Elon Musk's Grasshopper rocket makes its highest leap to date

[Buster's Uncle]

Elon Musk's Grasshopper rocket makes its highest leap to date
By Casey Newton on October 13, 2013 03:50 pm



SpaceX lateral motion screengrab (Credit: SpaceX/YouTube)



Elon Musk's quest to build a rocket that can be reused after delivering its cargo is getting closer to the atmosphere's upper reaches. A new video from SpaceX shows the Grasshopper rocket reaching its highest point to date: 744 meters. The test flight comes a month after Musk demonstrated the Grasshopper launching, flying 300 feet laterally, then returning to the launchpad and landing vertically. SpaceX has a long way to go before its reusable rockets are ready to deliver their cargo to the cosmos. But combined with the successful test flight of a more powerful Falcon 9 rocket last month, Musk has said "I think we now have all the pieces of the puzzle to bring the rocket back home."

Grasshopper 744m Test | Single Camera (Hexacopter)

http://www.theverge.com/2013/10/13/4834606/elon-musks-grasshopper-rocket-makes-its-highest-leap-to-date

[Buster's Uncle]

SpaceX Grasshopper Makes Its Highest Hop Yet
By Rich Smith  | October 13, 2013 



With every passing month, SpaceX is setting new records in the race to privatize space exploration.

This past week -- on Oct. 7, to be precise -- the company's experimental Grasshopper reusable rocket ship launched itself to its highest height yet: 2,441 feet straight up, then 2,441 feet straight down, landing right on its rump, and right back where it started on its launching pad. (Watch it fly in this YouTube video).



The Grasshopper at launch. Source: SpaceX


This test flight more than doubled Grasshopper's previous altitude record of 1,066 feet, set in July, but didn't attempt to retest the vehicle's ability to "divert" itself from a straight up-down flight path, as was tested in August.

The Grasshopper spacecraft launches itself atop a SpaceX-built Falcon 9 rocket first-stage tank powered by a Merlin 1D engine. It lands on four steel and aluminum landing legs cushioned with hydraulic dampers. It is designed to test the concept that spacecraft don't need to be disposable -- launching satellites into orbit, then falling into the atmosphere to burn up on re-entry. With Grasshopper, the idea is for the same spacecraft that lifts the satellite into orbit to then itself drop back down, pass through the atmosphere intact, and safely land itself back where it started.

Lather, rinse, repeat, and Grasshopper will become the first reusable space launch vehicle since the Space Shuttle -- and the first privately built reusable space-launch vehicle ever.


http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2013/10/13/spacex-grasshopper-makes-its-highest-hop-yet.aspx