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Boeing Starliner, leaving its crew behind, lands in New Mexico

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Re: Boeing Starliner, leaving its crew behind, lands in New Mexico

#51

Post by pie_flavor »

anonzzzies wrote: post #48
cbanek wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(I worked at SpaceX) Two words: flight heritage. Successful concepts are very often reused. For example, heat shields, parachute landings, sea landings, air bags for landings on hard land, etc. Now, let me try to explain this in something similar: cars. Cars are all pretty much the same. They have a steering wheel, 4 tires, transmission, engine, etc. The parts all do the same thing in different cars, but we don't alw…

> But if you're starting from scratch, you've lost all the "little fixes" that go into making a car good. This is also the reason massive software rewrites often fail; you rebuild the general gist quite fast, nice code, lovely interfaces etc but it will have a trillion bugs which come from decades of adding an exception here, adding one there etc. So now you have a beautiful albeit worthless product. And often these…

Joel Spolsky has an excellent writeup on this principle, explaining why it led to Netscape dying: https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-...

Re: Boeing Starliner, leaving its crew behind, lands in New Mexico

#52

Post by lenkite »

vegetablepotpie wrote: post #11
dghlsakjg wrote: post #3

I'm genuinely curious what has happened in the past 50 years that we can't iterate on already successful concepts? Did we have a higher risk tolerance back then? Is Boeing genuinely this bad? Not to sound too cliched, but we put a man on the moon. We put a CAR on the moon. Why can't the successors of those same companies be trusted to retrieve two people from LEO?

Although that happened over 50 years ago, and we can’t make the same exact designs, the physics is the same and well understood. Technology has evolved, and has given us more tools. Similar cultures can be made again that support that kind of work. What’s missing is we need better cultures. I’ve been in engineering cultures that are dominated by management desires to cut costs and deliver on schedule. Engineering exc…

That article sheds further light on the whistle blower who was assassinated. Didn't know John Barnett was such a major lightning rod at Boeing, documenting corruption to such an extraordinary extent that he was regularly abused by management and the CEO Jim McNerney. And finally was murdered when he was giving testimony. What a tragedy.

Re: Boeing Starliner, leaving its crew behind, lands in New Mexico

#53

Post by Am4TIfIsER0ppos »

dghlsakjg wrote: post #15
carabiner wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

? The Starliner landed successfully, so we have shown that we can iterate.

The capsule landed successfully, but it was missing about 400 pounds of the most important cargo.

Those are a pair of fat astronauts! Although I guess their spacesuits were missing too so maybe it adds up to that.

Re: Boeing Starliner, leaving its crew behind, lands in New Mexico

#54

Post by Bluestein »

cbanek wrote: post #18
dghlsakjg wrote: post #3

I'm genuinely curious what has happened in the past 50 years that we can't iterate on already successful concepts? Did we have a higher risk tolerance back then? Is Boeing genuinely this bad? Not to sound too cliched, but we put a man on the moon. We put a CAR on the moon. Why can't the successors of those same companies be trusted to retrieve two people from LEO?

(I worked at SpaceX) Two words: flight heritage. Successful concepts are very often reused. For example, heat shields, parachute landings, sea landings, air bags for landings on hard land, etc. Now, let me try to explain this in something similar: cars. Cars are all pretty much the same. They have a steering wheel, 4 tires, transmission, engine, etc. The parts all do the same thing in different cars, but we don't alw…

> For the question as why can't we make Apollo ships or Saturn V's anymore, a lot of plans and drawings were lost. Key people making decisions, testing, or even building parts on an assembly line weren't there.

"Know-how rot" is a thing. Actual people involved are literally dying off, and knowledge is being lost. It could have been a peak, the Apollo program.-

Re: Boeing Starliner, leaving its crew behind, lands in New Mexico

#55

Post by tim333 »

skissane wrote: post #7
dghlsakjg wrote: post #3

I'm genuinely curious what has happened in the past 50 years that we can't iterate on already successful concepts? Did we have a higher risk tolerance back then? Is Boeing genuinely this bad? Not to sound too cliched, but we put a man on the moon. We put a CAR on the moon. Why can't the successors of those same companies be trusted to retrieve two people from LEO?

> I'm genuinely curious what has happened in the past 50 years that we can't iterate on already successful concepts? I think SpaceX has been doing a great job of that, with Crew Dragon. > Did we have a higher risk tolerance back then? Yes, but also fewer options. This is the first time NASA has ever had a choice between two completely different American spacecraft to return crew on. It is like if you own two cars, an…

There'a an answer here on what went wrong. It seems some Boeing management knew the thrusters could overheat but didn;t fix it to save a few bob https://anythingspaceastronomy.quora.com/Boeing-Management-o...

It seems rather reminiscent of their other problems of doing a hack on the 737 Max which caused the crashes and ignoring safety inspections which caused the panel to blow out.

It's kind of interesting if you see Musk talk about the rockets design it's evident he pretty much understands it all and controls the money and so is able to make sensible decisions to do this, don't do that - see this 2021 vid for example https://youtu.be/t705r8ICkRw . With Boeing you get the impression you don't really have that and you have an accountant type saying your budget for this is $x without undertanding they engineering they are paying for.

Re: Boeing Starliner, leaving its crew behind, lands in New Mexico

#56

Post by blisterpeanuts »

Mistletoe wrote: post #27
dghlsakjg wrote: post #3

I'm genuinely curious what has happened in the past 50 years that we can't iterate on already successful concepts? Did we have a higher risk tolerance back then? Is Boeing genuinely this bad? Not to sound too cliched, but we put a man on the moon. We put a CAR on the moon. Why can't the successors of those same companies be trusted to retrieve two people from LEO?

Our IQ is literally dropping, I don’t think you need more than that. Going to outer space is hard. It requires intelligent people at every level and they need to be focused on what they are doing. Our era is an era of massive distraction and less intelligent people. >Flynn attributed this increase to better nutrition. Flynn continued his work and other scientists followed suit until they all noticed that children bor…

American culture has changed, and academic excellence is less treasured today.

Re: Boeing Starliner, leaving its crew behind, lands in New Mexico

#57

Post by blisterpeanuts »

I’ll say it, since no one else is: Congratulations to Boeing! This is a much needed victory at a time when their reputation has taken a beating (most of it deserved).

Over on Slashdot, it was reported that the likely cause was: a “Teflon seal in a valve known as a ‘poppet’ expanded as it was being heated by the nearby thrusters, significantly constraining the flow of the oxidizer”.

As Musk’s SpaceX team has stated repeatedly, every failure provides data for future success. At least they have a good idea as to why the thrusters failed, and the design can probably be modified and retested in a couple of uncrewed launches in 2025 or 2026.

The thrusters can be fixed. The question is whether Boeing can fix its culture.

Re: Boeing Starliner, leaving its crew behind, lands in New Mexico

#59

Post by manuelmoreale »

dartos wrote: post #37
skissane wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm genuinely curious what has happened in the past 50 years that we can't iterate on already successful concepts? I think SpaceX has been doing a great job of that, with Crew Dragon. > Did we have a higher risk tolerance back then? Yes, but also fewer options. This is the first time NASA has ever had a choice between two completely different American spacecraft to return crew on. It is like if you own two cars, an…

Didn’t get a ton of grants from the government? Like $15B over the last 20 years. https://qz.com/elon-musks-spacex-and-tesla-get-far-more-gove... . Is that not “cost-plus?”

> Is that not “cost-plus?”

No it is not. From wiki:

> A cost-plus contract, also termed a cost plus contract, is a contract such that a contractor is paid for all of its allowed expenses, plus additional payment to allow for risk and incentive sharing.

Spacex has received money over the last 20 years because they were awarded different contracts and they provided different services to the government.

From re-supplying the ISS, to launching satellites, to taking people to orbit.

Re: Boeing Starliner, leaving its crew behind, lands in New Mexico

#60

Post by tiahura »

tim333 wrote: post #55
skissane wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm genuinely curious what has happened in the past 50 years that we can't iterate on already successful concepts? I think SpaceX has been doing a great job of that, with Crew Dragon. > Did we have a higher risk tolerance back then? Yes, but also fewer options. This is the first time NASA has ever had a choice between two completely different American spacecraft to return crew on. It is like if you own two cars, an…

There'a an answer here on what went wrong. It seems some Boeing management knew the thrusters could overheat but didn;t fix it to save a few bob https://anythingspaceastronomy.quora.com/Boeing-Management-o... It seems rather reminiscent of their other problems of doing a hack on the 737 Max which caused the crashes and ignoring safety inspections which caused the panel to blow out. It's kind of interesting if you see…

Did you actually read the link you posted? It discusses a failure in involving designing and communicating specifications, not trying to save a buck.
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