Ares 1X launch Oct 27th

[shuttle_guy]

The range also gave them the 28th if they need it.

 

[Boris_Badenov]

I hope all goes well & on time. I also hope this isn't the only Ares 1 launch we see.

 

[docm]

And the odds of a RUD?

 

[usn_skwerl]

I look forward to this launch for that very reason. RUD, or more accurately, jackknife. Hopefully we'll see another Ares test flight too. 5 G's at 12Hz of vibration isn't cool.

 

[nessia]

I hope we go forward with the orion/ares project by NASA. It gives jobs to thousands of people and is
a source of pride for americans. It only needs 1-2 billion a year to remain on schedule.....perhaps we should
all send $5. to Nasa to keep it going. I am ashamed of the fact that we have 100 B2 bombers at 10 billion a shot,
not to mention maintenance, and can't get this puny capsule off the ground and to the moon. I think all
americans should be very embarassed by whats happening! Chicago USA....Nessia

 

[mr_mark]

I'm looking forward to this launch but, I'm afraid the whole program has been hijacked by business and political forces and it may be a very long time before a NASA derived vehicle is able to launch humans or cargo. This is good for companies like Spacex and Orbital Sciences but very bad for NASA. For instance what would happen if the current administration rules that the shuttle derived concept is the best way to proceed instead of Ares. You can then count on many more years because of stopping a program and restarting from scratch. By then Spacex and possibly Orbital Sciences will already be launching astronauts into orbit on a regular basis. Spacex is already launching a test Dragon capsule prototype at the end of this year on their new human rated and fully flight ready Falcon 9 launcher. The administration has not even decided what NASA launcher to develop yet! You can see the curve already starting to happen. Private industry is already so far ahead it's funny. Even Orbital Sciences has at least decided on a launcher, Taurus 2, which at the moment is still a paper rocket but that's farther than NASA has gotten.

 

[access]

I'm pretty sure that Taurus 2 is more than a paper rocket seeing as it's due to launch in 2010 we just hsven't seen anything because orbital doesn't give a damn about PR.

 

[docm]

I'm concerned with the engines being a Russian NK-33 derivation. I understand there are enough in the US for at least several launches, but putting later needs into yet another Russian basket that could suffer from international politics leaves me cold.

This to me is one big attraction of Falcon 9 and Merlin - US built, so no international games.

 

[radarredux]

I hope we go forward with the orion/ares project by NASA. It gives jobs to thousands of people

Sounds like your saying the Constellation program is a jobs program, make work for engineers. If Constellation was efficient enough so that only half the people were needed to develop and/or operate it, would this be a good thing (reduced cost) or a bad thing (reduced jobs)?

 

[radarredux]

I'm looking forward to this launch but, I'm afraid the whole program has been hijacked by business and political forces and it may be a very long time before a NASA derived vehicle is able to launch humans or cargo. This is good for companies like Spacex and Orbital Sciences but very bad for NASA.

There is always dueling hijacking going on. The current Constellation "plan of record" is being heavily promoted by the businesses that currently benefit from it (like ATK). I recently saw a full page article in Aviation Week & Space Technology promoting the current effort and dismissing the alternatives, and Congress members (like Senator Shelby) will fight to keep money flowing into their district or state.

Spacex is already launching a test Dragon capsule prototype at the end of this year on their new human rated and fully flight ready Falcon 9 launcher.

I hope SpaceX succeeds on this launch, but it took them several attempts to get a fully successful Falcon 1 launch.

 

[bobble_bob]

Do we know the exact time of liftoff yet? The windows is about 4 hours long, but cant find any specific launch times

 

[rfoshaug]

I hope we go forward with the orion/ares project by NASA. It gives jobs to thousands of people and is
a source of pride for americans. It only needs 1-2 billion a year to remain on schedule.....perhaps we should
all send $5. to Nasa to keep it going. I am ashamed of the fact that we have 100 B2 bombers at 10 billion a shot,
not to mention maintenance, and can't get this puny capsule off the ground and to the moon. I think all
americans should be very embarassed by whats happening! Chicago USA....Nessia

Just to nitpick a little. First of all the cost of each B2 was "only" about 750 million each, and secondly you don't have 100 of them but 20 (21 bought, one crashed). If you are going to use such comparisons to make a point, at least use correct numbers.

And also,getting "this puny capsule off the ground and to the moon" sounds so simple, but it is a complex thing to do.

 

[samkent]

Those B2’s allow you to sleep soundly at night. All of that expensive military hardware is the reason for the collapse of the old Soviet state and system. I for one would not want to go back to the way things were. Those 20 B2’s were the 20 last nails in the coffin of a bad era. They were cheap for what they did.

We would have spent far more than $20 billion in a more traditional way had things not changed.

Try on an old pair of shoes for a second. Put yourself in the place of a high school senior in 1970 with no chance of getting into college. You would gladly pay triple taxes for life to escape what awaited you upon graduation.

Now they (Russia) even offer space launches to the open market through joint venture with the US.

International Launch Services would not exist today without the military spending that we did in the 70’s and 80’s.

 

[MeteorWayne]

Folks, please let's stick to the topic of this Missions and Launches topic, which is the Ares 1X launch. If you want to discuss other issues, start a thread in Space Business and Technology where it belongs.

Thanx, Moderator Meteor Wayne

 

[docm]

OK....back to Ares I-X

 

[MeteorWayne]

http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/09 ... dates.html

NASA has pushed back the launch target for the space shuttle Atlantis to Nov. 16 — a four-day slip — to give its new Ares I-X rocket an extra chance to blast off, agency officials said Monday.

The new shuttle target will allow NASA to squeeze in a third launch try for its Ares I-X mission, a suborbital rocket test flight slated to blast off Oct. 27 at 8 a.m. EDT (1200 GMT).

"This opens up three launch opportunities for Ares I-X," NASA spokesperson Allard Beutel told SPACE.com today.

The towering Ares I-X rocket is due to roll out to its seaside Pad 39B launch site at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 12:01 a.m. EDT (0401 GMT) tomorrow. The test flight has a four-hour launch window each day between Oct. 27 and Oct. 29.

 

[Zipi]

Rollout videos:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcWkHTUf1u8[/youtube]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlxuInqaEQ0[/youtube]

NASA Edge: http://www.twitvid.com/E4E41

 

[Zipi]

NasaTV videofile:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gievqAWL0qM[/youtube]

 

[Eman_3]

This launch reeks of politics. Sadly, but that's just how business is done these days. NASA cannot afford a disaster, but it also has to demonstrate to everyone that the Aries program is moving forward. So this flight appears to designed to minimize any risks, in order to avoid nasty headlines and uglier pictures. The first stage is only a shuttle solid rocket, unchanged. The fifth solid rocket segment is only a dummy. The second stage and everything above the first stage are just dummies, zero risk. Since the launch window is from 8am to noon, this leaves lots of daylight to recover the spent first stage (extremely critical to recover that piece of hardware) and deal with any disaster. Unmanned, naturally.

Despite this, there are still countless new components and systems that have to prove themselves during this upcoming flight. It's a worthwhile mission, and regardless of the outcome, valuable data will be collected.

 

[CommonMan]

Oct 27, is my birthday, I’m not superstitious but if it crashes does that mean I will have bad luck? Someone I know is trying to give me that BS.

 

[radarredux]

This launch reeks of politics. Sadly, but that's just how business is done these days. NASA cannot afford a disaster, but it also has to demonstrate to everyone that the Aries program is moving forward. ... Despite this, there are still countless new components and systems that have to prove themselves during this upcoming flight. It's a worthwhile mission, and regardless of the outcome, valuable data will be collected.

Schizophrenic?

I think this launch has been in the pipeline almost since the beginning and well before the HSF committee and current doubts about the future of Constellation. Its good to fly hardware from time to time and compare the results to your predictions.

Also, this is one big Estes rocket! While the 4-segment SRBs have flown attached to a shuttle, I'm not familiar with an SRM this big flying stand-alone before. Anyone have some knowledge on this?

 

[Zipi]

Timelapse how they built Ares 1-X:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOee5gAHckI[/youtube]

 

[Swampcat]

Being a amateur rocket hobbyist, it's always interesting to see a new launch vehicle being tested, so I'm looking forward to this launch.

OTOH, why is it that NASA needs to do all these test flights?

I'm not trying to bash NASA. I understand the need for some testing, but let's look back at the beginnings of STS. You would have thought, with such a complicated and non-traditional vehicle (side-mounted payload), there would have been some unmanned test flights. But there weren't. The first test of the system was full-up and manned. A commercial payload was flown within a year and a half of the first flight. It took approximately 10 years from awarding the contracts to operational status.

Even if NASA were able to fly their first Ares I operational mission within 10 years of awarding contracts, you'd still have to wonder why it took so long. All things considered, Ares I couldn't possibly be as complicated as STS and shouldn't take as long to develop.

Just some thoughts on the subject. My inside contact at NASA works on Ares I-X and is going to KSC for the launch. Looking forward to some pictures and first person accounts. I'll likely be at work and won't be able to see it except for replays.

 

[jakethesnake]

Here is a little insight into what will be said Thursday…

As long as the Ares 1X has a good launch I think it’s going to be very hard to kill this baby…

It is my belief that if we have another dead end such as the X33 we won’t be able to human rate anything before 2018 – 2020. Anything else at this point is only a paper dream…

I will also say that I am somewhat disappointed that we are going back to landing in the Ocean instead of a runway, but it is what we have, and I believe it’s further down the road then anything out there as far as a human rated launcher. It will be safer than any launcher before or on the drawing board now.

From SPACE NEWS
10/20/09 07:11 PM ET
Augustine Panelist Endorses Sticking with Ares 1
________________________________________
By Amy Klamper

http://www.spacenews.com/civil/augustin ... orses.html
WASHINGTON -- Two days before a blue-ribbon panel’s final report on options for the U.S. human spaceflight program is due, a key panelist issued a strong personal endorsement of the NASA’s existing plan to go back to the Moon with the Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle and Ares family of rockets.

“I’m a rocket engineer, a rocket scientist. I’m a big, big believer in the need for rocket technology, so I personally want to see Ares 1 going and the program going as it’s currently structured,” said retired Air Force Gen. Lester Lyles, a member of the White House-appointed Review of U.S. Human Space Flight Plans Committee led by former Lockheed Martin chief Norm Augustine.

Lyles, who led the Augustine panel’s subcommittee on interagency and international cooperation, said while it may be prudent to study other options, he would not want to “disrupt” what he considers a successful program.

“When I say successful, I mean they’re meeting most of their milestones, if not all of them, and seem to be technically doing the right thing,” said Lyles, who spoke Oct. 20 during a luncheon hosted by Women in Aerospace and the Washington Space Business Roundtable here, two days before the Augustine panel is slated to release its final report at an Oct. 22 press conference here. A summary report released in September said that NASA's current program was "unsustainable" without a substantial budget boost and laid out several options for a U.S. human spaceflight program that did not include the Ares 1 rocket under development since 2005.

During his talk, Lyles said Augustine would address criticism of the panel’s cost estimates, conducted by Los Angeles-based Aerospace Corp., during the press conference.

“We know since the initial summary of the report came out there’s been some criticism, some comments about cost analysis that we did, and some comments from a lot of circles as to whether or not, why we did not endorse the program of record strongly enough,” Lyles said. “I thought we had, and I think that might be one of the things you’ll hear Norm address on Thursday.”

 

[jakethesnake]

Also, here is a picture that gives you a feel of the size of this thing...

Look at the people standing inside...