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Falcon 1 Staging Recontact - Engine Burp
From what I've gathered, it's looking more and more like a staging
recontact issue related to first stage engine shutdown behavior, possibly exacerbated by the near vacuum of the staging environment. The only other possibility would be complete staging failure related to the upper stage engine nozzle change out, but that seems unlikely. I hate staging : http://webpages.charter.net/tsiolkovsky/ I don't hate much, but I hate staging. |
#2
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Falcon 1 Staging Recontact - Engine Burp
kT wrote:
From what I've gathered, it's looking more and more like a staging recontact issue related to first stage engine shutdown behavior, possibly exacerbated by the near vacuum of the staging environment. The only other possibility would be complete staging failure related to the upper stage engine nozzle change out, but that seems unlikely. I hate staging : http://webpages.charter.net/tsiolkovsky/ I don't hate much, but I hate staging. Now that I think about this for a bit, what would really be interesting (for example, real bad) is if the engine burp were related to residual fuel sloshing as a result of the very slight roll oscillation observed. It's quite possible the roll oscillation was nominal, but I had a real bad feeling about that, almost as bad as I had when I saw the foam fall off the Columbia during launch, and thought is was an SRB plume anomaly. |
#3
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Falcon 1 Staging Recontact - Engine Burp
In article , kT
wrote: kT wrote: From what I've gathered, it's looking more and more like a staging recontact issue related to first stage engine shutdown behavior, possibly exacerbated by the near vacuum of the staging environment. The only other possibility would be complete staging failure related to the upper stage engine nozzle change out, but that seems unlikely. I hate staging : http://webpages.charter.net/tsiolkovsky/ I don't hate much, but I hate staging. Now that I think about this for a bit, what would really be interesting (for example, real bad) is if the engine burp were related to residual fuel sloshing as a result of the very slight roll oscillation observed. It's quite possible the roll oscillation was nominal, but I had a real bad feeling about that, almost as bad as I had when I saw the foam fall off the Columbia during launch, and thought is was an SRB plume anomaly. Or something as simple as thrust created by gas exhausting from the (new) cooling system. Geez Louise. Does Falcon 1 use anything other than explosive bolts and springs for stage separation? How many more basic errors can they afford to re-discover? |
#4
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Falcon 1 Staging Recontact - Engine Burp
richard schumacher wrote:
In article , kT wrote: kT wrote: From what I've gathered, it's looking more and more like a staging recontact issue related to first stage engine shutdown behavior, possibly exacerbated by the near vacuum of the staging environment. The only other possibility would be complete staging failure related to the upper stage engine nozzle change out, but that seems unlikely. I hate staging : http://webpages.charter.net/tsiolkovsky/ I don't hate much, but I hate staging. Now that I think about this for a bit, what would really be interesting (for example, real bad) is if the engine burp were related to residual fuel sloshing as a result of the very slight roll oscillation observed. It's quite possible the roll oscillation was nominal, but I had a real bad feeling about that, almost as bad as I had when I saw the foam fall off the Columbia during launch, and thought is was an SRB plume anomaly. Or something as simple as thrust created by gas exhausting from the (new) cooling system. Geez Louise. Does Falcon 1 use anything other than explosive bolts and springs for stage separation? How many more basic errors can they afford to re-discover? I suspected the regenerative engine right away, it's the major change. Like I said, they need an outside physicists perspective, and test flights. Easy Ares-1X type test flights with parachutes would work. That would give them a great chance to test their reusability hardware. They're in it for the long run, right? They could take their pretty time about it, and still come in ahead of Ares, which will never fly anyways. |
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Falcon 1 Staging Recontact - Engine Burp
"richard schumacher" wrote in message
... Or something as simple as thrust created by gas exhausting from the (new) cooling system. Geez Louise. Does Falcon 1 use anything other than explosive bolts and springs for stage separation? How many more basic errors can they afford to re-discover? Other than the two mentioned, what can be used for stage sep? |
#6
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Falcon 1 Staging Recontact - Engine Burp
Alan Erskine wrote:
"richard schumacher" wrote in message ... Or something as simple as thrust created by gas exhausting from the (new) cooling system. Geez Louise. Does Falcon 1 use anything other than explosive bolts and springs for stage separation? How many more basic errors can they afford to re-discover? Other than the two mentioned, what can be used for stage sep? Think it through. Like any other space vehicles, attitude control thrusters, or if the forces and vectors involved were very mild, you could use momentum wheels to rotate the first stage away from the stack. If you really understand the behavior of the engine and the stack, you could even do it passively. It's mostly in the precise sequencing. If there wasn't a mechanical or electrical failure, then it must have been a fundamental misunderstanding of the separation forces involved. |
#7
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Falcon 1 Staging Recontact - Engine Burp
richard schumacher wrote: Or something as simple as thrust created by gas exhausting from the (new) cooling system. Geez Louise. Does Falcon 1 use anything other than explosive bolts and springs for stage separation? How many more basic errors can they afford to re-discover? That's their problem; they are basically rediscovering every problem that rockets had in the mid-late 1950s. They should have hunted down retired steely-eyed missile men who worked on vehicles like Jupiter, Thor, Titan I, and Delta and pooled everything they learned from those programs as how to do and not do things. Propellant oscillation was a big problem in the early days, particularly for Jupiter. Pat |
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Falcon 1 Staging Recontact - Engine Burp
Alan Erskine wrote: Other than the two mentioned, what can be used for stage sep? You could sever them using a linear shaped charge around the body of the vehicle. This would have a advantage over multiple explosive bolts in that the whole thing would fire at once from a single detonation point, improving reliability. The odd stage separation of flight two makes it look like one explosive bolt fired late or not at all, causing the engine bell to hit the interstage structure as the first stage fell away. Pat |
#9
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Falcon 1 Staging Recontact - Engine Burp
"Alan Erskine" wrote:
"richard schumacher" wrote in message ... Or something as simple as thrust created by gas exhausting from the (new) cooling system. Geez Louise. Does Falcon 1 use anything other than explosive bolts and springs for stage separation? How many more basic errors can they afford to re-discover? Other than the two mentioned, what can be used for stage sep? FLSC - flexible linear shaped charge, used to cut through the skin of the bird. Or 'zip tubing' (I forget the exact term) which is a thick walled pipe/tube filled with fiberglass and a low explosive, when fired the tube expands and fractures the skin. One could also use tension ties or cables with the appropriate cutters. (As Apollo did to retain both the CM and the LES.) D. -- Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh. http://derekl1963.livejournal.com/ -Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings. Oct 5th, 2004 JDL |
#10
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Falcon 1 Staging Recontact - Engine Burp
"Pat Flannery" wrote in message
dakotatelephone... You could sever them using a linear shaped charge around the body of the vehicle. One word for both Pat and Derek on this: mass. Surely a shaped charge, even a small one, would be fairly heavy. Explosive bolts are used regularly on spacecraft, and only fail once in a while. I think the old addage of "Better the devil you know...". |
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