What's the ultimate fate of the Orbiters and completed ISS?

[rfoshaug]

Why display the inner parts of the one shuttle that doesn't have the inner parts of a real shuttle? <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><font color="#ff9900">----------------------------------</font></p><p><font color="#ff9900">My minds have many opinions</font></p> </div>

 

[CalliArcale]

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>A display with the full stack? That would be interesting, but how would you get it to Washington?<p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br /><br />I suppose it would have to be stacked at KSC in the VAB, probably on some kind of custom-built variation on the MLP. Then you'd have to figure out a way of getting it from there onto a custom-built barge to carry it up the Eastern seaboard and then up the Potomac River. I can't imagine driving the CT's off their crawlerway to do it. It would be a big challenge.<br /><br />It would probably be a lot simpler to display them separately. Saturn V stages are usually displayed separately, not stacked. It makes the transportation of these enormously massive objects a lot simpler.<br /><br />You could build a fake SRB/ET set upon which a real Orbiter could be placed, and then display the real ET and SRBs elsewhere. I can't imagine building a museum tall enough to accomodate the stack vertically, and I seriously doubt the ET could bear the weight of the Orbiter horizontally for a long period of time. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p> </p><p><font color="#666699"><em>"People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly . . . timey wimey . . . stuff."</em>  -- The Tenth Doctor, "Blink"</font></p> </div>

 

[edkyle98]

""It's been a few years since I've been to KSC, but I seem to remember the Explorer mockup outside the visitor's center having fairly realistic looking tiles. Explorer looks a lot more like one of the operational orbiters than Enterprise does, quite frankly! ""<br /><br />"It certainly does! It looks very realistic down to the RTV out gasing from the tiles. That out gassing forms white streaks in the direction of the flow field around the real Orbiters. They painted the Visitors Center fake Orbiter perfectly." <br /><br />This company built the Explorer orbiter mockup. <br />http://www.guard-lee.com<br />They also built mockups for Tom Hanks, etc.<br /><br />Here's one of my pics of Explorer<br /><br /> - Ed Kyle

 

[erioladastra]

"Can Russia control non-Russian components? What happens in the station's RMS breaks down? "<br /><br />Not sure I understand the question but no, the Russians cannot control any of the USOS equipment.

 

[CalliArcale]

Tip: you can click the little [re: so-and-so] link to the right of each post title to see the post they're replying to.<br /><br />I think he's making a pun; the post he's replying to said that the ultimate fate of the ISS is proton decay. <img src="/images/icons/tongue.gif" /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p> </p><p><font color="#666699"><em>"People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly . . . timey wimey . . . stuff."</em>  -- The Tenth Doctor, "Blink"</font></p> </div>

 

[willpittenger]

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>Isn't that the fate of some Russian boosters?<p><hr /></p></p></blockquote>Please quote the item that you are replying too so that we do not have to go back 3 pages of posts to figure out whay your post means. Thanks<p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br />I always use threaded mode. Linear mode is not useful. The administrator hid the Quote link.<br /><br />I was replying to a comment by someone that simply said "Proton Decay". <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <hr style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em" />Will Pittenger<hr style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em" />Add this user box to your Wikipedia User Page to show your support for the SDC forums: <div style="margin-left:1em">{{User:Will Pittenger/User Boxes/Space.com Account}}</div> </div>

 

[willpittenger]

The question was asked because someone suggested the Russians take over management of ISS if the US pulls out. I was pointing out that such a system might not work. RMS refers to the station arm. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <hr style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em" />Will Pittenger<hr style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em" />Add this user box to your Wikipedia User Page to show your support for the SDC forums: <div style="margin-left:1em">{{User:Will Pittenger/User Boxes/Space.com Account}}</div> </div>

 

[henryhallam]

<font color="yellow"><br />Mount the Shuttles on the 3 Shuttle Carrer Aircraft and have an airshow...<br /></font><br /><br />There are 3 SCA? I guess it might have made sense to have that many when the flight rate was predicted to be a lot higher.

 

[radarredux]

> <i><font color="yellow">Why display the inner parts of the one shuttle that doesn't have the inner parts of a real shuttle?</font>/i><br /><br />Sort of like cutting open a mannequin in order to show how the inside of the human body works. OK... maybe that is taking the analogy a little far.</i>

 

[willpittenger]

Could the Russian plane designed to carry Buran handle one of our shuttles? Might be cheaper. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <hr style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em" />Will Pittenger<hr style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em" />Add this user box to your Wikipedia User Page to show your support for the SDC forums: <div style="margin-left:1em">{{User:Will Pittenger/User Boxes/Space.com Account}}</div> </div>

 

[danwoodard]

>> Actually we did almost nothing to save Skylab. There were plans to get to it with the Shuttle Orbiter but it was too late. The Skylab came in early due to unexpected darg and the Shuttle was late. A robot de-orbit stage never got very far in development.<br /><br />I knew people who worked on Skylab Reboost, and they worked hard on it. It appeared at first that the shuttle would be operational long before Skylab re-entered, so the reboost was planned for STS-5. The Skylab orbit decay and the Shuttle delays developed almost simultaneously; the reboost was shifted to STS-2; but it finally became apparent that even this would be to late.<br /><br />My only point was that a functioning space station is a valuable asset. The lack of scientific productivity on ISS is largely because with such a small crew, really just enough to maintain the station, the total research in the five years of operation is roughly the same as one Spacelab mission. It seems a little unfare to abandon the ISS as unproductive when it has never even been fully manned.

 

[lbiderman]

I hope that after 2009, with full crew and labs, the ISS will turn very productive and make breakthroughs in science and technology. And most of the research will focus on human spaceflight-related stuff, so we will see them work shortly after that.

 

[rocketwatcher2001]

Will-<br /><font color="yellow">Actaully, put your faith in Scaled Composites and Burt Rutan. Branson just provides financing</font><br /><br />That's exactly why I put my faith in Branson (and others), the financing is the most important thing......No bucks, No Buck Rodgers. Sir Richard has the guts to put his money where his faith is. Maybe faith is the wrong word, my gut feeling is that we are going to have Lunar colonies under his leadership. And thank God for him.<br /> <br />Do you know why we don't have a 100 man moonbase or lauched several manned missions to Jupiter and beyond? Because we decided not to, not because we said "we don't know how", but because we said, "it's too expensive". I bet dollars to pesos that Branson, and others like him, could honest to God finance it, AND MAKE IT HAPPEN!!!!!! <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /> <br /><br />Don't get me wrong, Rutan is awesome, but he can't do it without the money folks. It would be great if congress had the foresight to do it, but I don't think they can get past the politics, Branson and his kind are way above all of that B.S. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>