alt Hacker NewsIt's not even the US in general, it's SpaceX specifically. Only the US and China have demonstrated reusable rockets, and only SpaceX demonstrated the actual reuse, the cadence and the economy of scale that it brings.
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toomuchtodo • today at 3:23 AM
It means the laws of physics allow it, and anyone willing to invest the time and fiat to accomplish it can. This means the world will no longer need to rely on SpaceX for inexpensive lift to orbit through reusable first stages, which is objectively good. No different then China working towards obviating the need for ASML for EUV semiconductor manufacturing.
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Reuse might turn out not to be the future - and its SpaceX has embraced this internally. At least not full reuse, or not the way most people think of a reusable spacecraft as a reusable aircraft. A reusable rocket engine might only have 2-3 flights in it, if that, with some routine inspection and maintenance between them.
3D printing has been a game changer that basically allows you to crank out rocket engines from raw materials, which means that building new ones is cheap and easy. If you look at the Raptor 3 (3D printed), it looks super clean, thanks to the fact that they integrated most of the piping into the 3d printed body, but that means you can't really fix or inspect it.
Which is fine tbh. SpaceX (and Tesla) has been shown to be pragmatic not dogmatic when it comes to new technology. 'Elon time' might be a meme, but Musk both pushes his employees very hard, but probably not harder than possible - and he's willing to take flak for delaying projects, changing scope or outright cancellation.