I remember reading a quote from Elon where he says that at some point, they realised it's less "strapping three cores together" than "flying three cores in very close formation"
The stresses involved are truly enormous, and the whole thing must be very well balanced to avoid putting even more stresses on the frame.
Something as stupid as fueling the rocket needs to be done with care, as they're dealing with super-chilled liquid oxygen: The cold temperatures make the rocket contract a little bit, you have to make sure all three boosters contract exactly the same otherwise you can break the attachment points.
After countless hours of experimenting with additional struts in KSP to keep my rockets from going through RUD I have a weird feeling as if I understand this on some level. Rationally, I don't think that I have any real understanding of rocket science from KSP - but that weird feeling just won't go away.
The stresses involved are truly enormous, and the whole thing must be very well balanced to avoid putting even more stresses on the frame.
Something as stupid as fueling the rocket needs to be done with care, as they're dealing with super-chilled liquid oxygen: The cold temperatures make the rocket contract a little bit, you have to make sure all three boosters contract exactly the same otherwise you can break the attachment points.