Do you have room in your front yard to park it next to the bouncy house and the clown tying balloon poodles?
Posted on 12/02/2017 5:00:55 AM PST by Elderberry
Building a new mobile launch platform for later Space Launch System missions could cost NASA $300 million but allow for more frequent launches, agency officials said.
Bill Hill, NASA deputy associate administrator for exploration systems development, discussed the tradeoffs regarding building a new mobile launcher during a Nov. 29 meeting of the human exploration and operations committee of the NASA Advisory Council at the Kennedy Space Center.
The current mobile launcher, originally built during the Constellation program for the since-cancelled Ares 1, is finishing modifications to support the first SLS launch, which will use the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage (ICPS). Future SLS missions, though, will involve the Block 1B version of the rocket with the larger Exploration Upper Stage, which will require further modifications to the launcher.
“The Exploration Upper Stage is 44 feet [13.4 meters] taller,” Hill said, which will require changes to the launcher structure and all its elements. “All the plumbing, elevators, cryos, everything you have to go back and redo. All the cabling that goes from the base to the top you basically have to pull out and reinstall it for the extra 44 feet. There’s just a lot to do.”
Those modifications mean there is what Hill called an “iron bar” in the schedule between Exploration Missions (EM) 1 and 2. Those modifications to the launcher can’t begin until after the EM-1 launch, which means EM-2 can’t take place until at least 33 months after EM-1, he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at spacenews.com ...
Will they rent it out for birthdays and celebrations? I’d like to take some pot-shots at Lil’ Kim’s palaces.
Do you have room in your front yard to park it next to the bouncy house and the clown tying balloon poodles?
The article never said how much it weighs.
How many years did OBAMA set back NASA with his deliberate, inept policies?
It might disturb the neighbors a bit:
You're going to have a heck of a time with all those nuisance bridges and wires. What a pain! All roads should be made mobile launch pad friendly.
From its use in the Shuttle days
Each MLP weighs 3,730,000 kg (8,230,000 lb) unloaded and roughly 5,000,000 kg (11,000,000 lb) with an unfueled Shuttle aboard---
Just what does this have to do with Muslim Outreach?
A figure of speech, I assume. They’re considering it.
Just what does this have to do with Muslim Outreach?
—
It doesn’t. And that’s the problem and reason for the almost 3 year delay; finding enough musselmen to push is going to take awhile with the immigration reforms and all.
NASA continues to decline with no leadership at the top. Same people running NASA now as during Obama. They are hoping to wait out Trump.
Upgrade! Cheaper to build a horizontal rocket sled launcher using Musk’s vacuum tube rail system on the curved portion of the ramp. Then you don’t have to use as much fuel to launch!
Fireball XL5 is Go!
This is pure BS, all you have to do is run your wires to a Terminal Box (A buss bar) and add your additional wiring. If this was a civil company, they all would be looking for a job and the company would be bankrupt.
NASA is useless for anything but being a money sponge.
The current mobile launcher, originally built during the Constellation program for the since-cancelled Ares 1, is finishing modifications to support the first SLS launch, which will use the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage (ICPS).While I'm glad they are repurposing something that was discontinued out of spite during the Obama years, the SLS is itself just a go-nowhere boondoggle and pork barrel, replacing the pointless STS (Earth orbit and back, whee) with another handout to our foreign enemy nations to construct a different space station in a different location (to the DSG and back, whee).
Sometimes they blow up:
I've got a 14 year old Excel spreadsheet detailing this. Mine uses a partial vacuum ahead and low pressure behind. Run the launch tube up the western slope of an equatorial mountain.
My main question is how much aerodynamic pressure (MaxQ) the payload cowling can handle at, say, 14,000 ft?
Back to around 1961, apparently.
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