United Launch Alliance (ULA) taps company
to modify pad 41
The launch of Atlas V / OTV-3 payload delayed by
two more weeks
The launch date is now tentatively set for no earlier than 27 November, pending range availability at Cape Canaveral. The delay is still related to the recent GPS IIF-3 launch aboard a Delta IV. While the mission successfully placed the GPS satellite in orbit, a lower than normal chamber pressure was observed on the Delta IV RL10 upper stage engine. A similar type of engine is used on the Atlas V's upper stage. Engineers are still reviewing Delta IV flight data in order to assess whether the same problem could occur during the upcoming Atlas V flight, 'America Space' reported.
Propellentless Space Propulsion Research Continues
Scientists working on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover said Friday that initial measurements of the Martian atmosphere failed to turn up any evidence of methane, a constituent detected in some previous observations that could be linked to life. a laser spectrometer on Curiosity's Sample Analysis at Mars instrument measured the composition of the atmosphere at the Gale Crater landing site, putting an upper limit of just a few parts per billion on any methane in the atmosphere there. Methane, which has been seen in some previous observations of the Martian atmosphere, is of interest since its lifetime in the atmosphere would be very short, implying it must have been produced recently. Methane can be produced by lifeforms, or through geological activity. Additional measurements are planned throughout the rover's multiyear mission to look for any changes in the atmosphere's composition and to improve the accuracy of those measurements.
to modify pad 41
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| Launch Complex 41 modifications would allow commercial crew missions. |
Work to redesign a launch complex at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station to support human flights could create 250 to 300 aerospace and construction jobs in Brevard County, United Launch Alliance says.
ULA is expected today to announce it has selected Hensel Phelps Construction Co. of Orlando to help plan modifications to Space Launch Complex 41 that would enable commercial crew missions on Atlas V rockets.
“We look forward to working with Hensel Phelps to take the next steps in launching crew from SLC-41 and providing safe and reliable crew launch services as early as 2015,” said George Sowers, ULA vice president of Human Launch Services, in a statement obtained by FLORIDA TODAY. ULA confirmed the statement.
During 21 months, Hensel Phelps will assist Denver, Colo.-based ULA with the design and development of an access tower and an access arm astronauts would use to enter a spacecraft sitting atop the Atlas V.
The firm also will work on the system astronauts and support personnel would use to escape the rocket in an emergency and a safe haven where they could take shelter before fully evacuating the pad area.
The work is being performed in partnership with The Boeing Co., whose CST-100 capsule is one of three private space taxis being developed with support from NASA’s Commercial Crew Program. The CST-100 would launch atop an Atlas V.
In August, the Kennedy Space Center-based program awarded Boeing $460 million, SpaceX $440 million and Sierra Nevada Corp. $212.5 million to complete system designs — including the rocket, ground and mission systems — by May 2014. Related story
NASA's Vehicle Assembly Building Prepared for Multiple Rockets
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The Vehicle Assembly Building, or VAB, at NASA's KennedySpace Center in Florida is undergoing renovations to accommodate future launch vehicles. A project of Ground Systems Development and Operations, or GSDO, space shuttle-era work platforms have been removed from the VAB's High Bay 3 and accommodations are being made to support a variety of future spacecraft, including NASA's Space Launch System (SLS) heavy-lift rocket.
The changes are part of a centerwide modernization and refurbishment initiative in preparation for the next generation of human spaceflight. One of the largest buildings in the world, the VAB was constructed in the mid-1960s to support stacking of the Apollo Saturn V rockets that took American astronauts to the moon. In the late 1970s, the facility was refurbished to accommodate the space shuttle. Following three decades of flight, the space shuttle was retired in 2011. Plans now call for the VAB to be able to support multiple types of space vehicles, including the SLS, Orion spacecraft and commercial rockets. NASA is partnering with private industry on rockets and spacecraft to take astronauts to low-Earth orbit and the International Space Station. SLS will be an advanced heavy-lift launch vehicle providing a new capability for human exploration beyond Earth orbit.
The VAB is 526 feet tall, 716 feet long and 518 feet wide. It covers eight acres and encloses more than 129 million cubic feet of space. The building was constructed to withstand hurricanes and tropical storms with a foundation consisting of 30,000 cubic yards of concrete and 4,225 steel pilings driven 160 feet into bedrock.
The first step in the plan was to remove space shuttle work platforms, a project that presented numerous challenges. There were eight box-like support structures surrounding the shuttles during stacking in the VAB. One box platform structure had been removed in 2009 in preparation for the launch of the Ares I-X test vehicle in October 2009. Each platform structure had work stands, connections for electricity, water, pneumatic and other commodities.
Ivey's Construction Inc. of Merritt Island, Fla., began the task in early September. Working closely with NASA and other Kennedy contractors such as United Space Alliance and URS, as well as an on-call architectural and engineering firm BRPH, they helped ensure all systems in the VAB were disconnected from the platforms.
The next major project will be to install a new fire suppression system. This will modernize the fire suppression water supply system and bring it up to modern codes.
Other major renovation includes code upgrades and safety improvements to the VAB. Some of the utilities and systems slated for replacement have been used since the VAB was completed in 1966. This initial work will be required to support any launch vehicle operated from Launch Complex 39 and will allow NASA to begin modernizing the facilities while vehicle specific requirements are being developed. Plans for 2014 include awarding the constitution contract for the new access platforms, including related structures and systems required for the SLS.
Some of the current work has included removal of over 150 miles of obsolete Apollo- and shuttle-era cabling. This will make room for installation of more efficient, state-of-the-art command, communication, control and power systems needed to perform testing and verification prior to the SLS and other rockets being rolled out to the launch pad.
two more weeks
The launch date is now tentatively set for no earlier than 27 November, pending range availability at Cape Canaveral. The delay is still related to the recent GPS IIF-3 launch aboard a Delta IV. While the mission successfully placed the GPS satellite in orbit, a lower than normal chamber pressure was observed on the Delta IV RL10 upper stage engine. A similar type of engine is used on the Atlas V's upper stage. Engineers are still reviewing Delta IV flight data in order to assess whether the same problem could occur during the upcoming Atlas V flight, 'America Space' reported.
Chinese scientists appear to have validated a propellentless space propulsion technology previously branded as impossible. Based on earlier British research, it is averred that the EmDrive concept provides sustained thrust at low cost and weight, but this has yet to be accepted even as a workable theory by the wider propulsion community.
The EmDrive story started in 2001 when engineer Roger Shawyer set up Satellite Propulsion Research (SPR) to exploit his new concept in electrical propulsion. He was helped by a modest grant from the U.K.'s now defunct Trade and Industry Department.
Space propulsion relies on Newton's laws of motion: propellant is ejected backward at high velocity, and the craft is pushed forward with equal and opposite momentum. Even with high exhaust velocity, such as ion drives ejecting particles at 30 km per second (more than 62,000 mph), the mass of propellant is a limiting factor. Shawyer's EmDrive does not have any exhaust. It consists of a tuned cavity shaped like a truncated cone into which resonating microwaves are channeled. Like other radiation, these exert a tiny pressure when reflected off a surface. According to Shawyer, the pressure exerted on the large end of the cavity is greater than the pressure on the small end, producing a net thrust. This appears to be a violation the law of conservation of momentum. However, Shawyer says net thrust occurs because the microwaves have a group velocity (the velocity of a collection of electromagnetic waves) greater in one direction than the other and relativistic effects to modify the Newtonian mechanics. Shawyer compares the EmDrive to a laser gyroscope, which also looks like a closed system but is actually open and works thanks to relativistic effects.
Meanwhile, China's Yang Juan and her team set out to explore the EmDrive independently. A 2008 theory paper by Yang and colleagues describes the EmDrive in terms of quantum theory and indicates net thrust is possible. A 2010 follow-up paper calculates a possible thrust of 456 mN from a 1-kw input, and states that the team was getting positive experimental results.
The latest paper, “Net Thrust Measurement of Propellentless Microwave Thruster,” is in the June edition of the journal Acta Physica Sinica published by the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Yang's team used a magnetron as a 2.45 GHz microwave source and produced a measured thrust of up to 720 mN from 2.5 kw of input power. On the surface, this appears to be a peer-reviewed validation of the science. “The new paper independently proves the EmDrive theory by publishing thrust levels five times higher than SPR results, but with a similar specific thrust,” Shawyer tells. The result, 720 mN, is just 2.5 oz. of thrust, but satellites often work with less. Boeing's advanced XIPS thruster, which fires out Xenon ions at high speed, achieves 165 mN of thrust from 4.5 lb. It weighs 35 lb., more than an equivalent EmDrive, and the propellant for prolonged operation can weigh much more.
XIPS and EmDrive can both run off solar electricity, but the EmDrive never runs out of propellant. Propellant to maintain satellite position is a major weight contribution; and the EmDrive could halve the cost of geostationary satellites. There has been little interest in the EmDrive in the West so far. Boeing's Phantom Works, which has previously explored exotic forms of space propulsion, was said to be looking into it some years ago. Such work has evidently ceased. Still, the latest Chinese work may revive Western interest in the EmDrive as a viable, revolutionary technology.
Source: Aviation Week & Space Technology
Japan schedules launch of innovative Epsilon rocket
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| Artist's concept of the Epsilon rocket |
Japan is scheduled to launch its first Epsilon solid-fueled rocket next year, deploying a planetary telescope in orbit while demonstrating new low-cost rocket assembly and control techniques, the Japanese space agency announced.
The three-stage rocket will launch from the Uchinoura Space Center on the south shore of Kyushu, the southernmost of Japan's main islands. The Epsilon program is designed to cut in half the cost of Japanese small satellite launches. Japan's M-5 rocket, which launched seven times before retiring in 2006, cost $94 million per flight. Each Epsilon launch is pegged to cost $47 million, according to Yasuhiro Morita, the rocket's program manager at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA.
The Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper reported last week the first launch of an Epsilon rocket is scheduled for August or September of 2013.
Engineers designed the Epsilon rocket with a simplified control system, and the vehicle's own computers will autonomously monitor the status of its systems during a countdown. Only a handful of engineers with laptop computers are required on the launch control team, according to JAXA. The Epsilon is also designed to launch after only seven days of assembly on the launch pad, reducing labor and overhead costs.
The M-5 rocket, which the Epsilon will replace, took several weeks of processing and dozens of controllers for each mission.
JAXA has worked on the Epsilon rocket since 2007, and the development is expected to cost 20.5 billion yen, or about $255 million, Morita told Spaceflight Now. Workers are modifying the M-5 launch pad at Uchinoura to accommodate the Epsilon rocket. JAXA is installing a 30-foot-high pedestal and a new flame trench underneath the oceanfront complex, according to Morita.
The 78-foot, 100-ton booster can lift up to 2,600 pounds into low Earth orbit. The Epsilon's first stage is based on the H-2A rocket's strap-on booster, while the second and third stages will use heritage solid-fueled motors from the M-5's upper stages.
IHI Aerospace Co. is the Epsilon rocket's prime contractor. The company builds the H-2A solid rocket boosters and previously held the lead contract for the M-5 rocket.
Epsilon's first launch will orbit the SPRINT-A satellite with a small telescope to observe Mercury, Venus, Mars and Jupiter. The approximately 700-pound spacecraft will carry an extreme ultraviolet spectrometer to study the interaction between planetary atmospheres and the solar wind. The second Epsilon flight in 2015 will launch Japan's Energization and Radiation in Geospace, or ERG, satellite, Morita said. According to Morita, officials have not selected a payload for the third Epsilon launch in 2016.
Source: www.spaceflightnow.com Related story
Flight Tests For Vortex Rocket Combustion
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| Add caption |
An innovative combustion-chamber setup that was flight-tested last month could cut the cost of rocket engines by eliminating the need for regenerative cooling. Orbital Technologies Corp. (Orbitec), a Madison, Wis.-based space-technology company, flight-tested a version of the 30,000-lb.-thrust liquid-propellant rocket engine it is developing for the U.S. Air Force's Advanced Upper Stage Engine Program (Ausep) and other in-space applications.
Results of the Oct. 20 sounding rocket test at Mojave, Calif., validated the company's “vortex” engine technology, which injects fuel and liquid oxygen so that the burning mixture does not touch the walls of the combustion chamber, allowing them to be thinner, lighter and lower cost, says Paul Zamprelli, business development director.
By carefully tweaking the propellant-injection parameters, the company hopes to eliminate the need for costly cooling tubes or channels that circulate unburned fuel through the combustion chamber walls to prevent them from overheating. The flight test also demonstrated Orbitec's acoustic igniter and a lightweight carbon-carbon nozzle extension developed for the flight by ATK.
“The next step is to demonstrate the performance at a larger scale and ensure that future launch vehicle requirements are captured in our design,” Zamprelli says. “Orbitec is ready and excited to compete for any future rocket engine and propulsion applications.”
In the vortex approach, oxidizer is injected into the combustion chamber at an angle that sets up a pair of coaxial vortices. The swirling motion provides better mixing with the fuel, with combustion occurring in the innermost vortex. The outer vortex protects the chamber walls and other surfaces from the heat of the combustion.
During the past 15 years, Orbitec has upgraded its test facilities to accommodate more powerful vortex engine ground-testing, working with both the Air Force and NASA on advancing the technology.
The flight test was preceded by a Sept. 20 ground test with a 3,000-lb.-thrust setup that demonstrated the chamber-wall vortex cooling, acoustic igniter and the ATK lightweight nozzle extension, which uses that company's technology to join hot carbon-carbon components to an actively cooled metal housing (AW&ST Oct. 1, p. 15.) More
Curiosity fails to detect methane in Martian atmosphere
Scientists working on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover said Friday that initial measurements of the Martian atmosphere failed to turn up any evidence of methane, a constituent detected in some previous observations that could be linked to life. a laser spectrometer on Curiosity's Sample Analysis at Mars instrument measured the composition of the atmosphere at the Gale Crater landing site, putting an upper limit of just a few parts per billion on any methane in the atmosphere there. Methane, which has been seen in some previous observations of the Martian atmosphere, is of interest since its lifetime in the atmosphere would be very short, implying it must have been produced recently. Methane can be produced by lifeforms, or through geological activity. Additional measurements are planned throughout the rover's multiyear mission to look for any changes in the atmosphere's composition and to improve the accuracy of those measurements.