Thread by @KerbalSystems

Wake up babes, EcoRocket Heavy just dropped and uh, you might want to strap in, gorg, because this is coconuts. Please keep all hands, arms, feet, and legs inside the bird app at all times, and enjoy the thread:

So let's break down this monster. And you'd better believe it's a monster. This thing is THIRTY FOUR METERS in diameter.

Ok, first things first, why does this thing even exist? Well here's the deal: ARCA is pivoting once again from small launch to, get this, ASTEROID MINING. I guess they figured that the market for a 10kg to orbit rocket is...rather limited

So let's talk about the rocket: first things first, it's a three stage rocket that uses concentric staging. So that means that the stages aren't stacked on top of each other, but arranged as rings around each other, with the outermost ring igniting then dropping off in sequence.

The first two stages are water powered, and the third stage is kerosine/hydrogen peroxide. It's 30 meters wide and has a launch mass of 5,630 TONS. That's on par with Starship (according to Wiki anyway)

Now, this monstrosity isn't really intended for commercial orbital launch, as far as I can tell, but only to support their asteroid mining operations. So they've got a new vehicle to do that, called the AMi Cargo.

This thing does the actual asteroid mining. It uses water as propellant once again, using a system they call "electric arc propulsion," whatever that is*

This contraption will actually approach the asteroid, mine it for rare-earth materials (they seem to mostly be interested in platinum), and then return it to Earth in the Return Capsule, which they don't explain much about

Ok, so the part you've all been waiting for: does this actually make sense? In short, no.

Let's start with the rocket. With some admittedly very limited and lame calculations (considering I only know the wet mass of the entire stack and the rough ISP of each stage), I found it should have the 𝚫V to put ~5 tons in orbit (rounded up)

I phrase that very carefully, because that's not really the payload to orbit for a couple of reasons. First, it uses a rather generous ISP for the first two stages. It also doesn't account for the ENORMOUS drag, gravity losses, or the fact that the upper stage isn't payload.

But let's go with 5 tons to orbit (if someone who's better at this than I am wants to redo the calculations with something better than an internet calculator, please do). Our first problem is that the AMi Cargo vehicle is expected to weigh twenty tons.

Hell, just the FUEL for it is going to be 17,000 kilograms. So according to my calculations, they'll need four launches to actually get the thing to orbit. They're planning to do it in one.

Also, the "electric-arc propulsion" on the AMi Cargo is going to need to be ABSURDLY efficient. A cursory google search didn't turn up much, but they're talking about this thing being able to burn for over 5 days on end.

Anyway in order to JUST do the ejection to the asteroid, it'll need an ISP of around 200, which is much higher than their current system.

Ok finally, let's talk about the money. If the above hasn't convinced you that this is bullshit, this will.

They estimate that they need a hundred million dollars to pull this all off. First and foremost, this is nowhere near enough. Getting asteroid mining up and running is going to take BILLIONS. It took Boeing $7 billion to complete the Dreamliner development program.

And building a new airliner costs that much, what amounts to probably the most ambitious commercial space program in the world right now is probably going to take a similar amount. Not $100,000,000, that's for sure.

But let's pretend that number is actually enough to do this. How do they intend on raising it? Well, the majority is expected to come through crypto bullshit. They're launching their own token at some point in the future, and expecting to make ~$70 million from that.

And considering the state of the crypto economy right now, I think we can dismiss that as absurd. But even more absurd is how they're expecting to raise the rest.

They're expecting to raise 2.4 million dollars off MERCH SALES. I doubt SpaceX makes that much off their merch, and they probably have the most profitable merch department of any space company (since NASA doesn't profit off their ubiquitous merch).

Also probably worth noting that their merch store has yet to come online.
Another $2.4 million is expected to come from "sponsorships" from various companies, the details of which are remarkably thin considering how much money they're hoping to make from it.

Finally and most damning, they're expecting to cover about a million dollars' worth of costs through VOLUNTEER WORK. So they're essentially relying on people BUILDING ROCKETS FOR FREE to make up the last million dollars.

And while Copenhagen Suborbitals is doing some great work, I think they'd be the first to admit that they're not going to be mining any asteroids with a volunteer space agency. Or reaching orbit at all (it's right there in the name, after all).

So in conclusion, this is as loony-tunes as everything else ARCA says. I'd also like to end by noting that the newly-rebranded EcoRocket demonstrator is supposed to fly this year and that they expect to return asteroids by the end of the decade, an absurd timeframe.

So thanks for reading, and @SciGuySpace you're welcome for writing your article for you.

That asterisk was for Arcjet propulsion, which according to the wiki is a thing that Lockheed has been using for a while, but only with hydrazine.

All of this comes from their white paper:
amiexploration.com/_files/ugd/b4b…

oh my god ok so I apparently did not scroll far enough because they give details on the mass of everything and these guys are fucking high

ok so each propulsion module weighs 10,340kg wet, and there's 420 of them on S1
we're gonna do some complex math here so try to stay with me:
10,340kg*420 = 4,342,800kg
4,342,800kg/1000 = 4,342 metric tons
SO WHY DO THEY SAY IT ONLY WEIGHS 4,200 TONS?!

note: I kind of just made up the term "concentric staging" because I wasn't aware that it already had a name: "onion staging"

Oh by the way, here's a shot from Arca's instagram showing a mockup of the return capsule in their Graveyard of Abandoned Projects