{"id":38451,"date":"2018-05-08T21:13:43","date_gmt":"2018-05-08T13:13:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/sls-requires-advanced-boosters-by-flight-nine-due-to-lack-of-shuttle-heritage-components\/"},"modified":"2018-05-08T21:13:43","modified_gmt":"2018-05-08T13:13:43","slug":"sls-requires-advanced-boosters-by-flight-nine-due-to-lack-of-shuttle-heritage-components","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/sls-requires-advanced-boosters-by-flight-nine-due-to-lack-of-shuttle-heritage-components\/","title":{"rendered":"SLS requires Advanced Boosters by flight nine due to lack of Shuttle heritage components"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>NASA has issued a new Request For Information (RFI) that shows there is a deadline for the Space Launch System (SLS) to transition to \u201cAdvanced (Evolved) Boosters\u201d no later than the ninth flight. This is due to a&nbsp;future obsolescence issue with the current booster design which relies on Shuttle heritage components of which there is only a limited amount of stock remaining. NASA intends to purchase another six SLS flight booster sets before the stock runs out, prior to moving to the Advanced Boosters.<\/p>\n<p>The Space Launch System includes a mix of former Shuttle and Constellation (CxP) hardware, a winning design from numerous studies conducted by the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) via political guidance provided in the 2010 Authorization Act.<\/p>\n<p>The commonality of design was aimed at protecting flight-proven technology \u2013 such as the RS-25 engines that served the Space Shuttle Program with distinction, through to large investments in the Ares I program \u2013 ranging from the Mobile Launcher (ML) to the five segment&nbsp;Solid Rocket Booster design that was to serve as the entire first stage of the in-line \u2018stick\u2019 rocket.<\/p>\n<p>Development of the five segment booster began during CxP but soon transitioned to SLS, including numerous test firings at Orbital ATK\u2019s test site in Utah.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"QM-2 test of Orbital ATK-built NASA SLS booster\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/NJL73smNrf0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen=\"\" name=\"fitvid0\" data-gtm-yt-inspected-20=\"true\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The motor is now classed as qualified allowing for the production of the first flight booster set for Exploration Mission -1 (EM-1). Production has already started on the booster set for the second mission.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<h4 class=\"widget-title penci-border-arrow\">See Also<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>SLS Forum Section<\/li>\n<li>L2 SLS Section<\/li>\n<li>L2 SRB Section<\/li>\n<li>Click here to Join L2<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>NASA has already contracted Orbital ATK for the first three booster sets, along with \u201cFlight Support Booster-One (FSB-1)\u201d as a back up to the flight boosters.<\/p>\n<p>NASA\u2019s latest Request For Information (RFI) is a government acquisition requirement where companies can bid and then win future contracts with NASA, although as with most SLS contracts only one company is in the running.<\/p>\n<p>Space Shuttle<path d=\"M7.59009 18.59L9.00009 20L17.0001 12L9.00009 4L7.59009 5.41L14.1701 12\" style=\"animation: initial !important; background: initial !important; border: 0px !important; box-shadow: none !important; color: inherit !important; cursor: inherit !important; direction: inherit !important; display: inline !important; fill: currentcolor !important; filter: initial !important; float: none !important; margin: 0px !important; opacity: initial !important; outline: 0px !important; overflow: initial !important; padding: 0px !important; stroke: initial !important; transform: initial !important; vertical-align: initial !important; visibility: inherit !important;\"><\/path>SpaceX launch tickets<path d=\"M7.59009 18.59L9.00009 20L17.0001 12L9.00009 4L7.59009 5.41L14.1701 12\" style=\"animation: initial !important; background: initial !important; border: 0px !important; box-shadow: none !important; color: inherit !important; cursor: inherit !important; direction: inherit !important; display: inline !important; fill: currentcolor !important; filter: initial !important; float: none !important; margin: 0px !important; opacity: initial !important; outline: 0px !important; overflow: initial !important; padding: 0px !important; stroke: initial !important; transform: initial !important; vertical-align: initial !important; visibility: inherit !important;\"><\/path>NASA mission updates<path d=\"M7.59009 18.59L9.00009 20L17.0001 12L9.00009 4L7.59009 5.41L14.1701 12\" style=\"animation: initial !important; background: initial !important; border: 0px !important; box-shadow: none !important; color: inherit !important; cursor: inherit !important; direction: inherit !important; display: inline !important; fill: currentcolor !important; filter: initial !important; float: none !important; margin: 0px !important; opacity: initial !important; outline: 0px !important; overflow: initial !important; padding: 0px !important; stroke: initial !important; transform: initial !important; vertical-align: initial !important; visibility: inherit !important;\"><\/path>\n<p>     (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});<\/p>\n<p>That becomes more obvious for the first element of the document, which notes NASA will purchase six more sets of five segment&nbsp;boosters. Only Orbital ATK will be able to produce the baselined boosters that will ride with the Block 1 and initial Block 1B SLS launches.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe first launch vehicle being designed, developed, and built as part of the NASA SLS Program is designated as the Block 1 configuration. Beyond this initial configuration, two upgrades are planned \u2013 the Block 1B vehicle and the Block 2 vehicle,\u201d noted the RFI.<\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-56279\" class=\"size-full wp-image-56279\" src=\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-182957.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1139\" height=\"676\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-182957.jpg 1139w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-182957-350x208.jpg 350w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-182957-590x350.jpg 590w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-182957-768x456.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1139px) 100vw, 1139px\"><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-56279\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">SLS Block 1, 1B and 2 configurations \u2013 with advanced boosters shown on Block 2.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Boosters remain the same in both Block 1 and Block 1B and are based on Shuttle heritage with many components preserved from the Shuttle program.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Such components include the casings that house the propellant in each segment. Most of the casings were reused from previous Shuttle missions, with the boosters parachuting to the Atlantic Ocean before being recovered and towed back to Port Canaveral.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-56280\" class=\"size-full wp-image-56280\" src=\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-204803.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"992\" height=\"550\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-204803.jpg 992w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-204803-350x194.jpg 350w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-204803-630x350.jpg 630w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-204803-768x426.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 992px) 100vw, 992px\"><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-56280\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">SRB Recovery Ship Freedom Star returning one of the Shuttle boosters<\/p>\n<p>The main reason for their return was to dismantle them and conduct a thorough review of their performance, with the findings documented in the SRB IFA (In Flight Anomaly) presentations, which in turn fed into the following mission\u2019s Flight Readiness Review (FRR). The casings were then refurbished and eventually found their way into back into the production line.<\/p>\n<p>Other obsolescence items listed are less specific but include \u201cmaterial suppliers; major structures; thrust vector control; motor cases; propellant, liner, and insulation; and nozzle ablative liners and metal housings.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>SLS does not intend to recover the boosters, a by-product of the Constellation Program (CxP) which suffered from performance issues, in part resulting in the deletion of the parachute and recovery systems on the boosters. Despite SLS\u2019 superior performance, the chutes were not brought back into the design, as such they will fire for the first two minutes of first stage flight, separate and then crash into the Atlantic before sinking to the ocean floor.<\/p>\n<p>This ultimately means the loss of hardware that would normally be fed back into the production line. With no plans to restart production, NASA has opted to use up the remaining stock and use it as a catalyst to bring the Advanced \u2013 also cited as \u201cEvolved\u201d in some documentation \u2013 Boosters online.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-56283\" class=\"size-full wp-image-56283\" src=\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-210356.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1031\" height=\"652\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-210356.jpg 1031w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-210356-350x221.jpg 350w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-210356-553x350.jpg 553w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-210356-768x486.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1031px) 100vw, 1031px\"><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-56283\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">An EM-1 Booster Segment in production \u2013 Orbital ATK<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEventually NASA will run out of the heritage Shuttle components and a replacement design is needed to address this future obsolescence,\u201d added the RFI.<\/p>\n<p>It has always been in the planning for SLS to move to an Advanced Booster, partly in a requirement for its Block 2 rocket, that is required for Mars missions. The Block 2 is not expected to launch until the 2030s based on long-range NASA outlook manifests. Crewed missions to Mars with SLS have been projected internally as mid-to-late 2030s recently.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat replacement design will be included in the Block 2 version of the SLS. It is expected that the replacement design will provide the same or higher ascent performance than the existing heritage design,\u201d the overview noted, confirming this document was citing the Advanced Boosters as the replacement. \u201cHow much extra performance is possible in a replacement design is of significant interest to the government.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Two Advanced Booster designs have been evaluated for several years, mainly under&nbsp;NASA\u2019s SLS Advanced Booster Engineering Demonstration and\/or Risk Reduction (ABEDRR) procurement process.<\/p>\n<p>Nearly six years ago, Dynetics, Inc. and Pratt &amp; Whitney Rocketdyne (PWR) formed a team \u201cto offer an affordable booster approach that meets the evolved capabilities of the SLS\u201d \u2013 and presented their overview at the 63rd International Astronautical Congress, Naples, Italy in 2012.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-56282\" class=\"wp-image-56282 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-205828-545x350.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"545\" height=\"350\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-205828-545x350.jpg 545w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-205828-350x225.jpg 350w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-205828-768x493.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-205828.jpg 791w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 545px) 100vw, 545px\"><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-56282\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dynetics\u2019 original proposal for liquid Advanced Boosters for SLS.<\/p>\n<p>Their liquid booster approach \u2013 using the baseline of the famous Saturn V F-1 engines&nbsp;\u2013 claims they could advance SLS\u2019 capability to launch payloads of 150mT to orbit.<\/p>\n<p>Orbital ATK\u2019s proposal \u2013 nicknamed the \u201cDark Knights\u201d due to their black casings \u2013 builds on their booster legacy, with a motor that is \u201cadvanced\u201d on several levels, by \u201cprovid(ing) NASA the capability for the SLS to achieve 130 mT capability \u2013 the baseline for SLS Block 2 \u2013 with significant margin, utilizing a booster that is 40 percent less expensive and 24 percent more reliable than the current SLS booster.<\/p>\n<p>However, the document leaves the door open for a second round of evolving the concepts past the original proposals for the Advanced Boosters.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-56281\" class=\"size-full wp-image-56281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-205222.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1091\" height=\"824\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-205222.jpg 1091w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-205222-350x264.jpg 350w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-205222-463x350.jpg 463w, https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2018-05-08-205222-768x580.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1091px) 100vw, 1091px\"><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-56281\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Orbital ATK\u2019s original proposal for Advanced Boosters<\/p>\n<p>Due to the aforementioned lack of Shuttle heritage stock for the current boosters, moving to the Advanced Booster must now become a reality by the ninth flight of SLS.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe intent of this acquisition is to extend the life of the current Booster design through the available Shuttle heritage inventory while developing replacement designs to be ready when that inventory runs out,\u201d noted the RFI.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBecause approximately eight flight sets of heritage hardware were preserved at the end of Shuttle, a new Booster for Block 2 must be developed, certified, and produced on or before the ninth flight of the SLS.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Despite continued references to the Advanced Booster and SLS Block 2, that ninth flight of SLS will be with the Block 1B, although the more powerful SLS won\u2019t be online until later than originally planned, likely in the second half of the 2020s, as NASA moves to additional Block 1 launches due to a number of factors including the construction of a second Mobile Launcher.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NASA has issued a new Request For Information (RFI) that shows there is a deadline for the Space Launch System (SLS) to transition to \u201cAdvanced (Evolved) Boosters\u201d no later than the ninth flight. This is due to a&nbsp;future obsolescence issue with the current booster design which relies on Shuttle heritage components of which there is [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29456,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38451","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38451"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38451"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38451\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29456"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38451"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38451"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38451"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}