Re:SpaceX Launches 19th Rocket in a Year, a Company Record
by SEJeff on Monday December 03, 2018 @04:24PM
(#18593212)
Elon described it in an interview once as this:
If you saw $6 million, falling from the sky, would you try to catch it? Each fairing is around $3 million, so they're trying to catch it. That gives them $6 million more per-customer they can discount the price should they need to get really competitive. It is really kind of insane that no one has tried this before.
Re:SpaceX Launches 19th Rocket in a Year, a Company Record
by jczhang on Monday December 03, 2018 @06:26PM
(#18594244)
Love that kind of commentary Elon provides.
Re:SpaceX Launches 19th Rocket in a Year, a Company Record
by nur0n on Monday December 03, 2018 @09:34PM
(#18595553)
Link to the interview?
Re:SpaceX Launches 19th Rocket in a Year, a Company Record
by Lanzaa on Wednesday December 05, 2018 @12:21PM
(#18610315)
Musk has used the pallet of cash analogy several times.
Here is Musk using it in regards to saving the fairing @ ISS Research and Development Conference 2017:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5cPMS6cT0Ig&t=825
In regards to the first stage (booster stage) at Code Conference 2016:
The reason for reuse isn't really the cost (though that's certainly part of it). The main driver is that they are going to become the production bottleneck if Falcon 9 reaches the flight cadence they are shooting for. The fairings are a big, unwieldy shape, and they take up a lot of room during the manufacturing process, so they can only make one at a time.