Falcon Heavy

Just a heads up that Musky is 'hopefully' going to be test launching the new Falcon heavy rocket later today (in a few hours) - approx 1:30 EST

New test launch rocket with around twice the capacity of the current big rockets.

In case you haven't heard he has decided to test it by launching his own tesla roadster into a hopeful mars orbit.



Well he needed to put something in it and its a better idea than a lump of concrete to test it with.

check out spacex.com for more
Fingers crossed it at least gets off the pad.

No idea who Musky is, but anything for space exploration is a good thing!

Elon Musk - Founder of Tesla Motors and SpaceX (amongst other things)

Have I understood your post correct. The owner of a car company is going to launch one of his cars from Earth into Mars orbit? What's the point of that, we haven't even started colonising the planet and we're going to start cluttering up its atmosphere with junk. Just a publicity gimmick, I can just see the sales slogans now 'Telsa cars are out of this world' with a picture of one floating around Mars orbit.

Not really the point. Spacex have created a new rocket that is capable of carrying much heavier payloads into orbit. With its reusable rockets. THis means cheaper and easier access to space for satellites and ISS deliveries.
Its a new development so need to be tested before you put anything valuable on it. You could just strap a lump of concrete to the top but Elon is a fun guy and of course having a car company it won't hurt sales to have the car there. But i think it's a very cool idea. Of course it could have blown up and that would have been the end of the car.

As it was it was almost a complete success. The final booster rocket core stage failed to land correctly. But the other 2 did. Seeing those 2 rockets fly themselves back and land together was probably the coolest thing i've seen in a long time. Real science fiction from my youth happening for real.

I did get one thing wrong.. the car is not going to mars directly.. it's been put into an elliptical orbit around the sun which will take it out past mars orbit.

Want to see live pictures from the car...? It flips between in car shots and other imafges.. but definitely wait for the in car shots..
https://www.youtube.com/wat...2kKAHN6M


And here is a video of the rocket and the flight. Skip to around 21 minutes to just see the flight. It is amazing.




« Last edited by testuser on Feb 7th 2018 »

Sanzano said:

I can just see the sales slogans now 'Telsa cars are out of this world' with a picture of one floating around Mars orbit.

I love this I hope they do it.

He's a bond villain right?

He does have all the makings of one.. although so far he seems to be doing the right thing. I think there are many who would be quite happy if he took over the world.

I was reading about this last night, apparently the owner of the car company has managed to commit the perfect murder in plain site of the world. I read that the dummy in the car they jettisoned into space had a corpse of someone he killed inside. Seems a bit far fetched to me, sounds like something out of a James Bond move...

« Last edited by Sanzano on Feb 8th 2018 »

We going to space BOY!!!

This is a good step forward for private space enterprise and really ups the chances I think of Elon or someone similar pushing forward with plans for trips to Mars.Id like to see that in my lifetime.

Trips to Mars...don't you mean a trip to death on a barren planet? Mars trips are one way only.

At the moment they certainly would be. But there are plenty of smart minds working on ways to solve that problem.
And even with a one way trip there are people who have volunteered to go. For science, exploration and of course the fame of being the first Martian.

And of course the outtakes from the last few years...

The only positive thing I see in this is the amount of funny memes it has caused