Endeavour to Launch Wednesday Evening

[Mark de Vries]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

Squiggyfm said:
During some of the first landings, tiles around the leading surface of the engines came off.

They've been very lucky dozens of time. I recall that after Columbia's first landing, they found that the plate protecting the engines was buckled so extensively that the shuttle could well have been lost then. But then again, that's the sort of thing you find during maiden flights.

Compared to that, the damage found on Endeavour is not nearly as serious. There are a couple of ways they can repair it if necessary. I suppose it's a matter of waiting what they find after tomorrow's einspection.

 

[Johnny Rico]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

FoxNews.com had a picture of the area in question on their front page yesterday, and I couldn't see anything, and they even pointed out where on the picture it was supposed to be. So it can't be too bad.

 

[FemurBone]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

They should go back to painting the external Fuel tank. That should keep the foam on.

 

[Johnny Rico]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

FemurBone said:
They should go back to painting the external Fuel tank. That should keep the foam on.

The foam comes off due to ice forming in the small holes in the foam. And of course when launched, the iced melts, it expands into water and pops off the foam in question.

NASA just held a Mission Status briefing and they detailed exactly what happened via video evidence from the SRB cameras. The piece of foam was a very small piece from one fo the brackets that holds the fuel transfer line (that long pipe that runs the length of the EFT).

Apparently STS-26 (first return to flight after the Challenger explosion, ironically) suffered from a foam hit in almost the exact same way which damaged 6 tiles in a similar manner that we've got here on STS-118. This damage is on just 3 tiles. They're going to do the boom inspection thing tomorrow to get a better idea of how deep the gouge is to see if repair is necessary.

Right now, based on what they've learned within the last 24 hours, it looks very doubtful will be necessary, because the damaged area isn't in that much of a critical area.

 

[Squiggy]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

FemurBone said:
They should go back to painting the external Fuel tank. That should keep the foam on.

a: As well as weigh down the STS system
b: not do anything since foam flew off in the first few missions where the ET painted white
c: A and B


If you picked C, you're correct!

 

[Zachary Smith]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

WRAP the freakin' external fuel tank in a CARGO NET. It will catch the foam even if it breaks loose.

 

[Squiggy]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

Which would melt and fly apart at liftoff.

 

[Cutter John]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

Please humor an ignorant boob, but I've always wondered why NASA never developed some type of spray or paint on insulation thats a large single piece, rather than the current method of thousands of pre-cut puzzle pieces that can work loose.

 

[Squiggy]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

A large single piece would weigh too much.

 

[FemurBone]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

Squiggyfm said:

FemurBone said:
They should go back to painting the external Fuel tank. That should keep the foam on.

a: As well as weigh down the STS system
b: not do anything since foam flew off in the first few missions where the ET painted white
c: A and B


If you picked C, you're correct!

The paint only weighed 500 pounds. They can spare 500 pounds to protect the shuttle. and none of the foam came off during the first 2 shuttle missions.

 

[Johnny Rico]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

FemurBone said:

Squiggyfm said:

FemurBone said:
They should go back to painting the external Fuel tank. That should keep the foam on.

a: As well as weigh down the STS system
b: not do anything since foam flew off in the first few missions where the ET painted white
c: A and B


If you picked C, you're correct!

The paint only weighed 500 pounds. They can spare 500 pounds to protect the shuttle. and none of the foam came off during the first 2 shuttle missions.

I guess I won't be going on any shuttle missions anytime soon then... (those 500 pounds)

 

[Noname Given]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

Brent said:
The Foam fix will be the shuttle's replacement, unfortuntely until then we'll have to live with possible foam and ice problems chipping away at the tiles. Thankfully there is a system in place now to detect these problems and repair them in space, so we are a lot safer now than it use to be.

And the wierd thing is that tehey knew about and foresaw these issues since DAY ONE of shuttle launches (they were launching with a tile repair kit that included a few replacemnt tiles and tools for cutting them to fit, etc. way back in 1984).

What happened was that they began to get complacent and overconfident in that they had lost tiles (including a few that were considered 'critical') VERY early on in the program; yet NEVER had a re-entry problem (up until the 2003 incident); thus they felt that nothing during an 'ordinary' could damage the shuttle tile system signifigantly enough to cause a total failure.

Of course, in the end, I think NASA's approach is due to it's limited budget. It's forcd them into a reactive mode as opposed to a proactive mode when it comes to problems - ie they wait UNTIL there's a catastrophe to correct a problem that they may have known about for years because "it's worked good so far".

 

[Spider]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

This doesn't sound good.

But the tiny pit extends all the way down to the ship's aluminum skin, which would melt without protection during the ship's re-entry into Earth's atmosphere prior to landing. The potential of that danger may require work on Endeavour in orbit, as well as on other shuttles now scheduled for launch, which could derail NASA's plans to complete work on the space station before the shuttle fleet is due to retire in three years.

Sounds like a worst case scenario to me, but still, it's not look good. I hope this isn't the case.

 

[Johnny Rico]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

Spider said:
This doesn't sound good.

But the tiny pit extends all the way down to the ship's aluminum skin, which would melt without protection during the ship's re-entry into Earth's atmosphere prior to landing. The potential of that danger may require work on Endeavour in orbit, as well as on other shuttles now scheduled for launch, which could derail NASA's plans to complete work on the space station before the shuttle fleet is due to retire in three years.

Sounds like a worst case scenario to me, but still, it's not look good. I hope this isn't the case.

I think you're overblowing the case a bit.

How NASA worked this problem is quite interesting in fact.

They took the 3D readings of the laser scan and created a 3D mock up of the tile using one of those computer-operated cutting machines. So then they took this mold and ran it through their heat simulation models, and they decided that the majority of the heat on that area would actually just impact the scuffed edge of the gouge. But I think they have decided to do some sort of repair on it using the boom extension deal.

 

[Spider]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

Johnny Rico said:
I think you're overblowing the case a bit.

Actually not me, but the news service I quoted that from. I hope your explination is better than thiers because I don't want another disaster in NASA.

 

[Johnny Rico]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

Spider said:

Johnny Rico said:
I think you're overblowing the case a bit.

Actually not me, but the news service I quoted that from. I hope your explination is better than thiers because I don't want another disaster in NASA.

Yeah, you're definately right about that. It seems that most news services, especially the 24-hour networks have to exaggerate a story to fill in air-time.

If these news services would actually have a reporter in on the NASA mission briefings then their reporting would be a bit more accurate. But because they're getting information second hand, they tend to blow things out of proportion.

My favorite NASA reporter is probably Todd Halverson (formerly of Space.com, now of Florida Today). He knows his shit and asks very pointed and well-informed questions during the Q&A after initial statements. It's ashame he doesn't work for a major national news service.

 

[Meredith]

Alpha_Geek said:
It's nice that the station is getting more habitable volume, but one question I have is:

Since NASA scrapped the habitation module long ago, where will additional station crew compliment live? As it is, they're already short 1 stateroom since Zveda only has 2. The third crewperson bunks in the destiny lab.

Suunds like a job for Transhab technology.. wait.. NASA scrapped those ideas already... GO BIGELOW!

Bigelow already has modules in orbit right now that would (if added to the ISS) would almost double the ISS capacity.

Too bad he can't send them to the ISS, LOL

 

[Meredith]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

The tile damage is what they get for putting the shuttle beside the main tank rather than on top of it.


I wonder if Buran had any simular issues.....?

 

[BolianAuthor]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

What will happen if Discovery has to lift off to help bring the shuttle crew home, and then one or more of ITS tiles get messed up?

 

[Noname Given]

Re: Gouge in shuttle tiles found...

BolianAdmiral said:
What will happen if Discovery has to lift off to help bring the shuttle crew home, and then one or more of ITS tiles get messed up?

Actually, they'd use the existing Soyuz capsule that's already docked there; and if it was decided to full abandon the station, the Russians would launch a couple more to get everyone off.