GAO Still Sees Problems With Constellation

Another problem is that they assembled a "dream team" for the program office and they created a design. Then they re-designed and re-designed and ...

They were promised the money to develop a really neat program (not that the realistic people believed it would actually be funded) and they went out and designed a program that was too expensive to be funded with the promised money! So then they cut here and cut there and we are still in big trouble.

And then the Federal budget was loaded with "stimulus" funding and any potential increase was spent on high speed internet to rural counties, etc.

So they designed a system that could not have even been funded by the "sand chart" and that money is not even gonna arrive. So we are stuck with ending our only manned space flight system with no replacement in sight.

Sigh. Hopefully we will get some money devoted to a commercial booster. But where is that money gonna come from?

"Gaps in the business case include


- significant technical and design challenges for the Orion and Ares I vehicles, such as limiting vibration during launch, eliminating the risk of hitting the launch tower during lift off, and reducing the mass of the Orion vehicle, represent considerable hurdles that must be overcome in order to meet safety and performance requirements; and..."

Nice try, GAO, but those aren't business case issues, those are engineering issues.

Learn the difference, it may be important someday.

Geez, how old IS this report?

"- significant technical and design challenges for the Orion and Ares I vehicles, such as limiting vibration during launch,"

Solved

"eliminating the risk of hitting the launch tower during lift off,"

Solved

"and reducing the mass of the Orion vehicle"

Solved

We aren't going to sort this out until the competition passes us by, are we...

Perhaps the GAO needs to examine these sites

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.rss.html?pid=32158

A potential problem with depots based on similar architecture?

"The anomaly caused the spacecraft ACS to switch to the Star Tracker Assembly for spacecraft positional information and caused the spacecraft's thruster to fire excessively, consuming a substantial amount of fuel."

Other problems...

http://www.flightglobal.com/blogs/hyperbola/2008/11/the-fantasy-of-orbital-fuel-de.html

http://thespacereview.com/article/1447/1

http://strategic.mit.edu/PDF_archive/theses/SM_2006_gralla.pdf

http://www.bautforum.com/space-exploration/93199-augustine-moon-return-no-go-5.html#post1582321

What did they think would be the result if NASA was given specific direction/goals and a time line in which to complete said tasks only to find no $$$$ in the check book to pay for these things?

If this country and more to the point the administration is going to get serious about manned space flight, then a viable and dedicated source of funding is going to have to be mandated. This will require a change of the status quo in DC by congress. They are going to have to pass multi year funding authorization so that long lead items can be ordered and an assembly line mentality can take root, that is one way to bring down the cost of access to LEO; well that and new technology such as; Thrust Augmented Nozzle (TAN) engines to allow for reliable access to space at a lower cost per pound than now possible.

Will, the money was there. Augustine said NASA got the money it was supposed to get. No one took money from NASA.

Constellation is over budget and over schedule, the end.

The original budget that was laid out by the former administration never arrived which caused program stretch-out due to a lack of funds received from the projected budgets. Check the 2005-2009 budgets on the NASA website, and the Authorization and Appropriation bills. You can plainly see this. Rep. Gordon is right.

There would be no mass limitations, launch tower probles or vibration problems if NASA simply flew the Orion on a Sidemount-HLV. Its time for Obama and Bolden to end the Ares1 program and go for NASA's plan B: the SD-HLV.

The SD-HLV will get us back to the Moon faster, cheaper, and safer.

There would be no mass limitations, launch tower problems or vibration problems if NASA simply flew the Orion on a Sidemount-HLV. Its time for Obama and Bolden to end the Ares1 program and go for NASA's plan B: the SD-HLV.

The SD-HLV will get us back to the Moon faster, cheaper, and safer.

Multi-year Congressional funding?
heheheheheheheheheh

Seems to me that Gordon, and other congressional pols, are on the record of supporting this failed program and now have no choice but to to rationalize their bad judgement and attempt a rescue to save face. Never saw a politician yet who would admit bad judgement, so I'm expecting a bitter fight over the next several months. Most likely. we'll waste another year and additional billions continuing to pursue Griffin's paper napkin design and R&D holocaust. Hope not but I surely fear such an outcome.

"Will, the money was there. Augustine said NASA got the money it was supposed to get. No one took money from NASA.

Constellation is over budget and over schedule, the end.
Posted by: RC at September 25, 2009 7:37 PM"

One issue is that NASA gets placed under a CR year after year because congress will not pass our budget. Every time this happens funding plans and schedules go out the window. All large hardware outlays get postponed and we have to use our 8.3% dribbles just to maintain our workforce. Costs go up and schedules slide to the right as a result. As long as the CR remains the normal way of doing business you can expect costs to rise and schedules to slide. This is true for every large program whether its Constellation or otherwise.

One fix would be to roll NASA under the military. That way our budget would be one of the first to get signed every year.

Constellation managers made a series of really poor decisions, like a maximum size and mass payload betting on some fictitious new wonder material which would make the 1.5 X Apollo weigh half as much as an Apollo, and they selected a booster which from the start could not carry even the reduced mass they weren't even planning for yet. We are not talking about subtle easily missed errors-these are big deals that should have been looked at closely from the start.

By comparison, in the case of Shuttle, first they reached design of the Orbiter, and once they had that mass pretty well known, 6 months later they let the contract on the ET, and once they figured out how big and massive it would be, 6 months later they let the contract on the SRB's and even then they left volume in the SRB casings for added propellant.

Constellation management made poor decisions, closed off their design at both ends, and did it again, and again, and again. Jeff Hanley said a couple months ago, when the crew was downsized from 6 to 4, that now Orion is at the max weight for its recovery system. Before the hardware build has started means they still have not learned the lesson even now, after four attempts. What happens if the capsule comes in 5%, 10% or 20% overweight, which is likely given space systems development mass issues ? In several years they could be in a mode of saying, oh, sorry, we need to start over again because we cannot land the vehicle safely. Fool me once, shame on you but fool me four times, shame on NASA's higher level management for not calling you on it.

As Augustine has correctly pointed out, they may need to resize Orion again and this means nearly starting over and an additional 18 month to 2 year delay.

Constellation should have been mapping out priorities and schedules at the outset. Nothing mattered more than getting off to a good start. They got the money and people they asked for and squandered a lot of it on activities that should not have been started for half a decade. They missed their target date for PDR on Orion by 3 years. They are now 3-4 years behind their target launch date of 4 years ago, and Augustine says they are probably more likely 5-7 years behind, 2-4 years behind where they say they are.

There are some really good people at NASA and in some other places who should have been put in charge of this job right at the outset, and instead someone is trying to protect the people who have created this crisis. Maybe they figure these people now have experience. The only experience they have is trying to come up with a preliminary design, which in every prior program means about a year's worth of preliminary getting your feet wet. They have not even started on the real job.

If you put the right people, a small team, on the job, you could have a real Orion in flight in 3 years. With the right people and a limited budget, Orion could be flying 3 years from now.

Aside from Apollo, the cost in that case having been determined by management fiat at the outset, here are the US space and hypersonic development programs, with time from contract start to first flight, and total program costs in then-year and equivalent 2010 dollars, except for Shuttle for which only development costs are shown.

X-15 42 months $120 million
(

@ Dr. Prunesquallor,

Clearly, the GAO disagrees with your assessment of those problems being 'solved'. It would be tactless of me to make remarks about 'Kool Aid'.

What JT said! Especially:

"There are some really good people at NASA and in some other places who should have been put in charge of this job right at the outset, and instead someone is trying to protect the people who have created this crisis."

Maybe the former astronaut club trying to cya for each other?

Then, add KSC CxP ground systems into the mix............
(but wait, they just had an LCC1 refurbed "Crippen Young" control center ribbon cutting ceremony - oooh ahhhh -
hmmmm, what could possibly be screwed up in there?)

RNP, sounds like the best solution is to put as much of NASA out of its misery as possible. Capitalism dissolves these problems. Sink or swim in the free market.

Nobody cares about the legions of dead organizations. All we care about is the cream that rises to the top.

That goes for the laid off workers too. If they're so good they'll get good jobs quickly.

@ Frank;

"Multi-year Congressional funding?
heheheheheheheheheh"

What/why is this so funny? We have several large DOD programs (F/A-18, F-22, C-17 & F-35 to name a few)that have on a regular basis been awarded (BY CONGRESS) multi year funding auth's. This could be handled the same way, in the long run it makes the most sense, with one very critical caveate: No cost plus fees! If Boeing, LockMart, Thiokol etc... want to bid for the right to be "primes" on the various segments of the program then they need to accept some financial responsibility too. If NASA is going to continue selecting the same "Gang of 3" contractors, then they need to be held accountable and expected to actually deliver when they say they will, what they say the will and at the price they CLAIMED they would! If they meet these stipulations then by all means have a mechanism in place to award them a Success bonus, otherwise no hardware, no check!

Think this is too "pie in the sky" thinking; look at COTS-D if Orbital & SpaceX DO NOT deliver as required, they DO NOT GET PAID!!! Why then do we (NASA/TAX PAYERS)continue to reward mediocraty??? (Gang of 3)

Will is saying that entrepreneurs are being punished by NASA and old contractors are being rewarded. That's the American Way.

@RC:
"Capitalism dissolves these problems. Sink or swim in the free market"

sure, that's why DOD requested Lockmart & Boeing form ULA? yeah, bid competition just works so well for govt contracts. didn't an AF bigwig & Boeing guy go to jail over bidding. wasn't there an SAIC NASA conflict somewhere recently? how many NASA/DOD SBIR frauds? small NASA vendor convicted recently for parts fraud.

(maybe Boeing & Northrop Grumman should try a ULA style play for that for the Tanker bid, & up the Florida work, LoL!) go sell that line someplace else - maybe try selling free market for dissolution of the Energy department, or HUD, or something else.

back on topic, why are the GAO folks softer on NASA than they are on DOD Space Systems? Doesn't seem to be anywhere near the thoroughness?

Remember criticisms about the J-2X program by the GAO that many here carped upon? I'll refresh your memory.

In July 2007, Rocketdyne was awarded the J-2X contract. In October 2007, the GAO said in report GAO-08-51 that the J-2X was a high risk program. April 3, 2008, the GAO issued another report, GAO-08-186T, that predicted possible delays in the J-2X program and therefore in Orion/Ares I IOC. Ares I Anti-Activists (AIAA's) (a.k.a. the Anti-Griffin Community, or AGC) went nuts. May 8, 2008, NASA announced the J-2X power pack was successfully tested. On September 8, 2008, Rocketdyne announced that the J-2X gas generator had been successfully tested. November 19, 2008, Rocketdyne announces the successful completion of the J-2X CDR. By September 25, 2009, all the GAO can report on about the J-2X program in its report GAO-09-844 is that NASA-MSFC is trying a couple of different tacks on the nozzle extension...blah, blah, blah. In other words, this "high risk" "new engine" program is coming along fine and is by some estimates ahead of schedule and under budget.

DM-1 test results were not a part of the HSFR Committee's Summary report and obviously not included in GAO-09-844. But even with Robert Block's cautious article about the DM-1 test and its results, the fact is that radical measures for dealing with TO, as are the mass penalties, on Ares I are trending off of the table. The debate is money now, not TO.

In the meantime, AIAA's and AGC, why don't we work as a community to fund Constellation to the levels needed to complete the goal of returning to the Moon, and in support of that goal, write our representatives and our President indicating our willingness to hold them to that support when we next go to the polls.

In the meantime, AIAA's and AGC, why don't we work as a community to fund Constellation to the levels needed to complete the goal of returning to the Moon, and in support of that goal, write our representatives and our President indicating our willingness to hold them to that support when we next go to the polls.

You need to understand that Constellation in the form of ESAS is not going to be funded. That decision has already been made by the White House.

This is a good thing. The ESAS architecture was never sustainable as even if every dime of money was presented to NASA, it would still cost several times what they budgeted.

The big problem with the Constellation program is that even if it had no development problems at all, it wouldn't be worth doing. The resulting infrastructure will be so expensive its only purpose would be to continue NASA as a parasite upon the body politic.

It is amazing how some people try to deflect criticism of CxP by trying to point out issues with other architectures. Jeff Wright tries to tie the LCROSS attitude control anomaly as an problem with propellant depots, when there is nothing in common. And actually, the LCROSS issue would be point againt his large boosters (risking billions on a large payload that could fail). He also tries to point the GAO to links where propellant depots are not shown in a good light.

Propellant depots are not the discussion here. The wasteful spending of CxP on a nonviable architecture is the issue here. Unfortunately, those with uneducated biases continually flood these forums with their uninformed posts.

Unfortunately, those with uneducated biases continually flood these forums with their uninformed posts.

Posted by: me at September 27, 2009 7:41 AM

Exactly, you being one of them.

For the cost of developing Constellation, NASA could have several dozen Bigelow modules delivered to anywhere in the Inner Solar System, on a shorter timeframe. For $35+ Billion, we could dig a tunnel from Alaska to Siberia. We could build seawalls around every coastal city or make a transnational superconducting power grid. Is this the level of infrastructure Constellation will create? If not, it's not worth the cash.

Plus, what Paul said.

For $35 Billion I expect warp drive and gold-plated unobtainium parts. This project is an order-of-magnitude out of alignment with similar projects.

@JO5H:
"For $35 Billion I expect warp drive and gold-plated unobtainium parts. This project is an order-of-magnitude out of alignment with similar projects.

ROFL!)The DC Program Management training department apparently got their training from from govt contractors, not NASA. Need to clean house up there!

That's what happens when Program Controls are reporting to PMs, instead of an independent authority. Ih-house works well for contractor-govt-contract-milking but NASA's supposed to do oversight, not milking itself!)
~~~~~~~~~~
@Jim Hillhouse:
"Remember criticisms about the J-2X program by the GAO that many here carped upon?...In other words, this "high risk" "new engine" program is coming along fine and is by some estimates ahead of schedule and under budget."

There's a Stennis 2008 press release that says 1st J-2X Test for an A-1 test stand in March 2010.
But a recent 2009 news article says there's a new A-3 test stand being built & the 1st J-2x test isn't until 2011.

So how's that ahead of schedule (& obviously then, not under budget?):

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/stennis/news/newsreleases/2008/HEC-08-064-cptn.html
"The current schedule calls for the new J-2X power pack to be installed by March 2010." (A-1 test stand)

http://www.sunherald.com/local/story/1607873.html
"The first J-2X engine test on the stand will be in 2011." (A-3 test stand)

So, besides questioning what these engine and facilities expenses are being charged to & for how much, exactly how much CxP forward work is being spent in Republican states - while planning to layoff many thousands of Shuttle workers in Florida, hmmmmmmm???

In the 4 years of the vision I have never seen the space community turn so viscerally against a system. The steady stream of delays, technical complications, shady looking decisions, and reductions of capacity have removed the non payed grass roots support of this system.

GAO is typically right, especially when what they say is backed up by MANY experts. Hopefully Obama, Bolden, and Congress can find a way to unwind the issue and get onto a path that lets the supporters keep their jobs, and the nation have their dream. If not, at least ULA, Bigelow, Orbital, Scaled Composites, and SpaceX are hiring.

My big concern right now is that a decision about NASA's future direction is going to take too long. If more Shuttle flights are going to be added, a decision on that cannot come too quickly. The longer it takes to decide the more it will cost, and the more likely it would be that we'd have a gap in Shuttle availability.

As for Constellation, if any or all of that is going to be shut down, it should be done quickly, so that money isn't wasted on a doomed program.

Also, if Constellation is continued, then there needs to be a solid commitment to serious beyond LEO operations for the program. A Constellation program that is mostly or exclusively limited to LEO will probably compare very unfavorably to the STS in terms of bang for the buck, which is saying a lot, and should be canceled in favor of dedicated LEO programs.

RC, if you believe that a free market economy is a viable fiscal model I have a couple of bridges you might be interested in. If you think the US is a free market economy you are sorely mistaken.

In the meantime, AIAA's and AGC, why don't we work as a community to fund Constellation to the levels needed to complete the goal of returning to the Moon, and in support of that goal, write our representatives and our President indicating our willingness to hold them to that support when we next go to the polls.

I will vote for anyone who kills this retro return to the 60's. Returning to throw away rockets, throw away propulsion, rcs, primary power and a return to slashing down in the Ocean is not advancment.
Close the checkbook and shut it down!