A new use for the ISS |
A new use for the ISS |
Jul 13 2008, 07:20 AM
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#16
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The Poet Dude Group: Moderator Posts: 5551 Joined: 15-March 04 From: Kendal, Cumbria, UK Member No.: 60 |
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Jul 13 2008, 07:25 AM
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#17
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Member Group: Members Posts: 524 Joined: 24-November 04 From: Heraklion, GR. Member No.: 112 |
Excuse the late night sarcasm, I am sure most can resonate with the visionary part.
But in the same article, I see that NASA " ...hasn't always been particularly welcoming to outside ideas." That line kind of killed the romance for me ... |
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Jul 13 2008, 09:32 AM
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#18
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Senior Member Group: Moderator Posts: 4279 Joined: 19-April 05 From: .br at .es Member No.: 253 |
I know there's about as much chance of this happening as there is of Keira Knightley ringing me up and asking me to show her the stars on the next clear night, but what a wonderful, wonderful idea... I think the chances of her asking you to see the stars, clear night or not, are higher … but still infinitesimal. |
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Jul 13 2008, 10:17 AM
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#19
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Founder Group: Chairman Posts: 14434 Joined: 8-February 04 Member No.: 1 |
OK - so several orders of magnitude out Infact, just about an order of magnitudes worth of orders of magnitude.
But still no in the realms of feasable. A space station in orbit around the moon is a great idea ( although a romantic one - I can't actually imagine any usefull purpose for it - if you change your perspective, we're all just in a high lunar orbit right now ) - but the ISS has never, is not nor will ever be the right tool for any other job than the one it is doing. Doug |
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Jul 13 2008, 04:28 PM
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#20
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 3419 Joined: 9-February 04 From: Minneapolis, MN, USA Member No.: 15 |
Yeah -- there are great challenges to getting ISS out of LEO, and while it could be made feasible with a huge amount of money, it will never be cost-effectively so.
Now, Skylab -- *that* would have been far more suited to lunar orbital use. Remove the ATM, use the EREP to study the lunar surface instead of the Earth's surface... that would have been useful. And far, far easier overall to get out of LEO. -the other Doug -------------------- “The trouble ain't that there is too many fools, but that the lightning ain't distributed right.” -Mark Twain
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Jul 14 2008, 10:54 AM
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#21
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Member Group: Members Posts: 593 Joined: 20-April 05 Member No.: 279 |
C'mon guys, think outside the box.... Ok. Since the article seemed to suggest that there's nothing more to study about weightlessness, and the ISS is modular - just like Lego - can I suggest the following re-engineering - Andy (Having seemingly awoken the spirit of Kenneth Gatland) |
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Jul 14 2008, 11:30 AM
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#22
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The Poet Dude Group: Moderator Posts: 5551 Joined: 15-March 04 From: Kendal, Cumbria, UK Member No.: 60 |
Oooh, I like that!
I can almost hear "The Blue Danube" looking at that pic... -------------------- |
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Jul 14 2008, 01:15 PM
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#23
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Member Group: Members Posts: 214 Joined: 30-December 05 Member No.: 628 |
If you are going to start imagining different configurations into which to rearrange the ISS modules, you could also spin off one or two and send them to orbit the moon. I don't know exactly what the point would be, but it would establish a permanent base out there a lot sooner than we could build one on the surface. It would also facilitate the colonization of the surface. Then the space shuttle fleet, no longer safe for taking off and landing, could be boosted to orbit one last time, stripped of their no-longer-neeeded wings, and put to work shuttling back and forth between the ISS and the lunar station. I suspect the shuttles would be much easier to convert into long-distance craft than the ISS itself. The objective isn't really to save money, because these ideas presuppose a major scaleup in the whole space program. If that were to happen (for some still hard-to-imagine reason), then we might as well redeploy our existing resources before fabricating new ones. I wouldn't have put all the effort into the shuttle and ISS programs in the first place if I could have magically reallocated those resources to UMSF activities, but now it's a sunk cost and we should make darn sure not to throw these assets away. Right?
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Jul 14 2008, 01:47 PM
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#24
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Member Group: Members Posts: 593 Joined: 20-April 05 Member No.: 279 |
I can almost hear "The Blue Danube" looking at that pic... ...and the real anorak will note that, with the radius defined by the array lengths, and a spin rate of 3rpm (i.e. the highest possible before the cusp of nausea) the onboard artificial gravity will be... (sounds of scribbled calculations on the back of a golden envelope) ..."Martian". Andy |
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Guest_PhilCo126_* |
Jul 24 2008, 12:13 PM
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#25
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Guests |
Talking about the ISS:
Astronauts onboard the ISS dumped the 600 Kg Early Ammonia Servicer (EAS) over board and the heavy payload is now visible as a star. Quiet bright but not as bright as the ISS itself. The Early Ammonia Servicer (EAS) was set over board because the remaining number of shuttle flights didn't foresee the return of the 600 Kg servicer. It will be visible the next week before it burns up in the atmosphere... |
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Jul 24 2008, 08:41 PM
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#26
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Member Group: Members Posts: 646 Joined: 23-December 05 From: Forest of Dean Member No.: 617 |
There's a good piece on heavens Above on the EAS, with ground observation video and observing tips. As it's an uncontrolled re-entry it could come down anywhere along the ISS' orbit track... with luck it'll happened during local night, near a well-populated area, with enough advance warning for the TV news or weather* to mention it - "And finally, if you pop outside about 10pm, you'll see a great fireworks show!"
* our local TV weather presenter often works in a mention of interesting night sky sights (meteor showers, aurorae, oppositions and the like.) (Heh! When I googled "BBC West weather astronomy" the first result was: http://www.bbc.co.uk/cumbria/weather/sky_a..._atkinson.shtml ] -------------------- --
Viva software libre! |
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Jul 24 2008, 09:25 PM
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#27
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The Poet Dude Group: Moderator Posts: 5551 Joined: 15-March 04 From: Kendal, Cumbria, UK Member No.: 60 |
The horror! That's DONKEYS' years old!!! I'll have to get them to update that...
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