SpaceX Mars Colonial Transporter (updates)

[DocM]

Part 1 of the secret is out: the big gun will be built using composites: $2-3 billion worth in this first deal. 

 

More hard info coming as we get closer to Sept. 27 so a new thread. It may need a name change later.

 

Toray fibers are used for some 787 parts, and the company has been looking for a reason to expand. Guess they've found it. Apparently Toray broke ground on a $1.4B project in Spartanburg, SC last January. Getting a head start.

 

http://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Deals/Toray-carbon-fiber-to-carry-SpaceX-s-Mars-ambitions

 

Quote

Toray carbon fiber to carry SpaceX's Mars ambitions

PALO ALTO, U.S. -- Japanese materials maker Toray Industries has entered into an agreement to supply carbon fiber to U.S. space flight startup SpaceX for use in the bodies of rockets and space vehicles.

The multiyear deal with Tesla founder Elon Musk's 14-year-old venture is estimated to be worth 200 billion yen to 300 billion yen ($1.99 billion to $2.98 billion) in total. The two sides are aiming to finalize the agreement this fall after hammering out prices, time frames and other terms.
>
>
SpaceX is switching to carbon fibers from aluminum as it develops heavy rockets for carrying people and large quantities of material. A lighter body would allow more cargo to be loaded, which would cut transport costs.
>

Edited August 16, 2016 by DocM

[DocM]

NASA and Boeing studied building large carbon fiber cryogenic rocket tanks tanks over the last several years. Built to handle LH2, they were 30% lighter and 25% cheaper than aluminum-lithium alloy tanks like SpaceX uses. CH4 and LOX should be a cinch for the tech.

 

Here's a NASA video about their work. BFR tanks would be about 3x the diameter of the tank in this video.

 

 

 

[Unobscured Vision]

Yep.  Some sort of Carbon+Composite Fiber that doesn't get brittle at super-low temps ... like LO2 low. Space low. Looks like they found just the thing they needed.  

[Draggendrop Veteran]

 

My guess would be that SpaceX will not confirm until the "reveal" next month.

 

This is shaping up to be real interesting in September....can't wait!

 

[DocM]

For the record;

 

it's an exclusive headline report by the Nikkei Asian Review, a subsidiary of the Nihon Keizai Shinbun, aka Japan Economic Newspaper, the world's largest financial newspaper. Nikkei also publishes the Nikkei 225, the index of the Japanese stock exchange, and it owns The Financial Times.

 

Not a tabloid rag by any means.

.

[Draggendrop Veteran]

This is a lot of carbon fiber sheets leading to the possibility of SpaceX doing the tooling in house and only outsourcing for the raw material. Without verification, this quantity (dollar value) may rival Boeing for 777/787 production use.

 

This is a real big deal.  

[Unobscured Vision]

I'm not surprised that they won't discuss the details of the fiber at all. Likely they won't discuss it in any specific detail next month either, due as much to proprietary and intellectual property concerns as it would be to ... shall we call it "Industrial Security" ones. This stuff is probably going to be something quite unusual indeed. It's not likely to be straight-up carbon fiber and some special coatings. Even used on Aircraft it isn't your bog-standard fiber.

 

But yeah, this changes everything about MCT/BFR design. I suggested something like this, that they'd make use of composites to lower the weight -- and Doc brought the new tanks to our attention , lowering the weight even more .... 

 

Depends on how much they plan to use in the design, of course, which will tell us how much of a weight savings bonus they'll get. But the info is starting to come in ... and we've got an idea of how much power initially the Raptor engines are able to crank out now. Things are starting to come together.  

[Draggendrop Veteran]

To bring this dollar value of raw material into play, leads me to suspect in house control of manufacturing in a big way, for all related composite items, even the lesser talked about items such as fairings, tanks and now probably structural sections.

 

In lieu of barge stalking, we may have to start tracking flatbeds in/out of SpaceX facilities......

[DocM]

It's not just carbon sheets but spools of single fibers. The new tank tech uses a robotic arm and rotating mandrel to precisely lay out and wind almost all the tank shell from a spool.

[Draggendrop Veteran]

SpaceX may also be trying different "curing" methods as well, would be tough to build environmental enclosures for really large sections.

 

This is going to be real exciting to see the development of finished "parts", small and extremely large.

 

[DocM]

There are now no-autoclave composites.

[DocM]

http://www.compositesworld.com/blog/post/no-oven-no-autoclave-nona-

 

 

[Unobscured Vision]

Wow, @DocM ... I like.  

[Draggendrop Veteran]

Yes...That was real neat, the possibilities are endless....Thank's for posting it Doc...