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New Problem Could Ground Space Shuttle Fleet
Ender writes "As if the NASA folks at KSC did not have enough problems to deal with a the moment, (see previous
/. article on the engine cracks and the following
CNN article on the repairs) a NEW problem has sufaced in the Apollo Era transporter which vehiculates the Shuttles to the launch pads (crawler). They found many cracked bearings in the cylinders that lift the shuttle and its launch platform on the transporter. After this discovery they took a look at the other crawler and it too had quite numerous cracked bearings. No word from NASA yet but these findings may further delay the next
Space Shuttle launch which is currently scheduled for NET (no earlier than) Sept 28th and by the same token slow down the assembly of the ISS.
Complete articles at SpaceFlightNow and
United Press International."
I blame overcomplexity. They should be slinging folks up there on giant spitballs, or from massive rubber bands. Only two things to go wrong there - you run out of spit, or the band breaks! Simplicity! :D
From the article: NASA and contractor engineers are troubleshooting cracked bearings ... it is not yet known what, if anything, must be done to resolve the issue.
My guess, and I should flag here that IANARS, is they'll have to replace those bearings...
Sigh.
I predict the feedback will be filled with the following:
1. Whining to the effect of 'they JUST found these? All the bearings went bad at once?'
2. Whining to the effect of 'They're still using 40+ year old crawlers? How dumb!'
3. Whining to the effect of 'NASA is so stupid, they can't even drive 5 miles, much less fly a million in a shuttle'
4. A few token 'We should be at moon/mars/jupiter by now, NASA has just fallen by the wayside and is a relic of lost dreams' whines
5. A few people will get a kick out of saying 'Maybe we should pay the Russians to help us with our space technology?' and 'Can't they fix this by having Natalie P. put grits on the bearings?'
6. Finally, one or two levelheaded people will say 'This stuff happens, and I'm glad they're catching it now instead of when a shuttle falls off a crawler'.
Of course, #6 will be basically ignored, and instead a message saying 'If these bearings failed, it would be bad.' will be marked +5 Insightful, +5 Interesting, and +5 Informative, the three I's of insipid posts that bring to mind the sound of a million people saying 'Well, duh....'
Ever seen the movie Apollo 13 ? It shows the crawlers moving equipment into place before launch. Imagine something along the lines of a hundred-ton bulldozer with a rocket sitting on top of it. If you had to replace one of them you'd wait as long as you could, too.
== Paul Rickard, Editor of The Microsoft Boycott Campaign ====
I'm too tired (and I gotta pee) to look up numbers, but the space shuttle fleet costs an arm and a leg to maintain. It was designed as the do-anything vehicle and ended up as the do-nothing-well vehicle. Sure it works but like masturbation there are better ways to get it done. At the current price/mass ratio, large space projects like ISS are uneconomical. Before building a space station, NASA should build a better launch facility either here or on the moon. Seeing as it's immeasurably easier and cheaper to build on Earth, I'd recommend starting with a big linear accelerator (think rail gun) here. If memory serves, the price/mass ratio is somewhere between 10 and 1000 times less than using the Shuttle fleet. It shouldn't take too long to recoup costs at that price, especially when one considers that lower price to orbit will mean lots more traffic. The flip side is that much more debris in the popular belts but the cost to send up a garbage collector would be that much less too.
Where's someone with 10 years and a hundred billion dollars to spend when you need 'em? By my count, 5 people could do it. Hey Bill, want to be a big player in an emerging market? Get your ass moving on a few square miles of solar cells and a linear accelerator.
High-speed Road Trip (18.000KPH)
Vehiculates? Sweet Jesus!, one can only assume that English is not their first language.
Rumor has it the Bush administration is looking at the possibility of folding NASA and Amtrak into the new Department of Homeland Security. This is part of Mr. Bush's greater effort to make the federal government more like a corporation by consolidating all government organizations that are crippled by cracks in the system into one, easily-ignorable department.
...vehiculates the Shuttles to the launch pads...
You means 'moves' or perhaps 'transports'?
You yanks...
# init 5
Connection closed.
Oh...
Well that begs the question:
...one in the eye hurts more than two in the bush
How do i "vechicle" myself?
oh it was a typo? hard to tell in this thread...
"Consider yourself a member of a virtual corporation with Mr. Torvalds as your Chief Executive Officer." - Linux Advocac
...which is currently scheduled for NET (no earlier than) Sept 28th...
Is Microsoft taking over our acronyms now, too? Where will it stop?
bug.gd: error search engine. Humanity working together to solve all errors.
A few of my NASA buddies and I got drunk one night, hotwired the crawlers and spent the evening drag racing them down the tarmac.
I may have over revved the engine on the first one while shifting from 2nd to 3rd gear at 0.7 miles per hour... I tell you, those suckers are tricky at those speeds...
Peter
Downsize DC Today!
god forbid they shifted the camera a few degrees to the left. Now that would be an ugly crack.
So close and yet so far from the world's perfect ID number
If Tattoo worked for Nasa:
"Deplanement! Deplanement!"
(Oh no, now the demodment commences)
Table-ized A.I.