Does anyone have any more information as to the environments that the First and Second stages will have to overcome in order to survive re-entry?
I think Spacex should give up on reusing stages. Falcon 1 works well now after 2 successes and Falcon 9 is on the way to doing good things as well. There is enough margin in price where they can stay competitive without stage recovery.
Why SRB is easier to save:- it fall from lower altitude and lower speed- SRB separate and still fly far from space shuttle before parachute are exposed.
We have to understand this is brand new problem(inline rocket and reusing first stage, expose to plume of the second stage), that nobody so far try to solve.
I am sure that Ares SRB was given a rotation post separation for a reason, and I speculate that the reason was to make it stable during the re-entry (meaning not letting it re-enter either end first, but sideways). Speculating further, this rotation and orientation makes it shed more of the velocity higher up in the atmosphere and thus make the peak load smaller. Something for folks tasked with reusability of F-9 to consider, perhaps.
If you are going to have 15-20% margin, why not do some research with it? More is learned from trying and failing than would be learned by following your advice.
The first stage parachutes failed to open and that is the principal explanation SpaceX has given for why the first stage was destroyed on re-entry.
Quote from: Garrett on 06/09/2010 07:35 amThe first stage parachutes failed to open and that is the principal explanation SpaceX has given for why the first stage was destroyed on re-entry. No, the principal explanation given by SpaceX was that the stage broke up during reentry which means the parachutes didn't even get the chance to fail.
Quote from: ugordan on 06/09/2010 07:49 amQuote from: Garrett on 06/09/2010 07:35 amThe first stage parachutes failed to open and that is the principal explanation SpaceX has given for why the first stage was destroyed on re-entry. No, the principal explanation given by SpaceX was that the stage broke up during reentry which means the parachutes didn't even get the chance to fail.I've been reading conflicting reports. Did SpaceX receive telemetry which indicated that the stage broke up? Some recent articles have reported an "incomplete parachute deployment and resulting impact damage to the first stage": Four Companies to Watch in the Brave New Commercial Space Mission EraFalcon 9 Nails Orbit - First Stage Slams Hard into Atlantic
It's possible the parachutes still opened, though incompletely.
No parachutes were reported visible in the debris field.