William Atkins
Wednesday, 20 August 2008 05:11
Science -
Space
Page 1 of 2
NASA announced on Tuesday, August 19, 2008 that it has worked out a solution to the excessive-vibration problem in its yet-to-be developed Ares 1 launch vehicle.
The Ares 1 rocket will take astronauts into space inside their Orion
crew capsule as part of the new Project Constellation for the United States. The first manned flight is due around 2015.
However, early in the design phase of the Ares 1, NASA engineers found that combustion in the solid-fuel motor would spread excessive vibration throughout the multi-stage Ares 1 rocket and the Orion crew capsule.
Although the larger-than-desired vibrations would only appear for a few seconds—at the end of the firing of the first stage (centered at 115 seconds into the flight)—the motions could very likely affect negatively the performance of astronauts during launch, especially in an emergency, if one should occur.
The NASA teleconference held the morning of August 19th relayed the message from NASA project managers that they plan to limit such vibrations to “one-quarter of a g force." That is, 25% of the force of gravity (g, but sometimes also stated as “G”) on Earth.
In other words, the astronauts will still experience several g-forces during ascent in their Orion capsule, but the vibrations (themselves) will contribute only 0.25g to the overall force exerted down on them.
Page two continues....
