According to his cultists, Elon is a genius who has mastered every branch of science and engineering beyond all human imagination. He can make an electric car! He can make a subway! He can make a rocket!
All of those achievements were fully mastered in 1910. There’s nothing new in any of it.
Now his supposedly most extreme genius, the rocket, fails repeatedly. The latest failure is strongly similar to Chevy Vega’s best failure mode.
The Vega’s chain of stupid errors, as documented in an old Collectible Auto mag:
= = = = = START VEGA:
Another problem involved the two-barrel Rochester carburetor. The engine would shake so badly that it loosened the screws holding the top cover on the float chamber. The top cover would then jump up and down, which activated the accelerator pump, which shot raw gasoline through the cylinders and into the exhaust system. Fuel would then puddle inside the muffler and eventually explode. The early mufflers would blow toward the fuel tank, so later mufflers were designed to blow away from the tank.
= = = = = END VEGA.
And how did the new Vega fail?
= = = = = START ELON:
Well, excessive harmonic vibrations ruptured the fuel lines, creating a gigantic fire that destroyed the entire upper stage mid-flight. This occurred despite the reduced stress placed on the engines and structure itself. Even worse, test flights 7 and 8 were launched using an improved version of Starship, featuring redesigned and strengthened fuel lines to prevent these failures from occurring.
So, why did this solution not work? Well, Starship has a huge thrust problem. Musk and his engineers overestimated the amount of thrust their Raptor engine could produce while designing the Starship. Even Musk himself has publicly stated that Starship can only take less than 50% of its promised payload to orbit, which is likely an overestimate. This means they are forced to cut down on as much of the craft’s weight as possible and push the engines to the limit during launches. Unfortunately, this makes the rocket more fragile and means the engines generate excessive heat and vibrations — which is a perfect recipe for guaranteed failure.
= = = = = END ELON.
Both failed for the same underlying reason, the arrogant stupidity of impaired executives. The only difference is that 1970s car execs were crazed by alcohol, while modern tech execs are crazed by LSD and ketamine.
Reality: Rocket science ain’t rocket science. Rockets are SIMPLE. They’re just big firecrackers. Automobiles are MASSIVELY more complicated than rockets, and their required duties are INFINITELY more complicated. A rocket goes from point A to point B with no sudden stops or re-accelerations in between. It flies through the simplest possible territory, the vacuum of outer space. It doesn’t have to carry a variable number of untrained passengers in comfort through an unknown and ever-changing variety of hills and rough pavement and dense traffic and snow and heat and rain and wind, and it doesn’t have to meet a thousand conflicting regulations and laws.
There’s another difference in the consequences. Elon is a taker and welfare bum, relying on the federal government. SpaceX is entirely welfare bum. Even before he took over the government, there was no chance of losing his welfare. GM was pure maker, relying on customers. After people SAMPLED the Vega and EXPERIENCED its total engine failures, GM lost customers and Toyota won them with real quality.
= = = = =
Footnote for context: GM didn’t NEED to develop a radical non-functional four-cylinder engine for the Vega. It already had a solid reliable four, first developed for the Chevy II in 1962 and thoroughly debugged by 1970. The drunk CEO wanted to develop a brand new engine that nobody else had tried before, and then shorted out the testing process so his ego trip was guaranteed to win. Even worse, the CEO collaborated with his drinking buddy who was CEO of Norfolk Southern Railroad. The drunk buddies decided that Vegas must be shipped VERTICALLY to fit more of them into a railroad car, which would give buddy’s railroad a monopoly on shipping. The VERTICAL shipping required even more degradation in the engine design because the cars ALSO had to be shipped with oil in the crankcase and gas in the tank for no good reason. Several expensive features had to be added to prevent the oil and gas from leaking out during shipment, so the buddies could pretend to be saving some pennies.
If anyone had been able to say NO to the drunk asshole, the Vega could have been a decent car like the original Chevy II. And now we’re back to similarities again.
Polistra's Mill 