Sometimes people just don't know what they've got

Until they lose it.



After playing around with the rocket equation, I noticed that the mass lifted to orbit is reminding me of something. Take a look at this:

Look at the numbers on the far right.  Eight tons to get off the moon!  But Apollo did it with five!

Note also that you can get to lunar orbit with a 50% usable mass. Getting to Earth orbit is a lot tougher. You might get 3-5%.




The thing to notice here is that the mass at LEO is equivalent in size to the early versions of the Falcon 9. That would be the one that didn't have re-usability.



Do notice that the Falcon 9 is much more powerful now, but it still doesn't lift all that much more than the original... Not to knock his accomplishments here, but if you want to get a crap load of stuff into orbit, the reusable angle is not necessarily the best way to go. One more thing, a Falcon 9 in orbit can get a decent mass on the moon. It's delta-v was good enough to get to orbit. That's about 9.5 km/sec. Nothing to sneeze at.


Update:

This post's title really means losing an opportunity.  The opportunity to do the Artemis mission is soon.  It wouldn't take much more to make this a reality.  If for some reason his dreams of rapid reusability fall short, Musk may look back on a lost opportunity with regret.  Hence the title.  He may not know what he has.  I can't see the reason for pursuing reusability with this much haste.  Getting all this much mass in orbit will enable the very things he says he wants to do.  It may take a lot longer than he thinks to get his ideas fleshed out.  Meanwhile, this opportunity to establish a permanent beach head on another world may die from a lack of attention.