Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT/SPACEDIG/V09_5/V9_558.TXT

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Date: Thu, 27 Jul 89 00:28:49 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: SPACE Digest V9 #558

SPACE Digest                                      Volume 9 : Issue 558

Today's Topics:
                  Re: TF-104
             Re: Space Transportation Act
     Re: Apollo 11 anniversary. Re: I'm getting too old for this
        George Bush's Upcoming Speech - Have YOUR Say!
              Significance of July 20th
          Re: space news from June 12 AW&ST
         Interesting Apollo crew observations
    NASA awards grants for future exploration studies (Forwarded)
           Magellan Status for 07/17/89 (Forwarded)
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 7 Jul 89 22:02:48 GMT
From: skipper![e-mail]
Subject: Re: TF-104

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (kevin w. holroyd) writes:

>>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:  <stuff deleted>

>>Greenamyer's F-104 was the structural test article--I'm not sure I'd
>>like to fly in something used to test structural fatigue life!
                                        ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
I should have said proof load (sorry)

>>There's another TF-104, in a museum in Texas that also has a MiG-15
>>and an F-86.  One of our test pilots flies all three for them.

>All three of these airplanes participated in an air show at Centennial
>last year.  One day after the show was over, I was working with a student
>doing touch and goes.  I heard the Starfighter call for clearance to taxi on
>ground freq.  Suitably warned, I timed our pattern so we would be on upwind
>(we were on the parallel runway) when the TF-104 took off.  What a sight.
>It was up and out of there and very quickly, and soon was only a smoke trail in
>the distance.  And I'm sure he was throttled back since we were under
>a TCA.

When I got my ride in the TF-104 we did a max-performance takeoff and
it was incredible!

The pilots here claim that nothing can match the F-104, although
they're starting to accept the F-18s that we got to replace the
F-104s.  They do like using radar to find the test aircraft when
flying chase--saves a lot of "Where are you now?" chatter.

I think that the most impressive takeoff I've ever seen was an
Ames U-2, though.  I believe the TR-2 is just as good, although
I haven't seen one yet.


--

M F Shafer                          [e-mail]
NASA Ames Research Center           arpa!elxsi.dfrf.nasa.gov!shafer
Dryden Flight Research Facility     ames!elxsi!shafer
Of course I don't speak for NASA    DON'T use the drynix address

------------------------------

Date: 8 Jul 89 22:36:57 GMT
From: mailrus!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!utzoo![e-mail]  (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: Space Transportation Act

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Larry Brader) writes:
>>...my blessing to the concept that the the government be forced to give up
>>it's milspecs and such when it is requesting a parcel delivery to LEO.
>
>Considering the harsh enviroment of space I'm surprise you suggest this.
>What specifications do you actually require for electronics/mechanical items
>in space? the moon?

That they work.

Which does not imply milspec.  Details depend on the environment.

Note that he's talking about launchers, not payloads, too.
--
$10 million equals 18 PM       |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
(Pentagon-Minutes). -Tom Neff  | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry [e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 18 Jun 89 05:38:14 GMT
From: hplabsb![e-mail]  (David Smith)
Subject: Re: Apollo 11 anniversary. Re: I'm getting too old for this

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Andy Clews) writes:
>Would this person's name be "Module" by any chance? I remember hearing
>on the TV News at around the time of Apollo 11, that someone in the
>States had named her newly-born daughter "Module".

I don't recall whether the baby was boy or girl, but the name given was
Lunar Module McGee.

--

            David R. Smith, HP Labs
            [e-mail]
            [phone]

------------------------------

Date: 13 Jul 89 05:03:15 GMT
From: [e-mail]  (Eric William Tilenius)
Subject: George Bush's Upcoming Speech - Have YOUR Say!

President George Bush will be giving a speech dealing with space policy on
July 20.  Dan Quayle and the National Space Council have already unveiled
a plan that would consist of putting a base on the moon, then going on to
exploration of Mars.

According to a column in the Washington Post (7/12):  "Whether the president
will use his July 20 speech to buy the full Quayle package or only bits and
pieces will not be known until he returns from Europe."

YOU CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE!!  IF YOU CARE ABOUT HAVING A SPACE, NOW IS THE
TIME TO ACT!

Bush is a president who is very sensitive to public moods and opinions.
If the White House gets lots of calls urging him to commit to a broad,
extensive, far-ranging space program -- including BOTH the Moon and Mars --
the chances of his committing to these goals on July 20 increases
tremendously!

CALL OR WRITE THE WHITE HOUSE WITH YOUR OPINIONS TODAY!

LET PRESIDENT BUSH KNOW THAT WE WANT A VIBRANT CIVILIAN SPACE PROGRAM THAT
AMERICA CAN BE PROUD OF ONCE AGAIN!

The Address:        President George Bush
-----------         The White House
                    Washington, D.C.  20500

The Phone:          [phone]   (Ask for the General Comments Office
---------                           or say you'd like to leave your opinion.)

PLEASE CALL OR WRITE AS SOON AS POSSIBLE IN SUPPORT OF BOTH A MOON BASE
AND A MARS MISSION!!     IF WE MISS THIS JULY 20 OPPORTUNITY, WE MAY BE
WAITING UNTIL WE GET A NEW PRESIDENT FOR ANOTHER CHANCE.

- ERIC -

Eric W. Tilenius     | ColorVenture Software    | [e-mail]
Quadrangle Club      | 11 Prospect Drive South  | [e-mail]
33 Prospect Avenue   | Huntington Sta, NY 11746 | rutgers!pucc.bitnet!ewtileni
Princeton, NJ 08540  | 516-424-2298             | princeton!pucc!ewtileni
609-683-4411         | * Sft. for the CoCo 3 *  | CIS:  70346,16

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 18 Jul 89 12:37:37 CDT
From: [e-mail] (Who remembers 8USER.PAR?)
Subject: Significance of July 20th

For me, the moon walk happened on July 21st.  For most of the world, this
is true, since the time was so late in the Western Hemisphere, the remainder
was already into July 21.

Not that this matters much or obscures the meaning of the celebration, but
I've always observed it on July 21 and nobody seemed to contradict me.

A happy 20th to Neil, Buzz, Mike and everyone who helped!

Dillon Pyron                         | The opinions are mine, the facts
TI/DSEG Lewisville Computer Services | probably belong to the company.
[e-mail]              |
[phone]                        | I hear Quayle sent Michel Jackson
                                     | congratulations on hearing it was
                                     | the 20th anniversary of the moonwalk

------------------------------

Date: 18 Jul 89 12:02:40 GMT
From: b.gp.cs.cmu.edu![e-mail]
Subject: Re: space news from June 12 AW&ST

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Henry Spencer) wrote:
}Story on Ball Aerospace's large-array image-intensifying sensors, one of
}which will be the sensor on the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph
}(first of the second-generation instruments that will eventually replace
}the current ones on the Hubble telescope).  They also have potential

Any bets on whether the replacement will be done before or after launch? :-)

}Rockwell International says that cutting production costs for ALS engines
}appears best done through simple designs, new production processes, and
}less use of exotic materials.  The efficiency of the manufacturing process
}is more important than ultimate maximum engine performance, Rockwell says.

BDB rears its head again....

--
UUCP: {ucbvax,harvard}!cs.cmu.edu!ralf -=-=-=-=- Voice: [phone] (school)
ARPA: [e-mail]  BIT: ralf%cs.cmu.edu@CMUCCVMA  FIDO: Ralf Brown 1:129/46
FAX: available on request                      Disclaimer? I claimed something?

PROGRAM n. A magic spell cast over a computer allowing it to turn one's input
  into error messages.  tr.v. To engage in a pastime similar to banging one's
  head against a wall, but with fewer opportunies for reward.
        -- from a flyer advertising for _Inside_Turbo_Pascal_

------------------------------

Date: 17 Jul 89 15:57:12 GMT
From: iconsys![e-mail]  (Danny Young)
Subject: Interesting Apollo crew observations

The July Astronomy magazine quotes Buzz Aldrin's comments on standing on
the moon: "I quickly discovered that I felt balanced--comfortably upright--only
when I was tilted slightly forward.  I also felt a bit disoriented:  On Earth
when one looks at the horizon, it appears flat.  On the Moon, so much smaller
than the Earth and quit without high terrain (at least in the Sea of
Tranquility), the horizon in all directions visibly curved down away from us."

Were these sensations anticipated?  Are there other interesting observations
that Apollo crews have made that perhaps came as a surprise to them?

--
Danny Young            USENET:  uunet!iconsys!danny
Icon International, Inc.    ARPANET: [e-mail]
764 East Timpanogos Pkwy    BITNET: icon%byuadam.bitnet
Orem, Utah 84057-6212       Telephone: [phone]

------------------------------

Date: 18 Jul 89 19:53:30 GMT
From: trident.arc.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Peter E. Yee)
Subject: NASA awards grants for future exploration studies (Forwarded)

Edward Campion                                   July 18, 1989
Headquarters, Washington, D.C.


RELEASE:  89-118

NASA AWARDS GRANTS FOR FUTURE EXPLORATION STUDIES


     NASA's Office of Exploration has awarded a series of study
contracts to various organizations to provide NASA with ideas,
concepts, devices, systems, trajectories, operations or
implementations which could be applied to furthering human
exploration of the solar system.

     The 20 winners, selected from 115 proposals submitted in
response to the April 12, 1989, NASA Research Announcement, are
located in 12 different states and come from various occupations
with five industry-related firms, two space support-related
organizations and 13 universities receiving awards.

     In selecting the winners, the criteria applied to all the
submissions was the experience of the principal investigator, the
relevance of the proposal to programs of human exploration of the
solar system, the performance improvement or complexity reduction
possibilities and the uniqueness of the idea or concept.


           Space Support-Related Organization Winners

  o  Oregon L-5 Society, Inc., Oregon City, Ore. - "Site
Characterization of the Oregon Moonbase."

  o  Tether Applications, La Jolla, Calif. - "Preliminary Design
of a 1KM/SEC Tether Transport Node."


                    Industry-Related Winners

  o  Martin Marietta Strategic Systems, Denver, Colo. - "Study of
Nuclear Thermal Rockets Utilizing Indigenous Martian
Propellants."

  o  Dean & Associates, Alexandria, Va. - "An Early Warning
System for Monitoring Large Projects."

  o  Titan Systems, Inc., San Diego, Calif. - The Evolution of
Design Alternatives for the Exploration of Mars by Balloon."

  o  Engineering Development Laboratory, Inc., Newport News, Va. -
"Determination of the Concentration of Spacecraft Cabin Gases using
Laser Spectroscopy."


  o  Orbitec, Madison, Wis. - "Aluminum/Oxygen Rocket Engine for
Lunar Transport Applications" and "The Use of Tethered Platforms to
Recover, Store, and Utilize CO2 from the Mars Atmosphere for On-
Orbit Propellants."

                    University-Related Winners

  o  Energy & Mineral Research Center, Grand Forks, N.D. - "Further
Investigation of the Feasibility of Applying Low-Temperature Plasma
Technology to a Closed-Loop Processing Resource Management System."

  o  Texas Engineering Experiment Station, College Station, Texas -
"Design of a General Purpose, Mobile, Multifunctional Radiation
Shield for Space Exploration."

  o  Boston College, Chestnut Hill, Mass. - "Design Considerations
of a Lunar Production Plant."

  o  Michigan Technological University, Houghton, Mich. -
"Planetary Materials and Resource Utilization."

  o  The Regents of the University of California, Santa Barbara,
Calif. - "A Small Particle Catalytic Thermal Reactor (SPCTR) for
the Conversion of CO and CO2 to Methane in a Gravity-Free
Environment Vehicle."

  o  The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Mich. - "Advanced Fuel
Cycles for the MICF - Fusion Propulsion System."

  o  Boston University, Boston, Mass. - "Pneumatic Structures for
Lunar and Martian Habitats."

  o  State University of New York at Stony Brook, Stony Brook,
N.Y. - "Artificial Intelligence to Simulate the Green Thumb."

  o  The Regents of the University of Colorado, Boulder, Colo. -
"Mars Tethered Sample Return Study."

  o  The University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, N.M. -
"Teleprospector:  A Teleoperated Robotic Field Geologist."

  o  Duke University, Durham, N.C. - "Deployable Magnetic Radiation
Shields using High Tc Superconductors:  A New Concept."

  o  International Space University, Boston, Mass. - "International
Lunar Polar Orbiter (ILPO)."

  o  The University of Texas, Houston, Texas - "Emergency Surgery
and Surgical Critical Care to Support Human Exploration of the
Solar System."


     The Office of Exploration intends to follow these selections
with future solicitations for other innovative ideas and
concepts.  These follow-on studies could be to refine concepts
studied this year or to deepen NASA's understanding or reexamine
using different conditions or ground rules; or these future studies
could be aimed at finding more new ideas.

------------------------------

Date: 18 Jul 89 17:54:08 GMT
From: trident.arc.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Peter E. Yee)
Subject: Magellan Status for 07/17/89 (Forwarded)


                     MAGELLAN WEEKLY STATUS
                          July 17, 1989


     This is a weekly status report. The Magellan spacecraft
continues to perform twice daily momentum wheel desaturations
and, for purposes of attitude update, once daily star
calibrations.

     All of the desaturations were normal and seven of nine of
the star calibrations were successful. Two were interrupted and
anomalies in the star scans are being investigated.

     For 15 hours on July 8 the spacecraft maneuvered to the
alternate Medium-Gain Antenna attitude to gather additional
Rocket Engine Module temperature data. The data showed that REM
temperatures in August and September should be about 87 C (188.6
F). This will require plans to work around the problem unless
ground tests now underway show the higher temperature will be
safe.

     The Solid Rocket Motor upper dome temperatures are
increasing slightly each day, and prior to this report, the
temperature was 30 C (86 F). Results of tests by Morton Thiokol,
received last Wednesday, show that the upper dome temperature
limits can be raised to 70 C (158 F) for a sustained period of
four weeks, or 80 C (176 F) for a period of two weeks. After
review, it is expected the higher limit will be used.

     The Cruise-6 computer command sequence was uplinked Sunday
and took effect today. The uplink was attempted three times
before it was successful, and the problem was attributed to
Goldstone.



     SPACECRAFT
     Distance From Earth (mi)                   10,167,907

     Velocity Geocentric                         9,024 mph
              Heliocentric                      67,493 mph

     One Way Light Time                           54.6 sec

------------------------------

End of SPACE Digest V9 #558
*******************