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Titan 4 rocket could launch from Cape late next week BY JUSTIN RAY SPACEFLIGHT NOW Posted: April 20, 2005 With a little ingenuity, elbow grease and help from 3,000 miles away, the Titan 4 rocket team is working to overcome ground equipment headaches that have kept the big booster bolted to its Cape Canaveral launch pad this month instead of flying a classified national security space mission.
The problem was traced to corrosion emanating from the ground storage tanks that clogged a filter in launch pad pipes and hurt a pumping unit at Cape Canaveral's Complex 40. The situation prevented the oxidizer from flowing into the rocket. "What we are finding is a magnetite, which is a corrosion product that is from the reaction with the oxidizer and what seems to be a long-term storage," Lt. Col. Jimmy Comfort, commander of the 3rd Space Launch Squadron at the Cape and the Air Force launch director, said in an interview. "Our first couple of efforts (to fuel the rocket) kept clogging that filter." The nitrogen tetroxide is pumped from the pad reservoirs, passes through the filter area that experienced the clogs, follows the feedlines up to the launch platform and is filtered again before actually entering the rocket stages. Crews decided to enhance the first filtering by building a contraption that a team member dubbed the "Medusa Manifold." "We were getting those filter clogs with this magnetite, so we went off and did two things," Comfort said. "We want to filter all of the stuff that is getting to the vehicle, so we have built an 8-filter manifold. Usually, we just have one filter but we've built 8 of them, and we lovingly call it the Medusa Manifold. If you can picture it -- it is one line going in, breaking off into 8 lines and filters on each of those 8 lines, and coming back into one line again that filters up to the vehicle."
"I'd like to say we built it in our Monster Garage out back," Comfort joked, referencing the popular Discovery Channel show. Secondly, the team has removed the ground pump due to concerns it could have been damaged by the magnetite. "This is not just a pump you can go buy down at Wal-Mart. It is something that has to work with nitrogen tetroxide -- highly corrosive stuff," Comfort said, adding: "This particular pump uses the nitrogen tetroxide as its own coolant to cool the shaft." In search of a quick replacement pump, the Cape team called across the country to Vandenberg Air Force Base in California where Titan rockets are also launched. The borrowed oxidizer pump was brought 3,000 miles to Florida earlier this week, and crews were busy Wednesday installing it into the Complex 40 plumbing. "We said let's put a known, good quantity pump in there. That is actually what we are doing today," Comfort said. "They did take the end cap off and everything looked very good. So that pump looked to be in very pristine condition." With the Medusa Manifold and pump in place, the team will turn its focus to building yet another new filtering system. This one will aid the coolant line to preserve the pump's life. "We're in the filter business in a big way," said Comfort. "We're filtering to beat our clogging issue in general, but we're also filtering that coolant line to protect the pump." After the fuel lines are reconnected, the whole system will undergo a leak test to ensure reliability before re-attempting to fill the rocket stages. If all goes well, Comfort said the rocket stages could receive their load of nitrogen tetroxide on Sunday or Monday. That should lead to liftoff next Thursday or Friday night. "Whenever we get OX loaded, we're roughly four days from a launch opportunity at that point." The Aerozine 50 fuel -- a mixture of hydrazine and unsymmetrical dimethyl-hydrazine -- is already aboard the first and second stages. That loading process occurred a couple of weeks ago, at the time when the oxidizer trouble first surfaced. This will be Cape Canaveral's final Titan launch, ending five decades of flights from the Space Coast.
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Michael Griffin, NASA's new administrator, holds his first news conference from agency headquarters to discuss shuttle return to flight, exploration plans and Hubble servicing. (46min 44sec file)
During his first day on the job, Michael Griffin, NASA's new administrator, addresses agency employees and answers questions on a variety of topics on April 14. (28min 50sec file)
Space shuttle Discovery begins its 4.2-mile journey from the Vehicle Assembly Building to launch pad 39B atop the Apollo-era crawler-transporter. (10min 30sec file)
Shuttle Discovery makes its way down the crawlerway under beautiful Florida skies. (5min 00sec file)
The transporter reaches the point where the crawlerway splits into two paths to the Complex 39 pads and makes the turn for pad 39B. (7min 11sec file)
As viewed from the Vehicle Assembly Building, space shuttle Discovery rolls northward and past launch pad 39A in the background. (4min 23sec file)
Discovery's rollout enters the early evening as the shuttle heads north toward launch pad 39B. (6min 15sec file)
This time lapse movie shows shuttle Discovery rolling up the ramp and arriving at launch pad 39B after the 10.5-hour trip from the VAB. (3min 32sec file)
The gantry-like Rotating Service Structure to moved around Discovery to enclose the orbiter just before sunrise, a couple of hours after the shuttle reached the pad, as seen is time lapse movie. (1min 26sec file)
