SpaceX And/Or Rocketry In General

AgentB
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RE: 'some challenges' :

Quote:
'some challenges' : well, metal freezes onto metal for a start eg. your spanner won't come off the bolt head ..... so you hit it with a hammer to loosen it and the spanner shatters etc. But you'd get that at 'usual' cryo anyway, so this extra 20 something Kelvin has exceeded expectations evidently.

No doubt colder liquids are both more dense and more viscous, the plumbing being colder with be narrower, i guess(?) some pump must do this, and that will have to work harder per litre.

Gary Charpentier
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No arm, no

No arm, no launch!
http://time.com/4155132/international-space-station-spacewalk-emergency/

Quote:
The problem involves the space station’s robotic arm, which moves from place to place along the station’s central truss aboard a sort of miniature rail car. When an uncrewed cargo vehicle arrives, it’s the job of the arm to reach out and grab it, then ease it in for a docking. But two days ago, as the arm was moving along the truss, it got stuck just four inches (1o cm) from where it needs to be to grapple an incoming ship.

archae86
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Gary Charpentier wrote:No

Gary Charpentier wrote:
No arm, no launch!


Quite likely true for ISS resupply missions, but the pending SpaceX launch is for a bunch of Orbcomm satellites. No ISS dependency for this one.

On a more encouraging note, latest news I see is that the static test finally burned, and that the current launch "window" is for the instant of 20:29 Eastern time on December 20. The next opportunity is for the 22nd.

AgentB
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RE: On a more encouraging

Quote:

On a more encouraging note, latest news I see is that the static test finally burned, and that the current launch "window" is for the instant of 20:29 Eastern time on December 20. The next opportunity is for the 22nd.

and Elon Musk tweeted ... "Currently looking good for a Sunday night (~8pm local) attempted orbital launch and rocket landing at Cape Canaveral"

Fingers crossed.

Anonymous

RE: RE: On a more

Quote:
Quote:

On a more encouraging note, latest news I see is that the static test finally burned, and that the current launch "window" is for the instant of 20:29 Eastern time on December 20. The next opportunity is for the 22nd.

and Elon Musk tweeted ... "Currently looking good for a Sunday night (~8pm local) attempted orbital launch and rocket landing at Cape Canaveral"

Fingers crossed.

Just saw his post. 8 pm? Most down here seem to pay little attention to the goings on at Canaveral. If they see a 1st stage under fire returning they will probably assume it is the "second coming" or in inbound asteroid. Will be quite an interesting site to see at night. The SpaceX crew is under immense pressure to make this happen.

archae86
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A post at SpaceFlightNow

A post at SpaceFlightNow includes quite a lot of mostly familiar background, but adds a chilling detail: It asserts that in addition to the previously mentioned supercooling of the oxidizer, this flight is also increasing the kerosene (RP-1) carried by chilling it to 20F. I think this gives considerably less density benefit than does the liquid oxygen chilling.

As we now have the Elon tweet affirming a Cape landing intention, the extra detail in this post that local employees have been alerted to road closures related to the landing attempt is no longer needed to confirm what was previously a rumor.

I think a few details in the lengthy post are off, or outdated, but it is a pretty broad background on the subject.

Anonymous

very low broken ceiling here

very low broken ceiling here this morning. hopefully it will burn off by this afternoon. It would effect camera tracking - going and returning.

Anonymous

I believe this is the link

I believe this is the link to the live SpaceX feed.

Yes I know I double posted. No drinking before the launch.

TimeLord04
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RE: I believe this is the

Quote:

I believe this is the link to the live SpaceX feed.

Yes I know I double posted. No drinking before the launch.


The Double Post rule is ONLY for TLPTPHW Thread; so, you're fine. :-)

TimeLord04
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archae86
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robl wrote:I believe this is

robl wrote:
I believe this is the link to the live SpaceX feed.


OrbComm has a web site mentioning live coverage. Possibly this will just turn out to be an alternate path to the identical SpaceX broadcast via the same servers, but just possibly it might be a usable alternate.

The fresh news on it at the moment is an additional delay, with the new target launch being Monday, December 21 at 8:34 pm ET.

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