Posted on 01/19/2021 4:45:39 PM PST by BenLurkin
After analyzing data from the test, NASA has determined that the problem was not with the engines or other hardware, which remain "in excellent condition," agency officials wrote in an update today (Jan. 19). Rather, the shutdown "was triggered by test parameters that were intentionally conservative to ensure the safety of the core stage during the test."
Those parameters concerned engine hydraulics — specifically, the system designed to gimbal, or pivot, each engine during flight. On Saturday, the preset parameters for Engine 2's system were exceeded, and the core stage's flight computers ended the test automatically, NASA officials wrote in the update. If this same issue crops up during an actual flight, the SLS will be able to fly through it, they added.
The core also generated a "major component failure" (MCF) reading during Saturday's test. That reading, which occurred about 1.5 seconds after the engines started, did not contribute to the shutdown and may be an issue with the instrumentation for Engine 4, NASA officials said.
The SLS team will continue to investigate the MCF reading. Team members will also delve deeper into reports of a bright flash observed near the engines around the time of shutdown, though sensor data and visual inspection of the area have not turned up anything anomalous thus far.
(Excerpt) Read more at space.com ...
Trumps fault. In before Biden scraps NASA.
Really.
If one core engine shut down because the tests were “too conservative” then the others should have as well.
This is just trying to save face “We meant to do that... The tests shut down because the engine was just too darn powerful. Can’t figure out why we got that core failure tho...”
Did they use Dominion software?
I bet they were jumping through hoops and dancing a jig while composing this explanation.
Where’s the guy pulling the plug in that scene in Airplane?
Meanwhile, SpaceX is days away from the second launch & landing test of their reusable Saturn 5 + Space Shuttle equivalent, and the factory is accelerating toward producing one every three days.
Easy to explain. The engines are so powerful that they couldn’t handle the restrictions placed upon them for test purposes.
Boeing software. Probably about the same reliability.
I have no idea how Elon Musk rolls out so many launches in quick succession. I’m guessing ABSENCE OF BUREAUCRATIC BULLSH!T has a lot to do with it.
IOW, they hedged their bets to pass the test and not leave a smoking hole in the ground. All well and good if you want to keep to your timeline to flight and keep federal funds flowing, but if I were an astronaut selected to sit atop that beast, I’d want to have them stress-test that thing nine ways to Sunday before I strapped in.
True!
That would be on my tombstone: He Blowed Up Real Good.
I wonder if that software ever crashes.
Seems he views regulations as just part of the engineering problem.
Hence he’s building massive reusable rockets in tents on a beach in Texas.
Methinks: once he figured out stainless steel was a viable material for rockets, it just turned into an outdoor industrial manufacturing project - no clean rooms needed. Heck, they’re supposed to work on the rough environments of Mars & Moon, why not build ‘em that way? dirt & weather shouldn’t adversely affect them in use, so just bake that in.
Teaching to the test.
Contrast that approach with SpaceX’s blooper reel: https://youtu.be/bvim4rsNHkQ
It is fascinating to watch.
Let me guess, the pinhead programmers did not design the code in such a way that a meaningful and human understandable error message would be raised and logged with appropriate severity to immediately let NASA engineers know exactly what happened when it actually happened?
I can see the NASA pinheads looking through thousands of screen pages of error logs for days and asking “What does ‘PC LOAD LETTER’ mean?”
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