NASA Relies On Thrusters To Steer Space Station After Malfunction

AP via CNN ^ | December 6, 2003 | AP

[John W]

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (AP) -- NASA is relying on Russian-made thrusters to steer the international space station following a new malfunction with the U.S. motion-control system, officials said Friday.

Flight controllers detected spikes in current and vibration in one of the station's three operating gyroscopes on November 8. Last week, when the gyroscopes were used again to shift the position of the orbiting outpost, all three worked.

[XBob]

20 - "He is also skeptical we have the money to create the infrastructure needed for another manned shot to the moon in the near term."

He is correct. Most who say we have the technology, forget about the hardware aspect, and just how hard it is to get it designed, let alone built and tested. (also see my note above about the crawlers)

They have been needing a new shuttle for 20 years now, and still can't even agree on a design.

Those who think we can use the big Delta rockets, seem to forget that we must carry a lunar orbital module, a lunar lander, a car, equipment, and a space ship to rocket off the moon and return to earth.

IMO NASA is working on the wrong projects and should be spending their money on anti-gravity research.

The super-collider fiasco would be a drop in the bucket compared to another manned moon mission. At least with the super-collider we have a big hole in the ground we can perhaps go back and complete some day.

[XBob]

21 - if I remember correctly, the super-collider was out of date before the first spade of earth was turned, the burro-crats and environ-wackos screwed around with it so long.

[snopercod]

Don't worry, Czechoslovakia still has the capability to manufacture large forgings.

[RadioAstronomer]

if I remember correctly, the super-collider was out of date before the first spade of earth was turned, the burro-crats and environ-wackos screwed around with it so long.

Not from what I understand. IMHO, canceling the SSC set high-energy and particle physics back decades. However, I pinged two folks here who know a whole lot more about this than I do in case I am wrong here.

[Physicist]

if I remember correctly, the super-collider was out of date before the first spade of earth was turned, the burro-crats and environ-wackos screwed around with it so long.

That's just all wet. There isn't even any machine in the planning stages what will be able to do what the supercollider would have done. There's a machine being built in Europe that will reach some of the SSC's physics goals; if we're lucky it might start producing data in 2008.

[farmfriend]

The big question is, if this program does get underway, will the next congress kill it not unlike the Superconducting Super Collider (SSC)?

I hated when they killed that program. How do they expect us to lead without basic research?

[XBob]

25 - Sorry guys, but I must ask youall to task your memories. I realize this is not my area, theortical physics, however, government boondoggles are my area.

As I remember, in the late 80's and early 90's there were numbers of breakthroughs in supercooling/superconducting.

As I remember, they developed new techniques and new magnets, which would have reduced the size and cost of the Dallas project by half (this at a time when the price went quickly from $2 billion, to 5 billion, to 6.5 billion, to 7.5 billion to 8+ billion, and on up to 12-25 billion. Just like the shuttle, which was to be an 'inexpensive' way to go to space, it appeared it was going to be a 'yacht' - you know - a big hole in the water into which you pour money.

And while it was last generation technology, as they were 'digging', it was to be bigger and better by than anything currently existing.

And the government, in it's usual stupidity, rather than regrouping, just dropped the whole thing, wasting billions of dollars and billions of research and hundreds of millions in contracts, facilities, holes, etc.

Please think back.

[RightWhale]

IMO NASA is working on the wrong projects and should be spending their money on anti-gravity research.

There is nothing in that area to justify spending a dime.

[RightWhale]

The SSC should have been built in Alaska. Got just the spot for it. Nothing but caribou and a few mag 2 quakes now and then.

[XBob]

you make no sense.

do you actually think we are going to get interplanetary or interstellar travel on combustible chemical fuels?

do you actually think the greenies will allow nuclear launches, when we can't even get a nuclear plant with 5ft thick walls built?

[RightWhale]

do you actually think we are going to get interplanetary

We already have interplanetary with existing motors.

[XBob]

31-"We already have interplanetary with existing motors."

I haven't seen any men on saturn lately.

You already have transcontinental travel built into your shoes too.

[RightWhale]

Did you say that we should research anti-gravity? This in spite of ZERO evidence there can be such a thing?

[XBob]

stop wasting bandwidth and our time.

[RightWhale]

stop wasting bandwidth and our time.

You can have ion motors and chemical motors, but you can't have nuclear motors and there is no such thing as anti-gravity. Don't expect NASA to waste any more time or money than they already have on this nonsense.

[Physicist]

As I remember, in the late 80's and early 90's there were numbers of breakthroughs in supercooling/superconducting.

If you mean the ceramic high-Tc superconductors, they are completely inappropriate for ultra-high-current applications like the SSC magnets. The design for the LHC magnets now being installed at CERN is fundamentally the same as the SSC magnet design, almost 20 years later.

As I remember, they developed new techniques and new magnets, which would have reduced the size and cost of the Dallas project by half (this at a time when the price went quickly from $2 billion, to 5 billion, to 6.5 billion, to 7.5 billion to 8+ billion, and on up to 12-25 billion.

I don't believe that the magnets made up anywhere near half the cost of the SSC, so even if they were free, you wouldn't save half the cost. Moreover, the initial price tag was $5 billion, and the final price tag was around $12 billion. Part of that is inflation, but most of that is due to cuts in discretionary spending. In each budget cycle, the SSC would get less than was budgeted, which would cause the schedule to stretch out, which would cause the total price to rise. The cost overruns were almost entirely political in nature.

As for antigravity, there is no theoretical or experimental reason to believe that such a thing exists. A search for the operating principle behind flying witch's brooms would be as wise a use of public funds.

[XBob]

http://www.cato.org/pubs/briefs/bp-016.html

Super Boondoggle Time To Pull The
Plug
On The Superconducting Super
Collider

May 26, 1992

Technological Defects

Despite its supporters' claims to the contrary, the SSC will rely on several untested technologies that are proving to be extremely expensive and riddled with problems. Some of the obstacles that the SSC has run into were predicted by its opponents. The gigantic atom-smashing machine will not be built with off-the-shelf technologies because neither the individual pieces nor any comparable systems have been built before.

The SSC has been designed to the scientifically optimum limits of a circular collider configuration. The size of the loop around which the atoms will circle was changed when researchers determined that there was a slightly different optimum size than originally assumed. There is even new evidence suggesting that a circular configuration may not be necessary for exploring high-energy particle collisions. Improved linear designs, which are potentially much less expensive than the SSC, may be technologically feasible in only a few years. Far less expensive linear design electron-positron accelerators soon may be able to compete with the SSC design as a scientific tool.(37)

In addition, only 11 prototypes of the more than 8,600 dipole magnets and only 1 prototype of the 2,000 quadrupole magnets have been built and tested. In fact, even if the prototypes are successful, most of the magnets will not be tested until after they are installed in the underground tunnel. The recent experience with the out-of-focus Hubble space telescope should provide a lesson on the desirability of pretesting complex equipment.

In addition, the subatomic particle collisions must be detected by complex devices and interpreted by powerful computers if the experiments are to yield any information whatsoever--yet the budget for that vital feature of the project has not been approved. The Department of Energy's estimated budget for the SSC includes no more than $640 million for design and construction of the massive detectors.(38) The people working on the designs "have been instructed to plan on a budget of no more than $500 million each, only half of which will come from the U.S. government."(39) So far, only one design has been accepted (but not built) by the SSC project managers, although the SSC plan requires two separate detector designs. The accepted design was to have been peer reviewed in April 1992. The estimated cost of the first detector alone is $712 million.

Even bigger roadblocks have impeded the development of the SSC's second detector. Selection of a designer of the detectors necessary to measure and record the experimental results has been slow and painful. The L-Star detector project proposal, developed by an international consortium of European, Soviet, and American institutions (90 institutions in 13 countries) has been rejected by the SSC management team. In January 1991 the SSC management team rejected a second design known as EMPACT/TEXAS. A June 1991 workshop was organized to investigate design options and create a new consortium. Currently, the gamma-electron-moon detector proposal is scheduled for review in November 1992.

The detector design problems demonstrate that the SSC is much further from reality than its proponents claim. In addition, the decision to develop only two detectors was based on cost, not scientific, considerations. Regardless of funding levels, the lack of appropriate detection devices and workable computer software could limit the SSC's scientific usefulness and greatly delay the scheduling of experiments.

[XBob]

36 - "As for antigravity, there is no theoretical or experimental reason to believe that such a thing exists. A search for the operating principle behind flying witch's brooms would be as wise a use of public funds."

Pardon me - please tell me what gravity is, since there is no anti-gravity.

seems to me there is a law of physics - for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

[Doc On The Bay]

THRUSTERS to Move our "Space Station" a "FEW FEET!!??"

WHO are we Kidding!!

It's TIME to go "Back to the Moon---& ON to Mars!!!

Despite the Utterly "Conservative" "Belief System" of the "Reactionary FOOLS" who THINK they are "in Control Of" the "Best & Brightest in America,"

WE are the FUTURE of "America!!"

Despite the Most EVIL "Thrusts" of the MOST "Islam, Aberrant Christianity, Animism, "Psychotic Islam," Has "Levelled at Us"--Somehow, We have Survived--& Prospered!!

[Physicist]

Pardon me - please tell me what gravity is, since there is no anti-gravity.

It's the curvature of spacetime. Feel free to tell me what the opposite of that is.