Production for the Super Heavy booster won’t start until Mk4 is complete, Musk added.

Despite that, crewed flight might come sooner than you think. SpaceX wants to pursue heavy reusability, to the extent that one Starship could fly “three or four times a day” while the booster could fly “20 times.” That could help it prove the feasibility of the technology quickly and put people on rockets as soon as 2020. SpaceX had previously aimed for commercial service by 2021 and its lunar tourist trip by 2023, and those goals would be more realistic with humans flying a year earlier.

Of course, there’s a lot that needs to go smoothly for this to happen, including an “exponentially” improved manufacturing process that, among other things, will use near-seamless rings of steel for the chassis instead of numerous welded plates. Musk is well-known for optimistic predictions, including his original hope that Falcon Heavy would fly in 2013. Don’t be surprised if there are delays. SpaceX has advanced considerably since its early days, though, and it’s evident that Musk doesn’t want Starship to spend years in testing Limbo.

During an update on the SpaceX Starship program, Elon Musk just showed off a brief clip that explained part of the plan for using these vehicles to reach Mars. It involved a Starship in orbit around Earth, meeting a similarly-sized vehicle to refuel before it goes on the long trip to another planet. Musk has long touted his desire to make human life “multiplanetary” and expressed this as the way to achieve his goal.

In a graphic, the process is explained as “Propellant settled by milli-g acceleration using control thrusters.” The way Musk described it, having the ability to refuel a Starship means it can carry a full 1200 ton propellant load when leaving Earth’s orbit. He also showed off an updated version of the Starship’s design, with its 50m-long body covered in 301 stainless steel, with ceramic tiles in certain high heat areas.

SpaceX introduced the launch system as the Big Falcon Rocket or BFR until its upper stage was renamed to Starship and its rocket booster to Super Heavy. Two competing builds are currently undergoing development in Texas and in Florida, and it’s possible that the final spacecraft will combine the best solutions the two teams can come up with.

Although there might be differences between the two builds, both groups are designing a vehicle that can carry 20 metric tons to geostationary orbit and over 100 metric tons to Low Earth Orbit. SpaceX ultimately plans to use the SpaceX-Super Heavy combo to bring payloads to the moon and Mars, though it’s also looking to offer quick point-to-point trips on Earth aboard the vehicle.

Before any of that can happen, SpaceX has to put the launch system through more rigorous testing. Hofeller said it’s doing more hop tests in the coming months and that the company’s goal is “to get orbital as quickly as possible, potentially even this year, with the full stack operational by the end of next year and then customers in early 2021.”