SpaceX Dragon 2 Making Progress
SpaceX Crew Dragon ship in anechoic chamber for EMI testing before being sent to @NASA Plum Brook vacuum chamber pic.twitter.com/BckUBkroLw
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 21, 2018
Elon Musk has taken a break from digging holes in the ground to tweet a bit on SpaceX and the Dragon 2 crew vehicle the company is building for NASA’s Commercial Crew Program.
Commercial Crew astronaut Suni Williams wearing a #SpaceX spacesuit while training with a mock-up of the Crew Dragon in Hawthorne, California
????: NASA, April 3, 2018 pic.twitter.com/mnj3hvovsq
— Robin Seemangal (@nova_road) May 18, 2018
Earlier this month, Musk tweeted that the first Dragon 2 would be shipped to Cape Canaveral in about three months. If the prediction is accurate, that would be mean sometime in August. If his previous schedule predictions are anything to go by, delivery will occur later than that. Unless, of course, SpaceX ships the spacecraft earlier than Musk is predicting.
In any event, the spacecraft will likely require a lot of prep work at the Cape before it makes an automated flight test to the International Space Station. A second flight to ISS with a crew would follow before Dragon 2 would be certified to carry NASA astronauts on a commercial basis.
20 responses to “SpaceX Dragon 2 Making Progress”
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It will be earlier, unless it’s earlier…
Way to go out on a limb with that prediction, Doug.
😀
So it will fly in September
it would be nice to see it fly successfully, in August.
Yes but early September is fine, haven’t heard much about Boeing’s status, they fix the heat shield getting in the way of the capsule problem?
Maybe. Maybe at the end of the year.
doubtful, this is a delivery date, not an early in development projected completion date, basically it means its just needs the finishing touches and checks before shipping
Missed that the capsule that is used for the uncrewed missions, will then be re-used for in-flight abort, which is supposed to be oct/nov time frame.
Again subject to the musk time relativity.
The bolt pattern on those scarfed thruster triplets hurts my desire for universal symmetry.
If you join the dots you probably get the outline of the BFS of the BFR – Elon Musk secret code stuff, Jeff. 🙂 Regards, Paul.
NASA said that if the Crewed Demo of either the Dragon 2 or Starliner is delayed far enough into 2019, they will send it up on a full crew rotation mission instead of just a two week test. If that happens, will the Commercial Crew Cadre astronauts get bumped in favor of the mission crew?
If that happens, it seems like NASA should be able to see it coming far enough in advance for the Commercial Crew Cadre (CCC – I like it!) to be the mission crew.
Plus after the crewed demos those astronauts will join the regular rotation,
The important question is, what will they use as a mass simulator, i think a hat, not a flamethrower, and a brick, but that might be too Boring…
I hope her gloved finger will get what she wants on the touch screen. My finger is too big for my little tablet. I need a pointer on a regular laptop. That trunk section , I did not expect strips. Maybe to make a flat surface for the solar cells. Or it represents those cells. Wild looking. Not much more waiting. I guess they are sure the windows will withstand a Amos type explosion. Maybe they have covers that come off.
With a decent UI design, that shouldn’t be a problem (i.e. you don’t make the buttons tiny since you have a large screen to work with). Those touch screens are rather large. I’m pretty sure they’re the same (or similar) as the ones used in the Tesla Model S so I’m sure they’ve already had a lot of use by people with “fat fingers”.
Plus the gloves could be designed to aid in touch screen control.
Well with gloves there are no smudges. My tablet will only work with a bare finger. I am sure that it will work fine.
Dragon 1 doesn’t seem to require a lot of on-site prep work at the Cape – except for the obvious loading of cargo. Perhaps the initial unmanned Dragon 2 launch will also be packed full of freight. Even if so, it’s far from obvious that said mission is going to be later than August in departing for ISS.
My bet is September, it will bring stuff to ISS mostly as mass simulator, but it needs to simulate downmass as well. And knowing SpaceX that mass simulator will be fun.
A control stick is better, like the one I used for 3 years on the F-4 radar. Touch screens need a lot cleaning. SpaceX should let her try one. Need one to control Dragon any way.