Space shuttle Endeavour finishes 16-day mission

Discussion in 'General Science & Technology' started by cosmictraveler, Dec 1, 2008.

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  1. cosmictraveler Be kind to yourself always. Valued Senior Member

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    By JOHN ANTCZAK – 38 minutes ago

    EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. (AP) — Space shuttle Endeavour and its seven astronauts safely returned to Earth on Sunday, taking a detour to sunny California after storms hit the main landing strip in Florida.

    Endeavour wrapped up a 16-day trip that left the international space station freshly remodeled and capable of housing bigger crews. The shuttle dropped off all kinds of home improvement equipment, including a new bathroom, kitchenette, exercise machine, two sleeping quarters and a recycling system designed to convert astronauts' urine and sweat into drinking water.

    But the mission wasn't without its problems. Astronaut Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper let go of a $100,000 tool bag during the first spacewalk, muttering "Oh, great" as it floated away.

    And Endeavour's astronauts also had to put in extra effort to get the urine processor working.

    About seven liters of recycled urine and condensation were coming back aboard Endeavour for extensive testing. No one at the space station will drink the recycled water until the equipment runs for 90 days and ground tests ensure it's safe. More samples will be returned on the next shuttle flight.

    The shuttle crew also conducted four spacewalks to clear metal shavings from a solar wing rotary joint at the space station. The joint had been jammed for more than a year and hampered energy production at the orbiting outpost.

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  3. madanthonywayne Morning in America Registered Senior Member

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    Isn't the entire space shuttle fleet supposed to retire in a couple years and leave the US without any heavy lift capacity? I can't believe they'll retire them before a replacement is ready.
     
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  5. Hercules Rockefeller Beatings will continue until morale improves. Moderator

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  7. madanthonywayne Morning in America Registered Senior Member

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    Things like planes have a history of being used for years beyond their intended lifetimes. Why not put off the retirement of the spaceshuttle fleet until their replacements are ready?
     
  8. Hercules Rockefeller Beatings will continue until morale improves. Moderator

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    Good question. I don't know the answer. Maybe it's a financial issue, or maybe a logistics issue. NASA might need to redirect all the money and manpower attached to the shuttle program in order to realize the Constellation Program.
     
  9. madanthonywayne Morning in America Registered Senior Member

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    Seems to me that it would make more sense to simply decrease the number of scheduled flights per year of the existing shuttles so that you have them available should the need arise without putting too much strain on them.

    The only reason I can think of to mothball them before the replacement is ready is political. NASA may believe that congress will feel pressure to get the US back in the game once we have no heavy lift capacity whatsoever and, therefore, fully fund the new vehicles. So long as the shuttles are flying, congress will feel no such pressure.
     
  10. D H Some other guy Valued Senior Member

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    It was a financial issue, now it is a financial issue and a logistics issue. The Shuttle includes a number of custom-made, one-off items, some of which must be replaced with each flight. The President and Congress ordered NASA to end the Shuttle program, consistent with a Challenger Board of Inquiry recommendation. NASA proceeded to begin the termination a few years ago. Before NASA closed the barn door (i.e., terminated those one-off contracts), NASA asked the President and Congress "Are you absolutely sure you want us to do this?"

    Now that those contracts have been cancelled, some congresscritters are demanding that NASA not cancel the program. Idiots. That barn door is closed. Much of the equipment needed to make that stuff has been dismantled. It will cost an immense amount to re-open it.

    There's an even bigger problem than the machinery and equipment: People. People who used to work on various aspects of the Shuttle program been looking for and finding new jobs. Even if Congress does re-start the Shuttle program, where will they get the skilled employees needed to run it? Those people who have left will not go back to working on the Shuttle, especially with this economy. Who in there right mind would go back to working on a program that will be re-terminated a couple years down the road?
     
  11. cosmictraveler Be kind to yourself always. Valued Senior Member

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    Lockheed Unveils Shuttle Replacement - A PM Exclusive
    Lockheed Martin unveils its proposed space shuttle replacement.

    BY DAVIN COBURN

    May 3, 12:00 am--When NASA requested designs for a Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV), two major teams--one headed by Lockheed Martin and one by Northrop Grumman and Boeing--took on the challenge. The winning concept will be chosen in 2008, and the manned vehicle flown in 2014.

    The agency's primary requirement is to "ensure crew safety through all mission phases." The Lockheed team--consisting of six companies--came up with a CEV in three parts. The titanium crew module holds four to six astronauts and launches separately from the mission module and the propulsion stage. They rendezvous in orbit to create a 70-ft.-long vehicle that weighs just under 40 metric tons.


    http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/air_space/1534782.html?page=2

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  12. D H Some other guy Valued Senior Member

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    That 2005 article is terribly out-of-date; it predates a significant change in the CEV timeline in June 2005. NASA awarded Lockheed-Martin and Northrop/Boeing a 13 month contract to develop preliminary designs for the CEV. NASA awarded the CEV contract to Lockheed-Martin in August, 2006.
     
  13. cosmictraveler Be kind to yourself always. Valued Senior Member

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    So they are going to just scrap millions of dollars worth of work already done on this? That sounds very stupid to me, what a waste.

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  14. D H Some other guy Valued Senior Member

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    What are you talking about? Lockheed-Martin has been working on the CEV (Osiris) for two-plus years now.
     
  15. D H Some other guy Valued Senior Member

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    To elaborate a bit, that "exclusive" article in Popular Mechanics was based on the CEV Phase I Request For Proposals, which were due to NASA the day before the article hit the press. The crude design drawings in that article are basically Lockheed's Orbital Space Plane design with a few minor modifications. Basically, it was a bad design.

    The basic idea behind the Phase I contract was a military-style "fly-off" contract. The military had learned the hard way that the way they did business on big projects sometimes resulted in lousy products and almost all of the time resulted in cost overruns. A couple of reasons: (1) Proposals typically didn't have enough meat in them to really distinguish which proposal was the best, and (2) even if they did, the evaluators didn't know enough about the engineering gotchas to let them decide which proposal was the best.

    The military decided that better approach would be to run a large R&D effort by starting with multiple contractors and then down-selecting to just one. While there is some wasted money in this approach (all that money paid to the losing contractors), the hope is that there is a lot less wasted money overall because the final selection was made by much more informed evaluators and made on something with a lot more substance behind it.

    NASA adopted this fly-off approach for the CEV contract. Lockheed and Northrup/Boeing were each awarded a 13 month development project to refine their designs. Each had to put in some of their own money in the Phase I effort, helping defray the cost to NASA a bit. Lockheed's final Phase II design didn't look anything like their initial Phase I design (the one portrayed in the Popular Mechanics article). NASA awarded Lockheed the Phase II contract in August, 2006.
     
  16. hypewaders Save Changes Registered Senior Member

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    Hauling rigid aero wings, and all the affiliated structures into orbit was never an efficient or inspired concept. We can land much simpler, more reliable re-entry vehicles anywhere using compact, lightweight, and redundant deployed parasails/parawings. The Apollo program had superior re-entry vehicles. Sport parachutists have developed superior deployable wings. Integrating these technologies will far surpass the utility and safety of the obsolete Shuttle. They had a good run overall, and now it's time to park them.
     
  17. D H Some other guy Valued Senior Member

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    Yep. The Shuttle didn't so much as fly but rather, to quote Buzz Lightyear, "fall with style". Hobbling the Shuttle with the military-induced cross range requirements didn't help. It may well be that the idea of a space plane just isn't a good idea. Handling the huge range in velocity is just to much to ask. It requires a very complex system that fails the "keep it simple, stupid" engineering mantra.
     
  18. fedr808 1100101 Valued Senior Member

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    There is a replacement. Actually two. One will send astronauts into orbit in a very advanced but apollo style capsule but is larger. And another one that is similar but with the addition of two large boosters, and a very large cargo bay at the nose. It will be tons cheaper.
     
  19. weed_eater_guy It ain't broke, don't fix it! Registered Senior Member

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    The period of time between the shuttle and the new vehicles can be used to retool facilities for the new vehicles. I did an internship a while back with a shuttle program contractor and got to run some of the NASA red tape (fun!), and knowing what I know of the way NASA operates, they'll want to take their time in making the changeover. When dealing with vehicles that carry the nation's reputation and pride with them (unlike most commercial vehicles), NASA spends massive time and resources in the name of safe and reliable performance, for better or worse.

    I'm just glad the new vehicles will attempt to use hardware from the shuttle, such as the original solid-fuel booster casings. With the economy the way it is, this should reduce the number of manufacturing facilities that need to be shut down and started up, keeping things easier on the contractors and the employees working for them.
     
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