It's interesting that Falcon Heavy costs 1.5x as much as Falcon 9, but carries 4x the payload.<p>Why doesn't SpaceX offer the Falcon Heavy exclusively and launch multiple payloads per launch, thus more than halving costs?<p>Are there payload volume or orbit separation limitations or is the pricing info not complete?
saw that a little while ago. it's fun you can now purchase a lift in LEO and with a direct quote even!<p>so, doing some weird math, you can get about 5000 person ashes in LEO for about 62M, so one could theoretically (I think law forbids it) run a kickstarter campaign to get people ashes in space for 15k each.<p>Just think of the possibilities! private launch space with a price allows all people a fair access to space (still pricey, but fair)
Rockets as a Service. We live in a cool era.<p>And these prices may go down dramatically after the first stages prove themselves reusable (depending on SpaceX's strategy).
Look like a typo. Falcon 9 up to 4.85mT to GTO. Falcon Heavy up to 6.8mT to GTO. <-- really?<p>But down below we see 4850kg and 21,200kg which seems more likely.
Using the smaller Falcon 9 you could send approximately 1500 people's ashes in to space (assuming an average of 3kg left after cremation for each person), at a cost of $39,000 each.<p>I wonder if that could be a viable business.
If you found this interesting, I would recommend taking a look at <a href="https://www.astrobotic.com/configure-mission" rel="nofollow">https://www.astrobotic.com/configure-mission</a>, another "space travel pricing page" - this one gives tweakable parameters that change the price, which is nice.<p>Sidenote: It's absolutely amazing that we can now get a satellite orbiting the Moon for $200k.
Cool. According to <i>Space launch market competition</i>[1] "Falcon 9 rockets [were] already the cheapest in the industry."<p>[1] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_launch_market_competition" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_launch_market_competitio...</a>
Under launch facilities, the one in California, that is suited for "defense intelligence" also touts a "launch path completely over the ocean"..<p>I guess that makes sense, if your super secret launch payload is going to fail, better that it falls in the ocean?
Judging from the landings legs on heavy center stage, they are planning to land it, but where? It will be flying much higher and faster than the side boosters I believe.
For comparison, The Delta IV Heavy costs ~$350 million to send 28,790 kg into LEO, or 14,220 kg into GTO.<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta_IV_Heavy" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta_IV_Heavy</a><p>the Saturn V, the rocket that sent men to the moon could send 140,000 kg to LEO and 48,600 kg on a translunar injection, which is a higher orbit (i.e. takes more energy) than a geostationary transfer. It's estimated that it cost upwards of a billion dollars per Saturn V launch.<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_V" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_V</a><p>Basically, this is a powerful and freaking cheap rocket.