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SpaceX outfits first orbital-class Starship booster with grid fins, Raptor engines
In the space of two days, SpaceX has outfitted Starship’s first orbital-class Super Heavy booster with four car-sized grid fins, stacked the rocket to its full height, and begun the process of installing up to 29 Raptor engines.
As part of what CEO Elon Musk has described as a “Starbase Surge,” SpaceX has reportedly sent hundreds of employees normaly stationed in California, Florida, and Central Texas to Boca Chica. There, SpaceX has been working for months to build Starship’s first orbital launch pad and first orbital-class ship and booster and prepare all three for an inaugural “Orbital Test Flight” as quickly as possible. Originally scheduled to occur no later than July 2021, Musk’s extremely ambitious target unsurprisingly came and went but SpaceX appears to be well on its way to an “aim for the Moon; miss; fall among the stars” situation as all the parts of Starship’s orbital launch debut begin to come together.
In the last few days, it’s become abundantly clear that SpaceX is likely moving faster than even its most optimistic followers expected.
On July 30th, after less than two days of assembly, Super Heavy Booster 4’s completed (upper) methane tank stack – 13 rings and ~25m (85 ft) tall was briefly rolled out of SpaceX’s Boca Chica ‘high bay.’ A few hours later, the booster tank was rolled back in and SpaceX technicians kicked off the installation of four car-sized steel grid fins. A day and a half later, all four fins were installed.
Unlike the famous cast titanium grid fins on Falcon boosters, Super Heavy’s fins are built out of welded steel (much heavier but magnitudes cheaper) and not designed to retract, meaning that they will remain in their deployed configuration at all times. While also allowing for a much simpler design, B4’s fixed (but rotatable) grid fins will also make it dramatically easier to catch Super Heavy boosters – as Elon Musk has said is the plan – on their grid fins using a giant tower with arms.
Almost immediately after the last grid fin was installed, SpaceX moved Super Heavy B4’s larger (aft) liquid oxygen tank stack onto a stand optimized for transport and stacked the newly finned methane tank on top of the rocket, raising it to its full ~65m (~215 ft) height. After stacking, it takes a team of SpaceX welders at least several hours to join the two steel booster sections into one monolithic rocket.
At the same time as technicians were working to complete Booster 4’s airframe, SpaceX accepted delivery of no less than five Raptor engines, raising the total number of engines delivered in the last five days to at least 18 – including two Raptor Vacuum variants for Starship S20.
In a sign of the breakneck pace SpaceX is working at, teams began installing Raptor engines on Booster 4 before its two halves were fully welded together. In a matter of hours, no less than 12 Raptor Boost (RB) engines have been rolled out of one of SpaceX’s three Boca Chica factory tents and lined up for installation on the first flightworthy Super Heavy. Requiring 29 engines total, it’s not implausible that SpaceX is attempt to fully outfit Booster 4 with all of its Raptors before rolling the rocket down the road to the orbital launch pad.
According to Elon Musk, SpaceX could attempt to install the Super Heavy booster on the pad’s launch mount/table (integrated just days ago) as early as “~Tuesday” and the company has already filed for transport-related road closure on Monday afternoon.
Elon Musk
Why automakers keep turning down Elon Musk’s Tesla Full Self-Driving offer
Elon Musk confirms no automaker has ever accepted Tesla’s offer to license Full Self-Driving software.
Elon Musk gave a brief answer on X Monday that confirmed that Tesla’s standing offer to license Full Self-Driving to other automakers still has zero takers. Sawyer Merritt wrote that “Tesla has for years openly invited other automakers to license FSD. None of them have accepted,” responding to a prediction from Boom Supersonic founder Blake Scholl that Tesla would eventually open FSD the way it opened its Supercharger network to rival brands. Musk’s reply to Merritt was one word: “Exactly.”
It is not the first time Musk has made this point. He said something similar in November, when he called legacy automakers reluctance to adopt FSD “crazy,” and Tesla has floated the offer publicly since at least 2021. Scholl’s prediction touches on something real. Once NACS became the de facto charging standard, adoption from Ford, GM, Rivian and others followed within about a year. FSD licensing was supposed to work the same way once Tesla built enough of a lead that switching made sense for everyone.
Tesla has for years openly invited other automakers to license FSD. None of them have accepted. https://t.co/kgz4idpoUM
— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) September 22, 2026
The case for licensing now is stronger than it was two years ago. Waymo and Zoox are logging hundreds of thousands of unsupervised autonomous miles, along with Tesla’s own Robotaxi fleet. Every automaker still selling driver assist systems that lag FSD has given the robotaxi conversation to Tesla, Waymo and Zoox by default. Licensing FSD would let a GM or a Ford compete on the same field without spending a decade and billions of dollars building a stack from scratch, the same argument Tesla made when it opened the Supercharger network to bring more EVs onto its chargers.
But FSD is not a connector standard. As one reply to Musk’s post pointed out, licensing FSD is not a software license the way NACS was a plug spec. It requires adopting Tesla’s eight camera layout and its onboard compute architecture, meaning a licensee’s cars would effectively become Tesla hardware wearing someone else’s badge. That is the visible obstacle. The less visible one is data. A licensed FSD stack would report back the same telemetry Tesla collects from its own fleet, giving Tesla a continuous read on how a competitor’s cars are actually driven, where they struggle, and how often drivers intervene. For an automaker trying to build its own autonomy program, or simply trying to keep its build quality and safety record private, handing Tesla that visibility could be a bigger cost than the hardware bill. It is the reason the Supercharger comparison only goes so far. Opening a charging plug cost Tesla very little. Opening FSD would cost a rival something it cannot get back.
Tesla has reopened reservations for its long-delayed next-generation Roadster, asking buyers for a $50,000 deposit just days before an October 1 reveal event in Waco, Texas. The move revives a reservation process first launched in 2017 and later paused when Tesla pulled pricing from its website in 2021.
The reservation page requires an immediate $5,000 credit-card payment, described as fully refundable, followed by a $45,000 wire transfer due within 10 days, which is identical to what was expected previously. Reservations are not considered final until the wire clears.
The structure matches the 2017 terms Tesla used when it first collected deposits after unveiling a prototype. Tesla has not published a confirmed retail price or production start date on the order page.
Go buy a Roadster pic.twitter.com/n7rhouAmIS
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) September 21, 2026
The October 1 event is scheduled in Waco, about 90 minutes north of Tesla’s Austin headquarters and near SpaceX’s McGregor rocket test site. Tesla sent invitations to existing reservation holders and posted a “Go for launch” teaser on September 12.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) established a temporary flight restriction over the McGregor area from September 18 through October 2, consistent with plans for a demonstration involving SpaceX-designed cold-gas thrusters. Elon Musk has previously described the optional package as enabling extreme acceleration or brief hovering. Tesla has said the event will include pricing, specifications, and production targets.
The second-generation Roadster was first shown in November 2017 during Tesla’s Semi launch. Musk promised production in 2020, with claimed performance of 0-60 mph in 1.9 seconds, more than 250 mph top speed, and roughly 620 miles of range.
Those targets have slipped repeatedly.
Tesla later pointed to 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025-2026 before indicating production would not begin until 2027 or 2028 at Gigafactory Texas. Design work has continued, with reports of a sharper, Cybertruck-influenced look replacing the original curvy prototype.
Original reservation holders who paid $50,000 in 2017, or $250,000 for the Founders Series, have waited nearly nine years without a production car. Some high-profile customers canceled. Tesla’s decision to reopen orders now, after previously shutting them down, tests whether new buyers will commit substantial funds before seeing a finalized production vehicle. The October 1 event is intended to answer remaining questions about what those buyers will actually receive and when.
Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (Supervised) is heading to Czechia after the Czech Ministry of Transport recognised the Dutch RDW’s provisional type approval, making the country the seventh EU member state to clear the system for public roads. Tesla Europe announced on 21 September 2026 that “FSD Supervised is now approved in Czechia” and that rollout “will begin soon.”
The decision marks a notable reversal. Earlier in 2026, Prague had declined to automatically recognise the Netherlands’ April approval, citing concerns over speed-limit compliance, traffic-sign recognition and driver-attention monitoring, and arguing that a coordinated EU approach was preferable. Officials said months of expert review, talks with Tesla and other member states, and real-world data from countries already using the system resolved those issues.
🚨 Tesla FSD heading to Czechia 🇨🇿 pic.twitter.com/mkzlM9QjrB
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) September 21, 2026
“Safety remains the top priority,” the ministry stated.
FSD Supervised remains a Level 2 driver-assistance system: the driver must stay engaged and is legally responsible. Eligible vehicles need AI4, the company’s most up-to-date hardware version. Tesla is expected to push the feature over the air in the coming days, following the pattern seen after earlier national approvals.
Europe’s rollout began when Dutch regulator RDW issued a provisional EU type approval on 10 April 2026 after extensive testing. Mutual recognition then produced a rapid cascade: Lithuania (20 May), Estonia (29 May), Denmark (9 June), Belgium (10 June) and Slovenia (7 September). Czechia now completes that list of seven.
The approvals cover only a modest share of the EU population, but they add political weight ahead of a 6 October vote by the Technical Committee on Motor Vehicles. A qualified majority, at least 15 of 27 member states representing 65 percent of the EU population, could open the remaining markets, including large ones such as Germany, France, Italy and Spain that have so far preferred to wait for a bloc-wide decision.
For Czech Tesla owners, the immediate prize is access to the same supervised highway and city driving already available in the other six countries. For Tesla, each new market generates additional European driving data and strengthens the case that FSD Supervised can operate safely under the continent’s varied road rules. The Czech approval is therefore both a local milestone and another incremental step toward a wider European launch.
Why automakers keep turning down Elon Musk’s Tesla Full Self-Driving offer
Tesla Roadster is available for order once again following brief hold
