How much fuel does the Falcon Heavy use? What is the price RP-1?

Question

Does anyone know how much fuel the Falcon Heavy can hold, the RP-1 fuel and liquid oxygen as oxidizer, and how much of that will it use to get to a certain point?

I don't know how i would calculate something like this. And the price of RP-1 is something I can't get a good answer on.

score 13 · Accepted Answer · edited Dec 10 '18 at 15:46

13

SpaceX doesn't publish this, but Spaceflight101 usually has pretty good estimates for this sort of data.

Core and boosters, each:

LOX Mass 287,430 kg
RP-1 Mass 123,570 kg

Second stage:

LOX Mass* 75,200kg
RP-1 Mass* 32,300kg

The cost of fueling a Falcon 9 is in the region of \$200,000 (for LOX plus RP-1), so a Falcon Heavy would be 2.5 times that, or \$0.5 million.

LOX costs in the region of \$0.20/kg, so (using the \$200k figure above) RP-1 would then be \$1,20/kg.

edited Dec 10 '18 at 15:46

Carl Kevinson

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answered Dec 10 '18 at 12:15

Hobbes

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is the 0.5 mil. included in the 90 million they need for each launch? – Pjotr Dec 10 '18 at 13:07
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@Pjotr: I think they ask for $90 million, but that's income not cost. – MSalters Dec 10 '18 at 13:24
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@MSalters To nitpick, that would be the price or revenue (income is after expenses). – chrylis -cautiouslyoptimistic- Dec 10 '18 at 19:04
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@chrylis Income is ambiguous - it can mean revenue (pre expenses) or earnings (net expenses.) – corsiKa Dec 10 '18 at 19:53
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This is a great example of why fuel efficiency is much less of a concern than re-usability from a cost standpoint. (it is a big deal when considering delta v however) A major portion of the cost is the initial (and continuing) engineering, initial manufacturing, and servicing in-between flights. – Aaron Dec 10 '18 at 21:05
@Pjotr Here's an interesting estimate of the costs involved in a SpaceX launch. It's just an estimate, but it gives some perspective of all the costs which go into even a reusable rocket. It's not gas-n-go. – Schwern Dec 10 '18 at 22:01
Is LOX really cheaper than RP-1? – ikrase Apr 08 '20 at 06:14

How much fuel does the Falcon Heavy use? What is the price RP-1?

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