SpaceX CRS-6 Hard Landing – Tracking Cam
spacex.com
spacex.com
[1] http://livestream.com/spacex/events/4152712
[2] http://qz.com/438866/spacex-has-two-important-missions-to-pe...
Glad to see the Iain M Banks inspiration here.
I'm just hoping that his first ship to land on Mars is called The Ends of Invention
In the books, the original AI's would get to name themselves after much reflection.
Also, I'd love to know when these launches are going to happen further in advance. The Launch Manifest page just shows the next launch as happening in June[1]. Is there a better place to get more exact planned launch dates further in advance?
Unless something goes wrong. Well, several things.
Shuttle launch imagery from land, air and water - http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/167722main_LaunchImagery06.pdf
Software to control a telescope (with sample videos) - http://www.optictracker.com/Home.html
Description of NASA's setup - http://photo.net/casual-conversations-forum/00cv5p
PDF of L3's system which provides a great overview - http://www2.l-3com.com/ios/pdf/L-3%20Brashear%20Capabilities...
Could a radar based camera be mounted on a helicopter, or could land-based tracking devices work in conjunction with a helicopter mounted camera to achieve the tracking?
For that matter, could a balloon be used as a recovery method?
Another alternative: Land in an artificial pond. The lake could be filled with a liquid specifically formulated to be kind to the rocket parts. (Perhaps just reservoir quality water?) The design could again dispense with the landing gear. Perhaps sturdy heat-resistant ballutes could inflate to take the water-impact and hold the rockets up and out of the water?
EDIT: Wow, so much anger! For one thing, all the above schemes involve first coming to an almost-hover mid-air. Also, why is everyone imagining such an amazing tone from my post? Please produce a quote that justifies this assumption. (Hint, it's irrational. Just take my brainstorming at face value.)
SpaceX is iterating on technology that will eventually be used to land millions of people on Mars. Before they get to that stage, they are working on perfecting rapid, full reusability of rockets to 1) achieve lower launch costs to win the market, and 2) have a ready-to-go system for landing people on Mars.
The primary design principles of the landing system must work on Mars as well as they do on Earth.
It's as if a complex software system is being tested for the first time, a couple bugs are found, and onlookers think the right answer is to redesign everything from scratch.
That said, your first comment really comes across about as aloof as some non-technical guy saying "how long will it take to build Facebook? It's a website right?"
The 1st doesn't apply, and the last one is only in the imaginations of knee-jerkers.
That said, your first comment really comes across about as aloof
Again, this has everything to do with some "tone" in your imagination.
But how could you tell?
The way you formulated yourself clearly sounded like second-guessing.
Such portrayals were present in old media, and this is way far off from anything I'm trying to express.
Following will have vastly different effects 1) Seeing a video footage once a life time 2) Seeing a footage (even edited for added entertainment) over and over again whenever you want
I'm glad NASA wasn't trying to develop rockets in the age of Facebook and youtube.
While it's normal to try to think and find better alternative, let me remind you that going into space is not simple. I always have a strong feeling about people over-simplifying hard problems with clueless alternative.
I feel this shows a lack of understanding and respect to a field you clearly don't understand. Try to take this as a constructive criticism.
Thank you. I was waiting for this response!
While it's normal to try to think and find better alternative, let me remind you that going into space is not simple. I always have a strong feeling about people over-simplifying hard problems with clueless alternative.
I know I'm a layman in this field. Nothing wrong with asking questions.
I feel this shows a lack of understanding and respect to a field you clearly don't understand.
I know I don't understand everything, but you should know better than to just engage in harsh silencing tactics against anyone who simply asks a question out of curiosity. If you see something in my post suggesting this is not the case, please post a quote. Then if you can't find anything that isn't subjective "tone" then please know that this was all in your imagination. Try to take this as a constructive criticism.
I get it, you were just idly speculating and wondering about possibilities. But surely you see why people are reacting badly to it given that you did not just ask questions.
What kind of liquid do you propose filling the pond with that won't destroy the rocket on impact? Hitting water at high speed is like ramming into concrete, and I don't think other liquids will be much better.
Your ideas sound like, "What SpaceX is doing is far too easy, let's come up with vastly more difficult approaches so they have a proper challenge!"
A large rig suspended from beneath a large helicopter. If there's a parachute involved, then it supposedly has a mount point that can support the weight of the rocket under high g load. (And of course, that would add weight.)
What kind of liquid do you propose filling the pond with that won't destroy the rocket on impact? Hitting water at high speed is like ramming into concrete, and I don't think other liquids will be much better.
Points off for poor reading comprehension. The scheme is to replace the landing legs with inflatable ballutes. The 1st stage would still nearly land just above the water. The impact the ballutes would take would only be from a short distance.
Your ideas sound like, "What SpaceX is doing is far too easy, let's come up with vastly more difficult approaches so they have a proper challenge!"
Your comment sounds a tad bit sensitive and emotional? In reality, I'm just going through the intellectual exercise of seeing what would work, given the landing control getting no better than what we have now. I fully expect it to get better, however.
Also, rockets are built to support compressive loads. The tensile loads imposed by a parachute slowing the stage down are completely different, so there's no guarantee you could even use a parachute without significant strengthening of the structure.
One might have to build one, and the scheme may well only be suitable for smaller rockets. Also, the point isn't to slow down the 1st stage from max velocity. It's to replace the landing legs after a near-hover.
> One might have to start an entire aircraft development program, employing a hundred or so rotorcraft engineers, constructing test facilities along the way, that might take years and tens of millions to complete
Only if it's SpaceX doing it. If it were anybody else, I'd guess over a decade and hundreds of millions.
The stage will fall over on impact with water, so you're still talking about a 200ft drop for the top of it, and it's still going to hit hard when this happens.
You don't appear to have any concept of the numbers involved here or the physical limitations, so I don't see how this could possibly be an intellectual exercise of seeing what would work. Saying "just catch it in mid-air with a helicopter," when no helicopter capable of doing this currently exists in the world, and building one that's suitable would be a massive undertaking, is intellectually lazy, not an intellectual exercise.
I don't see where I'm being sensitive or emotional. I'm just pointing out that your suggestions are, in fact, a whole lot worse than what's currently being done, and are therefore kind of ridiculous to just suggest off the cuff. Brainstorming is fun, but is it too much to ask to do a basic smell test on the ideas before you start talking about them as if they were realistic?
There are startups going for cheap access to space with a much smaller class of launchers. 20 metric tons might well be workable for such a scheme, and it would lighten the control requirement under rocket power, which is admittedly hard.
Also, there isn't even a requirement for the aircraft to be a helicopter, so much heavier 1st stage boosters could be handled. Helicopters would enable much lighter logistical requirements, however.
You don't appear to have any concept of the numbers involved here or the physical limitations, so I don't see how this could possibly be an intellectual exercise of seeing what would work. Saying "just catch it in mid-air with a helicopter," when no helicopter capable of doing this currently exists in the world, and building one that's suitable would be a massive undertaking, is intellectually lazy, not an intellectual exercise.
You know, you're applying an awful lot of assumptions to make the general scheme not work: a particular booster, a particular kind of aircraft,... etc. You can also think of that as informing the limitations of the particular scheme and delimiting the size and purpose of the launches it's suitable for.
I don't see where I'm being sensitive or emotional. I'm just pointing out that your suggestions are, in fact, a whole lot worse than what's currently being done, and are therefore kind of ridiculous to just suggest off the cuff. Brainstorming is fun, but is it too much to ask to do a basic smell test on the ideas before you start talking about them as if they were realistic?
Your "basic smell test" takes very particular assumptions that produce a ridiculous result. It's intellectually lazy on your part to just leave it there.
You cannot propose using a helicopter, then come after me for "making assumptions" for looking at how it would work with a helicopter!
Yes. Your assumption of the particular launch vehicle for one. Your assumption of a particular kind of aircraft for another.
When I asked what would recover the thing, you said it could be done with a helicopter.
It is clearly your assumption about "it" being the Falcon 9 1st stage. Also, the general principle of recovery by aircraft doesn't necessarily mean it has to be a helicopter.
You talked about recovering the Falcon 9 with a helicopter. When I pointed out that this wouldn't work, you then say I shouldn't assume either Falcon 9 nor helicopter??!??!??!?!?!?
Mass of an empty F9 stage: not public, but http://www.spaceflight101.com/falcon-9-v11.html estimated it at 23,000-26,000 kg. That's almost twice the 14,000 kg payload of the heaviest helicopter I could find, the CH-53E. Do you really think designing and building a new helicopter with twice the payload capacity of anything built will be a more cost-effective plan?
Do you really think designing and building a new helicopter with twice the payload capacity of anything built will be a more cost-effective plan?
Specifically for the Falcon 9, no. For the record, I think SpaceX knows what it's doing, and if they've concluded landing the 1st stage is the best way to go, it probably is. But it's fun to think about spacecraft recovery and huge machines. (Unless you're being piled on by tons of emotional HN commenters who imagine you holding strawman positions and speaking in imagined tones.)
Vs. coming in right on target - you'll still have small corrections to make at the end, but you have to gimbal the thruster in a random direction.
How about "It seems like they could replace the landing legs with a parachute ..."? Or "bringing the 1st stage nearly to a stop at some point mid-air should be way easier than landing it"?
Rather than continuing to assert that there is absolutely nothing about your post that implies you know better, you really should drop the ego and dispassionately read your own posts from an outsider's perspective. Understanding how you come across to others will be helpful when formulating yourself in the future.
The true irony is that all of the people responding with righteous indignation ( typically a good sign that the speaker has lost their objectivity) are 'defending' SpaceX from the violent attack from a person that is just Wonder if there may be another way to do something. Priceless.
And just to be crass, there are many fucking ways to skin a cat, assuming you get to build the cat, the skin, and the implement(s) to be used.
I'm pretty sure the wizards at SpaceX are ok with people thinking stuff and writing it online. All of you apologists may be better off sitting in quiet contemplation of the place the Crowd takes in literally every story of innovation.
Just my .048 BTC
Also, rockets are deceptively fragile so most variations of the 'catch and drop' type recovery won't be good for the rocket.
One thing to note about Falcon 9 is that it's impossible for it to hover since its thrust-to-weight ratio is greater than 1 at the time of recovery, even at minimum throttle. So you have to do a suicide burn such that you zero out velocity at your target.
Someone already pointed out the problem with helicopters capacity compared to the Falcon 9 weight. The idea is not without merit, However. ULA is considering a similar approach for the Vulcan. The big difference is that they plan to eject the engine core and catch only the engines with a helicopter. See http://spaceflightnow.com/2015/04/13/ula-unveils-its-future-...
The downside of this plan is increased complexity. Falcon 9's approach requires fins, some landing struTs and software. ULAs approach requires a system to eject the core, a shield for the cores re-entry, a parachute, a helicopter, and impeccable timing. I'm guessing that catching a parachute with a helicopter is an incredibly difficult problem just by itself.
I would suggest that you watch the Vulcan development to see how your thoughts play out.
Regarding the pool, I would assume that the issue would be finding an inert liquid, putting it in the middle of the ocean stably and enough quantities for a landing, and then getting the rocket into the liquid without damaging it. You'd likely still have all the same problems as just landing the rocket -- you have to zero horizontal elicits or the thing tips over and impacts the liquid too hard, and you have to zero verticle velocity or your impact is too hard. Ultimately you might as well just land the damn thing, which is also more versatile.
Edit: Every thread on HN or reddit usually has people suggesting other methods of landing rockets that require huge, specialized infrastructure. The primary goal here is to land on Mars without large or complex infrastructure. So even if you think you can devise a cheaper or 'better' system, if it doesn't work on Mars, it doesn't work at all.
That said, there is complexity in having higher performance valves and such to get a fast system response, but still that's improved performance of existing equipment as opposed to adding more stuff.