Viking '75 Mars Lander Construction, Looking for Viking lander design/construction information |
Viking '75 Mars Lander Construction, Looking for Viking lander design/construction information |
May 17 2012, 12:38 AM
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Member Group: Members Posts: 101 Joined: 3-May 12 From: Massachusetts, USA Member No.: 6392 |
Greetings all! I am searching for detailed construction and design information about the NASA Viking '75 Mars project hardware, particularly for the lander, aeroshell, base cover, and bioshield. Can anyone recommend good sources? I am especially looking for engineering drawings and under-construction photographs.
To set the stage, here is an album of about 100 drawings and photos which I've collected so far. I have already read the "usual" books, such as NASA RP-1027 "Viking '75 Spacecraft Design and Test", the press kits, the scientific papers produced about the mission, a number of industry papers covering various instruments and subsystems, the major Martin Marietta books, etc. I am hoping to find additional sources. Any ideas? Also, does anyone know if there are aeroshell, base cover, or bioshield components lurking in a museum or in storage somewhere? FYI, I have visited three of the best landers still on Earth: The Proof Test Capsule in the Smithsonian NASM, the Flight Capsule 3 (backup) in the Museum of Flight near Seattle, and the Science Test Lander in the Virginia Air and Space Center. I've taken nearly 1,000 photos of the three of them (most of which are publicly available in other Picasa Web albums of mine). I've taken a few measurements, but I would dearly love to find more authoritative drawings of more hardware (interior, exterior, everything). I have begun submitting some Freedom of Information Act requests to NASA/JPL which has started to bear some trivial but kind of fun fruit. --- Update as of March 2017: During the past few years I have been fortunate enough to collect a significant amount of information on the Viking lander hardware. My thanks to a number of organizations for providing me access to their resources:
Flight Capsule 3 in Seattle Museum of Flight (756 photos) Dimensioned diagrams of the FC3 lander PTC Lander at Smithsonian NASM 2013 (466 photos) PTC Lander at Smithsonian NASM 2016 (888 photos) Lander at Virginia Air and Space Center (622 photos) Dimensioned diagrams of the VASC’s lander Lander at California Science Center (456 photos) Dimensioned diagrams of the CSC's lander Misc diagrams, unusual photos (over 350 images) Body assembly blueprints Collector Head Shroud Unit at NASA LaRC (99 photos) Biology instrument at Cleveland MoNH (36 photos) Meteorology Sensor Assembly (60 photos) Meteorology Electronics Assembly (22 photos) Tape Recorder (53 photos) High Gain Antenna photos and measurements (96 images) XRFS Instrument (42 images) Viking lander contractor historic scale model (14 images) My Viking project documents collection The main focus of my efforts during the past few years has been to create an accurate and high-fidelity digital 3D model of the Viking lander. I've chosen to use the SketchUp software to build the model because a near-full-featured free version is available, allowing other people to use my model. The 3D model itself, as a work-in-progress, is available via DropBox. I update that model file periodically as major elements get added. I've created an album containing numerous renderings of digital model components, and I have a YouTube channel with some videos about the modeling project. I have also uploaded the lander core body and the Surface Sampler Collector Head to the SketchUp 3D Warehouse so that other people can easily access those components (the 3D Warehouse can be accessed from within SketchUp, or via web browser). The file on DropBox lister earlier contains those components and others. -- Tom |
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Jan 16 2016, 02:15 PM
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Member Group: Members Posts: 101 Joined: 3-May 12 From: Massachusetts, USA Member No.: 6392 |
I just completed a new video animation of my work-in-progress digital 3D SketchUp model of the Viking lander (which is freely available at the preceding link). This video is nearly six minutes long and shows detailed operation of the lander leg mechanisms, with cut-away sections revealing internal latches, springs, the honeycomb attenuator, pin-puller, etc.
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Jun 7 2016, 05:53 AM
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#3
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Member Group: Members Posts: 447 Joined: 1-July 05 From: New York City Member No.: 424 |
I just completed a new video animation of my work-in-progress digital 3D SketchUp model of the Viking lander (which is freely available at the preceding link). This video is nearly six minutes long and shows detailed operation of the lander leg mechanisms, with cut-away sections revealing internal latches, springs, the honeycomb attenuator, pin-puller, etc. I had assumed that your interesting project was to create a detailed 3D model of the external shape of the Viking lander. This animation includes some selected internal details. Was that a limited extravagance, or is it your goal ultimately to include all the internal mechanisms as well? Or perhaps you simply intend to pursue as much detail as you can find, whether internal or external. QUOTE Thanks to the very kind assistance of Matthew Shindell, curator in the space history department, and Jessica Bulger of the collections department, I had an hour of special access prior to museum opening. This allowed me to get over and under the lander for detail photography, and include scale references against some components. Did this session satisfy all of your needs for examination of the Proof Test Capsule? Or is there ongoing tension between your interests and the Smithsonian's view of its mission and responsibilities? |
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Jun 7 2016, 11:42 PM
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#4
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Member Group: Members Posts: 101 Joined: 3-May 12 From: Massachusetts, USA Member No.: 6392 |
My main goal is to model essentially all exterior piece-parts of lander hardware (though I'm undecided about a few external components such as the prominent wiring bundles - they would be hard to model and I don't have good data on the routing of the Flight lander wiring, which differs from the PTC and other test-unit wiring in various places). I would like to model the interior but I lack sufficient references to do a high-fidelity job on most items (and doing so would add about two years to the project). I'm doing selected "hidden" parts for which I have good information and which catch my eye, such as the leg mechanisms and the three interior struts that support the large Terminal Descent Landing Radar (TDLR) box below the lander body. I plan to model the Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators (RTGs) to a good level of detail because they are such iconic devices and I have the info. I'm not sure about internals of the three Terminal Descent Engines (TDEs), I've got almost enough information on them.
In my fantasy I would also model the Aeroshell and its numerous components, and the Base Cover and Mortar Support Truss. But they would entail another couple years' work, so that's very uncertain. Regarding my recent Viking research at the Smithsonian NASM, it was wonderful and a real privilege to be allowed a one-hour session right up against the lander with a collections specialist! To be clear I am not affiliated with any institutions, the staff did not know me, and I have no formal credentials. Thus being granted that access was an honor for which I am grateful. With that said there was a LOT of additional information I would have loved to acquire. Quite understandably (for the reasons above) I was not permitted to make contact with the lander myself. I did provide references to my earlier visits at NASA Langley, the Virginia Air and Space Center, the California Science Center, the Museum of Flight in Seattle, and the founders of the Viking Mars Missions Education and Preservation Project, who all allowed me to take direct careful measurements of authentic lander hardware. I could have spent ten hours gathering measurements and still not covered everything on my "PTC Bucket List." But I completely understand why that was not permitted. |
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