Starbase Sunday #11
Welcome everyone to the 11th edition of Starbase Sunday, our series that comes out at 13:00 UTC every Sunday and informs you on what’s been going on at Starbase and McGregor. Come on, let’s dive right in:
August 10th - Sunday
Let’s start at Pad B, where NSF cameras spotted an interesting piece of hardware being lifted into the OLM: a possible hold-down clamp! There are 20 clamp arms in the OLM, each set to host a clamp, for a total of 20 clamps to attach to the Booster and keep it on the ground when necessary. All of the 20 clamp arms were installed in late June-early July (except 4, which were installed prior to the OLM rolling), so they may be ready to receive the clamps.
Going to Massey’s, we observed work on the 2 newly installed, next-generation Block 3 Booster QDs at the cryo station at Massey’s: these 2 BQDs, one for the LOX tank and one for the CH4 tank, will flow propellants into the Block 3 boosters during their cryo tests at Massey’s. This cryo station was heavily damaged during Ship 36’s explosion, but it was quickly repaired, allowing progress to continue ahead of Block 3 Booster cryo testing in the future.
Additionally, Starbase City announced a road delay for “S37 static fire #2 transport” between 12 and 16 pm tomorrow… S37 testing is nearing!
August 11th - Monday - S37 rollout
Today was the day of Ship 37’s rollout for testing following an engine swap: work started early in the night, with the Ship lifting jig going over Ship 37’s work stand in Megabay 2. Then, in the early morning, the transport stand rolled in front of Megabay 2 and moved into position a couple of hours later… then, the door closed, and when it reopened, S37 was there, on the stand! During these days in MB2, we could see that SpaceX had not stopped work, with the structural catch pins and most of the previously missing heatshield tiles now installed.
In the early afternoon, S37 moved out of MB2 and began rolling towards the launch site, reaching it after about an hour, at which point it parked itself between the chopsticks: these then engaged the stabilizer pins, while crews on the ground installed the SQD interface, and S37 was lifted onto the OLM once again in the late afternoon.
Following the lift, teams ensured that it was correctly sitting on the stand, and a closure popped up for a “static fire” the following day, between 16:00 and 03:00 am of the next day… an unusual closure time, but one ensuring they would be as fast as they could.
However, we are not expecting a static fire: due to the lack of water deliveries to the water deluge (which likely is mostly empty after S37’s previous test campaign) and the absence of RVac stiffeners (some braces installed on the RVac nozzles to prevent their destruction when fired at sea level due to flow separation and vibrations), we will likely see a spin prime test, where the turbopumps are brought up to speed but there’s no ignition.
At Pad B, some ground systems in the tank farm got active and started venting in what is a GSE test to verify everything’s working nominally.
Over to the production site, Starship Gazer spotted a section labeled “B19 AFT#6,” which is the first piece of hardware spotted for Booster 19, the second next-generation Booster.
August 12th - Tuesday - Ship 37 spin prime attempt
Let’s start at the ASU plant, where the CFA drill rose for the first time before being laid back down.
Now we go over to the action-packed Pad A, where Ship 37 attempted a spin prime but ended up aborting due to a GSE issue; let’s see what happened in detail.
- Preparations began in the morning, with the dancefloor coming down at 09:50 and being rolled away about 1 hour later: this platform allows workers to work on the vehicle’s engines, and its lowering means that portion of work has been completed.
- In the midst of preparations, some tests were conducted: Ship 37 tested its flaps at 12:25, followed by a DSS test at 12:38:16, where a mix of water and nitrogen was sprayed under the OLM to verify the Detonation Suppression System was working as intended to avoid unwanted ignitions under the OLM.
- The road was closed at 16:00, as scheduled, and cars began leaving the pad shortly afterwards. After the pad was cleared, the tank farm began conditioning, with a lot of venting and the initiation of the pope vent… then, at 17:51, the OLM vent started, an indication that chilldown had started on the OLM lines.
- The OLM vent ended at 18:16, an indication that chilldown had ended and propellant loading was now beginning. However, at 18:26, after just 10 minutes of the OLM vent not running, it suddenly started again. This meant that propellant loading had finished, and with less than 2 rings of LOX and no CH4, it was unlikely for a test to be conducted.
- In fact, the Ship started unloading propellant immediately… the root cause was visually clear: a leak on the LOX umbilical of the new BQD/SQD hardware, which prompted the abort of the test.
- The road was reopened at 19:34, and workers flowed to the pad to troubleshoot the issue.
August 13th - Wednesday - Ship 37 spin prime
Today was the day at Pad A! After spending the night swapping the LOX umbilical and leak-checking it, along with inspections of all the other systems, SpaceX was ready for a new attempt, with a road closure starting at 06:00 am.
- The first step was the closure of the road, which occurred at 06:00, while the pad was cleared approximately 1 hour later. While pad clearing was occurring, ground conditioning started, chilling down the tanks and ground lines to their operating conditions… shortly before 07:00, the OLM vent began, marking the start of chilldown of the lines bringing propellant to the Ship.
- Going further into propellant loading, the LOX tank was fully loaded, while the CH4 tank was only partially loaded. Then, the final sequence began: at 07:50, all 4 flaps got tested, suggesting we were roughly 9-10 minutes away from the test… and then, right on schedule, the OLM vent came back at 07:56:51, suggesting less than 3 minutes to testing. And then we waited until the DSS went off at 08:02:46, with a successful spin prime test occurring at 08:02:57! During a spin prime, the engine’s turbopumps are brought up to speed and the propellants are flowed through them, but there’s no ignition, so all that we see is a cloud of exhaust going out of the Ship’s engines.
- Within a couple of hours after testing, the Ship had detanked, and the road was reopened, allowing workers to flow to the launch pad! Furthermore, the Starbase City website posted a road delay for Ship 37’s rollback for the following day, August 14th, between 3 and 8 am. Shortly afterwards, the chopsticks descended and closed around the Ship, ready for lifting.
A few hours after the road was reopened, the Ship transport stand rolled to the pad, and workers began disconnecting the hoses and umbilicals to the Ship, followed by the SQD interface.
Later in the evening, Ship 37 was lifted off the OLM and placed on the transport stand, ready for rollback in the coming hours.
Topping today, we got some official news from SpaceX, as they released a couple of pictures of the first completed next-generation grid fin for Block 3 boosters, now located in the Starfactory. This highly engineered grid fin is very different from the previous design, being 50% larger and much stronger, allowing SpaceX to pass from 4 to 3 grid fins on each booster, located 90° from each other… basically, they won’t be installed uniformly, but there will be a gap in one position. Additionally, SpaceX stated that these will make vehicle control better and allow it to descend at higher angles of attack, but one of the most jaw-dropping pieces of information is maybe that, from Block 3 onwards, boosters will be caught using catch points on the grid fins themselves! These redesigned catch points aren’t a separate piece of hardware anymore, but they are integrated onto the grid fins: they are seemingly wider and longer, like a metal bridge instead of the previous ball-like joint, and will likely be stronger. The grid fins will also be positioned lower on the booster to reduce the heat from separation, and all of the control hardware (fin shaft, actuators, fixed structure, motor) will now be placed inside the methane tank, therefore eliminating the current “bay” at the top of the booster.
This is huge information and makes us realize how advanced the next generation of vehicles is.
August 14th - Thursday
At the launch site, Ship 37 began rolling during the scheduled road delay and reached the production site, where it was rolled into Megabay 2 ahead of flight preparations.
Back at Pad A, teams worked on reconverting the OLM back to launch configuration, removing the flexible hoses from the framework structure. Then, the LR11k took a walk from Pad B to Pad A, attached to Starstool, and removed the adapter from the OLM. With the adapter now removed, the next step was to install all of the 20 hold-down clamps, with 6 of them installed today. Among clamp installations, a crane removed the first of several metal pipes from the framework.
At Pad B, 2 cross-braced vaporizers made their appearance, ready for installation. One of these was already delivered a few weeks ago, and we had talked about how they were more reinforced to sustain the forces of launch and catch.
At the production site, 2 Raptors (1 Raptor Vacuum and 1 sea-level engine) were delivered to Megabay 2, where they entered ahead of installation on Ship 38. It looks like SpaceX is readying the Ship to go out for static fire testing as soon as they can after Flight 10 takes place.
August 15th - Friday
Let’s start at the ASU site, where the CFA drilling rig started drilling holes and pouring concrete ahead of rebar installation, which occurred immediately afterwards.
At Pad A, work continued on the OLM, with 5 additional metal pipes removed from the framework.
Closing the day, at Pad B, the gas generators for the deluge system were tested for the first time, meaning we could be getting close to the pad coming online.
At Massey’s, the B18.1 test tank underwent a cryo test, the first in over 2.5 months, and it may have included some testing using the 79 pistons pushing on it! This test tank is made to verify the structural integrity of the design for the Block 3 Booster aft, so every test it does is another step towards design validation.
And then, we got some flight news: yes, SpaceX has finally announced the date of Flight 10, which is NET (No Earlier Than) August 24th, at 23:30 UTC, at the start of a 1-hour-long window. The backup dates continue, at the same hour, up until August 28th, and then resume on September 2nd: this gap is caused by Labor Day in the USA, which occurs on September 1st, and the weekend before it.
SpaceX has released the details into the failure of Ship 35 during Flight 9, which was traced back to a pressurization problem in the nosecone caused by the failure of the diffuser; they also released Flight 10’s flight plan, stating that Booster 16 won’t be caught but will follow a destiny similar to Booster 14, expended to allow for some experiments to be conducted. Ship 37 will follow the same flight plan as Ship 35, attempting to conduct the same experiments and, ultimately, survive reentry and make a soft splashdown in the Indian Ocean.
If you want to learn more, stick around for more, because a highly detailed article will be coming up soon.
August 16th - Saturday
At Pad A, in the midst of removing the OLM modifications, teams removed the Ship umbilical assembly, leaving the framework clear and ready for removal.
At Massey’s, B18.1 underwent a second round of cryogenic testing.
Meanwhile, at the production site, Ship 39’s nosecone was lifted and mated to the payload section, marking the first stacking operations for a next-generation Ship!
Raptor testing
August 10th
No Raptor tests were conducted today.
August 11th
- Raptor vertical - 19:18:48 - 39s
- Raptor vertical - 19:50:24 - 40s
- Raptor vertical - 19:51:11 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:51:38 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:52:05 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:52:31 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:52:58 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:53:25 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:53:51 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:54:18 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:54:45 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:55:11 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:55:38 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:56:06 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:56:32 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:56:59 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:57:26 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:57:52 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 19:58:19 - 2s
Total tests: 19
Total fire time: 401s / 6m41s
-Raptor vertical: 401s / 6m41s - 19 tests
August 12th
- Raptor vertical - 12:49:11 - 38s
- Raptor vertical - 16:59:15 - 7s
Total tests: 2
Total fire time: 45s
-Raptor vertical: 45s - 2 tests
August 13th
- Raptor south - 11:51:55 - 11s
- Raptor vertical - 14:11:24 - 101s / 1m41s
- Raptor south - 17:16:17 - 20s
Total tests: 3
Total fire time: 132s / 2m12s
-Raptor vertical: 101s / 1m41s - 1 test
-Raptor south: 31s - 2 tests
August 14th
- Raptor south - 09:46:38 - 20s
- Raptor vertical - 10:23:21 - 130s / 2m10s
- Raptor vertical - 14:58:08 - 130s / 2m10s
- Raptor south - 16:14:24 - 100s / 1m40s
Total tests: 4
Total fire time: 380s / 6m20s
-Raptor vertical: 260s / 4m20s - 2 tests
-Raptor south: 120s / 2m - 2 tests
August 15th
- Raptor south - 10:38:59 - 194s / 3m14s
- Raptor vertical - 13:08:43 - 41s
Total tests: 2
Total fire time: 235s / 3m55s
August 16th
There were no Raptor tests conducted today.
References
Jack Beyer (@thejackbeyer) / X
Starbase Live: 24/7 Starship & Super Heavy Development From SpaceX's Boca Chica Facility
McGregor Live: 24/7 SpaceX Engine Testing & Development for Starship and Falcon 9 Rockets
Starship Gazer (@StarshipGazer) / X
