
"Payload to Mars" Added to SpaceX Pricelist - paulsutter
http://www.spacex.com/about/capabilities?mars
======
paulvs
One Apollo astronaut when criticised by a commentator that the NASA moon
budget would be better spent on other humanitarian causes such as feeding the
poor in Africa, his response was along the lines of:

The money spent annually on cosmetics in the USA dwarfs the amount spent on
the NASA space program. (Can't find reference on the net.)

In 2015, the global cosmetics market was $61B USD [1], that's a roughly the
cost of one thousand trips to Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO) with a 5,500
Kg payload, or a grand total of 5.5 mega tons to GTO.

We have the resources to become a spacefaring race (at least to the
neighbouring planets in the solar system), we simply need to prioritise what's
really important.

[1] [http://www.statista.com/statistics/259217/global-make-up-
mar...](http://www.statista.com/statistics/259217/global-make-up-market-size/)

~~~
NotUsingLinux
You simply do not understand what cosmetics is about. As Many others in sub-
replies to this one. One could say you do not understand human nature, DNA or
anthropology. Cosmetics is not about something "unnecessary" it is about
increasing your chances with reproduction.

And now tell me what more important thing that reproduction could be encoded
in our genes? Second to reproduction is feeling well. For whatever strange
reasons our history shaped society, people today have to live in it and they,
of course tend to try to maximizes their happiness.

Some People feel better when they get attention (again DNA and anthropology).
Of course YOU want to go to space. And by you I mean all in this thread who
despise cosmetics in favour of space travel, simply. Because humans are not
simple we have deep contradictions embedded in our DNA and society forged
traditions.

Yes I agree with you all very much we should go to space BUT to be able to do
so we first need to find consensus on each individual happiness weighted
against the demands for happiness from other people, of the whole world. Its
as simple as that. And I don't have to tell you that concepts like nations do
not necessarily help in achieving that.

We are moving up the
ladder([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardashev_scale](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardashev_scale)),
towards a global society. In that we can not ignore a single persons mischief
as we do today.

I hope you see see that its not about "superficial" cosmetics, but about us as
humans. And how to be happy, all around the world. We can and should do it but
it will look very different to what the world looks today. And of course our
anthropology is fighting us here hard again. We want the result of change but
not change what is necessary to do that, that is to change ourselves (To
acknowledge other people, be more peaceful and thoughtful about resources,
etc..)

So again what do you think about cosmetics?

~~~
threatofrain
Cosmetics is a cause that justifies itself, an escalation of "arms" that
encourages others to race to the bottom in cosmetics spending, a race in which
the richest are the fittest. There's no intuition for us to entertain the idea
that a world without cosmetics is a world with less happiness or biological
fitness, but this world would probably never happen.

Space travel, and with it, scientific understanding, space mining, and perhaps
colonization, is an abstract thought that goes beyond thinking of local
maxima, and that's what makes it deep, as opposed to the cosmetics arms race
that is myopic in what it maximizes. That's what makes it shallow.

People naturally have many values, and these values often come in conflict.
How we resolve these conflicts can demonstrate a direction toward broad vision
and aforethought -- or shallow local maxima.

Anyways, I don't believe that the underlying point of cosmetics argument is
about cosmetics. I think it's about the activity of moral posturing, as
opposed to a sincere moral commitment toward moral results.

~~~
NotUsingLinux
Yes exactly my point(people having conflicts) but to resolve them we can't
simply "stop" doing cosmethics, we have to be concious about why we use so
much of that ( human nature + history) and then think of alternatives.

If you like we need ome kind of migration or negoating strategy.

The problem is people do not live in a vacuum , we live in a attention
economy. And people go straight for what they where thaught with ( tradions
and values from social environment)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow's_hierarchy_of_needs](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow's_hierarchy_of_needs)

Love (cosmetics) is at a lower level ( which means it has a higher priority
for most people) then Self-actualization or Self-transcendence (space). Do not
forget where we came from, thousands of years there were concepts like
cosmetics. But space is alien to most people they can not touch it, they can
not percieve or concieve it.

Thats the problem we should tackle IMO.

------
Hondor
Reusing the 1st stage seems to impose a massive penalty on the payload.
Chopping it down to 1/3 for the Falcon Heavy to GTO (8000 kg vs 22000 kg).

In case I'm misunderstanding, do these term have these meanings?

mT = metric tonne? The standard symbol is "t". It's odd that they also use kg
on the same table for the same quantity so maybe it really means something
else? Not millitesla I'm sure :P

"fully expendable vehicle" means dumping the 1st stage into the sea instead of
landing and recovering it?

~~~
rtkwe
Yes fully expendable means dumping the whole rocket like other launches.

It takes a good amount of fuel to kill all the horizontal velocity the first
stage built up before detaching and then a bit more for landing. Due to just
the physics you're losing some of the most effective (in terms of dV per unit
mass of fuel) burn in the first stage.

~~~
Klathmon
So hopefully someone can answer this, but what's the reason they don't put the
droneships WAY down range of the rockets?

So instead of having to fully stop and reverse, they position them so they can
arc back down and only has to stop its momentum.

~~~
rtkwe
CRS-8 which was the one that successfully landed on the barge recently was
going 6600 kmph at 71 km when the first stage cut off, most of that was
horizontal speed. They have to reduce that speed to both not break apart in
the atmosphere. They can't have a lot of horizontal momentum low in the
atmosphere and still land straight up on the barge. The rocket has hard limits
on how much it can control it's orientation inside the atmosphere because it
only has small cold gas thrusters and the grid fins to really control roll
pitch and yaw.

------
MertsA
So the only numbers I can find on price for the Atlas V that delivered
Curiosity to Mars is 20% of $2.5 billion. If I'm reading this right, a single
Falcon 9 could have launched the same payload (3,893 kg) all the way to Mars
for $62 million instead of ~$500 million. Am I reading this right?

~~~
Strom
No, as the Falcon Mars capability is theoretical and not before 2018.

------
vkou
It hasn't been added to the pricelist - it's been added to the rocket's
capabilities.

Doing a bit of napkin math would get you a similar number.

~~~
jonah
So is it the same fuel load to LEO, GTO, and Mars? Just less mass to move?

~~~
vmasto
Yes, it's the exact same rocket with the exact same fuel. The further you go
the less payload you can carry because heavier means spending more fuel.

------
Taniwha
Where are the "to the moon" prices?

I assume they're about halfway between GEO and Mars (or does aerobraking on
Mars save you enough mass that they are practically the same?)

~~~
blazespin
Probably not a lot of market demand for it. Good question though.

------
kabdib
... but no delivery mode specified. Mars orbit insertion or any landing is up
to your 4020 kg of payload, I'm assuming. Wonder what delta-v you need to
handle?

~~~
schwarrrtz
Assuming they'll deliver you onto a Mars transfer orbit, you need ~2 km/s for
the Mars capture maneuver. Assuming you have an engine with ~300s Isp, you
need a mass fraction of exp(-2/3) ~ 0.5. So you need your payload to be about
50% fuel by mass.

Also, this doesn't account for any aerobraking, which should save you some
fuel.

[http://space.stackexchange.com/questions/12660/delta-v-to-
lo...](http://space.stackexchange.com/questions/12660/delta-v-to-low-mars-
orbit)

~~~
the8472
> Assuming you have an engine with ~300s Isp, you need a mass fraction of
> exp(-2/3) ~ 0.5.

So would taking a longer earth-mars route that allowed the use of some more
efficient drive (e.g. ion engine) improve the amount of payload that could be
delivered?

~~~
schwarrrtz
Yes, definitely. If you had an engine with 3000s Isp, which according to
Wikipedia wouldn't be unreasonable for an ion thruster, then your mass
fraction would be about exp(-2/30) ~ 0.94. So you'd only need 6% of your
payload for fuel in that case.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Specific_impulse#Examples](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Specific_impulse#Examples)

------
nraynaud
It's all fun and game to put the price online until you actually want to place
an order and can't find the paypal button.

------
zitterbewegung
Is the pricelist there to market SpaceX itself because it doesn't seem like
you would merely accept the price on the pricelist?

~~~
magila
As I understand it, this price list is similar to the list prices you see for
large commercial aircraft. That is, these prices have only a vague relation to
the actual prices customers end up paying. With deals as large and complex as
these, each one is a little different so it's inevitable that they get
negotiated individually.

~~~
flyinghamster
Sounds like dealing with Oracle. :)

------
rrhyne
I think it should read: "Call for Pricing" under Mars, as the Standard Payment
Plan price is "to GTO"

~~~
6nf
For $90 million you can use their Falcon Heavy to send 8 tonnes to GTO.

SpaceX does not yet have a vehicle to take you to Mars. The idea is that your
GTO payload would be such a vehicle supplied by the customer. The numbers
below just shows the limits of what is possible, i.e. such a Mars Transfer
vehicle could weigh up to 22 tonnes and possibly contain up to 13 tonnes of
payload.

~~~
6nf
For comparison: The GTO vehicle for the Curiosity rover was about 8 tonnes.
SpaceX is about half the price of Atlas V a few years ago.

------
magicbuzz
About $6600 to get 1kg to Mars "-)

~~~
freditup
That seems... surprisingly cheap. $6600 could also get you a small apartment
for two months in NYC, about 10% of the way to the TSA randomizer app, or a
lawyer for a day. Sending something to Mars is by far the most incredible of
those things!

------
avivo
So the Falcon Heavy can get 13,600 kg to Mars for $90M.

By comparison, the Apollo 11 lunar (landing) module was 11,900 kg and the
command/service module was 28,800 kg at launch. There were also other
components that added at least 6000 kg. (according to some quick Wikipediaing)

So > 46,700 kg total.

~~~
wyattpeak
Yes, the Saturn 5 was a truly ludicrously powerful rocket.

~~~
GunboatDiplomat
A single Rocketdyne F-1 engine from the bottom of the Saturn V had about the
same thrust (about 1.5 million lbs.) as the whole first stage of a Falcon 9.
And it had 5 of those. A proposed new version of the F-1 would produce even
more thrust, 1.8 million lbs.

------
grey-area
Also payload to Pluto: 2,900kg

[http://www.spacex.com/falcon-heavy](http://www.spacex.com/falcon-heavy)

------
curiousgal
Just curious, what happens if a rocket fails and the client's payload is
destroyed?

~~~
JshWright
That depends on the customer. In the case of most commercial launches, the
insurance policy that was required by the investors financing the launch pays
out. In the case of government launches (who didn't need to borrow money for
the specific purpose of the launch), they just eat the cost of the payload.

------
programminggeek
Can we stake a claim on Mars yet? I figure it'd be relatively cheap to fly
something to Mars, say you own the whole planet and recoup more than the $60
million to get there...

~~~
Tuna-Fish
Why would anyone respect your claim?

~~~
zaroth
Seriously, depending on how long your game is, it might make sense. You would
expect at first the claim would be completely disregarded, and then in some
number of centuries enough inter-planetary infrastructure could develop that
includes a legal framework under which you could sue for damages. Or,
something...

I wonder if you could send over some type of networking equipment, and then
anticipate charging one heck of a bandwidth premium?

~~~
kiba
I have a feeling that those claims aren't valid if you, or your robots aren't
standing on them.

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nefitty
What would a group want to send to Mars at this point? I can imagine research
equipment, but I'm wondering what else besides scientific interests.

~~~
barkingcat
some extremophiles from underneath the polar ice caps.

some billionaire has to be thinking that their ultimate "mark on the universe"
would be to start seeding life on mars.

Call it the 21st century version of the Carnegie donation program. The Gates
Path to Life. Sounds romantic.

~~~
nefitty
I'm pretty sure cargo like that is at the top of their rejection list in bold
letters. Don't space agencies work super hard to disinfect and sterilize
equipment that needs to land on other planets? It might actually be illegal to
seed life on other planets, if I recall correctly.

~~~
JamilD
I don't think it's illegal, but it is enforced by COSPAR's recommendations on
Planetary Protection. Missions to Mars actually have a much higher threshold
for avoiding contamination than, say, missions to the moon.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planetary_protection](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planetary_protection)

------
wdr1
Do the prices include tax?

~~~
Strom
It's customary in the US to list prices without tax, so I would guess not.

~~~
drivingmenuts
Since SpaceX has a presence in Texas, I wonder if they pay state sales tax?

------
Aelinsaar
Have issues of long term radiation and micrometeorite impacts been solved
while I wasn't looking?

~~~
ceejayoz
For unmanned payloads - the only type SpaceX has flown thus far - that's been
solved since the 1970s.

~~~
Aelinsaar
I was thinking about Musk's planned 2018 manned mission.

~~~
rtkwe
2018 isn't manned it's just tossing an unmanned Dragon variant at Mars and
landing it. It's a technology demo and test mostly.

~~~
Aelinsaar
My bad!

------
wichsen
Honest question:

Why do space rockets and rockets in general always so closely resemble
penises?

~~~
fabulist
Maybe it's more interesting to ask, "why are penises so aerodynamic?"

~~~
wnevets
because they're aerodynamic

