Starship design challenges

  Only a blind person coldn't see, that the tiles based shield is well "fried" !!! In best case scenario they could push it to about 70% reentry success with mandatory required complete refurbishment of the entire shield after each reentry. People on board is 100% out of question with this mildly said POOR factor of safety design. The tiles based shield concept is 100% doomed, if the goals are rapid reusability and human rated vehicle.

I made a short video showing the methane-cooled Starship reentry shield concept. The shield features an inverted bell-shaped geometry, which offers several critical advantages. This configuration is inherently aerodynamically stable, eliminating the need for aft-actuated flaps. Furthermore, the shape significantly enhances aerodynamic braking authority, increases the effective radiative surface area, and improves lift-to-drag ratio for gliding capability during descent.  configurations. The active cooling system involves the injection of methane at a flow rate of approximately 5 kg/s, distributed uniformly across the base of the shield via a single longitudinal injector conduit running the length of the vehicle. If the outer shell of the shield is fabricated from HASTELLOY or a high-melting-point titanium alloy, the structure should be capable of withstanding hundreds—potentially thousands—of reentry cycles with minimal degradation. In my assessment, this represents the only v...

 In this last iteration I've managed to utilise the cooling flow up to 5 kg/s liquid methane, while keeping the max. shield temperature reasonable for HASTELLOY, keeping enough structural strenght and oxidation resistance. The 3D simulation model is designed to provide correct enough results, while keeping it simple, which is nececesey for the reentry simulation itself. All comments and suggestions are most welcome ...

This is just a very small part of the Starship reentry simulations I've performed. Wide range of conditions - different shield shapes, angle of attacks (AOA), velocities, atm. pressures and so on. CONCLUSION - ALL THEY BURN TILES AND CRINGE STEEL !!! THE TILES BASED SHIELD IS COMPLETELY DOOMED!!! All comments and suggestions are most welcome ...

  After performing multiple flow reentry simulations with wide reentry conditions I have not other choice, but to conclude that using a tiles based shield is completely impossible. It would not be safe even for one reentry as the temperatures on the tiles surface of more than 50% of the shield area well exceeds 3000 K. At that point I am mildly said baffled, why this option was even considered. On the other hand I've proved without a doubt, that an internally cooled shield is the only viable solution. My simulations and calculations proved that 10kg/s to 15kg/s cooling methane would be enough to keep the shield temperature below 1400 K in the most heated areas. As well I've proved that expelling methane through holes in the shield is far worse than keeping the cold methane inside the shield "jacket" and expelling it through the upper part of the shield. With this information I will allow myself to make a prediction - If SpaceX does not scrap completely and fast this d...

 In this simulation I've tried to optimize the cooling methane flow by introducing several baffles. This makes the heat transfer from the shield to the cooling methane more efficient "trapping" the methane longer in the shield jacket. As a result the fresh 100K cold methane gas is heated up to 330K, which is about 7 KW cooling power in a 50 mm shield slice. If we approximate this to the full Starship length we get minimum necessary cooling power of  about 8400KW. Same reentry conditions - V=6000m/s and Patm.=15 Pascals. If we consider the methane liquid-vapor phase transfer energy I think that 10 tons of methane should be enough for a 15 min. long reentry cooling. However this is on optimistic side and 15 tons methane should provide enough safety margin. All comments and suggestions are most welcome ...