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File:Launch of Gemini Board a Titan IIIC rocket (66C-76586) .jpg
The ITL in 1966 with the Solid Motors Check-out Building in the front, in the middle the Vertical Integration Building, to the left the Satellite Integration Building, at the back of the Solid Motors Assembly Building. The only unmanned Manned Orbiting Laboratory flight was launched from LC-40
MOL test launch OPS 0855, 3 November 1966, Cape Canaveral, FL

Integrate-Transfer-Launch (ITL) system As the name suggests, the ITL system was designed to assemble, checkout and integrate the TITAN IIIC's major components before it transferred the TITAN IIIC booster to the pad for payload mating and launch operations. The ITL system consisted on a Vertical Integration Building (VIB) for erection of the Titan III's core stages, a Solid Motor Assembly Building (SMAB) where the solid booster segments were stacked, a railroad track network, a warehouse and various support buildings and storage areas.[1]

TITAN IIIA Though the first TITAN IIIA launch went well, the third stage of the vehicle malfunctioned, and the 3,750-pound dummy payload failed to achieve orbit. The second TITAN IIIA flight from Launch Complex 20 was more successful, and that mission placed the vehicle's final stage and a 3,750-pound dummy payload into orbit on 10 December 1964. The third TITAN IIIA placed its transtage and a Lincoln Experimental Satellite (LES-1) into orbit on 11 February 1965. The fourth (and last) TITAN IIIA boosted LES-2 on a highly successful orbital mission on 6 May 1965. The first TITAN IIIC (date, where) carried a 21,000-pound dummy payload into orbit.

The Integrate-Transfer-Launch complex (ITL) was a complex of some of the largest buildings and two launch sites on Titan III road and the ITL Causeway at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station built in the early 1960s as a major production line to prepare the Titan III missiles for launch. In addition to the Titan IIIA, the Titan variants Titan IIIC, Titan IIIE, Titan 34D, the Commercial Titan III, the Titan IVA and the Titan IVB were also integrated here. The buildings were built on three artificial islands in the lagoon called Banana River.[2]

Because Titan operations were more confidential because of its military function, the ITL is less well known than the comparable civilian Launch Complex 39 located a few miles away at Kennedy Space Center.[1] Some of these structures were demolished after the Titan rockets had been phased out, and other buildings were given new functions.

Facilities that are part of the ITL Complex:

Titan Integration Process

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The original far-flung Titan IIIC I-T-L (Integrate - Transfer - Launch) complex, seen in the photo not long after its 1965 completion, was a rail-mobile based site that was originally designed to handle as many as 50 launches per year. But the maximum launch rate was more like 5 per year after the cancellation of the Manned Orbiting Lab (MOL) project.

Core Titan vehicles were stacked on one of several mobile launchers in the four-bay Vertical Integration Building (VIB - tallest building in photo), then rolled - pushed actually - by twin locomotives to the Solid Motor Assembly Building (SMAB - center of photo) where twin segmented solid motors were added. A new solid motor assembly building, named SMARF, was constructed during the early 1990s to process the new Titan IVB solid motors.The final move would position the rocket either on SLC 40 (top right) or SLC 41 (top center). I-T-L was the Air Force equivalent of NASA's Launch Complex 39, but the secrecy surrounding its operations meant that it garnered little acclaim.

SLC 41 supported Titan IIIE during the 1970s, which launched the Viking and Voyager probes. Titan IVB performed a final NASA launch when it orbited Cassini from SLC 40 in 1997.

A Centaur-trap for a Titan IIIE is placed on the rocket in VIB (year: 1975).

Until 2005, the Vertical Integration Building (VIB) stood at the start of the integration road. This is where the Titan's first stage arrived after being taken to Cape Canaveral by cargo plane. This rocket stage was then placed vertically on a mobile platform in one of the four high bays of the building, after which the second stage and the third stage (the Transtage or the Centaur) were mounted on it. After this, the platform with the rocket on it drove on to the Solid Motor Assembly Building (SMAB) where the side-boosters, two solid fuel engines, were mounted on the Titan. A Titan IIIA went directly to launch pad LC-20 as this configuration had no side boosters. The side boosters for the other configurations had previously arrived as separate segments by rail at the Solid Motors Check-out Buildings where these solid fuel engines were assembled.

A platform with a Titan III then drove on to one of the launch pads. There, the cargo prepared in the Satellite Assembly Building for integration into the mobile service tower on the Titan IIIC, Titan IIIE, Titan 34D or CT3 was lifted and assembled.

The Titan IVB leaves the SMARF to be integrated on the launch pad with the Centaur trap, Cassini-Huygens and the nose cone.

The Titan IVB was launched in the early 1990s built a new Solid Motors Assembly and Readiness Facility (SMARF) where the new larger side boosters could be mounted on the rocket and the launch systems could be connected.[2]. After this, the platform with these Titan missiles drove on to launch pad LC-40 or LC-41 where the cargo and nose cone were mounted on it in the Mobile Service Structure. With Titan IV missiles, the optional third stage (Inertial Upper Stage or Centaur) was also mounted there. The Launch Control Room from which the launch was monitored was located in VIB. For the Titan IV Centaur, NASA had a Launch Control Room elsewhere on the industrial area of ​​the CCAFS that NASA also used for the Delta II. The mobile launch platforms ran on so-called double track rails, so four rails in total and were pushed or pulled by two diesel locomotives driving side by side.

Post-Titan Usage

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International Space Station Expedition 10 Commander Leroy Chiao took this image from the International Space Station during March 2005.

The image captured the entire Titan IIIC/34D/IV Integrate Transfer Launch complex at Cape Canaveral. North is toward the left of the photograph.

The I-T-L complex consisted of the Vertical Integration Building (VIB), the original Titan IIIC/34D Solid Motor Assembly Building (SMAB), the newer Titan IVB Solid Motor Assembly and Readiness Facility (SMARF), Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC 40) where, at the time of the photograph, the last Cape Canaveral Titan was parked and enclosed by the massive Mobile Service Tower, and Space Launch Complex 41 (SLC 41).

SLC 41 was converted for use by Atlas V beginning in 1999. The Atlas V Vertical Integration Facility (VIF), located about one-quarter of a mile south of Pad 41, is much closer to the streamlined Atlas pad than the VIB was to the Titan pads (the VIB was more than four miles from SLC 41). The Atlas V launch control center is in the VIB area, as is the Atlas Spaceflight Operations Center (ASOC, a former Titan solid motor building visible at the bottom right). Unlike Titan, which was moved vertically by rail from the VIB to the pad, Atlas stages are trucked horizontally from the ASOC to the VIF.

After the final Titan launch, SLC 40, the SMARF, portions of the SMAB, the VIB, and the interconnecting railroad system were mothballed. The VIB and the SLC 40 mobile service tower were subsequently razed. Portions of Space Launch Complex 37, a more traditional non-mobile launch site originally built for Saturn I and now used for Delta IV, is visible at top right. A Delta IV Medium was erected on SLC 37B at the time of the photograph. The last Titan IV was launched in 2005. The VIB was subsequently demolished. The SMAB has been leased to SpaceX, which in the western portion of the building will place satellites in the nose cones of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets and load Dragon spaceships before integrating with the launch vehicle on SLC-40 or LC-39A. SpaceX renamed the building Satellite Processing and Integration Facility (SPIF).

The SMARF was leased to Lockheed Martin, which turned it into a Check-out facility (temporary storage of rocket stages) and launch control center for the Atlas V. Since 2006, Lockheed Martin has brought Atlas V manufacturing and operations under United Launch Alliance.

Vulcan Era

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On October 24, 2019, ULA renamed the SMARF a Spaceflight Processing Operations Center (SPOC, also a reference to the character Spock, the Vulcan from Startrek after which the Vulcan rocket is named). Contractors used to SPOC to assemble the Vulcan Launch Platform (VLP) to be used with ULA’s Vulcan Centaur rocket that will launch in late 2021.

SLC-41 launch pad and its Vertical Integration Facility (VIF) were modified in 2019 and 2020 to support Vulcan Centaur launches in addition to Atlas V.

References

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  1. ^ a b Cleary, Mark C. "The Titan III Program". Federation of American Scientists. Retrieved 13 August 2020.
  2. ^ a b La Morte, James F. (1 June 1963). "The Integrate-Transfer-Launch System for Titan III". Space Flight Testing Conference. Aerospace Corp. doi:10.2514/6.1963-89.
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Category:Cape Canaveral Space Force Station Category:Bouwwerk in Florida Category:Lanceerbasis

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