Author Topic: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding  (Read 35342 times)

Online Chris Bergin

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2018/05/schedule-first-sls-core-stage-sliding/

- By Philip Sloss

Wish we had some good news, but schedule issues mean SLS maiden launch (EM-1) is at least two years away and confidence levels for June 2020 holding is now less than 50 percent.
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Offline MATTBLAK

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #1 on: 05/14/2018 10:07 pm »
This is bordering on tragic. What can be done about this?! :(
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Offline HeartofGold2030

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #2 on: 05/14/2018 10:08 pm »
This is bordering on tragic. What can be done about this?! :(

The exact same thing that happened to the Constellation program...

Offline Comga

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #3 on: 05/14/2018 10:15 pm »
The article links to a previous article from 2012, saying that the heritage engine shields would be superseded by improved designs, (Better is the enemy of good enough.) but that the first flight remained on schedule for 2017, which at the time was 5 years away.
6 years later it's still over 2 years away.  A linear extrapolation says 2022.
What kind of wastrels would dump a perfectly good booster in the ocean after just one use?

Offline spacetraveler

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #4 on: 05/14/2018 10:17 pm »
I'm guessing we are about 6-9 months out from a launch slip into 2021.

Offline MATTBLAK

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #5 on: 05/14/2018 10:28 pm »
This is bordering on tragic. What can be done about this?! :(

The exact same thing that happened to the Constellation program...
At this rate; Vulcan-Centaur V will be flying before the SLS. If I were NASA, I'd be discretely talking to ULA about moving Orion over to that as a Hail Mary pass...
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Online cwr

Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #6 on: 05/14/2018 10:41 pm »
https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2018/05/schedule-first-sls-core-stage-sliding/

- By Philip Sloss

Wish we had some good news, but schedule issues mean SLS maiden launch (EM-1) is at least two years away and confidence levels for June 2020 holding is now less than 50 percent.

We used to have a problem where pdf slides with lots of info were unreadable in NSF articles.
Then a year or two back there was an upgrade to NSF article technology so that
clicking on such an image would expand it so that it was readable and all that info could be
enjoyed and analysed.

When I click on "EM-1 INTEGRATED MISSION MILESTONE SUMMARY" in this article,
it does not expand.
I don't know if the original image was too low a resolution or if something is missing from the
incorporation of the image.

If its easy to fix, that would be appreciated or supplying the URL for a readable version
of the image would be appreciated [in which case adding that URL to the article might be a good idea].

Thanks for listening

Carl

Offline AnalogMan

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #7 on: 05/14/2018 11:53 pm »
When I click on "EM-1 INTEGRATED MISSION MILESTONE SUMMARY" in this article,
it does not expand.
I don't know if the original image was too low a resolution or if something is missing from the
incorporation of the image.

If its easy to fix, that would be appreciated or supplying the URL for a readable version
of the image would be appreciated [in which case adding that URL to the article might be a good idea].

Here's a copy of the original (but without the magnified insert).

Online cwr

Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #8 on: 05/15/2018 12:49 am »
When I click on "EM-1 INTEGRATED MISSION MILESTONE SUMMARY" in this article,
it does not expand.
I don't know if the original image was too low a resolution or if something is missing from the
incorporation of the image.

If its easy to fix, that would be appreciated or supplying the URL for a readable version
of the image would be appreciated [in which case adding that URL to the article might be a good idea].

Here's a copy of the original (but without the magnified insert).

Thanks, I can read that.

Carl

Offline Jason Davies

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #9 on: 05/15/2018 02:39 am »
When I click on "EM-1 INTEGRATED MISSION MILESTONE SUMMARY" in this article,
it does not expand.
I don't know if the original image was too low a resolution or if something is missing from the
incorporation of the image.

If its easy to fix, that would be appreciated or supplying the URL for a readable version
of the image would be appreciated [in which case adding that URL to the article might be a good idea].

Here's a copy of the original (but without the magnified insert).

Thanks, I can read that.

Carl


Perfectly readable in the article. Either you are using a small phone or you need new glasses ;)

Interesting article. We all knew 2020 was the new date, but mid-2020 and may slip further isn't great. Still, Falcon Heavy slipped a few years and no one said a word.

Offline Lars-J

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #10 on: 05/15/2018 02:45 am »
Interesting article. We all knew 2020 was the new date, but mid-2020 and may slip further isn't great. Still, Falcon Heavy slipped a few years and no one said a word.

 ;D ;D

Offline johnfwhitesell

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #11 on: 05/15/2018 02:51 am »
At this rate; Vulcan-Centaur V will be flying before the SLS. If I were NASA, I'd be discretely talking to ULA about moving Orion over to that as a Hail Mary pass...

What missions would Orion make possible that wouldn't be possible with one of the other two capsules?

Offline MATTBLAK

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #12 on: 05/15/2018 03:21 am »
Beyond Earth Orbit, of course?! One of the stated goals for Vulcan - particularly Vulcan/ACES - is propellant transfer. With that, it would have more than enough delta-v to send Orion on TLI.
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Offline FireJack

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #13 on: 05/15/2018 03:26 am »
I suspect that the only saving grace for the SLS is that the human transport version of the BFR will probably take a lot  longer than a few years. Given how many problems they've been having just getting the dragon v2 ready I don't see them having something so much larger and complicated ready by 2025. Especially rated to take NASA astronauts.

Even if a cargo version is never really used I suspect using the SLS to launch humans into space will be its main justification, even if that doesn't happen until 2023.

Online cwr

Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #14 on: 05/15/2018 03:38 am »
When I click on "EM-1 INTEGRATED MISSION MILESTONE SUMMARY" in this article,
it does not expand.
I don't know if the original image was too low a resolution or if something is missing from the
incorporation of the image.

If its easy to fix, that would be appreciated or supplying the URL for a readable version
of the image would be appreciated [in which case adding that URL to the article might be a good idea].

Here's a copy of the original (but without the magnified insert).

Thanks, I can read that.

Carl


Perfectly readable in the article. Either you are using a small phone or you need new glasses ;)
I was viewing it on a 24" workstation with Firefox under Linux.

I also tried it on a 26" screen on a system running windows 10 using a similar version of Firefox.


Results are the same - the image in the article does not expand when I click on it.
However the version supplied by AnalogMan in this thread worked as expected, a click produces an expanded version which is perfectly readable.

Thanks

Carl

Offline Comga

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #15 on: 05/15/2018 04:02 am »
Interesting article. We all knew 2020 was the new date, but mid-2020 and may slip further isn't great. Still, Falcon Heavy slipped a few years and no one said a word.
Please leave SpaceX out of this.
There is almost no comparison, although people will fill pages making them.
And your statement about Heavy is untrue.
“Isn’t great” is an understatement.
What kind of wastrels would dump a perfectly good booster in the ocean after just one use?

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #16 on: 05/15/2018 05:12 am »
I was viewing it on a 24" workstation with Firefox under Linux.

I also tried it on a 26" screen on a system running windows 10 using a similar version of Firefox.

Results are the same - the image in the article does not expand when I click on it.

For future reference, the images on the new site are usually quite high resolution, but the browser will make them smaller to fit your screen.

Right clicking the image and opening it in a new tab will allow you to see it without this issue.

Offline woods170

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #17 on: 05/15/2018 07:26 am »
When I click on "EM-1 INTEGRATED MISSION MILESTONE SUMMARY" in this article,
it does not expand.
I don't know if the original image was too low a resolution or if something is missing from the
incorporation of the image.

If its easy to fix, that would be appreciated or supplying the URL for a readable version
of the image would be appreciated [in which case adding that URL to the article might be a good idea].

Here's a copy of the original (but without the magnified insert).

Thanks, I can read that.

Carl


Perfectly readable in the article. Either you are using a small phone or you need new glasses ;)

Interesting article. We all knew 2020 was the new date, but mid-2020 and may slip further isn't great. Still, Falcon Heavy slipped a few years and no one said a word.

FH was five years late and lotsa people here repeatedly asked the question when FH would finally launch.

But, to get back to SLS: first launch was mandated, by law, to be no later than December 2016. With the recent sliding of the CS schedule there is a very real chance that the new NET launch date for EM-1 will be in December 2020. That is four years behind schedule. Which is real bad for a government program gobbling up over a billion dollars PER YEAR. For comparison: FH was done on a mere $500 million IN TOTAL.

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #18 on: 05/15/2018 09:12 am »
But, to get back to SLS: first launch was mandated, by law, to be no later than December 2016. With the recent sliding of the CS schedule there is a very real chance that the new NET launch date for EM-1 will be in December 2020. That is four years behind schedule.

That fact and the relative lack of noise in Washington about the slips, indeed consistently increased funding over what's requested year-on-year, makes clear that politically the dates don't matter, yet. I'm pretty sure EM-1 will fly, but the delays mean the launch landscape with SpaceX and Blue Origin is likely to be very different before EM-2 and that's when I guess the politics will change.

Offline AncientU

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Re: Schedule for First SLS Core Stage Still Sliding
« Reply #19 on: 05/15/2018 11:32 am »
When I click on "EM-1 INTEGRATED MISSION MILESTONE SUMMARY" in this article,
it does not expand.
I don't know if the original image was too low a resolution or if something is missing from the
incorporation of the image.

If its easy to fix, that would be appreciated or supplying the URL for a readable version
of the image would be appreciated [in which case adding that URL to the article might be a good idea].

Here's a copy of the original (but without the magnified insert).

Thanks, I can read that.

Carl


Perfectly readable in the article. Either you are using a small phone or you need new glasses ;)

Interesting article. We all knew 2020 was the new date, but mid-2020 and may slip further isn't great. Still, Falcon Heavy slipped a few years and no one said a word.

FH was five years late and lotsa people here repeatedly asked the question when FH would finally launch.

But, to get back to SLS: first launch was mandated, by law, to be no later than December 2016. With the recent sliding of the CS schedule there is a very real chance that the new NET launch date for EM-1 will be in December 2020. That is four years behind schedule. Which is real bad for a government program gobbling up over a billion dollars PER YEAR. For comparison: FH was done on a mere $500 million IN TOTAL.

Per three months -- $4B per year of taxpayers' money, for a total of near$40B by the time it flies.
FH consumed $0 (zero taxpayers' dollars) -- and it is operational (and reusable)
« Last Edit: 05/15/2018 11:40 am by AncientU »
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