28 AVIATION WEEK & SPACE TECHNOLOGY/NOVEMBER 3/10, 2014 AviationWeek.com/awst
Guy Norris Los Angeles
Roller Coaster
Boeing begins assembling first test
CST-100 as SpaceX readies for key
Dragon pad abort evaluation
W
hile the outcome of Sierra Nevada Corp.’s protest
over NASA’s Commercial Crew program awards
will not be known until January, these two winners
are accelerating preparations for the next test, development
and demonstration phases of the space capsules that will
transport U.S. astronauts to the International Space Station
(ISS) starting in 2017.
The heightened pace will be welcomed by Boeing and
Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX), which have been
on a roller-coaster ride since their respective CST-100 and
Dragon V2 capsules were selected by
NASA over Sierra Nevada’s Dream
Chaser lifting body design for Com-
mercial Crew Transportation Capa-
bility (CCtCap) contracts on Sept. 16.
The stop-and-go began 10 days later
when Sierra Nevada filed a protest
with the U.S. Government Account-
ability Ofce, citing “inconsistencies
in the source-selection process.” In
response, NASA issued a stop-work
order to Boeing and SpaceX on Oct.
2, halting the program in its tracks.
However, only a week later, NASA
rescinded the order, stating that a
delay to the development of the
transportation service “poses risks
to the ISS crew, jeopardizes con-
tinued operation of the ISS, would
delay meeting critical crew size re-
quirements, and may result in the
U.S. failing to perform the commit-
ments it made in its international
agreements.” Not to be outdone, Si-
erra Nevada then lodged a petition
with the U.S. Court of Federal Claims in Washington calling
for NASA’s overriding of the stop-work order to be itself over-
turned. Despite Sierra’s protests, however, on Oct. 21, Judge
Marian Blank Horn ruled not to “overrule the override.”
SpaceX, in the meantime, is focused on executing two
key safety flight tests of its Dragon V2 over the next three
months. The first is a pad abort test scheduled for No-
vember from SLC-40A at Cape Canaveral, before the fo-
cus shifts to an inflight abort test from Vandenberg AFB
in California, in January. The test will be conducted using
“a very flight-like Dragon and the trunk, which will depart
from a truss structure rather than sit on a Falcon 9,” says
Garrett Reisman, Dragon Rider program manager. The ve-
hicle will have a crash test dummy inside and a prototype
seat. SpaceX expects initial acceleration loads of 5g to6g
coming of the pad. Speaking at a recent Future In-Space
Operations Working Group teleconference, he says: “We
will have a very flight-like propulsion system as far as ev-
erything that goes into the abort, including the avionics,
which will be identical to the avionics we are planning for
the flight vehicle.”
Following the recent legal uncertainties over CCtCap, Boe-
ing is “back to full-steam ahead,” says Commercial Crew Pro-
gram Manager John Mulholland. The company completed its
first CCtCap milestone—covering the vehicle certification
and verification plan—in late October and is moving onto
the next milestone concerning critical design review of the
ground operations. While so far much of Boeing’s buildup has
been via modeling, mockups and analysis, the manufacturer
is now bringing together parts for the real thing. “We already
have 150 pieces of flight-design hardware out in Florida, and
we will start assembly of the structural test article (STA) in
November,” says Mulholland.
Although designed at Boeing’s Houston Product Support
Center in Texas, the CST-100 will be manufactured at the
Commercial Crew Processing Facility, formerly Orbiter
Processing Facility-3, at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
Boeing will make four vehicles initially: One for ground tests,
and one each for the pad abort test in
2016, the first uncrewed flight in early
2017, and the first crewed flight to the
ISS later in 2017. “The big upper- and
lower-pressure domes are in the final
stages of machining at the vendor, as
is the big tunnel assembly, which is
the interface between the capsule and
docking system. So we have got the
three major pieces of hardware in the
final stages of machining and we will
finish up assembly of that in spring- Then we will get into structural
testing,” Mulholland says.
Following STA assembly, Boeing
will start construction of other units
for qualification tests. “The flight de-
sign service module will be tested at
White Sands Missile Range in New
Mexico, where we will do all the pro-
pulsion system qualification tests
[abort, orbital maneuvering and re-
action control] in 2016. That year we
will also have the flight-qualification
flight unit, as well as the pad abort
test which will be out at the missile range on the same site
as was used by [Lockheed Martin] Orion. We will then be
building up the capsule and service module for the orbital
flight tests. So once we get through that structural test article
build, we will be really ramping into simultaneous build on
multiple vehicles,” he adds.
Boeing acknowledges it faces an aggressive schedule, but
says it is manageable. “If we can come out as planned over the
next six months, we have a really good chance of meeting all
the downstream dates,” says Mulholland. Having overcome
an aero-acoustic design issue that cropped up relatively late
in the preceding commercial crew phase, Boeing’s priority is
“obviously to keep a focus on mass. We have margin now but
we want to keep it,” says Mulholland. “Then there are just
the typical watch items such as finishing the design, releas-
ing the drawings and keeping good communications [going]
with suppliers.” c
SPACEBoeing’s CST-100 is scheduled for initial
uncrewed and crewed flights in 2017.BOEING CONCEPT圀漀爀氀搀䴀愀最猀⸀渀攀琀圀漀爀氀搀䴀愀最猀⸀渀攀琀
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