Progress's oxidizer tank is 'suspect'?

Progress's oxidizer tank is 'suspect'?

Does anybody have any details? Will this change the undocking procedures?
What did they know, and when did they know it?


Aug 18 ISS Status Report:
On 8/20-21, MCC-Moscow/TsUP is planning to refuel the FGB tanks from
Progress 10P. The transfer of fuel (UDMH) will be preceded, as usual, by a
vacuum purge of the fuel (ZUG) lines, to vent residuals in the plumbing
between Progress and SM into space. The purge, scheduled for tomorrow
(8/19) will be recorded on video. [As previous recordings have shown, there
will be a stream of gas-liquid mixture resembling snow. The fuel will flow
with variable intensity of the liquid phase stream, like "fireworks". Since
the 10P's oxidizer tank is suspect, there will be no oxidizer transfer
(nitrogen tetroxide, N2O4).]

Bjørn Ove Isaksen wrote:

On Tue, 19 Aug 2003 22:05:10 GMT, "James Oberg"
wrote:

Progress's oxidizer tank is 'suspect'?

IIRC they had problems with the reboost of the station that they found
to be related to this fuel. They found that they did not consume
balanced levels of fuel and oxidizer and were not sure about what to
do with the remaining part. Seems they want to transfer it to the FGB.
Perhaps they can counterbalance the load on a future progress.

The all singing all dancing Soviet technology comes through once
again...

D.
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(Derek Lyons) writes:

Bjørn Ove Isaksen wrote:

IIRC they had problems with the reboost of the station that they found
to be related to this fuel. They found that they did not consume
balanced levels of fuel and oxidizer and were not sure about what to
do with the remaining part. Seems they want to transfer it to the FGB.
Perhaps they can counterbalance the load on a future progress.

The all singing all dancing Soviet technology comes through once
again...

I wouldn't poke fun at the Russians when they currently have the only
operational means to put men into space and resupply ISS. Ex-Soviet
technology isn't necessarily the best or the worst, it's just
different.

It's not like the US has advanced the state of the art in manned space
travel much since the 70's. Just where is that long promised shuttle
replacement?

Jeff
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Remove "no" and "spam" from email address to reply.
If it says "This is not spam!", it's surely a lie.

jeff findley wrote:

(Derek Lyons) writes:

The all singing all dancing Soviet technology comes through once
again...

I wouldn't poke fun at the Russians when they currently have the only
operational means to put men into space and resupply ISS. Ex-Soviet
technology isn't necessarily the best or the worst, it's just
different.

It's not poking fun, it's a serious reminder to those in this group
who doggedly insist that Soviet technology is magically better than
that of the US, despite abundant evidence to the contrary.

D.
--
The STS-107 Columbia Loss FAQ can be found
at the following URLs:

Text-Only Version:
http://www.io.com/~o_m/columbia_loss_faq.html

Enhanced HTML Version:
http://www.io.com/~o_m/columbia_loss_faq_x.html

Corrections, comments, and additions should be
e-mailed to , as well as posted to
sci.space.history and sci.space.shuttle for
discussion.

"Jorge R. Frank" wrote in message ...


And specifically aimed at the folks who never miss a chance to point out
flaws in NASA technology, but when Russian technology is also shown to have
flaws, they are either silent, or (even more curious), they snip all
references to the technology's origin from their reply.

Hmmm ... perhaps a new thread called "flaws in Russian space hardware" is in order.