However looking at Wikipedia, it seems that Starship is supposed to weigh around 500,000 pounds empty, and will have 6 raptors. Each raptor can produce between 200,000 to 500,000 pounds of force. So it is theoretically possible to hover on them.
However Elon wants to land on Mars. There a single raptor produces more thrust than is needed to hold up the ship. So you're back in suicide burn territory.
But Starship is supposed to have 6 raptors while SH to have (in current designs) 37. So there is hope that
this seems to be what could make this a possibility.
it'll take some work but the video highlights this strongly: falcon is light-weight & with modest throttling. it's gonna land, and just barely drop velocity, wherever it was pointed. there's so much thrust to weight & not enough fine throttling that running the engines for a bit isn't gonna help let it position itself.
ss & sh are heavy as heck. as much as throttle-ability my gut feel is that it's really the mass that helps make hoveribility-positioning sensible. some ability to get to the area & correct, & then land. there's enough mass that a bunch of burning isn't going to immediately blast the craft away again.
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Starship and SH are (AFAIK) meant to be able to hover (more thrust/more throttle-able than F9) so the suicide burn shouldn’t be an issue
I can't find anything definitive on that.
However looking at Wikipedia, it seems that Starship is supposed to weigh around 500,000 pounds empty, and will have 6 raptors. Each raptor can produce between 200,000 to 500,000 pounds of force. So it is theoretically possible to hover on them.
However Elon wants to land on Mars. There a single raptor produces more thrust than is needed to hold up the ship. So you're back in suicide burn territory.
But Starship is supposed to have 6 raptors while SH to have (in current designs) 37. So there is hope that
Starships probably won’t be landing on Mars empty. They will have up to 100t (220klb) of cargo, and maybe some extra fuel.
Even at 0.4G that should be more than 200klb, they’ll probably need two engines to hover.
this seems to be what could make this a possibility.
it'll take some work but the video highlights this strongly: falcon is light-weight & with modest throttling. it's gonna land, and just barely drop velocity, wherever it was pointed. there's so much thrust to weight & not enough fine throttling that running the engines for a bit isn't gonna help let it position itself.
ss & sh are heavy as heck. as much as throttle-ability my gut feel is that it's really the mass that helps make hoveribility-positioning sensible. some ability to get to the area & correct, & then land. there's enough mass that a bunch of burning isn't going to immediately blast the craft away again.
that's what I got from the video, at least.