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SpaceX rocket engine explodes during test at Texas facility
- SAI_Peregrinus 9y agoGood that it happened on the test stand instead of in a rocket! Hopefully they'll have good data on what failed and end up with an improved engine.
- mabbo 9y agoFor those who don't obsessively follow SpaceX: SpaceX is working on three projects right now. #1- Falcon Heavy, strapping three Falcon 9s together to make a super awesome rocket. #2- The BFR. All over the news lately, going to be a humongous rocket that does New York to Sydney in under an hour, or take humans to the Moon or Mars. And #3, they are working on what's being called "Block 5", the supposedly final upgrade to the Falcon 9 rocket, including upgraded Merlin engines. These would make the rockets just that much more powerful, increasing payload sizes on both Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches. So, this is probably one of those new Merlin engines. And it exploded. Which is going to delay Block 5. Damn.
- lightbyte 9y ago>#2- The BFR. All over the news lately, going to be a humongous rocket that does New York to Sydney in under an hour, or take humans to the Moon or Mars. Does BFR happen to stand for "big fucking rocket"?
- mabbo 9y agoI think publicly they say things like "Big Falcon Rocket".
- api 9y agoIt comes from the "BFG" from the original Doom games. Edit: fixed... was Doom not Quake :P
- lightedman 9y agoBFG is from Doom, not Quake, as the BFG9000.
- CodeWriter23 9y agoAhem, the BFG 9000 was from Doom.
- neuronexmachina 9y agoQuake II and Q3A did have a BFG10K, though.
- Robotbeat 9y agoYes. In polite company, it's "Big Falcon Rocket," but Elon has been perfectly clear about what it actually stands for.
- aidenn0 9y agoYes. This is from the same CEO who wanted to name his first 3 models of car "S, E, and X" (the 3 was going to be the model E, but renamed due to ford's trademark).
- pavement 9y agoWell, I never! How crude! I mean just poo-poo on this sort of thing and anybody amused by it!
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- Robotbeat 9y agoI don't think you can be certain it's a newer Merlin engine OR that it will delay Block 5. They do acceptance testing of all their engines, even the current iterations. They've launched literally hundreds of these engines, with multiple tests per engine (and, as an aside, a design for Falcon 9 that is able to survive an engine failure). They test multiple engines per week, and have the capacity for multiple times that, so losing a test cell for a few weeks need have no impact on the schedule for Block 5. My take is that this will have essentially no impact on SpaceX's schedule.
- arielb1 9y agoEngine failed during qualification testing, not acceptance testing - so it's a new design. If you don't occasionally blow an engine up on the stand you are either not testing hard enough or not pushing the limits hard enough.
- sunstone 9y agoOh of course. Test to failure, why didn't that occur to me with respect rocket engines? Thanks for the insight.
- sliverstorm 9y agoMove fast and blow shit up (literally)?
- Robotbeat 9y agoWhat's interesting is that updated info indicates it happened before the engine (which was a block 5 engine, as you say) was ignited, when they do a "LOx drop" test, basically running liquid oxygen through it to test for any leaks: https://arstechnica.com/science/2017/11/an-experimental-spacex-rocket-engine-has-exploded-in-texas/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2017/11/an-experimental-spac... It may mean they had a simple FOD (foreign object debris) or contamination issue, not a design problem. Powerful oxidizers like liquid oxygen can make contact explosives out of all kinds of organic materials.
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- le-mark 9y agoIs #4 test firing a full size Raptor a possibility?
- ChuckMcM 9y agoAs the article reports it was a Block 5 Merlin (aka the last Merlin upgrade). I don't believe qualification has started yet on Raptor but that would seem to be the logical next engine to qualify after the Block 5s. That it exploded is oddly a good thing according to friends at JPL. They say that when ever there is a catastrophic failure like this it forces a deep review and root cause analysis which invariably adds additional understanding and depth to the design. Knowing what can cause an engine to blow up, and knowing you have designed around it, is a good thing.
- stark3 9y agoThat's how I think when relatively complex programs I've written blow up (blow up = user term for job failing). I expect them to blow up during testing. The errors are then corrected and the code is also reviewed to determine how the error slipped by to begin with. If the programs work without any noticeable errors, the code review does not happen and there's a much greater likelihood of subtle errors slipping into production.
- avs733 9y agoBased on the article it sounds like they have backup capacity that can keep them on track...and the reality is that in space flight these things happen. Better for it to happen on a test stand than in a rocket. I just Wonder if they will try and blame a sniper this time[0]. [0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/implication-of-sabotage-adds-intrigue-to-spacex-investigation/2016/09/30/5bb60514-874c-11e6-a3ef-f35afb41797f_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/implication-...
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- andrewwharton 9y ago> a SpaceX employee visited its facilities at Cape Canaveral, Fla., and asked for access to the roof of one of ULA’s buildings. > The SpaceX representative explained to the ULA officials on site that it was trying to run down all possible leads in what was a cordial, not accusatory, encounter, according to the industry sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation. I wouldn't exactly call that trying to blame a sniper.
- jimjimjim 9y agoThis sort of thing does happen in the industry and better during testing than half way up. but I worry that there will now be an increase in the amount of FUD being pushed in the news. It already seems like the amount of muck being thrown at ANYTHING elon musk related has increased over the last few months.
- baq 9y agoyour feelings appear to be right, there was even a discussion about that here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15600878 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15600878
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- speeq 9y ago> The company said Tuesday in response to questions that it is “now conducting a thorough and fully transparent investigation of the root cause” of the explosion. “SpaceX is committed to our current manifest, and we do not expect this to have any impact on our launch cadence.”
- baq 9y agoas usual when talking about exploding rocket engines, go read Ignition! if you haven't already: https://library.sciencemadness.org/library/books/ignition.pdf https://library.sciencemadness.org/library/books/ignition.pd...
- sq_ 9y agoI love that book so much. My favorite part is the section on chlorine trifluoride (ClF3): "It is, of course, extremely toxic, but that’s the least of the problem. It is hypergolic with every known fuel, and so rapidly hypergolic that no ignition delay has ever been measured. It is also hypergolic with such things as cloth, wood, and test engineers, not to mention asbestos, sand, and water-with which it reacts explosively. It can be kept in some of the ordinary structural metals-steel, copper, aluminium, etc.-because of the formation of a thin film of insoluble metal fluoride which protects the bulk of the metal, just as the invisible coat of oxide on aluminium keeps it from burning up in the atmosphere. If, however, this coat is melted or scrubbed off, and has no chance to reform, the operator is confronted with the problem of coping with a metal-fluorine fire. For dealing with this situation, I have always recommended a good pair of running shoes."
- shmerl 9y agoHow is Raptor engine progressing?