In order to participate in the GunBroker Member forums, you must be logged in with your GunBroker.com account. Click the sign-in button at the top right of the forums page to get connected.
Rocket science = still hard
Warbirds
Member Posts: 16,923 ✭✭✭✭
Blue Origin launch failure today.
Comments
On a positive note, their crew capsule managed to get clear of the malfunctioning booster and return to Earth safely. Looks like it may have been a bit of a hard landing, but not un-survivable.
Back to the drawing board
My experience tells me they had a turbine pump problem which caused an immediate RUD (Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly). The escape system triggered as designed. That was not a hard landing. It always look like that because they use small rocket motors that fire when the capsule is less than a meter from the ground. That softens the landing and kicks up a lot of dust.
I wish they had shown some footage of the booster. It had to have been a massive fireball and crash.
Taking my best SWAG at the failure my conclusion is something important broke.
Looks to be a premature decapsulation.
Don
Brad Steele
In order to feed fuel and oxidizer to the engine in the volume required, the turbine pump in a rocket spins at over 30,000 rpm and pump over 1,000 pounds of propellants per second. To do this, the turbine itself burns the same fuel and oxidizer. It is actually the most stressed part of the system, more so than the engine itself. The engine has no moving parts.
Didn't the F-1 Engine originally have issues with run-away turbo pumps, Rocky? I seem to remember that one of the initial problems was controlling the fuel and oxygen flow into the engines.
There appeared to be a surge of some sort on this flight within a second of the eruption of the yellow flame and the capsule separation.
Kind of impressed with the attitude control of the capsule after it left.
Brad Steele
The F-1 engine (on the Saturn V moon rocket, for you whippersnappers) had LOTS of issues from turbopump RUDs to propellant injectors, unstable combustion, and more. They were all mostly fixed - some never were completely resolved - by throwing money and talent at it.
The surge you saw was likely the result of the turbopump failing. If you watch very closely, there was a "puff" in the exhaust immediately before the flame changed to yellow as the pump failed. Then there was a burst of flame sideways from the aft dome next to the rocket nozzle. The combined loss of thrust and the sideways lurch triggered the escape system, the smoke of which then blotted out the view of anything else. And the camera followed the capsule, not the booster after that.
There is surely footage of the booster, but whether Blue Origin ever releases it is another question.
Reminds me of our POTUS.
And fiery auto crashes
Some will die in hot pursuit
While sifting through my ashes
Some will fall in love with life
And drink it from a fountain
That is pouring like an avalanche
Coming down the mountain
Bezos needs to sell some more books to recover from this loss...........lol
Did some work on the Titan IV turbo pump during the post-challenger heavy lifting programs. The Titan pump assembly produced some 4000 horse power and its discharge provided additional thrust. During test the pump would actually start glowing red, so impeller angle vane clearances were absolutely critical while the parts heat expanded at high rpm. Bearings and running seals had to be inspected to laser light band tolerance for absolute flatness to prevent leakage. Balancing flow of the Ox and Fuel inlet lines were done by way of machined restrictor orifices. While not an extremely large pump (table size), it was an amazing piece of machinery.
We need another Werner Von Braun
According to the Greenville Men's Clinic ads on the local talk radio station, they got things a lot better than pills for that premature thingie!
RUD, Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly. Engineers crack me up! So, it blew up, huh? LOL!
Thanks for the explanation, Rocky.
You may be correct. Selling rides may be a little difficult in the near term.
Brad Steele
I think Bezos sold all his interest in Amazon, but you're sure correct about his prospects for future passenger money. The worse thing for him is that his little bottle rocket is the ONLY thing he has made that has flown. His orbital rocket and the engines to power it are years and billions behind. ULA made the disastrous decision to believe all of Bezos' rainbows and unicorns predictions about those engines and contracted to use them on their upcoming Atlas VI booster. Now ULA's contractual obligations to launch DoD satellites are dead in the water and facing massive penalties. Two years after the promised first launch of Atlas VI and ULA still doesn't have flight engines from Bezos.
Seems like SNAFU and * could fit in there somewhere.
Seriously though, this team has made some achievements that I’m guessing NASA will benefit from as far as new ideas and approach.
Mule