Will Starship fail in its zero-degree AoA deadzone?
4
100Ṁ91
2028
28%
chance

All current & previous designs of Starship have no means of aerodynamic control when at an AoA of zero degrees, because the axis of rotation of all flaps is coplanar. In the image below, if the ship ends up facing the oncoming air directly nose-first, no flap configuration could impart any torque on the ship. It's unclear to me whether cold-gas thruster system could recover the vehicle from such a flight mode. See the image of Starship from head-on for detail:

This question resolves YES when the ship enters such a flight regime and is unable to recover, and NO when a future revision of Starship removes the control surface root coplanarity (or when the program is cancelled/all future launches are called off, etc).

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This market has no resolution condition that doesn't revolve around the creator being right about the design weakness. Would be nice to actually have a market that tests your proposition in some way, rather than ... this.

@BorisBartlog The question is "will starship fail because its flap roots are coplanar?"

That is true and it does mean the control surfaces lose aerodynamic control at zero AoA.

https://manifold.markets/iwakura/will-starship-fail-in-its-zerodegre#4b8s3co3hz

@iwakura Yes, yes. And if it doesn't fail for this reason by some date, the market resolves no?

...oh, wait! No, the market can only resolve 'NO' if kira is totally right and they change the design! No number of successful flights would be enough to resolve it 'NO'!

Seriously.

@BorisBartlog If you think it will not fail, then bet NO! Pull out whenever you want the liquidity. You don't need to agree with resolution criteria or believe that the market maker will even resolve the question honestly to trade on it with your beliefs—we do this with stocks all the time.

@iwakura That means tying up mana and it never resolves because they never change the design because they can and do use RCS for attitude control.

When you want liquidity and have to trade, it will probably be at a worse higher %. Basically it is a bad idea to bet on this market. Well ok probably sensible to bet no if it is trading at 99% but I think it will take a long time to get there.

Are you taking into account center of gravity? If the flaps are actuated all in the same direction, the ship's CoG would shift such that it would probably no longer free-fall in vertical orientation.

Anyhow, your resolution criteria have nothing for "this isn't actually a problem and doesn't need to be fixed via design change", for any of many reasons (engine gimbal, unequal engine thrust even without gimbal, CoG, ACS, some instability of a 0-degree AoA such that it would inherently depart that angle, etc.).

@SeekingEternity If you think it's not a problem, then bet NO to push the probability down to what you think is accurate, and sell whenever you want the liquidity. The market will only resolve YES when it actually happens, and remain unresolved as long as the flap roots are coplanar; indefinitely if the design isn't ever changed.

During the powered parts of the flight, there's also engine gimbal. I think it's fine (source: I played Kerbal Space Program).

@ProjectVictory During powered flight, yeah. Raptors have gimbal, but RVacs don't, and I'm unsure if ignition could be done on short notice to escape the deadzone (or if the torque their gimbal would impart on the ship would even be enough)

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