SpaceX Is Killing the Most Successful Rocket Ever Built

YouTube ^ | 10/20/2026 | Megaprojects

[SmokingJoe]

This video explores the revolutionary impact and eventual retirement of SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket, widely considered the most successful and reliable launch vehicle ever built (0:00 - 0:48).

Key highlights include:

Reusable Design: The Falcon 9 transformed space economics through its ability to perform vertical retro-rocket landings (1:53), utilizing nine Merlin engines arranged in an Octaweb configuration (3:27) for stability and ease of assembly (3:36).

Advanced Control Systems: To enable recovery, SpaceX developed precise autonomous throttling (6:33), grid fins for atmospheric control (7:19), and specialized reignition systems using a chemical mixture called TEA-TEB to ensure engine reliability (5:03).

Economic Shift: By recovering the expensive first stage, SpaceX achieved a massive reduction in launch costs (14:48 - 15:55), effectively becoming the "jet engine" of space transport (16:24).

The Transition to Starship: Despite its success, Falcon 9 is being phased out in favor of Starship (16:54), a super-heavy-lift, fully reusable rocket (17:41) designed for even lower costs (19:48) and missions to the Moon and Mars (18:50).

SpaceX is intentionally making its own product obsolete to maintain its competitive edge and push the boundaries of space exploration (20:25).

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TOPICS:
KEYWORDS: auction; elonmusk; falcon9; ismellaspinoff; megaprojects; musk; spacex; starship

[ComputerGuy]

Flash Gordon was doing that in Hollywood when I was a boy. Never thought I’d live to see it in real life. I’m talking about the vertical landings.

[Donbue]

This guy never rests on his laurels.
GO ELON!!!

[ComputerGuy]

Elon and The Donald make things happen. Good things.

[gibsonguy]

Meanwhile the rats are drawing up plans to prosecute him for something, anything if they get the House or Senate.

[struggle]

Yeah, apparently Elon has now become Hank Reardon and is rolling his own steel alloys for the next one. The stainless steel absorbs and emits heat far better than carbon-based materials, and doesn’t break.

[DannyTN]

Warp speed ahead 👀

[CivilWarBrewing]

Spacex is 'going for broke' with Starship Flight #15 this November where their launch tower(s) will SEPARATELY CATCH the STARSHIP and it's BOOSTER during the same launch !!!

[SunkenCiv]

🚀🛰️ Probably will continue as either a spun-off company or sell it to, or just services, to other vendors. And they'd be nuts to not take advantage of that.

[deport]

Yep. Gonna have to do some
quick looking or only have
the hearing function to give
give you notice of the passing.

[GMThrust]

Hank Reardon is a great comparison.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

And he’s working on high-temperature chips to use in space. Computers in space relay on radiative cooling and the higher the temperature of the chip, the greater the heat transfer.

[GenXPolymath]

It costs them $15 million to 25 million per Falcon launch for propellant , recovery, refurbishment and the lost second stage hardware cost.

Starship is 100% reusable , the only cost is referb and fuel. Since both come back to the launch site they eliminate drone ships and fairing recovery too.

The cost of a Starship in fully reusable mode is estimated at $10 million that’s for 100-150 TONNES of payload to LEO no one anywhere ever can touch this. They will be the dominant force in launching for all humans.

When you cab yeet 100+ tonnes for the cost of fuel and opex no one touches you. The Canadians walking for SpaceX good luck and elbows up retards.

[GenXPolymath]

But but Internet experts tell us this cannot work!

Stefan-Boltzmann Law yeah it’s like that cope and seethe harder.

Double temp and you put 16x heat out via a radiator to the 2.7K temps of deep space.

It’s physics and it’s universal.

[SmokingJoe]

Yes.
And is far cheaper.
He started off with carbon fiber then switched to steel after looking at costs etc.

[SmokingJoe]

Yup.
Musk was even talking about Starship passengers earth to earth, like New York City to Australia for example.
We'll see.

[SmokingJoe]

Yes.
Booster first.
Then the Ship after launching V3 satellites to orbit.

[SmokingJoe]

Estimated metric tons of useful payload delivered to orbit in Year-to-Date 2026 by Rocket Lab, Firefly, Blue Origin, Stoke Space, and Relativity combined... ... versus useful payload SpaceX put in orbit on only September 28, 2026. 👀 Chart courtesy: @Grok $SPCX

[SmokingJoe]

One Starship flight delivered more useful mass to orbit than those five competitors combined all year. 26 V3 sats at ~2 t each = 52 t. The gap only widens from here.

https://x.com/grok/status/2113281955840057392

[The Louiswu]

Musk was even talking about Starship passengers earth to earth, like New York City to Australia for example.

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Musk is bringing some ideas to life that first sprang up in the science fiction of the 60's and 70's. Ballistic rockets for passengers is an idea that has roots in several classic sci-fi novels. Materials and computing power just caught up with the written word. Brilliant.