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since the dragon cargo vehicle was

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birthed

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uh to the station a week ago this past

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sunday the expedition 39 crew members

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have been unloading its content setting

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up experiments and also stowing away

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supplies

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this week more cargo is going to be

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unloaded but the human crew on orbit is

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actually not involved

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canadarm2 will be used to remove

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payloads from dragon's trunk and install

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them on the station and the arm will be

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commanded by flight controllers actually

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here on the ground

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joining us this morning to discuss

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operations scheduled to begin

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tomorrow actually is troy mccracken troy

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thanks for joining us here you're the

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lead robotics officer for this operation

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that right that's vermif thanks for

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having me um yeah i'll be leading all

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the cargo operations as we call it for

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the spacex trunk yeah

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one of the questions how often it do we

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actually use the robotic arm for ground

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like what you're planning on doing the

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ground commanded operation the majority

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of our robotic operations now are

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actually ground commanded over the years

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we've

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grown our capability we started out with

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simple maneuvers and walk-offs and now

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we're doing the majority of the the

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cargo operations

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the fram transfers we've also done an

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rpcmr and r out in the truss

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why would that why is ground commanded

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preferable there are obviously certain

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cases but why is it preferable to having

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you guys do it on the ground rather than

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the crew on orbit

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the cruise time is very valuable on

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orbit and so

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you know the more we can do from the

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ground to support station

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the more we're helping the entire

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program

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the spdm operations are very complex

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there's lots of

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different things you have to know and do

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and the training that we'd have to

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provide the crews also

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quite high so early on they kind of

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decided that they would back the crew

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training down on the spdm and have them

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focus on the critical crew ops

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with the big arm and that's really the

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the track and capture events where we're

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capturing and releasing the visiting

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vehicles where you have to have the crew

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member there focus their training there

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and then they also support the evas

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whenever there's a

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one of the external um

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crew members are outside and they're

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flying well they can step into the arm

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and we can fly them around on the arm

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right so when we're doing that we

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definitely want to have a crew member on

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the sticks inside flying the arm right

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so focusing on um dragon itself

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obviously um

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and your operation that's scheduled this

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week um describe to us the

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where these

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payloads are they're on the external

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part obviously

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describe where they are now and and

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where they're headed okay um we have two

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payloads coming up in the trunk um

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they have we have hdev which is the

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high definition earth viewing payload

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that has some cameras so we'll be

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reaching into the trunk with the spdm

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and the ssrms pulling it out of the

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trunk

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and then we'll be flying it over to the

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the columbus module where we'll be

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installing it on the nader

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exposed facility so that those cameras

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can look down on earth and do some

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viewing there

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the next payload is opals

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you also saw that in the trunk we'll be

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pulling it out of the trunk and this

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one's much more complicated it has to go

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out on one of the elc's on the end of

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the truss so to provide power to it

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we'll stow it on the spdm itself there's

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a eotp platform on the spdm where you

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can attach these frames and then we can

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provide power to them and keep them warm

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so once we install it on the spdm we

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actually have to stow this pdm on a lab

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pdgf stow it there and then we walk off

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with the big arm over to the mt

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then we'll reach back and grab the spdm

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and pull it off

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the the lab

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after we do that then we'll translate

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the mt out to worksite seven so farther

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outboard and once we get out there we'll

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install the opals on the final

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destination on elc on the nader side of

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the payload are there

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obviously the transit paths are there

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are there any problems with some of

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these transit class in terms of training

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or or where you're headed with these

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payloads um the real issue now is

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clearance with all the

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modules that we put on station whenever

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we come up on the port side when we're

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walking off basically we have to come up

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between the gym module and the truss

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the gem module has an exposed facility

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out there where they've attached

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payloads with appendages so whenever

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whenever we're coming up that corridor

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um we have to watch our clearances when

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we're just maneuvering the ssrms that's

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not really a big issue because it's

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pretty small but when you start putting

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modules or the spdm with its arms

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hanging off you really have to

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coordinate where you go through so when

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we're going through this

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corridor we'll actually slow down we'll

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have to change our payload file and go

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to slower rates as we go through that

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tightest clearance and then once we get

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through it we'll go back to our higher

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rates where we can move the arm at a

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faster speed um i know that uh i think

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it was late last week and maybe early

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this week you guys have done obviously

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some preparatory work um the the station

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has unique capabilities

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can you talk about the changes that

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you've made in terms of like like its

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operating base uh for the preparations

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for your activities this week right

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in preparation the

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first we had to translate the mt out to

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work site six so we

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does the mt is normally where we store

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the spdm so it's kind of up on the truss

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out of the way

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we have to be on node two with the big

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arm to do the capture and install the

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vehicle so after that was completed we

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needed to translate the mt over to

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worksite six and then we went and

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unstowed the spdm from that mbs after we

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did that since this is the first flight

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of

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dragon where we're doing these fram

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payloads we took the spdm and put it in

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a hover position over the top of the

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trunk so that we could use the spdm

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cameras to do a survey of the trunk make

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sure that everything in there survived

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launched and was where we were expecting

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it to be there was no issues

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uh we actually just saw a live view

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of of the robotic arms uh spdm and

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columbus as we talked about earlier and

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as we're talking about now we're talking

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with troy mccracken who is a

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lead robotics officer the robo console

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is right here in mission control in fact

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troy's been on console for quite a bit

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in preparation for these activities

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troy

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can you talk a little bit about

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the manual flying versus program

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maneuvers are you guys going to be

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mostly doing manual or or are there

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program commands how does that work all

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the ground control commanding is uh

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pre-programmed we use um o-cass so you

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give it a destination and it the arm

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automatically flies to that point unlike

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the crew that they actually have the

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hand controllers where they can just

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put in manual inputs and the arm

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responds to that everything we do on the

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ground is a destination and a

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automatic maneuver

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with that said we have developed a new

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tool

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in the recent past where when we get in

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close and we have to do these alignments

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when we bring a payload down we're never

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perfectly aligned so we'll have to do

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these minor corrections and we've

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developed a new tool where we basically

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just dial in we want to go a centimeter

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to the left or

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do a degree in pitch we'll dial that in

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and you hit do it and the tool basically

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sends the couple commands you need to do

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to set up the system and then there's

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one final command we send that says

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proceed which

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makes the maneuver and so it's

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simplified those little minor

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corrections that we have to do and

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that's all based in real time when we

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get an actual downlink video and

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comparing to what we're seeing to make

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sure that everything's lined up before

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we actually do the mate of the payload

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well i know you know

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you're you're well trained in doing this

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but there has to be sort of a cool

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factor to being able to to operate this

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robotic arm from the from the ground for

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that station 260 miles up it is always

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definitely you know you step back and

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when you see the arm moving you know in

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the video you'll step back and see that

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in the middle of your operations and you

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always realize it's it's a great job

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here to be able to do this and you know

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it's amazing that we've gone this far

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well

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i know we really appreciate you stopping

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by the console over here in the front

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corner of the room troy and