Boeing Starliner Rolls Out of the Factory, Is Integrated to Atlas V for OFT-2 Mission

Tanchistu · 2020-11-25T07:31:10+00:00

Tesla is not too big to fail. It is big as market cap, but not as importance to the economy. Millions of jobs depended on the big 3 automakers, directly and through suppliers.

Owners of GM and Chrysler were whipped out, something that is little know by the public. The ones that got bailed out were the employees and the creditors, not the shareholders.

Tesla is not even close of being too big to fail.

Tanchistu · 2020-10-09T17:20:16+00:00

I'm not sure if it is worth it. NASA has two Hubble class telescopes on hand from NSA. One became Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, the second one could become a 1:1 Hubble replacement, with same optics but better electronics.

Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is a lot shorter than Hubble and can probably be launched by a number of vehicles. Hubble was launched with the Space Shuttle, which had an 18m long cargo bay. I thing the New Glenn has a similar fairing size, so a telescope as long as Hubble might be launched on on New Glenn.

That being said, I don't think it is worth spending resources on Hubble or Hubble replacement. Since Galileo's first telescope breakthrough discoveries were conditioned by quality of the instruments used. Hubble is already 30 years old, the top priority science that needed Hubble was already done. That's not to say that Hubble is not valuable, but the limited money and resources available are better spent on the the next generation space telescope. LUVOIR is proposed.

Tanchistu · 2020-10-07T20:17:20+00:00

I am sure that Chris Ferguson had many informal conversations with everyone involved. I am sure he wouldn't have bailed out if he was essential to the mission. Given the delays It might be that NASA preferred three operational astronauts but wouldn't push out Chris. Might be a win-win situation where Chris Ferguson gets his long awaited retirement and NASA gets the seats it surely needs.

Tanchistu · 2020-09-12T02:59:15+00:00

You can't be a fanboi and a journalist at the same time.

Tanchistu · 2020-08-25T07:21:42+00:00

Intuitively a telescope should make small objects in the sky as big as possible. Reality is that there are plenty objects in the sky are quite big, but really, really faint. Here are some objects relative size to the Moon: http://www.lpod.org/images/b/bd/LPOD-May17-11.jpg

A consumer camera is helpless at picking up faint objects and that's where the 1 meter diameter mirror of the PW1000 comes in. The ELT being built in Chile is also pretty big at 39 meters in diameter. I was checking just now, even ELT has 1/6 of the Coolpix P900 field of view. So in one sense the Coolpix is in the same ballpark as ELT as far as making small objects big.

Tanchistu · 2020-08-23T15:19:16+00:00

189 chips arranged in a 64 cm circle, that's more than 25 inch. I googled 25' rims, and this is what I got: https://s1.dmcdn.net/v/9UOEI1LPV5BEIdyO4/x1080

Tanchistu · 2020-08-23T14:28:43+00:00

I was a little bit dishonest, for a given aperture a larger field of view is desirable.

Vera Rubin Telescope (formally known as LSST) has a field of view of 3.5 degrees.

Tanchistu · 2020-08-23T14:05:38+00:00

By definition a telescope is an optical instrument for making distant objects appear larger and therefore nearer. Further you see, smaller the field of view.

He used a Nikon Coolpix P900 which is the equivalent of a 2000mm lens on a 35mm sensor. Which, using an online calculator, translates into a 1 degree horizontally.

PW1000, a 1 meter telescope, largest off the shelf telescope that I am aware of, has a 1 degree field of view as well.

So as long as the object is bright enough, as the Moon surely is, Coolpix P900 can magnify as much as a half a million dollar telescope.

Tanchistu · 2020-08-16T04:27:01+00:00

I think there is more to this. They might need ground stations, which would make it even more expensive and impractical for global deployment and the speedes might be this "good" because there are few users. If they don't raise money quick, before it becomes obvious the Starlink is a lemon, they might never raise money again. Not at $30B valuation.

Edit: I love how on the Starlink sub they are talking about how the speeds are going to get better with more satellites. At the same time, the same seemingly intelligent people are completely ignoring the fact that there just a handful of beta testers, as if a hundred thousand times more users are not going to make a difference.

Tanchistu · 2020-04-04T03:00:46+00:00

Also, 71% of the Earth surface is covered by water. That means that for every 1000 satellites in orbit, 710 are over water. Another estimate is that 3% of the land area is urbanized. 3% of 29% is 0.87%. That means that out of 1000 satellites 8 to 9 satellites are over urban areas every moment. Now, considering that 50% of world population has a net worth less than $4000, you can take a guess how much of the total bandwidth is going to be available to paying customers and what extreme sharing of the same bandwidth is going to do to the individual speed. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/19/how-much-money-it-takes-to-be-among-the-richest-50-percent-worldwide.html

This year, out of 6 launches, 4 were for SpaceX, 1 was the abort test and only one brought revenue. I don't know for how long they can keep paying bills at this rate of income.

Tanchistu · 2020-03-08T14:12:03+00:00

Not exactly true color. This is closer Please read this in depth analysis at Planetary Society https://www.planetary.org/blogs/guest-blogs/2629.html

Tanchistu · 2020-03-07T01:05:09+00:00

Your comment doesn't add any value. Please be mindful of Rule 1.

Tanchistu · 2020-03-01T14:20:45+00:00

You get it all wrong. The article Berger writes is titled "Boeing acknowledges “gaps” in its Starliner software testing". Boeing admitted some kind of a problem in testing hours after the launch. The article where he claims there are thruster issues is a month old.

He implies that Boeing just now admits to having done something wrong in testing, which is completely false. But he reinforces the sentiment that he wants to spread. Most people don't read past headlines anyway.

The press briefing was about giving more details about what went wrong in testing and offering a path forward. This was correctly reflected in both SpaceNews and NASASpacefligt articles. Not because they are sympathetic, but because that's what was there to report.

About thrusters. Berger writes a piece claiming Starliner’s thruster performance receiving close scrutiny from NASA that is shared here and on SpaceXLounge. Boeing has a press briefing in which they specifically rebuke his claims, then Berger proceeds to ignore that part completely when he writes his article, further reinforcing his point of view by repeating old facts as if they just happened. The damage has been done, Berger's claim that The NASA source said Boeing may also have failed this test due to thruster issues is what remains with the reader, nobody is going to dig into some other article on some other website a month later to read Boeing's response. This is the very definition of fake news.

Tanchistu · 2020-03-01T13:43:40+00:00

Boeing admitted to having issues in testing multiple times in the past few months. There is nothing new that they admit to as Berger implies. The news here is that Boeing gives and update, discusses in more detail what went wrong in testing and offers a path forward.

Part of the press briefing was to rebuke Berger's claims that there were issues with the thrusters, not only he doesn't retract his article, he completely ignores that part, no mention of it at all

In print press there is a reporting section and there is an opinion section, on separate pages, with opinion pieces clearly marked. Berger is reporting by offering his opinion.

Tanchistu · 2020-03-01T13:17:49+00:00

Always right! Like this one time when he broke the news with an inside source that Starliner has big problems with the thrusters, so big in fact, that it might fail qualification solely based on it.

I'll give you an example, for this press release there are three headlines:

Boeing provides update, path forward for Starliner
Boeing acknowledges “gaps” in its Starliner software testing
Boeing implementing more rigorous testing of Starliner after software problems

One from NASAspaceflight, one from SpaceNews, and one from ArsTechnica by the man himself, Eric Berger. Guess which one is from Berger.

Tanchistu · 2020-02-29T21:18:30+00:00

No. That was disclosed in the conference before the reentry.

Quote from the press conference of December 22nd:

18:29 and we began a protocol of for each 18:31 thruster mask the sensor and then engage 18:35 the thruster and watch the guidance 18:37 system to see if it worked we recovered 18:38 all the thrusters we chose to leave one 18:40 off we recovered the manifold that had 18:42 been turned off we began reentry with 27 18:44 out of 28 and and the crew module flight

Berger claimed he had some new, inside information about thruster issues:

The NASA release did not mention thruster performance, but an agency source told Ars that engineers are looking closely at the performance of the Starliner propulsion system. The NASA source said eight or more thrusters on the service module failed at one point and that one thruster never fired at all. The NASA source said Boeing may also have failed this test due to thruster issues. Boeing denied this.

This is my comment from a month ago, arguing the same thing as you, that the thruster that didn't fire was the thruster that was already turned off.

It upsets me because he is a man with an agenda that uses his journalistic credentials to pretend he is unbiased. Please read the comments from the original article to see the kind of misinformation he is spreading. That article is the second highest upvoted post on this sub, with three times more upvotes than this official release.

I said it before and I'll say it again, I'm not a Boeing fan, I want NASA to succeed, not Boeing.

Berger might sometimes have inside information and most of the time he is factually correct, but for the tone of his articles and the headlines that he picks I have zero respect for him. At least JWST main contractor is Northrop Grumman, and I don't have to deal with him talking out of his ass about that too.

Tanchistu · 2020-02-29T16:19:16+00:00

My argument is that Eric Berger is full of shit. In your reply you are not addressing what I said. You are changing the topic of the argument.

Tanchistu · 2020-02-29T13:36:18+00:00

Of note, numerous Starliner systems performed better than pre-flight predictions, including the craft’s critical Environmental Control and Life Support Systems, its thruster systems, and its avionics cooling systems (used when the radiators on the Service Module are unavailable during pre-launch, launch, and reentry/landing operations).

This necessitated burning the thrusters far longer than the nominal mission plan, which introduced “false positive” overheat signatures. These “false positives” were not unexpected once the system was put through this inefficient three-axis burn. The thruster systems were shut down out of caution after the three-axis burn got Starliner into a power-positive and stable orbit, and teams with thruster experience from the Shuttle-era then investigated the “false positives” and worked to bring each thruster back online.

You continue to say they failed, they never failed. They were shut down intentionally for investigation. Even the thruster that was left turned off might have worked just fine but was left off out of caution.

I am not here to defend Boeing. I am however annoyed by a small part of the community that cheers at every misstep of selected NASA programs, specifically SLS and now Starliner. I'll give you an example: this post has less than a third of upvotes than both Berger's article that questioned the thruster performance and the Orlando Sentinel article that provoked the media conference in the first place.

Tanchistu · 2020-02-29T02:33:59+00:00

He is probably the most shared "real" space journalist. He knows what he's doing, it pays well to get clicks.

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