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SLS and Orion

NASA Can't Decide What SLS Engines It Does/Does Not Need

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
September 8, 2015
Filed under , , ,
NASA Can't Decide What SLS Engines It Does/Does Not Need

Decision looms on when to introduce new SLS upper stage, Spaceflight Now
“Officials initially planned to power the upper stage with a J-2X engine, a modernized powerplant based on the J-2 engine designed in the Apollo era. But managers decided the J-2X, which had roots in the canceled Constellation moon program, was overpowered for the job and sidelined the engine after a series of hotfire ground tests. NASA spent more than $1.4 billion on the J-2X engine from 2006 through 2014, an agency spokesperson said.”
Using Jedi Mind Tricks to Sell NASA’s Next Big Rocket (2014), earlier post
“The initial plan was to launch EM-1 with an upper stage composed of a modified Boeing Delta IV upper stage i.e. the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage (ICPS). After trying this for several years, and spending $400 million or so, NASA realized that this was not going to work. So they are going to ask Boeing to deliver a standard Delta IV upper stage and use that. NASA then wants to commence work on a 4 engine Exploration Upper Stage (EUS) that will only be used a few times.”
NASA Set for New Round Of J-2X Testing at Stennis Space Center, (2013) earlier post
“NASA’s progress toward a return to deep space missions continues with a new round of upcoming tests on the next-generation J-2X rocket engine, which will help power the agency’s Space Launch System (SLS) to new destinations in the solar system.”
NASA OIG: Final Memorandum on the Review of NASA’s Plan to Build the A-3 Facility for Rocket Propulsion Testing (2008), earlier posting
“We found that NASA’s Upper Stage Engine (USE) Element Manager, located at Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama, reviewed the J-2X rocket propulsion testing options and selected the A-3 test stand to be built at Stennis without the required formal reviews or recommendations of the NRPTA, or NASA’s RPTMB.”
NASA OIG: NASA’s Decision Process for Conducting Space Launch System Core Stage Testing at Stennis, (2014) earlier post
“Similar to the OIG’s conclusions 5 years ago, the OIG found that NASA failed to follow its internal policies or its agreement with the DOD when it decided to spend approximately $352 million to refurbish and test the SLS core stage on the B-2 test stand at Stennis.”
NASA Has No Clear Use for the J-2X That It Once Needed, earlier post

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

24 responses to “NASA Can't Decide What SLS Engines It Does/Does Not Need”

  1. Daniel Woodard says:
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    ‘Hill said NASA has no concerns with putting humans on the first flight of a new upper stage.’

    So, if a Commercial Crew provider wants to do the same thing, NASA would have no concerns….

    How many people remember the beginnings of project Apollo? Maybe the biggest single question was whether to use Earth Orbit Rendezvous or hurl the entire mission into space with one really big rocket. The rush to get to the Moon ASAP dictated the latter course, but assembling the mission in LEO as von Braun originally proposed might have reduced recurring cost, increased flexibility by separating LV payload from mission payload, and left us with a more sustainable LEO-first architecture.

  2. Matthew Black says:
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    The upper stage for the SLS could be somewhat simple and still very capable: base it on the Delta IV-Heavy’s 5 meter upper stage, but stretch it’s propellant tanks for about a 40% percent increase and buy the powerful 60k thrust Mitsubishi MB-60 LOX/LH2 engine to power it. Job done – for a capability somewhere between the ICPS and the EUS but for a fraction of the cost. And an even better option would be to go with the ACES stage design from the ULA which is already under development for the Vulcan launcher.

    • Jeff2Space says:
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      Last I heard, development of MB-60 was still incomplete. Perhaps 90% of the way there. But unfortunately, that last 10% of engineering development always seems to take more than 10% of the engineering development budget.

      I get a 404 error when I try to click on the P&W RL-60 link that came up in a Google search.

  3. Jeff2Space says:
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    the J-2X engine was needed in Ares I to make up for the lack of overall performance of the solid first stage. Once Ares I died, the need for the J-2X evaporated. On both Ares V and SLS, the venerable RL-10 engine fits the bill quite nicely, because you can fit more than one under the much wider EDS stage.

  4. NASA Taxpayer says:
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    Let me get this straight. The SLS program and HEOMD:
    – Wasted billions of dollars finishing a J-2X upper stage engine they later decided that they don’t want for at least a couple more decades (if ever);
    – Wasted hundreds of millions of dollars developing a variant Delta IV upper stage they later decided that they don’t want;
    – Blew hundreds of millions of dollars adapting a standard Delta IV upper stage that will only be used once (maybe twice);
    – Wasted tens of millions of dollars refurbishing two Stennis test stands that were unneeded and selected under dubious circumstances;
    And now HEOMD (or at least its deputy) is complaining that they don’t have enough funding to start their fourth choice for SLS upper stage development in time for only the second SLS launch six years from now? Gee, I wonder why? Could it be that the SLS program and HEOMD pissed away billions of taxpayer dollars and years of schedule on unused upper stages, engines, and test stands?
    Cry me a river. The White House and Congress should put an end to this mismanagement. The taxpayer should not have to shoulder the burden of the SLS program and HEOMD’s inability to engineer their way out of a wet paper bag.

    • Ben Russell-Gough says:
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      It IS a mess. It’s just a reminder of the level of politics and pork-distribution in public sector contracts. Money had to be distributed to certain Centres and certain districts via contractors or the political coalition supporting NASA might fall apart!

      There has to be a better way of doing this but, ultimately, I’m not sure that there is the political will to enact it.

      • Jeff2Space says:
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        The better way to do this is “commercial HLV”, which would have the US launch industry develop not one, but two, commercial HLVs in exactly the same way that the commercial cargo and commercial crew programs have been run. But, that would very likely kill SLS entirely, which Congress would not support.

    • Hug Doug ✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ says:
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      Congress / the White House is largely responsible for the mismanagement in the first place…

    • Panice says:
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      There’s nothing new here, folks. This is a well trod path. Besides Constellation, there was X-33, NASP, and about 10 other programs that spent billions without producing a single flight vehicle. There’s no reason to expect anything else from SLS.

  5. Ben Russell-Gough says:
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    Basically, I think that the upper stage engine boils down to two choices: RL-10C or MB-60. J-2X is a fantastic achievement in its own way but it is an ETO upper stage, not a BEO upper stage and its performance reflects that. Even in the ‘money is no object’ days of the Ares Launch System, J-2X was not intended for the Ares-V Dual-Use Upper Stage (DUUS) but a higher-efficiency derivation called the J-2XD.

    FWIW, I’d build a half-dozen or so of the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stages to stick in storage just in case they’re needed for SOMD missions like heavyweight space probes. However, I’d definitely look at 6 x RL-10C or 4 x MB-60 on a core-diameter DUUS for the SLS upper stage. It’s the minimum-cost and maximum-adaptability choice, especially as the runes are pointing towards SEP for propulsion on the crewed BEO missions.

    • space1999 says:
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      I’m curious why you say “J-2X is a fantastic achievement in its own way but it is an ETO upper stage, not a BEO upper stage and its performance reflects that.” Of the current RL-10 variants, the max ISP listed is 462 s, whereas the J-2X is listed as 448 s. The J-2X produces an order of magnitude more thrust, and is correspondingly heavier, but it has a higher thrust/weight ratio (55 vs 40). Also apparently the “J-2X is capable of four operational starts for 2,000 seconds” (Rocketdyne specs) vs a burn time of 700 seconds for the RL-10. Just wondering what in the above limits J-2X usefulness to earth to orbit. Thanks.

      • Ben Russell-Gough says:
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        Fuel-efficiency; it’s lower than a true BLEO engine. You would simply get less performance per unit propellent lifted into LEO with J-2X.

      • pathfinder_01 says:
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        Thrust and thrust to weight are more useful and important for first and second stages. (i.e. Not enough thrust and gravity losses will eat into performance.)

        For Saturn V the numbers kinda worked out and there was an cost savings by using the J2 in the 2nd and 3rd stage. The RL10 was the first choice for the moon program but cost and performance numbers tilted it towards J2. Esp. as the RL10 is an poor 2nd stage engine and would have only been used in the 3rd stage.

        For SLS there are cost savings by not using J2 at all and ISP trumps thrust in upper stage engines(no or not much advantage for using the J2) and whatever advantage comes at very high cost(RL10 is used in the Centaur and will be cheaper esp. in volume.).

        Basically Saturn V and Ares 1 needed their J2. In the 2nd stage for Saturn V(with cost savings for using it in the 3rd) and Ares 1(staged too low for the RL10 due to the solid first stage.) SLS does not need the J2-X because it can stage higher and faster.

  6. numbers_guy101 says:
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    A curious title to that article – think about it “Decision looms on when to introduce new SLS upper stage”. When to introduce? Like it’s something that exists and we will say “Hello, I’m the EUS!”

    When will it be introduced?

    When NASA gets NEW money!

    This is the sort of thing some people inside NASA try to warn projects about – plan ahead, don’t get into a half of a program thinking this will somehow embarrass congress into funding the other half.

    Don’t cooperate with poor direction – state the situation, put facts out there, say when things won’t add up, even while doing what you’ve been told by Congress.

    Being told to do something is one thing. Understandable. Becoming a collaborator and reinforcing the farce is another thing entirely.

    Sounds familiar? Even now the same warnings go out only to get the same responses. What goes atop the SLS and EUS? The response is a variation on (A) silence, crickets, nada, (B) “well, we do what we can, no one can see the future”, (C) “well, that’s congress’s fault for funding half a thing”, (D) “one day, when this country wakes up” …(channel Gregory Peck speech from Other People’s Money), and (E) queue endless PowerPoint charts about Mars things, should maybe possibly (in a fantasy universe) money rain from the sky down to NASA for the next 40 years.

    Just sad. I don’t know which is worse, people not wanting to hear the right answers because these present unpleasant career shifting challenges, or people who with mental gymnastics (cognitive dissonance?) actually start to support the poor directions chosen.