Merlin-1

[Salo]

Его прожигают без НРО.

[Salo]

http://www.parabolicarc.com/2012/10/12/spacex-nasa-form-investigation-board-on-falcon-9-engine-failure/

SpaceX, NASA Form Investigation Board on Falcon 9 Engine Failure
Posted by Doug Messier
on October 12, 2012, at 6:18 pm
   

Debris from the rupture of a Falcon 9 engine panel during the Oct. 7 launch.

Update / SpaceX CRS-1 Mission: October 12

NASA and SpaceX announce that they have jointly formed a CRS-1 Post-Flight Investigation Board. This board will methodically analyze all data in an effort to understand what occurred to engine 1 during liftoff of the CRS-1 mission on Sunday, October 7. While Falcon 9 was designed for engine out capability and the Dragon spacecraft has successfully arrived at the space station, SpaceX is committed to a comprehensive examination and analysis of all launch data, with the goal of understanding what happened and how to correct it prior to future flights. Additional information will be provided as it is available.

[SFN]

Спасибо улыбчивому инвестору

Making a SpaceX Engine
A separate building contains the manufacturing flow for the Merlin 1D engines. The shiny nozzle here has channels etched vertically in it for the fuel to run down and back up, keeping the nozzle from melting during use. The nozzles at the far end of the room have those channels and are ready for a metal jacket to cover them. This is much more elegant than the individual brazed tubes used in the earlier Merlin engines, or the RL-10 used on other rockets.

Похоже, шутка Маска о том что сотрудничать с Россией не обязательно, достаточно нанять нескольких русских уже стала явью)))

[SpaceR]

Похоже, это была не шутка, а постфактум...

З.Ы. Кстати говоря, народ на снимке как-то совсем мало похож на русских.  

[Salo]

http://shitelonsays.com/transcript/elon-musk-lecture-at-the-royal-aeronautical-society-2012-11-16

The Merlin architecture is an open cycle architecture, so it doesn't have the ISP advantage of a staged combustion system, and it's using RP-1 so we're talking ISP for the first stage booster engine around 310 to 312 and, for the vacuum version, that's around 340 to 345. The penalty for an open cycle engine is much less in a vacuum than it is on [inaudible] level. So that's wh ere we are. So, we definitely need a new engine for any kind of, sending people to Mars, but I think we can still get to full reusability with the current engines despite having a bit of an ISP disadvantage relative to say, the Russian kerosene based engines

. Оптимизма насчёт УИ вакуумного Мерлина явно поубавилось.

[SpaceR]

Salo
А почему поубавилось? ПМСМ 340-345 - это как раз довольно оптимистично.

[Salo]

336 было у 1С Vac. На 1D Vac пугали цифрой 346 с.

[SpaceR]

А на 1С в своё время - цифрой 342. ))
Помним...

[Salo]

Загадочное фото Merlin-1D:

[Salo]

http://www.spaceflightnow.com/falcon9/005/130228engine/#.Ua5Cu9iBXTo

SpaceX, NASA confident in Falcon 9 rocket engines
BY STEPHEN CLARK
SPACEFLIGHT NOW
Posted: February 28, 2013

Exquisite analysis and extensive testing by SpaceX engineers, with support and advice from NASA experts, showed a dramatic engine failure on the company's last launch was caused by a material flaw in the engine's protective jacket, a SpaceX official said Thursday.


The Falcon 9 rocket rolled out of its hangar Thursday for Friday's scheduled launch. Credit: SpaceX
 
Managers are confident the same problem will not show up during Friday's launch of a Falcon 9 rocket, the first flight of the two-stage booster since the Oct. 7 launch which suffered the engine failure.

"There was a material flaw that went undetected in the jacket of the Merlin engine, resulting in a breach ... causing depressurization of the combustion chamber, then the flight computer recognized that depressurization and commanded shutdown," said Gwynne Shotwell, president of SpaceX, during a press conference Thursday.

Each of the nine Merlin 1C engines on the Falcon 9 first stage is shrouded in a kevlar jacket to prevent a problem with one engine affecting another in the rocket's "tic-tac-toe" first stage engine matrix.

The rocket continued flying normally after the engine failure and deployed its Dragon payload in the correct orbit, but an Orbcomm communications satellite, carried as a secondary payload, was not released in the proper orbit because insufficient propellant was left in the rocket to meet safety requirements.

SpaceX says the Falcon 9 rocket can lose a first stage Merlin engine at any point in flight and still reach orbit. Nine Merlin engines power the first stage, and a single Merlin engine flies on the Falcon 9's second stage.

The final report on the Oct. 7 launch anomaly is not available for public release because it is under review by the U.S. State Department, according to Shotwell, who would not disclose what material was responsible for the engine failure, citing export control laws.

Shotwell did not say if any changes were made to the engines on the Falcon 9 rocket set to launch Friday, but she said engineers conducted exhaustive testing to make sure the engines did not suffer from the same defect that caused the engine failure.

"We did extensive analysis to understand the problem, [and] extensive assessment and testing on these particular engines," Shotwell said. "The field of science that we're talking about is called NDE - non-destructive evaluation. It's as much an art as a science, and we're certainly getting much better at it as we mature."

The engine failure occurred on SpaceX's first contracted cargo mission to the International Space Station. The Falcon 9's on-board computer detected a problem with one of the rocket's nine first stage engines and commanded a shutdown 79 seconds after liftoff.

The dramatic failure sent shards of debris into the rocket's exhaust plume. SpaceX says the debris came from an aerodynamic fairing covering the engine, which remained intact.

[Salo]

http://www.spaceflight101.com/merlin-1d-flight-qualification.html

SpaceX completes Flight Qualification Testing of Merlin 1D Engine
March 20, 2013


   

Спойлер

The SpaceX Merlin 1D liquid-fueled rocket engine has achieved flight qualification ahead of its first flight aboard the upgraded Falcon 9 v1.1 later this year, SpaceX announced in a press release on Wednesday. The engine that is based on the previously used Merlin 1C went through a 28 test qualification program, accumulating 1,970 seconds (32 minutes 50 seconds) of total test time.

The testing included four tests at or above the power and duration required for a nominal Falcon 9 launch and Merlin 1D completed tests at propellant inlet and operating conditions that are well outside the parameters expected in flight conditions. "SpaceX's testing program demonstrated a ratio of 4:1 for critical engine life parameters such as firing duration and restart capacity to the engine's expected flight requirements," SpaceX said in a press release.

"The Merlin 1D successfully performed every test throughout this extremely rigorous qualification program," said Elon Musk, SpaceX CEO and chief designer.
"With flight qualification now complete, we look forward to flying the first Merlin 1D engines on Falcon 9's Flight 6 this year."

The upgraded Falcon 9 featuring the Merlin 1D will make its first flight in June 2013, launching out of Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, to deliver the Cassiope satellite to orbit for the Canadian Space Agency.

This new version of the Falcon 9 stands 69.2 meters tall having a liftoff weight of 480,000kg with stretched propellant tanks feeding the nine Merlin 1D engines of the first and the single engine of the second stage. Merlin 1D provides a vacuum thrust of 720 Kilonewtons as compared to the 1C version that provides 480kN of vacuum thrust. Falcon 9 v1.1 will be capable of carrying payloads of up to 13,150 Kilograms to Low Earth Orbit and 4,850 Kilograms to Geostationary Transfer Orbit.

Although Merlin 1D is an upgraded version of the 1C, it can still build on the positive flight record of the 1C engines because both share a lot of common components. "It's a much higher-thrust engine, but surprisingly a lot of the infrastructure of that engine is the same," said SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell.
The first stage of the Falcon 9 v1.1 will feature a new engine layout with the nine engines arranged in an octagonal/circular pattern - eight engines clustered around a single Merlin 1D. The skin of the launcher is the primary load path for the launch vehicle and arranging most of the engines on the perimeter of the skin eliminates a lot of structure that needs to be installed to carry loads from the engines to the skin. The original Falcon features a tic-tac-toe engine pattern which required these load-transferring structures.

With the first launch of the Falcon 9 v1.1 just three months away, SpaceX is looking at a very tight manifest of launches. Falcon 9 v1.1 is set to deliver a variety of spacecraft to orbit for a number of different customers. The launcher will deploy communications satellites for commercial operators, scientific satellites for space agencies and of course the Dragon Spacecraft for ISS resupply missions and eventual manned missions.

[свернуть]

   


Photo: SpaceX

http://www.spacex.com/press.php?page=20130320

March 20, 201

SpaceX's Merlin 1D Engine Achieves Flight Qualification

Hawthorne, CA – Space Exploration Technologies' (SpaceX) Merlin 1D engine has achieved flight qualification, a major milestone for the next generation Merlin engine. Through a 28 test qualification program, the Merlin 1D accumulated 1,970 seconds of total test time, the equivalent run time of over 10 full mission durations, and is now fully qualified to fly on the Falcon 9 rocket.

Спойлер

The program included four tests at or above the power (147,000 pounds of thrust) and duration (185 seconds) required for a Falcon 9 rocket launch. The Merlin 1D engine was also tested at propellant inlet and operating conditions that were well outside the bounds of expected flight conditions.

SpaceX's testing program demonstrated a ratio of 4:1 for critical engine life parameters such as firing duration and restart capacity to the engine's expected flight requirements. The industry standard is 2:1.

"The Merlin 1D successfully performed every test throughout this extremely rigorous qualification program," said Elon Musk, SpaceX CEO and chief designer. "With flight qualification now complete, we look forward to flying the first Merlin 1D engines on Falcon 9's Flight 6 this year."

The Merlin 1D builds on the technology of the Merlin engines used on the first five flights of Falcon 9. With nine Merlin 1Ds on the first stage, the Falcon 9 rocket will produce nearly 1.5 million pounds of thrust in a vacuum. The Merlin 1D has a vacuum thrust-to-weight ratio exceeding 150, the best of any liquid rocket engine in history. This enhanced design makes the Merlin 1D the most efficient booster engine ever built, while still maintaining the structural and thermal safety margins needed to carry astronauts. Additionally, the new engine is designed for improved manufacturability by using higher efficiency processes, increased robotic construction and reduced parts count.

Testing took place at SpaceX's rocket development facility in McGregor, Texas.

About SpaceX

SpaceX designs, manufactures, and launches the world's most advanced rockets and spacecraft. The company was founded in 2002 by Elon Musk to revolutionize space transportation, with the ultimate goal of enabling people to live on other planets. Today, SpaceX is advancing the boundaries of space technology through its Falcon launch vehicles and Dragon spacecraft. SpaceX is a private company owned by management and employees, with minority investments from Founders Fund, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, and Valor Equity Partners. The company has more than 3,000 employees in California, Texas, Washington, D.C., and Florida. For more information, visit SpaceX.com.

[свернуть]

[Salo]

Подытожим:

Земная тяга 66,6 тс.
Вакуумная тяга 73,4 тс.
Соотношение вакуумной тяги с массой 150.
Масса двигателя 489 кг.
Земной УИ 282 с.
Вакуумный УИ 311 с.

[Salo]

Интересно, масса двигателя дана с подмоторной рамой, или тут мутка?

[Salo]

bavv пишет:

SpaceX ‏@SpaceX
SpaceX's powerful Merlin 1D engine test firing
21 марта 13 в 3:28
 


 Merlin 1D Engine Flight Qualification Test
The SpaceX Merlin 1D engine has achieved flight qualification, a major milestone for the next generation Merlin engine. Through a 28 test qualification program, the Merlin 1D accumulated 1,970 seconds of total test time, the equivalent run time of over 10 full mission durations, and is now fully qualified to fly on the Falcon 9 rocket.

[Дм. Журко]

SpaceR пишет:
А на 1С в своё время - цифрой 342. ))
Помним...  

Не 1C, а 1C-Vac с большим соплом. Сомневаетесь?

[Salo]

В чём? В том что оказалось 336 с?

[Дм. Журко]

Меня спрашиваете, уважаемый Salo? Я-то не сомневаюсь, что SpaceR не помнит и путает.

[Salo]

Но обещали-то 342 с.

ЗЫ: оказывается даже 346 с.

[Дм. Журко]

Я так понял несколько лет назад, что не обещали, а получили. То, что в итоге характеристика ниже -- обычное дело. Сопло, скажем, меньше, запасы и ресурс больше. Если же именно обещали, а не получили на стенде, то обещание скоро исполнится, очевидно, на Merlin 1D-Vac.

А вот сравнивать двигатели разного назначения надо с умом.  Что-то много юристов.

[Salo]

Salo пишет:
Подытожим:

Земная тяга 66,6 тс.
Вакуумная тяга 73,4 тс.
Соотношение вакуумной тяги с массой 150.
Масса двигателя 489 кг.
Земной УИ 282 с.
Вакуумный УИ 311 с.

Раньше было 160.