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A comment on Elon Musk’s plan to build one Starship a week and settle Mars. Parent comment

Re:Elon Musk’s plan to build one Starship a week and settle ... by grey-area on Thursday March 05, 2020 @01:58PM (#22496784)
There are additional constraints not found in most welding projects. They can’t just make the material and weld thicker/heavier as that would impact the rocket performance.

So it has to be as thin and fragile as possible but no thinner. That makes it very hard to get right, and the welds have to be done to very fine tolerances on thin material, you could say it is rocket science.

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Re:Elon Musk’s plan to build one Starship a week and settle ... by aguyfromnb on Friday March 06, 2020 @07:03AM (#22502927)
>They can’t just make the material and weld thicker/heavier as that would impact the rocket performance.

I understand. But the stresses that materials and welds can withstand are not unknown variables. We're talking about a pressurized tank here. You aren't going to build a rocket (designed to carry people) that has tolerances so tight that it's touch and go whether it explodes as soon as it's pressurized.

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