Elon Musk Will Launch His Tesla Roadster to Mars on SpaceX’s 1st Falcon Heavy Rocket

Megalith

Megalith

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Elon Musk says he's going to launch his own Tesla Roadster on the first test flight of SpaceX's new giant rocket next month, and the car will play David Bowie's "Space Oddity" full blast on the way to Mars (if the rocket doesn't explode during liftoff).

"Payload will be my midnight cherry Tesla Roadster playing Space Oddity," Musk added in a follow-up tweet. Okay, that's wild. But then there's this next thing. "Destination is Mars orbit," Musk wrote. "Will be in deep space for a billion years or so if it doesn't blow up on ascent." Whoa! That Roadster's going to rack up a lot of miles if it makes it to the Red Planet.
 
"Mars orbit" and "Deep space for a billion years" imply 2 different things.

More than likely its gonna make a fly-by close to mars and then off into the cosmos. Too much extra needs to happen to get it into orbit.
 
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Unless the car gets stolen first, and they are forced to replace it with a 1987 Ford Fiesta!
 
Does seem a wasted opportunity - sending all that mass out of Earth's gravity well just for the sake of a publicity stunt. Deploying a Mars communications satellite or two to act as orbiting relays or camera/sensor platforms would be a much better way of showing off.
 
Supercharged_Z06 said:
Does seem a wasted opportunity - sending all that mass out of Earth's gravity well just for the sake of a publicity stunt. Deploying a Mars communications satellite or two to act as orbiting relays or camera/sensor platforms would be a much better way of showing off.
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It's a test flight. You don't put anything that expensive on a test flight.
 
0neTwo said:
It's a test flight. You don't put anything that expensive on a test flight.
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Oh, I’m not necessarily advocating the premium grade NASA pricey stuff, it could be a passive/reflective array for bouncing signals and a couple of GoPros that phone home. (I’m pretty sure GoPro would even cover/donate the gear for the publicity it would generate.). Would still be better than lobbing a Tesla to Mars.
 
Supercharged_Z06 said:
Oh, I’m not necessarily advocating the premium grade NASA pricey stuff, it could be a passive/reflective array for bouncing signals and a couple of GoPros that phone home. (I’m pretty sure GoPro would even cover/donate the gear for the publicity it would generate.). Would still be better than lobbing a Tesla to Mars.
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You're not throwing a couple of gopros and harbor freight solar panels and whatever else without it costing millions of dollars. It doesn't work like that.

Plus that free publicity GoPro would get is kinda the reason the owner of spacex is launching a car from the company he also owns ;)

Its a test flight that has to happen no matter what, this just adds some publicity for Tesla also.
 
0neTwo said:
You're not throwing a couple of gopros and harbor freight solar panels and whatever else without it costing millions of dollars. It doesn't work like that.

Plus that free publicity GoPro would get is kinda the reason the owner of spacex is launching a car from the company he also owns ;)

Its a test flight that has to happen no matter what, this just adds some publicity for Tesla also.
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But it could... sponsor a bunch of high school students even - have multiple payloads sharing the platform. He could slap "Tesla" logos all over it. Still a wasted opportunity IMHO.
 
Might not be a waste if its still for testing and there is a risk of it exploding. Better to lose a car than a bazillion dollar satellite + promo points!
 
Supercharged_Z06 said:
But it could... sponsor a bunch of high school students even - have multiple payloads sharing the platform. He could slap "Tesla" logos all over it. Still a wasted opportunity IMHO.
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He's reiterated that there's a good chance it's going to explode. Putting other people's stuff and it exploding it not exactly great marketing, in most cases.
 
gigaxtreme1 said:
What a waste of resources. Something useful might be more appropriate. Fuel, food, solar power collection station, robotic habitat assembly systems to name a few better candidates
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its actually bumble bee they are launching to mars in hope of clearing alien life off for human colonization.
 
gigaxtreme1 said:
What a waste of resources. Something useful might be more appropriate. Fuel, food, solar power collection station, robotic habitat assembly systems to name a few better candidates
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I suggest composing mr. musk a heartfelt letter on your finest stationery.
 
It’s not being designed to explode guys, there’s just a good chance that it may happen. Still, the amount of engineering/expense it’ll take to properly mount and secure a Tesla in that sucker will be enormous. I’m sure NASA has a fuck ton of stuff just lying around as to designs/modules for mounting actual space gear. I would much rather see an attempt at least as to promoting some science rather than just launching a fucking car into space.
 
Elon confirmed that he wasn't serious - but I think the most interesting takeaway from all of this is that a ton of people took Elon seriously. Dude said he was going to launch a $200k+ car into space and then to Mars and we were all like 'yeah, figures'.
 
gigaxtreme1 said:
What a waste of resources. Something useful might be more appropriate. Fuel, food, solar power collection station, robotic habitat assembly systems to name a few better candidates
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Well the Republicans are giving him a massive tax break, how else do you think that money is gunna get spent?
 
One advantage of the car is it is already loaded with sensors. Just need to create an adapter cable from the car to the capsule so the car can send back data on what the ride feels like. Maybe they will include a crash test dummy just in case.

Krixon said:
Elon confirmed that he wasn't serious - but I think the most interesting takeaway from all of this is that a ton of people took Elon seriously. Dude said he was going to launch a $200k+ car into space and then to Mars and we were all like 'yeah, figures'.
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An update on another site says the initial "It was a joke" was mistaken and he really is serious about sending the car. It might have started as a joke and grown into a "What the hell, let's do it!" plan. This one may get updated a few times before the real story comes out.
 
Let's hope we keep track of it, otherwise a dozen years later, we might have a car collision in Mars orbit! :p
 
Dead Parrot said:
An update on another site says the initial "It was a joke" was mistaken and he really is serious about sending the car. It might have started as a joke and grown into a "What the hell, let's do it!" plan. This one may get updated a few times before the real story comes out.
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Noted. I hope Tesla/SpaceX goes through with it. While sending a sports car to another planet may seem wasteful, there are quite a few engineering hurdles that would have to be overcome to make it all possible - not to mention the unlimited advertising potential of comparing your cars to space ships. Anything that gets the general public interested in space exploration (again) is a win in my books.
 
Krixon said:
Noted. I hope Tesla/SpaceX goes through with it. While sending a sports car to another planet may seem wasteful, there are quite a few engineering hurdles that would have to be overcome to make it all possible - not to mention the unlimited advertising potential of comparing your cars to space ships. Anything that gets the general public interested in space exploration (again) is a win in my books.
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Space ships? How about advertising that your car is going faster than almost everything ever created by man.
 
Yeah great, on a really long journey where every ounce counts you totally want to go for a publicity stunt.

I'm guessing he's saying this tongue in cheek.
 
Elon Musk is such a fraud. He just makes up crazy stuff and the tech world worships him.

No one is going to Mars. We still can't pass through the Van Allen radiation belts. NASA admits this themselves.
 
This is like Lord British spending 30 Million to be launched in space by the Russians.
 
Read this this morning:
https://www.theverge.com/2017/12/1/16726822/spacex-falcon-heavy-tesla-roadster-launch-elon-musk
(Quoted from the article)
Sean O'Kane @ The Verge said:
Always willing to up the stakes of an already difficult situation, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has said the first flight of his company’s Falcon Heavy rocket will be used to send a Tesla Roadster into space. Musk first tweeted out the idea on Friday evening, and the payload was confirmed on Saturday.

But confirmation followed a bizarre exchange between The Verge and Musk. After Musk tweeted the plan, we asked him to confirm that it was real. Musk replied to us first by email, confirming that it was real. Then, after The Verge published a story about the plan, Musk sent us a response in a direct message on Twitter saying he “totally made it up.” We now know that response was false; a person familiar with the matter told The Verge Saturday evening that the payload is in fact real.
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Not quite sure what to make of that...
 
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