What is the reason for installing 27 small engines instead of a powerful engine on SpaceX's super large rocket "Falcon Heavy"

Successful launch on February 6, 2018 (Tue)SpaceXof"Falcon Heavy"Three boosters are used to gain the thrust of escaping the gravity zone of the earth, but one booster has nine small engines. In other words, we correctly controlled the total of 27 engines and succeeded in launching. Even if we go back to the history of the past, we can see that the launch of a rocket equipped with more than 10 engines besides "Falcon Heavy" has not succeeded and it is a predecessor record. Why is "Falcon Heavy" adopting a complicated design policy, why is it the CEO of SpaceXEarlon maskHe is speaking.

Musk explains why SpaceX prefers clusters of small engines | Ars Technica
https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/02/musks-inspiration-for-27-engines-modern-computer-clusters/

A rocket with more than nine engines in the past and successfully launched is SpaceX's "Falcon 9"WhenRocket Labof"ElectronThere are only two of them. Therefore, the achievement of successful launch by controlling 27 engines of "Falcon Heavy" is expected to further advance rocket development in the future. From 1969 to 1972, the Soviets used 30 engines "N-1It tried launching many times, there is the fact that all failed.

Mr. Mask said, "As there was no mistake in the N-1 rocket, did not you fear not to stack a lot of engines?", "There is no fear, N-1 Failure, mainlyAvionicsI have been remembering that there was a fire in the engine with the trouble of the engine. "It seems that there was conviction that" If it is SpaceX, it will work better "as of the 50th day of the month has elapsed.


Mr. Mask launched a policy to extend the number of engines to 27, in order to let the larger rocket escape from the gravity region of the earth by developing "Falcon 9" rocket with nine engines. Mr. Mask explains the computer system as an example for "Why did you decide to extend one engine rather than power it?"

"In the case of Google and Amazon, even if the number decreases due to a computer failure or the like, the content and performance of the service,responseIt has little effect. This is because it is realized with many small computers. That is, use one large machine like the mainframeLegacyIn the approach, 'machine failure = system stop' will result. "

ByR. Crap Mariner

According to Mr. Mask, "When you build a system with a lot of small computers, it's smarter, so it's more efficient and can be quickly created than using a high-performance computer, The same can be said about rocket engines,RedundancyIt is more expensive to build redundant, same-scale powerful engines using a lot of small engines than to build a powerful engine without time over time, "says Citizen. In fact, "Falcon Heavy" is designed to be launchable even if up to six engines fail.


Success of "Falcon Heavy" is a bigger rocket SpaceX next prepared "Big Falcon RocketIt also leads to the success of BFR. Currently, BFR is under development at Hawthorne, California where SpaceX headquarters is located. In boosters developed for BFR, there will be four more engines than "Falcon Heavy", totaling 31 engines will be installed. Furthermore, the sea surface thrust per engine is twice the performance of "Falcon Heavy". If this BFR launch is successful, a more powerful rocket will come out.