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The Falcon Heavy had already flown before, but now has a payload that counts and competitors who do not care. It is the first of a new generation of launchers capable of carrying huge payloads into space at low cost and frequently, opening a new frontier in the race for space. Watch the sunrise Sunday afternoon (we will post a reminder).
On April 7th, Falcon Heavy will be flying for the first time since its inaugural test last February, delivering the now infamous Tesla Roadster and "Starman" in a trajectory that led them beyond March. This successful launch allowed SpaceX to become its first customer for the system. The launch on Sunday will lead Arabsat-6A, a communications satellite built by Lockheed, into a geosynchronous orbit.
A static fire went well today, so weather permitting, the takeoff should take place as planned around 3:36 am Sunday afternoon. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said on Twitter that the Block 5 Falcon Heavy (ie, revision of the production as opposed to the previously tested version) offers a superior thrust capacity of 10 % compared to before, which also translates into better security. margin if you use less than its maximum.
So why is Falcon Heavy important? After all, launchers capable of placing one hundred tons of material in orbit or beyond have existed since Apollo. In simple terms, the difference comes down to the price.
Putting anything in the space is hard enough. But the heavier payloads are becoming increasingly difficult to lift exponentially: the equations we have known for about a century determine the need for lifting to get some mass into orbit and the amount of fuel needed to generate that lift, are clear about it.
As rocket materials and engines have progressed, they have disproportionately benefited small and medium-sized launchers. Combined with the decreasing size of satellite payloads, this has created a promising new era for small craft, which can be launched in large numbers – as we see among the many promises to deploy thousands of constellations.
Effectively manufactured disposable products like Rocket Lab's Electron and reusable products such as the Falcon 9 have begun to reduce the price of small and medium-sized launches to a fraction of what they were before.
But heavy and super heavy launchers have remained extremely expensive because of the fundamentally difficult nature of building these physics-defying monsters. So, while putting 10 tons into orbit has become cheap enough for startups to do, putting 100 tons there is still the province of the world's superpowers.
Falcon Heavy is really the first to launch a similar price change for this category, significantly reducing the cost of setting up large payloads. And while an estimated $ 100 million per launch is hardly a pocket change, it's far less than the $ 350 to $ 500 million a Delta IV could cost.
This level of savings can transform an entire space program. NASA could add to its budget a comprehensive planetary exploration mission matching the price difference of a single launch. These calculations do not always add up (the excellent Delta IV launch pad rightly commands a premium), but it's impossible to ignore.
Delta IV takes off in 2016
The market of heavy launches is, like that of small, very limited. Governments and corporations are aligned for years to place important elements in orbit or beyond. SpaceX will sell space on Falcon Heavy systems as quickly as possible. And as its secondary floors are reusable, it can make them faster than others This should make it possible to gain a lot of money while massively empowering the world space community.
Falcon Heavy has little competition on payloads exceeding the 50-tonne threshold, but below this limit, the competition field becomes congested. ULA, the Ariane group, Russia and China, even the promising rival Blue Origin, are preparing cheaper new generation platforms to take part in the new ecosystem. (A full account of this new launcher phase is a laudable attempt, but one for another time.)
For now though, Falcon Heavy is an anomaly, but a welcome one. Reducing the costs and complexity of more distant and ambitious space projects is an exciting prospect and Sunday's launch is one of the first signs of this change.
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