There's another version of the inbound booster, this time slowed up 4X and with the target barge indicated. It shows, I think, that they are using a 'go long' algorithm which can always be brought short as it were. It would be much more trouble to correct a short aim.
Cheers, Mike.
( edit ) Contrary to what I've said before, the eburnation of the vanes is not mainly due to the rocket plume but from hypersonic ablation.
( edit ) Plus an apparently "real time rate" version ie. the video length is how long it actually took to land from MECO to barge. Again I stand in awe of the engineering prowess required to do this.
The second video is quite amazing. When I look at it I find myself asking what type of cameras are they employing that can handle re-entry and the forces exerted? And yes you are correct. There is some amazing rocketry at work here.
The second video is quite amazing. When I look at it I find myself asking what type of cameras are they employing that can handle re-entry and the forces exerted?
Well buffered and protected I'd expect. There ought be much more vibration otherwise.
Quote:
And yes you are correct. There is some amazing rocketry at work here.
Yup. First you see The Earth with a curvature and it 'gradually' zones in on the barge which has an area of about the building I work in. Which rather fools you as to the actual speed and scale ( I have to remind/kick myself that this is not some Kerbal SP video animation ). As mentioned it is supersonic to within about 15 seconds before landing. It is a device which transitions ( I think ) through several flight dynamics models of approx three phases depending essentially upon : speed, air density and height.
I await with extreme interest inspection of the barrel and vanes when it comes to port.
{ Darn. I don't think I have any hope of getting shares. Not in the right loop, too small a fish etc. Any current serious evaluation has to place SpaceX's paradigm as the future of rocketry IMHO. No one is going to share this golden goose any time soon. It is not a venture capital start-up any more. They have expertise as demonstrated that captures the LEO and lighter payload to GSTO market with a massive undercut of competitors, even if you leave in the loss-leading and development costs. }
I also state the obvious : the cadence of the launches is increasing sharply ie. this is the rhythm they were developing before the CRS failure. Project that to another eight or nine before New Year. This will be a big income year for SpaceX. I wonder if we will get a Falcon Heavy test by then though ?
I've acquired some new editing tools. The initial alignment using thrusters up quite high before the retro-burn :
.... and this occurs several times back and forth, so you might ask why. It's because it is not quite in space and so at over 10+ Mach at that height there is still significant drag on the barrel. This will work much like a weather vane and tend to align the barrel along the flight path ( by pushing against one side of the tube more than the other it will rotate ). But we don't want that. We want the correct attitude before the primary slow-down burn :
.... which has been reported as a three Merlin affair. On the target-marked video this burn happens when the barrel is pointed right at the barge. Then there is another thruster alignment after that burn :
.... I hope you will note the contrary direction of that c/w before. This is why I think the base case is to aim long and then re-adjust later to shorten downrange travel ie. coming back towards to OCISLY. By that I imply that from the given viewpoint the thruster working orthogonally to the barrel is adjusting left/right downrange, with the leftward thruster aiming long and the rightward thruster aiming short. This is an extremely rough analysis, but note we see little or no barrel rotation around it's own axis therefore a reasonable deduction is consistent use of the thrusters we can't see. Now here is the start of a particulate debris plume coming off the left side vane :
.... perhaps charred paint from the hypersonic abalation. Notably the burn seems worse on the vane components furthest from the barrel :
.... perhaps suggesting a surface layer preservation of the barrel. But again I want to see that at port. I look at this flight phase in detail because this determines re-use. The extra few seconds of burn preserves the components. We hope ! :-))
Cheers, Mike.
( edit ) To orient you, the alignment on the frames with respect to the Earth is :
- top is northward
- bottom is southward
- left is westward/ground
- right is eastward/space
the launch was at 17::30 local time and thus the Sun is behind a downrange trajectory ie. that is why there is a shadow ( looks like a double step Mayan pyramid ) on the barrel thrown by whatever the camera is sitting on/within. Hence you will see that shadow move a bit back and forth after the second posted frame c/w go-long/go-short adjustments. Anyhows that's a yaw/pitch, not a roll.
{ The first minute or so is taken up with a series of three axis maneuvers transitioning from the burny-end-pointing-towards-the-west to the burny-end-pointing-towards-the-east. }
( edit ) FWIW : here is the formal coordinate frame as disclosed in the Falcon Nine User's Guide :
... however this graphic is the earlier shorter barrel, and has no vanes attached. In any event the camera is looking down/back-along the positive X-axis ( X is greater toward the top of the rocket ). Thus if the top of video frame points along the positive Y-axis ( we don't know that ) then the positive Z-axis is to the left of frame.
( edit ) In case I wasn't abundantly clear : with the grunty end pointing into the direction of motion and the draggy end at the back then it is far easier to subtract from downrange KE than it is to add to downrange KE. This is what I have labelled as a ( default, to be adjusted ) 'go-long' method.
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...
... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal
( edit ) It's 5am at the Cape. The realtime vessel movement map provided with/below the webcam shows a vessel ( nominated as under US flag ) holding approx 1km offshore of the port entrance : OCISLY ???
.... sorry, it's the Disney Dream. :-)))
( edit ) More Golden Research : if you go here you have the realtime map I spoke of. Port Canaveral is to the east of Orlando and north of Melbourne ie. at Cocoa/Cocoa-Beach. Next trick is to decide which, if any, is OCISLY eg. what is it categorised as ? Special Craft ? Unspecified ?
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...
... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal
RE: There's another version
)
The second video is quite amazing. When I look at it I find myself asking what type of cameras are they employing that can handle re-entry and the forces exerted? And yes you are correct. There is some amazing rocketry at work here.
RE: The second video is
)
Well buffered and protected I'd expect. There ought be much more vibration otherwise.
Yup. First you see The Earth with a curvature and it 'gradually' zones in on the barge which has an area of about the building I work in. Which rather fools you as to the actual speed and scale ( I have to remind/kick myself that this is not some Kerbal SP video animation ). As mentioned it is supersonic to within about 15 seconds before landing. It is a device which transitions ( I think ) through several flight dynamics models of approx three phases depending essentially upon : speed, air density and height.
I await with extreme interest inspection of the barrel and vanes when it comes to port.
{ Darn. I don't think I have any hope of getting shares. Not in the right loop, too small a fish etc. Any current serious evaluation has to place SpaceX's paradigm as the future of rocketry IMHO. No one is going to share this golden goose any time soon. It is not a venture capital start-up any more. They have expertise as demonstrated that captures the LEO and lighter payload to GSTO market with a massive undercut of competitors, even if you leave in the loss-leading and development costs. }
I also state the obvious : the cadence of the launches is increasing sharply ie. this is the rhythm they were developing before the CRS failure. Project that to another eight or nine before New Year. This will be a big income year for SpaceX. I wonder if we will get a Falcon Heavy test by then though ?
Cheers, Mike.
( edit ) Nuthin's on the Port Canaveral Webcam just yet. The YouTube channel to keep an eye on is USLaunchReport produced by war veterans.
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...
... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal
RE: RE: Some nice views
)
Maybe, but if you note right before the lens coat the vanes look nice, after it clears they look burnt. I'm sure a lot of what we see is condensate.
I've acquired some new
)
I've acquired some new editing tools. The initial alignment using thrusters up quite high before the retro-burn :
.... and this occurs several times back and forth, so you might ask why. It's because it is not quite in space and so at over 10+ Mach at that height there is still significant drag on the barrel. This will work much like a weather vane and tend to align the barrel along the flight path ( by pushing against one side of the tube more than the other it will rotate ). But we don't want that. We want the correct attitude before the primary slow-down burn :
.... which has been reported as a three Merlin affair. On the target-marked video this burn happens when the barrel is pointed right at the barge. Then there is another thruster alignment after that burn :
.... I hope you will note the contrary direction of that c/w before. This is why I think the base case is to aim long and then re-adjust later to shorten downrange travel ie. coming back towards to OCISLY. By that I imply that from the given viewpoint the thruster working orthogonally to the barrel is adjusting left/right downrange, with the leftward thruster aiming long and the rightward thruster aiming short. This is an extremely rough analysis, but note we see little or no barrel rotation around it's own axis therefore a reasonable deduction is consistent use of the thrusters we can't see. Now here is the start of a particulate debris plume coming off the left side vane :
.... perhaps charred paint from the hypersonic abalation. Notably the burn seems worse on the vane components furthest from the barrel :
.... perhaps suggesting a surface layer preservation of the barrel. But again I want to see that at port. I look at this flight phase in detail because this determines re-use. The extra few seconds of burn preserves the components. We hope ! :-))
Cheers, Mike.
( edit ) To orient you, the alignment on the frames with respect to the Earth is :
- top is northward
- bottom is southward
- left is westward/ground
- right is eastward/space
the launch was at 17::30 local time and thus the Sun is behind a downrange trajectory ie. that is why there is a shadow ( looks like a double step Mayan pyramid ) on the barrel thrown by whatever the camera is sitting on/within. Hence you will see that shadow move a bit back and forth after the second posted frame c/w go-long/go-short adjustments. Anyhows that's a yaw/pitch, not a roll.
{ The first minute or so is taken up with a series of three axis maneuvers transitioning from the burny-end-pointing-towards-the-west to the burny-end-pointing-towards-the-east. }
( edit ) FWIW : here is the formal coordinate frame as disclosed in the Falcon Nine User's Guide :
... however this graphic is the earlier shorter barrel, and has no vanes attached. In any event the camera is looking down/back-along the positive X-axis ( X is greater toward the top of the rocket ). Thus if the top of video frame points along the positive Y-axis ( we don't know that ) then the positive Z-axis is to the left of frame.
( edit ) In case I wasn't abundantly clear : with the grunty end pointing into the direction of motion and the draggy end at the back then it is far easier to subtract from downrange KE than it is to add to downrange KE. This is what I have labelled as a ( default, to be adjusted ) 'go-long' method.
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...
... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal
Q: How do you transport a
)
Q: How do you transport a freshly minted Falcon Nine ?
..... in shrinkwrap of course ! :_)))
Cheers, Mike.
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...
... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal
RE: Shortly after ignition
)
Try this page on Flickr :
Cheers, Mike.
( edit ) It's 5am at the Cape. The realtime vessel movement map provided with/below the webcam shows a vessel ( nominated as under US flag ) holding approx 1km offshore of the port entrance : OCISLY ???
.... sorry, it's the Disney Dream. :-)))
( edit ) More Golden Research : if you go here you have the realtime map I spoke of. Port Canaveral is to the east of Orlando and north of Melbourne ie. at Cocoa/Cocoa-Beach. Next trick is to decide which, if any, is OCISLY eg. what is it categorised as ? Special Craft ? Unspecified ?
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...
... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal
RE: Try this page on Flickr
)
Nice photos there, i noticed this of CRS-8 venting i guess the N2 thrusters.
It just occurred to me each thruster vent has three directions, and i guess you only need two thusters to cover all contingencies.
This earlier launch shows quite nicely the thrusters working after first stage separates.
RE: RE: Shortly after
)
"Come in" said the spider to the fly. Cables have never looked so "pretty". A really great shot from the ultimate perspective.
RE: This earlier launch
)
Great link. I had not seeen this video before. This video demonstrates some serious thruster action. Zulu! Thrusters to station keeping.
And while SpaceX is making
)
And while SpaceX is making this look like a walk in the sunshine lets not forget just how difficult this "science" is!!
[EDIT] This comment is not intended as a knock against the competition but as a reminder of the difficulties involved.