hangar
A hangar is a building or structure designed to hold aircraft or spacecraft. Hangars are built of metal, wood, or concrete. The word ''hangar'' comes from Middle French ''hanghart'' ("enclosure near a house"), of Germanic origin, from Frankish ...
s where U.S.
Space Shuttle orbiter
The Space Shuttle orbiter is the spaceplane component of the Space Shuttle, a partially reusable orbital spacecraft system that was part of the discontinued Space Shuttle program. Operated from 1977 to 2011 by NASA, the U.S. space agency, thi ...
s underwent maintenance between flights. They are located west of the
Vehicle Assembly Building
The Vehicle Assembly Building (originally the Vertical Assembly Building), or VAB, is a large building at NASA's Kennedy Space Center (KSC), designed to assemble large pre-manufactured space vehicle components, such as the massive Saturn V and th ...
, where the orbiter was mated with its
External Tank
The Space Shuttle external tank (ET) was the component of the Space Shuttle launch vehicle that contained the liquid hydrogen fuel and liquid oxygen oxidizer. During lift-off and ascent it supplied the fuel and oxidizer under pressure to ...
and Solid Rocket Boosters before transport to the launch pad. OPF-1 and OPF-2 are connected with a low bay between them, while OPF-3 is across the street.
OPF-3 was previously called the Orbiter Maintenance & Refurbishment Facility (OMRF), but was upgraded to a fully functioning OPF.
Processing flow
When a Shuttle mission was completed, the orbiter was towed from the
Shuttle Landing Facility
The Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF) also known as Launch and Landing Facility (LLF) is an airport located on Merritt Island in Brevard County, Florida, United States. It is a part of the Kennedy Space Center and was used by Space Shuttle for ...
to its assigned OPF where it spent several months (typically less than 100 days) being prepared for the next mission. Any remaining payloads from the previous mission were removed and the vehicle was fully inspected, tested, and refurbished.
* The orbiter's main engines were purged to remove the moisture that was a by-product of liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen combustion.
* payload bay doors were opened and any hazardous payloads were processed for safety
* fuel cell tanks were drained of remaining cryogenic reactants. The oxygen system was rendered inert with gaseous nitrogen and the hydrogen system with gaseous helium.
* high-pressure gases were vented from the environmental control and life support systems.
* refuse and other waste products including draining of the potable water system were offloaded
* heat shields were removed from the engines and aft access were opened
* main engines were locked in place and covers installed.
* scaffolding was installed around the orbiters aft to allow technicians to access the main engines
* main engines were removed and transferred to the
Main Engine Processing Facility
Main may refer to:
Geography
* Main River (disambiguation)
**Most commonly the Main (river) in Germany
* Main, Iran, a village in Fars Province
*"Spanish Main", the Caribbean coasts of mainland Spanish territories in the 16th and 17th centuries
...
for checkout and service
* any needed repairs on the orbiter's thermal protection system including the thermal blankets and thousands of tiles were completed.
* the
Orbital Maneuvering System
In spaceflight, an orbital maneuver (otherwise known as a burn) is the use of propulsion systems to change the orbit of a spacecraft.
For spacecraft far from Earth (for example those in orbits around the Sun) an orbital maneuver is called a ' ...
and
Reaction Control System
A reaction control system (RCS) is a spacecraft system that uses thrusters to provide attitude control and translation. Alternatively, reaction wheels are used for attitude control. Use of diverted engine thrust to provide stable attitude cont ...
pods were possibly removed and transferred to the
Hypergol Maintenance Facility Hypergol Maintenance Facility (HMF) is a rocket fuel and engine center located in an isolated location in the Kennedy Space Center industrial area. It was constructed in 1964 to support the Apollo program and upgraded in 1985 to support the Space ...
for troubleshooting, repair or other services.
* any modifications to the orbiter were completed in the OPF.
* After all its flights, the orbiter went through "Down Mission Processing."
Prior to rollout to the
Vehicle Assembly Building
The Vehicle Assembly Building (originally the Vertical Assembly Building), or VAB, is a large building at NASA's Kennedy Space Center (KSC), designed to assemble large pre-manufactured space vehicle components, such as the massive Saturn V and th ...
, several weeks before scheduled launch, the orbiter was prepared for the next mission by installing mission flight kits, payloads, consumable fluids and gases where possible. Remaining payloads, fuels and fluids were installed on the pad closer to launch day. The last step before rollover to the VAB was weighing the orbiter to determine its center of gravity.
Current status
OPF-1 was closed following ''Atlantiss rollout on June 29, 2012. OPF-2 is now inactive following ''Atlantis''s departure on October 18, 2012. OPF-3 is under lease to Boeing for the manufacture and testing of their
CST-100 Starliner
The Boeing CST-100 Starliner is a class of two partially
Boeing X-37B
The Boeing X-37, also known as the Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV), is a reusable robotic spacecraft. It is boosted into space by a launch vehicle, then re-enters Earth's atmosphere and lands as a spaceplane. The X-37 is operated by the United St ...
vehicles would be housed at
Kennedy Space Center
The John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC, originally known as the NASA Launch Operations Center), located on Merritt Island, Florida, is one of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) ten field centers. Since December 1968 ...
in OPF-1 and 2, hangars previously occupied by the Space Shuttle. Boeing had said the space planes would use OPF-1 in January 2014, and the Air Force had previously said it was considering consolidating X-37B operations, housed at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, nearer to their launch site at Cape Canaveral. NASA also stated that the program had completed tests to determine whether the X-37B, one-fourth the size of the Space Shuttle, could land on the former Shuttle runways. NASA furthermore stated that renovations of the two hangars would be completed by the end of 2014; the main doors of OPF-1 were marked with the message "Home of the X-37B" by this point.