They seem to have had a successful pre-flight engine test today, opening the way to the first flight of the Dragon capsule on Tuesday.
3 thoughts on “Congrats To SpaceX”
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They seem to have had a successful pre-flight engine test today, opening the way to the first flight of the Dragon capsule on Tuesday.
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I’m wishing them well. It would be nice to have more info on the Dragon than their brochure provides. It seems like they formed the company yesterday.
According to Spaceflight Now, there seems to be a problem with the second stage engine that will delay the flight to at least Thursday.
1857 GMT (1:57 p.m. EST)
In an ongoing press conference at Kennedy Space Center, SpaceX reports engineers discovered porosity and potential cracking in a weld joint in the Falcon 9 rocket’s second stage Merlin engine.
The upper stage engine includes an expansion nozzle specially designed for firing in the vacuum of space. The nozzle is made of a lightweight but sturdy niobium material.
The rocket was lowered horizontally this morning for inspections. The rocket is now vertical again as engineers exercise the upper stage’s thrust vector control steering system in another test of the engine, according to Gwynne Shotwell, president of SpaceX.
1842 GMT (1:42 p.m. EST)
LAUNCH DELAY. Liftoff of the Falcon 9 rocket has been postponed to at least Thursday, Dec. 9, SpaceX just announced.
Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX president, said engineers found an issue with the Falcon 9 rocket’s second stage engines in a review of closeout photos this morning.
“It looks like the first attempt of this flight is no earlier than Thursday, if things look good,” Shotwell said.
If a new niobium vacuum nozzle is required on the second stage Merlin engine, launch could be pushed back to Friday or Saturday, Shotwell said.
Actually, if the replacement of a major engine component only results in a 2 or 3 day delay, that’s a pretty amazing statement about the Falcon 9. If the same problem had been found on, say, a Delta IV, how long would it delay the launch– a month? Two? More?