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SpaceX rocket catch simulation raises more questions about concept
CEO Elon Musk has published the first official visualization of what SpaceX’s plans to catch Super Heavy boosters might look like in real life. However, the simulation he shared raises just as many questions as it answers.
Since at least late 2020, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has been floating the idea of catching Starships and Super Heavy boosters out of the sky as an alternative to having the several-dozen-ton steel rockets use basic legs to land on the ground. This would be a major departure from SpaceX’s highly successful Falcon family, which land on a relatively complex set of deployable legs that can be retracted after most landings. The flexible, lightweight structures have mostly been reliable and easily reusable but Falcon boosters occasionally have rough landings, which can use up disposable shock absorbers or even damage the legs and make boosters hard to safely recover and slower to reuse.
As a smaller rocket, Falcon boosters have to be extremely lightweight to ensure healthy payload margins and likely weigh about 25-30 tons empty and 450 tons fully fueled – an excellent mass ratio for a reusable rocket. While it’s still good to continue that practice of rigorous mass optimization with Starship, the vehicle is an entirely different story. Once plans to stretch the Starship upper stage’s tanks and add three more Raptors are realized, it’s quite possible that Starship will be capable of launching more than 200 tons (~440,000 lb) of payload to low Earth orbit (LEO) with ship and booster recovery.
One might think that SpaceX, with the most capable rocket ever built potentially on its hands, would want to take advantage of that unprecedented performance to make the rocket itself – also likely to be one of the most complex launch vehicles ever – simpler and more reliable early on in the development process. Generally speaking, that would involve sacrificing some of its payload capability and adding systems that are heavier but simpler and more robust. Once Starship is regularly flying to orbit and gathering extensive flight experience and data, SpaceX might then be able refine the rocket, gradually reducing its mass and improving payload to orbit by optimizing or fully replacing suboptimal systems and designs.
Instead, SpaceX appears to be trying to substantially optimize Starship before it’s attempted a single orbital launch. The biggest example is Elon Musk’s plan to catch Super Heavy boosters – and maybe Starships, too – for the sole purpose of, in his own words, “[saving] landing leg mass [and enabling] immediate reflight of [a giant, unwieldy rocket].” Musk, SpaceX executives, or both appear to be attempting to refine a rocket that has never flown. Further, based on a simulation of a Super Heavy “catch” Musk shared on January 20th, all that oddly timed effort may end up producing a solution that’s actually worse than what it’s trying to replace.
Based on the simulated telemetry shown in the visualization, Super Heavy’s descent to the landing zone appears to be considerably gentler than the ‘suicide burn’ SpaceX routinely uses on Falcon. By decelerating as quickly as possible and making landing burns as short as possible, Falcon saves a considerable amount of propellant during recovery – extra propellant that, if otherwise required, would effectively increase Falcon’s dry mass and decrease its payload to orbit. In the Super Heavy “catch” Musk shared, the booster actually appears to be landing – just on an incredibly small patch of steel on the tower’s ‘Mechazilla’ arms instead of a concrete pad on the ground.
Aside from a tiny bit of lateral motion, the arms appear motionless during the ‘catch,’ making it more of a landing. Further, Super Heavy is shown decelerating rather slowly throughout the simulation and appears to hover for almost 10 seconds near the end. That slow, cautious descent and even slower touchdown may be necessary because of how incredibly accurate Super Heavy has to be to land on a pair of hardpoints with inches of lateral margin for error and maybe a few square feet of usable surface area. The challenge is a bit like if SpaceX, for some reason, made Falcon boosters land on two elevated ledges about as wide as car tires. Aside from demanding accurate rotational control, even the slightest lateral deviation would cause the booster to topple off the pillars and – in the case of Super Heavy – fall about a hundred feet onto concrete, where it would obviously explode.
What that slow descent and final hover mean is that the Super Heavy landing shown would likely cost significantly more delta V (propellant) than a Falcon-style suicide burn. Propellant has mass, so Super Heavy would likely need to burn at least 5-10 tons more to carefully land on arms that aren’t actively matching the booster’s position and velocity. Ironically, SpaceX could probably quite easily add rudimentary, fixed legs – removing most of the bad aspects of Falcon legs – to Super Heavy with a mass budget of 10 tons. But even if SpaceX were to make those legs as simple, dumb, and reliable as physically possible and they wound up weighing 20 tons total, the inherent physics of rocketry mean that adding 20 tons to Super Heavy’s likely 200-ton dry mass would only reduce the rocket’s payload to orbit by about 3-5 tons or 1-3%.
Further, per Musk’s argument that landing on the arms would enhance the speed of reuse, it’s difficult to see how landing Super Heavy or Starship in the exact same corridor – but on the ground instead of on the arms – would change anything. If Super Heavy is accurate enough to land on a few square meters of steel, it must inherently be accurate enough to land within the far larger breadth of those arms. The only process landing on the arms would clearly remove is reattaching the arms to a landed booster or ship, which it’s impossible to imagine would save more than a handful of minutes or maybe an hour of work. SpaceX’s Falcon booster turnaround record is currently 27 days, so it’s even harder to imagine why SpaceX would be worrying about cutting minutes or a few hours off of the turnaround and reuse of a rocket that has never even performed a full static fire test – let alone attempted an orbital-class launch, reentry, or landing.
Put simply, while Starbase’s launch tower arms will undoubtedly be useful for quickly lifting and stacking Super Heavy and Starship, it’s looking more and more likely that using those arms as a landing platform will, at best, be an inferior alternative to basic Falcon-style landings. More importantly, even if everything works perfectly, the arms actually cooperate with boosters to catch them, and it’s possible for Super Heavy to avoid hovering and use a more efficient suicide burn, the apparent best-case outcome of all that effort is marginally faster reuse and perhaps a 5% increase in payload to orbit. Only time will tell if such a radical change proves to be worth such marginal benefits.
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Tesla Semi is already winning over truck drivers
The consensus among participants is clear: the Semi feels quieter, quicker, and far less physically demanding than diesel rigs while delivering three times the power and dramatically lower operating costs.
Tesla’s all-electric Semi is proving more than just a flashy concept as it is winning converts among the professionals who know trucks best.
As fleets roll out Pilot Programs for Tesla across North America, drivers are raving about the Class 8 electric truck’s unique features, including a centered driver’s seat, massive touchscreen visibility, instant torque, and absence of gear-shifting fatigue.
These features are transforming long days behind the wheel into noticeably easier, less stressful shifts.
Tesla Semi pricing revealed after company uncovers trim levels
In a recent Wall Street Journal profile of early pilots, Dakota Shearer of IMC Logistics described backing out of a tight spot he had mistakenly entered:
“I backed right out of there, no problem. It’s like I’d never done it in the first place. That right there showed me that the technology the Tesla has makes a big difference.”
His colleague Angel Rodriguez of Hight Logistics, who switched from a 13-speed diesel, agreed:
“It’s just easier on your body. It’s less stressful because you’re not really having to engage the clutch and the stick shift.”
Veteran drivers in other tests echo the same enthusiasm. Tom Sterba, a Senior Driver at Saia, spent days testing the Semi and came away impressed with the navigation and overall feel:
“The navigation systems in these trucks are just unbelievable. That’s what I love about it.”
Sterba summed up the experience with a line that has since gone viral among trucking circles:
“I hope I retire in this truck.”
Pilot programs with ArcBest, thyssenkrupp Supply Chain Services, and Mone Transport delivered similar feedback. Drivers consistently praised the center-seat layout for eliminating blind spots, the smooth acceleration, and the overall comfort and safety.
Real-world data backed the hype, as ArcBest logged thousands of miles at efficient consumption rates, even over the challenging routes, like Donner Pass, while other fleets beat Tesla’s own efficiency targets.
The consensus among participants is clear: the Semi feels quieter, quicker, and far less physically demanding than diesel rigs while delivering three times the power and dramatically lower operating costs.
The latest chapter in the Semi’s story arrived just days ago on Jay Leno’s Garage, as Leno became the first outsider to drive the updated long-range production model, joined by Tesla Chief Designer Franz von Holzhausen, and Semi Program Director Dan Priestley.
Tesla reveals various improvements to the Semi in new piece with Jay Leno
The episode revealed major upgrades heading to volume production this year: the truck sheds roughly 1,000 pounds, adopts a 48-volt architecture, switches to fully electric steering with Cybertruck-derived actuators, and uses 4680 battery cells engineered for an over-one-million-mile lifespan.
Aerodynamics improved, enabling a 500-mile range on the long-haul version, and about 325 miles on the shorter-wheelbase standard-range model. Megachargers can now deliver up to 1.2 megawatts, adding roughly 300 miles in about 30 minutes.
Leno hauled heavy loads and marveled at the turning radius and effortless power delivery. “I don’t feel like I’m pulling anything,” he said during the episode.
With hundreds of Semis already accumulating over 13.5 million fleet miles and high uptime, the future of heavy-duty trucking looks electric. Drivers are giving raving reviews, and they’re ready to climb aboard the electric trucking industry for good.
Investor's Corner
Tesla and SpaceX to merge in 2027, Wall Street analyst predicts
The move, Ives argues, is no longer a distant possibility but a logical next step, fueled by deepening operational ties, shared AI ambitions, and Elon Musk’s vision for dominating the next era of technology.
Tesla and SpaceX are two of Elon Musk’s most popular and notable companies, but a new note from one Wall Street analyst claims the two companies will become one sometime next year, as 2027 could see the dawn of a new horizon.
In a bold new research note, Wedbush analyst Dan Ives has reaffirmed his long-standing prediction: Tesla and SpaceX will merge in 2027.
The move, Ives argues, is no longer a distant possibility but a logical next step, fueled by deepening operational ties, shared AI ambitions, and Elon Musk’s vision for dominating the next era of technology.
He writes:
“Still Expect Tesla and SpaceX to Merge in 2027. We continue to believe that SpaceX and Tesla will eventually merge into one company in 2027 with the groundwork already in place for both operations to become one organization. Tesla already owns a stake in SpaceX after the company’s $2 billion investment in xAI got converted to SpaceX shares following SpaceX’s acquisition of xAI earlier this year initially tying both of Musk’s ventures closer together but still represents <1% of SpaceX’s expected valuation. The recent announcement of a joint Terafab facility between SpaceX and Tesla further ties both operations together making it more feasible to merge operations given the now existing overlap being built out across the two with this the first step.”
The groundwork is already being laid. Earlier this year, SpaceX acquired xAI, converting Tesla’s $2 billion investment in the AI startup into a small equity stake, less than 1 percent, in SpaceX.
Regulatory filings cleared the transaction in March 2026, formally linking the two Musk-led companies financially for the first time. Then came the announcement of a joint TERAFAB facility in Austin, Texas: two advanced chip factories, one dedicated to Tesla’s AI needs for vehicles and Optimus robots, the other targeting space-based data centers.
Elon Musk launches TERAFAB: The $25B Tesla-SpaceXAI chip factory that will rewire the AI industry
Ives calls Terafab the “first step” toward full operational integration.
SpaceX’s impending IPO, expected as soon as mid-June 2026, will turbocharge these plans. The company aims to raise approximately $75 billion at a roughly $1.75 trillion valuation, far exceeding earlier estimates.
Proceeds will fund Starship rocket flights, a NASA-contracted lunar base, expanded Starlink services across maritime, aviation, and direct-to-mobile applications, and crucially, orbital AI infrastructure
A major driver is the exploding demand for AI compute. U.S. data centers are projected to consume 470 TWh of electricity by 2030, constrained by power grids and land.
🚨 Wedbush’s Dan Ives says that Tesla and SpaceX will merge in 2027. SpaceX will IPO soon, his new note says:
“According to media reports, SpaceX could file a prospectus for an IPO imminently with the goal of raising ~$75 billion above the prior expectation of ~$50 billion…
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) March 27, 2026
SpaceX’s strategy, launching millions of solar-powered satellites to host data centers in orbit, bypasses Earth’s energy bottlenecks. Solar energy captured in space avoids atmospheric losses and day-night cycles, offering a scalable solution for AI training and inference.
The xAI acquisition ties directly into this vision, positioning the combined entity as a leader in extraterrestrial computing.
The merger would create a formidable conglomerate spanning electric vehicles, robotics, satellite communications, human spaceflight, and defense.
Ives highlights SpaceX’s role in the Trump administration’s “Golden Dome” missile defense shield, which would leverage Starlink satellites for tracking.
For Tesla, access to SpaceX’s launch cadence and orbital assets could accelerate autonomous driving, Robotaxi fleets, and Optimus deployment.
Musk, who has signaled his desire to own roughly 25 percent of Tesla to steer its AI future, views the combination as essential to overcoming fragmented regulatory scrutiny from the FTC and DOJ.
Challenges remain. Antitrust hurdles could delay or reshape the deal, and shareholder approvals on both sides would be required. Yet Ives remains bullish, maintaining an Outperform rating on Tesla with a $600 price target, implying substantial upside from current levels. The analyst sees the merger as the “holy grail” for consolidating Musk’s disruptive tech empire.
If realized, a 2027 Tesla-SpaceX union would not only reshape corporate boundaries but redefine humanity’s trajectory in AI and space exploration. It would mark the moment two pioneering companies become one unstoppable force, pushing the limits of what’s possible on Earth and beyond.
News
Tesla ‘Killer’ heads to the graveyard as AFEELA taps out
SHM has officially discontinued development of its highly anticipated AFEELA electric vehicles. On March 25, the joint venture between Sony and Honda announced it would halt the AFEELA 1 luxury sedan and a planned SUV model.
There have been many Tesla “Killers” over the years, all of which have either failed to dethrone the automaker from its dominance in the United States, or even make it to the market altogether.
The Sony Honda Mobility (SHM) project, known as AFEELA, is the latest to make it to the grave, as the company announced its intentions to abandon the project earlier this week, Bloomberg reported.
SHM has officially discontinued development of its highly anticipated AFEELA electric vehicles. On March 25, the joint venture between Sony and Honda announced it would halt the AFEELA 1 luxury sedan and a planned SUV model.
🚗 Tesla Killers Graveyard:
Sony-Honda AFEELA
The sleek, AI-packed luxury sedan with PlayStation integration. Officially cancelled in March 2026 after Honda scaled back its EV plans.Fisker Ocean
Stylish SUV with solar roof promises. Company filed for bankruptcy in 2024 amid… https://t.co/Om14UhISOy— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) March 26, 2026
The decision follows Honda’s March 12 reassessment of its electrification strategy, which scrapped several upcoming EV programs amid slowing demand, high costs, and shifting market conditions.
SHM stated that it could no longer rely on key Honda technologies and manufacturing assets, leaving “no viable path forward.” Reservation fees for early buyers in California are being fully refunded, and the joint venture’s future is now under review.
Launched with fanfare in 2022, the AFEELA was positioned as a tech-forward premium EV blending Honda’s engineering reliability with Sony’s entertainment and AI expertise.
Prototypes featured advanced autonomous driving systems, immersive in-cabin displays, and even PlayStation integration, earning it early media labels as a potential “Tesla Killer.”
Priced around $90,000, the sedan was slated for limited production at Honda’s Ohio plant with deliveries targeted for late 2026. Industry watchers saw it as a serious challenger to Tesla’s dominance in software, connectivity, and premium appeal.
Yet, like many ambitious EV projects, it fell victim to broader industry headwinds: softening consumer demand, persistent high interest rates, and intense competition from established players.
The AFEELA joins a long list of vehicles once hyped as “Tesla Killers” that failed to deliver. In the late 2010s, Fisker’s second act, the Ocean SUV, promised stylish design and solid-state battery tech but collapsed into bankruptcy in 2024 after production delays, quality issues, and financial shortfalls.
Faraday Future poured billions into the FF 91 luxury sedan, touting it as a hyper-tech rival with unmatched performance and features; the company delivered fewer than 100 vehicles before fading into obscurity.
Lordstown Motors’ Endurance electric pickup generated massive pre-order buzz and Wall Street excitement but imploded after exaggerated range claims, a factory sale, and eventual bankruptcy.
Even Lucid Motors’ Air sedan, frequently called a Tesla slayer for its superior range and luxury, has struggled with sluggish sales and missed growth targets despite strong reviews.
Rivian’s R1T and R1S trucks enjoyed similar early acclaim and a blockbuster IPO, yet production ramp-up challenges and profitability woes have prevented it from dethroning Tesla.
The AFEELA’s quiet demise underscores a harsh reality in the EV sector. While Tesla’s first-mover advantage in software, charging infrastructure, and brand loyalty remains formidable, legacy automakers and tech newcomers alike continue to underestimate the complexities of scaling affordable, desirable electric vehicles.
As market realities force tough choices, the graveyard of “Tesla Killers” grows longer, another reminder that innovation alone is rarely enough to topple an established leader.
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