How about iced-up foam?
3000 mph
- Thread starter BLUE_KAWI
- Start date
How about iced-up foam?
Specifically it was a large chunk of insulating foam, that is presumed to have caused the damage. They had video of it coming loose.
[video=youtube;bBt-k6IaV0Q]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBt-k6IaV0Q[/video]
Rob, I worked there for several years on the return to flight program and all the improvements from Canadian side, so no real need to explain it to me. Personally, I am glad that the shuttle is no longer in service. It is an amazing machine, most likely the most complex piece of machinery that has ever been built. But being so complex played against it. It never met the original expectations, and was way too expensive to maintain/repair in the long run. The sad part is that the Americans don't have anything to replace it. Orion capsule got "downsized" to become an escape module for the ISS, if it will ever happen, and even then, it's a capsule, nothing revolutionary new like the shuttles wer in their first years of service.
optionfa
Well-known member
Didn't development of the space program during the time the shuttle was being built cost something like 5% of the U.S. GDP every year for a few decades? I don't think well see much in evolution in space travel in this economy.
Defense spending is currently 14% of US GDP. That leaves some leeway.
NASA budget is separate from the US military budget, and gets separately approved by the congress.
Yes, I know. What happens when the US finally gets their butt out of Afghanistan?
A lot of unemployed people. That's what happens.
That's what you get when your design criteria is based on photo ops (Look, we built a REUSABLE spacecraft!), rather than logic and engineering principles.
Rob, I am seriously curious, do you have a better idea for reusable and affordable spacecraft, which is reliable enough to carry humans into space? It's really really hard to design something very very reliable and make it affordable. So far, I haven't seen a single design worth discussing (for humans, since cargo ships are a different beast altogether).
I'm not an engineer. The engineers thought that Orion fit the bill. Then there are the heavy military boosters, for shuttling cargo loads.
Reusable was a gimmick. There was plenty of accounting, that showed not bothering to retrieve the SRBs was more economical.
What I am saying is that these boosters are so 50s technology, it's not even funny, and we still do not have anything modern, but solid and liquid fuel "boosters" to get to the orbit. Orion? Orion is another capsule. Soyuz is a capsule, Gemini and Mercury used capsules. Nothing has changed since then. Yes, we can put all the modern electronics in the world in these capsules, but still boost them as far as 330 km above hearth, woohoo! Yes, they are safe, but seriously, using 50s technologies in 21st century?!
It's the best (and by that I mean the safest and cheapest) way of getting stuff to space... doesn't matter that it looks "old fashioned."
We still use tons of old tech in this day and age... like the combustion engine, and what about microwave ovens? From the 60s?! It's the 21st century.. isn't there a better way to warm up my ****ing TV dinner?
EDIT: I'm not being a smart***... I have a genuine distrust towards the microwave.
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And the Shuttle was about as advanced as a 747. From 1974. There were several other options on the table, but Orion was deemed the most viable. A reusable launch vehicle, used solely for personnel transport, still seems to be on the plate but something is needed in the meanwhile.
The TV is 60+ year old technology. The telephone is 140 year old technology. Does that mean we're still using the original versions? No, there have been developments since then. There's a reason why, though, we use older technology. It works. Even if the RLV becomes reality, those heavy military boosters are the most likely method of lifting substantial payloads into orbit.
It was my understanding that the Challenger explosion was due to failed seals that were needed because the boosters were made in sections somewhere in the mid-west. The boosters could have been made in one piece on the east coast but approval votes were needed from the midwest and they wanted into the action. No action, no cooperation.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/1103109...out-challenger-shuttle-disaster/#.T2m6RdmfZ8E
Cold weather and deformation of the booster's O-ring.
Ugh, so where is the improvement in the boosters over the 70-year-period? Can I go further on them? Can I go faster on them? Are the emissions cleaner (semi-joke)? The TVs went from ugly spherical-looking contraptions to amazing OLEDs nowadays. Phones went from relay-based stations with operators to slim smartphones that use latest technologies, including satellites in come cases. How is the Orion capsule better than say, current Soyuz capsule, the safest vehicle ever used? Soyuz got upgraded obviously, but it's still a capsule. Orion could theoretically take more people, but to me there is no major ground-breaking difference.
tricky, it's the SAFEST, that's the key word. We cannot skimp on safety when we are talking about human lives. My grudge is that many companies, including NASA, have amazing and proven space-grade technologies, but they do not implement them in the human space flight. I cannot talk and compare them publically, but being very conservative is not always the best solution.
What about safety? Guidance? Control? Instrumentation? Cars still largely burn gas but would you say that there have been no advances to them, in the last 70 years?
You see, that's why I am talking about, we keep "upgrading" these systems to do exactly the same thing. Do these system perform better than the old ones? Maybe faster, maybe more reliable (which is arguable), but the end purpose is the same. Can you leave LEO with better guidance, control and instrumentation systems? It seems not, as we still cannot do this. Do we have better engines/boosters to leave LEO than compared to say 60s? I'd say NO. These engines may be a bit more efficient, may have a bit more thrust per amount of fuel burned. But can they help us to reach the Moon or Mars faster? NO. We don't even have engines nowadays to go to the Moon and back. What's the point of building the same thing over and over again to perform exactly the same function?
