[Tanada]

Six I think you would be well served by taking a deep breath and looking for corroboration of your beliefs about scary Russians and deficient engines before posting about them. The N-1 program was cancelled for two reasons, America had already landed on the moon and the chief designer had died several years earlier so there was no confidence in the Kremlin that it was better than the Proton that replaced it. The Soviet space program got the best of everything while they were trying to win the moon race. Engines are engines designed with the same physics no matter who the engineering staff works for and these things were intended to prove Communism was better so they were built with the greatest care imaginable. Sitting on a shelf/rack in a warehouse doesn't do them any harm, and they are rebuilt before use so any underlying defects are discovered and dealt with.

Why all the hate for Orbital anyhow? To me the more the merrier, and having NASA down to just two contractors for the next round almost assures the death or Orbital within five years, unless they can get private contracts for launches for other stuff not NASA related. I wish them a speedy resolution to the cause and solution so they can go on competing for payloads. SpaceX needs competition to keep them on their toes too.

[Poordogabone]

At this point no one knows which part of the rocket failed so let's not jumped to conclusions. Since the end of the shuttle flights we have been relying on russian rockets to put stuff into orbit, they can't be that bad. Shit happens.

[dissident]

The Six$ drone just had to post something about the N1. You see, in his little mind if you have a deficient design in anything, then you have deficient designs in everything.

In the real world, which is infinitely larger and more complex than the binary random stream generator in the head of Six$, you have the Atlas V using RD-180 engines. Has it been blowing up all the time?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlas_V

Not a single failure pertaining to the RD-180 engines.

Naturally we have hate and vitriol aimed at Russia and none at Ukraine. Things have been slipping in Ukraine for a long time and the most likely failure point is the Ukrainian first stage. The N1 rocket engines are what they are. I am quite sure that they have been subjected to testing with X-rays and ultrasound for fractures and other defects. There are quite a few potential failure points in the first stage.

http://en.ria.ru/science/20130226/17970 ... ilure.html

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', 'W')hy all the hate for Orbital anyhow?.

[Sixstrings]

As for "more the merrier," I actually agree with you there Tanada.

This could have a happy ending. I think probably NASA won't give up on orbital but the danger is that if they keep having failures THEN CONGRESS WILL KILL IT ALL and that's spacex too. Which would still survive, they're so profitable they've got other nations and private clients lined up for years.

But anyhow -- NASA will move in and figure out what's going on with Orbital Sciences, and they'll help them, and probably get them on track.

I still think we need to stop using Russian engines, period. But NASA will probably get them cleaned up and sorted out and it could wind up being another useful player in the industry.

At some point though, we cannot just have NASA supporting fail companies. That's just socialism. That's as bad as paying out the nose for boeing-lockheed to make rockets. Musk has proven a better way, beating everyone in the whole world on cost but having the best quality too.

[Strummer]

As already mentioned, the most probable point of failure is in fact not the russian engine, but the ukrainian Zenit first stage...

[Sixstrings]

Really, this could have been a bigger disaster. That thing exploded all over the place. Someone could have gotten killed.

It was preventable, that's my complaint, they should not have been using half century old USSR engines they bought on the cheap out of a Russian warehouse.

Musk already went to Russia years ago, he talked to them, he saw their engines and their ICBMs and he could have bought them but he concluded he could make a better engine and the supply would be more stable.

And he turned out right. We may not even be able to get more Russian engines now, so all these companies using Russian engines are working off inventory. They can't make new engines.

Musk turns out right over and over again, right about the batteries, now right about these Russian engines.

Last thing I'll say on this: I first saw that rocket blowing up on the news and I thought maybe it was spacex and I was pretty sad about that and surprised, and then they said orbital sciences and right away I thought "oh that figures I had a feeling that was going to happen with them"

[Sixstrings]

Anyhow, Orbital Sciences is out of the game for a while.

It's jsut SpaceX now, and the Russian Protons -- however long that lasts and Russians keep launching for us. Kind of an oxymoron there, launching our space stuff and at the same time doing bomber incursions and hacking the white house computers.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'N')ASA down to one commercial supplier to ISS

The Antares rocket's failure leaves SpaceX as the only U.S. company able to fly cargo to the orbiting laboratory for the near future, raising the stakes of SpaceX's next launch from Cape Canaveral, Fla., which is planned no earlier than Dec. 9.

...

Speculation immediately focused on the Antares rocket's two AJ26 main engines, which were built in the 1970s for a Soviet-era moon program and refurbished in the United States by Aerojet Rocketdyne.

The decades-old AJ26 engines have experienced problems during tests, with one catching fire in 2011 and another lost completely on a test stand earlier this year.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/10/28/nasa-down-to-one-commercial-provider/18093545/

[Withnail]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Strummer', 'A')s already mentioned, the most probable point of failure is in fact not the russian engine, but the ukrainian Zenit first stage...

[Sixstrings]

Well I'm a supporter of Ukraine but we shouldn't be using their stages either.

That's old Soviet tech. Someone could make it work out but that would be old Soviet engineers and knowhow in Ukraine and Russia, not Orbital Sciences corp blasting 40 year old Soviet stuff off in Virginia.

But okay withnail, you can have your rocket thread without me in it and you guys can talk about rockets and I'll shut up.

I WAS RIGHT ABOUT USING THE OUTSOURCED SOVIET TECH.

I've posted about this before, these Russian engines, and I was right.

[Withnail]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Sixstrings', '
')But okay withnail, you can have your rocket thread without me in it and you guys can talk about rockets and I'll shut up.

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Withnail', 'I')f that's what you want. Nobody asked you to shut up.

[Sixstrings]

Here's something I wonder -- why is this even getting so much coverage, that's unusual, there have been rocket failures before. I think it's because the pics are so spectacular, and "classified encryption" something somewhere in the water or on the beach, and, that this was in Virginia and so many came out to watch it and then you've got this huge Soviet-lookin fireball. (the soviets sure had their share of massive infernos on the launch pad, now we have the same thing, using their old N1 engines they gave up on)

But really, as long as there is a 95-97% success rate then that's the best anyone has ever done anyhow. Although the Apollo program never have a rocket failure, just that capsule test fire on the ground.

The shuttle had what, two lost vehicles, challenger and columbia.

And then I remember NASA was put back for a long time after challenger and then they had a rocket blow up. That didn't get so much coverage as this.

What's important here is that congress doesn't give up on private space corps, but if Orbital is a loser and big fail then yeah we can't be socialist and keep funding FAIL and throw billions at failure hoping to build their company up.

THEY HAVE A HORRIBLE BUSINESS MODEL, using old Ukrainian stages and Soviet rocket engines, for crying out loud. Musk was right. He went out and built a better engine. He figured out how to be the cheapest and the best, he showed it's possible, you can make the engines here and make everything right here in the US and it be the best and the cheapest.

[dinopello]

Yes, many SpaceX rockets have blown up as well. It is rocket science. ULA may have had some failures but may have the best record overall.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014 ... /18118913/

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dinopello', 'Y')es, many SpaceX rockets have blown up as well. It is rocket science. ULA may have had some failures but may have the best record overall.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014 ... /18118913/

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Sixstrings', 'H')ere's something I wonder -- why is this even getting so much coverage, that's unusual, there have been rocket failures before. I think it's because the pics are so spectacular, and "classified encryption" something somewhere in the water or on the beach, and, that this was in Virginia and so many came out to watch it and then you've got this huge Soviet-lookin fireball. (the soviets sure had their share of massive infernos on the launch pad, now we have the same thing, using their old N1 engines they gave up on)

[dinopello]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Sixstrings', '
')Spacex has never lost a paid payload.

[Cid_Yama]

Oh, please. CNN has been Fox-lite since Ted Turner sold it years ago.

Our most hilarious/humiliating failure, just months before the Russians put the first man in space, was Mercury-Redstone 1.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7O4V7JfeTSU

[Poordogabone]

Has anyone re-watched the video of the launch? At about 4 seconds after lift off on the left side some puff of smoke followed by what appears to be fuel leaking out are clearly visible. It does not look like an engine problem to me. More reminiscent to the Challenger accident, maybe a joint seal failure.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYm9PaBOiKw

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', 'C')NN has long been a Democrat leaning news organization and they are desperate for any news they can use to avoid talking about next Tuesday. Strangely enough they are almost the only news service which has spent any time on this story.