Dragon Tests Its Parachutes

Folks:

That's two for two firsts from Spacex!

tinker

This is looking really good.

The NASA leadership, such as it is, would do well to take a look how a small team with minimal funding is able to do this kind of a job, when Constellation, with something like 20X the money (and presumably 20X the people) could not match the pace.

I don't think the Space X approach is too different than what was done by JSC half a decade ago on X-38, or before that the development of the new JSC control center, or how projects like Spacehab, which was commercial, or NASA-Mir were carried out. Small teams, experience leading, short time frames, relatively little money.

Of course if the real goal is simply a jobs program with no real intent to accomplish anything on a reasonable schedule, then the more recent Constellation approach is the way to go.

The real recovery advantage SpaceX has over Constellation is the future opportunity to practice reentry and recovery with lots of expendable unmanned cargo modules.

This is good news. Parachute deployment is always tricky.

I am concerned that we only find out about most tests after the fact. So they can shape what they say were the tests by what worked.

It is important to remember that said small team is relying heavily on 50+ years of NASA work. There is no way that SpaceX or the other small commercial launch companies could start with absolutely nothing and get to where they are today without that experience and database. they may not admit it, but NASA did a lot of their R&D work for them.

It is really simple JMro, do you want a space program or a jobs program. If you want the latter, then you are happy with NASA just the way it is.

SpaceX is the NASA of the 1960s; only there is one difference, SpaceX is a private corporation which is benefiting from a government contract without the government bureaucracy.

Imagine Elon Musk having CxP's budget and five years.

Hello Merlin 2
Hello Raptor
Hello Dragon Human Rating

Yeah, pretty much sums it all up. Nothing against the people at NASA, just hate the bureaucracy of it all.

VR
RE327

It is important to remember that said small team [SpaceX] is relying heavily on 50+ years of NASA work.

Unless you come to the table with facts, you're just another troll throwing feces around. Before accepting a position at SpaceX, I spent many years at NASA and I can tell you with certainty that you haven't a clue what you're talking about.

~Antoine

David44149 - everyone is in full agreement with you. SpaceX is not claiming to have invented RP rockets.

But the CxP team also had those same 50 years of experience to rely on, and actually they even had a shorter path to the accumulated know-how. Yet every attempt by NASA to make a commercial-like system has been a failure.

So NASA should keep on doing those things that later enable commercial entities to build commercial systems. NASA should develop new technologies that are beyond cutting edge, and let go the trailing edge technologies so that groups like SpaceX can make working viable spacecraft from them.

There are a number of people with Space X who had been working for NASA or had NASA experience previously. I know personally of a couple. The technologies of Space X did not come out of thin air.

Crazy Eddie is also correct, that Constellation had ready access to even more and more recent experience, but many of the Constellation management thought they were better than the previous experience; they did not have enough experience themselves to know what the previous experience had been; they decided they would do it their way, and they would do it better and more quickly; they wound up getting almost no where at all and have now done serious damage to NASA human space program. The NASA bureaucracy enables this and is very detrimental for all.

The best thing now is for those who can move fastest to move with all due haste and safety and get the US back on track to the future.

NASA can excel at expenditures for small R&D projects that commercial entities won't invest in, or on educational projects, or identifying industries and companies that might have some interest in partnering and collaborating. When it comes to getting someone to produce, integrate or operate already known technologies, the best thing NASA can do is to define some top level requirements and stay out of the way.

How many Orion parachute tests have failed so far? They can't even get their test setup chutes to work let alone test the actual Orion chutes...

Congrats to SpaceX on getting it right the first time.

The Orion parachutes works very well for the Pad Abort Test. If Orion had problems with the parachutes, that problem is fixed, until the next test.
The parachutes for the 5 segment SRB have problems. We will have to wait and see these problems get fixed.

Maybe someone who knows can explain?

In both the SpaceX and the Orion drop tests, the drogues come out just a few seconds after the craft is released, so at pretty low air velocities.

Wouldn't a more realistic test alow the craft accelerate to near terminal velocity first? It's not like either of them were short on altitude, even from 14,000'. (Orion's seemed even higher)

Are there more drop tests scheduled? If the drogues are redundant, will they try them with just one? If the chutes are redundant, will they try it with one of them torn on purpose?

Just askin'.

High altitude (much higher than this test), high Mach number (high subsonic) drogue test data is very slim (Apollo). Realistic deployment testing for the drogues is usually prohibitively expensive. Hence the advantage of having a customer pay for taking reentry test vehicles up to orbit.

David:

Spacex is leveraging NASA experience and technology and freely admit they couldn't have done without it. But, being small and lean, they can move a lot quicker off the blocks. They improved on the heat shield material developed by NASA (and with NASAs help) in less then a year from the time they got there hands on it. None of this "should we assemble a committee to discuss the possibility of doing a study to see whether we should consider improving this product..." stuff going on. They just did it.

Crazy Eddie:

Good point about the drogue deploying early. Was thinking the same myself. Anyone out there want to take a crack at doing the math for us dummies? How long does it take to reach terminal velocity from a standing start from 14,000 ft.? Also, was the Dragon capsule as heavy as they would expect a full up capsule to be? The first Falcon 9 launched a lot lighter than with a full up Dragon. There is something to be said for incremental testing... when your system allows it.

tinker

Matt, yeah, I'm sure that the overall thinking, since they know that soft landings are not a requirement for a long time to come.

The problem is that that dark forces are just waiting for an excuse to pounce... but hey, they'd pounce just the same if a test drop failed... ("they're launching a capsule that failed tests etc") so I guess it's better to have a good launch and orbital data and exactly as you say, just do all these tests on the cargo missions.

Good for them. They really have stuff figured out.

Looks like they did have the chutes in the skirts.I could see where they popped the skin off.All the other capsules have the chutes inside the pressure vessel.The skirt way gives a whole lot more room inside.This way is ok for cargo,but for crew maybe not.There is a lot of heat from the plasma.The white color will reflect and lot of insulation will make it work.After the failure to parachute the first stage I was worried they did not know parachutes.They say that it broke up on reentry and they will have to make it stronger though.I think some sort of attitude control might work also.They could add a auto pilot,wheels and aero controls and land at KSC.Easier to refurbish.That salt water might be damaging.I wanted to see a drop at 50,000' at 500mph,but the helicopter drop is ok I hope.

"All the other capsules have the chutes inside the pressure vessel"

Are you sure about that? I think they are always outside the pressure vessel.

What is with "SpaceX did not start from zero, nah nah, SpaceX sucks" trolls here lately?

Repeat after me: WE ARE ALL STANDING ON SHOULDERS OF GIANTS.

Sorry for caps, but it had to be said.

Admirable accomplishment. It is hard to argue with success.

I have looked at the diagram for Apollo and the parachutes are inside.Looking at Soyuz landing images,they are inside.That might be the chutes behind the crew in interior shots.If it works outside it will great.Saves a lot of room.There must be a reason why others are different.