Lawmakers Aim to End RD-180 Use by 2019

Triton

Triton

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"Lawmakers Aim to End RD-180 Use by 2019"
Dec. 3, 2014 - 04:59PM |
By AARON MEHTA | Comments
Source:
http://www.defensenews.com/article/20141203/DEFREG02/312030030

ORLANDO — If US lawmakers have their way, the Russian-built RD-180 engine will cease being used on military launches by 2019.

Language agreed upon for the FY2015 National Defense Authorization Act, finalized by negotiators for the Senate and House Tuesday, essentially puts a timetable on the use of the RD-180, a key component in the United Launch Alliance’s Atlas V space launch vehicle.

A summary of the NDAA language, obtained by Defense News, prohibits the use of the RD-180 for national security launches, with an exception of a waiver “if needed for national security and if space launch services cannot be obtained at a fair and reasonable price without the use” of the engines.

The language allows the use of any RD-180 engines procured before Russia’s invasion of Crimea, or purchased under an existing block-buy launch contract. That is key, as ULA signed an $11 billion agreement to cover all RD-180 purchases through 2019.

Notably, the language “mandates the development” of a new rocket propulsion system for the Pentagon, to be active by 2019. That is something that has been widely expected, with industry taking steps to prepare for such a deadline. ULA has teamed up with Seattle-based Blue Origin to offer a new rocket option, and Aerojet Rocketdyne has also offered a new solution.

Just how that will be funded – and there are multiple options out there, including public-private partnerships – is unclear from the summary, but Air Force officials have raised serious concerns about what impact that may have on its overall budget.

Taken all together, it is clear Congress wants the US to end its use of the Russian-made engine by 2019. The engine has been a key component of military launch since the middle of the last decade, but has become increasingly controversial since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In addition to the engine language, the summary orders the Air Force to add an additional “competitive” launch contract in FY15 and a second sometime between FY15 and FY17. While ULA has a monopoly on military space launch, competitor SpaceX is expected to be certified in the near future and has been lobbying hard through Congress to open up the number of potential launches it could bid on.
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http://spacenews.com/thornberry-wants-air-force-to-explain-why-it-needs-more-time-to-replace-rd-180/

http://spacenews.com/lawmakers-appear-divided-on-relaxing-terms-of-rd-180-ban/
 
and i heard US already got over 225000 pages of RD-180 manufacturing documents, enough to start production on their own. Why not just built RD-180 in the meantime before whatever "All American" Engine replacement ready.
 
You can't reliably just start stamping out rocket engines just because you have a bunch of documentation. You'd be amazed how much of the process is tribal knowledge. The document might say to "apply coating XYZ here," but it might not say *how* to apply that coating. What is the coating supposed to be thinned with before application? What temperature limits? Air dried? What humidity levels? Should it be baked on? You'd be amazed how many manufacturing steps are at the whim of one graybeard "artist" rather than hard data programmed into a CNC mill.

And, worse, going from Russian manufacturing to American means that some of the manufacturing steps could very well be *illegal.* "Before application of adhesive, clean mating surfaces with trichloroethane."

And some of the materials might well be unavailable. A foam, for example, is specified, that is produced by a single Russian vendor. But they went out of business seven years ago. Ooops.

All these problems can of course be dealt with. But by the time you've gone through the bother, you might very well have designed a clean-sheet design that avoids the problems entirely.
 
The term "tribal knowledge" should strike terror in the hearts of program managers everywhere.
 
I think what's meant is "tacit knowledge" - the knowledge one gains on the line from more experienced workers - the lack of which is part of the reason why F-1 production wasn't restarted in the 1980s.
 
Flying Sorcerer said:
I think what's meant is "tacit knowledge" - the knowledge one gains on the line from more experienced workers - the lack of which is part of the reason why F-1 production wasn't restarted in the 1980s.
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Tribal knowledge / tacit knowledge, same thing. The stuff that isn't in the engineering or work instructions that separates a good build from disaster.
 
I know I've told this story before, but what the heck: when I worked at United Tech, I was talking with some guys who were working on solid rocket components of A Certain Missile that had been transferred by the US to UT from Aerojet. When the program was transferred, so were the diagrams and manufacturing instructions. It took excessively long to transfer the paper diagrams into the UT CAD system, because the quality of the diagrams *sucked.* Old, blurry, 15th-generation copies, the effort was *not* made to make things easy for UT. Anyway, the drawings were converted and parts started being made. One rocket motor igniter was made per diagrams and instructions, put on the test stand, fired... and tore itself to bits. So a second one was tested, and it tore itself apart. This went on for a while, every time checking agains the diagrams. Best as anyone could tell, the parts were being made to spec, but the igniters blew themselves apart, every time. The official response from Aerojet was, I was told, essentially "not our problem."

After a while, one engineer or technician at UT was talking with one from Aerojet about this problem. "Oh, yeah, that. We had the same problem. So we just started making that one plate out of quarter inch stock rather than 1/8. Never bothered to change the diagrams or instructions, because why would you?"

Since the change was not "official," when UT made the change they had to jump through a lot of bureaucracy to make it official.

--------
And then there's machining practices. Let's say an important load-bearing component is to be machined 2.000 cm in diameter, +/- 0.001 cm. You get these instructions and do your best to make it dead nuts 2.000 cm. And every single unit fails. But they worked for the previous company. But why? Because when they made it 2.000 cm in diameter it failed, but when they made it 2.001 cm in diameter, it worked. So they knew to always ride on that side of the tolerance. They'd stay within the specified tolerance, but they knew that one extreme was better than the other, or even the dead-on exact spec.
 
When the deal was first announced in August 1997, Pratt & Whitney was going to establish a production line in West Palm Beach, FL to manufacture the RD-180 as part of a joint venture with NPO Energomash. I guess that never happened.
 
Triton said:
When the deal was first announced in August 1997, Pratt & Whitney was going to establish a production line in West Palm Beach, FL to manufacture the RD-180 as part of a joint venture with NPO Energomash. I guess that never happened.
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They were under no pressure to get started. Lockheed, later ULA, was more than happy to keep paying the Russian price for engines. The Air Force was already paying more than it wanted to for the EELVs, adding the price of a US-produced RD-180 was undesirable. RD-AMROSS execs were and are making a mint with the status quo. And Rocketdyne changed hands.
 
Moose said:
They were under no pressure to get started. Lockheed, later ULA, was more than happy to keep paying the Russian price for engines. The Air Force was already paying more than it wanted to for the EELVs, adding the price of a US-produced RD-180 was undesirable. RD-AMROSS execs were and are making a mint with the status quo. And Rocketdyne changed hands.
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I seem to remember reading that Lockheed Martin took an equity stake in NPO Energomash “V. P. Glushko" during this period, which has since been sold.
 
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/jun/15/pentagon-seeks-repeal-of-russian-rocket-ban/
 
http://www.space.com/31485-air-force-rocket-research-contracts.html
 
http://breakingdefense.com/2016/01/mccain-intros-bill-to-stop-rd-180-use-pentagon-urges-caution/

EDIT: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-space-russia-idUSKCN0V522D
 
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Pentagon_Cant_Overcome_Its_Russian_Engines_Addiction_McCain_999.html

http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/James_describes_way_forward_to_Space_Launch_System_999.html
 
http://breakingdefense.com/2016/02/shelby-air-force-press-case-to-keep-rd-180-mccain-not-so-much/
 
AR1.jpg

​
Grey Havoc said:
Battle Over Space Launch Heating Up (UPDATED) [National Defense magazine]
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Wishing for a US-Made Heavy Lift Rocket Won’t Make It So (Defense One)
 
Another article which adroitly maneuvers around any mention of Delta.
 
I dont know, it might just have something to do with the fact Atlas V launches like 2/3's of the missions, is by far cheaper and that Delta IV (other than the heavy config) will be phased out by 2018?
 
Yes but if you're making a pure cost argument, Atlas loses its shirt to Falcon, in fact Falcon may cost enough less than Atlas to pay for Delta's cost premium. And Delta, which doesn't use a politically unpalatable engine, is not exactly unreliable. Neither does it turn into a pumpkin in 2018, that sunset is a decision ULA has made for business reasons, and since both RS-68 and Delta core will remain in oroduction to support Heavy it's arguably not so much being phased out as omitted from the sales brochure. So arguing that barring ULA from futher RD-180 purchases imperils the US on national security grounds, while sparing not one word to point out that ULA itself is kikking/scaling back one of the alternatives to shave cash burn, is being dishonest.
 
flanker said:
I dont know, it might just have something to do with the fact Atlas V launches like 2/3's of the missions, is by far cheaper and that Delta IV (other than the heavy config) will be phased out by 2018?
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I'm surprised ULA never pursued the 3-core variant of Atlas V in place of Delta IV Heavy.
 
Government, industry rocket propulsion experts to convene this month
September 01, 2016

The Air Force will provide an update later this month on its work to develop innovative solutions to improve rocket propulsion performance -- work that could feed into a separate effort to develop a new, domestically-produced rocket engine.

Before the Air Force began pouring time and resources into eliminating its reliance on the Russian-made RD-180 rocket engine, the service in 2010 created a program called Rocket Propulsion for the 21st Century to provide a venue for government and industry to "share, critique and discuss" ongoing rocket propulsion science and technology efforts, service spokesman Daryl Mayer told Inside the Air Force on Aug. 31. The group is an outgrowth of a previous effort called the Integrated High Payoff Rocket Propulsion Technology (IHPRPT) program, which was established in 1996.

Mayer explained that the service does not directly award contracts through RP21, but the program directs and informs other technology development efforts.

"RP21 is simply an umbrella program to give a direction to technology efforts and ensure they are aligned with customer/warfighter needs," he said.

The service announced in August that the group -- made up of representatives from the Air Force, Navy, Army, NASA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the U.S. rocket propulsion industry -- will meet in Arlington, VA, Sept. 13-15 to brief technology development efforts and discuss progress toward meeting program goals. It also released a request for information Aug. 16 asking industry to submit plans for advancing rocket propulsion technology and to provide feedback on the government's plan.

Congress in fiscal year 2015 directed the Air Force to end its reliance by 2019 on the Russian-made RD-180, which powers the United Launch Alliance's Atlas V launch vehicle. ULA, until recently, has been the service's sole-source provider of Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle-class launches, and the Atlas V has been its workhorse for those missions.

In response to the congressional directive, the service has teamed with industry, through public-private partnerships, to invest in new launch technology and support efforts to leverage that technology to develop new propulsion systems and launch vehicles.

Mayer told ITAF that although RP21 and its predecessor program were established long before the recent push to eliminate the use of the RD-180, the group has long had a goal to support the development of a rocket engine that "meets/exceeds the performance of the RD-180 engine."

"So the Air Force effort to invest in a new launch vehicle and eliminate reliance on the RD-180 is leveraging technology development efforts that are derived from the RP21 program goals," he said.

According to briefing slides provided this week to ITAF, RP21 has a number of performance goals with initial thresholds it expects to meet by 2017 and then further improvements on those thresholds it expects to achieve by 2027. The technical goals include a reduction in stage failure rate, an increase in efficiency and a reduction in engine turn time. The goals apply to boost and orbit transfer propulsion -- which includes efforts related to sustaining strategic systems like intercontinental ballistic missiles and submarine-launched ballistic missiles -- as well as spacecraft propulsion and tactical propulsion.

"The FY-17 goals correspond to a smaller improvement over the baseline -- achievable, for the most part, with directed investment," Mayer said. "The FY-27 goals are more aggressive and require more broad research and development before directed investment can be made, hence the longer time line." -- Courtney Albon
 
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/US_Russia_Venture_Hopes_to_Sell_More_RD_180_Rocket_Engines_to_US_999.html
 

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