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ilbasso
I missed the 3rd launch. Just went back and looked at the video from the second launch, and it sure looks to me like the first stage impacted the second stage's engine bell as it was separating. The tolerances must be mighty close. Some other boosters have an interstage skirt to keep that kind of thing from happening.

EDIT: My apologies, I missed the previous discussions on this. As Emily Litella said, "Nevermind!"
Littlebit
QUOTE (peter59 @ Aug 5 2008, 02:16 AM) *
...
An interview with Elon Musk.
Q&A: SpaceX's Elon Musk Vows to Make Orbit

"We definitely know where the problem occurred, but 'why?' is the question. We think we know, but have to be sure. We think it's very small and will require a tiny change, so tiny that if we had another rocket on the pad we could launch tomorrow."
What's arrogance! Luckily, I’m not investor.

Indeed. the third failure appears to be very close in the timing sequence to the second failure. Elon was certain it was a minor issue the first time. His statement this time is is irrational. If you know it was minor, you must have suspected that the failure mode existed before the launch. Why would one launch a customers products without certainty in the vehicles engineering? This is not 1957 and this is not a race. Nor is the technology new. Somebody is a poor rocket builder.
ElkGroveDan
QUOTE (Littlebit @ Aug 5 2008, 08:37 PM) *
If you know it was minor, you must have suspected that the failure mode existed before the launch.

I don't see how you reach that conclusion. They deduced the cause of the failure based on the events and possible telemetry and visual records. They know their devices and the designs like the back of their hands. A weakness that didn't seem apparent prior to launch reveals itself under these conditions.

As for wasting anyone's money, the vast amount of capital in Spacex is Elon's own. Watch and see. Great things are in store for Spacex and their birds.
dvandorn
As I've said before -- I'll believe it when I see it.

Haven't seen it yet.

-the other Doug
ugordan
Message from Elon Musk: Falcon 1, Flight 3 Mission Summary:

I couldn't find a permalink to this exact release so I'm posting the entire update:

QUOTE
Timing is Everything

On August 2nd, Falcon 1 executed a picture perfect first stage flight, ultimately reaching an altitude of 217 km, but encountered a problem just after stage separation that prevented the second stage from reaching orbit. At this point, we are certain as to the origin of the problem. Four methods of analysis – vehicle inertial measurement, chamber pressure, onboard video and a simple physics free body calculation – all give the same answer.

The problem arose due to the longer thrust decay transient of our new Merlin 1C regeneratively cooled engine, as compared to the prior flight that used our old Merlin 1A ablatively cooled engine. Unlike the ablative engine, the regen engine had unburned fuel in the cooling channels and manifold that combined with a small amount of residual oxygen to produce a small thrust that was just enough to overcome the stage separation pusher impulse.

We were aware of and had allowed for a thrust transient, but did not expect it to last that long. As it turned out, a very small increase in the time between commanding main engine shutdown and stage separation would have been enough to save the mission.

The question then is why didn't we catch this issue? Unfortunately, the engine chamber pressure is so low for this transient thrust -- only about 10 psi -- that it barely registered on our ground test stand in Texas where ambient pressure is 14.5 psi. However, in vacuum that 10 psi chamber pressure produced enough thrust to cause the first stage to recontact the second stage.

It looks like we may have flight four on the launch pad as soon as next month. The long gap between flight two and three was mainly due to the Merlin 1C regen engine development, but there are no technology upgrades between flight three and four.

Good Things About This Flight

* Merlin 1C and overall first stage performance was excellent
* The stage separation system worked properly, in that all bolts fired and the pneumatic pushers delivered the correct impulse
* Second stage ignited and achieved nominal chamber pressure
* Fairing separated correctly
* We discovered this transient problem on Falcon 1 rather than Falcon 9
* Rocket stages were integrated, rolled out and launched in seven days
* Neither the near miss potential failures of flight two nor any new ones were present

The only untested portion of flight is whether or not we have solved the main problem of flight two, where the control system coupled with the slosh modes of the liquid oxygen tank. Given the addition of slosh baffles and significant improvements to the control logic, I feel confident that this will not be an issue for the upcoming flight four.
djellison
Seems plausable, fixable.

Onward!
ugordan
Yes, fingers crossed for the next flight. The failure analysis gives a good explanation to why Elon was being "arrogant" on the simplicity of the fix as well - no actual hardware fixes are needed.
djellison
Although - that would suggest there's a bit more video to come smile.gif
Greg Hullender
I'm impressed with the promptness of Elon's disclosure on this. I expected they'd take weeks or months to tell us anything.

Separately, I'm wondering if they managed to recover the first stage this time. Last time it sank. Of course, this time it does have an excuse. ;-)

--Greg
ugordan
I suppose the disclosure comes from the fact no actual hardware fault was present this time, rather a simple tweaking of the flight software is needed. I am curious, though, about the way they're handling the "torque" imparted on the rocket that caused the 1st stage to recontact on the 2nd stage engine bell in the second launch. I see no mention of that, only the added baffles in the 2nd stage LOX tank to limit sloshing.

Did I misinterpret the reasons for the messy stage sep somewhere? I do seem to remember reading about residual momentum in the Merlin engine (turbopump?) that's unloaded at shutdown and gives the vehicle a nudge.
climber
Here is the launch replay in case you're looking for it: http://www.nasawatch.com/archives/2008/08/...n_1_flight.html
1st stage hitting 2nd is cleraly visible.
ugordan
Thanks for that link, climber! The quality is loads better than what I've seen on YouTube so far. It shows the first stage clearly overtaking the second stage again. At 1st stage burnout, the vehicle attitude was disturbed again as in the second attempt, with a kick in the yaw axis. This is somewhat worrisome to me.

I didn't know they had microphones on the vehicle, btw!
djellison
Wow - not subtle is it!
ElkGroveDan
Holy smokes!

I'll never get over how cool it is to watch those launch videos. Things like the expanding exhaust plume are just fascinating to watch.
Greg Hullender
QUOTE (djellison @ Aug 7 2008, 01:07 PM) *
Wow - not subtle is it!


I guess we can see the source of their confidence in their explanation of the anomoly!

--Greg
nprev
Yeah, really... blink.gif Ray Charles could've seen that!
Littlebit
QUOTE (Greg Hullender @ Aug 7 2008, 05:06 PM) *
I guess we can see the source of their confidence in their explanation of the anomoly!

--Greg

But not necesserally the solution: Elon said adding ~1 second to the delay time before severing and firing the second stage should allow the motors to separate. But look what is happening: the top stages are pushing a headwind, and the 1st stage is drafting. A longer pause will not necessarily prevent the first stage from closing on the upper stages - it happens in cycling all the time. NASA uses boost separation motors to make sure the Shuttle springs clear when the boosters separate at a similar altitude. It doesn't look like Elon's explosive bolt provide much thrust - the dynamic situation is iffy and difficult to model.
Greg Hullender
QUOTE (Littlebit @ Aug 7 2008, 07:20 PM) *
the top stages are pushing a headwind, and the 1st stage is drafting.


I don't think there's enough air for that. Anyone know for sure?

--Greg
nprev
I don't, but I'm sure there's still some aerodynamic pressure along the flight path at that point, esp. since it was well past trans-sonic by then. Gonna guess it was at 100,000 ft or so, which if close is still about the same as Mars' surface atmospheric pressure. Gordan's yaw observation for the 2nd stage is somewhat worrisome in this light.
djellison
Fairing sep is moments later, so any dynamic pressure would be low I'd have thought. THis is all about residual thrust. Stronger sep springs would help as well I'd have thought.
Tman
There's a wm player video for full screen: http://mfile.akamai.com/22165/wmv/spacex.d...2165/F1-003.asx
In another forum someone extracted the very last pic from the video that could be just the second stage ignition.



nprev
I wasn't sure how to interpret the fairing separation in this context, to be honest; not sure if it was intentional at that point, or a consequence of the accident. Did this occur immediately after the first-stage jett, or later on? (I was thinking that the clip was pretty much real time, but remember now that there was a break announcing the fairing event).
Tman
Think it's real time and one of the last picture that show the first stage (trundling) at 2:54/55 in the wmplayer video - after the separation at 2:50/51.
nprev
Huh. Speaking from sheer ignorance here, really, but wouldn't it be a bit odd to have staging, second-stage ignition, and fairing sep all happen within a few seconds of each other? That seems nightmarish in terms of event coordination. I'd think that you'd want to have the second stage achieve dynamic stability before jettisoning the fairing.
djellison
QUOTE (nprev @ Aug 8 2008, 01:08 PM) *
wouldn't it be a bit odd to have staging, second-stage ignition, and fairing sep all happen within a few seconds of each other?


It's the norm, afaik. 5-10 seconds between each.
ugordan
I think we can rule out any appreciable air dynamic pressure at stage sep as cause for recontact because of these things:

1) Staging occurs at an altitude of much more than 60 km by my estimate given the 01:40 call "1050 m/s. alt 35 km" and the 1st stage burns for an additional minute. It's probably closer to or higher than 100 km.
2) No evidence of aerodynamic drag can be seen on the second launch attempt where the stage hit the Kestrel engine bell.
3) Aerodynamic drag would be readily visible in telemetry of both stages after stage sep as inertial acceleration and SpaceX would be able to deduce it's not the 1st stage pushing forward, but 2nd stage falling back. They did not arrive at this conclusion.

Since the altitude is so high, it doesn't hurt to jettison the fairing immediately after staging, although it's wise to be in an attitude hold mode at that time to ensure no pitch/yaw rates mess up with the sep (similarly to what flight 2 saw with staging). Delta II rockets also in principle jettison the fairing just seconds after stage 2 ignition. The Falcon 1 is a smaller rocket so payload mass penalties might be greater if the fairing stayed on for a bit longer than actually needed. The reason the fairing sep looked ugly in the video is it was already tumbling as a result of bad staging and then 2nd stage ignition performed a "fire-in-the-hole" ignition when it really wasn't supposed to.
nprev
This is why I ask, this is how we learn; thank you, Doug & Gordan! smile.gif
djellison
One thing of note - for cinematic reasons probably - Dan Maas never had the right Delta II Sequence in the MER anim or IMAX sequence. He seems to put Fairing sep just before SECO...when it's just after MECO.

Doug
Greg Hullender
Looking at SpaceX's Falcon 1 page

http://spacex.com/falcon1.php

Separation should be at 297,000 feet and then second-stage ignition should be at 324,000 feet, with fairing separation at 429,000 feet. These correspond to about 90.5 km, 98.6 km, and 131 km, respectively.

If we believe Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_pressure

Atmospheric pressure at those altitudes ought to be about 1/100,000 of sea-level.

Since Falcon is moving at most 1000x as fast as a bicycle (and has a much smaller cross-section as a function of mass) it's hard to believe the drafting effect could be significant. I'd question whether it's even measurable over such a short time span.

--Greg


dvandorn
I think there's something wrong with the processor in my head -- when I read the subtitle to the thread, I get a "Divide By Zero" error in my brain... huh.gif rolleyes.gif

Seriously, I *do* hope SpaceX gets its ducks in a row and manages a few successful launches. But that thread subtitle still strikes me as not yet an honest representation.

-the other Doug
ugordan
It's their slogan, I don't see why you're being so sensitive about it. Would you also have prohibited calling Saturn V the world's most powerful rocket before it actually flew? If it flew and blew up by some chance?

It's a plan reflected in their slogan. They will either fail at it or not.
dvandorn
About the Saturn V, I would have said (as NASA and its contractors said), before it flew, that it "will be" the world's most powerful rocket. There was always the chance that it would never successfully fly. (And in fact, the N-1 was more powerful, at least in lift-off thrust -- would you have the N-1 usurp the Saturn V because it was more powerful on the drawing boards, even though it never had a successful flight?)

I don't know why it grates -- it just sort of feels like calling someone a Pulitzer-prize-winning author, when his/her first book is still in galley proofs. It *might* be a true statement at some future date, but at the present, it still has the feel of vaporware.

-the other Doug
djellison
Unmanned Semantics Forum it seems. rolleyes.gif
Greg Hullender
QUOTE (dvandorn @ Aug 8 2008, 11:43 AM) *
I think there's something wrong with the processor in my head


Looks like the "HALT" instruction's not working quite right. :-)

Seriously, it's just typical ad hype -- like you'd see with any brand. We're just not used to seeing it for rockets. If you think about it, this is really a good sign.

--Greg
Littlebit
QUOTE (dvandorn @ Aug 8 2008, 12:43 PM) *
I think there's something wrong with the processor in my head -- when I read the subtitle to the thread, I get a "Divide By Zero" error in my brain... huh.gif rolleyes.gif

"World's cheapest cigar" comes to mind:)
Jim from NSF.com
QUOTE (djellison @ Aug 8 2008, 09:14 AM) *
One thing of note - for cinematic reasons probably - Dan Maas never had the right Delta II Sequence in the MER anim or IMAX sequence. He seems to put Fairing sep just before SECO...when it's just after MECO.

Doug



The fairing sep is after second stage ignition, which is after MECO and after 1st stage jettison.
djellison
QUOTE (Jim from NSF.com @ Sep 3 2008, 12:32 PM) *
The fairing sep is after second stage ignition, which is after MECO and after 1st stage jettison.



I know. MECO-SEP-2nd Ignit-Fairing-Sep. Thus Fairing sep is shortly after MECO.

What Maas did was push the Fairing sep right, to just before 2nd cutoff. He also didn't include the coast phase - but truthfully, it doesn't actually matter.

imipak
The SpaceX site says:

CODE
Upcoming Missions

Customer            Target        Vehicle
                    Date*
ATSB (Malaysia)     Q3 2008       Falcon 1


"Q3" to me signifies July, August, September -- i.e., a launch between now and a week next Tuesday..?

[EDIT: DUH! ]

" *Target dates are for vehicle arrival at launch site. "

Greg Hullender
SpaceX (and Elon's brother) have been quiet about that. I seem to remember that the Malaysians had a clause that said their payload couldn't be launched until there had already been a successful Falcon 1 launch, so I'd guess that SpaceX is in the process of trying to scare up a customer for it.

And, of course, I imagine they're distracted by their upcoming Falcon 9 launch -- due any time in the next three months.

--Greg
farpung
I have read that the next Falcon 1 flight will be a simply test flight with no commercial payload.
This is backed up by http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_in_spaceflight, which seems to be a reasonably accurate source of info about SpaceX flights.
In fact, according to that site, the test flight will be tomorrow (19 Sep)!!!
Nothing about it on the SpaceX site yet, but last time the launch was only announced at the last minute there.
So it might be worth checking their site tomorrow... (unless they are going to send this one up without publicity and we will only hear about it after the event?)

I notice there are no other even tentative dates for Falcon rockets for the rest of the year on the 2008_in_spaceflight site (yet).

Lets hope it works this time!
farpung
No launch today, but there is new launch information on the SpaceX Updates page (http://www.spacex.com/updates.php), including a great picture of the next Falcon 1 on the launch pad.

"If preparations go smoothly, we will conduct a static fire on Saturday and launch sometime between Tuesday and Thursday (California time)."

Also, "Flight 5 production is well underway with an expected January completion date, Flight 6 parts are on order and Flight 7 production will begin early next year. We are now in steady state production of Falcon 1 at a rate of one vehicle every four months, which we will probably step up to one vehicle every two to three months in 2010."

So it looks like they are steaming ahead with confidence!
SolarSystemRubble
Still waiting news about an official launch date/time. Rumor is flight 4 might take place in a day or so....

SpaceX site's last update was on the 19th.

Wish we had SOME news.

MW
ugordan
Wasn't there a bit of news here about a possible ground problem (range safety?) postponing the launch? I think the last SpaceX release mentioned this possible delay as well. I'm not holding my breath.
MahFL
QUOTE (farpung @ Sep 20 2008, 01:54 AM) *
...
"If preparations go smoothly, we will conduct a static fire on Saturday and launch sometime between Tuesday and Thursday (California time)."


I was not aware California had different days from the rest of the World, amazing !
ugordan
Yes, it's almost as if the launch period can fall between different days, depending on which time zone you are in!
SolarSystemRubble
From SpaceX

Posted September 23, 2008

Flight 4 of Falcon 1


The static fire took place on Saturday [20 Sep 2008, CA time], as expected, and no major issues came up. However, after a detailed analysis of data, we decided to replace a component in the 2nd stage engine LOX supply line. There is a good chance we would be ok flying as is, but we are being extremely cautious.

This adds a few extra days to the schedule, so the updated launch window estimate is now Sept 28th through Oct 1st [CA time].

Pavel
Omelek island is on the other side of the International Date Line from the US West Coast, so the time difference is almost to one day. Tuesday to Thursday California time could mean Wednesday to Friday range time.
Vultur
QUOTE (SolarSystemRubble @ Sep 23 2008, 08:02 PM) *
From SpaceX

Posted September 23, 2008

Flight 4 of Falcon 1


The static fire took place on Saturday [20 Sep 2008, CA time], as expected, and no major issues came up. However, after a detailed analysis of data, we decided to replace a component in the 2nd stage engine LOX supply line. There is a good chance we would be ok flying as is, but we are being extremely cautious.

This adds a few extra days to the schedule, so the updated launch window estimate is now Sept 28th through Oct 1st [CA time].


In a way, I'm glad it's delayed. It would be much better for the company to be a few days later launching than to lose another rocket. I really, really hope this one works.

Go private spaceflight!
dvandorn
I'd just really like to know if the engineers over at SpaceX have even considered a set of small retro-rockets on the first stage, to ensure a clean separation and no recontact of stages after staging.

That's the solution von Braun and his team used in the Saturns, and there was not a single case of recontact occurring in that program...

-the other Doug
ugordan
I haven't heard they use solids for separation and onboard footage suggests there are none. I'm not sure Delta II uses solid retros either and it's a pretty damn reliable rocket.
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