Report: NASA May Miss SLS Launch Deadline 59
An anonymous reader writes: A post at the Planetary Society's blog summarizes a report from NASA's Office of Inspector General which says the agency will struggle to get launch facilities up and running in time for the Space Launch System's November 2018 launch deadline. "Ground systems are a critical piece of the SLS-Orion infrastructure. All three elements are tightly integrated, with ground systems requiring significant input from the rocket and capsule designs." To be more specific, NASA has found 462 separate inter-dependencies, less than two-thirds of which have been resolved so far. "The Mobile Launcher must be moved into the Vehicle Assembly Building for testing prior to the delivery of SLS and Orion. When it comes time to stack the rocket and capsule for the first flight, there may be a 'learning curve,' said the OIG, where engineers work through unforeseen glitches." They're also worried about having to develop all the software to run these systems before the hardware is in place to test.
NASA missing a date is not news (Score:1)
But it would be news if they made the launch date
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Re:NASA missing a date is not news (Score:4, Insightful)
Read all about it! (Score:2)
Potemkin rocket launch delayed!
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NASA is an awesome organization, but the political requirements they have which seem to be congressional mandates to pump good money after bad into hogs like Lockheed, Grumman, Harris, etc... is their greatest failure.
I have tried many times to find any records of successful projects from the companies building the SLS. Not once have they ever come close to deadline or within 100% of their original budget. They appear to habitually underbid on contracts to win them. They then appear to invest heavily
Re: NASA missing a date is not news (Score:2)
Re:budget (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:budget (Score:4, Interesting)
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The article explains it fairly well. The SLS organization is a disaster. Not that this is unexpected.
NASA’s Office of Inspector General warned that Ground Systems Development and Operations, or GSDO, may be hard-pressed to have Kennedy Space Center's launch facilities ready on time. ...
"GSDO cannot finalize and complete its requirements without substantial input for the other two programs," said Jim Morrison, the assistant inspector general for audits. "And NASA is still finalizing the requirements fo
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you cannot park a fully-fuelled mars departure stage in LEO for more than a couple days awaiting the rest of the mission package before the fuel evaporates
I think It would be weeks at the worst, and even that most likely because of the presence of Earth. The tanks can be sun-shaded, just like the JSWT. In the interplanetary space, months would be survivable...although methane is probably a better idea in the first place, at least until we start mining ice in space.
This is why NASA needs to privatize (Score:5, Insightful)
Outsource the whole operation to SpaceX or Boeing and then have them be responsible for hitting the deadline.
It won't cost more then what it currently costs, the US will retain the internal capability to do the work... and we'll be able to put real pressure on the whole institution to actually hit deadlines.
They want to get paid? Deliver on the contract.
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I can't say about SpaceX and they already have their Falcon Heavy in the works (which doesn't match the SLS specs), but Boeing is already the prime contractor for most of the SLS vehicle -- "Boeing is the prime contractor for the design, development, test and production of the launch vehicle cryogenic stages, as well as development of the avionics suite." http://www.boeing.com/boeing/d... [boeing.com]
Being an old school aerospace contractor, Boeing knows the risks to deliver new, cutting edge space hardware*. I doubt t
Re:This is why NASA needs to privatize (Score:5, Insightful)
Boeing is doing SLS on a cost-plus contract. SpaceX' work for NASA is a fixed-price contract.
What that means is that, with a cost-plus, if a contractor goes over budget, then NASA will pay for the overage, no matter how much it is. With a fixed-price contract, NASA pays a fixed amount, and any overages are up to the contractor to absorb.
There are certain justifications for cost-plus, for example a small company where a fixed-price contract could bankrupt the company if something goes wrong. In that case, NASA gets nothing, because there is no opportunity to fund the overage. But with a cost-plus, the safety net is there, where NASA would have the choice to either terminate the contract, or pay the overage.
The problem comes when you have big companies like Boeing doing cost-plus contracts, who are perfectly capable of absorbing cost overruns without going bankrupt. They have no incentive to stick to any sort of budget or schedule.
Re:This is why NASA needs to privatize (Score:4, Interesting)
To add to all of this, NASA is taking on a large part of the responsibility for "systems integration" for SLS/Orion. This is where major cost overruns originate. And when Boeing has a cost plus contract, every requirements clarification NASA produces represents a change order Boeing can bill for.
This is the wet dream of every government contractor.
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There's no reason Boeing couldn't be doing this on a fixed price model. In fact, they should be doing it. SpaceX would take the contract on that basis. And frankly they're making some really good progress with delivering high quality products at a fraction of the competition's price.
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their Falcon Heavy in the works (which doesn't match the SLS specs)
Especially in the $/kg area. :-p
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Boeing wouldn't take it. Would SpaceX? I'm not so sure, they haven't launched the Falcon Heavy yet. We know they're working on the Raptor engine and even bigger rockets, but not if they're at the point they'd accept a fixed price contract. Sure they might say they will all the while SLS negates any chance NASA will actually do it, but it's easy to bail on that. I think SpaceX would be better off with a runner-up contract, like with the "Commercial Crew" program. There's probably not room in NASAs budget for
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If you offered them a chance to take boeing's contract they'd make it work. The money is too good.
Re: This is why NASA needs to privatize (Score:1)
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They should be afraid. They aren't offering competitive service. They have that "in" of being a weapons contractor which opens a lot of doors.
Possibly spaceX should develop some missiles. Seriously. It might help them. Maybe produce some cruise missiles or something. There are close ties between the Pentagon and NASA. NASA likes to pretend they're not there but you can see it in the budget. Programs are shifted between the two organizations dynamically depending on which ever one has more room in their budg
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They should be afraid. They aren't offering competitive service.
Boeing/ULA has already announced the retirement of Delta IV Medium. It could be either because Delta IV Medium was utterly uncompetitive already, or because Delta IV Medium will have even fewer chances to get any contracts after Falcon 9 gets certified, or because ULA wants to blackmail the Congress into re-allowing the import of RD-180 for national security payloads.
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We know they're working on the Raptor engine and even bigger rockets
All that while doing important contributions [gputechconf.com] to the problem of rocket engine analysis.
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I suppose that is why the government spending and revenue as a percentage of GDP increased by an average of about 2.5% of GDP per decade for the past seven decades. If you want to make a cancer analogy....
Re:CUT THE FEDERAL BUDGET (Score:4, Insightful)
that has nothing to do with nasa, who brings in some
We can still cut the budget in other areas that are rife with abuse, and not touch (or give more to) nasa
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One man's abuse is another man's necessity.
Deciding who is right is the problem.
Re: CUT THE FEDERAL BUDGET (Score:2)
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Musk has a pretty terrible reputation for sticking to deadlines himself. He'd get enormously more done with the same amount of money, sure, but don't expect it on time.
Re: Space Czar (Score:3, Interesting)
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Well they can also do three Falcon 9 launches with the same amount of cores for a single Heavy which I expect gives them a lot more profit for roughly the same amount of manufacturing work.
It also helps clear their launch backlog and build a customer base. So it is not unreasonable that spend the first one or two years just doing Falcon 9 launches.
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Well they can also do three Falcon 9 launches with the same amount of cores for a single Heavy which I expect gives them a lot more profit for roughly the same amount of manufacturing work.
Only until reusability kicks in, because with FH, you're expending just one upper stage instead of the three needed for three F9 launches (ditto for fairings). With roughly similar total payload mass in both cases, you're suddenly wasting just one third of your hardware compared to the F9 flights. It all depends on the stage refly costs, of course. I choose to remain a cautious optimist for the moment.
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Yeah if they can get it to work it will be a tremendous improvement.
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Unacceptable (Score:3)
You must find and itemize any and all unforeseen problems that could crop up, complete with solutions and procedure to minimize their impact.
Crazy! (Score:2)
Maybe they could do something crazy like making a general puopse launch center that can handle SLS, Space-X, others, now and into the future instead of starting from scratch on each new program.
Re: Slow walking (Score:2)
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It was the neo-cons that created the SLS in their bill. Worse, they are the cocksuckers that continue to work to kill off private space. NASA wanted 3 companies to handle manned launches. It was your leaders that pushed for 1-2 companies, pushing Boeing and SNC, and fought hard to kill off SpaceX from the list.
Stupid idiots like you are why we continue to elect GOP and dems. You refuse to take re
Re: Obama said he'd fundamentally change America (Score:2)
obvious issue (Score:2)
NASA has found 462 separate inter-dependencies, less than two-thirds of which have been resolved so far.
sounds like someone deleted systemd from their software repo. ;)
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Sounds like someone failed to do a proper "systems engineering" job in the first place. Part of that job is identifying system interfaces between the parts early, then controlling the interface. In computer terms, the PCI specification is the interface between the PCI slot and the PCI card that goes in the slot. You have to control that specification so the parts will work together. A rocket and the launch site it uses are just bigger and more complicated interfaces.
It was not that complicated (Score:2)
no. (Score:2)
Secondly, the problem is the GOP. They want NASA as a jobs bill only in their district. Private space is not under their control so they have issues.
Re: National Research Council Predicted This (Score:2)