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#460
by
Prober
on 20 Dec, 2014 11:00
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(to be fair: SpaceX engines contains all the electronics onbaord the engine, RD-180 just comes with sensors and no hw/sw).
Quite wrong. There is an engine controller
Of course there is an engine controller. But afaik the controller on Atlas V is not developed/delivered by Energomash. So if we compare development costs, this should be taken into account.
Its made in Russia and NPO Energomash got the contract to do the crewed rated version.
Perhaps - But only if you make the (IMO mistaken) assumption that a new engine HAS TO equal RD-180 in every aspect.
The topic of conversation, as I get it, was about why did US-companies miss to develop a competetive RD-180/nk-33 replacement for xyz $.
Nope, originally it was about how OSC had to look for solutions outside the US because none was available in time for them to complete their CRS-1 obligations. It then went into how the merged entity that conglomerates all significant liquid rocket manufacturers haven't been able to do a single competitive kerolox engine. In fact, the main critique was that they ended in that situation because they were quite comfortable to stay only in big government contracts. Now the companies that brought men to the moon can't compete on anything but already existing government designs.
Orbital would have loved to have a TR-107, RS-86 or even a modernized RS-27 as an option. Something like a throttleable GG on the 1MN range, or even 800kN 15 years ago could have been an Atlas replacement and might have work for OSC in the COTS proposal. Just to put an example.
Orbital would be very happy with a supply of RD-180's if they could have gotten them.
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#461
by
Jim
on 20 Dec, 2014 12:40
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Of course there is an engine controller. But afaik the controller on Atlas V is not developed/delivered by Energomash. So if we compare development costs, this should be taken into account.
It is part of the RD-180 and not delivered separately. The Atlas avionics send commands to it for thrust level and TVC.
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#462
by
Remes
on 20 Dec, 2014 17:10
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Of course there is an engine controller. But afaik the controller on Atlas V is not developed/delivered by Energomash. So if we compare development costs, this should be taken into account.
It is part of the RD-180 and not delivered separately. The Atlas avionics send commands to it for thrust level and TVC.
Its made in Russia and NPO Energomash got the contract to do the crewed rated version.
Wow. That's amazing. Is anything publicly known what kind of system it is? Discrete digital/processor? Does it talk 1553 or something else?
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#463
by
russianhalo117
on 20 Dec, 2014 21:25
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#464
by
Lars-J
on 20 Dec, 2014 21:30
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Perhaps - But only if you make the (IMO mistaken) assumption that a new engine HAS TO equal RD-180 in every aspect.
The topic of conversation, as I get it, was about why did US-companies miss to develop a competetive RD-180/nk-33 replacement for xyz $.
My point was merely that the concept of what a RD-180 or NK-33 replacement can be should be widened. It doesn't have to be a 1-1 replacement. Smaller engines (cheaper) can be clustered.
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#465
by
arachnitect
on 21 Dec, 2014 00:48
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#466
by
rayleighscatter
on 21 Dec, 2014 01:09
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#467
by
a_langwich
on 21 Dec, 2014 02:34
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#468
by
baldusi
on 21 Dec, 2014 04:31
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Yet all performance curves are with 23x series.
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#469
by
Antares
on 21 Dec, 2014 05:04
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Orbital would be very happy with a supply of RD-180's if they could have gotten them.
Except the RD-180 was offered to Orbital in 2008 and noses were thumbed.
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#470
by
Antares
on 21 Dec, 2014 05:06
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Well I hope "Antares 200 series" sticks. I don't think I can handle another Orbital rocket name change.
Achilles?
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#471
by
Jim
on 21 Dec, 2014 11:37
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Wow. That's amazing. Is anything publicly known what kind of system it is? Discrete digital/processor? Does it talk 1553 or something else?
? that is how it has always work. Don't know want the surprise is about.
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#472
by
baldusi
on 21 Dec, 2014 13:26
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#473
by
Remes
on 22 Dec, 2014 20:26
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? that is how it has always work. Don't know want the surprise is about.
Russian chip industry is a little bit behind. Less density in the integrated circuits, requires more chips, more soldering points, more PCB, more connections. Automatically this gets less reliable (not saying it is unreliable, it is less reliable: somewhere behind the dot in 99.99xxx something changes). As the IC structures are older there is more heating, therefore more hassle with environmental conditions for the electronic. There is still a lot of manual labor (in western aerospace products flex circuits are more and more used which require less connectors/soldering/cabling/... and have a lot of benefits in regards to thermal stress and others.)
My surprise is that russian electronics made it into a US-launcher.
For the ISS the guidance computer hardware were developed in Europe. Software was written in Russia. I always thought it was somehow similar for Atlas. Or maybe the control algorithms were handed over to someone in the US.
As only russians have the knowledge about the control of closed cycle oxygen rich engines, they could have written software on US space rated control equipment. But now, as I have learned I was wrong and I start to think about it: in this business software must be tested on the final hardware, and it would have been impossible to send engine controllers to Russia.
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#474
by
Jim
on 23 Dec, 2014 03:51
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As only russians have the knowledge about the control of closed cycle oxygen rich engines, they could have written software on US space rated control equipment. But now, as I have learned I was wrong and I start to think about it: in this business software must be tested on the final hardware, and it would have been impossible to send engine controllers to Russia.
Not quite that way. The RD-180 comes as an integrated package, TVC included. The Atlas just sends start, shutdown, throttle level and thrust vector signals.
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#475
by
kevin-rf
on 23 Dec, 2014 12:51
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How was health monitoring for man rating going to be done then? Just curious.
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#476
by
ugordan
on 23 Dec, 2014 12:58
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RD-180 is a direct descendant of the man-rated RD-170, does it not already have sufficient health monitoring? Stuff that's currently just telemetered to the ground and for a human-rated Atlas would be one of the inputs into the EDS box?
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#477
by
kevin-rf
on 23 Dec, 2014 13:43
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My point was, health monitoring alone requires more complexity than the simple picture of the interface Jim painted. There has to be two way communications, there isn't just a simple line that flags the abort system to go when it goes to TTL high.
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#478
by
Remes
on 23 Dec, 2014 15:10
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#479
by
ArbitraryConstant
on 23 Dec, 2014 18:27
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Bezoz was a week or two ago in the news, because his companies are making no profits.
Amazon has been in a position to flip a switch and be profitable for probably a decade or more, but they prefer to reinvest.
Next to "government subsidized lala land" we have now also "venture capital lala land".
For these startups building engines, the work is done with low headcount and an extremely efficient cost structure. It's the business equivalent of an Oberth maneuver.
I really don't see that under anything close to "free market rules" (beeing able to earn money and pay the workers) one could have made a RD-181 like engine from scratch without government funding.
I don't think your definition of "free market rules" is sufficiently broad. Companies have a prerogative to anticipate and mitigate risks, and take on risks by making investments that may not pay off.
Some may disagree, but here we are with AJR's potentially exiting the market because they didn't invest, while Blue Origin was Johnny-on-the-spot with a half-completed engine because they did.