM that can hit that far, and by the time the munitions were in range the first stage would be travelling back to base. Also, the rocket and its munitions would be travelling hypersonically. Much harder for a SAM to hit, and certainly much harder to hit than any manned aircraft, stealth or not.
As for fuel quality, you're not trying to reach orbit so you have much more performance margin. The BE-4 runs on natural gas so I don't see it as a big issue.
Sorry, I don't feel shot down in flames yet. although I do see how everyone would be waiting to see how it turns out.
Nomadd wrote:There's a big difference between acquiring a target with a SAM and the maximum intercept range. The further away they pick it up, the more accurately they can intercept it.
The BE-4 runs on purified methane, not regular natural gas, and performance margin isn't the issue. Not working when the fuel is wrong is the issue. Including the LOX. Making 95% pure oxygen is easy. 99.9% pure isn't.
And in case you forgot to read your own post, you were the one talking about Starship. It's also the only fully reusable rocket on the boards at the moment unless you want to talk about somebodies Powerpoint.
mxaxai wrote:I'm not sure what the application would be.
Bombers are required anyway for their ability to loiter as well as their ability to identify and track moving targets. You're not going to replace them.
mxaxai wrote:For short range tactical strikes against fixed positions, traditional air-launched (hypersonic or subsonic) cruise missiles work well.
mxaxai wrote:A ship-launched cruise missile could consider a reusable first stage but I'm not sure how easy or safe it would be to recover the stage on a ship.
kurtverbose wrote:mxaxai wrote:A ship-launched cruise missile could consider a reusable first stage but I'm not sure how easy or safe it would be to recover the stage on a ship.
Yes, that might be very difficult.
kurtverbose wrote:Already countered. You use drones or satellites or troops on the ground for targeting, including moving targets.
mxaxai wrote:Yeah it's one thing to land on a cheap autonomous barge in calm weather and another to land on the helipad of a multirole ship under all circumstances. Not to mention the risk of injuries to the crew, or even the loss of the entire ship, if something goes wrong.
How many boosters has SpaceX lost on landing? Would you rather throw away a rocket stage worth $1M or risk a ship and crew worth 100 - 1000 times that?
mxaxai wrote:The main point is the rapid and precise response ability of a crewed (or uncrewed) aircraft in the immediate vicinity of the battlefield. Traditional artillery can work as well but rockets launched from far away just can't replace a proper close air support. We're talking about response time differences between 30 seconds for traditional tactical support and 10-30 minutes for medium range missiles (even hypersonic).
kurtverbose wrote:Ok, so you're talking about close air support, and only that, because a rocket is maximum 10 minutes from hitting a target. Your $200 billion B-21 project is just about close air support, because after 10 minutes a rocket is better. I think I'd rather spend my $200 billion else where.
mxaxai wrote:Your rocket system would have one role only, strategic strikes against fixed targets, and the military already has something for that. They're not going to spend $200 billion in development cost just to save $1 million per rocket launch.
zanl188 wrote:How would one differentiate this conventionally armed system from a nuclear one?
Routine spacecraft launches are announced well in advance and are thus easy to identify as non-hostile. Your proposed system I assume would not be announced in advance - it’ll look like a nuke.
Non starter on this point alone.
kurtverbose wrote:
But there are a lot of nuclear delivery systems that can be confused with conventional, not just ICBM's. Cruise missiles can and are nuclear armed, existing bombers can and do carry nuclear arms. There even used to be nuclear artillery.