A fair question. Making a tube long enough and straight enough without segmentation I think would be a daunting task.
An even better question might be: "Is the booster constructed in such a way that burn-through can't happen, no matter what the temperature?
Of course, this all is supposed to be in support of the Ares program, which explicitly keeps everything in a vertical stack, with the most sensitive items up top. This way, each element in the stack can have issues, but the odds of it destroying the sensitive item at the top is diminished.
After seeing how failure modes combined with horizontal integration has lead to 14 dead astronauts, it was a no-brainer.
A fair question. Making a tube long enough and straight enough without segmentation I think would be a daunting task.
I was under the impression that the primary reason for segmenting the shuttle boosters was transport; they had to be able to fit it on trains to get from the factory to Florida.
“A fair question. Making a tube long enough and straight enough without segmentation I think would be a daunting task.
I don’t know if it’s length or straightness that is the problem. I think that it’s more the need to be able to pour the solid fuel slurry without any voids. If you get air pockets trapped in the fuel stack then the fuel does not burn properly and my not be contained.