Latest / Elon Musk Podcast / SpaceX Moves Starship V3 Maiden Flight to May: What’s the Hold Up?

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SpaceX Moves Starship V3 Maiden Flight to May: What’s the Hold Up? · Elon Musk Podcast

• 0:00
  Elon Musk and SpaceX are preparing the 12th integrated
• 0:03
  flight test of Starship V3, the most powerful rocket ever built,
• 0:07
  which is actually tied to an unprecedented plan to place
• 0:10
  artificial intelligence data centers on the moon.
• 0:13
  Yeah, I mean, when you look at the raw physical reality of this
• 0:16
  machine, it really just defies normal comprehension, right?
• 0:19
  We are talking about a vehicle that towers over the Statue of
• 0:22
  Liberty, generating thrust that makes the Apollo era Saturn V
• 0:27
  look like, well, a hobbyist project.
• 0:29
  Yeah, it's enormous. But what really anchors this
• 0:32
  hardware reality is the financial machinery operating
• 0:35
  quietly in the background. The engineering upgrades
• 0:39
  happened down in Texas. Right now, they are acting as
• 0:41
  the direct physical collateral for Spacex's confidential
• 0:45
  financial filings with the Securities and Exchange
• 0:47
  Commission. OK.
• 0:48
  Wow. They are structuring the largest
• 0:49
  initial public offering in history.
• 0:51
  So we basically have a situation where the most extreme aerospace
• 0:55
  hardware ever constructed is moving in lockstep with the most
• 0:59
  aggressive financial financial market maneuver we have ever
• 1:01
  seen. So the real question here is how
• 1:03
  does a company simultaneously orchestrate the launch of an
• 1:06
  untested, redesigned rocket architecture and the biggest
• 1:10
  financial market debut ever recorded, while explicitly
• 1:14
  targeting retail investors? Right.
• 1:16
  And that tension, that specific tension, is exactly what drives
• 1:20
  every single decision being made in their facilities right now.
• 1:23
  Well, let's look at the hardware first, because the V3 iteration
• 1:26
  introduces a completely redesigned architecture focused
• 1:30
  on massive orbital efficiency. Yes, absolutely.
• 1:34
  And the core of this hardware upgrade is the new Raptor 3
• 1:37
  engine. This specific engine produces
• 1:39
  higher thrust while somehow being significantly lighter and
• 1:44
  more reliable than the previous iteration.
• 1:46
  Yeah, and the major engineering feat of the Raptor 3A thing that
• 1:49
  really stands out is the complete elimination of heavy
• 1:52
  thermal shielding. Oh, right.
• 1:53
  Because for decades, rocket engines have required extensive
• 1:56
  external shielding to protect the surrounding components from
• 1:59
  the extreme heat of combustion. Sure, you usually see like a
• 2:02
  massive mess of pipes and wires and sensors all wrapped in those
• 2:06
  heat resistant blankets. Exactly.
• 2:08
  But what the engineers have done with the Raptor 3 is integrate
• 2:11
  the cooling systems directly into the physical the structure
• 2:14
  of the engine itself. Hold on back up because if you
• 2:17
  strip away the heat shield the engine bell should liquefy
• 2:19
  almost instantly right? I mean you have gas burning at
• 2:22
  thousands of degrees in there. Unless, wait, are they using the
• 2:27
  freezing liquid methane fuel itself as a heat sponge before
• 2:30
  they actually burn it? Yes, you are hitting on the
• 2:33
  exact mechanism. Think about how the human body
• 2:37
  regulates temperature. OK, you do not wear a thick
• 2:41
  external thermal blanket to keep your core temperature stable
• 2:44
  when you go for a run. Yeah, obviously not.
• 2:46
  Your body relies on a vascular system.
• 2:48
  You have this whole network of veins and capillaries pumping
• 2:52
  fluid just beneath the surface of your skin.
• 2:55
  Right, the blood circulating. Exactly.
• 2:57
  And as your internal temperature rises, that fluid carries the
• 3:01
  heat away from your core and distributes it, eventually
• 3:04
  releasing it. The Raptor 3 operates on a very
• 3:07
  similar principle. That's wild.
• 3:09
  Instead of bolting dead weight onto the outside of the engine
• 3:12
  in the form of heat Shields, the engineers have milled incredibly
• 3:15
  complex micro channels directly into the combustion chamber and
• 3:20
  the engine nozzle walls. So there are tiny tubes built
• 3:23
  into the actual metal of the engine.
• 3:24
  Yeah, exactly. And they pumped liquid methane,
• 3:28
  which is chilled to nearly 300° below 0 Fahrenheit through those
• 3:33
  tiny vascular channels before it ever even enters the combustion
• 3:36
  chamber. Wow.
• 3:37
  So the freezing fuel absorbs the immense heat radiating through
• 3:41
  the metal alloy, cooling the engine bell from the inside out.
• 3:44
  It's absorbing the heat before it burns.
• 3:46
  Right, and then that preheated fuel is injected into the main
• 3:49
  chamber and ignited. The physical structure of the
• 3:52
  engine itself becomes the cooling mechanism.
• 3:54
  Well, that dramatically reduces the dead weight of the entire
• 3:57
  vehicle, because in aerospace the math is just brutal.
• 4:00
  Oh yeah, every Oz counts. Right.
• 4:03
  Every single gram of dead weight you remove from the rocket is
• 4:05
  exactly 1g of payload you can add to the cargo Bay.
• 4:08
  And because the Raptor 3 is so much lighter, and there are
• 4:12
  dozens of them clustered at the bottom of the booster, this
• 4:15
  completely alters the vehicle's capacity.
• 4:17
  It really does. It actually opens up the upper
• 4:20
  stage of the rocket to be physically stretched.
• 4:22
  The filings indicate they are adding an additional 2 to 3
• 4:26
  meters to the Starship UER stage.
• 4:28
  Which is huge. Right, because that allows for
• 4:31
  significantly larger propellant tanks and because of this single
• 4:35
  engine redesign, company statements outline a target of
• 4:38
  between 100 and 200 metric tons of payload to low Earth orbit.
• 4:44
  Yeah, the numbers are staggering.
• 4:45
  I mean you are talking about hauling raw building materials
• 4:49
  and tire fleets of satellites or like fully assembled space
• 4:52
  station modules in a single trip.
• 4:54
  A 200 ton payload capacity completely expands the baseline
• 4:58
  of what is possible in space construction.
• 5:00
  It does, but I think you are looking at the payload claims
• 5:04
  with a lot of optimism here. But you think so?
• 5:06
  Well. We have to recognize the extreme
• 5:08
  engineering risk associated with baking the cooling system
• 5:10
  directly into the engine wall like that.
• 5:12
  OK, Fairpoint. When you rely on regenerative
• 5:15
  cooling, pumping fuel through the actual structural metal, you
• 5:19
  severely limit your margin of error.
• 5:21
  How so? Well, if a traditional external
• 5:24
  heat shield cracks, you might have localized damage, but you
• 5:28
  still have a physical barrier absorbing the unishment.
• 5:31
  Right, a buffer. Exactly.
• 5:33
  With the rater 3, if a single microchannel inside that engine
• 5:37
  wall clogs, or if there is like a millimeter wide structural
• 5:41
  flaw in the metal manufacturing, that specific section of the
• 5:44
  engine loses its cooling fluid instantly.
• 5:47
  Oh wow. And within milliseconds, the
• 5:49
  thousands of degrees of combustion heat will melt
• 5:52
  through that weak point and the entire engine will vaporize.
• 5:54
  Because the fuel is literally the only thing keeping it from
• 5:57
  melting. Yes, you're trading external
• 5:58
  dead weight for an architecture where a microscopic
• 6:01
  manufacturing defect can result in the total loss of the
• 6:04
  vehicle. That is terrifying, but it's not
• 6:07
  just the engines that are changing.
• 6:09
  The Super Heavy booster for the V3 features strength and domes
• 6:12
  and optimized fuel propellant transfer tubes.
• 6:15
  Right. And those structural upgrades
• 6:18
  are specifically designed to manage the intense mechanical
• 6:20
  stress of rapid repeated use. OK, because when a booster re
• 6:24
  enters the atmosphere it faces immense aerodynamic pressure.
• 6:29
  The domes capping the fuel tanks have to withstand the dynamic
• 6:33
  shock of slowing down from supersonic speeds.
• 6:36
  Yeah, slamming into the thick air.
• 6:37
  Exactly. And the transfer tubes have to
• 6:39
  manage the violent sloshing of whatever residual propellant is
• 6:43
  left inside. So let's step back for a second,
• 6:45
  because this connects directly to how they operate the vehicle.
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  Traditionally, launching rockets has been like taking a
• 6:51
  commercial airliner, flying it from New York to London, and
• 6:55
  then just abandoning it on the runway to build a brand new one
• 6:58
  for the next flight. Which sounds completely absurd
• 7:00
  when you put it like that. Is incredibly wasteful and the
• 7:03
  reinforced domes and transfer tubes they are built to support
• 7:06
  more reliable booster catch operations using the Meccazilla
• 7:10
  tower arm. Yes, the chopsticks.
• 7:12
  Right, They aren't just landing this booster on a flat concrete
• 7:15
  pad anymore. They're flying a massive steel
• 7:18
  cylinder back to the launch site and catching it out of midair.
• 7:21
  Which is still hard to believe even when you see it.
• 7:24
  Seriously, just imagine trying to parallel park a 20 story
• 7:28
  building using only giant mechanical chopsticks, all while
• 7:32
  the building is falling out of the sky.
• 7:34
  It was. Crazy.
• 7:35
  The dynamic shock of those mechanical arms grabbing the
• 7:38
  load bearing pins on the side of the booster, it puts
• 7:41
  unimaginable stress on the internal structure.
• 7:43
  It does, but catching the booster reliably limits the
• 7:46
  required downtime between launches, and it really opens up
• 7:51
  the possibility of a consistent operational transit system.
• 7:55
  Right, like an actual airline. Exactly.
• 7:57
  Because if you land on a pad with legs, you have to send out
• 8:00
  cranes. You have to secure the vehicle,
• 8:02
  carefully lift it and transport it back to the launch.
• 8:04
  Mount and that takes days or even weeks.
• 8:07
  Yeah, lots of logistics overhead.
• 8:09
  By catching the booster directly on the launch mount with the
• 8:12
  Mechazilla arms, you bypass all of that entirely.
• 8:15
  You just plop it right back where it started, right?
• 8:18
  The strength and domes mean the booster can absorb the
• 8:20
  mechanical shock of the catch without requiring weeks of
• 8:23
  structural inspections afterward.
• 8:25
  You catch the booster, you stack a new upper stage on top of it,
• 8:28
  you pump cryogenic propellant through those optimized transfer
• 8:31
  tubes, and you are ready to fly again.
• 8:34
  And the success of this V3 hardware is mandatory at this
• 8:37
  point. The entire architecture of our
• 8:40
  near term space exploration completely depends on it.
• 8:43
  Oh. 100%. This exact vehicle serves as the
• 8:45
  foundation for NASA's Artemis, the third lunar landing mission,
• 8:49
  which aims to return humans to the Moon, and it also serves as
• 8:53
  the primary deployment mechanism for the Starling V3 satellite
• 8:57
  constellation. Yeah, but beyond standard
• 8:59
  exploration and satellite deployment, the Starship V3 is
• 9:02
  actually a crucial component of Terafab.
• 9:04
  Terafab. Right, which involves setting up
• 9:06
  artificial intelligence data centers on the moon.
• 9:08
  Wait, hold on, AI data centers on the moon?
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  Why are we talking about shipping server racks to the
• 9:13
  lunar surface? We are currently struggling to
• 9:15
  build enough data centers here on Earth just to keep up with AI
• 9:18
  demand. Please explain the logic behind
• 9:21
  targeting the moon for computing infrastructure.
• 9:23
  Well, you have to look at the physical constraints of comuting
• 9:26
  on Earth, OK? Artificial intelligence requires
• 9:29
  A staggering amount of processing power, and the
• 9:32
  graphic processing units generating that power produce
• 9:35
  massive amounts of heat. Right, the GPU's run super hot.
• 9:38
  Extremely hot on Earth data centers consume millions of
• 9:42
  gallons of fresh water and require massive power grids just
• 9:46
  to run the commercial air conditioning systems to keep the
• 9:48
  servers from melting down. Yeah, they're huge drains on the
• 9:52
  power grid. Exactly because Earth is a warm,
• 9:55
  insulated environment. The Moon, however, offers a
• 9:59
  completely different thermal reality.
• 10:01
  Because it's cold. Right, you have the cold vacuum
• 10:03
  of space, and while a vacuum itself is technically an
• 10:06
  insulator, the moon has access to areas in permanent shadow
• 10:10
  that are hundreds of degrees below 0.
• 10:12
  Oh, I see. So you can set up massive
• 10:14
  thermal radiators pointing out into the deep freeze of deep
• 10:17
  space to manage the heat generated by the AI processors.
• 10:21
  That's actually brilliant. And furthermore, if you position
• 10:24
  these data centers at the lunar poles near the Shackleton
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  crater, for example, you have access to peaks of eternal
• 10:30
  light. Peaks of eternal light, What is
• 10:32
  that? These are high elevation
• 10:34
  locations that receive constant, uninterrupted solar exposure.
• 10:37
  So you get infinite free energy from the Sun, and infinite free
• 10:40
  cooling from the dark craters. Exactly.
• 10:42
  Wow, that changes the entire objective of going back to the
• 10:46
  moon. I mean it shifts the focus away
• 10:48
  from simply sending humans to conduct science experiments and
• 10:52
  collect rock samples. It really does.
• 10:54
  It opens up an off world digital economy focused on heavy
• 10:58
  industrial and computational infrastructure.
• 11:00
  Yes, if you process massive amounts of AI data off world
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  using unlimited solar energy and vacuum cooling, you bypass the
• 11:08
  energy grid constraints and environmental impact concerns on
• 11:11
  Earth entirely. Right, but achieving that
• 11:14
  requires immense cargo capacity. You cannot build a lunar data
• 11:18
  center by launching tiny, delicate probes.
• 11:20
  So you'd need tons of equipment. Hundreds of tons.
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  You need the Starship V3 to deliver industrial equipment,
• 11:27
  solar panels, thermal radiators, and heavy server racks.
• 11:31
  The V3 is literally the only vehicle even theoretically
• 11:35
  capable of that kind of heavy lift.
• 11:37
  Well, while off world industrialization sounds a bit
• 11:40
  like science fiction right now, you don't actually have to wait
• 11:42
  for lunar data centers to see the consumer impact.
• 11:45
  No, you don't. Because this space technology is
• 11:47
  already rewiring how you use your cell phone today.
• 11:50
  Yeah, US Mobile and Starlink have launched a first of its
• 11:53
  kind bundle offering home satellite Internet and a mobile
• 11:57
  cell plan for $47. Which makes US Mobile the first
• 12:00
  prepaid carrier to integrate low Earth orbit satellite technology
• 12:04
  into a single billing experience.
• 12:06
  Yes, and they are explicitly targeting rural connectivity and
• 12:09
  dead zones. But how exactly does a standard
• 12:13
  cell phone connect to a satellite flying hundreds of
• 12:15
  miles overhead? That's the trick, isn't it?
• 12:18
  Right, because usually you need a motorized dish on your roof to
• 12:21
  track the satellite. The phones in our pockets don't
• 12:23
  have that hardware. They don't.
• 12:25
  So the Starling satellites are utilizing advanced phased array
• 12:29
  antennas. OK.
• 12:30
  Phased arrays. Right.
• 12:31
  Instead of physically moving a dish to beam a signal, these
• 12:35
  satellites use hundreds of tiny antennas that manipulate radio
• 12:39
  waves electronically. So they don't actually move.
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  No moving parts. They electronically steer the
• 12:43
  signal to connect directly with the low power antenna inside a
• 12:47
  regular smartphone. The satellite effectively acts
• 12:50
  as a giant cell tower in the sky.
• 12:52
  And the downstream effects here fundamentally alter the
• 12:55
  communications industry, specifically eliminating the
• 12:58
  rural penalty. Yes, the rural penalty has been
• 13:01
  a huge issue. For decades, remote users have
• 13:03
  paid exorbitant fees for terrible service.
• 13:06
  Laying fiber optic cables or building physical cell towers in
• 13:10
  areas with very few people is simply not economically viable
• 13:14
  for traditional telecom companies.
• 13:16
  The return on investment just isn't there for them.
• 13:18
  Exactly. So rural populations either have
• 13:21
  no connection, or they rely on outdated, highly expensive
• 13:25
  regional providers who basically face no competition.
• 13:27
  Right, monopolies. But this new bundle limits the
• 13:30
  power of those traditional regional telecom monopolies.
• 13:34
  By integrating low Earth orbit satellites directly with mobile
• 13:38
  carriers, you bypass the need for ground infrastructure
• 13:41
  entirely. It's completely wireless from
• 13:43
  space. Right.
• 13:45
  This opens up universal unified connectivity for a flat low rate
• 13:49
  regardless of physical geography.
• 13:51
  And it connects directly back to the rocket hardware too.
• 13:53
  Of course, the only way Starlink can provide that level of
• 13:56
  bandwidth directly to cell phones for $47 a month is if
• 14:00
  they have thousands of massive, highly advanced satellites in
• 14:03
  orbit. Right, You need a massive
• 14:05
  constellation and. The only way you can launch
• 14:07
  thousands of heavy V3 satellites economically is with the
• 14:10
  Starship V3. It all comes back to the rocket.
• 14:13
  It does. The consumer telecom pricing you
• 14:16
  pay on Earth is entirely dependent on the aerodynamic
• 14:18
  efficiency and rapid reusability of that rocket catching
• 14:21
  mechanism back in Texas. Which brings us to the financial
• 14:24
  side of all this, because SpaceX has filed confidential paperwork
• 14:28
  with the Securities and Exchange Commission to go public, taking
• 14:31
  the first step toward what could be the largest initial public
• 14:35
  offering in history. Yeah, and rather than following
• 14:37
  the traditional route, SpaceX is hosting a 1500 person investor
• 14:42
  event and they are specifically setting aside a massive chunk of
• 14:47
  shares for regular retail investors.
• 14:49
  Entirely bypassing the giant Wall Street hedge.
• 14:52
  Fund Exactly. When a company of this magnitude
• 14:55
  goes public, the standard procedure is to court
• 14:57
  institutional investors. Right, the big guys.
• 15:00
  You go to Wall Street, you talk to the massive asset management
• 15:02
  firms and they buy up the vast majority of the shares at a set
• 15:06
  price before the public ever gets a chance.
• 15:08
  Yep, the roadshow. Right, the institutions get the
• 15:10
  early allocation, the stock hits the open market, the price pops,
• 15:14
  and the retail investors are left buying in at a premium.
• 15:16
  But by changing that structure it opens up a completely new
• 15:20
  Ave. for capital generation. I mean, it allows everyday
• 15:24
  people to directly invest in the infrastructure being built for
• 15:28
  Artemis the Third and these lunar AI data centers from day
• 15:31
  one. It does.
• 15:32
  It disrupts the traditional IPO playbook where institutions
• 15:36
  capture all the early profits. You have a scenario where the
• 15:40
  retail investor is placed at the front of the line for a company
• 15:43
  building interplanetary infrastructure.
• 15:45
  Well, I actually viewed this approach cautiously.
• 15:48
  Really. Why?
• 15:50
  Going public inherently limits a company's current engineering
• 15:53
  freedom. Right now, operating as a
• 15:56
  private entity, SpaceX has an incredible tolerance for
• 16:00
  explosive iteration. True, they blow things up all
• 16:02
  the time. Exactly.
• 16:03
  They can put a highly experimental Starship on the
• 16:05
  pad, launch it, and if it explodes in a massive fireball
• 16:08
  during a test, the engineers gather the telemetry data, sweep
• 16:12
  up the debris, and build the next one.
• 16:14
  It's just. Part of the process for.
• 16:15
  Them right because they do not have to answer to a board of
• 16:18
  directors worried about the daily stock price drop.
• 16:21
  Once you are a public company, you have to answer to
• 16:24
  shareholders every single quarter.
• 16:27
  When you transition from private engineering freedom to public
• 16:30
  market scrutiny. Exploding a rocket during a test
• 16:33
  can cause a panic sell off. Right.
• 16:36
  Wall Street hates unpredictability.
• 16:38
  Exactly. You are inviting immense
• 16:40
  pressure to perform perfectly on a strict schedule, which is
• 16:44
  entirely contrary to how their aerospace development actually
• 16:47
  works. I hear that, but I look at the
• 16:49
  specific demographic they are targeting and I think it might
• 16:52
  be a calculated defense mechanism.
• 16:53
  How so? Well, retail investors who
• 16:55
  follow Elon Musk and SpaceX are highly tolerant of risk and
• 16:59
  failure. You could easily argue they're
• 17:01
  much more tolerant than traditional hedge funds.
• 17:03
  That's an interesting point. A hedge fund manager looks at a
• 17:06
  rocket explosion as a loss of quarterly capital and an
• 17:09
  immediate risk to their portfolio.
• 17:11
  They want predictable linear growth.
• 17:14
  Right, slow and steady. But a retail investor following
• 17:16
  the Starship program understands that the explosion is a
• 17:19
  necessary part of the data collection process.
• 17:22
  Yeah, they're the ones watching the live streams.
• 17:24
  Exactly. They understand the iterative
• 17:26
  design philosophy. By prioritizing retail investors
• 17:30
  over institutional funds, SpaceX might be actively protecting
• 17:34
  their ability to blow things up. So they are curating their
• 17:37
  shareholders. Yes, they are building a
• 17:38
  shareholder base that expects explosions as a natural step
• 17:42
  toward linear data centers, rather than a traditional Wall
• 17:45
  Street base that demands cautious, slow perfection.
• 17:48
  It creates a highly unusual market dynamic though.
• 17:51
  You are combining the highest level of physical engineering
• 17:53
  risk with the most volatile type of public investment base, all
• 17:57
  to fund infrastructure that doesn't even exist on this
• 18:00
  planet yet. It's wild.
• 18:01
  So basically SpaceX is concurrently attempting to
• 18:04
  launch an unprecedented rocket architecture with Starship V3
• 18:08
  while executing a public financial offering of historic
• 18:11
  scale, entirely redefining off world infrastructure and on
• 18:15
  world telecommunications. Yeah, and it leaves you
• 18:17
  wondering if a single company establishes the dominant digital
• 18:21
  economy on the moon with terrafab and controls the only
• 18:24
  physical transportation network to get there, Do traditional
• 18:27
  Earth based jurisdictions and tax laws even apply anymore?
• 18:31
  Or are we watching the birth of the first corporate sovereign
• 18:34
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• 18:36
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• 18:39
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