Ares I (CLV) - status

cIclops · 2008-05-16 06:23:49

Program briefing - 15 May 2008 - audio 61 mins

Briefing participants:

- Jeff Hanley, manager, Constellation Program, NASA's Johnson Space Center, Houston
- Mark Geyer, manager, Orion Project, NASA's Johnson Space Center
- Steve Cook, manager, Ares Projects, NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala.

o Reaching end of the formulation phase
o Finishing formulation for Orion and Ares I by summer 2008 and program approval review by end of 2008
o Improved confidence in March 2015 date of Initial Operational Capability for Orion/Ares I
o Excellent prime contractor (ATK, P&W, Lockheed Martin) performance
o KSC preparing for Ares I-X, hardware CDR June 2008
o Ares I-X main risk to launch date is availability of mobile launch platform (max slip 6 weeks)
o Construction continues at pad 39B and VAB
o USA will process Ares I-X stack
o Internal first flight date is Sep 2013 - unchanged - no impact due to slippage
o Biggest challenge is funding
o Ares I-X test will validate dynamics models, trajectory and flight controls; also prove lean methods for manufacturing and operations
o Cx budget can manage 6 months of continuing resolution from Congress

Ares I
o Ares I vehicle stack PDR starts 14 July to be complete 10 September 2008
o 70% wind tunnel testing complete (5000 hours)
o First stage now in PDR to be complete 5 June 2008
o First drogue parachute tests in July 2008
o First inert 5 segment cast complete for ground vibration tests
o Nozzle tests complete
o First static test of 5 segment motor April 2009
o J-2X starting CDR component reviews, full engine CDR in November
o Testing J-2X gas generator
o Started production of powerpack #2 (J-2X)
o Upper stage PDR starting in June 2008, all subsystems PDRs complete
o Acceptance testing large scale robotic weld tools
o Wide panel structural tests starting July 2008
o Thrust Oscillation issue in work - design and tests - to be ready for Ares I stack review

SpaceNut · 2008-05-16 09:33:42

The Ares 1X test flight will make us of a modified four-segment shuttle booster containg a mock-up of the fifth segment, a dummy second stage, Orion spacecraft and a launch abort system.

The test is slated to cost $320 million and was schedueled for launch from Kennedy Space Center on April 15, 2009 but since the launch of Atlantis to fix the Hubble has been delayed to Oct. 3 from Aug. 28, this will push back the test flight into late next May, 2009.

The suborbital mission is largely a test of the rocket's first-stage flight control system. Officials say it must be launched by October 2009 to keep NASA on track for the first piloted Orion flight in March 2015.

The Ares 1X test flight will be the first of four to be carried out under a $1.8 billion contract to design, develop and test the moon rocket's first stage: a five-segment shuttle-derived solid rocket booster.

With the need for a safety shuttle waiting on the other launch pad for the Hubble mission to take place. NASA was to have Endeavour on pad 39B ready for a rapid-response rescue mission if Atlantis was in a seriously damaged condition after blasts off from the nearby pad 39A.

Delays in shuttle external tank production forced NASA to push back the Hubble mission. Tanks equipped with all post-Columbia safety modifications are taking longer to produce.

Other flights impacted as well is a mission to haul up the station the last set of U.S. solar arrays. This was to launch in Dec. 4 but that mission ultimately is expected to be delayed to February as well.

SpaceNut · 2012-01-24 20:04:24

Hard to believe the time warp that has happened by the website going south but we are back and here is an update on what used to be constellation.....

ATK has still gone forth with the work need to make this rocket possible even thou funding really was taken away so long ago...

ATK Completes Third Space Act Agreement Milestone for Liberty under NASA's Commercial Crew Program

ATK's Liberty Launch System Designed to Provide Safe, Reliable Crew Transportation to the ISS

Liberty program successfully held its Launch System Initial Systems Design (ISD) Review, which completes the third of five milestones in the company's unfunded Space Act Agreement (SAA) with NASA for the Commercial Crew Development Program.
The commercial crew Liberty Transportation System combines two of the world's most reliable propulsion systems. ATK is the prime, providing the human-rated five-segment solid rocket motor as the first stage. Astrium is providing the core stage from the Ariane 5 rocket, including the Vulcain 2 engine, as Liberty's upper stage. The launch vehicle has the capability to lift 44,000 pounds to low-Earth-orbit.
The five-segment motor is derived from the human-rated Space Shuttle and Ares solid rocket motors, and the core stage for the Ariane 5 was originally slated to lift the Hermes Space Plane. The current goal is to begin test launches in 2015, with a crewed flight in 2016.

SpaceNut · 2021-07-25 20:07:09

I was pleased to see that the old topic was still here as the original use of a single modified booster was to have the over weight orion capsule to use it as a crew transport but the longitudinal vibrations were so great that it put Nasa behind the design 8 ball.

NASA, Northrop Grumman designing new BOLE SRB for SLS Block 2 vehicle

sls_lift_capabilities_and_configurations_508_03152018_0.config-slide.png

I believe that they changed some grains near max q to make it possible to lower the thrust why it transitioned and then back to full power....

RobertDyck · 2021-07-25 22:06:46

I'm not sure how to react. The Ares launch vehicle that was proposed as part of Mars Direct included upgraded SRBs. But there is an alternative: liquid boosters using 2 F-1B engines each, with RP1/LOX propellant. The article says "new formula", "something more modern and higher performing", "a different propellant mix from the Shuttle solid motors, which allows more of the higher-impulse propellant", "the propellant that we’re using is a higher density". The info-graphic mentions "HTPB propellant", which is Hydroxyl-terminated polybutadiene. Solid rocket boosters for Shuttle used that, it's the same rubber. We've discussed this many times on this forum; the difference is replacing some of the ammonium perchlorate (solid oxidizer) with either RDX or HMX or a mixture of both. Military C4 explosive is RDX with soft putty-like plastic stabilizer. HMX is even more powerful than RDX. GW Johnson has assured me this has been used for missiles for years, it's stable. The RDX combusts (burns) when diluted and mixed with solid rocket fuel, it doesn't explode. Well, I would still prefer liquid boosters over deliberately adding explosive to solid rocket booster.

Development of boosters for SLS Block 2 are way overdue. However, as I said, I would prefer liquid boosters. Remember, the first stage of Saturn V used F-1 engines. In 1969 Rocketdyne developed an upgrade: F-1A, which produced 1.8 million pounds of thrust each. F-1 produced 1.5 million pounds each for Apollo 4 through 14, for Apollo 15 and later it was upgraded to 1.522 million pounds. F-1B is just F-1A with exactly the same performance, but using modern electronics instead of 1969 vintage electronics, and many parts fabricated with 3D printers.

SpaceNut · 2021-07-26 17:16:45

All with these latest changes going into the production for the SLS or what was the Ares V from close to a decade old now....

GW Johnson · 2021-07-27 15:09:56

To the best of my understanding, SLS Block 1 and Block 1B are to use the 5-segment solid. Block 2 is intended to use some sort of liquid strap-on booster.

The polymers used commonly in composite solid propellants have historically been PBAN (polybutadiene acrylonitrile), CTPB (carboxy-terminated polybutadiene), and HTPB (hydroxy-terminated polybutadiene). All are polybutadiene polymers, but they are not the same. PBAN has fallen out of favor relative to CTPB and especially HTPB. You get the best structural performance at tactical hot and cold soak (145 F and -65 F) with HTPB, better than CTPB. And CTPB gave better structural performance than PBAN.

The tactical weapons plants used CTPB, and now use HTPB, leading the industry far in advance of the big motor boys. Very few of the big motors ever saw anything but an air conditioned and heated launch silo or tube. Now, the SRB's get exposed to modestly extreme weather. Which is why the big motor boys are finally making the move to HTPB.

Mix viscosity and how you cast determines the solids loading you can have in your mix, which in turn determines deliverable Isp, deliverable burn rates, and higher stress capability as well as still-considerable strain. Higher solids loading is higher Isp, first and foremost. (Too low a solids content leads to too-easy slumping from viscoelastic behavior.) If you know how to pressure-cast and pressure-pack, you can get significantly better Isp performance at maximum 85-88% solids. If you don't, and just do gravity sleeve casting, you are restricted to the 80-85% solids range as your maximum. Simple as that.

Anybody who has ever cast wet and dry concrete mixes knows what I am talking about. Not getting this right leads to voids and cracks. Those guarantee motor explosions. Either way, you X-ray every single motor. The stats do not support any other assumption.

In the solids, oxidizer is dominant, and the oxidizer of choice is now pretty much ammonium perchlorate (AP), although in the 1950's and 1960's it was ammonium nitrate (AN). The next largest item is aluminum powder, if used at all, up to about 20% max. The opacifier is about 1-2% carbon black, without which the bright fire shines deep into the propellant, and ignites it into an explosion. The burn rate catalyst is 1-2% iron compound, the safest one being yellow iron oxide powder. (There is a liquid iron compound called catocene, but it adds serious processing hazards, and its percentage adds to the liquids, not the solids.)

If you use an explosive powder like RDX or HMX (and the tactical boys have for many decades; I have even used pelletized NC for an explosive powder), it is restricted to a max around 5-10% in order to safety-test as only a class 1.3 explosive. Too much, and your friction sensitivity is too high, your autoignition temperature is too low, your shock sensitivity is too high, and you end up being a class 1.1 mass-detonable. Or worse.

The sum of all these solids must be maximum 80-85% if you sleeve cast, or can be maximum 85-88% if you pressure cast. The remainder are your liquids: the polymer, plus an appropriate plasticizing oil (if any), plus an appropriate curative agent. The polymer dominates by far. Propellant cure requires cooking in an oven, not just adding the curative. This is the analog to vulcanizing the rubber in a tire.

You usually vulcanize (cook) at a temperature about 100 F or so hotter than the max hot soak exposure temperature expected, including aeroheat effects. If you don't get that right, your propellant will liquify and slump where it gets too hot. That blows up the motor. This requirement is ABSOLUTELY why your autoignition temperature must be quite high (because your cooking temperature is pretty high.

If you come away from this thinking that propellant formulation is very complex, and subject to many, many constraints, then you got the proper message! Real aerospace solid propellants are NOT simple fireworks or garage-shop-producible things. I did this very stuff for 16 years. And more besides (our ramjets used fuel-rich propellant effluents for fuel instead of kerosene, a very odd subclass of solid propellants).

And I haven't yet said a word about bond peel strength, shelf life, shock/vibration resistance, fragment impact, or fire exposure tests! So, you see, it's a whole lot more complicated than I can even indicate in a short discussion like this. That is why this kind of work is NOT cheap! Even though the motors are, in a relative sense, compared to what they push.

GW

Last edited by GW Johnson (2021-07-27 19:27:39)

SpaceNut · 2021-07-27 19:31:22

There has been no work that I am aware of for the liquid flyback other than paper. There is a topic if its still here from when the F1 was being looked at for doing just that...

ATK was the previous owner of the booster technology that Northrup Grumman bought in order to get the lion share of going back to the moon and ISS support. They have been doing the normal upgrade of what they bought to modernize it to make it profitable.

GW Johnson · 2021-07-27 19:57:23

I hope my post 582 gave you a sense that there is a whole lot more to it than just the money to buy up other facilities. That stuff is about 40% science (written down), 50% art (not written down), and 10% blind dumb luck. In production work. In development work, the art and luck fractions are higher. Nobody buys the art. They just fire the ones who know it.

GW

RobertDyck · 2021-07-27 21:42:57

GW: thank you. I very much appreciate that.

Liquid booster did get a tiny bit beyond paper. Rocketdyne did build a gas generator for an F-1B. Fabricated with 3D printing. Not the whole engine, just the gas generator.
(click image for YouTube video. 1 minute 49 seconds)

Oldfart1939 · 2021-07-28 09:42:16

I've been pondering the use of SRBs for Falcon 9 as a Falcon 9 "Intermediate" which could enhance the performance readily. If the SRBs could be recovered by parachute and then be snagged airborne by helicopter, that would maintain the reusability concept for SpaceX. But since the focus is on Starship, this would seem to be a meaningless side diversion in Elon's eyes. Maybe 2 years ago would have made some sense?

RobertDyck · 2021-07-28 12:32:14

Oldfart1939,
I posted a mission plan to use Falcon Heavy for a human mission to the Moon. But Elon doesn't want to do that, he wants to use Starship. It's oversized for that role, designed to carry 100 passengers plus enough food and life support supplies for a mission to Mars. And Starship hasn't achieved orbit yet. But it's his company, and that's what he wants to do.

SpaceNut · 2021-07-28 18:55:29

Solids of a much small size are well used to send Delta family as well as the Atlas with greater payloads to orbit with the extra boost that they provide.
I am sure that these are more than the shuttles reoccurring costs per flight of 200,000,000 that nasa once paid since these are now under a new corporation even if its still of the same design....

Mars_B4_Moon · 2021-11-27 15:38:33

These original human missions to Mars were a series of human missions proposed by the George Bush jnr Vision for Space Exploration a new direction for NASA.
An update on this rocket for those reading the long conversations, much has changed since the glitch or forum shutdown from the old ikon boards, Ares I rocket WAS the crew launch vehicle that was being developed by NASA

However, the Constellation program, including Ares I, was cancelled by U.S. president Barack Obama in October 2010 with the passage of his 2010 NASA authorization bill. In September 2011, NASA detailed the Space Launch System as its new vehicle for human exploration beyond Earth's orbit. In January 2008, NASA Watch revealed that the first stage solid rocket of the Ares I could have created high vibrations during the first few minutes of ascent. The vibrations would have been caused by thrust oscillations inside the first stage. NASA officials had identified the potential problem at the Ares I system design review in late October 2007, stating in a press release that it wanted to solve it by March 2008. NASA admitted that this problem was very severe, rating it four out of five on a risk scale, but the agency was very confident in solving it.The mitigation approach developed by the Ares engineering team included active and passive vibration damping, adding an active tuned-mass absorber and a passive "compliance structure" – essentially a spring-loaded ring that would have detuned the Ares I stack. NASA also pointed out that, since this would have been a new launch system, like the Apollo or Space Shuttle systems, it was normal for such problems to arise during the development stage. According to NASA, analysis of the data and telemetry from the Ares I-X flight showed that vibrations from thrust oscillation were within the normal range for a Space Shuttle flight. One study released in July 2009 by the 45th Space Wing of the US Air Force concluded that an abort 30–60 seconds after launch would have a ~100% chance of killing all crew, due to the capsule being engulfed until ground impact by a cloud of 4,000 °F (2,200 °C) solid propellant fragments, which would melt the capsule's nylon parachute material. NASA's study showed the crew capsule would have flown beyond the more severe danger.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/5467711.html
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=1266
https://web.archive.org/web/20090720215 … 1613.story
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=31792
http://www.space.com/news/080118-nasa-n … shake.html

RobertDyck wrote:

Oldfart1939,
I posted a mission plan to use Falcon Heavy for a human mission to the Moon. But Elon doesn't want to do that, he wants to use Starship.

Musk has clearly become a winner in all this

While Ares is gone we can at least be thankful that Musk, Space-X and Falcon stepped up

now if only Biden would give him some support in the Musk vision for Mars?

Asteroid mission
https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 … fence-test

Elon Musk Says First Orbital Launch of Starship Could Happen by January
https://gizmodo.com/elon-musk-says-firs … 1848082594

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2021-11-27 15:39:39)

SpaceNut · 2021-11-27 17:24:06

The srb rocket "Liberty" is still possible if the new ATK owner show choose and it could use Boeing's Starliner or Orion capsules if Northrup Grumman should move forward with it.

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#576 2008-05-16 06:23:49

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#577 2008-05-16 09:33:42

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#578 2012-01-24 20:04:24

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#579 2021-07-25 20:07:09

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#580 2021-07-25 22:06:46

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#581 2021-07-26 17:16:45

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#582 2021-07-27 15:09:56

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#583 2021-07-27 19:31:22

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#584 2021-07-27 19:57:23

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#585 2021-07-27 21:42:57

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#586 2021-07-28 09:42:16

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#587 2021-07-28 12:32:14

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#588 2021-07-28 18:55:29

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#589 2021-11-27 15:38:33

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

#590 2021-11-27 17:24:06

Re: Ares I (CLV) - status

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