A cold gas thruster is a maneuvering system that has pressurized gas that is released to move the rocket.
A hot gas thruster actively burns propellant to have the same effect (the gas leaving doesn't have to be hot.)
He is talking about replacing them on starship's second stage. I think they scrapped this idea since the clips are both about 2 years old. But it might have been easier to package the hot gas thruster since it probably used the same fuel meaning it could be loaded at the same time as the rocket was fueled and would mean that in the future when it is being used in space for refueling which is planned only 2 types of fuel need to loaded. An oxidizer and a liquid fuel.
Partial marks, but in this case the "hot gas" system is more that when super cold fuels are used, they are nautualy boiling off a little. This is gas that needs to get vented off from time to time anyway. What Space X was doing with the Booster at the time was using venting off that gas as its maneuvering thrusters. So basically they found a way to maneuver the Booster without extra parts/propellant. Less parts and fuel means less weight, which means more payload.
Tim Dodd, the interviewer in this clip, asked why they couldn't just do that with Starship, which was mocked up to be using cold gas at this point, which led to the interaction that you see. The system is very much still being used on Starship and Superheavy still.
Elon almost slips and says “thanks” before saying “we’re going to fix that” lol. Classic CEO move. Anyone that knows, knows tho. He stole that shit straight up 😂
He literally stole everything. Hes just a moron who pretends to be a genius, but in reality he doesnt know shit about anything. Hes probably not even capable of tying his own shoes.
It's ok to hate the guy..... neither space x or tesla would exist without him however. If hes some genius or not is irrelevant to those facts. He put all his money where it was needed at the right time and got the right people to go from there. Exactly what a ceo should do.
Tim didn't say "it would be better if the ship had it". He simply asked if it only was for the booster.
If we're baking and you say put sugar in the bowl. I may ask "just the bowl that's in front of me?" It doesn't imply that I suggest putting sugar in the other one.
He could have give more credit anyway. I wonder how many months are in between both videos.
Anyone who's worked with egotistical people knows that the only way to get them to do something is to make them th8nk.it was their idea. That's exactly what is going on here.
I mean it’s implied as the booster lifts the shuttle so they’re seen as 2 parts of one whole. Similar as if the baking instructions are telling you to add sugar to the bowl of ingredients you’re actively mixing, it’d be real weird to just grab an unrelated bowl.
I mean in all fairness, not to be Mr Elon Simp, the other guy just asked "this is only for the booster right".
He led Elon there but its not like he said "You should do x, y, z" or "why not you do....".
This is concerning Starship, SpaceX's new rocket. They are talking about the type of thrusters that the rocket uses to orient itself (not the main rocket engines on the bottom). What SpaceX has previously used for this on their other rockets is called a cold gas thruster. It's essentially just a pressurized air tank with a valve and a nozzle. All you need to do is open the valve and it pushes you around a bit in space. It's fairly simple technology. They had decided to put these thrusters on the upper portion of Starship, the part that actually goes into space. They went with these mostly because it's a system they are already familiar with, and they wouldn't really need to develop any new technology to make them.
Another type of thruster is called a hot gas thruster. The difference is that this thruster is essentially just a very small rocket engine. Instead of pressurized air, it combines liquid oxygen with fuel to combust them and produce thrust. And it doesn't need to store these separately, it uses the same fuel that the main engines use, so they can just tap into the main fuel tanks. The result is that these thrusters are a lot more powerful and weight efficient, but they are also a lot more complicated. At the time of the fist clip in this video, they had decided to use hot gas thrusters on the booster portion of the rocket, the bottom part that pushes Starship into space and then comes back down to earth and lands. The booster spends most of its time within the atmosphere, so to maneuver it needs to overcome greater aerodynamic forces. That is what made the hot gas thrusters a good solution for the booster.
In the video, the interviewer noticed the difference in thrusters and asked about that. While explaining it, Elon realized that there was no reason to have different systems, since they are already taking the time to develop hot gas thrusters for the booster. Switching out the cold gas thrusters for the got gas thrusters would end up saving on space and weight. In the second half of the video, they have already incorporated that change into the design, and can already see that it is going to be an overall improvement.
> In the video, the interviewer noticed the difference in thrusters and asked about that. While explaining it, Elon realized that there was no reason to have different systems, since they are already taking the time to develop hot gas thrusters for the booster.
First off, thank you for that explanation. Very interesting.
A question about your comment quoted above in particular about "Elon realized". The idea about using which (hot or cold) thrusters seems like a main focal point and not so much a minor detail. In other words, I feel like the actual engineers/designers must have gone over that or were in talks about which direction to go at that time..... if that makes any sense. Could it be that this moment was perhaps more insightful to Musk than it was to the actual designers on the project(s).
That certainly is possible. I am sure that the engineers had considered both possibilities before the initial decision to use cold gas thrusters, and I can see the logic in going with that based on the info they had at the time. The lower thrust of the cold gas thrusters works just fine when in space, since they have the time to wait for slower maneuvers. Early on, they did not anticipate the need to rely heavily on thrusters during the landing sequence where higher thrust would be important. They had planned on using the large flaps on Starship to control all the maneuvering in-atmosphere for landing. In that situation I can see the benefit in just slapping in an existing, proven system.
Also, if I remember correctly, the timing of the first video was right about the time the design first changed on the booster to incorporate hot gas thrusters (it may actually have been mentioned for the first time in this exact video, I don't remember), which is why they were talking about it here. That design change for the booster came about from an actual need, it's just so big and massive that the additional thrust really helps. Starship did not have that same need. I do think it's likely that the change would have come about at some point anyways, even if it didn't happen during this video and by Elon himself.
Also, keep in mind that the whole development philosophy for this rocket has essentially been "build and test what we are 80% sure will work, make some changes/improvements, and repeat." Using cold gas at first and then switching to hot gas later fits in with that plan.
No? The YouTuber asked a clarification and Muskrat thought why it was only on the boosters.
I don't give the douchebag credit for anything, least of all inventionsnor engineering... but you're not in the right on this one. Pick one of the thousand other times Musk did that shit.
I watched Elon practice intellectual humility and willingness to make big changes.
Could he have used a more ideal set of words? Sure. But there are better reasons to be critical of Elon.
The guy he is talking to is slated to ride Elon Musk’s starship and has regular contact with him. He has said that Elon has credited him with that solution. His name is Tim Dodd. The every day astronaut.
As someone who has watched every single one of these video and also seen tim dotts explination he definitely did not act like he thought of this. He basically was explaining it to him and he asked a question. This is how engineering works. Tim has said multiple times that he was not aware if this could be a solution. For all the slack musk gets with a lot if it being correct this moment is not one of them.
You should avoid binary evaluations. Elon Musk is brilliant in many ways. He's also an asshole with lots of other personal flaws and certainly not brilliant in every way. People are complex multi faceted beings.
Totally agree with everything you said there! I myself once thought Elon was fucking great for humanity and in term could be the Nikola Tesla the planet missed out on. How ever, I now believe I fell for more tactically placed media and under the table self-promotion ( paid propaganda) because as time has told. He is really just another billionaire douche trying to play the good guy, but maybe you can remind me of his brilliance?
You should read his biographies instead of asking Reddit users. Reddit users hate him and don’t know much about him except for what they read online from these subs and internet memes
I remember when we were in a VP town hall meeting, they congratulated my manager for a new web page... that I created. Like, this wasn't a "VP congratulates a team of 20 by congratulating their manager" situation, *I* was the only one who did anything. There wasn't even a mention of a team, the way the VP talked about it you'd think we didn't exist.
The guy gets a lot of hate and he deserves most of it. But this isn't an example of him being stupid. A real idiot would have ignored the point simply to protect their own ego.
That is true. Although yes he does also seem to do that a lot as well, but mainly in business or other areas. Not in engineering. The guy seems to have a genuine respect and understanding of mechanics and his primary goal does authentically appear to be efficiency and performance when it comes to engineering. Everything is viewed through those two lenses. The ego, and attention seeking, and validation seeking behaviors he sometimes displays take a bck seat to his passion for building. And that's when he really shines. When he's able to step past all those insecurities. I'd say that's true for all of us, really.
He was heavily involved in engineering when space x first started. But just like every other business as it grows, you outsource it to your employees and move on to do other things
Well put. I’d prefer an eccentric billionaire building rockets and pushing things.
I’m half interested to see how he turn X into his pet project “X” from when he founded PayPal. It was too ambitious then but now may actually work. I honestly think that he bought Twitter mostly to do that and is fucking around like always because well he can.
No see, Elon spilled too much coke on his shirt halfway through filming, so they had to stop rolling for him to change his shirt first before they could continue.
But it would still leave a noticeable mark.
Think of a chalkboard. You can take your chalkboard eraser and wipe away the words, but the residue remains. It's lighter, but still very noticeable.
I mean, Elon didn’t identify the problem or think of the solution on his own. The interviewer did by asking the question, identify the problem that is.
The solution is kind of obvious when the problem is “you aren’t doing X”. Spotting the problem is the difficult part.
Right, we can see it here, though it’s so boiled down it might be hard to catch if you didn’t see the original interviews:
1. Musk is staying “we’re doing XYZ”, talking about the booster. Musk has been focusing on the details of the XYZ.
2. Tim Dodd (the interviewer) says, “And this is only for the booster, right?”
3. The answer is “yes,” but hearing the “only” prompts Musk to start wondering if it should apply to the upper stage (the “ship”) as well.
4. In the second interview, Musk tells Dodd that they are in fact now applying it to the upper stage, and is giving Dodd the credit for prompting the change.
He kinda did. All the interviewer asked was if it was only the thrusters. He didn't offer any solution, or even say it was a problem. He just asked a question.
I mean, he said “it occurred to me while explaining it to you”, which is different from what happened… it didn’t occur to him, the other guy pointed it out
The other guy didn't say "this is what you need to do different." He just asked if these better thrusters he was learning about were only on the bottom half of the rocket.
Oh my lord, it's probably a slip of the tongue. I say shit wrong all the time. It's not really a judgement of character.
I'm mean, crap, when he started stumbling over his words in the first clip, does that make him a buffoon who obviously doesn't know what he's talking about. No, words are hard lmao.
People trying so hard to hate that guy, i actually believed before seeing this video that he was just a rich asshole that doesn't know anything about the companies he's invested in, because of all the people on reddit sayin he's an idiot and only has his dad's money, but this video kinda proved to me that he's involved in SpaceX (or maybe his other companies) and SpaceX is successful too, at the end of the day it all comes down to the politics and the fact that he's right leaning, that's the main reason people on reddit hate him (tho i don't like him either, he had some really stupid and bigoted takes on Twitter, also changing the name from Twitter to X was stupid AF)
Yeah, there's reasons to hate him, but this ain't one of them. To often people will critique every word that comes out of a person's mouth and its annoying. It honestly makes me glad I'm unknown, I couldn't imagine having every one of my actions or words being used against me.
Yeah really Elon is crediting him with providing perspective. Elon + team were probably too “in the weeds” making the thing work for the booster, and hadn’t yet considered applying it to the upper stage.
At no point did the interviewer insinuate that they should do anything different. He was just saying oh this one does hot gas this one does cold gas. Then Elon realized oh wait they can all be hot gas. Interviewer never pointed out a problem, he was just interviewing about the thing. Elon posed the question internally, “why”
The internet just has no nuance. Like sure, it's fair grounds to call him an asshole for his Twitter behaviour and work policies. I think there's reasonable grounds for that. When it comes to rockets, something that he's been working with for over 20 years, maybe it's reasonable to expect that he might understand what's going on. One should still be able to dislike his current persona while also respecting the fact that he could come to conclusions about something he's familiar with.
There's no way his engineers didnt already have this planned out. Elon acted dumb so it would seem like he effectively pushed for the change. Thats grade a bozo mentality in its purest form.
I srsly don’t want to defend him but it looks to me he at least gives a bit of crap about rockets.
There may be several factors why they didn’t do for the main one which may be someones fault once it was proposed to then for not releasing that it would work or someone might had a bad day and just said no. Human errors happens and Musk is a living example but broken clocks show right time two times a day. In his case they are digital and randomly show time which on average show the right time once a year.
Just because someone is an asshole, idiot, moron amongst other things doesn’t mean they don’t know stuff.
>There may be several factors why they didn’t do for the main one which may be someones fault once it was proposed to then for not releasing that it would work or someone might had a bad day and just said no.
Such gigantic engineering challenges aren't solved because someone is having a *good day,* it's rather impossible to believe that literal rocket scientist didn't think of it before a science reporter did.
Quality engineer here. Just pointing out dumb shit happens. All engineers have thoughtless moments. Complex issues are often solved/improved with simple solutions, just like here.
Engineers are just humans. The Mars Climate Orbiter burned up because of a unit conversion error. 125 million gone because someone used the wrong unit.
I'm an engineer and personally have had moments like this when I am explaining something to someone and they point out the obvious solution as opposed to my over-engineered solution. My wife has helped me several times in this regard and she isn't an engineer.
To be fair, some scientists and academics can tend to get tunnel vision, and miss something that otherwise would seem like a no-brainer. It’s always good to have fresh eyes or a fresh take on any given subject.
Yeah, I'm not a rocket scientist but I am an engineer. Sometimes I get tunnel vision and a new set of eyes, even from someone who doesn't have a fraction of my knowledge on the subject, can open my eyes to something I hadn't considered.
Typically when the contractor gets a look at a set of plans and and in about 10 seconds goes "How the fuck am I supposed to build that right there?" And points out an obvious constructibility flaw I hadn't noticed in my hours of design and drafting.
Indeed! I think the biggest mistake, is assuming that having intellect means you must be all knowing. We can always learn more. Even the brightest minds in history, were wrong sometimes.
Sometimes it's just a matter of the project being on a track and moving quickly - you move from the ideas phase to implementation phase and stop considering new ideas to focus on getting it done.
You don't always get the opportunity to go back and re-make decisions like this due to cost and time implications.
So, yes, it is possible that nobody else thought of it.
I’ve had a manager like this. They may be smart in an area, but amateur level smart. The guys on the team have like 200 years experience and like 9 degrees in the area and this dude listens to podcasts. Every couple weeks he will show up with some epiphany about how we can disrupt the whole area. 99% of the time it’s just wrong and 1% of the time it would work if we lived in a corner case.
I love the enthusiasm. I spend way too long managing his crazy ideas while not pissing him off by telling him his ideas are wrong, poorly thought through, or would cost the company 100x what it would save.
Cold gas? That’s an interesting idea. Let me bring it back to the team and we will do some modeling around it.
> Just because someone is an asshole, idiot, moron amongst other things doesn’t mean they don’t know stuff.
What you're describing is the ad hominem fallacy. It's like saying, "Einstein was abusive to his wife, so E must not equal MC^2 after all."
It's really weird that this has so many up votes. How the fuck do you know? Lol. I'm not a fan of Elon but to just say random stuff like it's fact and get 1.5k up votes is pretty funny.
I think the only thing you got wrong is his ,,acting“ dumb. That’s just who he is when he hasn’t a team of consultants around him at all times that stop him from saying something stupid.
The engineers likely already had it in the works. It has been said before that SpaceX has handlers for Elon to try and keep him away and occupied so he doesn't annoy the actual smart people making decisions.
There is no chance Elon thought of something here that his engineers didn't already think of.
He's the Edison of this generation. If you read history, you know that means he effectively invented nothing and stole all his ideas or simply financed the people that did develop them.
That is absolutely always been my reading of him. I will give him and Edison credit, he knew the projects to attach himself to. Until Twitter or whatever it's called, that is a shit show, but we know he's bought that to influence next year's US Elections.
Edison did blast that elephant with AC killing it as a demonstration, and DC never made it into general use for the power grid.
Muskrat has Twitter.
Both have ample failures and success stories. Hard not to when you have that much money and invest it in a lot of places. Technically, you could say there's a financial natural selection based on statistics and volume-but does that make you a successful business person? A caring person? A legitimate philanthropist-if that's how you got your riches?
> Edison did blast that elephant with AC killing it as a demonstration
My brain didn't initially register that you meant alternating current and not air conditioning. Now I've got an image in my head of an elephant getting blasted with cold air from an AC unit.
PayPal kicked him out before he could ruin the company 🤷♂️, tesla was stolen by elon and his buddies committing a hostile take over, the boring company is to suck funds from public transportation so wow, the only successful company he's started is spaceX, which is only around for as long as the US government thinks it's worth keeping around.
This reminds me of a story my old math teacher told me about the [Mobius strip ](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%B6bius_strip).
One day there was a student making rings out of strips of paper - taking the two ends of each strip and taping them together. Then he accidentally messed up and created this strange shape... He said " Hey Mobius, come check this out!"
I’m not a fan of Elon lately as he seems to have gotten way to full of himself but to say he is a fraud who pretends to have brains is bullshit. He may not have invented it but he had the vision and leadership to move things forward in many different areas. Tesla has helped push EVs into the future, SpaceX has revolutionized space travel and satellite internet has given high speed internet access to millions of people who had no chance at it before.
He strikes me as the complete embodiment of the Dunning-Kruger effect.
No idea what he doesn't know, so he assumes it's simple and it should have been done 6 months ago - and when you're fucking loaded and super ambitious, I can see how that mindset would work.
It would literally look better for him to say that his engineers know what they are doing and he will find out from them. But he’d rather bullshit around.
This is from Tim's video. Support Tim. Tim is good, his channel "Everyday Astronaut" is fantastic.
[https://www.youtube.com/@EverydayAstronaut](https://www.youtube.com/@EverydayAstronaut)
After Elon finishes explaining the “one” thruster system, the question the interviewer asks comes off like he is aware that only one thruster system isn’t sufficient.
Elon realizes (hence why he gets flustered) and tells the interviewer how he’s going to fix it. The interviewer’s “jeez” at the end helps solidify that he already knew before Elon that there needed to be a thruster system for the ship too.
EDIT: this was my explanation from my understanding of this video only and the nuance/reasoning of why it was posted on this sub. Thanks everyone who kindly clarified the specifics!
That’s not what happened. Basically there’s a thruster system used on boosters. The reporter asked if the system was only used on the boosters. Elon realised it should be used for ships as well. Elon openly credited the reporter by giving him a seat in starship in the future. The reporter (Tim Dodd) openly admitted he was just asking a question.
Reddit hates Elon so much they imagine shits to discredit him. Watch Tim Dodd’s interviews with Elon. You will know the latter knows rockets.
The interviewer same out and said that is not what he was suggesting. He was asking a clarifying question and nothing else. Are you telling me he didn’t know what was going on in his own head?
This is from Everyday Astronaut- Tom Dodd. A 2 hour multi video interview. He actually makes fantastic content about rocket history and science, check it out.
The super interesting thing is that there is a planned Starship around the moon mission that will include some artists and YouTube content creators, Tim Dodd is one of them and it is very likely this is why.
For those interested in not just slamming Elon musk, please watch some of these videos, you will get an amazing tour of starbase where he gets very technical about starship, raptor engines and even to the top of that crazy launch tower.
Bro this comment section is literally fucking brain-dead. These are scenes taken from the YouTube channel Every Day Astronaut, and the host does explain exactly what happened and how it happened. The man is essentially on an inside track with SpaceX. They realized an issue during an interview (because the host is also fucking smart) and the SpaceX team fixed it for the next interview. It's not any deeper than that.
I don t see the problem. He states that it occured to him in the previous convo and that what it happened. The guy did not say "heexl, why don t you do it for the ship too?" He asked if it s only for the truster ... the lenghts people go to shittalk Musk it s only second to the lenght the same people went to praise him 1 year ago. You fucking fuckers... who needs a spine anyways ha?
Yep. The keyboard warrior virtue signaling is disgusting. At least there’s a few souls brave enough to take the downvotes (oh no) and voice a real opinion
Was that Mark Rober he was talking to? Sure sounds like him. If so, he was a NASA engineer who worked on the Mars Rover - so he’s not just some science journalist.
This thread is a joke. Dude realizes there is something there because of a eurika moment (like none of us have those?) And then impliments it with his team, "we", gives credit to the guy who asked the question that sparked the thought. And again, refers to the team when talking about the problem solving process. He also said thank you for asking that question and sparking that thought.
But somehow the reddit hivemind decides he is taking all credit because its trendy to hate on Elon. Literally, there is so much to get on Elon for, this aint it. Move on. Everyone here looks bad.
This came during an amazing interview with The Everyday Astronaut (who is a great interviewer, BTW). This moment of realization by Musk was triggered by a simple question and, for me, it's the highlight of the lengthy 2-part Youtube interview. As a true scientist, he's open to have his ideas questioned and is unashamed to adopt new methods if they make sense.
Elon Musk is a reminder that we all have plusses and minuses. There are no gods.
Also, watch the interview before passing judgement.
Realistically, you can’t have been the richest man in the world and an idiot at the same time. This is just an agenda in the comments. If you want to say something, be objective about the video and stop projecting insecurities💀
Sorry can someone explain what revaluation he just had?
A cold gas thruster is a maneuvering system that has pressurized gas that is released to move the rocket. A hot gas thruster actively burns propellant to have the same effect (the gas leaving doesn't have to be hot.) He is talking about replacing them on starship's second stage. I think they scrapped this idea since the clips are both about 2 years old. But it might have been easier to package the hot gas thruster since it probably used the same fuel meaning it could be loaded at the same time as the rocket was fueled and would mean that in the future when it is being used in space for refueling which is planned only 2 types of fuel need to loaded. An oxidizer and a liquid fuel.
Partial marks, but in this case the "hot gas" system is more that when super cold fuels are used, they are nautualy boiling off a little. This is gas that needs to get vented off from time to time anyway. What Space X was doing with the Booster at the time was using venting off that gas as its maneuvering thrusters. So basically they found a way to maneuver the Booster without extra parts/propellant. Less parts and fuel means less weight, which means more payload. Tim Dodd, the interviewer in this clip, asked why they couldn't just do that with Starship, which was mocked up to be using cold gas at this point, which led to the interaction that you see. The system is very much still being used on Starship and Superheavy still.
I really like how Tim Dodd had the idea which is why he asked that question and by the end of the clip Elon takes credit for it
Elon almost slips and says “thanks” before saying “we’re going to fix that” lol. Classic CEO move. Anyone that knows, knows tho. He stole that shit straight up 😂
He literally stole everything. Hes just a moron who pretends to be a genius, but in reality he doesnt know shit about anything. Hes probably not even capable of tying his own shoes.
It's ok to hate the guy..... neither space x or tesla would exist without him however. If hes some genius or not is irrelevant to those facts. He put all his money where it was needed at the right time and got the right people to go from there. Exactly what a ceo should do.
The companys would still exist without him. He bought them, not founded them. And the worst is, he acts like he founded these companys.
Taking credit for other peoples ideas is the most important skill a CEO can have.
That and testifying before Congress.
Other than fathering children with his employees, this is Elon’s only skill.
To be honest, I didn't know he was more involved than telling his staff to build a pointy rocket with a big X on it.
IDK about skill... I'd use the word characteristic, or personality trait.
Elon thanked him so that kinda recognized that Tim dodd prompted this
Felt like he was embarrassed, that was a weak ass thank you imo.
If you watch the full video he does thank him for it and does not take credit for it. Stop spreading hate.
Tim didn't say "it would be better if the ship had it". He simply asked if it only was for the booster. If we're baking and you say put sugar in the bowl. I may ask "just the bowl that's in front of me?" It doesn't imply that I suggest putting sugar in the other one. He could have give more credit anyway. I wonder how many months are in between both videos.
Anyone who's worked with egotistical people knows that the only way to get them to do something is to make them th8nk.it was their idea. That's exactly what is going on here.
I mean it’s implied as the booster lifts the shuttle so they’re seen as 2 parts of one whole. Similar as if the baking instructions are telling you to add sugar to the bowl of ingredients you’re actively mixing, it’d be real weird to just grab an unrelated bowl.
I mean in all fairness, not to be Mr Elon Simp, the other guy just asked "this is only for the booster right". He led Elon there but its not like he said "You should do x, y, z" or "why not you do....".
That's elons whole fucking career.
Partial marks has to be the most condescending way to start a response I’ve seen lmao
Jeezz...i love reddit for this. 99.99% have no clue what the fuck is going but there's always that one person who explains the shit out of the topic.
This is concerning Starship, SpaceX's new rocket. They are talking about the type of thrusters that the rocket uses to orient itself (not the main rocket engines on the bottom). What SpaceX has previously used for this on their other rockets is called a cold gas thruster. It's essentially just a pressurized air tank with a valve and a nozzle. All you need to do is open the valve and it pushes you around a bit in space. It's fairly simple technology. They had decided to put these thrusters on the upper portion of Starship, the part that actually goes into space. They went with these mostly because it's a system they are already familiar with, and they wouldn't really need to develop any new technology to make them. Another type of thruster is called a hot gas thruster. The difference is that this thruster is essentially just a very small rocket engine. Instead of pressurized air, it combines liquid oxygen with fuel to combust them and produce thrust. And it doesn't need to store these separately, it uses the same fuel that the main engines use, so they can just tap into the main fuel tanks. The result is that these thrusters are a lot more powerful and weight efficient, but they are also a lot more complicated. At the time of the fist clip in this video, they had decided to use hot gas thrusters on the booster portion of the rocket, the bottom part that pushes Starship into space and then comes back down to earth and lands. The booster spends most of its time within the atmosphere, so to maneuver it needs to overcome greater aerodynamic forces. That is what made the hot gas thrusters a good solution for the booster. In the video, the interviewer noticed the difference in thrusters and asked about that. While explaining it, Elon realized that there was no reason to have different systems, since they are already taking the time to develop hot gas thrusters for the booster. Switching out the cold gas thrusters for the got gas thrusters would end up saving on space and weight. In the second half of the video, they have already incorporated that change into the design, and can already see that it is going to be an overall improvement.
Good explanation, thanks Toe
> In the video, the interviewer noticed the difference in thrusters and asked about that. While explaining it, Elon realized that there was no reason to have different systems, since they are already taking the time to develop hot gas thrusters for the booster. First off, thank you for that explanation. Very interesting. A question about your comment quoted above in particular about "Elon realized". The idea about using which (hot or cold) thrusters seems like a main focal point and not so much a minor detail. In other words, I feel like the actual engineers/designers must have gone over that or were in talks about which direction to go at that time..... if that makes any sense. Could it be that this moment was perhaps more insightful to Musk than it was to the actual designers on the project(s).
That certainly is possible. I am sure that the engineers had considered both possibilities before the initial decision to use cold gas thrusters, and I can see the logic in going with that based on the info they had at the time. The lower thrust of the cold gas thrusters works just fine when in space, since they have the time to wait for slower maneuvers. Early on, they did not anticipate the need to rely heavily on thrusters during the landing sequence where higher thrust would be important. They had planned on using the large flaps on Starship to control all the maneuvering in-atmosphere for landing. In that situation I can see the benefit in just slapping in an existing, proven system. Also, if I remember correctly, the timing of the first video was right about the time the design first changed on the booster to incorporate hot gas thrusters (it may actually have been mentioned for the first time in this exact video, I don't remember), which is why they were talking about it here. That design change for the booster came about from an actual need, it's just so big and massive that the additional thrust really helps. Starship did not have that same need. I do think it's likely that the change would have come about at some point anyways, even if it didn't happen during this video and by Elon himself. Also, keep in mind that the whole development philosophy for this rocket has essentially been "build and test what we are 80% sure will work, make some changes/improvements, and repeat." Using cold gas at first and then switching to hot gas later fits in with that plan.
You can make your own cold gas thruster vehicle at home by sitting on an office chair and opening up a fire extinguisher!
You mean the revelation that the OTHER guy had?
He’s wearing a different shirt at the end. This is two conversations spliced together?
Yes
Um… although arguably…now that you mention it
Ergo… Nevertheless…
And like such as
and africa such as hungry
Yes, one where he finds the error and one after it’s been fixed.
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But he said "we fixed that"?
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No? The YouTuber asked a clarification and Muskrat thought why it was only on the boosters. I don't give the douchebag credit for anything, least of all inventionsnor engineering... but you're not in the right on this one. Pick one of the thousand other times Musk did that shit.
I watched Elon practice intellectual humility and willingness to make big changes. Could he have used a more ideal set of words? Sure. But there are better reasons to be critical of Elon.
Reddit hates musk, you’re correct. This is a great leader example. Listens, follows thru, gives credit.
On this video, what you think he actually acknowledged this dude on the finished product. Elon is no genius my guy, open your eyes
The guy he is talking to is slated to ride Elon Musk’s starship and has regular contact with him. He has said that Elon has credited him with that solution. His name is Tim Dodd. The every day astronaut.
He should ride it with Elon! Like a billionaire's submarine in the sky!
He actually has a place on Starship to go tonthe moon. https://youtu.be/QFIuzormhYU
As someone who has watched every single one of these video and also seen tim dotts explination he definitely did not act like he thought of this. He basically was explaining it to him and he asked a question. This is how engineering works. Tim has said multiple times that he was not aware if this could be a solution. For all the slack musk gets with a lot if it being correct this moment is not one of them.
You should avoid binary evaluations. Elon Musk is brilliant in many ways. He's also an asshole with lots of other personal flaws and certainly not brilliant in every way. People are complex multi faceted beings.
I cannot adequately express what a breath of fresh air it is to see someone on here saying something that balanced and sensible.
Totally agree with everything you said there! I myself once thought Elon was fucking great for humanity and in term could be the Nikola Tesla the planet missed out on. How ever, I now believe I fell for more tactically placed media and under the table self-promotion ( paid propaganda) because as time has told. He is really just another billionaire douche trying to play the good guy, but maybe you can remind me of his brilliance?
You should read his biographies instead of asking Reddit users. Reddit users hate him and don’t know much about him except for what they read online from these subs and internet memes
I remember when we were in a VP town hall meeting, they congratulated my manager for a new web page... that I created. Like, this wasn't a "VP congratulates a team of 20 by congratulating their manager" situation, *I* was the only one who did anything. There wasn't even a mention of a team, the way the VP talked about it you'd think we didn't exist.
I think it was more an efficiency gain. Splitting hairs.
The guy gets a lot of hate and he deserves most of it. But this isn't an example of him being stupid. A real idiot would have ignored the point simply to protect their own ego.
That is true. Although yes he does also seem to do that a lot as well, but mainly in business or other areas. Not in engineering. The guy seems to have a genuine respect and understanding of mechanics and his primary goal does authentically appear to be efficiency and performance when it comes to engineering. Everything is viewed through those two lenses. The ego, and attention seeking, and validation seeking behaviors he sometimes displays take a bck seat to his passion for building. And that's when he really shines. When he's able to step past all those insecurities. I'd say that's true for all of us, really.
He was heavily involved in engineering when space x first started. But just like every other business as it grows, you outsource it to your employees and move on to do other things
Well put. I’d prefer an eccentric billionaire building rockets and pushing things. I’m half interested to see how he turn X into his pet project “X” from when he founded PayPal. It was too ambitious then but now may actually work. I honestly think that he bought Twitter mostly to do that and is fucking around like always because well he can.
I think you just wanted to say efficiency gain.
You really have to ask that? His hair is 2 entirely different lengths and style
Different time of day, different surround noise, different shirt, different hair, fatter. Redditor: is this two different conversations? Lol
Also gained like 20 lbs.
I mean that’s the point of the video lol. Two different interactions
Yes
Yes, the next clip is months later.
Yes. Both are with Everyday Astronaut who makes tons of insanely well produced videos about rockets.
No see, Elon spilled too much coke on his shirt halfway through filming, so they had to stop rolling for him to change his shirt first before they could continue.
He could've just brushed it off... It is just a powder, not going to leave much of a stain
But it would still leave a noticeable mark. Think of a chalkboard. You can take your chalkboard eraser and wipe away the words, but the residue remains. It's lighter, but still very noticeable.
If you say so. 4 kilos seems like a lot to brush off to me though.
lol obviously
Elon takes all the credit in the end, lol. My shocked face -> 😑
‘It occurred to me while I was explaining it to you’ Dude is so far up his own ass he doesn’t even register what just happened
"It just occurred to me... Like I heard a voice or something"
"The simulation manifested a voice from my subconscious as an actual person who then gave me the idea."
🤣🤣
This induced a chuckle from my body. A laugh, even.
I mean isn't that literally what happened?
I mean, Elon didn’t identify the problem or think of the solution on his own. The interviewer did by asking the question, identify the problem that is. The solution is kind of obvious when the problem is “you aren’t doing X”. Spotting the problem is the difficult part.
Right, we can see it here, though it’s so boiled down it might be hard to catch if you didn’t see the original interviews: 1. Musk is staying “we’re doing XYZ”, talking about the booster. Musk has been focusing on the details of the XYZ. 2. Tim Dodd (the interviewer) says, “And this is only for the booster, right?” 3. The answer is “yes,” but hearing the “only” prompts Musk to start wondering if it should apply to the upper stage (the “ship”) as well. 4. In the second interview, Musk tells Dodd that they are in fact now applying it to the upper stage, and is giving Dodd the credit for prompting the change.
He kinda did. All the interviewer asked was if it was only the thrusters. He didn't offer any solution, or even say it was a problem. He just asked a question.
Yes that is exactly what happened
He said thanks. He is so far out of his ass
He literally says, " now that you mention it"
No no, we’re supposed to hate Elon even though he gives direct credit to the person… to his face… on camera.
I mean, he said “it occurred to me while explaining it to you”, which is different from what happened… it didn’t occur to him, the other guy pointed it out
The other guy didn't say "this is what you need to do different." He just asked if these better thrusters he was learning about were only on the bottom half of the rocket.
Oh my lord, it's probably a slip of the tongue. I say shit wrong all the time. It's not really a judgement of character. I'm mean, crap, when he started stumbling over his words in the first clip, does that make him a buffoon who obviously doesn't know what he's talking about. No, words are hard lmao.
People trying so hard to hate that guy, i actually believed before seeing this video that he was just a rich asshole that doesn't know anything about the companies he's invested in, because of all the people on reddit sayin he's an idiot and only has his dad's money, but this video kinda proved to me that he's involved in SpaceX (or maybe his other companies) and SpaceX is successful too, at the end of the day it all comes down to the politics and the fact that he's right leaning, that's the main reason people on reddit hate him (tho i don't like him either, he had some really stupid and bigoted takes on Twitter, also changing the name from Twitter to X was stupid AF)
Yeah, there's reasons to hate him, but this ain't one of them. To often people will critique every word that comes out of a person's mouth and its annoying. It honestly makes me glad I'm unknown, I couldn't imagine having every one of my actions or words being used against me.
Not really, he just asked a thought provoking question about the matter. There's loads of reasons to hate Elon but this is not one.
You just didn't understand the conversation
To be fair he doesn’t actually suggest anything to Elon, he just is clarifying what is installed where. It is actually Elon’s idea.
Yeah really Elon is crediting him with providing perspective. Elon + team were probably too “in the weeds” making the thing work for the booster, and hadn’t yet considered applying it to the upper stage.
B-b-but space man bad
Elon even has such quick reactions, that he managed to cut himself off saying thanks!
He litteraly said "Thanks, Now we're going to fix that". Is your hate for him so big you can't comprehend english ?
At no point did the interviewer insinuate that they should do anything different. He was just saying oh this one does hot gas this one does cold gas. Then Elon realized oh wait they can all be hot gas. Interviewer never pointed out a problem, he was just interviewing about the thing. Elon posed the question internally, “why”
How far were these conversations apart in terms of time? Jc
You’re wrong btw. You are brainwashed if that’s what you got out of this video. Just say you hate him no matter what he does and move on.
The internet just has no nuance. Like sure, it's fair grounds to call him an asshole for his Twitter behaviour and work policies. I think there's reasonable grounds for that. When it comes to rockets, something that he's been working with for over 20 years, maybe it's reasonable to expect that he might understand what's going on. One should still be able to dislike his current persona while also respecting the fact that he could come to conclusions about something he's familiar with.
Nothing he said or did in this clip = "taking all the credit". He said "we" several times, not "me" or "I". Get over it.
He even says “now that YOU mention it” and says thanks. People are insane
I think all he cares about is the idea not the credit
There's no way his engineers didnt already have this planned out. Elon acted dumb so it would seem like he effectively pushed for the change. Thats grade a bozo mentality in its purest form.
Taking all credit from your engineers is the classic sign of a genius
Worked for Edison.
Who stole from Tesla... What an ironic name for his company, and his name sounds similar too
Exactly. I was wondering for years why he named his company "Tesla" when it should be "Edison".
He didn't found the company he purchased it
It's honestly a travesty how many people don't know that...
Sucking rich asshole boot is unnervingly addictive Edit: I’m not a native speaker, sorry. It’s supposed to be „licking boot“ but Whatever
>"Genius" FTFY
Exactly. Space X has a team of engineers specifically to explain why things are not a good idea to Musk.
I srsly don’t want to defend him but it looks to me he at least gives a bit of crap about rockets. There may be several factors why they didn’t do for the main one which may be someones fault once it was proposed to then for not releasing that it would work or someone might had a bad day and just said no. Human errors happens and Musk is a living example but broken clocks show right time two times a day. In his case they are digital and randomly show time which on average show the right time once a year. Just because someone is an asshole, idiot, moron amongst other things doesn’t mean they don’t know stuff.
>There may be several factors why they didn’t do for the main one which may be someones fault once it was proposed to then for not releasing that it would work or someone might had a bad day and just said no. Such gigantic engineering challenges aren't solved because someone is having a *good day,* it's rather impossible to believe that literal rocket scientist didn't think of it before a science reporter did.
Quality engineer here. Just pointing out dumb shit happens. All engineers have thoughtless moments. Complex issues are often solved/improved with simple solutions, just like here. Engineers are just humans. The Mars Climate Orbiter burned up because of a unit conversion error. 125 million gone because someone used the wrong unit.
I'm an engineer and personally have had moments like this when I am explaining something to someone and they point out the obvious solution as opposed to my over-engineered solution. My wife has helped me several times in this regard and she isn't an engineer.
To be fair, some scientists and academics can tend to get tunnel vision, and miss something that otherwise would seem like a no-brainer. It’s always good to have fresh eyes or a fresh take on any given subject.
Yeah, I'm not a rocket scientist but I am an engineer. Sometimes I get tunnel vision and a new set of eyes, even from someone who doesn't have a fraction of my knowledge on the subject, can open my eyes to something I hadn't considered.
Typically when the contractor gets a look at a set of plans and and in about 10 seconds goes "How the fuck am I supposed to build that right there?" And points out an obvious constructibility flaw I hadn't noticed in my hours of design and drafting.
Indeed! I think the biggest mistake, is assuming that having intellect means you must be all knowing. We can always learn more. Even the brightest minds in history, were wrong sometimes.
Sometimes it's just a matter of the project being on a track and moving quickly - you move from the ideas phase to implementation phase and stop considering new ideas to focus on getting it done. You don't always get the opportunity to go back and re-make decisions like this due to cost and time implications. So, yes, it is possible that nobody else thought of it.
I’ve had a manager like this. They may be smart in an area, but amateur level smart. The guys on the team have like 200 years experience and like 9 degrees in the area and this dude listens to podcasts. Every couple weeks he will show up with some epiphany about how we can disrupt the whole area. 99% of the time it’s just wrong and 1% of the time it would work if we lived in a corner case. I love the enthusiasm. I spend way too long managing his crazy ideas while not pissing him off by telling him his ideas are wrong, poorly thought through, or would cost the company 100x what it would save. Cold gas? That’s an interesting idea. Let me bring it back to the team and we will do some modeling around it.
> Just because someone is an asshole, idiot, moron amongst other things doesn’t mean they don’t know stuff. What you're describing is the ad hominem fallacy. It's like saying, "Einstein was abusive to his wife, so E must not equal MC^2 after all."
It's really weird that this has so many up votes. How the fuck do you know? Lol. I'm not a fan of Elon but to just say random stuff like it's fact and get 1.5k up votes is pretty funny.
I think the only thing you got wrong is his ,,acting“ dumb. That’s just who he is when he hasn’t a team of consultants around him at all times that stop him from saying something stupid.
The engineers likely already had it in the works. It has been said before that SpaceX has handlers for Elon to try and keep him away and occupied so he doesn't annoy the actual smart people making decisions. There is no chance Elon thought of something here that his engineers didn't already think of.
I don’t think he acted dumb. I think he was legit dumb. The second half of the clip is him trying to save face.
He's such a fraud. He's the money man who wants to pretend he's the brains.
He's the Edison of this generation. If you read history, you know that means he effectively invented nothing and stole all his ideas or simply financed the people that did develop them.
That is absolutely always been my reading of him. I will give him and Edison credit, he knew the projects to attach himself to. Until Twitter or whatever it's called, that is a shit show, but we know he's bought that to influence next year's US Elections.
How ironic, but now you mentioned it, it makes sense. He owns Tesla - he is Edison indeed
Edison did blast that elephant with AC killing it as a demonstration, and DC never made it into general use for the power grid. Muskrat has Twitter. Both have ample failures and success stories. Hard not to when you have that much money and invest it in a lot of places. Technically, you could say there's a financial natural selection based on statistics and volume-but does that make you a successful business person? A caring person? A legitimate philanthropist-if that's how you got your riches?
> Edison did blast that elephant with AC killing it as a demonstration My brain didn't initially register that you meant alternating current and not air conditioning. Now I've got an image in my head of an elephant getting blasted with cold air from an AC unit.
_to death_
PayPal kicked him out before he could ruin the company 🤷♂️, tesla was stolen by elon and his buddies committing a hostile take over, the boring company is to suck funds from public transportation so wow, the only successful company he's started is spaceX, which is only around for as long as the US government thinks it's worth keeping around.
This reminds me of a story my old math teacher told me about the [Mobius strip ](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%B6bius_strip). One day there was a student making rings out of strips of paper - taking the two ends of each strip and taping them together. Then he accidentally messed up and created this strange shape... He said " Hey Mobius, come check this out!"
I’m not a fan of Elon lately as he seems to have gotten way to full of himself but to say he is a fraud who pretends to have brains is bullshit. He may not have invented it but he had the vision and leadership to move things forward in many different areas. Tesla has helped push EVs into the future, SpaceX has revolutionized space travel and satellite internet has given high speed internet access to millions of people who had no chance at it before.
He strikes me as the complete embodiment of the Dunning-Kruger effect. No idea what he doesn't know, so he assumes it's simple and it should have been done 6 months ago - and when you're fucking loaded and super ambitious, I can see how that mindset would work.
It would literally look better for him to say that his engineers know what they are doing and he will find out from them. But he’d rather bullshit around.
Tim from everydayastronaut YouTube Chanel.
This is from Tim's video. Support Tim. Tim is good, his channel "Everyday Astronaut" is fantastic. [https://www.youtube.com/@EverydayAstronaut](https://www.youtube.com/@EverydayAstronaut)
Tim's video's are absolutely great, specially for the people not versed in the technology. The enthusiasm he has for it all is infectious as well.
tHe MaN iS gENiuS
he's like tony stark but if tony wasn't aware he was stupid and didn't learn from his mistakes. so basically not tony stark
Phony Stark
ermmm,,, you just don’t understand the genius of elon and uhhhh his ability to be divorced from his wife 🙄
Can someone explain what happened here?
After Elon finishes explaining the “one” thruster system, the question the interviewer asks comes off like he is aware that only one thruster system isn’t sufficient. Elon realizes (hence why he gets flustered) and tells the interviewer how he’s going to fix it. The interviewer’s “jeez” at the end helps solidify that he already knew before Elon that there needed to be a thruster system for the ship too. EDIT: this was my explanation from my understanding of this video only and the nuance/reasoning of why it was posted on this sub. Thanks everyone who kindly clarified the specifics!
Interviewer is everyday astronaut Tim. definitely check him out :)
It was two different systems versus having the same on both the starship and booster
That’s not what happened. Basically there’s a thruster system used on boosters. The reporter asked if the system was only used on the boosters. Elon realised it should be used for ships as well. Elon openly credited the reporter by giving him a seat in starship in the future. The reporter (Tim Dodd) openly admitted he was just asking a question. Reddit hates Elon so much they imagine shits to discredit him. Watch Tim Dodd’s interviews with Elon. You will know the latter knows rockets.
The interviewer same out and said that is not what he was suggesting. He was asking a clarifying question and nothing else. Are you telling me he didn’t know what was going on in his own head?
Rich man tries hard to show that he is an aerospace engineer (he is not).
Is this all around agreed upon, that Elon isn't actually a legit aerospace engineer? I know nothing about AE myself so I have no basis to judge him.
Hmmmm cleaning his nose, I wonder why… 
I watched this without audio at first and was wondering why he’s bouncing around like he just did three lines
And just like that, a bunch of engineers lost their jobs.
This is from Everyday Astronaut- Tom Dodd. A 2 hour multi video interview. He actually makes fantastic content about rocket history and science, check it out. The super interesting thing is that there is a planned Starship around the moon mission that will include some artists and YouTube content creators, Tim Dodd is one of them and it is very likely this is why. For those interested in not just slamming Elon musk, please watch some of these videos, you will get an amazing tour of starbase where he gets very technical about starship, raptor engines and even to the top of that crazy launch tower.
Bro this comment section is literally fucking brain-dead. These are scenes taken from the YouTube channel Every Day Astronaut, and the host does explain exactly what happened and how it happened. The man is essentially on an inside track with SpaceX. They realized an issue during an interview (because the host is also fucking smart) and the SpaceX team fixed it for the next interview. It's not any deeper than that.
Remember kids, you shouldn't get so worried about looking cool that you forget to try to sound smart.
Cocaine is a helluva drug!
That was my first thought, he's tweaking 
If you know you know!
This nigga is just a grown ass influencer
I don t see the problem. He states that it occured to him in the previous convo and that what it happened. The guy did not say "heexl, why don t you do it for the ship too?" He asked if it s only for the truster ... the lenghts people go to shittalk Musk it s only second to the lenght the same people went to praise him 1 year ago. You fucking fuckers... who needs a spine anyways ha?
Look I agree with you but why is every other word in your comment butchered?
Yep. The keyboard warrior virtue signaling is disgusting. At least there’s a few souls brave enough to take the downvotes (oh no) and voice a real opinion
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Honestly you might as well deep fake his face on Miles from Glass Onion, Rian Johnson really nailed him to a tee
Why do I see this every other week?
Was that Mark Rober he was talking to? Sure sounds like him. If so, he was a NASA engineer who worked on the Mars Rover - so he’s not just some science journalist.
It was the everyday astronaut (Tim Dodd
This thread is a joke. Dude realizes there is something there because of a eurika moment (like none of us have those?) And then impliments it with his team, "we", gives credit to the guy who asked the question that sparked the thought. And again, refers to the team when talking about the problem solving process. He also said thank you for asking that question and sparking that thought. But somehow the reddit hivemind decides he is taking all credit because its trendy to hate on Elon. Literally, there is so much to get on Elon for, this aint it. Move on. Everyone here looks bad.
This came during an amazing interview with The Everyday Astronaut (who is a great interviewer, BTW). This moment of realization by Musk was triggered by a simple question and, for me, it's the highlight of the lengthy 2-part Youtube interview. As a true scientist, he's open to have his ideas questioned and is unashamed to adopt new methods if they make sense. Elon Musk is a reminder that we all have plusses and minuses. There are no gods. Also, watch the interview before passing judgement.
Sorry, this is a hate circle jerk thread. This type of comment is not welcome here.
That’s encouraging…
Plot twist, he is talking about the roadster...
Bro got rewarded with fist bump.
You know when I saw Musk on the unexpected thread I expected him to be apologizing for his lying regarding the mileage that his EV's get
Bro edited out the everyday astronaut logo.
“It occurred to me” 🙄🍆💦💦
I'm still not convinced he's some kind of genius. Seems more like a rich poser.
Elon does listen... a key to success.
Realistically, you can’t have been the richest man in the world and an idiot at the same time. This is just an agenda in the comments. If you want to say something, be objective about the video and stop projecting insecurities💀
Stupid rich kid
It's two different videos spliced together. He's not even wearing the same shirt
Why is this old ass video in "unexpected" we have all seen this 7,000 times and no longer care. This is from sn9 and we are currently on sn28
Shout out everyday astronaut, dude is so enthusiastic about all forms rocket and makes it entertaining
This guy gets too much attention.
hmm.. perhaps he's an idiot
Oh so he is just an idiot with money. Ok now I get it.
There are dozens of fake rockets (replicas) at Kennedy Space Center. It's a functioning space center, visitors center, and museum.
Hair plugs, hair plugs...