Posted on 10/28/2014 4:41:34 PM PDT by CivilWarBrewing
The video says it all.
The Orbital Sciences Antares light-to-medium-lift launcher has two modified NK-33 in its first stage, a solid Castor 30-based second stage and an optional solid or hypergolic third stage.[16] The NK-33s are imported from Russia to the United States and modified into Aerojet AJ26s, which involves removing some electrical harnessing, adding U.S. electronics, qualifying it for U.S. propellants, and modifying the steering system.[1]
The Antares rocket was successfully launched from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on April 21, 2013. This marked the first successful launch of the NK-33 heritage engines built in early 1970s.[17]
Aerojet has agreed to recondition sufficient NK-33s to serve Orbital’s 16-flight NASA Commercial Resupply Services contract. Beyond that, it has a stockpile of 23 1960s and 1970s era engines. Kuznetsov no longer manufactures the engine, and the lack of a continuing supplier brings into question the long-term viability of Antares. To address this, Orbital has sought to buy RD-180 engines, but maker NPO Energomash’s contract with United Launch Alliance prevents this. Orbital has sued ULA for this, alleging anti-trust violations.[18] Aerojet has offered to work with Kuznetsov to restart production of new NK-33 engines, to assure Orbital of an ongoing supply.[19]
NK-33 and NK-43 are derived from the earlier NK-15 and NK-15V engines, respectively.
The engines are high-pressure, regeneratively cooled staged combustion cycle bipropellant rocket engines, and use oxygen-rich preburners to drive the turbopumps. The turbopumps require subcooled liquid oxygen (LOX) to cool the bearings. These kinds of burners are highly unusual, since their hot, oxygen-rich exhaust tends to attack metal, causing burn-through failures. The United States had not much investigated oxygen-rich combustion technologies until the Integrated Powerhead Demonstrator project in the early 2000s.[2] The Soviets, however, perfected the metallurgy behind this method. The nozzle was constructed from corrugated metal, brazed to an outer and inner lining, giving a simple, light, but strong structure. In addition, since the NK-33 uses subcooled LOX and kerosene, which have similar densities, a single rotating shaft could be used for both turbopumps.[3] Given its longer, heavier nozzle, the NK-43 ratio in vacuum is slightly heavier, with a thrust-to-weight ratio of about 120:1.[4
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NK-33
You guys realize that this wasn’t a NASA-assembled vehicle, right?
Under President Reagan's inspired leadership, NASA was the pride of the world for its achievements. But all of his good was undone by the DemonRAT-controlled House of Representatives run by the drunken idiot Tipsy O'Neill and wrongway Jim Wright. Had the GOP been in control of Congress, I doubt that the Challenger tragedy would have happened. DemonRATs dismantled the military, and then, as now, they undermined NASA.
I guess they should have stopped at 107% main engine thrust.
Antares maelstrom, Perdition’s flames.
Russian engines...
We sort of did. It was Russian engines.
Beyond that, it has a stockpile of 23 1960s and 1970s era engines.
...
So the engine that failed could be over 40 years old.
That’s irrelevant. This was NASA’s responsibility. Hire the RIGHT PEOPLE then.
Russian engines? Did Putin personally QC it before launch?
Bigger boom boom?
The Shuttle was inherently risky because of its design, which was the result of the intent to use it militarily. Second, there was the failure of management which made the decision to launch in record cold weather for the Shuttle. And then there was the question of the pressure to launch because of the Teacher in Space program.
Don’t look for any sense here. This thread is almost as stupid as the CNN idiots making breathless commentary, augmented by nonsense from Leroy Chao and Mark Kelly, who both just proved they know hardly anything about rockets.
It’s a setback for the CRS program. It will probably also turn out to be an indictment of Aerojet for relying on the NK-33 variant they use called the AJ-26.
From the video looks like there was a combustion instability leading to an overpressure that umm...led to Boom. Almost certainly one of the AJ-26’s had a big hiccup.
Next time Aerojet might try designing their own stuff instead of refurbishing old Russian bent metal.
India has a space program — maybe we should outsource NASA to Mumbai?
“Russian engines...”
The NK-33s are imported from Russia to the United States and modified into Aerojet AJ26s, which involves removing some electrical harnessing, adding U.S. electronics, qualifying it for U.S. propellants, and modifying the steering system.
Americans fixed them and made them better............
Firsttime I have ever seen a lifetoff. Thanks!
LIFTOFF in upper case is a banned word in many school firewalls.
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