Talk:Falcon 5

Advertising?

I am highly suspicious of (the motives of the person who initially wrote) this article. It appears to me that it was an attempt at advertising. This for several reasons:

• The article included pricing information (which I have now removed).
• This article refers to a launch vehicle under development, which has never flown. Nevertheless, it was included in the Space Launch Vehicles category, a category which by all appearances seems to be reserved for actual existing and functional or historical (previously existing) hardware that (success or failure) was actually flown.
• It was not prominently indicatedin the article that the rocket in question has never flown. (I have added a boilerplate type warning to that extent.)

I first had a mind to submitting this for deletion outright: There are literally hundreds of "hopeful" projects at various stages of completion out there. If we were to include them all under the said launch vehicle category, that category would be swamped with vapourware. There is a reason why, say, the Kistler K1 isn't included either. To paraphrase John Kerry: Saying something is a launch vehicle doesn't make it so. (It needs to be completed and flown first.)

However, upon further consideration I acknowledge that it is useful to include information about unfinished endeavours like this in the Wikipedia: They may soon be finished. This doesn't however justify the categorization Space Launch vehicle until the thing has flown in some form. It isn't done till it's done. And putting pricing info in the Wikipaedia is of course wholly unacceptable. Ropers 23:25, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Falcon Rockets

In answer to your questions and comments:

(1) I am at least two degrees removed from any benefit from SpaceX. Even there, the connection is rather tenuous, since I haven't been in the industry for a decade and haven't kept up my connections.
(2) It is convention to give list pricing/costing numbers in space references (see, e.g., Astronautix), so that researchers can do cost per pound to Low Earth Orbit calculations. I guess that's because the industry is so heavily government influenced. In any event, DARPA purchased the first Falcon I flight for $6 million, so it's a matter of public record for that rocket at least.
(3) The engines for these rockets have already been built and tested and at least the Falcon I has been fully assembled. It is true that neither have been launched yet, but the rockets exist as identifiable articles, and, as such, fully warrant present tense treatment. Please note that in my additions to the reusable launch vehicle article, I did add reference to the Kistler K-1 and the X-Prize vehicles, in anticipation of somebody adding information on those vehicles. Also, I did include cost information on the Armadillo Aerospace's Black Armadillo, so I think the NPOV has been preserved.

Because of all of these things, I am going to revert the articles for now. Dschmelzer 20:25, 1 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Further comments re. this issue are at Talk:Falcon I. Ropers 14:16, 14 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Axe the launch site details, pricing information, payload capabilities and vehicle details. Merge content with Falcon I. Do those things and, with a little copy editing, this could shape up to be a pretty good article. –Floorsheim 05:00, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Falcon 9 and change of Falcon 5 configuration

Someone should write something about it [1]. --Bricktop 00:17, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

Re-usability of Falcon V

Per the payload user guide, the second stage is not reusable. I've pulled an edit that suggested it was. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 21:23, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

You are confusing the Falcon I with the Falcon 5. SpaceX says both stages of the Falcon 5 are designed to be reusable, see[2].--Duk 23:06, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

How does the stage return from orbit without breaking up though? --GW_Simulations 13:04, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

Falcon V or Falcon 5?

Being that SpaceX refers to this rocket as the "Falcon 5", should this article still be named "Falcon V"? The same can be said about the Falcon 1. Finally, just to avoid any ambiguity later, perhaps the model articles should be prefaced with "SpaceX" so that this article would be named "SpaceX Falcon 5". --StuffOfInterest 13:11, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Numerals sound good, but i'd disagree with the SpaceX prefix. --Duk 15:48, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

2nd Stage Engine(s)?

The table lists the 2nd stage as having "2 * Kestrel engine (or 1 * Merlin engine)" but on the SpaceX website[3] it says a single merlin engine will be used, and there is no mention of the possiblity of 2 Kestrel engines being used--perhaps this should be changed? --subzero788 4:00, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

done:--Duk 20:29, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Outdated

This page appears to be very outdated. As far as I know, Falcon 5 won't be human rated (that's the Falcon 9), and there is no launch planned for late 2006. Plus the picture doesn't look like the right vehicle, and they changed the design a bit so maybe that's the old design?Fifteen10e56 22:36, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Reusability

How does the Falcon 5 re-use all over again? Do they use parachutes to retrieve it and return it back to launch site? Bigtop 23:32, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Contradiction

The lead paragraph reads:

The Falcon 5 is a two stage to orbit partially reusable launch vehicle designed and manufactured by SpaceX. The first stage includes five Merlin engines and the upper stage includes one Merlin engine. Both burn kerosene/liquid oxygen. Along with the Falcon 9, it will be the world's first fully reusable launcher.

I have highlighted the sections that contradict. Which is correct? --GW_Simulations_{User Page | Talk} 12:47, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

I think some Falcon 1 info snuck in. The Falcon 1 is a partially reusable rocket (stage 1 reused, stage 2 burns up), but the Falcon 5 and 9 are (or were for the 5 now) supposed to be fully reusable (both stages come home). If time permits, I'll try to dig through the SpaceX website for more information. --StuffOfInterest 13:42, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

added ref and removed the {{contradiction}} tag. --Duk 07:48, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Delete page?

Should this rocked have an article? It has been canceled and was never launched. I'm inclined to redirect to Falcon 9. --Duk 02:43, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

The Falcon 9 really is a completely different rocket design from what was put into the Falcon 5. Some significant engineering did go into the Falcon 5, and it was explicitly "advertised" on the SpaceX website. From this perspective, it seems reasonable to give this its own independent article, but admittedly it will be sparse on the information as its development seems to have been abandoned.

More to the point, the Falcon 9 is not the same as the Falcon 5, and these are two completely different vehicles. That they are both a part of the Falcon series of spacecraft is true, and it was hinted that perhaps the Falcon 5 might be re-introduced at some point in the future... even though (I don't believe) that any active engineering effort is going into its development at the moment. Engineers working on the Falcon 5 were re-tasked to the Falcon 9 or elsewhere in the company.

So, no, I don't think this should be merged into the Falcon 9 article and should be maintained as a separate article. --Robert Horning (talk) 03:55, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Strong oppose - just because it never launched is no reason not to include it. It is still notable. --GW_Simulations_{User Page | Talk} 08:55, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

When canceled?

The last SpaceX press release which mentions the Falcon 5 was in December 2005. Are there any references to when SpaceX officially halted development and marketing? A past edit indicated Falcon 5 was removed from the SpaceX website in January 2007. --IanOsgood (talk) 17:27, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

A really excellent source was added to the article on 2010-07-17T07:20:20 by User:GW Simulations, that would seem to indicate the F5 was dropped in 2007. However, still looking for a source to indicate SpaceX explicitly dropped the rocket program. So I think the When is clear; still need to find verifiable info on SpaceX cancellation or not. N2e (talk) 12:34, 17 July 2010 (UTC)