Starship Flight 13 Timeline Taking Shape | B20 Passes First Cryo Test | Starship Update

[00:00] Booster 20 has finally rolled out for cryotesting at Massey's, and given the state of ship 40, the next in line for flight, what's the timeline looking like for flight 13? Starship flight falls may be behind us now. The activity is not slowing down as SpaceX prepares those next in line for what's to come.

[00:15] From Florida Space Coast to South Texas, we'll be discussing all of that and more on this week's Starship Update.

[00:30] After an extended stay inside of Mega Bay 1, Booster 20 was finally placed atop the Booster Cryo stand and rolled out to the Massey's test site. There, it will complete its cryo direct testing campaign while in the company of the test

[00:45] tanks still occupying space. But before talking into all the details on Booster 20, let's go and talk about these test tanks real quick. DMA 2.3 has conducted yet another test of sorts. This Booster Forward test article is evaluating the version 3 integrated hot staging ring and

[00:59] grid fan slots, and this week's test marked its 20th overall. Alongside B18.3, the Lightning 10 test article also completed a test run, though it remains far less used with just two tests overalls at this

[01:11] point. Now back to Mr. 20. Cryogenic testing is meant to verify the structural integrity of both liquid oxygen and liquid methane tanks while ensuring that everything in front of the booster, from COPDs, various sensors, and other internal hardware, worked together nominally. The roll-on

[01:25] itself wasn't without drama though. On the way to Massey's, the F21-10 is used to transport vehicles and hardware encountered issues, and teams are seen replacing the power packs on both of them. Yikes! You may have also noticed that Booster 20 rolled out missing some key components as well,

[01:39] most notably the grid fins, the cover for the LOX VQD, and most significantly, its engines. Cryo-driven testing is unique in that it doesn't require any of these components. There's no engine testing during cryo runs, and the grid fins can be installed and tested at any later point. Booster

[01:53] 20 is expected to complete between two and four cryo tests, ensuring thorough and consistent data. just like Booster 19 had. In the past though, Booster typically only performed two, and this past Saturday night, Booster 20 underwent its first cryo test at Massey's. Both tanks on the

[02:08] Booster were filled completely, and massive venting was observed from the methane tank. But that's not methane, mind you, as the methane tank is filled with nitrogen for cryoproof testing, for 50 reasons. After Booster 20 rolls back to the production site, teams will review all data and

[02:22] make any necessary changes if issues were found. If everything looks good, the crews will then transition into preparing the booster for static fire testing at pad 2. This is when the engines and the grid fins will be installed. The grid fins are especially important though because with the version 3

[02:36] design the lifts and catch points are integrated into them allowing the booster to be lifted by the chopsticks. Also in the works for flight 13 is Ship 40 which is currently inside Mega Bay 2. It's preparing for static fire testing after completing its cryo testing back in early May. Ship 40 had a

[02:51] prolonged stay in Mega Bay 2, much like Booster 20. It's possible that teams were waiting on data from Flight 12 before committing to any final changes. The good news is that over the past few days, three Gregory-3 C-level engines and three

[03:04] vacuum-optimized engines had been rolled inside for installation on Ship 40. It's unlikely Ship 40 will roll off for a couple more days, though, as SpaceX probably wants to finish up testing on Booster 20 first. Over at Massey's, Ship 40 will likely have a much quicker

[03:17] engine testing campaign than Ship 39 did. Ship 39 performed a spin prime, two additional tests that we're still not entirely sure about, possibly more spin primes or igniter tests, a six-engine static fire, and then, after the wet dress rehearsal, it returned to Massey's for one final igniter test.

[03:33] All of this was necessary because it was the first flight with sea level and vacuum Raptor 3 engines. St. Tex wanted to be absolutely sure everything worked before flight 12. Now, with all the real-world data from Raptor 3 on flight 12,

[03:45] 640 may have a noticeably short test campaign. That said, teams may still want to do at least one spin time or smaller test of sorts before the full six engine static fire test. There's one question that we're still curious about though. Will it perform a single engine static fire?

[03:59] We saw these on the version 2 ships to help validate in-space relight capability, even though the test is obviously still on the ground. Ship 29 skipped this test entirely, yet the in-space relight was still listed as a mission objective, which they ultimately missed due to a lost RVAC engine on the set.

[04:14] It unclear whether Shipboard will conduct this or not so we have to wait and see Finally once both vehicles have concluded testing and returns to the production site teams can perform all pre checks load the throwing simulators into ship

[04:26] and roll them back out to the pad, likely for a wide dress rehearsal first before attempting to launch. But Flight 13 isn't the only task on SpaceX's agenda right now, though. They're already deep into vehicle production for Flight 14, starting off with Ship 41.

[04:38] Soon after Flight 12, it was fully stacked inside of Mega Bay 2, where it received its ass-flaps and addition touches across the rest of the ship. Based on previous timelines, Ship 41 looks to be spending a little bit longer inside Mega Bay 2.

[04:50] Ship 39 took just over a month between the ass-flap installation and crowd testing, while Ship 40 just took under two months. That would place Ship 41's first testing campaign in early July, unless SpaceX has managed to speed things up, which would not entirely be surprising as they become more familiar working with version 3 vehicles as time goes on.

[05:06] Moving over to Ship 21, which should find tandem with Ship 41 if all goes well. It had noticeable progress over the past week. Following the transfer tube installation, which we briefly covered last episode, teams rolled out the LOX landing tank.

[05:18] This is a smaller tank that sits alongside the Falcon 9-sized transfer tube. It supplies the Inner 13 engine, specifically with oxygen, during landing, once the main tank has longer enough propellant to feed them. With the landing tank now installed at Booster 21, SpaceX can move on to their next major production

[05:32] steps, rolling out the final X section to complete the main LOX tank, followed by stacking the entire forward section, which consists of the integrated hot staging rate and methane tank. From this point in Rooster 20's production, it took teams about a month to fully stack

[05:44] the vehicle on Mega Bay 1, for a total build time of 83 days. Hopefully they can speed up production in the near future, but it's SpaceX after all, so it's not really an if, it's a when. And of course, all these vehicles being SpaceX

[05:56] needs a lot of Raptor 3 engines. If my math is correct, that's 12 engines for ship 40 and 41, plus 66 engines for Rooster 20 and 21, totaling 88 engines just for these two flight campaigns, assuming there won't be any slots at some point.

[06:12] And speaking of Raptors, it's time for our McGregor Minute. Testing has finally ramped up for the first time since Flight 12, with a total of 15 engine tests recorded this week, up from just 3 in last week's episode. But none of these burns exceeded 150 seconds though, so they were all relatively short.

[06:27] Because of that, we can't confidently say any of these engines are destined for a ship. Ship engines usually see burns upwards of 300 seconds to simulate the ascent burn. Now, earlier I mentioned that SpaceX seems 88 engines ready for flight 13 and 14.

[06:40] So, how close are we? Well, this week a new record was set. Again, the highest Raptor 0 number now sits at Raptor 3 number 172. We're getting closer and closer to that number 200 milestone. The engines flown on Boost 19 during flight 12 were in the 100s or below,

[06:55] with a few in the 120s and one in the 130s. So, it's quite possible that SpaceX already has close to, or maybe even more than, aviator engines tested and ready. Now let's circle back to Starbase and take a quick look inside Star Factory.

[07:09] Ship 42 was hooked up to a transfer crane and moved it to a different stand. This appears to be a staging area where SpaceX positions Nose Jones before lifting them onto their payload base. Assuming, of course, this ship is actually a payload configured ship. But we're pretty confident Ship 42 is.

[07:22] Once the Nose Jones is lifted onto the payload base, Ship 42 will be nearly ready for rollout. If all goes well, we should see Mega Bay 2 by early to mid-July for stacking with the rest of the vehicle sections. Unfortunately, 2402 is pretty much the only nose cone whose identity we're sure of,

[07:37] as it's extremely difficult to keep track of all the nose cone movements. Of the remaining nose cones, one is currently receiving oblated material in heat shield tiles, one has a hatch installed, another has no tiles or header tanks,

[07:50] and another has no tiles with only the tip of the nose visible. We're now firmly in speculation territory here. With new designs appearing, like the metal stone with the hatch, we can only guess what types of ships these might be.

[08:02] Some are likely standard Starling vessels, but it's possible we're also seeing early tanker, depot, or even HLS hardware. Unfortunately, it's almost impossible to tell the difference when we have never seen a proper test article for any of these specialized areas.

[08:15] At least yet. So what exactly does the future hold for all of these ships? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section down below. But surely, one or more of these ships being assembled inside Star Factory will eventually make its way to the Space Coast.

[08:28] Transport will be handled by SpaceX's barge, you'll thank me later. Last week we mentioned it had arrived at the port of Brownsville from Florida This week it had made the return trip departing Brownsville and heading back to the Space Ghost Prior to the departure SpaceX rolled a booster transport stand and a ship transport stand from the Starbase production site and all the way down to the port

[08:47] But we already knew this though, because the Port of Brownsville paperwork had indicated the barge would be carrying ring walls. The term SpaceX uses for these transport stands. We're confident the stands made out of a barge thanks to two distinct separate shadows visible in the barge's canopy.

[09:02] It makes perfect sense to move them now rather than waiting for a vehicle to be ready. Given the barge's dimensions, it probably can't fit both a full vehicle and a stand at the same time. These stands are also massive, two road lanes wide, and SCMTs are kind of slow, in case you haven't noticed.

[09:19] So there's no practical way to send them by conventional roads. It's not like Falcon 9. They also take a long time to build. SpaceX has an entire area in the Sanchez lot dedicated for transport and construction and other tooling, something they do not have at Roberts Road yet.

[09:33] By sending the stands first, SpaceX is pre-positioning hardware on the Space Coast before any vehicles arrive. This could also serve as a trial run for shipping actual Starships and Super Heavy boosters. And since we're talking about transporting vehicles this way,

[09:46] let's go ahead and check in on Starship Progress here in Florida. We'll start a launch complex on the 9A. Teams are continuing to add further cladding to the launch mount service structure. This is important not only for protecting the structure during launches, but also because once the cladding is complete,

[09:59] they can begin testing the pad's value system at full capacity. It wouldn't exactly be ideal to run the full value system, including the top deck, and risk smoking the internals of the structure and potentially damaging hardware in the process.

[10:11] And just like we saw at Pad 2 and Starbase, Launch Complex 79A is also undergoing extensive tank farm testing, and we had more of that this week. Given how relatively smooth Flight 12's test campaign was on Pad 2,

[10:23] with no major tank farm issues, testing clearly paid off here. Here's hoping it leads to an equally smooth first flight campaign from 39A. Fingers crossed. And soon. While Pad 39A is nearing completion, the other Starship launch site at the Cape, Space Launch Complex 37, is still very much in its infancy.

[10:40] That said, though, work is progressing. You may recall from earlier updates that SpaceX has been building those tower sections at Roberts Road for the first of the two launch pads planned for Space Launch Complex 37. They then transported these tower sections all the way to Pad 37, well before the tower foundation was even fixed.

[10:56] That was a few months ago though, and things look very different now. There is finally a tower base at Space Launch Complex 37, and SpaceX has begun digging the Sun Trench for this pad. The big question though in recent weeks has been when they would begin stacking these sections.

[11:10] They had the massive LR-13000 crane on site and ready for the job, but it had been lowered for quite a while. That changed this week though. Just a few days ago, our old Julia Bergeron spotted the LR-13000 crane back in its vertical position,

[11:23] which could mean tower stacking is imminent. Even though these are distant shots, Starship's tower is so tall that it will eventually become one of the most identifiable structures as the Cape. We'll be able to track its progress clearly from now on, and of course, we'll keep you updated.

[11:37] Julia also captured shots of Gigabank at Roberts Road, and we regularly checked our Space Force Live cameras for updates. Slowly but surely, the building is receiving more exterior cladding, making it difficult to seem soft. We have, however, spotted the dismantling of the four tower cranes that helped build Gigabay over the past year, of which only two remain.

[11:56] As seen from this domain structure of Gigabay, all tower cranes will be removed and replaced by a mobile crane on the exterior for final outfitting. If the megabays of Starbase are of any indication, full outfitting will be a very lengthy process,

[12:08] but they won't need the building to be fully finished to start using it, which is why I'm still surprised they're already preparing to send vehicles from Starbase in the near future. And back in Starbase, Gigabank remains mostly unclad, so the ongoing work inside is still visible.

[12:21] This is partly because construction began a few months after Florida. There also seems to be a noticeably different construction philosophy between the two sites. In Florida, for example, teams prefabricated certain internal sections, such as stairways, while continuing to build upward level by level.

[12:36] In Starbase, they've instead built everything progressively as they went, which has meant more time spent at each individual level. As a result while Florida gigabyte has already reached its full height with its tower cranes being dismantled Starbase just hasn even finished its penultimate level yet and Cladding still has a long way left to go This week in Starbase we also seen a lot of activity at the launch site especially where it focused on getting pad 2 ready for flight once again Attention has been mostly focused on the chopsticks on Tower 2 Last week crews removed the existing landing rails from the arms for reasons that weren

[13:07] made immediately clear. Earlier this week, we then saw the arms being put through quick movement, the kind you'd expect during a catch attempt. Most of those tests were complete, and a new set of landing rails were installed. These new rails appear noticeably lighter than the previous ones, which should allow

[13:20] for the arms to move more quickly and stop with less wobbling. Changes like this are the result of lessons learned as SpaceX continues to use their hardware and identify weak points needing improvement. This work is especially important because a booster catch may not be too far off,

[13:35] provided the Super Heavy booster has successfully demonstrated its capabilities on the next launch. The sooner the pad is ready, the better. Beyond the chopsticks themselves, crews also treated to making further adjustments to the chopstick carrier system, as evidenced by the occasional sparks we've seen souring in the area.

[13:49] Of course, teams have also been paying close attention to the launch mount. The launch route is under extreme forces and temperatures during liftoff, so it's no surprise there that inspections and repair work are still ongoing two weeks after flight 12.

[14:01] Now, while the long-term goal is rapid turnarounds, each flight demonstrates what needs more sufficient protection and where design changes may be required to make that possible. And we've seen this exact progression in the Falcon 9. It used to take three weeks to turn the pad around, and now they can do that in under three days.

[14:18] Lessons learned are being applied to every Starship facility SpaceX is building, both here in Florida and as the very first Starship launch pad service, Pad 1. Oh, good old Pad 1. Pad 1 is currently being modified with newer designs of launch hardware, and one of the

[14:32] key differences compared to Pad 2 has been the prefabrication of the launch mount service structure. This is where all the plumbers in the tank farm will eventually connect before feeding into the launch mount. It will also house much of the mount's control hardware and purging systems.

[14:44] While we assume, just like the Pad 2, that internal systems will not be fully installed until after the commodity trench is in place, there is no reason to wait on building the basic truss structure itself. That main truss structure now appears largely complete,

[14:56] and is simply waiting for the installation area to be prepared. The flame trench excavation for Pad 1 also seems to be progressing well, judging by the visible amounts of excavated soil. We've also seen SpaceX staging sections of the flame trench walls, which is another sign that the

[15:09] full trench will take shape very soon. Now it's time to revisit a topic that we covered last week, Starfall. As you may have seen by now, SpaceX is preparing to go public. And to be clear, here at NSF we do not cover financials or investments, but we do care deeply about the technological side of things. We're nerds after all.

[15:26] This week, SpaceX released a series of slides and videos highlighting the company, its current work, and future plans. Of all included material, one particular register stood out to us. An image wanted to on-orbit manufacturing that looks remarkably like Starfall.

[15:40] If you missed last week's episode, Starfall is a project focused towards on-orbit manufacturing, point-to-point cargo transport, and other similar applications. Each Starfall pod is shaped like a hockey puck, roughly 3 meters wide, and just short enough to fit through the Starship PEDS dispenser.

[15:55] The render shown in the presentation appears to depict four of these pods being deployed from a specialized satellite bus. This plus features cutouts for the pods, attachment parts for the PEDS dispenser, and solar panels. In theory, Starship could carry multiple of these and employ a large number of pods in a single mission.

[16:10] It's especially interesting because the same slide also mentions asteroid mining, lunar manufacturing, and sending large numbers of people to Mars. Yet, this particular project now feels much more imminent, given the paperwork that we've already seen for Starfall and how soon the first launches could happen.

[16:26] And, speaking of launching payloads on Starship, the presentation once again reaffirms SpaceX's plan to begin launching Starlink V3 satellites on Starship in the second half of this year. So, if Flight 13 goes well, we may see an operational Starlink mission within the next few months.

[16:42] Flight 13 is coming up pretty quick now with hardware progressing through testing, and we'll be here before we know it. And the broader picture for Starship is becoming more apparent with recent moves from SpaceX themselves. with new launch sites, payloads, and more, SpaceX is going all in on Starship.

[16:57] When do you think we'll see both Flight 13 vehicles ready for launch? And when do you think the mission objectives will be when the time comes? And I've asked this before, but when do you believe Starship will make its long-awaiter first flight from Florida Space Coast, given recent developments?

[17:10] Feel free to let us know in the comments section down below. I'm Max Evans from SF, thank you so much for watching, and we'll catch you guys in the next one.