Starliner delays have cost Boeing another $185 million

Capitalism in space: Boeing today announced that it has had to taken another $185 million charge out of its earnings, in addition to the $410 million previously deducted, in order to cover the problems and delays in developing its Starliner manned capsule.

When Boeing took the original earnings charge, it said it did so because it committed to redo the uncrewed flight test at no expense to NASA, a point a Boeing executive reaffirmed at the Oct. 19 briefing. “There’s no additional charges that will be going to the government for this. This is something that The Boeing Company will make sure we’ve got covered as we get this vehicle prepared,” said John Vollmer, vice president and program manager for Boeing’s commercial crew program.

These costs are beginning to pile up. Boeing has got to get this capsule fixed and flying, not only to begin bringing in some income but to show the world that it can do this right.

Sierra Space teams up with Blue Origin to build its Life space station

Proposed Orbital Reef space station

Capitalism in space: Sierra Space and Blue Origin today announced [pdf] that they are forming a consortium of space companies to build a space station they dub Orbital Reef. From the press release:

The Orbital Reef team of experts brings proven capabilities and new visions to provide key elements and services, including unique experience from building and operating the International Space Station:

  • Blue Origin – Utility systems, large-diameter core modules, and reusable heavy-lift New Glenn launch system.
  • Sierra Space – Large Integrated Flexible Environment (LIFE) module, node module, and runway-landing Dream Chaser spaceplane for crew and cargo transportation, capable of landing on runways worldwide.
  • Boeing – Science module, station operations, maintenance engineering, and Starliner crew spacecraft.
  • Redwire Space – Microgravity research, development, and manufacturing; payload operations and deployable structures.
  • Genesis Engineering Solutions – Single Person Spacecraft for routine operations and tourist excursions.
  • Arizona State University – Leads a global consortium of universities providing research advisory services and public outreach.

I suspect that this deal is actually telling us that Jeff Bezos is spreading some of his Blue Origin money to help finance Sierra Space’s work. The deal also appears to be an effort to generate work for Blue Origin’s not-yet-launched New Glenn rocket and Boeing’s not-yet launched Starliner capsule.

The release says nothing about target dates, but the overview [pdf] on the Orbital Reef website says they are aiming for the second half of this decade.

While the success of such a project can only increase the competition and lower the cost to orbit, thus making the settlement of space more likely, this announcement reeks of the same kind of high-minded promises that came with Blue Origin’s Blue Moon lunar lander: Big plans by the best and most established space companies, with little firm commitment by these companies to actually build anything.

Compared to the Blue Moon lunar lander project, however, this project has one very significant difference that could make it real. Orbital Reef is not being touted in order to win a government contract. It is being touted as a commercial station for private customers. Such a project will require these companies to either invest their own money, or obtain outside investment capital, to build it. To make money they can’t sit and wait for their customers to pay for it, since customers never do that (except the government). They need to first build it.

Meanwhile, the BE-4 engine is not yet flight worthy, so that Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket remains no closer to launch, even though it is now approaching two years behind schedule.

Boeing to take Starliner apart, remove two valves

Boeing has decided to take apart the Starliner capsule intended for its second unmanned demo flight to ISS to do a close inspection of two of the troublesome valves that caused the launch in August to be scrubbed.

The current guess at what caused the valve issue involves moisture that accumulated near some of the valves’ Teflon seal. But without any clear culprit, the company now plans to ship two of the valves to a NASA center in Huntsville, Ala., for a forensic CT scan, using machines similar the ones used on humans to detect diseases.

This action now means that the next launch attempt will likely be delayed until the middle of ’22.

The delay is costing Boeing money, not NASA, as the contract is fixed price and Boeing will not get paid additional money until it meets its next milestone, which is a successful demo flight to ISS.

Update on Boeing’s investigation into Starliner valve issue

NASA yesterday issued an update on Boeing’s investigation into Starliner valve issue, noting that progress is being made.

Boeing has demonstrated success in valve functionality using localized heating and electrical charging techniques. Troubleshooting on the pad, at the launch complex, and inside the Starliner production factory at Kennedy Space Center has resulted in movement of all but one of the original stuck valves. That valve has not been moved intentionally to preserve forensics for direct root cause analysis.

Most items on the fault tree have been dispositioned by the team including causes related to avionics, flight software and wiring. Boeing has identified a most probable cause related to oxidizer and moisture interactions, and although some verification work remains underway, our confidence is high enough that we are commencing corrective and preventive actions. Additional spacecraft and component testing will be conducted in the coming weeks to further explore contributing factors and necessary system remediation before flight.

…Boeing has identified several paths forward depending on the outcome of the testing to ultimately resolve the issue and prevent it from happening on future flights. These options could range from minor refurbishment of the current service module components to using another service module already in production. [emphasis mine]

The announcement also confirmed that the next launch attempt of the unmanned demo mission is now being targeted for “the first half of 2022, pending hardware readiness, the rocket manifest, and space station availability.”

The highlighted words raise a very serious question. How is it possible for “oxidizer and moisture interactions” to cause this problem now on Starliner, when the environmental conditions at Cape Canaveral for spacecraft have been understood for better than sixty years? Though this problem might have uncovered a previously undetected fundamental engineering issue related to valves, I am very skeptical. It seems more likely that some quality control issue occurred during this capsule’s assembly. That they are considering using a different Starliner capsule for the demo flight strongly confirms this, suggesting again that the valve issue is not systemic to all valves but is specifically linked to the assembly of this capsule.

If this speculation is correct, it suggests there are some some very disturbing quality control problems in Boeing’s Starliner design and assembly processes. First they missed about sixty software issues that forced the premature landing of the capsule in the first demo flight, issues that should have been fixed during design and construction. Now it appears they have discovered assembly problems with the capsule’s valves, and only did so mere hours before launch.

Boeing has got to get these issues fixed, or it is going to have a serious public relations problem garnering private customers outside NASA once Starliner begins commercial flights.

NASA shifts Starliner crew to Dragon to get them in space

NASA announced yesterday that it is is changing the launch assignments of two astronauts from Boeing’s long delayed Starliner capsule to SpaceX’s Dragon capsule, thus allowing them to get into space sooner.

Astronauts Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada were supposed to be among the first human passengers on Starliner during its first crewed flights in the coming years. Now, they’ll fly together on SpaceX’s fifth crewed mission to the International Space Station, which is slated to take place in the fall of 2022.

Both had been assigned to Starliner in 2018, but the delays at Boeing have left them stranded on the ground while others are flying. Worse, it is now unclear when Starliner will launch, as Boeing has not yet resolved the serious valve issue that scrubbed the launch of Starliner’s second unmanned demo mission in August.

Starliner unmanned demo flight likely delayed until ’22

Capitalism in space: The second Starliner unmanned demo flight, repeatedly delayed throughout ’21 due to scheduling and technical problems, is now likely to be delayed until next year.

Apparently, Boeing engineers have been unable to figure out why 13 of 64 valves on Starliner failed to function properly just hours before the last planned launch, causing the launch to be scrubbed.

The quality control systems at Boeing during this entire program have not shined. The capsule is now years behind schedule, and has been dogged by design and construction flaws — from software to parachutes to valves — that in the 21st century should not be problems any longer in building a manned spacecraft.

Like SpaceX and its Dragon capsule, Boeing owns Starliner and will be able to offer private citizens and companies flights on it once it is operational. These failures, however, will not be good for that future business. They make this spacecraft a far less appealing product when compared to the high quality of the engineering at SpaceX. Why would anyone risk their life on Starliner when they can buy a ticket on the apparently much more reliable Dragon?

In other words, Boeing has been doing terrible harm to its brand name with these problems. It needs to get them fixed, and fast.

Prep of first SLS rocket continues to suggest no launch in ’21

Though NASA and Boeing crews and management have been striving very hard to get the SLS rocket on the launchpad for a liftoff before the end of this year, the schedule has as expected continued to slip, with the chances of a launch by December now increasingly unlikely.

NASA engineers have not discovered any major problems during the SLS testing, but key milestones leading up to the Artemis 1 launch have been steadily sliding to the right in NASA’s processing schedule.

Before NASA raised the Boeing-made SLS core stage onto its mobile launch platform inside High Bay 3 of the VAB in June, managers hoped to connect he Orion spacecraft for the Artemis 1 mission on top of the rocket in August. That’s now expected this fall.

The first rollout of the 322-foot-tall (98-meter) rocket from the VAB to launch pad 39B was scheduled no earlier than September. That’s now expected in late November, at the soonest, according to [Cliff Lanham, senior vehicle operations manager for NASA’s exploration ground systems program].

The schedule slips, while not significant amid the history of SLS program delays, have put a major crunch on NASA’s ambition to launch the Artemis 1 mission this year. The agency is evaluating Artemis 1 launch opportunities in the second half of December, multiple sources said, but that would require NASA to cut in half the time it originally allotted between the SLS fueling test and the actual launch date.

None of this is really a surprise. NASA had always said it would take about six to ten months to get the rocket ready for launch once it arrived in Florida, and it only got there in May. That meant a late November launch could only occur if everything went perfectly. As this is the first time this rocket has ever been assembled, it is not reasonable to expect such perfection.

Based on all factors, the launch will likely occur no earlier than January, but more likely in February, at the earliest. On that schedule it is very likely SpaceX’s Starship will reach orbit first.

Boeing to buy part of Virgin Orbit for $3.2 billion

Capitalism in space: In a stock market merger/investment deal, Boeing is going to buy a part ownership in Virgin Orbit for $3.2 billion, with the deal to close by the end of the year.

After the deal completes, Branson’s Virgin group will hold about 68 per cent of Virgin Orbit. Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth fund, Mubadala Investment Company, is an existing investor in Virgin Orbit and will have about 17 per cent, while the Pipe and other private investors will hold about 15 per cent of the group. Boeing’s share was not disclosed.

My first thought was that Boeing wanted to get into a space company that was doing things better than anything Boeing was trying. And considering that Virgin Orbit a Richard Branson space company, albeit one with some real success, that indicates how badly everything else is at Boeing

My second thought was: Where is Boeing getting the cash? My impression is that because of its various problems with the 737-Max, it has sold almost no planes in the past two years, and has even had to refund money from many purchasers. Its cash flow with Starliner is nil until they fly it. SLS has brought them money as the contract is cost-plus, but hardly enough to pay for this deal.

My third thought was that this deal indicates the continuing cash problems at Branson’s Virgin Group. The Wuhan panic cut airline traffic significantly. It appears Branson is still digging for cash to bail out these operations.

Boeing to return Starliner to factory

Capitalism in space: According to a Wall Street Journal story today, Boeing and NASA have decided to remove the Starliner capsule from the Atlas-5 rocket and return it to Boeing’s factory in order to do a more thorough inverstigation into the capsule’s failing valves.

This decision means that the launch of the second unmanned demo test flight of Starliner will not occur in August, and will likely be delayed several more months. NASA and Boeing just held a press conference in which they made this decision official. During that conference they said they think the moist environment at Kennedy might have caused corrosion in the valves, which caused them to stick.

I once again wonder if Boeing has any quality control systems at all. For such a serious problem — the failure of 13 valves out of 24 — to suddenly pop up just hours before launch, when they have been developing this capsule for years, and even had an extra year and a half to check the capsule out after the failures during the first unmanned demo flight in December 2019, is somewhat astonishing, and very disturbing.

Others will argue that problems like this can always appear unexpectedly in space hardware. I say hogwash. Boeing is not inventing something new with Starliner. This is a capsule, using heritage engineering first invented in the late 1950s. It should not be so hard to get this right.

Starliner launch scrub: 13 of 24 of the capsule’s propulsion valves failed to work

It now appears that the launch scrub last week of Boeing’s Starliner second unmanned demo flight to ISS occurred because thirteen valves in the capsule’s propulsion valves all failed to open during prelaunch testing.

Over the weekend, the team made “positive progress,” a spokesperson said Monday, allowing the company to continue to plan for a launch this month. The company has found “no signs of damage or external corrosion,” Boeing said in a statement Monday. “Test teams are now applying mechanical, electrical and thermal techniques to prompt the valves open.” As a result, more than half of the valves “are now operating as designed,” it said, and work would continue on the others “in the days ahead.”

In a blog post, NASA said that “if all valve functionality can be restored and root cause identified, NASA will work with Boeing to determine a path to flight for the important uncrewed mission to the space station.” The earliest opportunity would come in mid-August, it said.

But Boeing still does not know what caused the valves to remain closed when they needed to be in the open position, and it is unclear how long determining that would take. As a result, some in the aerospace industry are skeptical the company could launch this month.

They have managed to get seven of those thirteen valves working again.

That 13 of 24 failed to function correct strongly suggests the problem isn’t random but is instead a fundamental design problem that needs to be identified prior to launch.

That such a problem has only been discovered now, during the launch countdown, does not reflect well on Boeing or its capsule. That the problem was not noticed in the year and a half delay caused by the software problems during the first unmanned demo flight in December 2019 makes this problem even more disturbing.

In fact, it is downright shocking. It makes one wonder about Boeing’s entire operation, considering the disastrous problems the company has also had with its commercial and military airplane projects in recent years. Does the company have no quality control systems in place, at all?

I truly hope Boeing gets this fixed and Starliner flying, but right now they need to fly a number of times, including reusing a capsule a few times, before I’d recommend anyone buying a ticket.

Starliner launch scrubbed; no launch date yet set

For reasons that have not yet been revealed, ULA scrubbed today’s unmanned demo test flight of Boeing’s Starliner capsule just prior to launch, rescheduling the launch for tomorrow.

The launch tomorrow wiill occur at 12:57 am (Eastern).

UPDATE: It appears the scrub occurred because of a valve issue in the propulsion system of Boeing’s Starliner capsule.

“During pre-launch preparations for the uncrewed test flight of the CST-100 Starliner spacecraft, Boeing engineers monitoring the health and status of the vehicle detected unexpected valve position indications in the propulsion system,” the company said in a statement. “The issue was initially detected during check outs following yesterday’s electrical storms in the region of Kennedy Space Center.”

…The propulsion system valves in question are inside the Starliner’s service module, which has an array of rocket thrusters designed to propel the spacecraft away from its launcher during an in-flight emergency. Other thrusters on the service module are used for in-orbit maneuvers and spacecraft pointing control.

Boeing cannot afford more failures during this second demo flight. The company has been plagued with numerous debilitating technical failures during the past four years, from Starliner to its airlines. Right now the failure to get Starliner operational is losing them business in the emerging orbital tourist market. They need to get it working, and working reliably.

UPDATE: They have decided to cancel the launch plans for tomorrow, to roll the rocket back into the assembly building so they can do more tests on the capsule’s service module where the troublesome valves are.

Nauka engines fire unexpectedly after docking; forces cancellation of Starliner launch

The soap opera of the Nauka module to ISS became even more dramatic today when its engines fired unexpectedly after its docking, causing the station to shift in orbit and forcing Russian mission controllers to shut it down and fire other engines to return the station to its proper orbit.

Russia’s Roscosmos space agency attributed the issue to Nauka’s engines having to work with residual fuel in the craft, TASS news agency reported. “The process of transferring the Nauka module from flight mode to ‘docked with ISS’ mode is underway. Work is being carried out on the remaining fuel in the module,” Roscosmos was cited by TASS as saying.

It appears that because they needed to improvise the rendezvous using different engines, there is more fuel left over in Nauka than expected once it docked, and this needs to be vented safely. Somehow, instead of venting the module ignited the engines.

NASA has subsequently postponed tomorrow’s second unmanned demo launch of Boeing’s manned Starliner capsule until the agency has a clear understanding of the issue and has confirmed that Nauka’s presence is not a serious safety issue.

The future of SLS?

In this long NASASpaceflight.com article describing the building the second core stage for NASA’s SLS rocket (the stage scheduled to take astronauts around the Moon in September 2023) was also additional information about the status of later core stages, still not entirely funded.

The key tidbit of information is this:

Core Stage-3 is the first build under the new “Stages Production and Evolution Contract” that was initiated in 2019; the contract is not yet completely finalized, with the latest estimate for definitization being early in Fiscal Year 2022 (which begins on October 1st, 2021).

Both NASA and Boeing are proceeding under the assumption that this Congress will approve full funding for later SLS rockets after flights one and two. While the signs strongly suggest that funding for at least two more rockets will arrive, that funding still depends largely on the success of the first unmanned SLS test flight, tentatively scheduled for November-December 2021.

It also depends on the political winds, and when Starship starts reaching orbit somewhat regularly (and cheaply). When that happens, all bets are off on the future of SLS. At some point it will become obvious that it can’t compete against that SpaceX rocket, and Congress will shift its funding appropriately.

Sadly, knowing Congress and the corrupt DC culture, this change will likely only happen after a lot of taxpayer money is wasted on a rocket that is simply too expensive and too cumbersome, and thus not practical for making space exploration possible.

Astronauts complete installation of 1st set of new solar panels on ISS

Astronauts yesterday successfully completed the installation of the first set of new solar panels on ISS, completing the work they could not do on a first spacewalk because of issues with one of the astronaut’s spacesuits.

The new panels are deployed on top of the old panels. Though smaller, they are more efficient, so they actually produce more energy total.

The IROSAs [acronym for the new panels] will be installed on top of six of the station’s existing solar arrays, which will allow the IROSAs to utilize the same sun-tracking motors and be connected into the same electrical system as the current arrays.

With the IROSAs being around 30% efficient, compared to the 14% efficiency of the original arrays, the IROSAs will generate roughly the same amount of power as the originals despite being only half their size. Each IROSA will produce 20kW of additional power, for a total of 120kW across all six arrays.

However, because the IROSAs are smaller, they will not completely cover the half of the six [old panels] they’ll be installed over. Instead, portions of the original arrays will still be power positive. The unshadowed portions of the original arrays will continue to produce 95kW as a result, making for a combined total of 215kW of power available to the ISS — an increase of nearly a third compared with the outpost’s current levels.

The set installed yesterday was the first of six new panels to be installed, replacing all of the old panels.

United Airlines buys 15 Boom Supersonic airplanes

United Airlines today announced that it has signed a deal with Boom Supersonic to buy fifteen of its supersonic Overture airplanes.

Under the terms of the agreement, United will purchase 15 of Boom’s ‘Overture’ airliners, once Overture meets United’s demanding safety, operating and sustainability requirements, with an option for an additional 35 aircraft. The companies will work together on meeting those requirements before delivery. Once operational, Overture is expected to be the first large commercial aircraft to be net-zero carbon from day one, optimized to run on 100% sustainable aviation fuel (SAF). It is slated to roll out in 2025, fly in 2026 and expected to carry passengers by 2029.

Boom has been developing this supersonic passenger plane since 2016, though little progress has appeared to take place during most of the last five years. This contract appears to be the company’s first real sale. It also appears that it makes United a partner in the plane’s development.

Meanwhile, another company, Aerion, is developing its own supersonic passenger jet, in partnership with Boeing and scheduled for launch in 2023.

We shall have to wait to see which company wins the race to begin commercial flights.

Boeing and NASA set July 30th for 2nd unmanned Starliner demo mission

Capitalism in space: Boeing and NASA today announced that they have now scheduled the second unmanned Starliner demo mission to ISS for July 30th.

In separate statements, the agency and the company said they were planning to launch the Starliner on a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 at 2:53 p.m. Eastern July 30 on the Orbital Flight Test (OFT) 2 mission. A launch that day would allow the spacecraft to dock with the International Space Station on the evening of July 31.

The new launch date comes after NASA and Boeing completed an “integrated mission dress rehearsal” for the mission using a simulator at a Boeing facility in Houston. The five-day simulation covered activities starting 26 hours before launch and going through landing, including docking and undocking from the station.

Both Boeing and NASA are still hopeful that the first manned flight of Starliner can still take place before the end of this year. Whether it does or not will largely depend on how well things go on this unmanned demo flight.

Boeing confirms next Starliner unmanned demo flight delayed until August

Capitalism in space: Boeing on April 17th confirmed what had already been rumored, that the second unmanned demo flight to ISS of Starliner, its manned capsule, has been delayed until August.

In a statement, Boeing said that the company and NASA are projecting the uncrewed Orbital Flight Test (OFT) 2 mission will take place in August or September. That date is “supported by a space station docking opportunity and the availability of the United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket and Eastern Range.”

Boeing had been working toward a launch of OFT-2 in late March or early April. However, by early March, NASA officials acknowledged that was no longer likely because of delays from the replacement of avionics units on the spacecraft that were damaged by a power surge during ground tests, as well as power outages in the Houston area caused by a winter storm in February that interrupted software testing.

They still hope to make the first manned demo flight before the end of the year, assuming the summer unmanned flight goes as planned.

For Boeing, the sooner they get this capsule operational, the sooner it can start earning money by flying commercial flights. At the moment the delays have meant that SpaceX is getting all that business, with two private flights already scheduled and rumors that it will win a flight from the UAE as well. Furthermore, other commercial competitors are on the horizon, including both China and India.

More delays to Boeing’s Starliner manned capsule schedule

Capitalism in space: Though no new launch date has been announced, both NASA and Boeing are now likely aiming for a summer launch of the second unmanned Starliner demo mission to ISS.

This is largely due to traffic at the International Space Station rather than the readiness of Starliner itself. Two NASA sources said the vehicle is “close” to being ready, with only a few small tests to certify the spacecraft for flight remaining. Starliner is therefore expected to be ready to fly by early summer.

The primary issue is the availability of space station docking ports fitted with an “international docking adapter,” which are used by SpaceX’s Crew Dragon, Cargo Dragon 2, and Starliner vehicles. There are presently two such ports on the station, and for NASA, the priority for access to these ports are crew rotations followed by supply missions. So the question becomes when the Starliner test flight can find an open slot on station.

It appears that they are now targeting the window of availability for either of those ports in the late July into August time period.

While this might be the main reason for this new delay, it also appears that there might be technical issues as well. In early March Boeing and NASA had announced that they were delaying this demo mission for the same scheduling reasons, but then they said they were targeting a May launch date, during a period after one manned Dragon mission had left in late April and before the next Dragon cargo mission arrived in June.

It now appears they cannot meet that window any longer, and are therefore aiming for the next, in July.

Meanwhile, the first manned Starliner demo mission appears to have also pushed back, from late this year to early next year.

NASA completes assembly of SLS’s first two solid rocket boosters

The stacking and assembly of the first two solid rocket boosters for the first launch of SLS has been completed at Cape Canaveral.

The boosters, built by Northrop Grumman, now only wait for the arrival of Boeing’s core stage, which is still awaiting the successful completion of its final static test, now tentatively set for sometime in the next week or so.

Stacking of the boosters began in November 2020, which means that the first SLS launch must happen by November ’21 because the boosters have a limited life span of about a year. To make that November launch happen on time however is becoming increasingly difficult. Assuming the mid-March core static static fire test in Mississippi is successful, NASA will have to then ship the stage to Florida and get it assembled with those two boosters. NASA has previously said it will take about six months to do this. Their margin between now and November is thus getting quite tight.

Scheduling conflicts at ISS delay Starliner unmanned demo flight till May

NASA and Boeing have been forced to again delay the second unmanned Starliner demo mission to ISS due to scheduling conflicts with Soyuz and Dragon missions in April, forcing the flight to slip to May.

A Russian Soyuz capsule is set for launch April 9 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan with two Russian cosmonauts and a U.S. astronaut. The Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft will dock with the space station about three hours after launch, and an outgoing three-person crew will depart and return to Earth on April 17.

SpaceX’s next Crew Dragon flight to the space station is set for launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida around April 20 with astronauts Shane Kimbrough, Megan McArthur, Akihiko Hoshide, and Thomas Pesquet. Their mission, known as Crew-2, will last about six months.

The four astronauts who flew to the station last November on the Crew-1 mission — aboard the Crew Dragon “Resilience” spacecraft — will return to Earth in late April or early May. Both docking ports capable of receiving the Boeing Starliner capsule will be occupied during the crew handover in late April.

They had hoped to launch on April 2nd, but I suspect strongly that Boeing and NASA are glad to have this extra time.

Biden fires Boeing on SLS; gives job to Acme

In an interesting announcement today, the Biden administration fired Boeing as the prime contractor for SLS and gave the job to a well-known southwest company dubbed Acme.

Anticipating critical comment, White House spokesmen pointed out that Acme had a long history of use of solid-fuel rockets for crewed applications, “without loss of human life or serious injury” despite some less-than-fatal mishaps.

…The spokesperson also added, “It should be noted that Acme’s products have never killed anybody. Unfortunately the same can’t be said for Boeing.”

Before you comment, make sure you read the article at the link closely, and also click on the two links in the article to get some detailed background on Acme, from some original sources.

NASA postpones second SLS static fire test

NASA today announced that it was postponing the second SLS static fire test of the rocket’s core stage due to a valve issue in its main engines.

NASA said it was postponing the Green Run static-fire test, which had been scheduled for Feb. 25, after discovering a problem with one of eight valves called “prevalves” associated with the stage’s four RS-25 main engines. The valve, which supplies liquid oxygen, was “not working properly,” NASA said in a statement, but didn’t elaborate on the problem.

Engineers identified the problem during preparations over the weekend for the test. NASA said it will work with Boeing, the prime contractor for the core stage, to “identify a path forward in the days ahead and reschedule the hot fire test” but did not set a new date for the test.

This was not the first time Boeing and NASA has had valve problems with the rocket, though this problem appears unrelated to the previous issue.

Either way, the continuing technical problems — such as the two previous aborts during testing — does not build confidence in the rocket. First, the schedule is very tight, and is getting tighter. Its first unmanned test flight was supposed to happen by the end of this year, and right now that looks very unlikely. Yet, it must happen within the next twelve months because they have begun stacking the strap-on solid rocket boosters, and those have a sell-by date.

More important, these issues raise big red flags as to the overall trustworthiness of the rocket. I certainly would not want to fly on it, at least not until I see it fly at least a half dozen times successfully. The problems however suggest that achieving such a track record is going to be quite difficult.

And if SLS has any major failures during any launch, be prepared for Congress’s support to finally collapse, especially with the on-going spectacular progress being achieved by SpaceX with Starship along with two Falcon Heavy launches planned for this year.

Texas power outages delay Starliner but not Starship

Boeing announced yesterday that due to the winter storms and power outages in Texas it has delayed the second unmanned demo flight of its Starliner manned capsule from March 25 to no earlier than April 2nd.

Meanwhile, SpaceX’s Starship operation in Boca Chica, Texas has been proceeding practically unaffected by the power outages.

At the southernmost fringes of Texas, SpaceX’s Boca Chica Starship factory hasn’t been insulated from the chaos, though a large Tesla Solar and Energy installation has almost certainly lessened the blow. Highly cognizant of Boca Chica’s shortcomings for industrial-grade power needs, SpaceX installed that solar array and Tesla-made Powerpacks almost three years ago and substantially expanded it in 2020.

As a result, despite major issues posed by freezing weather and power grid instability, SpaceX has managed to keep the lights on and continue work at its Starship factory, while also slowly but surely preparing Starship serial number 10 (SN10) for its first static fire and high-altitude launch.

The weather is clearly slowing the Starship test schedule, but at least the work seems insulated from loss of power.

NASA to do another static fire test of SLS’s core stage

NASA has now scheduled a second static fire test of the core stage of its SLS rocket, tentatively scheduled for the fourth week in February.

The first test, planned to last eight minutes, shut down after only one minute when the stage’s computers decided the parameters on engine #2 were outside their conservative margins. That burn also had a sensor issue with its fourth engine.

Conducting a second hot fire test will allow the team to repeat operations from the first hot fire test and obtain data on how the core stage and the engines perform over a longer period that simulates more activities during the rocket’s launch and ascent. To prepare for the second hot fire test, the team is continuing to analyze data from the first test, drying and refurbishing the engines, and making minor thermal protection system repairs. They are also updating conservative control logic parameters that resulted in the flight computer ending the first hot fire test earlier than planned. The team has already repaired the faulty electrical harness which resulted in a notification of a Major Component Failure on Engine 4. This instrumentation issue did not affect the engine’s performance and did not contribute to ending the first test early.

Assuming this test is successful, they will then need a month to get the stage ready for shipment by barge to Cape Canaveral, where it will take several more months to get it assembled with its two strap-on solid rocket boosters, its upper stage, and the Orion capsule on top.

Right now the unmanned test flight into orbit of this entire rocket and Orion is set for November ’21. While NASA has not announced a delay, this additional static fire test puts significant pressure on that schedule.

SLS core stage static fire test aborts after only one minute

During the crucial first static fire test of SLS’s core stage yesterday — meant to last a full eight minutes — the booster aborted the test after only one minute.

It’s still too early to know exactly what caused the early shutdown in Saturday’s engine test.

Flight controllers could be heard during the test referring to an “MCF” (a major component failure) apparently related to engine No. 4 on the SLS booster. John Honeycutt, NASA’s SLS program manager, added that at about the 60-second mark, cameras caught a flash in a protective thermal blanket on the engine, though its cause and significance remain to be determined.

Honeycutt said it’s too early to know if a second hot-fire test will be required at Stennis, or if it can be done later at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where the SLS is scheduled to launch the uncrewed Artemis 1 mission around the moon by the end of this year. Similarly, it’s too early to know if Artemis 1 will still be able to launch this year. “I think it’s still too early to tell,” Bridenstine said of whether a 2021 launch for Artemis 1 is still in the cards. “As we figure out what went wrong, we’re going to know kind of what the future holds.” [emphasis mine]

If this engine abort had occurred during a launch, with the two strap-on solid rocket boosters still firing (and no way to turn them off), the entire rocket would have been lost. Thus, for NASA to even consider shipping this core stage to Florida before figuring out the problem and fixing it is downright insane.

They need to figure out what went wrong, fix it, and then test again, even if if means the first unmanned Artemis flight experiences a serious delay. If they don’t then this whole program is proved to be an idiotic sham (something I have believed for about a decade), and should be shut down by Congress and the new President, immediately.

I am reporting this late because this weekend I was out in the country on a caving trip, taking a very much needed break from the truly horrible news of modern America.

Another SLS core stage abort during dress rehearsal

NASA today revealed that engineers were forced on December 20th to abort at about T-5 minutes their second attempt to do a fueled dress rehearsal countdown in preparation for the full core stage static fire test.

[S]ources said the terminal countdown started at T-10 minutes and counting and ran down to T-4 minutes and 40 seconds where an unplanned hold occurred. … The criteria for how long it should take for a liquid hydrogen replenish valve to close was violated at that point in the countdown when the valve was commanded to the close position as a part of the process to pressurize the liquid hydrogen tank for engine firing. After holding at the T-4:40 point for a few minutes, teams decided the terminal countdown test couldn’t continue.

Vehicle safing and recycle sequences were then executed.

Although the countdown ran for over half of its intended duration, the early cutoff left several major milestones untested. With the countdown aborted at that point, the stage’s propellant tanks weren’t fully pressurized, the hydraulic Core Stage Auxiliary Power Units (CAPUs) were never started, the final RS-25 engine purge sequence was never run, and the vehicle power transfer didn’t occur.

NASA management is debating now whether they can proceed directly to the full core stage static fire test, where the core stage engine will fire for the full duration of a normal launch. It could be that they will decide to waive testing what was not tested on this last dress rehearsal.

If they delay the full test to do another dress rehearsal, they risk causing a delay in the fall launch of SLS, as they need a lot of time to disassemble, ship, and reassembly the stage in Florida. If they don’t delay, they risk either a failure during the full static fire test, or (even worse) a failure during that first launch.

Considering the number of nagging problems that have plagued this test program, it seems foolish to me to bypass any testing. They not only do not have enough data to really understand how to fuel the core stage reliably, they don’t even have a lot of practice doing the countdown itself. All this bodes ill when they try to launch later this year, especially if they decide to not work the kinks out now.

Boeing and NASA delay again the 2nd unmanned demo flight of Starliner

Boeing and NASA yesterday announced that they now plan to fly the second unmanned demo flight of Starliner in late March, rather in January as last scheduled.

Though there have been hints for awhile that a launch close to the start of the new year was no longer likely, this announcement confirms those hints. This means that it will have taken Boeing more than a year to fix the software issues that forced the first demo mission to abort its docking with ISS and come back early.

Whether this will delay the manned mission, which they are still targeting for as early as the summer of ’21, remains unclear. I think it will all depend on how well that the demo mission goes.

1st countdown dress rehearsal of SLS core stage scrubbed

The attempt by NASA to conduct a full countdown dress rehearsal of the SLS core stage, including loading its tanks, was scrubbed early in the countdown yesterday when engineers encountered problems loading oxygen into the rocket’s tanks.

An issue with the LOX chilldown process run on Monday meant that the LOX propellant tank couldn’t be filled, which meant that the full WDR test wasn’t possible.

NASA’s post-scrub statement indicated the vehicle systems performed well and that the Core Stage engineering community and the test team at Stennis were working on fixes and determining when the tanking and countdown demonstration parts of the WDR test can be retried.

This dress rehearsal is intended to preparatory to what NASA dubs the Green Run test static fire of the core stage, set to last for the full 500 seconds the core stage would fire during an actual launch. Whether this scrub will prevent that Green Run test from occurring before the end of the year remains unclear. Either way it must happen soon if NASA is to maintain its schedule for the long frequently delayed launch of SLS, now scheduled for November ’21.

Boeing hires former SpaceX software engineer

Capitalism in space: Boeing has hired a former SpaceX software engineer to head software development for the company.

Boeing on Friday announced it hired Jinnah Hosein as vice president of software engineering, a new role at the aerospace giant. The job will lead a centralized organization of engineers developing software across Boeing’s portfolio of products. Hosein will report to Greg Hyslop, Boeing chief engineer and senior vice president of engineering, test and technology.

…Hosein’s resume reads like a defense industry wish list of Silicon Valley stops. He worked as Google’s director of software engineering for cloud networking, helped design Tesla’s autopilot software and most recently worked as software lead for self-driving startup Aurora.

But it’s his experiences at SpaceX — where he was key to software development for the Falcon, Falcon Heavy, Dragon and Crew Dragon vehicles — that Boeing may look to draw from the most. Boeing and SpaceX have fiercely competed over NASA’s manned space programs, and SpaceX is a competitor for military space launches against the United Launch Alliance, which is co-owned by Boeing and Lockheed Martin.

Since software was the main issue that grounded Boeing’s 737-Max airplane as well as caused the serious problems on the first unmanned demo flight of the company’s Starliner capsule, this hire appears to be aimed at fixing these software issues. In both cases the management philosophy behind developing and testing software was very flawed, leaving the product saddled with software that either didn’t work properly or was not tested properly in development.

I imagine Boeing’s top management is hoping Hosein can bring to Boeing some of the agile, focused, and very successful management style found at SpaceX.

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