B
barrykirk
Guest
Warning: Long winded post with a lot of questions.<br /><br />I've noticed in the literature that I've been able to dig up the following facts about the Falcon 1.<br /><br />First Stage Burn Time is 169 seconds.<br /><br />Second Stage Burn Time is 378 seconds.<br /><br />So, the second stage burns for slightly longer than twice as long as the first stage...<br /><br />Having said that, I found a chart that showed the second stage developed 0.65 g's at ignition and took around 130 seconds to work up to 1 g. Although it slowly builds accel over its burn to peak at a little over 4 g's by burnout.<br /><br />Does that make any sense that they would go that much under 1 g and for that long? Would they do better starting the Kestrel with less fuel so she starts at 1 g accel to reduce gravity losses?<br /><br />I found the rocket total launch mass is 60,000 pounds and the Merlin engine develops 77,000 pounds.<br /><br />I also found that the Kestrel engine develops around 7,000 pounds force. Around 9.1% the power of the Merlin. But with a higher ISP because it's entire flight is in a vacuum or close to it.<br /><br />Obviously, the Kestrel burns fuel at a much lower rate than the Merlin.<br /><br />No where did I find the breakdown of how much fuel is on the first stage and how much fuel is on the second stage.<br /><br />Also, the number I have, 7000 LBs for the second stage, does that include the payload?<br /><br />Another question I have is what is the velocity at first stage seperation? Does most of the velocity come from the second stage?<br /><br />I know that with the Saturn vehicles like the Saturn IB which was two stage to orbit. The velocity at first stage burnout was less than half the final orbital velocity. Is the falcon similar?<br /><br />Here is another one that I've been pondering.<br /><br />When the BFG comes out. If SpaceX makes it into a five engine cluster like Saturn V and puts a full blown Falcon IX on top of it, what would be the total mass to orbit capability?<br />