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OSP: reliability and survivability



 
 
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  #72  
Old September 16th 03, 12:15 PM
Kim Keller
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Default reliability and survivability


"Rand Simberg" wrote in message
...
Then again, given the value of satellites, and the insurance rates,
why didn't they design this way to begin with?


If you're talking about just unmanned launchers, then the answer would be
that the builder strove for an economic balance between launch cost and
launcher reliability. The satellite industry seems to tolerate a .95
reliability rate or thereabouts. Would they be willing to spend the much
greater launch cost on a booster that has .99 reliability? That's the
compromise the industry currently looks for, because that extra .04 seems to
be exponentially more costly.

-Kim-

  #73  
Old September 16th 03, 01:06 PM
Kim Keller
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Default reliability and survivability


"Kevin Willoughby" wrote in message
...
Man-rating is (well, imho, should be) deciding how many nines one can
afford on crew survival, not launcher reliability.


In a properly balanced program the two are inter-related. Mission success
demands launcher reliability. Crew survival demands abort options. Both are
essential elements.

-Kim-

  #74  
Old September 16th 03, 05:26 PM
Rand Simberg
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Default reliability and survivability

On 16 Sep 2003 11:15:05 GMT, in a place far, far away, "Kim Keller"
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a
way as to indicate that:


"Rand Simberg" wrote in message
.. .
Then again, given the value of satellites, and the insurance rates,
why didn't they design this way to begin with?


If you're talking about just unmanned launchers, then the answer would be
that the builder strove for an economic balance between launch cost and
launcher reliability. The satellite industry seems to tolerate a .95
reliability rate or thereabouts. Would they be willing to spend the much
greater launch cost on a booster that has .99 reliability? That's the
compromise the industry currently looks for, because that extra .04 seems to
be exponentially more costly.


I don't think that "tolerate" is the right word. The idea behind new
launchers such as A-5 and the EELVs was not just reduced costs, but
increased reliability. I doubt if the insurance industry expects, or
is happy with five losses out of a hundred, and I suspect that their
disappointment is going to be reflected in their rates, which should
encourage the builders to do something about the problem, regardless
of what the payload is.

Considering how much these vehicles cost now, if it raises it
"exponentially" to make them reliable, then we can't afford to put
people up on them.

--
simberg.interglobal.org * 310 372-7963 (CA) 307 739-1296 (Jackson Hole)
interglobal space lines * 307 733-1715 (Fax) http://www.interglobal.org

"Extraordinary launch vehicles require extraordinary markets..."
Swap the first . and @ and throw out the ".trash" to email me.
Here's my email address for autospammers:

  #75  
Old September 16th 03, 05:29 PM
Sander Vesik
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Default reliability and survivability

In sci.space.policy Allen Thomson wrote:

What system(s) would have saved the crew/payload from, for example, the
Titan 4 failures, Ariane 5, Proton, Zenit, etc?


Ariane 5 - have the crew module be able to separate and land
on its own while the rest ios blown up?

--
Sander

+++ Out of cheese error +++

  #76  
Old September 16th 03, 08:52 PM
Jim Kingdon
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Default reliability and survivability

To me, man-rating boils down to one thing: increasing LV reliability
to an acceptable number of nines. The trick is deciding how many nines
one can afford or is willing to live with.


I would think a harder trick is trying to figure out whether you can
believe the number you have calculated for reliability.

In the 1990's they increased shuttle reliability (on paper) from 98.9%
to 99.7% (or whatever the exact numbers are, I'm referring to some
studies at least one of which was done by SAIC and showed one in 248
probability of an accident). But given the small sample sizes, we
have no way of knowing whether these estimates were truth or fiction.
Given the vagueries of the process of calculating a reliability, it's
pretty easy to start with the answer you are hoping to get, and work
backwards to the assumptions which will produce it.

One illustration of the difficulties is that that both shuttle
accidents to date were caused not by a random, anticipated event, but
by something which was known, just not fully appreciated.

  #77  
Old September 17th 03, 09:48 PM
Allen Thomson
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Default reliability and survivability

Jim Kingdon wrote

In the 1990's they increased shuttle reliability (on paper) from 98.9%
to 99.7% (or whatever the exact numbers are, I'm referring to some
studies at least one of which was done by SAIC and showed one in 248
probability of an accident).


Checking previous references to this report, the number was originally
given as 1 in ~140, with 1 in 230 and 1 in 76 being the 5% confidence
bounds. (I think there were later reports that did move the central
figure up by a factor or two or so as a consequence of Shuttle
improvements.)

It's interesting that the as-flown Pa is now running not much outside
the lower end of the range.

One illustration of the difficulties is that that both shuttle
accidents to date were caused not by a random, anticipated event, but
by something which was known, just not fully appreciated.


Yes, a feature and limitation, though not a fault if properly
understood by the users, of the PRA method is that it depends on
identifying relevant fault trees and estimating the probabilities of
the events along each tree.

  #78  
Old September 26th 03, 06:36 AM
The Ruzicka Family
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Posts: n/a
Default reliability and survivability


"Rand Simberg" wrote in message
...
On 16 Sep 2003 11:15:05 GMT, in a place far, far away, "Kim Keller"
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a
way as to indicate that:


"Rand Simberg" wrote in message
.. .
Then again, given the value of satellites, and the insurance rates,
why didn't they design this way to begin with?


If you're talking about just unmanned launchers, then the answer would be
that the builder strove for an economic balance between launch cost and
launcher reliability. The satellite industry seems to tolerate a .95
reliability rate or thereabouts. Would they be willing to spend the much
greater launch cost on a booster that has .99 reliability? That's the
compromise the industry currently looks for, because that extra .04 seems

to
be exponentially more costly.


I don't think that "tolerate" is the right word. The idea behind new
launchers such as A-5 and the EELVs was not just reduced costs, but
increased reliability. I doubt if the insurance industry expects, or
is happy with five losses out of a hundred, and I suspect that their
disappointment is going to be reflected in their rates, which should
encourage the builders to do something about the problem, regardless
of what the payload is.

Considering how much these vehicles cost now, if it raises it
"exponentially" to make them reliable, then we can't afford to put
people up on them.

While I can not speak specifically for the Delta-4, I can say with some
knowledge that, for the Atlas V, the idea of what the insurance industry
wanted to see was not a big factor. When the Atlas V EELV program was first
developed, it was with the idea that the vehicles would be used for
government missions, not commercial ones. That was the big driver. There
were only going to be three basic configurations: 301, 401, and Heavy. The
first time that anyone thought of marketing it for a commercial mission was
when they decided to go after Teledesic. That was what drove them to
finally expand the number of configurations to include SRBs. Up until that
point, they had never even thought of adding solids! By that time though,
the basic design of the core was set, and it was too late (or too costly) to
change the core in such a way that they might have been able to have up to 6
solids; that's why they have to settle for 5.
Oops...sorry to stray here...merely meant to show that the commercial
market, and the associated insurance industry considerations of extra
reliability, etc, were not big factors in the original design of the Atlas
V.


 




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