Sixstrings wrote:It's worth the little bit of money that nasa actually gets, comparatively, I hope you agree with me on that at least.
It's a good jobs program for us engineers, for sure.
Sixstrings wrote:It's worth the little bit of money that nasa actually gets, comparatively, I hope you agree with me on that at least.
Alfred Tennyson wrote:We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Tanada wrote:I dug it up just for you Sixstrings because you said you were looking for a NASA/Space thread, as opposed to the Orbital/SpaceX/Elon Musk/Moon threads.
pstarr wrote:Nasa doesn't deserve or get anything anymore if I had my way. We made it to the moon on lovely roman candles. It was nice. I liked it, even attended a Space Shuttle liftoff. It was amazing.
But down here on earth, in the real world we need to immediately drill light-rail through suburbia, electrify our national rail freight system, and install bullet trains where appropriate.
Sixstrings wrote:China will just steal his tech with espionage.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/12/05/nasas-orion-blasts-off-in-historic-test-flight/?tid=trending_strip_4NASA entered a new era of space exploration on Friday when its Orion capsule splashed down in the Pacific Ocean after going farther from the planet than any spacecraft built for humans in more than 40 years.
The maiden test flight -- made without astronauts aboard -- is a step toward eventually getting astronauts to deep space: first to help snag an asteroid, and then, NASA hopes, to Mars. Orion lifted off from Cape Canaveral, Fla., at 7:05 a.m., a day after gusty wind and problems with several valves forced officials to cancel the mission.
But on Friday, the 4.5-hour mission appeared to go off flawlessly. "There's your new spacecraft, America," said Mission Control commentator Rob Navias shortly before Orion hit the water.
As it sent back stunning images broadcast on NASA’s website, Orion orbited the Earth twice, shot up to an altitude of about 3,600 miles above the Earth. That was farther than any spacecraft designed for humans had gone since the Apollo 17 moon mission in 1972.
It splashed into the Pacific Ocean at 11:29 a.m.
Subjectivist wrote:Orion was test launched this morning on a Delta IV Heavy because the rocket is not built yet. If Orion is successful that will put pressure on NASA to actually build this launcher.
http://youtu.be/UEuOpxOrA_0
Orion: a last-ditch effort by a fading empire that will never strike back
When a space startup has twice the force for a fraction of the cost, you know the US government has a problem
Friday’s Orion launch was a galvanizing moment for the traditional, government-led spacecraft movement in the United States. This Bush-era program was decried as wasteful and directionless spending – a “rocket to nowhere” – and cancelled four years ago. But the Empire rallied and revived Orion and the massive proposed rocket that’s supposed to propel it to deep space. After all, the Death Star wasn’t built in a day; it was devised by some very talented engineers. And from their point of view, it’s a shame anyone would blow it up.
But there are some people out there who say Orion is too big not to fail. Earlier this year, the US Government Accountability Office took Nasa to the woodpile for fuzzy math, and offered its own accounting of how much it costs to develop Orion and its rocket through its first two flight in 2017 and 2021: $20bn, with a full $9bn spent on Orion.
And of course there’s that other curse haunting Orion: It won’t carry actual people until around 2022.
And that’s if the budgets hold out. The incoming Congress may not shut down a program like Orion, but they can starve it of fuel until it enters a netherworld of delays, life-support funding and lethargy. When it flies on missions, it will be outdated. Orion is particularly vulnerable since, you know, Nasa has not set a destination for it to go. If the first manned test flight is in 2021, when will the actual mission to Mars be funded and staged? It takes a very optimistic person to think the funding and tech will be ready by 2022 – or even 2025.
...
So far his claims about SpaceX have come true, and soon he’ll be fighting, with the lobbyists and the politicians who play favorites, for satellite contracts worth hundreds of billions of dollars.
Combine that kind of force with Elon Musk’s capsule full of actual people returning to space – under a Nasa contract to deliver astronauts to the International Space Station – and you have a private startup that can beat Nasa or any other government agency back to the moon, if it so chooses.
Return of the Jedi, indeed.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/dec/05/nasa-orion-launch-space-startup
pstarr wrote:Then he gets to pretend he is smarter than NASA. Your/his patriotism needs a refresher.
Sixstrings wrote:Did you read the Guardian article? It says the Orion may never go anywhere other than ISS shuttling, that any interesting mission just keep getting put off years and years, it's not even going to do any cool mission for ten years or whatever.
Assuming NASA doesn't cancel it.
Meanwhile, Elon Musk gets it done for a fraction of what Boeing-Lockheed wants to charge.
The world's biggest rocket that could take humans to Mars in the 2030s is a step closer to reality.
NASA has completed a crucial hot fire test of its RS-25 engine flight controller at Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.
A 3D printed 'shock absorber,' intended to give astronauts a smoother ride, was tested during the 365-second event.
The part will now be installed on an engine for use by NASA's Space Launch System (SLS), a deep-space rocket designed to be the most powerful on the planet.
The rocket, set to take it's maiden flight in 2019, will eventually carry humans on the Orion spacecraft and enable missions to the moon and Mars.
Over the next year, engineers plan to add additional 3D printed parts to the RS-25 engine to reduce waste and costs associated with the SLS.
The full duration test came a month after NASA capped a year of RS-25 testing with a flight controller test in mid-December.
'We ended 2017 with a successful engine test in December and have now maintained that momentum into 2018,' said Dan Adamski, RS-25 program director at Aerojet Rocketdyne, who collaborated with NASA on the test.
'Future testing this year will continue to add to the program's inventory of flight controllers and will bring additional development hardware into the test program to demonstrate design, manufacturing and affordability improvements.'
The 3D printed engine component, called a pogo accumulator assembly, is part of an ongoing series of test on parts made using advanced manufacturing techniques that will make building future engines more affordable.
Aerojet Rocketdyne engineers told Fox News that the shock absrober component was printed using a laser and metal powder, with a machine that builds the part in two halves in weeks, compared to hand construction which can take years.
'As you’re driving along a cobble stone road you have dampeners in your car that make it a nice smooth ride and that’s what were doing for astronauts,' said Alan Fung, one of the lead mechanical design engineers on the project.
'When the astronauts are riding up into space they’ll feel this vibration that kind of feels like jumping on a pogo stick.
'That’s where the name comes from.
'While the astronauts are feeling that, it’s causing a lot of problems for the engine so we don’t want that effect,' he said.
The most recent test was for the engine controller that will be used on the third engine of the second planned flight of the SLS (EM-2), which is set to carry astronauts.
The deep-space SLS rocket will be fueled by four RS-25 engines firing simultaneously to generate 2 million pounds of thrust and, working with a pair of solid rocket boosters, will produce more than 8 million pounds of thrust.
RS-25 engines for the initial SLS flights will be former space shuttle main engines, modified to provide the initial power needed by the larger SLS rocket.
According to NASA, a key part of that modification is the new flight controller, which works as the RS-25 'brain,' helping the engine communicate with the SLS rocket and providing precision control of engine operation and internal health diagnostics.
NASA is testing all RS-25 engines and flight controllers for SLS mission at Stennis Space Center.
The initial SLS Exploration Mission-1 (EM-1) will serve as the first test flight for the new rocket, and will carry an uncrewed Orion spacecraft.
The engines for this flight have already been tested at Stennis and are ready to be attached to the rocket's core stage being built at NASA's Michoud Assembly Center in New Orleans.
The current engine tests are for controllers for Exploration Mission-2, the first flight that will transport astronauts on board Orion.
As well as testing those engines, NASA is preparing the B-2 Test Stand at Stennis to test the entire SLS core stage with its four engines for EM-1.
This 'green run' test will require installing the flight core stage on the B-2 stand and firing all four RS-25 engines simultaneously, as in an actual launch.
The RS-25 tests at Stennis are conducted by a team of NASA, Aerojet Rocketdyne and Syncom Space Services engineers.
Aerojet Rocketdyne is the RS-25 primary contractor, and Syncom Space Services is the prime contractor for the Stennis Center's facilities and operations.
Alfred Tennyson wrote:We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Tanada wrote:The world's biggest rocket that could take humans to Mars in the 2030s is a step closer to reality.
NASA has completed a crucial hot fire test of its RS-25 engine flight controller at Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.
A 3D printed 'shock absorber,' intended to give astronauts a smoother ride, was tested during the 365-second event.
LINK
Harrison H. Schmitt wrote:Why NASA’s Artemis Matters | Aviation Week Network
Harrison H. Schmitt
5-7 minutes
The Artemis program to return to the Moon and to ultimately explore the lunar south pole region, like its Apollo predecessor, has a geopolitical context that extends far beyond its technical objectives. China and Russia have created another grave threat to free societies on Earth comparable to and potentially greater than that posed by the Soviet Union during the Cold War period, 1945 through 1991.
The launch of Artemis I on the Space Launch System (SLS) begins the implementation of America’s and the free world’s response to the broad challenges in space posed by the aggressive hegemonic aims of China and Russia.
Now, as recognized by then-Presidents Dwight Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy in the 1950s and 1960s, respectively, space dominance—and specifically the exploration and eventual settlement of the Moon—play a great psychological role in forming the attitudes of people who ultimately will choose between tyranny and freedom.
Success in meeting challenges in space will have profound effects on shaping the hopes and fears of peoples and nations. Artemis’ success will depend on full-throated political support from all sectors of American leadership as well as on funding levels that provide sufficient management reserves to solve technical issues without schedule slips.
The Space Launch System can constitute the beginning development and sustained availability of Apollo-Saturn V class of launch vehicles and spacecraft that routinely access the surface of the Moon with explorers, workers, cargo and settlers. With the addition of upper stages to the SLS comparable to the S-II and S-IVB of the Saturn V and a propulsive Service Module to the Orion spacecraft, the mountainous risk management difficulties now faced by Artemis can be greatly reduced.
Flexible lunar-landing spacecraft and roving and service vehicles are required that can integrate the lessons of Apollo into a vast array of new data about the Moon and new commercial space technologies. Each utilitarian hardware development also should fully utilize the capabilities of the human eyes, brain and hands to reduce risk in each task undertaken, from landing to exploration to construction to lunar resource acquisition. The planning and operational advantages available to Artemis through the vast reservoir of data provided by Japan’s Selene, India’s Chandrayaan, the U.S.’s Grail and Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft will greatly reduce some of the navigational and exploration uncertainties faced in the Apollo era. Every new mission, however, will experience new surprises that must be overcome.
As a scientific follow-up to the Apollo 17 mission, a landing at the lunar south pole would extend knowledge of the disposition of volatile resources and of material ejected from the 12-km-deep (7.5-mi.), 2,500-km-dia. South Pole-Aitken basin on the lunar far side. On the other hand, an attempt by Artemis to land at the lunar south pole should be preceded by less complex missions, as was done prior to the Apollo 11 landing in 1969.
Although the lessons from the Mercury and Gemini programs became foundational for human spaceflight, those of the non-landing flights of Apollo 8, 9 and 10 gave skilled workers, engineers, astronauts, flight controllers and managers the experience necessary for success on Apollo 11 and subsequent landings. A new generation of skilled workers, engineers, astronauts, flight controllers and managers can gain critical experience if there are two or three initial Artemis landings at lower-latitude sites that represent fewer, but never zero, operational challenges as well as important exploration targets. The last landings prior to the first in the lunar south pole area might be at a lower latitude within reach of a permanently shadowed crater, but such landings could limit the added difficulties in navigation, lighting and thermal environments presented by landing near the lunar south pole.
A landing near the lunar south pole will be tough, given the orbital constraints imposed by the lunar Gateway station as well as by possible landing site locations. Further, there will be rapidly variable lighting, extreme thermal changes and the currently unknown nature of surface materials inherent in the region. Early Artemis crews will be constrained further by a compressed training schedule relative to Apollo 17’s that will limit their pre-flight field exploration experience. In addition, the current flight profile for a SpaceX Starship landing apparently would not allow the crew to have direct views of their landing sites.
Whatever course is selected for the sequencing of Artemis missions, I have the utmost confidence in the motivation, courage and competence of the hundreds of thousands of young Americans that will see Artemis through to success, whatever unanticipated operational obstacles come their way.
Harrison Schmitt was a lunar module pilot for Apollo 17 and the last person on the Moon. Later a U.S. senator from New Mexico, he is now an aerospace consultant and lunar research scientist.
What Is Starship Payload Capacity?
In addition to its dry mass of 85 tons, the Starship has a fuel capacity of 1200 tons via its rockets.payloads are 150 t each to the moon and at least a 50 t return.A pair of aft fins and two canards allows you to make a splash as the Starship reenters belly-first.
Is SlS More Powerful Than Starship?
The space craft SLS will be considerably weaker than the Starship.The SLS will be able to launch 95 tons in LEO, whereas the ISS can launch 150 tons in LEO.In addition, because Starship can be reusable completely and rapidly, it’s much less expensive than SLS at 1/10th the cost of launch.
Alfred Tennyson wrote:We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Return to North America Discussion
Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 7 guests