Vice President tells NASA to get to the Moon in 5 years.

[RamjetFDO 10603]

.

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

hydrogen leak in tank cavity when they got to 8% gassed up

propload on hold

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

lox at 40% in "slow mode"

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

started warming the hydrogen line, cavity leak diminishing?

lh2 flowing again

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

wx starts at 60 and closes at 80

[Captainant 27972]

55 minutes ago, Hagbard Celine said:

hydrogen leak in tank cavity when they got to 8% gassed up

propload on hold

You'd think after all the inspections and torque checks they'd have all the gremlins squashed! Crazy how many problems they've had with the fuel system - leaks, insufficient flow, stuck valves, it's just sad and ridiculous 

[RamjetFDO 10603]

You'd think after all the inspections and torque checks they'd have all the gremlins squashed! Crazy how many problems they've had with the fuel system - leaks, insufficient flow, stuck valves, it's just sad and ridiculous 

When you bypass critical path items on test procedures, this is what can happen.

[RamjetFDO 10603]

Also... would love to hear details later about the conversations on that "troubleshooting loop."

Hopefully some back channel sources will give me a recap later.

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

No doubt Pence’s ultimate goal is Uranus.

[Captainant 27972]

I'm not feeling optimistic about a launch attempt today (or the next window in a few days), and even less so if they do light 'er up. Just wayyyyyyy too many unknowns, and STILL haven't fully completed a wet dress rehearsal. 

By my understanding, they're basically using every launch attempt as a wet dress rehearsal, and if they make it far enough they'll attempt a launch. Doesn't feel like NASA standard and proven procedure, and I've studied the Challenger disaster too much to not think about possible severe outcomes when NASA cuts corners

[Duval Street 420]

Wasn’t this stack tested at Stennis for the entire burn (minus the SRBs)?  Is the fueling procedure different on the test stand that the issues weren’t detected? Honest question, and haven’t caught any of today’s coverage yet.

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

15 minutes ago, Captainant said:

I'm not feeling optimistic about a launch attempt today (or the next window in a few days), and even less so if they do light 'er up. Just wayyyyyyy too many unknowns, and STILL haven't fully completed a wet dress rehearsal. 

By my understanding, they're basically using every launch attempt as a wet dress rehearsal, and if they make it far enough they'll attempt a launch. Doesn't feel like NASA standard and proven procedure, and I've studied the Challenger disaster too much to not think about possible severe outcomes when NASA cuts corners

ramjet can comment.  eric berger maintains that these issues with the same engines, systems, hardware, gas, etc., were not solved until sts-109, which was the 108th of the 135 total shuttle missions.  it took 21 years and dozens of aborts, holds, and tinkering to get the entire package to some state of cromulence.

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

11 minutes ago, Duval Street said:

Wasn’t this stack tested at Stennis for the entire burn (minus the SRBs)?  Is the fueling procedure different on the test stand that the issues weren’t detected? Honest question, and haven’t caught any of today’s coverage yet.

iirc that was a green run on the engines

the all-up stack was first assembled in the VAB

testing of the flight stack began when it was rolled out to the pad

[Captainant 27972]

10 minutes ago, Duval Street said:

Wasn’t this stack tested at Stennis for the entire burn (minus the SRBs)?  Is the fueling procedure different on the test stand that the issues weren’t detected? Honest question, and haven’t caught any of today’s coverage yet.

IIRC, the green run (the test burn) had a different start sequence since it was on a test stand, and not the launch stand. One of the modifications they're (maybe) trying today is using the startup sequence from the green run instead of the original planned sequence

2 minutes ago, Hagbard Celine said:

ramjet can comment.  eric berger maintains that these issues with the same engines, systems, hardware, gas, etc., were not solved until sts-109, which was the 108th of the 135 total shuttle missions.  it took 21 years and dozens of aborts, holds, and tinkering to get the entire package to some state of cromulence.

I've just about finished reading Ignition, and there's a whole chapter on LH2 and learning how to tame it for a rocket. It imposes so many design constraints that it's really not worth it unless you NEED a low-coking fuel for reusability, or the uniquely high performance of the fuel cycle. We've got far better and less temperamental options than the RS25 now

[Captainant 27972]

10 minutes ago, Duval Street said:

Wasn’t this stack tested at Stennis for the entire burn (minus the SRBs)?  Is the fueling procedure different on the test stand that the issues weren’t detected? Honest question, and haven’t caught any of today’s coverage yet.

IIRC, the green run (the test burn) had a different start sequence since it was on a test stand, and not the launch stand. One of the modifications they're (maybe) trying today is using the startup sequence from the green run instead of the original planned sequence

2 minutes ago, Hagbard Celine said:

ramjet can comment.  eric berger maintains that these issues with the same engines, systems, hardware, gas, etc., were not solved until sts-109, which was the 108th of the 135 total shuttle missions.  it took 21 years and dozens of aborts, holds, and tinkering to get the entire package to some state of cromulence.

I've just about finished reading Ignition, and there's a whole chapter on LH2 and learning how to tame it for a rocket. It imposes so many design constraints that it's really not worth it unless you NEED a low-coking fuel for reusability, or the uniquely high performance of the fuel cycle. We've got far better and less temperamental options than the RS25 now

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

lh2 tanking resumed....

 

[Captainant 27972]

 

 

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

3 minutes ago, Captainant said:

IIRC, the green run (the test burn) had a different start sequence since it was on a test stand, and not the launch stand. One of the modifications they're (maybe) trying today is using the startup sequence from the green run instead of the original planned sequence

I've just about finished reading Ignition, and there's a whole chapter on LH2 and learning how to tame it for a rocket. It imposes so many design constraints that it's really not worth it unless you NEED a low-coking fuel for reusability, or the uniquely high performance of the fuel cycle. We've got far better and less temperamental options than the RS25 now

the operative word is "now"

rocketmasters around the world are moving to kerosene or methane, the latter of course being the magic compound that can be manufactured in-situ on the moon, mars, europa (sorry monolith, we will attempt a landing there), titan, pluto, asteroids and other moons of the gas giants if it makes sense

the use/re-use of shuttle hardware was congressionally mandated as part of the jobs / campaign contributions package(s)

no other powerplant was a political or economic (funding) option

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

Eric Berger

@SciGuySpace

·

2m

NASA has now essentially tried "turning it off an plugging it back in" twice now with the hydrogen line. It's not clear what next steps might entail as we're now less than four hours from the launch window opening, and 2 hours and 30 minutes behind the timeline.

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

Marco Ayala

@ICS_SCADA

·

13m

Replying to

@SciGuySpace

The old H2 heat and then slow fill cool trick. 60% of the time it works every time as per NASA , lol

slow fill will take 20 hours at the current rate

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

 

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

Eric Berger

@SciGuySpace

If SLS scrubs today, here are the agency's options: Monday launch: May allow a quick visit to pad and fix. Not sure if possible timewise. A good two-hour launch window. Tuesday: Another day for pad fixes, but a very short launch window of less than 30 minutes. Rollback to VAB.

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

nasa: update on the leak shortly

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

Eric Berger

@SciGuySpace

This is NASA's sixth attempt to complete a wet dress rehearsal test of the Space Launch System, dating back to April. It appears there will probably be a seventh.

9:46 AM · Sep 3, 2022·TweetDeck

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

funny from berger tweet comments

 

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

scrub recommended to launch director

stand by for final decision

[miguelito 11337]

[InkaUtexas 26354]

2 minutes ago, Hagbard Celine said:

scrub recommended to launch director

stand by for final decision

I would prefer they scrub, fix, and make sure things work. This is an important mission to FAFO. 

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

"fix and make sure things work" embiggens the possible outcomes

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

scrubbed

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

berger says scrubbed

nasa says "there's still a chance" and not ready to fully finally totally 100%-fer-shur scrub it

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

artemis launch control

launch director charlie blackwell-thompson officially calls the scrub

 

[Texzilla58 4745]

Probably Chinese parts.

Disappointed. Would love to be there. Went to a nighttime shuttle launch years ago and it was awesomest.

[RamjetFDO 10603]

Probably Chinese parts.

Close.

/obligatory

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

waiting final confirmation of a return to the vab

why can't they work on it on the pad?

because the tower was deliberately designed to make that unpossible

 

[atomheartbevo 90054]

3 hours ago, InkaUtexas said:

I would prefer they scrub, fix, and make sure things work. This is an important mission to FAFO. 

I do not like this system or the people who are calling the shots right now.  I get that Congress stuck them with this system,  but this feels like making a videogame, and they find a crippling bug and rather than hold everything up and fix it, they’ll release it to manufacturing and push out a day one patch that may fix it.

Their only saving grace is that China is pushing for the moon.  If China wasn’t, and they fuck this up with a launch, plenty in Congress would be happy to yank that funding and send it elsewhere.

[RamjetFDO 10603]

The only thing fly-ing at KSC today.

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

58 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

I do not like this system or the people who are calling the shots right now.  I get that Congress stuck them with this system,  but this feels like making a videogame, and they find a crippling bug and rather than hold everything up and fix it, they’ll release it to manufacturing and push out a day one patch that may fix it.

Their only saving grace is that China is pushing for the moon.  If China wasn’t, and they fuck this up with a launch, plenty in Congress would be happy to yank that funding and send it elsewhere.

congress is not stuck with it. congress required it.  it is illegal to improve the hardware under the funding provisions for this rocket program.

the crippling bug was not "found".  it has been known since 1981.  LH2 leaks, and as i posted above, it took 21 years to solve the LH2 gremlins in the shuttle.   the engines, components and materials remain the same, but the configuration is different (4 engines instead of 3, pipes that run OUTSIDE of the main body, larger tanks).  all of the insiders and engineers that post in the comments in eric berger's articles have precisely predicted what has happened because the space-powers-that-be knew what would happen because it fulfills the design criteria of the program: keep cashing checks to get several thousand people to full retirement doing the same exact job they've been doing for 30+ years.  flying is only a bonus.  monday and today were simply WDRs #6 and #7 disguised as flight dates because the mid-term donation cycle required the appearance of an imminent launch.   feature, not a bug.

[atomheartbevo 90054]

46 minutes ago, Hagbard Celine said:

congress is not stuck with it. congress required it.  it is illegal to improve the hardware under the funding provisions for this rocket program.

I’m saying Congress stuck them with it.  

And I don’t mean the LH2 thing is a bug in the video game sense, just a comment on the system of trying to meet deadlines, knowing there are still kinks to be worked out.

I’m frustrated, because if they fuck this up, it’ll set everything back for a long time.

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

actually, if they fuck this up, it will likely rapidly accelerate progress by diverting billions and billions every year away from old space and to the new players.  new glenn holds far more promise as a "conventional" heavy lift vehicle and starship is like going from props to jets.

there is a cadre of engineers, scientists and insiders that want to see it go "boom" and take out the tower.  this is called the "wickwick" event, the thinking is that only destroying the tower itself will stop the hydrabeast from regenerating.

imagine the past 6 days, except that it's actually been the past 6 years have been like this on a weekly basis, and another 6 years at $10/million/day.  only now because a few more people are attuned, will this sarlak pit rocket program face any external threat whatsoever.

[Blotto 23700]

2 hours ago, Hagbard Celine said:

congress is not stuck with it. congress required it.  it is illegal to improve the hardware under the funding provisions for this rocket program.

the crippling bug was not "found".  it has been known since 1981.  LH2 leaks, and as i posted above, it took 21 years to solve the LH2 gremlins in the shuttle.   the engines, components and materials remain the same, but the configuration is different (4 engines instead of 3, pipes that run OUTSIDE of the main body, larger tanks).  all of the insiders and engineers that post in the comments in eric berger's articles have precisely predicted what has happened because the space-powers-that-be knew what would happen because it fulfills the design criteria of the program: keep cashing checks to get several thousand people to full retirement doing the same exact job they've been doing for 30+ years.  flying is only a bonus.  monday and today were simply WDRs #6 and #7 disguised as flight dates because the mid-term donation cycle required the appearance of an imminent launch.   feature, not a bug.

 

18 minutes ago, Hagbard Celine said:

actually, if they fuck this up, it will likely rapidly accelerate progress by diverting billions and billions every year away from old space and to the new players.  new glenn holds far more promise as a "conventional" heavy lift vehicle and starship is like going from props to jets.

there is a cadre of engineers, scientists and insiders that want to see it go "boom" and take out the tower.  this is called the "wickwick" event, the thinking is that only destroying the tower itself will stop the hydrabeast from regenerating.

imagine the past 6 days, except that it's actually been the past 6 years have been like this on a weekly basis, and another 6 years at $10/million/day.  only now because a few more people are attuned, will this sarlak pit rocket program face any external threat whatsoever.

I havent been following this particular story that much, but your posts on the subject are not exactly encouraging. More like infuriating. 

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/09/years-after-shuttle-nasa-rediscovers-the-perils-of-liquid-hydrogen/

Saturday Leak System — Years after shuttle, NASA rediscovers the perils of liquid hydrogen "Every time we saw a leak, it pretty quickly exceeded our flammability limits."

Eric Berger - Sep 3, 2022 10:38 pm UTC

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla.—America's space agency on Saturday sought to launch a rocket largely cobbled together from the space shuttle, which itself was designed and built more than four decades ago.

As the space shuttle often was delayed due to technical problems, it therefore comes as scant surprise that the debut launch of NASA's Space Launch System rocket scrubbed a few hours before its launch window opened. The showstopper was an 8-inch diameter line carrying liquid hydrogen into the rocket. It sprung a persistent leak at the inlet, known as a quick-disconnect, leading on board the vehicle.

Valiantly, the launch team at Kennedy Space Center tried three different times to staunch the leak, all to no avail. Finally at 11:17 am ET, hours behind on their timeline to fuel the rocket, launch director Charlie Blackwell-Thompson called a halt.

What comes next depends on what engineers and technicians find on Monday when they inspect the vehicle at the launch pad. If the launch team decides it can replace the quick-disconnect hardware at the pad, it may be an option to perform a partial fueling test to determine the integrity of the fix. This may allow NASA to keep the vehicle on the pad ahead of the next launch. Alternatively, the engineers may decide the repairs are best performed inside the Vehicle Assembly Building, and roll the rocket back inside.

Due to the orbital dynamics of the Artemis I mission to fly an uncrewed Orion spacecraft to the Moon, NASA will next have an opportunity to launch from September 19 to October 4. However, making that window would necessitate fixing the rocket at the pad, and then getting a waiver from the US Space Force, which operates the launch range along the Florida coast.

At issue is the flight termination system, which is powered independently of the rocket, with batteries rated for 25 days. NASA would need to extend that battery rating to about 40 days. The space agency is expected to have those discussions with range officials soon.

If the rocket is rolled back to the Vehicle Assembly Building, which would be necessary service the flight termination system or perform more than cursory work at the launch pad, NASA has another Artemis I launch opportunity from October 17 to October 31.

A tiny, tiny element

The space shuttle was an extremely complex vehicle, mingling the use of solid-rocket boosters—which are something akin to very, very powerful firecrackers—along with exquisitely built main engines powered by the combustion of liquid hydrogen propellant and liquid oxygen to serve as an oxidizer.

Over its lifetime, due to this complexity, the shuttle on average scrubbed nearly once every launch attempt. Some shuttle flights scrubbed as many as five times before finally lifting off. For launch controllers, it never really got a whole lot easier to manage the space shuttle's complex fueling process, and hydrogen was frequently a culprit.

Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe, but it is also the lightest. It takes 600 sextillion hydrogen atoms to reach the mass of a single gram. Because it is so tiny, hydrogen can squeeze through the smallest of gaps. This is not so great a problem at ambient temperatures and pressures, but at super-chilled temperatures and high pressures, hydrogen easily oozes out of any available opening.

To keep a rocket's fuel tanks topped off, propellant lines leading from ground-based systems must remain attached to the booster until the very moment of launch. In the final second, the "quick-disconnects" at the end of these lines break away from the rocket. The difficulty is that, in order to be fail-safes in disconnecting from the rocket, this equipment cannot be bolted together tightly enough to entirely preclude the passage of hydrogen atoms—it is extremely difficult to seal these connections under high pressure, and low temperatures.

NASA, therefore, has a tolerance for a small amount of hydrogen leakage. Anything above a 4 percent concentration of hydrogen in the purge area near the quick disconnect, however, is considered a flammability hazard. "We were seeing in excess of that by two or three times that," said Mike Sarafin, NASA's Artemis I Mission Manager, said of Saturday's hydrogen leak. "It was pretty clear we weren’t going to be able to work our way through it. Every time we saw a leak, it pretty quickly exceeded our flammability limits."

Twice, launch controllers stopped the flow of hydrogen into the vehicle, in hopes that the quick-disconnect would warm a little bit. They hoped that, when they restarted slowly flowing cryogenic hydrogen on board the rocket, the quick-disconnect would find a tighter fit with the booster. It did not. Another time they tried applying a significant amount of pressure to re-seat the quick disconnect.

NASA officials are still assessing the cause of the leak, but they believe it may have been due to an errant valve being opened. This occurred during the process of chilling down the rocket prior to loading liquid hydrogen. Amid a sequence of about a dozen commands being sent to the rocket, a command was sent to a wrong valve to open. This was rectified within 3 or 4 seconds, Sarafin said. However, during this time, the hydrogen line that would develop a problematic quick-disconnect was briefly over-pressurized.

Deferring to the experts

So why does NASA use liquid hydrogen as a fuel for its rockets, if it is so difficult to work with, and there are easier to handle alternatives such as methane or kerosene? One reason is that hydrogen is a very efficient fuel, meaning that it provides better "gas mileage" when used in rocket engines. However, the real answer is that Congress mandated that NASA continue to use space shuttle main engines as part of the SLS rocket program.

In 2010, when Congress wrote the authorization bill for NASA that led to creation of the Space Launch System, it directed the agency to "utilize existing contracts, investments, workforce, industrial base, and capabilities from the Space Shuttle and Orion and Ares 1 projects, including ... existing United States propulsion systems, including liquid fuel engines, external tank or tank related capability, and solid rocket motor engines."

During a news conference on Saturday, Ars asked NASA Administrator Bill Nelson whether it was the right decision for NASA to continue working with hydrogen after the agency's experience with the space shuttle. In 2010, Nelson was a US Senator from Florida, and ringleader of the space authorization bill alongside US Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, of Texas. "We deferred to the experts," Nelson said.

By this Nelson meant that the Senate worked alongside some officials at NASA, and within industry, to design the SLS rocket. These industry officials, who would continue to win lucrative contracts from NASA for their work on shuttle-related hardware, were only too happy to support the new rocket design.

Among the idea's opponents was Lori Garver, who served as NASA's deputy administrator at the time. She said the decision to use space shuttle components for the agency's next generation rocket seemed like a terrible idea, given the challenges of working with hydrogen demonstrated over the previous three decades.

"They took finicky, expensive programs that couldn't fly very often, stacked them together differently, and said now, all of a sudden, it's going to be cheap and easy," she told Ars in August. "Yeah, we've flown them before, but they've proven to be problematic and challenging. This is one of the things that boggled my mind. What about it was going to change? I attribute it to this sort of group think, the contractors and the self-licking ice cream cone."

Now, NASA faces the challenge of managing this finicky hardware through more inspections and tests after so many already. The rocket's core stage, manufactured by Boeing, was shipped from its factory in Louisiana more than two and a half years ago. It underwent nearly a year of testing in Mississippi before arriving at Kennedy Space Center in April 2021. Since then, NASA and its contractors have been assembling the complete rocket and testing it on the launch pad.

Effectively, Saturday's "launch" attempt was the sixth time NASA has tried to completely fuel the first and second stages of the rocket, and then get deep into the countdown. To date, it has not succeeded with any of these fueling tests, known as wet dress rehearsals. On Saturday, the core stage's massive liquid hydrogen tank, with a capacity of more than 500,000 gallons, was only 11 percent full when the scrub was called.

Perhaps the seventh time will be a charm.

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

Walt Dizzy wrote:

The continued difficulties of the SLS remind me of the situation the Japanese military found itself in during WWII (per Neal Stephenson in Cryptonomicon).

Suffering a string of stinging defeats, it became obvious to most of their officers that their military encryption schemes had been compromised. Yet no one dared to discuss the failure openly because they feared being branded as defeatists.

This parody of a successful space program can't continue forever. Continued failure to execute is deadly: people who started out supporting Artemis are going to get bored, if nothing else.

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

the comments sections of eric berger's articles this week are a must read for anyone that cares about the US space program, the future of humanity, etc.  and they are easy to post here in DT because the porkbarreling has been a bipartisan swine-in-shit-swimming equal opportunity fiscal rape of your tax dollars....  here's another gem:

+++

YetAnotherBoris Ars Scholae Palatinae

reply Sep 4, 2022 2:47 AM

Popular

The SLS costs 2+ $Billion per launch, not even counting the already sunk and ongoing costs of its development program (well over 20 $Billion, so far...) This lofts something between 100 and 130 tons to LEO per launch.

Forget about Starship; an existing and proven heavy launch alternative - SpaceX's Falcon Heavy - costs less than $200 Million per launch in fully expendable mode, lofting 64 tons to LEO.

So, for the price of a single SLS launch, we could instead conduct 10 Falcon Heavy launches putting over 600 tons into LEO, which is well over 4× what even the final, future, most-evolved version of SLS will eventually, maybe, supposedly, hopefully be capable of - at a cost markup per launch yet to be determined and who knows how many more R&D $Billions and years from now. Or, use the Falcon Heavy in fully reusable mode for half the cost per launch, and put slightly less total mass into orbit with a lot less waste.

By any objective metric, the SLS is a miserable failure even if it managed to launch on the first attempt and complete its maiden voyage flawlessly. These ongoing failed attempts just put more turd blossoms on top of the cow pie.

Whatever "experts" Bill Nelson wants to dump this on, the basic math fails to pencil out so spectacularly that all these pathetic, transparent attempts at deflection fail on their face.

As exciting as it might be to see the SLS actually launch, the show will be little more than a spectacular display of shamelessly setting $Billions on fire, and openly promising to do more of that for years and decades to come. Just, simply, disgusting. And very, very sad.

[TKthunder2 5016]

I just finished listening to The Man Who Knew the Way to the Moon, about lunar orbit rendezvous and John Houbolt and they stated that originally (like back in the 60s) Von Braun and NASA wanted an orbiting space station hub to construct ships in space.

The logistics of that seem not so outlandish now with the ISS and a commercial rocket company like Space X able to physically carry the load and run the logistics of getting any equipment into space and then NASA could simply work on the assembly of the station/craft.

I’m not knowledgeable of this at all, but is that something that could realistically happen?  Or is that still so SciFi that’s it’s not seriously being considered?

For cost of SLS it seems that we’re just spending money on doing the same thing that Apollo did.  It be nice to see them advance the process for future missions (like Mars).

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

the more you know.....

+++++

normally butters Ars Praefectus

reply Sep 4, 2022 12:09 PM

Popular

cassydd wrote:

show nested quotes

"Can you show us this expert advice?"

"... no."

The "expert advice" was in a 2011 report called the Requirements Analysis Cycle, which has never been released to the public. There were three NASA teams assigned to evaluate three launch concepts within the context of the 2010 NASA Authorization Act. RAC-1 was the Shuttle-derived heavy lift, RAC-2 was Saturn-inspired all-new kerolox heavy lift, and RAC-3 was distributed launch with evolved Atlas/Delta rockets.

An example of the cloak-and-dagger nature is that the RAC-3 team was told their concept lost because of high loss-of-mission probabilities, but they were not allowed to see the probabilistic risk assessment. The RAC-2 team was told their concept had slightly higher fixed costs than RAC-1, but they weren't allowed to see the cost accounting. RAC-1 didn't just win the competition, NASA sources told NSF L2 that it wasn't even close, the other concepts were "pummeled" by the Shuttle-derived concept.

The experts did their best, but NASA management played favorites and put their thumbs on the scale. Congress listened to NASA management. NASA management didn't listen to all of the experts, only the ones who were pitching the desired proposal.

 +65 (+65 / 0) 

4142 posts | registered 1/29/2007

[Hagbard Celine 10995]

Quote

 

This kludge by its very design is unable to meet the ridiculous fable of the stated mission statement of the Artemis program for "A permanent and sustained human presence on the lunar surface." What in the world is sustained and permanent about a launch cadence of once every 2 years at 4 Bil a pop just for launching it? It's too expensive for any kind of commercial application let alone being available for it. It can't do any deep space missions other than lunar due to limitations of Orion life support.

SLS was a rocket without a mission so the idiotic Gateway was made up to give it and people something to do while anyone who knows space stuff knows whatever they would do there can be done in LEO. It wasn't until the Trump administration wanted a political election year stunt that SLS/Orion was targeted for the lunar surface. SLS/Orion has no relevance beyond what it was meant to be-a jobs program for politicians, lobbyists and corporate toadies.

 

depressing

[Murfdogg21 4482]

On 9/4/2022 at 12:47 PM, TKthunder2 said:

I just finished listening to The Man Who Knew the Way to the Moon, about lunar orbit rendezvous and John Houbolt and they stated that originally (like back in the 60s) Von Braun and NASA wanted an orbiting space station hub to construct ships in space.

The logistics of that seem not so outlandish now with the ISS and a commercial rocket company like Space X able to physically carry the load and run the logistics of getting any equipment into space and then NASA could simply work on the assembly of the station/craft.

I’m not knowledgeable of this at all, but is that something that could realistically happen?  Or is that still so SciFi that’s it’s not seriously being considered?

For cost of SLS it seems that we’re just spending money on doing the same thing that Apollo did.  It be nice to see them advance the process for future missions (like Mars).

[RamjetFDO 10603]

Another week.  Another test.

Replaced/repaired (could never get a straight answer) the sensor that had been acting up.  Fueled it up again, ran the tests.  It's still leaking, but now below thresholds and the replaced/repaired sensor shows proper flow to the engine to cool it down pre-ignition.  

Next launch attempt is Tuesday, 9/27 at 10:37 CDT.

While there was a claim of a successful test, I'm still more than a bit concerned at a leak rate that might leave excess H2 hanging about when those engines actually ignite.

[atomheartbevo 90054]

52 minutes ago, RamjetFDO said:

It's still leaking,