Posted on 08/10/2021 4:14:08 AM PDT by BenLurkin
Over the weekend, engineers were able to open seven of those valves and restore them to working order, the company said, and it is still hopeful that it could launch the test flight by the end of the month. But Boeing still does not know what caused the problem, which forced yet another delay in a program that has been plagued by serious issues for years.
Boeing is developing Starliner under a contract with NASA to fly the space agency’s astronauts to and from the International Space Station. Elon Musk’s SpaceX, the other company that holds the “commercial crew” contract, has now flown three human spaceflight missions to the space station, but Boeing has struggled with its program and has lagged far behind.
Before it flies a test mission with astronauts, Boeing must first launch an uncrewed mission that would demonstrate that the autonomous spacecraft is able to meet up with the station in orbit, dock, survive the vacuum of space, and then fly back to Earth safely. Once those milestones are achieved, NASA would then green light a flight with astronauts on board.
The Starliner launch was rescheduled to Aug. 3, but Boeing and NASA announced that it would be delayed after it discovered “unexpected valve position indications in the propulsion system.”
(Excerpt) Read more at seattletimes.com ...
Look for the Union label................
It’s worse than that...
starting in the early 2000’s, companies began to uncerimoniously dump senior engineers.
The senior engineers were the mentors of the next generation of engineers, relaying their experience as to what works and what does not work. Many times what looks good on paper is a disaster in practice. The current class did not receive this mentoring.
What I was observing before I retired was the new class going down into the archives and pulling prints for things that had long ago been discarded. These new engineers, lacking the mentoring, put this old crap back into production.
What we are seeing today is a lack of vision due to having to muddle around on their own without the support of the “old guys” that knew what looks good on paper does not always work.
These decisions were not made by the engineers. These decisions to cut the senior staff was made by beancounters who have no skin in the game.
Oh, he was one of... them...
...never mind.
I’m kind of surprised someone like Musk hasn’t searched the country for experienced engineers. They could work from anywhere and he could skim the cream of the crop of experience.
Man that brings back some memories. That song had completely vanished from mu memory until now. Thanks
He already did. How do you think SpaceX managed to build and land reusable rockets do fast and regulstlysenx cargo and people to the Spacestation?
Been awhile
👌
Knowledge and experience are not nearly the same are they?
I too am a retired engineer after 42 years in service building all manner of things massive and snall. One of the things I saw decay was component qualification testing. Too much trust was being placed with vendors saying they met not only specification but application suitability knowing nothing about operations.
Some things got better with technology and access to knowledge but whet did not get better got worse.
Once a millwright engineer did a consulting job for my late Dad, also an enginee r. The work was on some ship size rotating machinery tnat would not perform. Some complained about his fee for a relatively short visit and wanted an itemized bill. He submitted the invoice for the same amount but 10% for his time and 90% for knowing where to put the marks. The problem was solved. Nobody else could do it.
Experience. You will never get anywhere without it.
The google age refutes that idea.
Never ask if someone understands. You have to take the time to find out what he understands before you release him to perform the task. Then you have to inspect and not just expect.
How does SpaceX launch one rocket after another yet Boeing can’t get going?
starting in the early 2000’s, companies began to uncerimoniously dump senior engineers.Leftist reformers, professors, and corporate fools all believe nothing that came before them has any value.
It is not chance that rules the world. Ask the Romans, who had a continuous sequence of successes when they were guided by a certain plan, and an uninterrupted sequence of reverses when they followed another. There are general causes, moral and physical, which act in every monarchy, elevating it, maintaining it, or hurling it to the ground. All accidents are controlled by these causes. And if the chance of one battle – that is, a particular cause – has brought a state to ruin, some general cause made it necessary for that state to perish from a single battle. In a word, the main trend draws with it all particular accidents
Not long ago, I heard an extended radio interview with an aerospace expert who had consulted with Musk on the start-up of Space-X. He described engineers there as full of enthusiasm and working nights and weekends to get things done. In contrast, he described NASA as overly cautious and bureaucratic, slow, and risk-averse.
And supposedly cheaper off-shoring usually brings unexpected costs, inefficiencies, and defects. Supposedly, when Boeing investigated the faulty software in their new astronaut hauler, they found it riddled with defects from the cheap Indian coders they had relied on. Too many American companies are run by scheming careerists looking no further than the next accounting period.
I confess that I am a little prejudiced on this point. A Polish immigrant grandfather of mine was a self-taught machinist who readily found work even in the Depression because he had a rare talent for fixing errant equipment, quickly and soundly. Alas, I did not inherit that talent but do have his take-no-sh*t-from-anyone attitude.
If it’s Boeing I’m not going.
Bad software / firmware, or sabotage. The first one is an isolated event, the 2nd one is happenstance, but the 13th one is enemy action.
I get your meaning, but they didn’t have full-flow staged-combustion methane/LOX engines in the 40s. At least, America didn’t.
Can confirm. I stole one of the best engineers I ever had away from SpaceX :-D
Boeing probably didn’t get the right number of process committees to approve the vales opening.
“Does anyone think that a young smart engineer at Boeing would be able to walk up to the Boeing CEO and say “hey I think new technique this will work.” “
Sure, but 20 VPs will step forward and lay claim to various parts of the idea and kill it with bureaucracy.
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