ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

An old design is not inherently bad. It still provides a huge amount of performance.

It's also getting replaced in the medium term. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_ ... lved_Stage

ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

An old design is not inherently bad. It still provides a huge amount of performance.
It's also getting replaced in the medium term. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_ ... lved_Stage

Francoflier wrote:

Are they ever going to launch this thing?

kitplane01 wrote:

I understand that the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy cost much less than the rockets from ULA. Do the ULA vehicles have any advantages over the Falcon products? (Beyond being a second source.)

flyingturtle wrote:

kitplane01 wrote:

I understand that the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy cost much less than the rockets from ULA. Do the ULA vehicles have any advantages over the Falcon products? (Beyond being a second source.)

I haven't time to really look it up, so don't quote me...
Differences are the payload dimensions - while FH and F9 have a 5.2 meter fairing, Delta Heavy IV has a 5 meter one. But the Delta Heavy can transport longer payloads. A longer fairing is in the works by the Holy Spatial Order of the Muskovites, though.
Also something SpaceX isn't providing yet: Vertical assembly of the payload. SpaceX wants to offer that at Vandenberg AFB in the future.
Something else is better acceleration of the upper stage.

Tugger wrote:

Next launch attempt for Delta IV Heavy - NROL-44 is Sunday Sep. 27 at 12:10am EDT (4:10am UTC). Current forecast is 60% chance, cloud cover being the main issue.

Tugg

CRJockey wrote:

Tugger wrote:

Next launch attempt for Delta IV Heavy - NROL-44 is Sunday Sep. 27 at 12:10am EDT (4:10am UTC). Current forecast is 60% chance, cloud cover being the main issue.
Tugg

Out of sheer lack of knowledge on my side:
Why is cloud cover, or other non-TS weather phenomena, holding up rocket launches? Curious to know, thanks.

CRJockey wrote:

Tugger wrote:

Next launch attempt for Delta IV Heavy - NROL-44 is Sunday Sep. 27 at 12:10am EDT (4:10am UTC). Current forecast is 60% chance, cloud cover being the main issue.

Tugg

Out of sheer lack of knowledge on my side:

Why is cloud cover, or other non-TS weather phenomena, holding up rocket launches? Curious to know, thanks.

It seems unlikely that everyone in the space community will be celebrating. Bezos made his fortune at Amazon through competitive pricing and timely delivery of goods to his customers worldwide. But so far at least, his Blue Origin space company has been a less reliable vendor.

This has been especially of concern to United Launch Alliance, which is relying on Blue Origin-built engines for its new Vulcan rocket. The US Space Force is also watching, as it is counting on the Vulcan booster to help launch some of its most precious satellites into orbit. Blue Origin's powerful BE-4 rocket engine, which burns methane and liquid oxygen, is years late.

Privately, multiple sources say, the relationship between Blue Origin and United Launch Alliance is not good. "There is great concern about this engine development," one person in the industry said. "It's much more than Tory Bruno is showing publicly. There is great concern that Blue is not putting enough attention and priority on the engine."

ThePointblank wrote:

Eric Berger over at Ars Technica is reporting an increasingly strained relationship between ULA and Blue Origin over Blue Origin's delays in delivering an engine:

https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/07 ... nhappy-one

flyingturtle wrote:

I think Elon could sell a few engines. At ULA prices, of course. Thrust-wise, the engines are quite comparable, 2.4 vs. 2.2 meganewtons of sea level thrust.

zululima wrote:

flyingturtle wrote:

I think Elon could sell a few engines. At ULA prices, of course. Thrust-wise, the engines are quite comparable, 2.4 vs. 2.2 meganewtons of sea level thrust.

Oh, I didn't realize it was as easy as a simple swap-in replacement.

In the real world, rockets are designed around their engines and using Raptors would entail an entire redesign of already-in-production Vulcan. Better to just turn up the heat on Blue. I don't understand why they are so slow about everything; they certainly have the money to throw at any problems.

flyingturtle wrote:

zululima wrote:

flyingturtle wrote:

I think Elon could sell a few engines. At ULA prices, of course. Thrust-wise, the engines are quite comparable, 2.4 vs. 2.2 meganewtons of sea level thrust.

Oh, I didn't realize it was as easy as a simple swap-in replacement.

In the real world, rockets are designed around their engines and using Raptors would entail an entire redesign of already-in-production Vulcan. Better to just turn up the heat on Blue. I don't understand why they are so slow about everything; they certainly have the money to throw at any problems.

Hey, but... at the ULA prices I mentioned, maybe with a $20 stupidity surcharge, SpaceX would be willing to redesign the Vulcan.

Yeah, Mr. Bezos is crazy rich. He could basically buy a few engineers from SpaceX, and allow for a similar, solution-oriented company culture.

Stitch wrote:

And said Starliner flight has now been delayed due to the ISS orientation issues due to the Russian Nakua module thruster misfire:

https://www.upi.com/News_Photos/view/up ... l-Florida/

Boeing wrote:

Boeing engineers monitoring the health and status of the vehicle detected unexpected valve position indications in the propulsion system.

Francoflier wrote:

Anyhow, rant over... I hope they launch this thing tomorrow and that it works this time at l(e)ast.

After more than four years of frustrating delays, Blue Origin is finally making significant progress toward completing development of its powerful BE-4 rocket engine. At present, engineers and technicians with the company are assembling the first two flight engines at Blue Origin's main factory in Kent, Washington.

The company aspires to deliver these two flight engines to United Launch Alliance before the end of this year, although that increasingly appears to be a "stretch" goal. Delivery may slip into early 2022. And in order to make this deadline, Blue Origin plans to take the somewhat risky step of shipping the engines to its customer before completing full qualification testing.

This delivery has been a long time coming. United Launch Alliance, or ULA, first agreed to buy the engines from Blue Origin back in 2014. It was a bold bet by ULA, a blueblood in space launch, on a new entrant to the market. But with the BE-4 engine, Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos was promising a relatively low-cost, high performing engine with a power output comparable to a Space Shuttle main engine. At the time of this initial agreement, Blue Origin said the BE-4 would be "ready for flight" by 2017.

The BE-4's delayed development has, increasingly, been the subject of keen interest. This is partly because ULA has been working on its new Vulcan rocket for a number of years, and that rocket is important to the future of the company. The military is also eager for this delivery, as ULA is a primary provider of launch services to the Department of Defense alongside SpaceX. They hope Vulcan provides lower cost launch services with engines manufactured in the United States. Finally, many in the space community are genuinely curious about the cause of the delay.

Despite this widespread interest, however, Blue Origin has said almost nothing publicly about the engine development. Therefore, this story attempts to provide some context for why the BE-4 engines are late. It is based on anonymous sources at the company's headquarters as well as industry officials, some of whom would likely be fired if they were named.

Teams continue to work on Starliner's service module propulsion system inside of @ULALaunch's Vertical Integration Facility.

@BoeingSpace has been able to command seven of 13 valves open that previously were in the closed position. Learn more: https://go.nasa.gov/3iwTwYU

ThePointblank wrote:

Ongoing issues with Starliner's service module being worked on by Boeing, which is pushing back the launch date:

https://twitter.com/Commercial_Crew/sta ... 8131360770

Teams continue to work on Starliner's service module propulsion system inside of @ULALaunch's Vertical Integration Facility.

@BoeingSpace has been able to command seven of 13 valves open that previously were in the closed position. Learn more: https://go.nasa.gov/3iwTwYU

FGITD wrote:

ThePointblank wrote:

Ongoing issues with Starliner's service module being worked on by Boeing, which is pushing back the launch date:

https://twitter.com/Commercial_Crew/sta ... 8131360770

Teams continue to work on Starliner's service module propulsion system inside of @ULALaunch's Vertical Integration Facility.

@BoeingSpace has been able to command seven of 13 valves open that previously were in the closed position. Learn more: https://go.nasa.gov/3iwTwYU

It’s concerning that they don’t have any idea what could have caused this, and for the moment still don’t really have a viable fix. I just don’t see it launching any time soon.

Although it’s always good to point out that for the success SpaceX has enjoyed, their prototype literally blew up during a ground test, so maybe some stuck valves aren’t the end of the world

JetBuddy wrote:

Starliner is further delayed.

"We've determined #Starliner will return to our factory for deeper-level troubleshooting of four propulsion system valves. With
@NASA
, we've decided to stand down for this launch window to make way for other national priority missions."

https://twitter.com/BoeingSpace/status/ ... 0779420678

https://starlinerupdates.com/starliner- ... lve-issue/

Boeing said its preliminary analysis indicated that moisture in the spacecraft’s propulsion system somehow resulted in corrosion on 13, or more than half, of certain valves and prevented them from opening properly, according to John Vollmer, a company executive who oversees the Starliner.

Boeing's John Vollmer on launching Starliner in 2021: "It's probably too early to say whether it's this year, or not. I would certainly hope for as early as possible, and if we could fly this year it would be fantastic."

Translation: Not 2021.

ThePointblank wrote:

And it looks like Starliner's launch is likely going to get pushed to next year:

Sooner787 wrote:

Hell, the boys in Chicago need to sell their whole space operation to Space X / Musk
and move along. They're obviously not up to the task anymore

flyingturtle wrote:

kitplane01 wrote:

I understand that the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy cost much less than the rockets from ULA. Do the ULA vehicles have any advantages over the Falcon products? (Beyond being a second source.)

I haven't time to really look it up, so don't quote me...

Differences are the payload dimensions - while FH and F9 have a 5.2 meter fairing, Delta Heavy IV has a 5 meter one. But the Delta Heavy can transport longer payloads. A longer fairing is in the works by the Holy Spatial Order of the Muskovites, though.

Also something SpaceX isn't providing yet: Vertical assembly of the payload. SpaceX wants to offer that at Vandenberg AFB in the future.

Something else is better acceleration of the upper stage.

Nomadd wrote:

SpaceX had a lot of valve issues in the early Starship days. Nothing like sitting on the roof for eight hours, waiting for them to drive down and hit a sticky valve with a hammer. ​They'd usually get it going the same day or the day after and have the problem analyzed and a permanent solution in place within a week.
​If you asked Boeing management why they need a year to fix a similar problem the answer would be "Because it's always been that way".

​Until the old guard can figure out that throwing a thousand people, eighteen months of time and a billion dollars at a simple problem doesn't make anything more reliable, it will continue. And until they figure out that taking a year to do the paperwork on a component and failing to take the amazingly obvious step of testing it under all possible environmental conditions is stupid beyond the ability of science to accurately measure, the problems will continue.
They need to trade a few of the engineers whose sole ability is generating paperwork for a few good garage mechanics.

Francoflier wrote:

ThePointblank wrote:

And it looks like Starliner's launch is likely going to get pushed to next year:

Step 1: extend hand in front of head
Step 2: place palm over face
Step 3: ffs...


I wonder if ULA gets compensated for readying a booster on the pad for nothing. That can't be cheap.

FGITD wrote:

This is b-a-d bad for Boeing. It’s one thing to delay the launch a few days or weeks to get the problem sorted. But this is now like taking a car back to the factory because allegedly a tire is leaking. There has to be more to it than some unresponsive valves.

meecrob wrote:

FGITD wrote:

This is b-a-d bad for Boeing. It’s one thing to delay the launch a few days or weeks to get the problem sorted. But this is now like taking a car back to the factory because allegedly a tire is leaking. There has to be more to it than some unresponsive valves.

You might be right that there is more to it, but those valves are flight-critical. Like you wouldn't take off in a plane knowing you do not have full control authority.

FGITD wrote:

This is b-a-d bad for Boeing. It’s one thing to delay the launch a few days or weeks to get the problem sorted. But this is now like taking a car back to the factory because allegedly a tire is leaking. There has to be more to it than some unresponsive valves.

meecrob wrote:

FGITD wrote:

This is b-a-d bad for Boeing. It’s one thing to delay the launch a few days or weeks to get the problem sorted. But this is now like taking a car back to the factory because allegedly a tire is leaking. There has to be more to it than some unresponsive valves.

You might be right that there is more to it, but those valves are flight-critical. Like you wouldn't take off in a plane knowing you do not have full control authority.

ThePointblank wrote:

Francoflier wrote:

ThePointblank wrote:

And it looks like Starliner's launch is likely going to get pushed to next year:

Step 1: extend hand in front of head
Step 2: place palm over face
Step 3: ffs...


I wonder if ULA gets compensated for readying a booster on the pad for nothing. That can't be cheap.

They can repurpose the first stage, but the second stage is unique to Starliner, with a dual engined Centaur upper stage.

Yes. In fact, we will be using the booster for Lucy, allowing it to stay in the VIF

FGITD wrote:

meecrob wrote:

FGITD wrote:

This is b-a-d bad for Boeing. It’s one thing to delay the launch a few days or weeks to get the problem sorted. But this is now like taking a car back to the factory because allegedly a tire is leaking. There has to be more to it than some unresponsive valves.

You might be right that there is more to it, but those valves are flight-critical. Like you wouldn't take off in a plane knowing you do not have full control authority.

Absolutely and you cannot discredit them for taking the steps necessary to ensure it flies right. but I’m mostly curious about the timing and how everything proceeded. Remember, this thing was due to launch the day before it scrubbed because of the sticky valves.

Did the problem already exist and they hoped to fix it in time? Could it have happened after launch, despite everything being all good at launch time? (More doubtful about that one) Was it a handling issue that could have been prevented?

Nomadd wrote:

SpaceX had a lot of valve issues in the early Starship days. Nothing like sitting on the roof for eight hours, waiting for them to drive down and hit a sticky valve with a hammer. ​They'd usually get it going the same day or the day after and have the problem analyzed and a permanent solution in place within a week.
​If you asked Boeing management why they need a year to fix a similar problem the answer would be "Because it's always been that way".

​Until the old guard can figure out that throwing a thousand people, eighteen months of time and a billion dollars at a simple problem doesn't make anything more reliable, it will continue. And until they figure out that taking a year to do the paperwork on a component and failing to take the amazingly obvious step of testing it under all possible environmental conditions is stupid beyond the ability of science to accurately measure, the problems will continue.
They need to trade a few of the engineers whose sole ability is generating paperwork for a few good garage mechanics.

flyingturtle wrote:

https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/08/in-leaked-email-ula-official-calls-nasa-leadership-incompetent/

Excerpts:

In leaked email, ULA official calls NASA leadership “incompetent”

"Large NASA taxpayer investments are being thrown away due to the cozy relationship established by Trump political hacks throughout NASA," Sabathier wrote on April 23. "The US Government’s deep space exploration program is at risk: This large program which is the baseline for deep space exploration is being threatened due to political favors being offered to Elon Musk."

And Sabathier painted Elon Musk as a backer of Republicans who used his influence to get NASA contracts.

Owww. If the reality distortion field at ULA is that strong... I have no hope left for that quasi-government company.

Nomadd wrote:

It's one numbnuts emailing a Machinists union rep. I wouldn't take it too seriously.

flyingturtle wrote:

Owww. If the reality distortion field at ULA is that strong... I have no hope left for that quasi-government company.

Nomadd wrote:

FGITD wrote:

This is b-a-d bad for Boeing. It’s one thing to delay the launch a few days or weeks to get the problem sorted. But this is now like taking a car back to the factory because allegedly a tire is leaking. There has to be more to it than some unresponsive valves.

The big problem is the same as their airliner development and production problems. Figuring out how such bonehead issues happen in the first place. And that seems to be beyond them.