Author Topic: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS  (Read 72673 times)

Offline Lar

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #20 on: 02/20/2018 03:44 pm »
(mod) Discussing why this money is spent the way it is probably veers into politics.
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Offline Kansan52

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #21 on: 02/20/2018 03:47 pm »
I realize the costs in the ArsTechnica article are true, but I despise price stacking from one program to another. His own research doesn't get close enough to round to a billion dollars US without adding the Ares I work to the SLS work.

Also, he laments that this ML (mobile launcher) may only be used once. It wasn't EVER going to be used again after one launch of a test Ares I. Did that bother him then?

OK, stepping away from the podium and shutting up.

Offline envy887

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #22 on: 02/20/2018 04:10 pm »
I realize the costs in the ArsTechnica article are true, but I despise price stacking from one program to another. His own research doesn't get close enough to round to a billion dollars US without adding the Ares I work to the SLS work.

Also, he laments that this ML (mobile launcher) may only be used once. It wasn't EVER going to be used again after one launch of a test Ares I. Did that bother him then?

OK, stepping away from the podium and shutting up.

I thought it was going to be converted to crew launches with Ares 1, after the Ares I-X launch but before Constellation was canceled.

Any way you look at it, NASA has spent 900 million+ on that particular MLP, and gotten exactly one test launch out of it, and only hopes to get 1 more test launch before spending 33 months (and probably another $300 million) converting it to operational status. $600 million per test launch just on MLPs  is not a good rate.

And that's assuming it doesn't lean excessively and require more rework or a new MLP.

Constellation costs should be burdened on SLS/Orion, because SLS/Orion was supposed to be faster and cheaper due to all the work done on Constellation, and because Constellation didn't accomplish anything else useful.

At this point, it would have been faster and cheaper to have scrapped everything related to Constellation and Shuttle in 2011 and built an all-new SHLV system from scratch.
« Last Edit: 02/20/2018 04:15 pm by envy887 »

Offline AncientU

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #23 on: 02/20/2018 04:27 pm »
Depends on who built the engines...
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Offline DreamyPickle

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #24 on: 02/20/2018 04:55 pm »
When this tower was first built for Ares-I, was there also a plan to support Ares-V or was it purely for crew?

The enormous increase in the size of the rocket it must support might partially explain this. And it's difficult to blame the Constellation people for not massively over-designing their ground support.

In retrospect using a smaller vehicle for crew was one of their better decisions, I just wish they went with an EELV for crew and kept the SHLV unmanned.

Online DaveS

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #25 on: 02/20/2018 05:48 pm »
I realize the costs in the ArsTechnica article are true, but I despise price stacking from one program to another. His own research doesn't get close enough to round to a billion dollars US without adding the Ares I work to the SLS work.

Also, he laments that this ML (mobile launcher) may only be used once. It wasn't EVER going to be used again after one launch of a test Ares I. Did that bother him then?

OK, stepping away from the podium and shutting up.

I thought it was going to be converted to crew launches with Ares 1, after the Ares I-X launch but before Constellation was canceled.
Ares 1X used MLP-1 which was first used for Columbia's first launch in 1981. The real Ares 1 would have used the brand new ML-1 but CxP was axed before outfitting even began. This left the new ML-1 structurally complete but without any of real hardware. So when SLS came along in 2011, they decided it would launch from 39B on a modified ML-1. All three STS MLPs have been safed and retired. The OATK interest is for one MLP along with H/B-2 of the VAB.
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Offline RonM

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #26 on: 02/20/2018 06:21 pm »
At this point, it would have been faster and cheaper to have scrapped everything related to Constellation and Shuttle in 2011 and built an all-new SHLV system from scratch.

That might be true from what we have seen, but the government would have paid hundreds of millions of dollars in contract cancellation fees. Using the Constellation contracts as a start for SLS seemed like a good idea at the time.

Fastest thing to do would have been to still cancel Shuttle, but convert STS to a side mount like the Shuttle-C designs. While that was flying NASA could have worked on what to do next.

Offline Lar

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #27 on: 02/20/2018 08:23 pm »
veering a bit far into the "what should have been done" generics I think?
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Offline su27k

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #28 on: 02/21/2018 02:28 am »
And the article:
Quote
NASA spends $1 billion for a launch tower that leans, may only be used once
Quote
Instead of costing just $54 million, the US Government Accountability Office found that NASA spent $281.8 million revamping the mobile launcher from fiscal years 2012 to 2015, but still the work was not done. The recently released White House budget for fiscal year 2019 reveals that NASA anticipates spending an additional $396.2 million on the mobile launcher from 2015 through the maiden launch of the SLS, probably in 2020.

Therefore, from the tower's inception in 2009, NASA will have spent $912 million on the mobile launcher it may use for just a single launch of the SLS rocket. Moreover, the agency will have required eight years to modify a launch tower it built in two years.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/02/nasa-spends-1-billion-for-a-launch-tower-that-leans-may-only-be-used-once/

Even more insane is that the actual cost is 12.5 times the initial cost estimate, how can anyone trust the cost estimates coming out of SLS after this?

Offline catdlr

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #29 on: 02/27/2018 08:14 pm »
NASA's Mobile Launcher from a Bird's Eye View


NASAKennedy
Published on Feb 27, 2018


This video provides a bird's eye view of the crew access arm for the Orion spacecraft and Space Launch System rocket being attached to the mobile launcher at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.



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Offline Arb

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #30 on: 02/28/2018 03:11 pm »
The walkway has no handrails. It's going to be glazed or something?

Offline woods170

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #31 on: 02/28/2018 04:42 pm »
The walkway has no handrails. It's going to be glazed or something?
It isn't completed yet. Lotsa stuff still missing.

Offline yg1968

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #32 on: 03/01/2018 06:18 pm »
NASA no longer seeking to develop second mobile launcher for SLS:
http://spacenews.com/nasa-no-longer-seeking-to-develop-second-mobile-launcher-for-sls/

Offline centaurinasa

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #33 on: 03/08/2018 12:11 pm »
SLS umbilical animation (It's a video from a few years ago, and not sure that this has not already been published, but....)

« Last Edit: 03/08/2018 12:25 pm by centaurinasa »
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Offline centaurinasa

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Offline AnalogMan

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #35 on: 03/22/2018 10:31 am »
Last of the Big Swing Arm Umbilicals Installed on Mobile Launcher
Linda Herridge - March 21, 2018

Nearly the last of several large connection lines, called umbilicals, was installed on the mobile launcher at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The umbilical was lifted by crane and attached high on the tower of the mobile launcher at about the 240-foot level, bringing the steel structure one step closer to supporting processing and launch of NASA’s Orion spacecraft and Space Launch System (SLS) rocket. The launcher is designed to support the assembly, testing, check out and servicing of the rocket, as well as transfer it to the pad and provide the platform from which it will launch.

This particular umbilical will supply propellants, environmental control systems, pneumatics and electrical connections to the interim cryogenic propulsion stage (ICPS) of the SLS rocket and will swing away before launch. The umbilical also will provide hazardous gas leak detection while the rocket is on the pad. The ICPS is located between the core stage of the rocket and the Orion capsule, and will provide propulsion for Orion while in space and give the spacecraft the big push needed to fly beyond the moon.

To install the umbilical, construction workers with JP Donovan prepared the rigging lines and attached the umbilical to a large crane. The ICPS umbilical was slowly lifted up and bolted to the mobile launcher. The entire process took about four hours.

With the umbilical in place, workers will install additional equipment on the tower, as well as electrical wiring, environmental control system tubing, hydraulics and other commodities will be routed to the umbilical arm before testing. Tests of the swing arm also will be performed as part of the verification and validation process.

Exploration Ground Systems is overseeing installation of the launch umbilicals and launch accessories on the mobile launcher to prepare for the first integrated test flight of Orion atop the SLS on Exploration Mission-1. A pair of tail service mast umbilicals are slated for installation later this year and will be the last of the twenty umbilicals and launch accessories to be installed on the mobile launcher. With this test flight, NASA is preparing for missions to send astronauts to deep space destinations, including the Moon, Mars and beyond.

https://blogs.nasa.gov/groundsystems/2018/03/21/last-of-the-big-swing-arm-umbilicals-installed-on-mobile-launcher/

Photo Caption: A heavy-lift crane and rigging lines are used to install the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage Umbilical high up on the tower of the mobile launcher at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Photo credit: NASA/Ben Smegelsky
« Last Edit: 03/22/2018 10:33 am by AnalogMan »

Offline Adam W

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #36 on: 03/22/2018 06:23 pm »
So the FY 2018 budget for the US has in the NASA section $350mn for a second Mobile Launcher. Also the bill passed the house and is likely to pass the Senate and go to the president as written in the next few days. What does this mean for launch cadence and the existing ML?

Offline russianhalo117

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #37 on: 03/22/2018 06:41 pm »
So the FY 2018 budget for the US has in the NASA section $350mn for a second Mobile Launcher. Also the bill passed the house and is likely to pass the Senate and go to the president as written in the next few days. What does this mean for launch cadence and the existing ML?
ML-1 would likely be rebuilt for cargo and science launches and ML2 for crew, and if necessary also cargo and science launches. A third ML could be built but is now currently planned as the number of launches VAB HB space now no longer having the potential for 3 dedicated SLS High Bays with an HB going to OATK for their NGL while also having 3 Saturn/STS MLP's.

Offline Caleb Cattuzzo

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #38 on: 03/22/2018 07:25 pm »
So what's the progress on the ML?I heard on a article that it is ready to go but I haven't seen anything else that supports that.Very hyped for EM-1 btw
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Offline russianhalo117

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Re: Preparing the Mobile Launcher to be armed and ready for SLS
« Reply #39 on: 03/22/2018 09:30 pm »
So what's the progress on the ML?I heard on a article that it is ready to go but I haven't seen anything else that supports that.Very hyped for EM-1 btw
It is not ready to support EM-1 but is nearly ready to move inside the VAB. For a start of outstanding items on the list, just the TSMU's, Vertical Stabilizers and piping left for installation outside in terms of large items.

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