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NASA

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RifleDude View Drop Down
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    Posted: May/27/2015 at 18:08
Some photos I took at NASA - Houston a couple weeks ago...

Obviously, the first one is Space Shuttle Independence, in carrier transport config:




This is the Saturn V 3 stage heavy lift rocket, which was used for the Apollo moon missions, as well as for launching Skylab into orbit. The whole 3-stage assembly is 363 feet tall and fully loaded with fuel, wieighed 6.5 million lbs. The 5 F1 engines in the first stage produced 1.5 million lbs of thrust each (7.5 million lbs total).






Two earlier and much smaller rockets that I don't remember the names of:





Mercury capsule:



Full scale model of Skylab interior:



Skylab exterior:




Display of astronaut Thomas Stafford right before his historic "world's first international space handshake" with Soviet cosmonaut Alexei Leonov during the Apollo - Soyuz Test Project (1975), when his Apollo spacecraft linked up with the Soviet Soyuz spacecraft:



Display with scientific instrumentation left on the moon's surface during Apollo missions:




Edited by RifleDude - May/27/2015 at 18:32
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote RifleDude Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/27/2015 at 18:24
This is the astronaut training center. We weren't allowed to actually go down on the training area floor, so I took these photos from behind glass along a visitor walkway above (which is why you see some glass reflections in the photos).

This is the International Space Station simulator, a full scale duplicate of the real thing. Astronauts from around the world go there for training. In the background, you can also see the Space Shuttle simulator, although the Space Shuttle has been retired.





This is the Orion capsule simulator. The Orion capsule will be attached atop the Orion heavy lift rocket for future planned manned missions to Mars sometime within the next couple decades:



These are some random surface mobile robot prototypes to be sent to Mars and other stuff I have no clue about:



Here are 2 Mars Rover prototypes that will allow astronauts to drive around on the surface of Mars on some future Orion Mission:





Edited by RifleDude - May/27/2015 at 18:34
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Peddler Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/27/2015 at 19:04
I wish I could grasp if all of that money spent was worth it!

It's been a humongous amount of money spent for what?

Try to make me understand.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote Kickboxer Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/27/2015 at 20:22
How about if every major medical advance since the 1950's came about as a result of some aspect of the space program?
The major advances in electronics… space program
Metallurgy… space program
Computers… space program
Optics… space program
Propulsion… space program

What else???

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote RifleDude Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/27/2015 at 21:23
Besides those Dan mentioned...

-- The development of all sorts of high temperature alloys

-- Development of high tech, high temp ceramics and polymers

-- Satellites put in orbit for communications, GPS, weather

-- GPS

-- Solar cells

-- Improvements in batteries

-- Lasers

-- Advanced design & imaging graphics

-- Structural analysis / finite element analysis software

-- Advanced coatings technology

-- Semiconductors

-- Advancements in aircraft controls

-- MRI, most high tech medical imaging devices

-- Doppler radar

-- Advanced lubricants

-- Freeze dried food

-- Water purification

-- Missile technology in general

-- Advancements in manufacturing equipment, tooling, and methods too numerous to mention

 Just for starters. Would some of those things been invented anyway despite the space program? Maybe, maybe not. But all were spin-off technologies developed as a result of needs to support space missions.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Peddler Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/28/2015 at 05:09
Thanks KB and Ted, I understand the benefits but I guess I'm still thinking about the trillion dollars spent for it.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Kickboxer Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/28/2015 at 07:50

Would have been a lot more, if we got the benefits at all, if there had not been a space program... 

My only regrets with the space program is that it got slowed down (and almost halted by the current administration) and we have not yet made it to all the planets in our solar system (manned flights).  We should be "reaching the stars" by now...

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Stephanie Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/28/2015 at 08:22
Excellent
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote RifleDude Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/28/2015 at 09:10
Not to mention all the countless ways inventions to support the space program have helped our military, which is of course essential to our national security.

I would say MOST of what I do every day in my job involves using technologies developed as a result of the space program.

What price do you put on satisfying mankind's natural curiosity about new frontiers yet unknown, and gaining a better understanding about space/other planets/the galaxy/the universe?

I'm as pro limited government as anyone you'll ever meet. I believe the fed gov't should "stay in its own lane" and strictly adhere to its limited, enumerated powers laid out by the Constitution. You'll never get any argument from me that the fed gov't wastes obscene amounts of money. The government contract and procurement process with industry has all sorts of built-in waste and drives up costs way beyond what the same process would require in the private sector, as the government doesn't have to answer to stockholders.

But, I'm also a realist, and I know none of the above would have ever happened solely in the private sector. The logistics and costs are just too great. We are all beneficiaries of the space program, every day of our lives. Almost any new technological development you can think of in every aspect of your life that has occurred in the past 50 years contains something or was built using technologies and materials that originated from the space program, and that's no exaggeration.

GEEKS UNITE!!! Haha!
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Skylar McMahon Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/28/2015 at 09:13
Man, those are some cool pictures. I like #6, the best.
 
Great Job Ted!
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote RifleDude Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/28/2015 at 09:19
Thanks, Sky Mac.

Some of them are a bit soft and grainy because they were taken inside dark buildings, handheld without any support, at long shutter duration, no flash, and high ISO. I had to remove a lot of noise from several of them in post.

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote coyote95 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/29/2015 at 08:26
Great pics ! thanks for for sharing...
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Rancid Coolaid Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/29/2015 at 08:47
No one mentioned XM radio.

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Kickboxer Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/29/2015 at 08:52
advances in electronics and computers should have covered that… they are both prime for communications… 
I guess I am getting more communistic as time goes by… grouping things… time to reawaken individual efforts...
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Rancid Coolaid Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/29/2015 at 09:56
Precision AND accuracy!

I ain't about area weapons, generalizations, or non-specific comments.

Precision AND accuracy!
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote BeltFed Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/29/2015 at 10:30
My brother has an autographed picture of Ed Wright or is it White, anyway he was the first man to walk in space and one of the astronauts that died in the Apollo capsule fire.
My brother was a mechanical engineer intern at Wright Patterson AFB and helped in developing the power tools and the hand held propulsion unit that was used in that space walk. Those tools are now on display at the Air Force Museum at Wright Patterson AFB.
I wonder if Bud has my brother to thank for his job?
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote RifleDude Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/29/2015 at 12:02
Originally posted by BeltFed BeltFed wrote:

My brother has an autographed picture of Ed Wright or is it White, anyway he was the first man to walk in space and one of the astronauts that died in the Apollo capsule fire.



Ed White

Along with Gus Grissom and Roger Chaffee.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote bugsNbows Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/29/2015 at 12:50
The space stuff was pretty hot here at KSC. The first shuttle launch was spectacular. I lived (at that time) along the Indian River. The VAB /launch complex was in sight. When the shuttle lifted, the ground shook and the windows in my house rattled. Night launches were awesome as well. All we get now are some occasional launches from Canaveral AFS (but I now live way inland over 75 miles from Canaveral). Those were the good old days.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote BeltFed Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May/29/2015 at 12:51
Thanks Ted

My brother also had another project in the AF Museum. I don't know if it's still there. It was his ASAT missile. He was project manager all the way through it's cancellation by Congress. It was the first and only missile launched by an aircraft (a modified F-15) to shoot down an orbiting satellite, and on the first try too.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote budperm Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: June/08/2015 at 09:04
Originally posted by Peddler Peddler wrote:

I wish I could grasp if all of that money spent was worth it!

It's been a humongous amount of money spent for what?

Try to make me understand.
 
 
And on top of all the other valid reasons there was the unification and focusing on an entire nation on something other than WAR!!!!  Every entity needs a common purpose and goal to perform at it's best and advance quickly.  I'd take just about any positive direction or war and or conflict....  One of our Golden Periods...
"Peace is that brief glorious moment in history when everybody stands around reloading".
--Thomas Jefferson



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