SN10 in the series of Flying Water Towers of Boca Chica (more formally, StarShip) flew today. This time they lit three engines for the final flip from skydiver unpowered descent to landing. That is one more than strictly needed, with software in place to choose what to shut down based on what is working, the better to actually land rather than again "making a crater in the right place".
Looked pretty good to me. There were moments of discolored exhaust during ascent which had me wondering whether an engine might be burning a bit off-nominal, and there was a not exactly tiny fire burning near or at the base of the vehicle shortly after landing for a few tens of seconds, but otherwise, I did not notice anything amiss.
So very, very much has to work almost exactly right just for the thing to fly up to 10 kilometers and land intact on a piece of concrete about the size of a medium house lot.
On to supersonic. On to energetic re-entry (the thermal tiles so far have not needed to do anything more than stay attached).
[Edit to add: So after sitting on the ground with the immediate post-crash fire seeming to be out for some time, it just blew up. A sudden energetic event that sent the whole vehicle flying upward.]
For my location in Albuquerque, NM, that statement reads "Starlink will begin offering service in your area beginning mid to late 2021".
Since I gave SpaceX my deposit, things have moved along faster than forecast (maybe Starlink customer interface is not running on Elon Time).
As of this morning, April 22, 2021, a FedEx carton is heading my way from California with a Starlink user terminal inside. I've been up on my roof looking for places meeting the 25 degree above horizon obstruction clearance, and not presenting my neighbors more of a view of the thing than they might like.
For my location in Albuquerque, NM, that statement reads "Starlink will begin offering service in your area beginning mid to late 2021".
Since I gave SpaceX my deposit, things have moved along faster than forecast (maybe Starlink customer interface is not running on Elon Time).
As of this morning, April 22, 2021, a FedEx carton is heading my way from California with a Starlink user terminal inside. I've been up on my roof looking for places meeting the 25 degree above horizon obstruction clearance, and not presenting my neighbors more of a view of the thing than they might like.
WOO HOO!!!
Dish Network is now mounting their dishes on the ground on a stake and it is now warrantied against weather damage unlike the ones they install on peoples roofs, they are putting them behind bushes etc to screen them from the neighbors. I wonder if that is a better option for you too, no climbing on roofs and easy adjustments if needed.
Dish Network is now mounting their dishes on the ground on a stake and it is now warrantied against weather damage unlike the ones they install on peoples roofs, they are putting them behind bushes etc to screen them from the neighbors. I wonder if that is a better option for you too, no climbing on roofs and easy adjustments if needed.
Those geosynchronous system ground antennas just need to point at one spot in the sky. No obstruction to that single point and you're good. Starlink has well over a thousand satellites up there, and they are trucking right along, as orbital altitude is about 550 kilometers. The antenna needs a clear view of every pass so long as the satellite is more than 25 degrees above the horizon. That makes a ground-level location a bad option for most people's lots. Even on the roof chimneys and trees restrict the options.
My house roof, as with most in New Mexico, is flat. I made myself a nice ladder out of the sort of pressure-treated wood you use for decks years ago and it just lives all the time ready to climb. So roof work for me is nothing like it is for most homeowners. My big risk is putting holes in the roofing to attach the mount. SpaceX includes in the standard roof mounting kit thick gooey black sheets of stuff that is supposed to seal that up OK. I hope they got that part right.
Speaking of holes, my other problem is to play "cable guy" and put a hole through the wall of my computer room so the cable going up to the User Terminal can come inside for the power brick and the router. I'll be employing my new stud finder which claims live AC wire detection and crossing my fingers as I start drilling.
Dish Network is now mounting their dishes on the ground on a stake and it is now warrantied against weather damage unlike the ones they install on peoples roofs, they are putting them behind bushes etc to screen them from the neighbors. I wonder if that is a better option for you too, no climbing on roofs and easy adjustments if needed.
Those geosynchronous system ground antennas just need to point at one spot in the sky. No obstruction to that single point and you're good. Starlink has well over a thousand satellites up there, and they are trucking right along, as orbital altitude is about 550 kilometers. The antenna needs a clear view of every pass so long as the satellite is more than 25 degrees above the horizon. That makes a ground-level location a bad option for most people's lots. Even on the roof chimneys and trees restrict the options.
My house roof, as with most in New Mexico, is flat. I made myself a nice ladder out of the sort of pressure-treated wood you use for decks years ago and it just lives all the time ready to climb. So roof work for me is nothing like it is for most homeowners. My big risk is putting holes in the roofing to attach the mount. SpaceX includes in the standard roof mounting kit thick gooey black sheets of stuff that is supposed to seal that up OK. I hope they got that part right.
Speaking of holes, my other problem is to play "cable guy" and put a hole through the wall of my computer room so the cable going up to the User Terminal can come inside for the power brick and the router. I'll be employing my new stud finder which claims live AC wire detection and crossing my fingers as I start drilling.
Ahhh that makes sense, have fun and as always be safe!!
I am writing this post using my new Starlink connection. The dish took about a minute to motor itself from the travel stow position (nearly vertical) to dead flat to the horizon. I think it took about four more minutes to engage satellites and decide the real angle it wanted, which my eye on a protractor guesses is about 24 degrees up from being flat on the horizon, pointed due north.
Just in the last day I've seen secondary source indications that a big piece of sky where Starlink satellites appear for me is not allowed, as there is a limitation against pointing my beam too close to the geosynchronous satellites (my source called this the "Clarke belt", which is a new term to me, but an obvious reference to Arthur C. Clarke). My source estimates "too close" at 22 degrees, which throws away a lot of candidates, and helps explain why the system points my antenna so strongly north.
It really was pretty plug-and-play, as they claim. I just plugged the User Terminal (aka antenna, aka Dishy, aka Dishy McFlatface) and the router into the power brick, the power brick into the wall, and went looking for Wifi signals visible on a tablet. Connected to the one that matched the ID on the box, supplied a new network name and password, and done.
I am writing this post using my new Starlink connection. The dish took about a minute to motor itself from the travel stow position (nearly vertical) to dead flat to the horizon. I think it took about four more minutes to engage satellites and decide the real angle it wanted, which my eye on a protractor guesses is about 24 degrees up from being flat on the horizon, pointed due north.
Just in the last day I've seen secondary source indications that a big piece of sky where Starlink satellites appear for me is not allowed, as there is a limitation against pointing my beam too close to the geosynchronous satellites (my source called this the "Clarke belt", which is a new term to me, but an obvious reference to Arthur C. Clarke). My source estimates "too close" at 22 degrees, which throws away a lot of candidates, and helps explain why the system points my antenna so strongly north.
It really was pretty plug-and-play, as they claim. I just plugged the User Terminal (aka antenna, aka Dishy, aka Dishy McFlatface) and the router into the power brick, the power brick into the wall, and went looking for Wifi signals visible on a tablet. Connected to the one that matched the ID on the box, supplied a new network name and password, and done.
That has been interesting. On my early tests I saw lower download speeds than I hoped, but higher upload speeds than Comcast gives me here. I was doing those tests from PCs which connected by Wifi. It turns out that the Starlink Wifi router is not as good at connecting to my PC at the other end of a long skinny house as is my TP-Link router.
Happily, it turns out that I was able to swing my whole home network, including both WiFi and ethernet connections by the single move of unplugging my TP-Link router/access point from the Comcast cable modem and plugging it straight into the Starlink power brick, dropping use of the Starlink router entirely. With that revision, and making tests from a PC with an Ethernet connection to the router, I have seen Starlink download speeds up over 300 Megabits/second. When I tried just now, Speedtest by Ookla reported from my ethernet connected PC 163 down, 21 up. Ping was reported as 88 msec.
Power consumption is less than the 100 watts I feared and assumed. I've got a Kill-a-Watt watching the input to the power brick, and it varies from about 32 to about 55. I'll hazard a guesstimate average of 45. And that overstates my increase, as the cable modem power consumption goes away. So maybe 40 watts added to my household base power consumption.
This still is not a very financially reasonable move for anyone with a good connection paying under $100/month, which leaves out a great deal of the world. But the folks "out there" are just clamoring for the service at the current price and performance.
But I suppose the performance varies greatly as the available satellites mover around, and sharing with other users varies. Just as I finished this post I repeated the Ookla test, which reported just 34 down, 9 up, and again 88 ping.
archae86 wrote: SN10 in the
)
oops
me thinks the valve didn't
)
me thinks the valve didn't close giving fuel to the fire and the rest of the fuel boiled.
BTW looks like they bounced the landing
archae86 wrote:For my
)
Since I gave SpaceX my deposit, things have moved along faster than forecast (maybe Starlink customer interface is not running on Elon Time).
As of this morning, April 22, 2021, a FedEx carton is heading my way from California with a Starlink user terminal inside. I've been up on my roof looking for places meeting the 25 degree above horizon obstruction clearance, and not presenting my neighbors more of a view of the thing than they might like.
archae86 wrote:archae86
)
WOO HOO!!!
Dish Network is now mounting their dishes on the ground on a stake and it is now warrantied against weather damage unlike the ones they install on peoples roofs, they are putting them behind bushes etc to screen them from the neighbors. I wonder if that is a better option for you too, no climbing on roofs and easy adjustments if needed.
mikey wrote:Dish Network is
)
Those geosynchronous system ground antennas just need to point at one spot in the sky. No obstruction to that single point and you're good. Starlink has well over a thousand satellites up there, and they are trucking right along, as orbital altitude is about 550 kilometers. The antenna needs a clear view of every pass so long as the satellite is more than 25 degrees above the horizon. That makes a ground-level location a bad option for most people's lots. Even on the roof chimneys and trees restrict the options.
My house roof, as with most in New Mexico, is flat. I made myself a nice ladder out of the sort of pressure-treated wood you use for decks years ago and it just lives all the time ready to climb. So roof work for me is nothing like it is for most homeowners. My big risk is putting holes in the roofing to attach the mount. SpaceX includes in the standard roof mounting kit thick gooey black sheets of stuff that is supposed to seal that up OK. I hope they got that part right.
Speaking of holes, my other problem is to play "cable guy" and put a hole through the wall of my computer room so the cable going up to the User Terminal can come inside for the power brick and the router. I'll be employing my new stud finder which claims live AC wire detection and crossing my fingers as I start drilling.
archae86 wrote: mikey
)
Ahhh that makes sense, have fun and as always be safe!!
I'm watching on NASA live
)
I'm watching on NASA live with 23 minutes and counting for the Falcon 9
Perfect launch and Dragon crew on the way to the ISS
https://www.nasa.gov/crew-2
I writing this post using my
)
I am writing this post using my new Starlink connection. The dish took about a minute to motor itself from the travel stow position (nearly vertical) to dead flat to the horizon. I think it took about four more minutes to engage satellites and decide the real angle it wanted, which my eye on a protractor guesses is about 24 degrees up from being flat on the horizon, pointed due north.
Just in the last day I've seen secondary source indications that a big piece of sky where Starlink satellites appear for me is not allowed, as there is a limitation against pointing my beam too close to the geosynchronous satellites (my source called this the "Clarke belt", which is a new term to me, but an obvious reference to Arthur C. Clarke). My source estimates "too close" at 22 degrees, which throws away a lot of candidates, and helps explain why the system points my antenna so strongly north.
It really was pretty plug-and-play, as they claim. I just plugged the User Terminal (aka antenna, aka Dishy, aka Dishy McFlatface) and the router into the power brick, the power brick into the wall, and went looking for Wifi signals visible on a tablet. Connected to the one that matched the ID on the box, supplied a new network name and password, and done.
archae86 wrote: I am writing
)
WOO HOO!!!
But what about the SPEED of the network
mikey wrote:But what about
)
That has been interesting. On my early tests I saw lower download speeds than I hoped, but higher upload speeds than Comcast gives me here. I was doing those tests from PCs which connected by Wifi. It turns out that the Starlink Wifi router is not as good at connecting to my PC at the other end of a long skinny house as is my TP-Link router.
Happily, it turns out that I was able to swing my whole home network, including both WiFi and ethernet connections by the single move of unplugging my TP-Link router/access point from the Comcast cable modem and plugging it straight into the Starlink power brick, dropping use of the Starlink router entirely. With that revision, and making tests from a PC with an Ethernet connection to the router, I have seen Starlink download speeds up over 300 Megabits/second. When I tried just now, Speedtest by Ookla reported from my ethernet connected PC 163 down, 21 up. Ping was reported as 88 msec.
Power consumption is less than the 100 watts I feared and assumed. I've got a Kill-a-Watt watching the input to the power brick, and it varies from about 32 to about 55. I'll hazard a guesstimate average of 45. And that overstates my increase, as the cable modem power consumption goes away. So maybe 40 watts added to my household base power consumption.
This still is not a very financially reasonable move for anyone with a good connection paying under $100/month, which leaves out a great deal of the world. But the folks "out there" are just clamoring for the service at the current price and performance.
But I suppose the performance varies greatly as the available satellites mover around, and sharing with other users varies. Just as I finished this post I repeated the Ookla test, which reported just 34 down, 9 up, and again 88 ping.