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SpaceX Cargo Capsule Reaches International Space Station
Despite having some trouble with maneuvering thrusters a few days ago, SpaceX's Dragon cargo capsule has successfully reached the International Space Station. from the article: "Astronauts aboard the outpost used the station's robotic arm to pluck the capsule from orbit at 5:31 a.m. EST as the ships sailed 250 miles over northern Ukraine. Flight controllers at NASA's Mission Control in Houston then stepped in to drive the capsule to its berthing port on the station's Harmony connecting node."
Congrats SpaceX and their NASA Counterparts!
"Chance favors the prepared mind." ~Me
I think it's a throwaway. Looks like it burns up on re-entry.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cygnus_(spacecraft)
Actually TFA said "Dragon is the only station freighter that makes return trips", but that doesn't necessarily mean reusability.
The SpaceX site claims it is reusable, but I don't know if it actually has been reused to date.
The last picture on the above linked page shows the condition of the returned vehicle. Its significantly crispy that it might be less expensive
to simply build a new one. Especially for manned missions coming later.
There is a comparison of cargo vehicle on Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_space_station_cargo_vehicles
None mention re-useability explicitly.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Don't understand all the throwaway freighters, it's like throwing away your semi-truck after every shipment.
Truckers would readily throw away their trucks on every voyage if it were insanely expensive and difficult to bring them back in any kind of functional condition.
And that's exactly why we use single-use rockets.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
The Dragon spacecraft/capsule is partially reusable. So far, the Falcon boosters are single-use. Space-X hopes to start recovering the first stage boosters, but that isn't working yet.
Meanwhile, they have 9 Merlin engines per Falcon first stage, one per second stage, and they're building about 400 per year. So they get manufacturing economies of scale. That's more valuable than reusability with heavy refurbishing, which tends to be a labor-intensive custom job. Refurbishing was the big cost problem with the US Space Shuttle - the amount of labor required for each turnaround was very high.
If it's so insanely expensive and difficult, then why is SpaceX working on just that, a reusable rocket? The pie-in-the-sky has always been a readily reusable rocket. That was the idea behind the shuttle. Didn't work out so well, but that was the idea.
Dragon capsules are reusable, however, NASA has specifically contracted new capsules for every resupply mission. There's nothing stopping SpaceX from reusing the capsules for other missions, however. I know the demo 1 capsule, that performed a few orbits before returning, and demo 2 capsule, the first to berth with ISS, are both hanging outside mission control at the SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, CA.
It's really a misnomer to call the space shuttle reusable. "Rebuildability" is more like it. The things had to spend months after each flight being torn apart and having every part inspected over and over and a big chunk of them replaced.
The key to economic space flight is full and rapid reusability. Payload launchers need to become as reusable as passenger aeroplanes for space flight to become routine.
If it's so insanely expensive and difficult, then why is SpaceX working on just that, a reusable rocket?
Because it's a worthwhile goal, which IMNSHO SpaceX is working on in the proper method: incrementally from simple, known-working parts.
That was the idea behind the shuttle. Didn't work out so well, but that was the idea.
Many at NASA in the 1970s should be flogged for over-promising and under-budgeting a single-stage-to-orbit "truck".
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
The Dragon's are designed to be reused. However, if I recall correctly, NASA requested that SpaceX use a brand new capsule for each of the 12 scheduled delivery missions. This likely means that SpaceX is building up a stock of used Dragon capsules that can be repurposed to other missions at a reduced price.
If someone could confirm this, I would like to know if this is because NASA is stuck in the old ways of doing things with capsules, or if there is a legitimate safety/efficiency reason used Dragons could not be recycled for future supply missions.
Many at NASA in the 1970s should be flogged for over-promising and under-budgeting a single-stage-to-orbit "truck".
Keep in mind that Congress and the Air Force were back seat designers on the Space Shuttle. It wasn't all NASA's fault.
I sure hope the NYT's John Broder isn't going to cover this story.
When he's done with the article, Dragon will have caromed off a couple comets, run out of fuel, and started floating backwards towards a black hole or something.
That "crispy" look is just soot/ash from the heat shield. You can see several places below the channel for the drogue chute's cord (the diagonal groove) where it has been rubbed off, showing a pristine white underneath. Besides, that picture only shows the bad side of the capsule. Take a look at the capsule from a few different angles. You see, contrary to popular belief, capsules like this do not traverse through the atmosphere straight on. They "fly" in a tilted orientation. That's why the soot marks are on an angle, and one side of the capsule looks charred, while the other looks barely singed.
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