Astra - znów nieudany start 15.12. o 20:55 z Kodiak wystrzelona została RN Rocket v3.2, która miała wynieść w T+8' 32" na orbitę o parametrach: hp=380 km, ha=380 km, i=98,1° pakiet instrumentów rejestrujących parametry lotu.
Lot zakończył się niepowodzeniem, rakieta osiągnęła wysokość 390 km, ale prędkość jedynie 7,2 km/s zamiast 7,68 km/s.http://lk.astronautilus.pl/n201201.htm#13Launch of Astra's "Rocket 3.2"82 wyświetlenia•16 gru 2020
Astra@Astra At T+145 to T+153, Rocket 3.2 crossed the Karman line entering outer space and successfully completed fairing separation, stage separation and upper stage ignition
8:03 PM · 16 gru 2020
https://twitter.com/Astra/status/1339285108071649282Astra@Astra The upper stage continued to burn for six minutes and 48 seconds, precisely reaching the target apogee of 380 km at 7.2 km/s. Rocket 3.2 then successfully sent a signal simulating deployment of a satellite
8:04 PM · 16 gru 2020
https://twitter.com/Astra/status/1339285162421407744Astra’s smallsat launcher reaches space on second test flightDecember 16, 2020 Stephen Clark
Astra’s Rocket 3.2 takes off from Kodiak Island, Alaska. Credit: Astra / John Kraus(...) On its second test flight Tuesday, Astra’s privately-developed small satellite launcher ran out of fuel seconds before reaching the velocity needed to enter orbit but exceeded the company’s expectations with an otherwise-successful climb into space from Kodiak Island, Alaska.
Astra officials said Tuesday the rocket “performed flawlessly” for roughly eight minutes, successfully demonstrating the launcher’s first stage burn, stage separation, payload fairing jettison, and second stage ignition milestones on the ascent into space.
The second stage engine shut down prematurely after exhausting its kerosene fuel supply, leaving the rocket just shy of the velocity required to reach orbit around Earth, Astra said.
Astra shared images captured by the rocket after it reached space, showing the curvature of the Earth and scattered clouds hanging over the deep blue Pacific Ocean. The company said the rocket flew to a maximum altitude of about 242 miles, or 390 kilometers, and reached a top speed of around 16,100 mph (7.2 kilometers per second).
“This far exceeded our team’s expectations,” said Chris Kemp, co-founder and CEO of Astra, based in Alameda, California.
If the second stage engine had fired its full duration — just 12 to 15 seconds longer, Kemp said — the rocket would have gained another 1,000 mph in velocity and entered a stable orbit, according to Astra.
Astra says the second stage’s early cutoff can be fixed with a tweak to the upper stage Aether engine’s propellant mixture ratio, which governs how much kerosene fuel it consumes relative to liquid oxygen, the rocket’s oxidizer.
“We now have flight data, so we can tune the mixture between the fuel and the liquid oxygen, so there’s no residual liquid oxygen in the next flight,” Kemp said. “So this system works … From all the preliminary data we’ve looked at, the system performed flawlessly.”
The upper stage engine shut down in a controlled fashion after depleting its fuel, and had the mixture ratio been correct, the rocket would have reached orbit, Kemp said. (...)
https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/12/16/astras-smallsat-launcher-reaches-space-on-second-test-flight/https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2020/12/astra-second-orbital-launch-attempt/AA
https://www.forum.kosmonauta.net/index.php?topic=3987.mshttps://space.skyrocket.de/doc_sdat/strix-alpha.htm