STS-117 Atlantis | Mission Status

POSTED BY: cljohnston108
UPDATED: Friday, June 29, 2007 13:58
VIEWED: 23775
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FLORALBUNNY

Thursday, June 14, 2007 6:21 AM

Well, let's see...
The stuff can be hard to handle, so we'd
want a tape on which the glue is activated
in a time-bracket close to when it's in the
desired final position -- maybe take a heat-gun
to it -- also we don't want any loss of
flexibility under extreme conditions -- we
better get right on it, if such a nifty item
doesn't already exist.

bun
Frisky Browncoat
~plus~

JAYNEZTOWN

Thursday, June 14, 2007 7:42 AM

Quote:

we are going to do a repair and will make sure the crew is safe.

It's sad to see this once great spacecraft these days.

They are going to *Try* and repair but the damage looks like it may be away from a critical area of the Shuttle so it may not be so important.

The Shuttle is very old now, and it isn't as safe as we once thought. NASA has to look like it's at least trying to make repairs in a post-columbia NASA. I still think the ship will return home safe as thew damage doesn't look too serious, plus if NASA gets really desperate they could always ask the Ruskies or Chinese for a lift home.

MAIII

Thursday, June 14, 2007 11:43 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by FloralBunny:
Thanks for the bulletins!
About the repairs: they were talking about
using a sewing kit that's taken along to fix
spacesuits, but by tonight (Wed.) there were
references to staples. ??
Isn't there a space version of duct tape?

bun
Frisky Browncoat
~etc.~

they are going to have the crew use the medical surgical stapler to put two rows of staples on the blanket to blanket interface. for the forward facing blanket to tile interface they are going to use these stainless steel Saffil pins to keep the blanket down. they are still looking at the material properties in terms of how long these pins and staples will last at 1300 deg F (melting point is 2500, but they might loose some strength by 1500). even if they do melt, there is still the lower layer of staples that should be covered by the blankets and the aero loads dont start ramping up until Mach 6, and by Mach 3.5 (~2 mins later) the heat loads have fallen off. so if the blanket pops up the potential for heating in the cavity and failing your face sheets and graphite epoxy as been reduced from 15 mins to 2 min.
the repair will be performed first thing on EVA3.

FILLYGIRL

Thursday, June 14, 2007 12:32 PM

God, I hope its easier than it sounds!! I just hope it works. Thanks Maiii for all the posting, I get such a kick of having this 'inside' information!!!

PFC in the 76th Battalion

...it's worse than you know...Operative
...it usually is.....Mal

CHINDI

Thursday, June 14, 2007 7:12 PM

Thanks MAIII I am always looking forward to your daily updates..

and yes; the Shuttle is aging.. we need NEW and IMPROVED shuttles!! There should be funding for the next great vehicle.. hell- cars get improved every year... why can we not have a new space shuttle every decade at least!! (Yes I know they are costly, but exploration does not come cheap, nor should our crew's safety!!)

And one of the next generation Shuttles should be called Serenity.. like the Big "E"

Chindi

MAIII

Thursday, June 14, 2007 9:35 PM

Well the last 36 hours has been pretty interesting. The team has converged on a plan to repair the L OMS Pod Blanket on the EVA tomorrow. Just as we started to break through clouds and reach the top of the mountain the clouds parted and showed an even bigger mountain looming in the distance called Russian computers. Short story is all three Russian computers are down and have not been able to be recovered for any length of time. What this means to the shuttle is that we can not leave until this problem is fixed. Any active attitude control(firing jets) for the ISS goes through the russian computers, the current stable control mode of momentum management is controlled by the US segment and working fine as long as we don’t perturb the system to much (think of it as balancing a marble on the top of and upside down bowl). So we are looking to do what we can to extend the time the shuttle can stay docked, by conserving power and propellant. If needed looks like we could extend the docked mission by another day. If this problem can not be solved by the time we have to undock then the ISS crew might have to abandon ship because it is highly unlikely that momentum management without russian thrusters could handle the disturbance of undocking.

Anyway the mission timeline proceeds nominally while the team works through the issues. Tomorrow is EVA3 with blanket repair first thing then solar array retraction troublehooting after that. I updated the link with photos from EVA2.

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=ekhorlf.24ok35ob&x=0&y=-bjbomd

CHINDI

Thursday, June 14, 2007 10:00 PM

I heard about the computers on the news last night. It does seem like this is a MAJOR problem for the ISS.

Again, we can throw BILLIONS away on useless agendas and the space program languishes.. (sorry- just my humble opinion, and not meant to offend)

I hope that the problems gets fixed; but it sounds quite dire and quite likely that the residents of the ISS may end up hitching a ride home on Atlantis.. I do not know enough to know if the computers come back, whether they can trust them enough to leave the ISS crew there.. this could be their only way home in a long while....

Chindi.. prayers for their safety...

MAIII

Thursday, June 14, 2007 10:31 PM

well they were able to at least reconfig stuff on the russian segment so that the Soyuz has continuous power so the ISS crew wont have to hitch a ride with the shuttle, but if this computer can be fixed and they cant find a way to undock without upsetting momentum management then the ISS crew might have to undock in the Soyuz just before or just after us.

FLORALBUNNY

Friday, June 15, 2007 12:59 AM

TQVM, maiiiiii, for the info on the thermal
blanket repair.

My remarks about space-going duct tape were
made with a whole catalog of visions slide-
showing in my fevered brain of the various
disasters I've had with terrestrial versions
of the dire and entangling material.

As for the ISS possibly facing an "Out of
Gas" type situation, I had heard about those
faulty computers on Sunday eve. on all-nut
radio and hesitated to mention it here on
the chance it wasn't really happening.
I'm hoping one of the geniuses involved will
be able at least to work out a kluge good
enough to keep the thing going until good
equipment can be sent up, or -- ever so much
better -- fix it all the way.

bun
Frisky Browncoat
~etc. turtle pardy~

CHINDI

Friday, June 15, 2007 5:19 AM

FB.. GMTA.. I thought of OOG too... and I hope this ends as well or better than that moment in the verse...

I am sure it will; but it makes me angry about the underfunding.. ah me.

Chindi. we Browncoats HANG TOGETHER!!! it is what we do..

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