SpaceX have published a series of photographs showing an array of launch vehicles and spacecraft currently in production for upcoming missions. The images \u2013 showing what is the nearest thing to a nursery for spacecraft \u2013 were taken at SpaceX Hawthorne production facility, which has increased its manufacturing capability to match the company\u2019s busy manifest.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
SpaceX Rocket Overload:<\/p>\n
SpaceX are currently in the final stages of preparation for the debut launch of their upgraded Falcon 9 v1.1 from their Space Launch Complex -4 (SLC-4) at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.<\/p>\n
![\"Z612\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/Z6121.jpg\")
The rocket \u2013 sporting new Merlin 1D engines \u2013 recently passed its hot fire (or static fire) test at the second attempt, with a Launch Readiness Review (LRR) upcoming. This meeting will confirm the launch date, which is currently targeting the opening of the launch window on September 29.<\/p>\n
The mission to launch the CAScade, Smallsat and IOnospheric Polar Explorer (CASSIOPE) spacecraft \u2013 a made-in-Canada small satellite from the Canadian Space Agency \u2013 will be a major test of the numerous upgrades to the Falcon 9, with CEO and chief designer Elon Musk warning the probability of failure is significant.<\/p>\n
However, there is enough confidence in the longer, more capable, Falcon 9 v1.1 that engineering teams at SpaceX\u2019s Hawthorne base have pressed on with fabricating numerous launch vehicle stages for what is a very busy upcoming manifest for the company.<\/p>\n
SpaceX released undated photographs from the factory floor, showing several launch vehicles in various stages of their infancy, as the company continues to increase the manufacture of rocket hardware.<\/p>\n
NASA mission updates (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});<\/p>\n \u201cSpaceX has increased production on its upgraded Falcon 9 vehicle. More than 70 percent of each Falcon launch vehicle is manufactured or assembled at the SpaceX Hawthorne production facility, which allows SpaceX to avoid the pitfalls associated with single-source parts dependency and gives the company competitive advantages in quality, cost and schedule control,\u201d the company noted.<\/p>\n Renamed F9R-1, this stage is undergoing Octaweb Integration operations ahead of engine installation, with silver material providing radiation shielding around the aft. Attachment areas for what will be its landing legs are also visible.<\/p>\n With all of these cores lined up next to each other, SpaceX portrayed the imagery as a sign of how they are streamlining processing via commonality of design and production.<\/p>\n \u201cEase of manufacturing is inherent in the Falcon 9 design. Each Falcon 9 is identical, regardless of the type of mission it will fly \u2013 from low Earth orbit to geosynchronous transfer orbit to resupply of the International Space Station. Commonalities in the vehicle\u2019s subassemblies also facilitate rapid production.<\/p>\n *Click here for SpaceX News Articles: http:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/tag\/spacex\/<\/p>\n \u201cFor instance, the second-stage tanks of the Falcon 9 are a shorter version of the first-stage tanks and use most of the same tooling, material and manufacturing techniques.<\/p>\n \u201cThe second-stage engine is a modified, vacuum version of the engine used to power the first stage. The fuel tanks feature a common bulkhead design for the liquid oxygen and rocket-grade kerosene. Falcon 9\u2019s propellant tank walls and domes are both made from an aluminum-lithium alloy.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAs the only operational vehicle capable of taking significant amounts of cargo both to and from the International Space Station, SpaceX\u2019s Dragon spacecraft is already a critical piece of the American space program,\u201d added SpaceX.<\/p>\n \u201cWith at least 10 more station resupply missions over the next couple years, and with development of a human-rated Dragon and DragonLab underway, production of the Dragon spacecraft has increased significantly.<\/p>\n Two more Dragons are shown, both aiming to be the pathfinders for SpaceX\u2019s Commercial Crew Program aspirations, with a drop test Dragon along with a pad abort Dragon weldment.<\/p>\n According to L2 information, the only noticeable differences in the Crew Dragon weldment are that the aft cylinder is a few inches longer than on Cargo, and there are clevises machined into the edge of the forward bulkhead to receive SuperDraco thrusters.<\/p>\n Also, the pad abort Dragon won\u2019t be launched on a Falcon 9, but from a special launch mount at SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral.<\/p>\n What is probably the most impressive aspect of the photographs is that all of them were taken at the same factory. Most space industry companies have a main production facility as a production hub, but with a lot of hardware \u2013 such as the engines \u2013 shipped in from other facilities and contractors.<\/p>\n \u201cTo accommodate a high production rate, the facility\u2019s manufacturing footprint has more than doubled to almost 1 million sq ft. SpaceX produces more rocket engines than any other U.S. manufacturer and the SpaceX factory is one of the largest manufacturing facilities in California \u2013 large enough to fit two complete Falcon 9\u2019s end to end along the short length of the building.<\/p>\n \u201cWith a floor plan designed around mass production, the factory is already set up to eventually achieve a pace of forty cores annually.<\/p>\n \u201cNo other American company is mass producing spacecraft at the same rate.\u201d<\/p>\n (Images: via SpaceX and L2\u2019s SpaceX Special Section is now a dedicated sections, covering all missions and developments \u2013 and now includes over 1,000 unreleased hi res images from Dragon\u2019s flights to the ISS.)<\/p>\n (Click here: http:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/l2\/ \u2013 to view how you can directly support NSF\u2019s running costs and access the best space flight content on the entire internet).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" SpaceX have published a series of photographs showing an array of launch vehicles and spacecraft currently in production for upcoming missions. The images \u2013 showing what is the nearest thing to a nursery for spacecraft \u2013 were taken at SpaceX Hawthorne production facility, which has increased its manufacturing capability to match the company\u2019s busy manifest. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30001,"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":[1395,233,8340],"class_list":["post-39752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-dragon","tag-iss","tag-spacex-falcon-9"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39752"}],"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=39752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39752\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Z3A\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/Z3A1.jpg\")
According to L2 information, the photos show Falcon 9 v1.1 first stages F9S1-008, F9S1-009 and F9S1-010, along with the qualification tank that was returned from SpaceX\u2019s Rocket Development and Test Facility in McGregor, Texas.<\/p>\n![\"Z313\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/Z3131.jpg\")
If the view of numerous launch vehicles all tucked together on the factory floor wasn\u2019t enough to cause rocket fans to drool, SpaceX also showed off numerous Dragon spacecraft, all in various stages of production.<\/p>\n![\"Z4\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/Z47.jpg\")
The family of Dragons pictured includes four of the spacecraft set to visit the ISS, ranging from the SpX-3\/CRS-3 Dragon \u2013 set to launch to the orbital outpost early in 2014, through to the SpX-6\/CRS-6 Dragon \u2013 currently manifested for a December, 2014 mission.<\/p>\n![\"Z5\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/Z512.jpg\")
While SpaceX are already America\u2019s leader in producing new rocket engines \u2013 with nine riding on each Falcon 9 core and 27 set to be utilized on each Falcon Heavy launch \u2013 the factory\u2019s capacity will be able to accommodate the production of as many as 40 cores each year.<\/p>\n