CRATER to be updated?

What are they going to do about CRATER?

Are they going to re-evaluate / retest and update it with new information?

Are they going to abandon it?

Are they going to continue to use it within its existing limitations /
parameters?

Are they going to add a second tool to handle whatever CRATER is not
designed to do?

What happens if they come across a hit outside of the scope of CRATER --
get engineers to do the calculations by hand and run computational fluid
dynamics (CFD) sims?

I haven't heard much about what NASA intends to do with CRATER, so got to
wondering.

Was wondering because was thinking... next time they catch debris falling
off, what then? What if it's outside the scope of CRATER? Are they going to
make any CRATER update as a prereq for RTF?

-Dan

In article ,
says...
What are they going to do about CRATER?

Are they going to re-evaluate / retest and update it with new information?

Are they going to abandon it?

Are they going to continue to use it within its existing limitations /
parameters?

Are they going to add a second tool to handle whatever CRATER is not
designed to do?

What happens if they come across a hit outside of the scope of CRATER --
get engineers to do the calculations by hand and run computational fluid
dynamics (CFD) sims?

I haven't heard much about what NASA intends to do with CRATER, so got to
wondering.

Was wondering because was thinking... next time they catch debris falling
off, what then? What if it's outside the scope of CRATER? Are they going to
make any CRATER update as a prereq for RTF?

CRATER was designed to let the people on the ground guesstimate the
amount of damage when debris is observed coming off the ET and striking
the orbiter.

Now they will, on every flight, closely inspect the TPS (the tiles and
RCC, especially) with video cameras. So there won't be any need to use
CRATER to guesstimate damage -- you'll observe all damage directly. No
more guesswork required.

--

Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for | Doug Van Dorn
thou art crunchy and taste good with ketchup |

The Orange County Register a few weeks ago ran an article about the guy who
developed Crater in the 1970s. He's long retired, lives somewhere in Orange
County and apparently has been asked by Boeing to provide support if and
when NASA decides to upgrade Crater to handle large hunks of foam FOD
impacting the orbiter. You can check the OCR website if you're interested.

Later
Ray Schmitt



"Dan Foster" wrote in message
...
What are they going to do about CRATER?

Are they going to re-evaluate / retest and update it with new information?

Are they going to abandon it?

Are they going to continue to use it within its existing limitations /
parameters?

Are they going to add a second tool to handle whatever CRATER is not
designed to do?

What happens if they come across a hit outside of the scope of CRATER --
get engineers to do the calculations by hand and run computational fluid
dynamics (CFD) sims?

I haven't heard much about what NASA intends to do with CRATER, so got to
wondering.

Was wondering because was thinking... next time they catch debris falling
off, what then? What if it's outside the scope of CRATER? Are they going
to
make any CRATER update as a prereq for RTF?

-Dan

rschmitt23 wrote:

Are they going to re-evaluate / retest and update it with new information?

The Orange County Register a few weeks ago ran an article about the guy who
developed Crater in the 1970s. He's long retired, lives somewhere in Orange
County and apparently has been asked by Boeing to provide support if and
when NASA decides to upgrade Crater to handle large hunks of foam FOD
impacting the orbiter.

If I'm recalling the relevant part of the CAIB report correctly, CRATER turns
out to be essentially one big equation that is supposed to model the effects of
strikes on the TIPS. My take is that it's not a generalized simulation program
that can be easily updated, modified, or adapted to other materials such as
RCC.

I'm somewhat suprised that there isn't an explicit recommendation to adopt
and qualify a modern FEA tool for such analyses.

JGM

Dan Foster writes:

What are they going to do about CRATER?

CRATER, or any other program used to do analysis, isn't necessarily
the problem. The problem is that the engineers running the program
have to understand the limitations of the software, the assumptions
involved, and must feed it good input data (otherwise you get garbage
in, garbage out).

You can't really blame the software here.

Jeff
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