Visitor tail-draggin' another 3 days, at least

Falcon 9 launch of Dragon capsule delayed a minimum of 3 days after
chamber pressure issues at T - 1/2 sec.

If the in-flight testing sequence isn't changed, and the catch-up orbit
isn't faster, that means a 3-day delay for arrival at ISS (to state the
obvious).

Today's launch window was approx 1 min; I haven't heard if Tuesday's
will be any different; I seem to remember 5 minute windows for some of
the Shuttle's rendezvous flights, but I'm not sure what the most
flexible orbital dynamics constraint for SpaceX is.

/dps

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Who, me? And what lacuna?

on 5/19/2012, Snidely supposed :
Falcon 9 launch of Dragon capsule delayed a minimum of 3 days after chamber
pressure issues at T - 1/2 sec.

If the in-flight testing sequence isn't changed, and the catch-up orbit isn't
faster, that means a 3-day delay for arrival at ISS (to state the obvious).

Today's launch window was approx 1 min; I haven't heard if Tuesday's will be
any different; I seem to remember 5 minute windows for some of the Shuttle's
rendezvous flights, but I'm not sure what the most flexible orbital dynamics
constraint for SpaceX is.

See
http://spaceflightnow.com/falcon9/003/status.html
of course.

/dps

--
Who, me? And what lacuna?

On Saturday, JF Mezei queried:

Snidely wrote:

Today's launch window was approx 1 min;


Is this a fuel capacity issue, hardware design which makes it hard for
the rocket to steer back into the right orbit, or perhaps software
design with the software not (yet) having the ability to do the
manoeuvers to adjust the orbital plane ?

Considering it was designed specifically to meet up with existing
orbiting objects such as ISS.

On the other hand, out of all Shuttle launches, how many times were they
able to succesfully make use of the extra 5 minutes and still launch ?

I recall that time when someone left a gate on the pad and they rushed
to get the gate out and get back. (But I am not sure they even had to
move the launch time because they did this at the panned T-9 hold if I
recall correctly)

If the shuttle's history shows that the larger launch window was rarely
or never used succesfully, then it makes sense to not spend money to get
Dragon an equivalent launch window.

Ah, the CS Monitor seems to have the answer:

quote
On this mission, SpaceX has mere seconds to launch. Otherwise it must
wait another three days for a second try.

The reason: NASA is requiring that Dragon perform several kinds of
maneuvers, including a rendezvous abort, in the station's general
vicinity.[...]

The few-seconds-long launch window puts the Dragon on the most
fuel-miserly trajectory to the station, leaving enough thruster
propellant available for on-orbit do-overs if needed."
/quote

http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2012/0518/Why-historic-SpaceX-mission-to-space-station-will-be-so-difficult
or http://tinyurl.com/csmDragon

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Who, me? And what lacuna?