Artemis Moon Program

BlueAbyssal said:
Pretend I’m someone uninterested in space. How do you persuade me that Artemis is worthwhile, and that the SLS and Orion are irreplaceable assets for NASA?
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For every dollar spent on Apollo—you got a 7-10 buck return. NASA generated 71 billion
www.nasa.gov

NASA’s Economic Benefit Reaches All 50 States - NASA

Editor's note: NASA updated this release July 6, 2023, to included updated dollar amounts with tax revenue for the agency’s impact.NASA released the results
www.nasa.gov www.nasa.gov

The Dubya tax cut?

Keynes works for space at least.

But the real answer is soft power.

When Arty II flies Americans back to the Moon—it will be in spite of the Lori Garver obstructionists of the world—-not because of them.

The biggest waste in government spending was Lori Garver’s paychecks.
 
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publiusr said:
For every dollar spent on Apollo—you got a 7-10 buck return. NASA generated 71 billion
www.nasa.gov

NASA’s Economic Benefit Reaches All 50 States - NASA

Editor's note: NASA updated this release July 6, 2023, to included updated dollar amounts with tax revenue for the agency’s impact.NASA released the results
www.nasa.gov www.nasa.gov

The Dubya tax cut?

Keynes works for space at least.

But the real answer is soft power.

When Arty II flies Americans back to the Moon—it will be in spite of the Lori Garver obstructionists of the world—-not because of them.

The biggest waste in government spending was Lori Garver’s paychecks.
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Apollo was in an era where NASA and American industry had to develop everything from scratch. The SLS and Orion are doing nothing fundamentally new, are deliberately using older propulsion (which is always the long pole in development), and will not, themselves, enable any new lines of economic or scientific activity, except incidentally at best. Bush's tax cuts have no relevance to the discussion. Neither does Keynesian economics. CLPS is a far better example of something actually worthwhile that NASA is doing.

Going back to my avatar of indifference: okay, but I don't care. Who is Lori Garver? Why does anything she said or did matter? What does it matter to me if we land on the Moon? I don't get to go, and from what I hear it's a billion dollars or more for every astronaut who does. Putting people back on the Moon doesn't mean squat to me, it doesn't improve the power grid, grow food, improve education, lessen crime, help the national defense, or do anything but keep a bunch of white-collar people on what looks like to me well-paid welfare. If that's the best use of NASA's budget, shut the agency down, I say, or at least end Artemis. Leave space to the private sector, who at least isn't spending my tax dollars lining the pockets of Boeing and Lockheed's CEOs.

(Keep in mind that I know exactly who Garver is, publiusr. I'm playing devil's advocate. You're arguing minutiae that might be important to people who actually care about spaceflight, but someone who doesn't pay attention to space except in the broadest terms will neither know nor care, and will blow you off as being irrelevant at best, and disconnected from reality at worst, because you're bringing up internal squabbles to justify your position.)
 
Yeah, this is all inside baseball…

What is odd is that a stage-and-a-half deal like SLS would be easier for Musk to build…Falcon type strap-ons perhaps.

You would expect SLS level money to go to Starship. I’m only half joking when I say Boeing and SpaceX really need to swap rocket programs :)
 
My understanding is that Moon should be reached via SpaceX and the highest level of risk that comes with a Mars mission be delegated to NASA SLS.

I am sorry but that makes sense.
 
The LVs we have now…with New Glenn…mean a lot of mass could be launched in a short time. FH and SLS replace Ares I and V.

With a Starship and New Glenn…you could assemble Mars Flyby craft in short time…FLEM was to use just a single Saturn V.

We have far more options than in the 90’s when STS and and a few missile mods was all we had.
 
A video from the Space Bucket concerning potentials with the Orion CM's aft heat-shield:


It’s now been over a year since the Orion spacecraft splashed down concluding the Artemis 1 mission. While initial results were promising, soon after it was discovered that the spacecraft’s heat shield had eroded more than expected. By now in early 2024, the agency is still working on this issue to determine exactly what happened and whether or not changes are necessary.
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Last month the agency announced delays to both Artemis II and III, pushing each mission back at least by a year. This continued investigation into the heat shield is just one project of many that encouraged the agency to push back its launch date. Here I will go more in-depth into the main spacecraft issue, NASA’s current progress, when the agency expects to finish its investigation, and more.
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Full article here - https://thespacebucket.com/why-nasas-...
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I really do hope that this heat-shield issue can be resolved swiftly.
 
The propellant tanks for Artemis III's first-stage are on the move at Michoud:


Technicians at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans are simultaneously producing the core stages for the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket for NASA’s Artemis missions II, III, IV, and V. Most recently, both of the giant propellant tanks that will help fuel the Artemis III mission have been on the move inside the factory’s Vertical Assembly Building. The 130-foot-tall liquid hydrogen tank underwent internal cleaning prior to primer application while the liquid oxygen tank in a nearby manufacturing cell was fully welded to form one structure.
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While the theme seems to be sharing Artemis assembly images,

KSC-20240130-PH-GEB01_0006
Workers with NASA’s Exploration Ground Systems (EGS) paint the bright red NASA “worm” logo on the side of an Artemis II solid rocket booster segment inside the Rotation, Processing and Surge Facility (RPSF) at Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2024. The EGS team used a laser projector to mask off the logo with tape, then painted the first coat of the iconic design. The booster segments will help propel the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket on the Artemis II mission to send four astronauts around the Moon as part of the agency’s effort to establish a long-term science and exploration presence at the Moon, and eventually Mars. Photo credit: NASA/Glenn Benson
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https://flic.kr/p/2pywSid
View: https://flic.kr/p/2pywSid
 
NMaude said:
the original Meatball logo
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Original meatball logo does look grand, got 2 caps with it from NASA gift shop online.
Yet, if the check for the paint job is coming out of my bank account, we're painting the single-color worm!
And as an added bonus at no additional charge, a 4 story worm shows up well to the cameras.
 
In regards to the vertical friction-stir welding machine is it the only one in Michoud or are there more?
 
I just across this guy today and he has some was rather interesting progress videos to do with the SLS and the Orion CSM:


When I talk about the status or watch items for an Orion or SLS build for Artemis II, III, or IV, but in particular Artemis II and III, there are several things that I'm looking for. I wanted to run through some of the hardware pieces and some of the milestones that can be general indicators about overall progress or the status of a build. In this video, I'll go through some of the Orion hardware and milestones that we would expect to see or hear about during assembly and test of a spacecraft build.
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In this NASA Artemis update, EGS is continuing to prepare the SLS SRB motor segments for eventual Artemis II stacking and getting ready to test the emergency egress slidewire baskets at Pad 39B. NASA also provided an update on a key milestone for Artemis Gateway and HLS programs. Another RS-25 Retrofit 3b hot-fire test was conducted at the beginning of the week and a surprise one on the weekend. And the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel released their annual report for 2023, which highlighted some widely discussed, ongoing concerns about Artemis.
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In this NASA Artemis update on the Moon to Mars programs, the latest picture dump by NASA Public Affairs this past week gives us a peek inside the Orion spacecraft being assembled for Artemis II and shows recent milestones for Exploration Ground Systems (EGS) and Space Launch System (SLS).
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The Orion program released pictures of the inside of the Artemis II Orion crew module and the outside of the spacecraft's Service Module in the Industrial Operations Zone (IOZ) at the Kennedy Space Center in the Final Assembly Systems Test (FAST) cell.
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The EGS picture dump showed work to paint the NASA worm logo on the center-center SRB motor segments for Artemis II, which revealed that they were relocated from their positions on the Artemis I Boosters.
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The SLS pictures showed that the Core Stage-3 liquid oxygen (LOX) tank structure is finally complete and has left the big weld tool at Michoud Assembly Facility (MAF) in New Orleans after being stuck there for over a year. Completion of the LOX tank after issues were found is a big milestone in production and means that all the structures for the Artemis III Core Stage are now complete.
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And belatedly noting Gateway Logistics Services (GLS) Authority to Proceed (ATP) from last November, so now SpaceX can continue Dragon XL development to support pre-positioning logistics at the Gateway before Artemis IV.
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Not a lot of updates in terms of details or schedule yet after the delays to Artemis II and III, but there were a couple of notes about Orion spacecraft and SLS Core Stage functional testing for Artemis II.
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Very interesting and highly informative videos concerning the Artemis missions and hardware.
 
Up till this point I really thought that they would beat the Chinese to the race to the Moon since they already had the hardware ready on paper but I have only realised now that they really mishandled the whole mission planning and the project management part.

I really would not be surprised if we see them update their timeline to roughly match the Chinese plan.
 
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Michel Van said:
Texas landed on moon
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Since I *honestly* didn't follow the mission (because it was uncrewed, so who *really* cares about replicating the Surveyor landings more than half a century later???), just to make sure, *all* of the lander, launch vehicle, launch site, design, manufacturing, testing, verification, integration, validation. communication, and mission control facilities are located *exclusively* in Texas then, correct? Because otherwise it would be like Luxembourg claiming it is putting GEO comsats into space *all by its own*...
 
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the Intuitive Machines is a Texas Company
and they put Texas flag on lander
1024px-Intuitive_Machines%E2%80%99_Nova-C_lunar_lander_%28IM_00309%29_%28cropped%29.jpg
 
Illuminating and speculative thread.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1760865701995127191
View: https://twitter.com/coastal8049/status/1760865701995127191



What happened to IM-1 as it approached the Moon?
Intuitive Machines elected to not do TCM3.
The lander's trajectory diverged from the expected trajectory as it approach the Moon and at LOI entered the wrong orbit based on my data.
IM-1 didn't enter the expected orbit and couldn't make the landing time. One can see the lander was running >15 minutes early on published predictions after LOI. Coupled with the divergence before LOI tells us something.

This left Intuitive Machines with limited time to act as their cryogenic fuel was quickly boiling off forcing hasty changes to their landing plans and begin a series of orbital changes to attempt to get the lander down.

After some review, noted something interesting prior to all the scrambling in lunar orbit by the IM team all the predictions had a fixed landing time. Based on obs of previous landers their landing times changed based on past activities. IM-1 was doing this backward
Rather than allowing flexibility they were forcing solutions rather than correcting for minor errors in the trajectory. Add in the fact they are using a 'new' ground support network to determine 'where' IM-1 was possibly introduced significant errors.
I suggest they thought they knew where IM-1 was after TCM2 and cancelled TCM3, but really didn't know. Arrived at the LOI timing burned and ended up in the wrong orbit. Scrambled and somehow landed 'somewhere' on the Moon today.
The seat of the pants flying likely resulted is errors or suboptimal landing decisions. If they landed at a latitude longitude not planned for the HGA will be off. The hemispherics are aimed straight up.
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It has been a very long time Archibald that makes it almost 60 years since Surveyor 7 touched down as a prelude to Apollo 11. Now we are doing it all over again this time getting ready for Artemis 3.
 
I was born too late to see Apollo 17 Archibald sadly, so if NASA can succeed with Artemis 3 it will more than make up for it.
 
Seem the Moon strike back

Nova-C transmit too weak signal and
Eagle cam didn’t deploy during landing
 
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https://twitter.com/x/status/1761032731729739804
View: https://twitter.com/int_machines/status/1761032731729739804


Lunar Surface Day One Update (23FEB2024 0818 CST)
Odysseus is alive and well. Flight controllers are communicating and commanding the vehicle to download science data. The lander has good telemetry and solar charging.

We continue to learn more about the vehicle’s specific information (Lat/Lon), overall health, and attitude (orientation). Intuitive Machines CEO Steve Altemus will participate in a press conference later today to discuss this historic moment. Press conference information will be coordinated with NASA and published shortly.
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From the NSF thread:

For those waiting for EagleCame data:
Due to complications with Odysseus’ internal navigation system — specifically concerning the software patch to navigation data to include NASA’s NDL (Navigation Doppler Lidar) payload, which is meant to ensure a soft landing — the decision was made to power down EagleCam during landing and not deploy the device during Odysseus’ final descent.

However, both the Intuitive Machines and EagleCam teams still plan to deploy EagleCam and capture images of the lander on the lunar surface as the mission continues.

The time of deployment is currently unknown.
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The Space Bucket has just uploaded a video about the successful landing:


After a successful launch and week-long journey, a private company has managed to land on the Moon. This marks the first U.S. Moon landing in over half a century with the last one taking place in 1972. Despite a communication issue that occurred during the landing, the company responsible, Intuitive Machines, has reported that the uncrewed lander is upright and both sending and receiving data.
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With this part of its journey out of the way, it now plans to begin conducting a long list of science and experiments on the surface. However, the lander is not designed to survive the cold lunar night which puts some time pressure on its operations. Here I will go more in-depth into the vehicle’s landing, journey from Earth, its busy next few days, and more.
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Full article here - https://thespacebucket.com/a-private-...
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Perhaps at least a few of any following lander might want to try a low and wide form?

Now, true, getting a low and wide form to orbit in a tall and narrow rocket might insert some wrinkles in the mission fabric.

But, hey, those classic Lunar Rovers such as in the aforementioned Apollo 17 folded quite nicely to fit inside a limited space.

;) See, this is why we need flying saucers now, it takes a lot to tip a saucer.

(does "it takes a lot to tip a saucer" sound like some kind of advertising line or what)
 

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