News Space Launch System News

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NASASpaceflight.com: Orbital ATK prepares for final casting of SLS EM-1 flight SRBs

 

[N_Molson]

Good, let's make sure that those toric joints are perfectly weather-proof this time.

 

[zerofay32]

Good, let's make sure that those toric joints are perfectly weather-proof this time.

They have been since 1988...

 

[N_Molson]

Sure, but there's no issue checking one more time

 

[Urwumpe]

Sure, but there's no issue checking one more time

When was the last failure of a segmented SRM? :dry:

 

[N_Molson]

There's nothing wrong in testing hardware in live conditions rather than relying entirely on stats and simulations.

 

[Urwumpe]

There's nothing wrong in testing hardware in live conditions rather than relying entirely on stats and simulations.

Yes, but your comment is about as helpful as going to Renault and telling them "Don't forget checking that the pistons don't seize".

Of course they shouldn't. But it also never happened on new engines in the past decades, even mass produced engines already achieve tolerances as low as on a 1990s formula one car engine.

 

[N_Molson]

Wow, sorry, didn't knew that each post on this forum had to be the result of hours of thinking. It's always been a bit elitist over there but I see that things are worsening.

 

[PhantomCruiser]

If there is one thing I've learned in years of industrial maintenance across multiple platforms is that the "next generation" of managers will always suggest to cut costs by making the same types of cost custing measures that didn't work in years past.

It would not surprise me in the least that despite lessons learned, they insist that "tis time it will be different".

 

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NASA: NASA Completes Welding on Massive Fuel Tank for First Flight of SLS Rocket

 

[MaverickSawyer]

When was the last failure of a segmented SRM? :dry:

Gonna have to go with a Titan IVA that suffered a failure of one of its SRMs during ascent from Vandenberg AFB on 2 August 1993.

 

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[ame="https://twitter.com/NASA_SLS/status/786185542685700096"]NASA_SLS on Twitter: "Test version of a critical piece of #NASASLS connection hardware gets ready to go in the test stand @NASA_Marshall: https://t.co/wR1sXVL551 https://t.co/Y9J3NZGVYP"[/ame]
[ame="https://twitter.com/NASA_SLS/status/786202037968961537"]NASA_SLS on Twitter: "Going up! The #NASASLS launch vehicle stage adapter begins the ascent to the test stand @NASA_Marshall. #JourneyToMars https://t.co/aydHnUTHEy"[/ame]

NASA: NASA Completes Test Version of SLS Launch Vehicle Stage Adapter

 

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[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U-2PPmY3HLg"]Watch 60-Seconds of Major SLS Hardware Being Moved and Put in the Test Stand at NASA Marshall - YouTube[/ame]

 

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NASASpaceflight.com: KSC evaluating the groundwork challenges for SLS Block 1B upgrades

 

[Andy44]

SLS Block 1B upgrades

When I first saw that my brain read it as "Saturn 1B upgrades" and for a moment I was thinking, "Well, we really are reaching back now, aren't we..."

 

[Nicholas Kang]

Wind Tunnel Testing Underway for SLS

Official NASA Press Statement:https://www.nasa.gov/exploration/systems/sls/wind-tunnel-testing-underway-for-sls

Dr. Patrick Shea inspects a nearly 4 3/4-foot (1.3 percent scale) model of the second generation of NASA's Space Launch System in a wind tunnel for ascent testing at NASA's Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley, California.

The tests will help determine the larger, more powerful rocket's behavior as it climbs and accelerates through the sound barrier after launch. To also test a new optical measurement method, Ames engineers coated the SLS model with Unsteady Pressure-Sensitive Paint, which under the lighting glows dimmer or brighter according to the air pressure acting on different areas of the rocket.

Shea, who is from NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, was SLS aerodynamic test lead for the work at Ames.

Credits: NASA/Ames/Dominic Hart

As engines are fired, software written and hardware welded to prepare for the first flight of NASA's Space Launch System (SLS), engineers are already running tests in supersonic wind tunnels to develop the next, more powerful version of the world's most advanced launch vehicle capable of carrying humans to deep space destinations.

Two other test series are planned at Langley. The first in early 2017 will provide data to ensure that as the SLS’s two solid rocket boosters separate from the rocket during ascent, they don't come back into contact with the vehicle.

Next will be liftoff transition testing, scheduled in the summer. These tests will include evaluation of the effects of winds on the rocket as it is waiting on the pad, and the presence of the mobile launcher and tower during liftoff. Drift of the vehicle as it moves past the tower must be controlled to avoid damage and because the sound bouncing back from the pad can cause damaging vibration.

 

[Nicholas Kang]

Construction Complete: Stand Prepares to Test SLS’s Largest Fuel Tank

Official NASA Press Statement:https://www.nasa.gov/centers/marsha...prepares-to-test-sls-s-largest-fuel-tank.html

Robert Bobo, left, and Mike Nichols talk beneath the 221-foot-tall Test Stand 4693, the largest of two new Space Launch System test stands at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.

Credits: NASA/MSFC/Emmett Given

Major construction is complete on NASA’s largest new Space Launch System structural test stand, and engineers are now installing equipment needed to test the rocket’s biggest fuel tank. The stand is critical for ensuring SLS’s liquid hydrogen tank can withstand the extreme forces of launch and ascent on its first flight, and later on the second flight.

The stand will simulate the powerful dynamics of launch and flight by pushing, pulling and bending the SLS liquid hydrogen qualification test article, recently constructed by Boeing at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans. The 149-foot-long (45.4 meters) test article consists of a liquid hydrogen tank and equipment attached at each end to simulate the other parts of the 212-foot-long (64.6 meters) core stage, the backbone of the rocket.

 

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AmericaSpace: PHOTOS: Final SLS Work Platform Installed in KSC's Vehicle Assembly Building

More photos

 

[DaveS]

RS-25 hot-fire test today, estimated T0 is 1959 UTC (2:59 pm CDT, 3:59 pm EDT). This will be the first hot-fire using the brand new modern Main Engine Controller (MEC) replacing the shuttle-era MEC.