I don't know if this is the right place to post this, but here goes:
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=18353
http://www.spacex.com/
Looking forward to launch videos...
From the December 8, 2005, issue of Nature:
Internet star shoots for a rocket revolution
Tony Reichhardt
Nature 438, 736-737 (2005)
doi:10.1038/438736a
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v438/n7069/full/438736a.html
Excerpt:
"For the past 20 years, most start-up rocket companies have followed the same sad trajectory. They produce an artist's concept of an innovative vehicle while promising to cut launch costs by a factor of ten. Scrounge for money, mostly without success. Badmouth NASA and established rocket manufacturers such as Boeing. Fail, usually before reaching the launch pad. And disappear.
"The names may be different — AMROC, Conestoga, Rotary Rocket, Beal Aerospace — but the stories are essentially the same. And their combined impact on the economics of spaceflight has been zero. It still costs tens of millions of dollars to place even a modest satellite in orbit.
"Enter Elon Musk, the latest comer with long-shot dreams of revolutionizing the launch business..."
From the SpaceX website Updates page:
Posted December 7, 2005: The new launch date is approximately December 20, depending on when the Missile Defense Agency testing is complete. As soon as we have a firm time, it will be posted on the SpaceX website.
Liquid Oxygen
Regarding liquid oxygen (LOX) supplies, we expect to have enough on hand this time to fill the rocket four or five times over. This should account for almost any issue with a particular storage tank as well as an extended hold on the pad. There is an engineering term known as a s*load. I have asked that we have at least two s*loads on hand in case one s*load is not enough.
We chartered a C-17 to fly two of our empty high quality LOX containers to Hawaii, sourced another high quality LOX container on Hawaii and put all three on the barge to Kwajalein. In addition, our LOX plant on Kwajalein has been repaired and is producing LOX on island again.
Some might be wondering why we were so dumb as to run out of LOX on a remote tropical island on the last launch attempt. Believe me, we tried hard to avoid it, but several issues conspired to create the problem:
* The additional month of Merlin testing resulted in additional LOX boil-off on island. Even though it is stored in vacuum jacketed containers, LOX at -300F degrees does not like being on a tropical island at 85F.
* The SpaceX LOX plant on island broke down a few weeks prior to launch, which meant we could not top up.
* We ordered replacement LOX from Hawaii, but the container quality was poor, so only 20% of what we ordered actually arrived.
* Ground winds were unusually high on launch day, which amplifies the boil-off rate significantly, since the Falcon's first stage LOX tank is uninsulated.
* All of the above would not have mattered if our final storage tank did not have a small, manual vent valve incorrectly in the open position. Somewhat agonizingly, we were only a few percent away from being full. We just needed a little sip from the last tank.
* After a while, we were able to close the vent and fill the vehicle's LOX tanks. However, we use LOX to chill our onboard helium and the absence of ground LOX to do so resulted in the helium heating up and venting back to storage. In the end, we did not have enough LOX to stay filled on the rocket and chill & pressurize the helium.
Engine Computer
The engine computer reboot anomaly was definitively traced to a ground power problem. Importantly, this would have had no effect on flight, since we switch to vehicle power before the autosequence begins. The reason it cropped up at Kwajalein was that the higher load on the longer umbilical (three times longer than in prior tests) coupled with high temperatures in Kwajalein resulted in increased resistance in the ground umbilical. This was just enough to lower the voltage below minimums and cause an engine computer reset when drawing maximum power. The same max power test was repeated on internal vehicle batteries with no problem at all.
This problem has been solved by slightly increasing voltage on the ground umbilical.
--Elon-
anyone know of live information from the launch on the web other than spaceflightnow.com or spacex.com ?
Not offhand. From spaceflightnow:
http://spaceflightnow.com/falcon/f1/status.html
"1900 GMT (2:00 p.m. EST)
Today's launch window is now open. However, the countdown has been stopped due to the strong winds at the launch site. Officials are waiting for the winds to ease before proceeding with the launch attempt of the first Falcon 1 rocket. "
SCRUBBED!
I thought this rocket is supposed to be reliable and cheap...how much these scrubs cost?
....how much these scrubs cost?
a LOT less than one Space Shuttle Toilet!
It's the first one - it's going to be troublesome. Give them a chance to work it all out and THEN see how they do.
Doug
I like those images of the rocket by the sea at sunset, but does anyone else think that all rockets should be launched from somewhere in the deserts of the Southwestern US, like they used to be depicted?
Either that is really bad video compression or they are using a palm tree as a service tower.
Does anyone have the link to that live webcam feed? For next time...
From http://spacex.com:
New update from Feb 6:
* SpaceX Delays Inaugural Falcon 1 Launch at Least One Day
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/060207_spacex_falcon1_delay.html
Space Exploration (SpaceX) Technologies' third attempt to launch the Falcon 1
rocket on its maiden flight has been pushed back roughly 24 hours to Friday,
Feb. 10 to allow for more tests.
* ASTRONOTES: Private Spaceflight Firm Partners With Japanese Researchers
http://www.space.com/astronotes/astronotes.html
Rocketplane Limited Inc. has entered into an agreement with a Japanese research
group to take experiment specimens into space.
Anyone know how the test fire went....or if the test fire has happened yet?
looking forward to the launch..hope it is broadcast somewhere tomorrow...
Looks like it'll be awhile before launch:
http://www.spacex.com/updates.php
Static Fire Video up on http://www.spacex.com/updates.php
Companies Prepare to Launch Remains into Space
http://www.space.com/news/ap_060221_space_ashes.html
Scotty will be blasted into space – not beamed up – and Gordo is returning for
his third flight. The craft also will hold the ashes of 185 others, including a
telephone technician, a nurse and a college student.
Update on Feb 24:
http://www.spacex.com/updates.php
Article on the Space-X 'Dragon' manned/cargo vehicle:
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=1095
Bob Shaw
Its not one exact carbon copy, but I cant help thinking its like a rebirth of the Gemini program.
A case could be made for a design with a "service module" equivalent compartment inside the re-entry body behind the pressurized crew compartment (which is what I think SpaceX is doing here) ...
AND
with external "ports" that could connect to propellent, fuel-cell supplies, etc. to provide extend-mission capabilities. An "external service" module could be little more than an adaptor with throwaway tanks and almost nothing else. All the high-value reusable stuff and short-duration, low-delta-v mission consumables could be inside the entry-shell
March 15th http://www.spacex.com/updates.php available:
I just check the site frequently. I signed up, too, but have never received an email from them. It might be a good idea to send them an email to check their mailing list sender.
It is now close to sundown on the 18th on Kwajalein. There was supposed to be a static firing yesterday or today. I can find no news more recent than Musk's 3/15 update. That update implied that they had accumulated enough LOX on the island and said again that the launch would be beteen the 20th and the 25th but....? His brother (http://kwajrockets.blogspot.com/) is off-line since 2/10. I do see on Space News that SpaceX has recruited another industry vet:
http://www.space.com/spacenews/ Sea Launch President Joining SpaceX
PARIS —- Sea Launch LLC President Jim Maser is resigning his post at the end of this month and will become a manager at launcher startup company Space Exploration Technologies, known as SpaceX, according to industry officials.
This looks to me like quite an endorsement. A veteran of an incrimental plan to reduce launch costs jumping ship to a radical plan to lower launch costs. However, it is still not the news I was looking for.
My take on the total lack of news from Kwaj... (no news atoll)... is that they're up to their (anatomical reference deleted) in fiddly stuff and too busy to take a breather and chat at us.
But of course, no news is no news. And that Jim Maser info is most interesting, as is the fact that Kistler's operation has been bought... was it the Rocketplane people, with... was it some French funding... (my brain's going.. I can't remember what I read yesterday)
from nasawatch.com...
"SpaceX Update
Editor's note: According to SpaceX sources, the test firing countdown and static fire went fine except that they had a ground helium supply disconnect prematurely during engine startup. One of their flight video cameras also stop working. Neither event is seen as being a big issue, but these things will take a few days to correct. SpaceX is still working toward a launch in the next few days."
Thanks argv,
I've not used nasawatch as a resource before. Some interesting stuff there.
Beside NASA Watch, you want to monitor Cowing's companion site, SpaceRef.
http://www.spaceref.com/news/press.html is the link I usually use. From there, also go to the "Mission Status Reports" link near the top of the page.
Thanks Ed,
I found a strangely worded http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/launches/next_launch.html It mentions "...tests will determine whether the firm shoots for a launch sometime between Monday and March 25. The launch window opens at 4:00 p.m. EST (2100 GMT)...". But later it states, "SpaceX is making its launch service debut with today's Falcon 1 launch." I wonder if the last two sentences were copied from a previous article.
http://kwajrockets.blogspot.com/ has the latest http://kwajrockets.blogspot.com/
There was an update at the SpaceX site last night:
http://www.spacex.com/updates.php
A link to a static fire video (streaming) can be found under the March 21 post.
Launch postponed until Friday at 13:00 PST:
http://www.spacex.com/updates.php
A web cast of launch?? mm..i lets hope its true
http://www.spacex.com/?content=webcast
Webcast looking good -but it looks mighty windy...
Currently 25 mins into an unplanned hold. The Safety boat is apparently in the wrong place!
Count to restart at 21:15 UTC when will be T-1:15. Launch thus at 22:30 UTC.
Can't wait! :-)
Anyone recording this? Would love to have a copy of checks leading up to launch, or transcript.
WMV's are hard to record
Elon just came on the net and said that the weather is green, fuel's nearly ready to go - all just about go for launch.
Doug
Well - the webfeed seemed to die after launch - but the onboard camera showed a few seconds of what looked like a tumbling vehicle.
Doug
Are you sure it wasn't just normal rotation, Doug? I think the video feed cut out for all.
Argh!
Space.com says it "roared skyward", but hasn't given much more yet:
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/launches/next_launch.html
"We did lose the vehicle," says Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX vice president of business development.
2:42 PM
Gwynne Shotwell seems to indicate (on spaceflightnow.com) that they got a minute or two of flight.
Not exactly to orbit, but a significant step in the right direction...
Is there any chance that they can recover FalconSat-2 from the wreckage?
I did a video... where can i post it?
Waiting for the video of hal_9000, here is one of the last image from the onbard camera.
http://spaceflightnow.com/falcon/f1/images/onboard.jpg
here
Things like google video will let you host it.
Doug
bad news in my mind... from http://spaceflightnow.com/falcon/f1/status.html
"The Falcon 1 rocket apparently impacted the Pacific about 40 seconds after liftoff. The vehicle went out of control and fell back to Earth." so it was really only going "up" for less than 20 s..dam..wish it was longer
I'm not able to load that link, Hal. Do you have the video.google url for it?
Thanks again.
Severe bummer, and my sincere sympathies for the SpaceX team. However..."The lessons that burn are the lessons you learn". I think Falcon 2 will be better for the experience, nilhilisitically enough because of the pain. Keep your chins up, gang...and congratulations on having the chutzpah to try this at all!!!!
This is a little bit off-topic to today's launch, but is relevant to Comga's http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?showtopic=1705&st=34#
I received an email from Dianne Molina at SpaceX. I had asked about the lack of email updates sent to SpaceX's mailing list subscribers. She had this to say:
Based on the Spaceflightnow.com article it appears that a sticking "thermal coat" may have contributed to the failed launch
here are the relevant portions and I have bolded a few sentences for emphasis:
"To keep the liquid oxygen from warming up and naturally boiling away while the rocket sat on its tropical launch pad before liftoff, a "thermal coat" had been wrapped around the first stage. Problems running out of liquid oxygen on the remote island have bedeviled SpaceX over the past few months.
"A glaring deficiency that we had in the November and December attempts was the fact that we were basically boiling LOX at an unacceptably high rate. It is hard to get LOX on the island. So what we did was put a blanket scheme together to cover the first stage LOX tank," Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX vice president of business development, told reporters during Friday's countdown.
"It is held to the rocket by Velcro and we've got lanyards that hold it down to the ground. So basically the lanyards will pull a zipper as the vehicle lifts up, a Velcro zipper, and that LOX tank insulation will stay on the ground as the vehicle flies through it."
The Falcon 1 had set sail on its maiden voyage, and a video camera mounted on the rocket beamed back live footage of the booster ascending skyward. However, the launch video did not show any signs of the liquid oxygen blanket unzipping and being yanked free from the rocket by ground tethers as planned.
As the vehicle climbed higher, a white blanket presumably the cover Shotwell had mentioned could be seen flapping wildly in the onboard video. Large pieces appeared to rip away at T+plus 20 seconds due to the rocket's increasing speed.
The vehicle had a noticeable rolling motion, rocking back and forth a bit, and then at T+plus 26 seconds rapidly pitched over when its fiery engine plume became greatly distorted.
"This is the RCO, we have an active track with the radar," the Range Safety officer announced.
Just moments later the rocket impacted the ocean, apparently on its side, at about T+plus 41 seconds.
Did the blanket play a role? Was the engine damaged? Did the nozzle fail? Investigators are beginning to sift through the data collected during the brief flight to construct a full picture of the launch.
Musk looked good, but those large Falcon payloads are just a fantasy and they still haven't lived up to the claim of 'Lowest Cost Rocket'
- sure the Tito tourist flights on Soyuz cost a few million but now the Russians, Chinese and others are starting to put larger payloads into space for a much cheaper price and they have much better success rates.
Spaceflight Now is now suggesting that it was a fuel leak rather than the thermal blanket that resulted in the failure. Sounds like a fixable problem (well fixable for the next one at least...)
QUOTE>>
Early insights from investigators examining Friday's failed launch of the first SpaceX Falcon 1 rocket suggest a fuel leak triggered a fire that ultimately brought down the booster, the company's founder said today.
"The good news is that all vehicle systems, including the main engine, thrust vector control, structures, avionics, software, guidance algorithm, etc. were picture perfect. Falcon's trajectory was within 0.2 degrees of nominal during powered flight," Elon Musk said in a statement this morning.
"However, at T+25s, a fuel leak of currently unknown origin caused a fire around the top of the main engine that cut into the first stage helium pneumatic system. On high resolution imagery, the fire is clearly visible within seconds after liftoff. Once the pneumatic pressure decayed below a critical value, the spring return safety function of the pre-valves forced them closed, shutting down the main engine at T+29s."
<<UNQUOTE
So..since its a leak.. my solution..
duct tape the crap out of it and give it a go again
to be honest being a leak seems to be "good news" as compared to other possibliities. I'm relieved it wasn't the insulation..be a "DUH" moment (ala homer simpson) if that was the only cause. Lets hope that the definitive cause for leak is found quickly and a easy solution is available and not.."We think this is where it leaked and so lets try again"
http://kwajrockets.blogspot.com/ has an update and a couple of pictures showing the fuel leak that doomed the vehicle.
Sorry guys..
but the video is here..
http://rapidshare.de/files/16430092/falconvideo.rm.html
Guys... I hate to say it... but this shows once again that getting into orbit is *not* easy. It's actually rather difficult. And when you try to do it cheaply, you tend to fail. Spectacularly.
It's all a matter of the amount of energy required to get into orbit -- and the time frame in which you have to release that energy. A fully fueled 747, for example, carries enough energy to place the entire airplane into orbit. But it cannot release that energy quickly enough to achieve the necessary acceleration.
You not only have to provide enough energy to accelerate you to orbital velocity, you have to have a motor (or motors) that can release that energy fast enough to actually achieve the acceleration you need. If you try to do that with cheaply built or mass-produced parts, or with assemblies that have not been fault-tested to within an inch of their lives, you tend to get the results we just saw Falcon 1 achieve. And the manufacturing standards and fault testing required to assure success -- they just ain't cheap.
-the other Doug
The Heretic Jeffrey Bell E-mailed me on just that point last night:
"The problem with all these libertarian alt.space guys is that they grossly underestimate the real cost of developing aerospace hardware. If you try to explain it to them, they claim that all gummint projects are grossly bloated and most of the costs are unnecessary: 'We'll be able to do this for a fraction of what NASA would spend.' Then they actually try it and find out that only massive engineering, massive quality control, massive testing, and massive attention to detail can bring the failure rate down to a tolerable level. [Sounds kind of like Colin Pillinger -- Moomaw.]
"Even SpaceX suffers from a Silicon Valley variation of this delusion: 'We need a Moore's Law of space, similar to that of the semiconductor arena, where the cost per pound cost of access to space is constantly improving,' Musk told SPACE.com. 'Only if that happens, will we become a true spacefaring civilization where ordinary people have the opportunity to travel in space.'
"Musk just doesn't understand the massive differences between the chip industry and space. I had hoped he would have learned by now, but apparently not."
_____________________________
In my own experience, anyone who accuses socialists of being hopeless political/economic romantics has never talked to libertarians, who at a minimum fully equal the socialists in wishful political thinking. I despise P.J. O'Rourke, but he did come up with a good line recently: "Any libertarian anarchists who want to see their ideas in action should visit current-day Albania."
Well, that's the problem -- the fact that they didn't get to any of those other flight milestones means that God knows what flaws are lurking in those as well. (Remember how just that happened with the first flights of Ariane 5 and Delta 3 -- after they redesigned them to get past the FIRST disastrous flaw, a second one was lurking further on. Also remember my description of how the same thing happened through four straight Soviet lunar soft-landing attempts in a row in 1965, until they finally managed to get past ALL the bugs on the fifth try.)
All points well taken.
What really is irksome is that modeling & simulation technology is so good now that most of these types of failures should be avoidable during the design phase...provided that all the possible failure modes of all the components (and combinations thereof) can be identified. I am not convinced that doing that is possible in the real world...
To paraphrase a tired old chestnut, chaos theory isn't just a good idea, it seems to be the law!
"What really is irksome is that modeling & simulation technology is so good now that most of these types of failures should be avoidable during the design phase......."
Uh... that's part of the problem. There are a hell of a lot of engineers out there who have more CAD and simulation experience than shop-floor bending-metal experience.
It's sort of like the recent Geico auto insurence ads with the Geico Gecko. The animated gecko looks pretty realistic, though naturally a bit anthropomorphised.... till you look at the REAL gecko lying near it on the branch.. and see all the infinite level of real-world detail that the simulation just doesn't have.
I look forward to Musk getting it right on the 2nd or 3rd attempt and proving Bell wrong.
Doug
It's worth noting their idea of designing to try to avoid the most common launch killers still has merit.
A first launch is always at the mercy of design bugs. Even when something flies perfectly and surprises everybody on the first try, like Saturn 501 and Surveyor 1, marginal design can bite you on the <deleted> on the Second flight... Saturn 502 failed major flight test objectives when it didn't lob the CSM into a high elliptical orbit for a Lunar-return like heatshield test. Surveyor 2 was killed by fuel contamination.
Musk himself kept pointing out the 50/50 record of first flights.
Since this flight only got 25'ish seconds of useful flight data, unfortunately, it didn't prove a good fraction of the total vehicle design, so flight #2 will be nearly as "at risk" of first flight defects as this was.
After a successful flight, you know you have a vehicle that can work. Then you're trying to catch marginal design elements before they catch you, and prevent random manufacturing errors (quality control) from nailing you.
From http://kwajrockets.blogspot.com/
The satellite was thrown high into the air when the rocket impacted and came crashing down through the roof of our machine shop, landing mostly intact on the floor!
It's incredible !
I'd like to point out one or two things...
First, one reason SpaceX is having a really hard time getting these test flights in the air and proving out their engineering is they keep having to kludge together fixes and workarounds based on the lack of liquid oxygen on their base island. If part of "cheap access to LEO" is based on choosing not to develop *required* elements of infrastructure (like an oxygen liquification plant on the same land mass as your launch site), then that element of "savings" is not really valid. It's just a *deferred* expense.
Second, from what little detail can be seen in the RealPlayer version of the launch video, I'll bet you any money that the thing failed because the jerry-rigged insulation blanket (that was supposed to be ripped off the rocket at launch, but wasn't) flew back against the motor housing (and into the engine plume) and ruptured a fuel line. If a NASA rocket had suffered a failure because some similar kludged-up fix had backfired, most of the people here urging patience with SpaceX's travails would be calling for the heads of the NASA managers who "ought to know better." What makes it OK for SpaceX *not* to know better? Is it because they're promising "cheap" access to space, so it's OK to cut corners?
Hey, I want SpaceX to succeed as much as anyone here. But I've seen this many times before -- people loudly proclaiming that *they* know how to provide cheap access to space, only to utterly fail to deliver. Those who have succeeded to even a small degree have done so only by using second-hand military hardware that has already been proven to function and already been fault-tested by its manufacturers.
I will call Scaled Composite's contributions to the field a success when they put something into orbit. It's one heck of a lot easier to do a stunt pop-up out of the sensible atmosphere, going relatively slowly, than it is to achieve orbit. So far, neither they nor SpaceX has shown me an ability to get anything as far as LEO, and the history of the industry tells me that no one has yet lived up to the vaporware they've tried to sell us.
I guess this has just been a really long-winded way of saying I'll believe it when I see it, and not a moment before...
-the other Doug
Yes we don't judge spaceX and great space administration on an equal basis. Great administrations are not "ours", while having accounts to report to tax payers. They have the best engineers and tools available. No stupid failure or fiddling is allowed.
SpaceX is sort of amateur. It is you and me, in a way. Of course there are 1,5 billon dollars that we don't have. But if I had 1,5 billion dollars, most probably I would do something like that. We cannot all be spaceX and build our own rocket to orbit, but spaceX is our ambassador into space.
Ah, to say "my rocket" and not "state's rocket".
Actually, SpaceX is the one private launcher development company that Jeffrey Bell has any respect for; he's said for some time before this launch -- and maybe still thinks -- that they have a real chance of pulling this off. But we have just had another demonstration that the free market is not a magician, and that it does not repeal the fact that launchers are damned complex and expensive to develop. Libertarians tend to think that the world would instantly turn into paradise if those Evil Government Bureaucrats would just disappear, as socialists used to think the same thing about those Evil Private Businessmen. No such luck.
The first ones, usually has the highest rate of failure. It is a learning process. I don't blame it unless they recognize the causes of that failure.
SpaceX was founded in June 2002 by CEO/CTO Elon Musk, who had also co‐founded startup companies Zip2 and PayPal, and who so far has invested in SpaceX about $100,000,000 of the fortune he gained through the sales of his two previous companies. Although Musk has stated that he could financially handle a couple of early‐launch failures, he also has said "If we have three consecutive failures […] it's not clear to me that we know what we're doing and maybe we should go out of business."
The lesson for them, study well of the failure, plan with calm (I have seen that they were hurried against the clock which I didn't like since it pushes further to the failure) and do accordingly to the plan with calm. The slow advancement but firm so that the launch of Falcon 1 would be successful before than three launches. The first failure, has already costed more than US 6.7 millions...
SpaceX man, back again and start to work again.
Rodolfo
Our rockets always blow up
---
In the aftermath of Friday's failed launch of SpaceX's Falcon 1
booster, many people claimed that most first launches of new rockets
have failed. Dwayne Day checks how accurate a claim that is.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/585/1
Jeff Bell has some more sour comments -- including the most plausible theory I've seen yet of how the failure might be due to that impromptu LOX insulating blanket:
"I used to like SpaceX because they were the only Mom&Pop Rocket Shop with a technically workable approach to COTS. Most of the others seemed to base their vehicle design on science-fiction stories.
"But the more we see of the detailed implementation of the concept, the more it looks like all the previous fiascos. SpaceX seems to be making a lot of dumb mistakes that make me question the competence of the technical staff Musk has hired.
"First, they made a big mistake trying to develop a new orbital launch facility on a sandbar in the middle of nowhere. Sure, nearby Kwaj Island is a US missile base, but
"A) most of the stuff there is highly classified, so SpaceX personnel must be highly restricted in their movements.
"B) the rockets fired there are all solid-fueled, so there aren't any support facilities for liquid-fueled rockets. E.g. the LOX fiasco.
"C) it is extremely hard to get there from civilization.
"Musk should have made a few flights from Vandenburg or Canaveral before trying this South Seas adventure.
"Then we heard a list of screw-ups from Kwaj that is exactly the same as the mistakes made in the early days at Canaveral, or Peenemunde for that matter. It almost seems that no one in the company has any launch experience, or has read any books about early rocketry.
"Now they are putting in a bunch of screwy new ideas. For instance, they lose a lot of LOX through boil-off and have a lot of ice forming on the tank. This is inherent in having a small booster in a hot and super-humid environment. (Actually this winter in Hawaii has been unusually cool.)
"Now the real solution would be to have your own LOX generator and a top-off pipe in the pad, like every booster has had since the V-2. But instead of doing some proper engineering, they kludge up this insulation blanket that is held on with Velcro and is supposed to tear off during the launch. Anybody with a brain could see that this system is stupid, because the Velcro is likely to get frozen solid with ice. Basically they launched with the booster tied down to the pad with ropes. They were lucky to get as far as they did.
"Most of these problems don't seem to be related to the sheer lack of funding and engineering staff relative to any other sucessful booster program. So I really am starting to fear that this is another Keystone Rocket Scientist operation. If so, private space flight is dead, because no one else has a hope of doing it."
Although Jeff bell has some relevant arguments, I think he is a much of a lot too much pessimistic.
Far too pessimistic, but that's the modern journalistic way unfortunately - no story without criticism. He has some valid points but in some places he's just, well, wrong. Point C is no more valid than for Sea Launch for example, or even Kodiak, Point A is true of any launch facility, they're all ultra high security places, and they WANTED to launch from Vandenberg for their first launch but were forced to move it out to the Atoll. Furthermore, they were already addressing the LOX issue before this launch. It's almost as if Bell's never read the SpaceX news pages or the launch blog.
Doug
Well, they certainly didn't address the LOX issue very well -- they were totally unprepared for the effects of any significant launch delays, which is why they came up with that Boob McNutt detachable blanket. Given the likely effects of ice on it, I suspect that Bell is right in pinning the failure on it.
I believe earlier Ariane (Up to Ariane 4 even ) vehicles ued something similar - it looked like the thing was buckling in the middle. I'm assuming the earlier Ariane family was a derivative of the Diamant family.
http://esamultimedia.esa.int/images/launcher/ariane403950.jpg
http://mek.kosmo.cz/nosice/esa/ariane/arv99.jpg
Doug
I guess all these stuff falling away from the Emeraude launchers were also foam pannels (which were later re-used for Diamant launchers).
-- Rakhir
ROCKET SCIENCE
- Falcon Images Show Fatal Engine Fire
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Falcon_Images_Show_Fatal_Engine_Fire.html
El Segundo CA (SPX) Mar 27, 2006 - New images released by Space Exploration
Technologies Inc. of the launch of the Falcon 1 last Friday clearly show the
beginning of an engine fire that ultimately caused mission controllers to
destroy the rocket less than a minute into its historic flight.
- Musk Vows To Launch Falcon 1 Again Within Six Months
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Musk_Vows_To_Launch_Falcon_1_Again_Within_Six_Months.html
- Falcon 1 Lost In First Launch Attempt
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Falcon_1_Lost_In_First_Launch_Attempt.html
- Vinci Cyrogenic Motor Shines In CNES Tests
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Vinci_Cyrogenic_Motor_Shines_In_CNES_Tests.html
Eventually this fire seems to have no relation with the problem of the blanket.
Short videos of first launch now up with March 31 http:///www.spacex.com/updates.php. None, so far, showing Falcon's demise.
How great of a problem can that cloud of dust/sand/vegetation cause? How much of a priority should it be to make a pad with a greater diameter, thus reducing dust?
Regarding ELDO: There were four test flights. The French "Coralie" second stage gave them fits during ground tests (the ground crew took to referring to it as "de Gaulle's Force de Fart") -- but during all four actual flights, it worked, while the previously reliable West German third stage always failed.
First flight success isn't the whole story
---
Last month's failed first launch of the Falcon 1 raised the question
of just how successful the first launches of new rockets are. Tom
Hill points out that those rockets that have successful first flights
often have a great deal of flight heritage.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/590/1
Maybe it's time to start a Falcon 9 thread, with both 1 and 9 as subtopics of SpaceX, under Private missions. Check out the last half of this article from space.com:
http://www.space.com/news/060403_nss_preview.html
Will further Falcon 1 tests be done prior to the Falcon 9 1st stage static fire?
Contrary to popular belief, the Falcon 9 is now even more in the future. You don't built a Delta IV class vehicle AND all the infrastructure in two years.
Here's the picture the SpaceX team didn't *quite* catch!
Bob Shaw
Maybe we should combine this thread with the "blowed Up Real Good!", A Place for Spectacular Failures" thread until further notice or should I say "awaiting further developments"....
Bit harsh?..
If the loss of Falcon 1 is down to human error as reported by http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/060406_nss_falc1.html then that's not such a bad place to be. I wouldn't be writing these people and this craft off quite yet.
I have the impression that the mistake was due mainly of the sensation of anxiety of the first launch that is very common. That state of anxiety of the personnel to get the thing working will lead many blind mistakes. Hope that the next time, all personnel will be calmer due to the more experience and confidence.
Rodolfo
Bad, Good, and Great
First the bad: Newsweek finally noticed SpaceX. In twenty words they made at least three errors, not the least of which was putting the Falcon 1 launch under the heading of "Space Tourism". They want to cancel "their" seet on Virgin Galactic's SpaceShip 2, not that they have one, even though that's an air-launched, hybrid rocket, winged...... you get the picture.
Then the good: The April 3 edition of Aviation Week has a full two page article on the launch, titled "First 30 Sec. Good..." It is a good article in classic Av Week fashion (Blackstar TSTO not withstanding ). There is even an enlargement of one of the very early photos with more clarity than I have seen showing the fire before the rocke is half way past the transport cradle. It appears that the fire is inside some blankets attached to the tubular (blue painted titanium?) thrust frame. They have a great image of the engine from a few years back for context. There are no pictures of the wreckage, but I don't blame SpaceX for not being THAT forthcoming. Lots of quotes that I have not read to date.
Then the great: The top half of the Av Week back page is an editorial titled "Two cheers for the new rocketeers". It sums up what many of us "fans" have felt for years: this was never going to be easy, it is harder than many thought even when being "realistic", but there is a lot riding on the success of SpaceX, and we have good reason to believe that they will succeed to a good degree, at least technically.
We just have to wait for the official report to see which wild guess was closest to the true failure mechanism.
Here is launch video
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3843552474868248168
Very good movie. The camera was bobling with the wind, after the rocket blast, a wooden house was shattared, nice movie during its climbing until crashing!
Rodolfo
According to Jonathan's Space Report Number 563:
"It's been reported from Kwaj (kwajrockets.blogspot.com) that the
payload fell back to Earth through the roof of SpaceX's machine shop."
http://www.planet4589.org/jsr.html
Er... ...old news, I fear - this is what the Falcon Blog (written as an 'unofficial' record by Elon Musk's brother) had to say:
"Saturday, March 25, 2006
Someone's looking out for that satellite...
The team is on Omelek collecting debris.
The rocket impacted on a dead reef about 250 ft away from the launch pad, so most of it is recoverable for analysis.
Amazingly, the satellite was thrown high into the air when the rocket impacted and came crashing down through the roof of our machine shop, landing mostly intact on the floor! One helluva' return trip.
The hole in the machine shop roof is the only significant damage to the island."
http://kwajrockets.blogspot.com/
According to Dwanye Day, the latest news has the next Falcon going out of Kwaj,
probably with no payload. This will not happen until this fall, apparently.
Why no payload? Not even some test equipment?
I guess it means they'll chuck something on top, but not a 'customer' payload.
Doug
http://www.space.com/adastra/adastra_isdc_musk_060504.html
Falcon re-flight
Also addressing the opening day of the ISDC meeting at a “Space Venturing Forum” was private rocketeer, Elon Musk, chairman and chief executive officer of El Segundo, California-based Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX).
The SpaceX Falcon 1 rocket failed March 24 of this year, shortly after liftoff from a launch pad on Omelek Island. The private rocket’s maiden flight suffered a fuel leak, leading to a main engine shutoff, Musk recounted.
“The rocket business is a tough business,” Musk said.
Musk said that an on-the-pad processing error by a couple of technicians the day before launch doomed the vehicle. SpaceX engineers are now putting in place improvements in several areas, particularly in processing the rocket booster for launch—incorporating “fool proof” design changes, as well as improving a health-monitoring software check system used on the rocket, he added.
“We’ve had hundreds of engine tests … and not once did the problem that occurred on launch day show up,” Musk stated. “When we make it … it sure won’t be luck.”
The problem cropped up, ironically, in the part of the booster that ground personnel check for leaks in the engine, Musk explained.
Next flight of the Falcon—a demonstration flight—is slated for September, Musk advised.
Musk said that SpaceX has some 11 launches that have now been sold.
Asked about his company’s interest in building a crew capsule, Musk said that if SpaceX wins soon-to-be-announced NASA crew and cargo transport work, the entrepreneurial firm will accelerate building of the hardware.
Given the NASA win, the crew capsule would be available roughly three years from now, Musk said. Without the contract work, a scaled-down version would be available in 2011, he said.
Thanks, LJK4-1. I've been hoping to hear more Falcon news.
I want to mention something that I just found. I know it's not directly related to Falcon, but it is related to Elon Musk. Yesterday, I noticed that Business 2.0 posted an http://money.cnn.com/2006/05/04/technology/business2_wrightspeed/ about electric sports cars. It mentions that Elon Musk is an investor in https://www.teslamotors.com. Tesla's site is not yet announcing much about it's product, but one of it's former employees has some interesting news about his new vehicle, the http://www.wrightspeed.com/. Check out the video there.
So I guess Wrightspeed and Tesla Motors are in competition.
I'm curious what Musk's company is cooking up to rival the X1. That guy has alot of irons in the fire.
A quote from the Business 2.0 article:
First flight facts
---
Recent articles have discussed the odds of the failure of the first
launch of a new vehicle in the wake of the Falcon 1 launch failure in
March.
Wayne Eleazer provides another look at the statistics of
launch failures to demonstrate just how likely new rockets will fail
on its early flights.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/616/1
They do say that there are "Lies, Damn lies and Statistics" but I have to say that I'm quite impressed by this review of the probable success rates of early launch attempts.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/622/1
be nice if its true
Is SpaceX getting a little government help for its Falcon 9 launcher?
Perhaps to launch a space plane for the USAF?
See here:
Final frontier revisited: the US responds to space requirements
By Bill Sweetman IDR Technology and Aerospace Editor
So far, little attention has been paid to a potentially important new start in
the Fiscal Year 2007 US defence budget: the first funding line in years to be
dedicated to a military, partially reusable space launch vehicle. If it survives
this year's budget deliberations in Congress, the Affordable Responsive
Spacelift (ARES) programme could start with flight tests of a small X-plane
demonstrator as early as 2010.
Another little-publicised new development in 2005 was that the new-start SpaceX
(Space Exploration Technologies) company announced an order for the Falcon 9
expendable launcher from an unspecified US government customer. The US Air Force
(USAF) had previously ordered launches from SpaceX, covering the small Falcon 1,
but this was the first US government order for a medium-class launcher from a
non-traditional company.
The philosophy behind ARES is to balance the advantages of the reusable system
with those of the expendable - which, like SpaceX's Falcon, is quite simple and
can be cheap to develop. Compared with a fully reusable system, ARES requires
the development of about one third as much reusable hardware, with a less
challenging speed and temperature envelope. Compared with a fully expendable
system, ARES expends about one third as much mass. In a study by the Aerospace
Corporation, the hybrid approach turned out to be the best choice in about 85
per cent of the scenarios examined.
Underlying this philosophical approach is the fact that ARES is much more about
responsiveness than economics, although the USAF is looking to reduce costs by a
factor of three to six. The first step in the ARES programme, according to USAF
documents, is to define and build a small-scale demonstrator. This would be
about one quarter the size of a full-scale ARES and would weigh about 6,800 kg
without booster fuel. Its main goals would be to demonstrate the integration of
modern materials, avionics and propulsion technology in a low-maintenance,
high-flight-rate vehicle - one specific target is to launch five times in 10
days with a 15-person crew - and to demonstrate a flight profile in which the
booster would release an upper stage at Mach 7 and return to its launch site.
360 of 2,684 words
[End of non-subscriber extract.]
http://idr.janes.com/public/idr/index.shtml
I think the amaturish nature of the Falcon launch failure is telling. It is clear that much of the process was not in control. Much of the cost of rocket building is in QA - material control and design margins. Ninety percent of these costs could be eliminated, and system reliability reduced less than 1%. But if only 1% of your mission critical systems fail, where goes the mission?
well,
actually signed up for the spacex mailing list seems like a year ago and got the first e-mail today
from the http://www.spacex.com web site in the update section...
some good tidbits...can't wait to see Falcon 9 on the test stand!!
From http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/060719_falcon1_update.html
Falcon 1 Failure Traced to a Busted Nut
The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the sponsor of the Falcon 1’s inaugural flight, announced July 18 that the review board concluded a small aluminum nut designed to hold the fuel pipe fitting in place failed due to subsurface corrosion not visible to the naked eye. The resulting kerosene leak caused the main engine to catch fire shortly after the rocket cleared the launch pad, bringing the flight to a premature end.
“The board determined that the only plausible cause of the fire was the failure of an aluminum B-nut on the fuel pump inlet pressure transducer due to inter-granular corrosion cracking,” the DARPA release states. “This caused [Refined Petroleum-1] fuel to leak onto the engine and down the outside of the thrust chamber. Once the engine ignited, the leaking fuel caught fire. The fire, over time, resulted in a loss of pneumatic pressure, causing the RP-1 and liquid oxygen pre-valves to close, terminating engine thrust 34 seconds after ignition.”
The rocket’s manufacturer, Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) of El Segundo, Calif., initially suspected that the Falcon 1’s fuel leak was caused by a tiny pipe fitting loosened and accidentally left untightened by technicians doing work on the rocket the day before launch.
The next Falcon 1 launch is slated for November from Kwajalein.
That's what I call a headline...
Phil
"NUTS!"
No. Just one.
Space.com article:
a good update at http://www.spacex.com/ web site..
good pics too...
cheers
jb
Falcon 1 second launch is now targeted for mid-to-late January 2007 http://www.livescience.com/blogs/2006/11/16/private-spacex-rocket-now-targeted-for-2007/
Launch "attempt", I say, as the first one was a failure.
Just noticed this new, really brief update at spacex.com:
Minor Update
All Falcon 1 parts have been shipped to the launch site to prepare for next flight. Our current schedule calls for a static fire in mid January and first flight countdown in late January. Given the many upgrades to Falcon 1, there may be many countdowns before launch occurs.
--Greg
http://www.spacex.com/
And the trail heats up, even if we already have one more day's delay. Great news!
Another short update: http://spacex.com/
Posted January 17, 2007
DemoFlight 2 Launch Update
The static fire has moved to Friday (California time) and launch to Monday, January 22. We have not encountered any new issues – the shift in timing is primarily to provide for additional risk reduction activities on site, as we continue to operate with a healthy paranoia.
As stated in the prior update, there is a high likelihood that the dates will continue to change, given the broad array of vehicle robustness upgrades. This will remain true all the way up to the final few seconds of the countdown, as our new health verification software executes hundreds of systems checks between engine ignition at T-3 sec and liftoff at T-0, when the hold down clamps release the rocket for flight. This is a critical phase for verification, given that the vehicle will have undergone substantial state changes throughout the first stage and avionics system.
--
latest update from http://www.spacex.com
DemoFlight 2 Launch Update
During our final check-outs prior to static fire, we uncovered an anomaly with the thrust vector control (TVC) pitch actuator on the second stage that will result in launch being pushed to February. Since this is not used during the static fire, we have decided to push forward with that test in order to acquire valuable data on engine ignition, pad acoustics, and the overall system response. The static fire is now planned to occur between Saturday and Tuesday (California time). This test will proceed very slowly and then only burns for about four seconds, so will not be webcast to avoid boring people silly. We will post a video afterwards.
Upon completion of the static fire, we will take the rocket back into the hangar to thoroughly investigate the TVC issue. With the range available to us only until January 23 (Kwaj needs to reconfigure for an incoming Minuteman mission), this means launch is now planned for mid-February. As I’ve mentioned previously, don’t hold your breath for this launch. Given the large number of robustness improvements and the fact that our vehicle/pad health verification system has increased from about 30 checks to almost 1000, shifts in the launch date are to be expected. Overall, the SpaceX team is quite happy with the smooth progress so far.
--Elon--
And another update
January 25, 2007: DemoFlight 2 Launch Update
In an excess of caution, we decided not to proceed with the static fire this month. The vehicle is now back in the hangar, where the stages are being demated for careful inspection.
The static fire and launch window is now mid to late February, due to Kwaj having to configure for an incoming Minuteman and then reconfigure back to handling a Falcon launch. During this downtime, we will take the opportunity to go over every inch of the rocket with a microscope again.
As Andy Grove said, "Only the Paranoid Survive".
---Elon
From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) [web1913]:
Paranoia \Par`a*noi"a\, n. (Med.)
A chronic form of insanity characterized by very gradual
impairment of the intellect, systematized delusion, and
usually by delusions of persecution or mandatory delusions
producing homicidal tendency. In its mild form paranoia may
consist in the well-marked crotchetiness exhibited in persons
commonly called ``cranks.'' Paranoiacs usually show evidences
of bodily and nervous degeneration, and many have
hallucinations, esp. of sight and hearing.
OK, but how would you call ignoring an incoming Minuteman? Psychopathy? Emotional flatness?
I'm sure he was waiting in the crater were Apollo 11 was heading...
It's not like the Minuteman is carrying a real and armed nuclear warhead.
Two new updates :
Posted February 7, 2007
After the upcoming demonstration flight, Falcon 1 is scheduled to launch a satellite for the US Navy Research Laboratory (funded by the Office of Force Transformation) in late summer and then a satellite for the Malaysian Space Agency late in the year. We are also building an additional Falcon 1 vehicle in the event that some promising customer discussions culminate in a fourth Falcon 1 launch this year.
Posted February 8, 2007
We have recently been informed by the Kwajalein Army Range that they do not have sufficient resources to support our launch in mid to late Feb. Several range personnel critical to the launch safety process will be unavailable in that timeframe. The earliest launch window available from the Range now opens March 9.
... and a new http://www.spacex.com/index.php with video and photo galleries, launch manifest...
New update....
"The launch window is now March 19th to 22nd (California time). During extended ground testing in late February, one of our second stage thrust vector control boards indicated a problem. Although our analysis showed substantial margin for flight, we decided nonetheless to increase the robustness of certain of the components and run a delta qualification.
The upgraded boards will be installed this week. If all goes well, Falcon 1 will do a static fire next week and then launch in the week of the 19th.
--Elon--"
http://www.spacex.com/updates.php#demoflight_2_launch_update_6
Another update on http://www.spacex.com Posted March 16, 2007
Successful static firing with video posted
More news tomorrow ( Sunday )
Launch countdown as early as Monday
Falcon 9 update next month
The live webcast is now underway.
Man that camera wobble on the web cam feed is freaky.
Reports are that they are having trouble getting telemetry from the island to SpaceX headquarters in California. They're not sure if they can launch with these communication problems.
Updates at http://spaceflightnow.com/falcon/f2/status.html
30 minutes to go. I'm (somewhat cautiously) predicting the payload will make it into orbit today.
Now set for 4:45
Fueling is complete
Is there actually a payload per se, or is it just an instrumented lump of something.
Doug
There are a couple of small NASA experimental payloads going up, which I believe will not separate from the rocket. One of the payloads involves some kind of communications transceiver test.
aborted at t- 1:02
I'll go over there with a box of matches next time. They're not saying words that would make me think of a 24 hour scrub or anything like that - perhaps they can recyle to the SB retract and have another hack at it, they're not stuck to a specific window with a test flight I guess.
I made a cup of Mocha to watch the launch with, came back from the kitchen "abort". Don't open your sachet of instant mocha till the rocket's launched. Lesson learnt.
Doug
Just before the abort, the first stage venting had stopped, but it was continuing to vent on the second stage. I wonder if they couldn't get a valve closed? No official word yet on what the problem is.
If it was something really minor I think they still can launch today.
SFN "SpaceX has time available to troubleshoot the issue and try the launch again -- so the flight has not been scrubbed for today."
They're going to look at it for another 10 minutes.
Don't know about you guys, but somewhere in the flow from that pad camera to my screen - there is a glitch that makes it wobble a little. There's some wind at the site, I can see trees moving - but there's also this whole image wobble that's a bit scarey as it makes the whole vehicle look like it's bending back and forth in the wind.
Doug
Yes, its an odd sort of wobble. And it affects both of the cameras I've seen images from. It might be an electronic thing but I suspect that the cameras may be viewing the pad via mirrors (to protect the cameras) and the mirrors are flexing in the fairly stiff breeze. But this is probably rubbish speculation on my part! Difficult to ignore the wobble though -keep thinking the thing is going to fall over.
Rob
They're having a chat on the 'Anomaly Net' - sounds like something Hoagland would be on I think we'll get an answer on having another go soon.
And it's a scrub for the day.
Doug
Scrubbed....
New launch time set for 4pm California time today (Tues).
http://www.spacex.com/updates.php#demoflight_2_launch_update_11
Anyone else having trouble getting the stream?
http://www.spacex.com/webcast.php
It hasn't started yet.
Stream's up now, because of the 65 min late launch time
Doug
Indeed, and I am watching it on my 56" HDTV! It's blurry as hell, but it's big!
put the screen in your front window and move back about 100 yards.
With a monitor that large, you're seing Falcon 1 slightly larger than it is in real life.
Doug
You have five minutes to get your mocha Doug.
I'm not falling for that one again...see
"I thought we'd be a lot higher at MECO"
Doug
Oooh. I've no fingernails left. How do people do this for a living...
darn
Oops - someone didn't realise his mike was still on.... But I share the sentiment. aaaargh..
I assume once they've done an ignitiion they can't then recycle for another go.....oh - and did you just head that bit of audio on the feed
Like I've been saying all along -- I'll believe it when I see it.
So far, I still ain't seen it. Lots of nice smoke and flame, just no rising rocket...
And I swear, about 30 seconds after the engine shut down and they called the abort, I heard one of the controllers' voices on the loop saying an agonized "Oh, God...!"
-the other Doug
And again. Someone really needs to tell that guy he's on air.
You don't hear that during an Atlas V launch Hell, I didn't hear so much as a "Merde" after that first Ariane V failure
Doug
I too would think once they entered ignition sequence that would be it, but I swear I thought I heard someone whisper something about trying another go-round.
SFN agrees with you..
"main engine chamber pressure was less than 0.1 percent lower than the redline limit, Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX vice president of business development, tells reporters. She added they are looking to recycle the countdown. Launch has not been scrubbed."
Recycle to T-11min being touted....I'm impressed.
Doug
I herd that too. I thought I heard the same guy (he was the F*** and M**********r dude) say that it was "just 1 PSI over". Possibly I misheard but they are apparently recycling back to T-11 so it looks like we're still on.
Yep -- the last thing I heard, here, was "Verify you have no contraints for a recycle," followed by "Verified." Looks like they're gonna try again, here.
-the other Doug
I think we're seing a symptom of them bringing every limit tighter..ooo..remote camera man's going wandering. IF they get it away, or even get another count going, I'll be super impressed, not as impressed as I would be if they could fix their wireless video signals though.
Mocha didn't work, nothing didn't work, so I'm trying Apple Juice with Elderflower.
Doug
I don't know, I could live without the dropouts but the wobbly camera seems somehow fitting for a "lowest cost to orbit" outfit. No money wasted on such fripperies as solid camera mounts.
Now it looks like the weather is taking a turn.
What is that BBC supposed to mean?
They're asking if they can do a new 01:10 launch time.
Wow! Fuel loading is underway!
Will the weather cooperate until then ?
Anyway, recycling a few minutes after an aborted main engine start. I'm impressed.
They're recycling to T-16:00 and trying for a launch time of 1:10 (I assume that's GMT). Am I right in my calculation that, on my side of the pond, this would be 9:10 pm EDT, 8:10 CDT, 7:10 MDT and 6:10 PDT?
Also, did anyone hear any detail whatsover as to what caused the abort? Do we have any confidence that the thing won't shut itself down again?
-the other Doug
Countdown is set to 16:00 30 minutes left in this window, then the weather will surely put a cap on any other attempts today.
By my figuring, that means the count ought to restart in about five minutes.
-the other Doug
Interesting. I wondered why they went through a detank-and-retank procedure on the fuel tanks. With all the problems they've had getting enough LOX on the island to support launch attempts, I can understand why they *only* half-emptied and refilled the fuel tanks.
-the other Doug
The counting has been resumed.
I'm guessing the kerosine cools down quite quickly once onboard as it's sat above/below LOX which is a bit chilly. Perhaps draining some out, filling it bac up again - ups the Kerosine temp maybe?
Doug
That water supression looks like a small garden sprinkler
She's away this time - with good onboard footage
Go baby go.
I think this camera might be on the second stage...I hope so, very cool views if it is.
450m/sec
13.9km
Past MaxQ
Main engine plume looking like it's growing like it does on a Delta II on the way up the hill
OUCH - the Kestrel engine got a HELL of a whack from the first stage during seperation - put the thing out of alignment for a moment I think - but it's all good again - beautiful fairing sep shot.
Doug
I just saw first stage separation!
They should have had this camera on the ground. Sweet.
It's getting a bit divergant on the engine pointing - and my feed has died.
From SFN : Telemetry has been lost, SpaceX spokeswoman tells reporters.
The last thing I say is a strange shaking and going off course as Doug said. I was some strange pieces flying around also.
My personal opinion is that one of the most dangerous things happened during flight - pogo.
The engine pointing was going around and around in increasing circles, and the whole stage appeared to be getting a little wild in response - like a pilot induced occilation.
From SFN
0115 GMT (9:15 p.m. EDT Tues.)
T+plus 5 minutes, 5 seconds. Telemetry has been lost, SpaceX spokeswoman tells reporters. The webcast provided by the company has stopped too.
Perhaps it threw itself into a full on tumble?
Doug
At separation I thought the first stage actually hit the nozzle of the second stage. Not sure though.
I saw the engine bell start to describe small circles against the Earth below, and then my feed died, too. Can't get it back, either.
The expansion nozzle was really glowing bright red, wasn't it? I hope she didn't start to tumble because of nozzle leakage -- that thing looked like it was going to burn through the side at any moment, as irregular as the bright red glow appeared...
-the other Doug
I saw that 'nudge' Cugel - the nozzle got quite a nudge during seperation, pitching the whole upper stage quite a bit - but it corrected itself quite quickly I thought. The nozzle glow didn't seem that different to similar I've seen on Delta II/IV footage really, but with an impact like that during S1/2 sep..who knows.
I also saw a ring, almost like the very bottom part of the Kestrel nozzle, come off about the same time as fairing seperation - perhaps dislodged during that recontact during stage seperation? One hell of a ride while it lasted...but it looked like it was turning into a bad session using the Orbiter sim towards the end.
Doug
I saw this ring falling too.
At least, they opened the champagne :
"I just wanted everybody to know that we in the Washington, D.C., office are celebrating with champagne. We don't have any information yet from the launch control center, but the Falcon clearly got to space with a successful liftoff, stage separation, second stage ignition and fairing separation," says Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX vice president of business development.
However, what happened during the second stage burn is not clear.
"Regardless, we're thrilled here." (from SFN)
I also saw the knock and the "ring" fall away right after stage 1 separation - it rectified itself so well that I didn't think it was a problem especially since we were getting the "stage 2 engine nominal" commentary. Just before the feed was lost it was glowing very red and oscillating very badly, considering how stable the camera (and the actual upper stage itself by inference) was against the backdrop of the earth it really did not look healthy.
Did they post any success criteria for the demoflight anywhere? By my reckoning she was about 30% of the way through the stage 2 burn when contact was lost.
Maybe the mission will be declared as a partial success. They should at least be able to recover the first stage.
The First Stage seemed great ( apart from trying to beat up the second stage on seperation ) - so hopefully they should be able to sign that off as flight worthy and see how well it does post-recovery.
That's got to have been quite a sub-orbital lob as well - Maybe they will get some telemetry back from the upper stage at some point, even if only briefly, before it gets it's swimming shorts on into the Pacific.
Doug
I'd be giving that effort a strong B+ as a demo.
They got to really prove out their hold-before-release system and show off quite a rapid abort recycle, then they had what seems to have been a 100% by the numbers launch and first stage flight. The 1st stage separation appears to have been ropey (to us total amateurs admittedly) but the 2nd stage lit bang on the money and appeared to be doing the job well until telemetry was lost. That's a good 7/10 anfd pretty damn good for a second attempt surely.
So they don't get the whole cookie just yet but they are a lot closer now than they were yesterday in my book.
Musk confirmed the "roll control anomaly" according to SFN.
This launch, while impressive, illustrates why launching things into orbit is both risky and expensive. SpaceX is going to have to fly a lot of rockets, and study a fair number of failures, before they figure out all of the little, almost unnoticeable things that will jump out from the shadows and destroy their equipment (and the equipment of their paying customers).
For example, if first stage recontact with the second stage occurred after sep, or if the fairing struck the second stage engine when it was let go, they'll have to revisit all of their simulations and modeling, and add systems to keep these things from happening again. Then they'll have to fly those systems and validate their effectiveness. All of this requires actual test flights -- you obviously can't just rely on your paper models or your computer simulations.
Each test flight is a few million $'s worth of rocket, and you *have* to spend that money to get the bugs out of the hardware, or else you'll lose customer payloads. And soon you won't have any customers. At that point, it doesn't matter how brilliant your designers are or how well funded you were -- you're going to go out of business.
As I said, the whole thing points to some very good reasons why getting into orbit is hard, and why it's expensive. By the time SpaceX spends all of the money needed to have a reliable fleet of boosters, the costs they'll have already incurred will have to be amortized through the price of their services. So, while they may still offer the cheapest way to orbit, it ain't gonna be all *that* cheap, and certainly far more expensive than current estimates...
-the other Doug
Or - from another perspective, from SFN
Musk says 90 percent of the Falcon 1 rocket's technical challenges were proven out with this launch. He doesn't foresee needing another test flight before launching the first operational mission in late summer carrying the U.S. military's TacSat 1 spacecraft.
I recorded the web feed of the launch, but it's a fairly large file, so I'm not sure how best to deliver it. I'll start by uploading it to Google video. If anyone has suggestions for sending the full-res file, I'm wide open to them.
I'd be interested in seeing the video if you figure out a way to pass it around. I had to leave for a business meeting 15 minutes before launch. I hope Doug got his mocha. I had a nice Cabernet.
How large is "fairly large?"
http://spacex.com/video_gallery.php
Seems pretty clear to me that the Stage 2 engine got smacked by Stage 1 and 12 seconds later part of it ripped away.
3:28/3:29 - Stage 2 bngine bell getting soundly rung as stage 1 separates
3:41 - Edge of the Stage 2 engine bell starting to look noticably ragged
3:49 - "Ring" detaches in 2 pieces
I'm having problems cutting stills from the video but the timings should make it simple to find for those curious.
The SpaceX site has an interesting comment on the Kestrel's Nozzle construction:
Launch video on http://youtube.com/watch?v=7CwuIQ9d5D8.
What would be the functional impact of losing this "ring" at the engine nozzle? It seems to me the big problem arose due to buildup of an oscillation around the spacecraft roll axis. A case of positive feedback perhaps where the engine gimbal control actually winds up feeding the oscillation further, or maybe the effect just grew stronger due to rapidly diminishing mass of the vehicle.
I don't believe this is a pogo oscillation because IIRC pogo is a longitudinal oscillation. Of course, it's difficult to judge from the video whether any pogo effect was present because the camera probably wouldn't pick it up.
That ring is supposed to detach remember - so I wouldn't factor that into it at all.
Falcon 1, The World's Lowest Cost Rocket to Orbit.......maybe the subject title needs amending.......
Doug do you have a reference that shows that the ring detach is by design?
http://www.spaceflightnow.com/falcon/f2/070320briefingquotes.html
Odd to rely upon a temperature sensitive bonding agent to control the release of a stiffening ring.
That sounds more like the description of a failure mode than a flight asset.
I wonder if they charge extra for bugs in the soup in the local canteen:)
What we saw in the video could be caused by a number of things, but nozzle erosion and burn-through is definitely one of them.
We could only see about 30% or so of the entire engine bell. A really small burn-through could have occurred on a part of the nozzle that wasn't immediately visible. And that could have imparted a rolling moment to the stage.
Of course, there are a lot of other things that could have happened. I suppose we'll have to wait and see what SpaceX says about their telemetry and the tale it tells.
-the other Doug
I've seen things like wiring break loose off Delta second stages as well and wouldn't really attribute that as an abnormal scenarios.
Word on the NSF forums is the first stage recontact might have kicked off the propellant sloshing and it started an oscillation that fed off the attitude control countermeasures (positive feedback, an ugly beast) and it just lost battle with it after a while. They are saying the 2nd stage nozzle most likely didn't receive any damage (it's apparently pretty rubber-like), but the nudge started an oscillation chain reaction. Or maybe it was simply a case of a closed-loop where guidance didn't account for positive feedback effects like this when small attitude changes are allowed to grow rapidly.
Dvandorn, the nozzle heating up is perfectly normal as it's a radiation cooled design, it's not ablative nor regenerative cooled. I suspect it ought to have become much brighter glowing if a burn-through was to happen. In any case, a burn through would probably manifest itself as a sudden kick of the engine bell in one direction and I don't see that from the video. All there is is a gradual increase in oscillations, nudging both the engine and the rest of the vehicle.
"The second test launch of Falcon 1 took place today at 6:10 pm California time. The launch was not perfect, but certainly pretty good. Given that the primary objectives were demonstrating responsive launch and gathering test data in advance of our first operational satellite launch later this year, the outcome was great. Operationally responsive (ie fast) launch has become an increasingly important national security objective, so demonstrating rapid loading of propellents and launch in less than an hour, as well as a rapid recycle following the first engine ignition are major accomplishments."
they're sort of right aren't they?
The glow on the Kestrel engine was very similar to the glow - in colour and texture, to that on a Delta II second stage - I didn't see anything there I would consider unusual, and indeed upper stage nozzles seem to be very flexible - certainly the Delta II upper stage engine wobbles around quite a lot.
Sloshing sounds like a very convincing scenario. Hopefully Elon will continue his applaudable record of reporting events quite regularly and honestly and we'll soon know what actually happened.
Doug
For a test flight, it was certainly not a complete failure. They demonstrated a lot of good things, and the test of the first stage seems to have been almost completely successful.
If this was an opreational launch, though, it would have been a complete failure, no matter how well the first stage worked. The paying customer would have had his/her expensive satellite dumped into the ocean. That's the real definition of success or failure -- did you deliver the package where the customer wanted it to go?
As tempting as SpaceX's pricing seems to be, I know that if I had a payload that I really needed to place into orbit, I would definitely wait until the Falcons started flying successfully before I spent any money on them. Then again, I wouldn't buy the first model year of, say, a fuel-cell-powered car or a car with a hydrogen engine, either. I'd wait to see how well they work and what the service and maintenance issues *really* are, not just what the salespeople want me to believe they are...
-the other Doug
Doug - is there something you want to tell us about Q1-08? Are you planning a UMSF microsat or perhaps another shed in LEO?
I wish DougSat is still a pipe dream.
Maybe we should all pitch in for a http://www.jpaerospace.com/pongsat/index.htm
http://www.jpaerospace.com/100spacead.html
The video I recorded is about 150 mb. It starts half an hour or so (out of 45 minutes total) before the second countdown, so it could probably be trimmed down quite a bit. It seems to be pretty much identical in quality to the high quality wmv on http://spacex.com/video_gallery.php, so unless someone wants the full countdown, there's probably not much point in trying to get it out there.
I grabbed this point-of-impact image from the hi-res video
Looks to me their biggest problem was attitude control. Engines performed well, which is great news. The staging sequence introduced some big attitude disturbance that was probably the culprint causing recontact with the first stage.
A big part of the second stage burn also exhibited wobbly attitude and the engine nozzle was jittering noticeably the whole time. Things started to get very rough at T+04:42 and obviously soon after the thrust vector control reached its maximum authority with the nozzle making rough circles. It managed to keep the heading pretty well, though. It's even possible the oscillations would have died down after a peak, but we'll never know.
At T+04:55 the vehicle started to roll and that's probably what lead to LOS and automatic engine shutdown. Whether the attitude drift and roll problems were linked is the big question, I understand roll control is maintained via cold helium gas jets and it was speculated there could have been a leak somewhere.
That still leaves the question why engine pitch/yaw gimbal was having such a hard time keeping the vehicle steady.
I agree with ugordan's observations re control system difficulties. Given the impact, I have to wonder if one of the nozzle position sensors was affected (perhaps knocked out of calibration?) Oscillating control commands are usually caused by insufficient position feedback or rate sensing if the system itself is malfunctioning. I assume that they used linear variable differential transformers (LVDTs) or something else with high reliability and hopefully redundant channels; if they used feedback potentiometers or rely on single sensors, that could be bad...
Another possibility is that the rate sensors for the second stage aren't located in exactly the right place on the vehicle, I guess, but this seems unlikely.
The fuel sloshing scenario sounds plausible as well, but I can't imagine that they wouldn't have baffles in the tanks to prevent this sort of thing. Unpredictable center of gravity shifts are hard to compensate for...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NE4HkniM3Vc&mode=related&search=
This video on youtube goes a bit longer than the live webcast and the video posted on the SpaceX site.
The last frame shows a time of +5 min, 14 sec, compared with the 5:01 "official version"
The sequence shows the slow roll that is visible in the last few "official" seconds of video rapidly increases in speed, together with the probable start of a tumbling motion. When the video cuts off, the total roll is somewhere around 3/4 of a turn and the speed is rapidly increasing. The last oscillation of the nozzle seems to be almost violent (the oscillation amplitude steadily increases with time) and rather out of step with the previous oscillations.
In addition, something nobody's noted here or on the Nasaspaceflight.com forum (that I can see)
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/forums/forum-view.asp?fid=6
is that at T+4:44, there is a long recangular, square-ended piece of white debris (like a segment of a window blind) falls past the camera and is visible for a few frames. The oscillations of the engine and vehicle get stronger rapidly starting maybe 3 seconds after this event, and more debris, most looking perhaps like shredded insolation or irregular shed ice pieces fall past the camera, the overall abundance of visible debris generally increases in the last 30 seconds. Other pieces are not clearly identifiable as discrete objects like the "slat" at 4:44, but it's clear things are being shaken nearly to bits.
I would not be surprised if at or just after the end of the youtube video, the vehicle had a major structural failure, as suggested by the extra-violent irregular motion in the last 1/2 second of video.
Beyond all this post-mortem analysis, the fact remains that they had a test flight that was a mission failure, but achieved some 90% of "detailed test objectives". In that, it resembles the flights of Saturn 502 (Apollo 6, which made orbit but had multiple problems and failed S-IVB restart) or the Delta IV Heavy (which didn't make the proper orbit and dropped secondary payloads into atmosphere-intercepting orbits.)
They have made a major step toward orbit with a totally new vehicle and should be congratulated.
Bits of 'white', I've seen in LOADS of upper stage vids - usually bits of ice falling off when the engine gimbals. As with that shuttle mission a year or so ago, a piece of ice can really look like something else in Zero G. With the engine gimbaling so hard, it wouldn't be suprising to have ice getting rattled off the top of the stage toward the 'end' of the sequence I guess. As the situation evolved, the 'wobble' got worse, the engine gimbaling got worse in reponse (and of course, the two looped one another ) and as a results the stage was getting more of a battering around and thus more ice debris would be normal I would have thought.
Doug
And by the time that rectangular piece of white stuff fell off, the vehicle wasn't really gimbaling so hard to think something structurally important broke loose. I'm also going with the chunk of ice explanation in this case.
A linear piece wouldn't be unusual either - probably formed down the side of an exposed pipe and fell off when rattled hard enough.
Doug
Very nice - I can never get enough of onboard video.
And thanks for the correction - I am afraid my lack of launcher knowledge is being exposed.
So, just why did SpaceX cut the feed? Clearly the rocketcam transmission continued -as has now appeared on YouTube. What purpose was served by abruptly cutting the feed to the internet?
Clearly SpaceX can do what they like with their video, after all it's their property and we are all incredibly grateful for their openness in sharing this experience with us.
It is just that this behaviour seems a little inconsistent.
Puzzled...
Rob
Jim - Ugordan... if you're going to have a bitch fight - do it elsewhere.
7 posts deleted.
Doug
Interview with Elon Musk on
http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/
Good news. They have recovered telemetry (and more video....I wanna see it but gimme a motion sickness pill first!) from some 2+ more minutes of flight. The vehicle shut down only about 1 min early at about 7.5m min into flight AND deployed the dummy payload mass.
And the problem was indeed coupling between the slosh in the LOx tank and the thrust vector control system. Slosh was apparently started by the collision with the first stage (triggered by larger than test-stand indicated tip-off forces from the first stage engine shutdown), AND the hard slew to get back on track. "....shutdown transient had a very high pitchover force. causing five times the max expected rotation rate."
And regarding the debris events.. Since the vehicle wasn't approaching breakup, I'd have to concur that the debris was mostly or all ice. The regularity of the rectangular piece is still odd, but I have no real idea of it's size and the "ice off a pipe" speculation seems plausible.
...well, I'll be. Definitely a plausible failure mode, but I still have to ask whether the second stage had internal baffles to prevent abrupt fuel COG shifts...makes me wonder if these were dropped in the name of mass savings.
Falcon engineers baffled by sloshing fuel...and aluminum nuts.
There were fuel sloshing problems during the early Mercury program, too.
They flew live-broadcast TV cameras inside Saturn and other launch vehicle tanks, with bright lights an everything (Mommy, it's dark in here!) to study fuel/oxidizer dynamics. One entire Saturn 1B flight (Saturn 202?) didn't have a CSM on top, the mission was just to study SIV-B behavior, I think. A Saturn 1 or early Centaur failed engine restart because they were unable to settle propellant adequately in the tank with ullage burn (or surface-tension control baffling). Some ?other? vehicle ended up in a flat spin, I think, with liquids ending up at opposite ends of fuel and oxidizer tanks, I suspect.
Slosh is a NON trivial problem, and abouit as amenable to numerical simulation as a supernova explosion. I doubt Elon had 50,000 hours eauivalent of CPU simulation time on slosh modeling as the recently published white dwarf supernova simulations had.
NASA is spending extran $ on a launch vehicle with active 3-rd stage attitude control (Atlas) instead of Delta for Lunar Recon Orbiter (which made room for the LCROSS experiment) due to propellant slosh concerns in the big LRO tanks on a spin-stabilized upper stage.
Jim, if I understand nutation in this context correctly (periodic 'wobbling' along an axis, presumably roll or yaw), couldn't that be compensated via an additional control system algorithim? Of course, you couldn't really write a good one until the behavior was observed in real conditions such as this event, and actually we're probably talking at this point more about refining the coefficents rather than coding the subroutine...
Powered by Invision Power Board (http://www.invisionboard.com)
© Invision Power Services (http://www.invisionpower.com)