zweig@m.cs.uiuc.edu (12/07/88)
Does anyone know offhand: a) How far downrange do the SRB's hit the Atlantic, and b) How deep is the water there, and c) How do they get the things to float back up? Is it something the divers have to go down and hook on or is it some system inside the boosters themselves? Forgive me if it's been asked before. I just saw the boosters floating so nicely after Atlantis took off (CNN footage) and it got me wondreing... Johnny Zweig University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Department of Computer Science
sjeyasin@zaphod.axion.bt.co.uk (swaraj jeyasingh) (12/15/88)
From article <22000010@m.cs.uiuc.edu>, by zweig@m.cs.uiuc.edu: > > Does anyone know offhand: > > a) How far downrange do the SRB's hit the Atlantic, and > > b) How deep is the water there, and > > c) How do they get the things to float back up? Is it something the > divers have to go down and hook on or is it some system inside the > boosters themselves? > The only thing I am sure of is that after splash-down the SRBs end up floating vertically as they are half filled with sea-water (the rest being air presumably). Once they are secured to the recovery vessel(USS Liberty Bell is one I think) the rest of the sea water is pumped out so that they float horizontally for towing back. Exactly how the securing is done I don't know. Frogmen ? Canadarm (!) or equivalent ? Can't say more than that without recourse to books. BTW, I've been reading the net for a while and find it stimulating and informative. I can understand the need for the occasional outburst of nationalistic sentiment (we in the UK haven't got too much to brag about). But we can do without the VIVE LE FRANCE attitude and still retain some sense of national pride. Swaraj Jeyasingh British Telecom Research Labs Ipswich UK
smcmahon@watvlsi.waterloo.edu (Scott H. McMahon) (12/18/88)
In article <757@zaphod.axion.bt.co.uk> sjeyasin@zaphod.axion.bt.co.uk writes: >From article <22000010@m.cs.uiuc.edu>, by zweig@m.cs.uiuc.edu: >> >> Does anyone know offhand: >> [ questions deleted ... ] >horizontally for towing back. Exactly how the securing is done I don't know. >Frogmen ? Canadarm (!) or equivalent ? Can't say more than that without ^^^^^^^^^^^^ >recourse to books. > > >Swaraj Jeyasingh >British Telecom Research Labs Well I'm not too sure how they do it either, but I am pretty sure that the Canadarm cannot support its own weight. I seem to remember seeing a video on its development and they had to test it with its joints supported on air cussion devices. The "tube" is made of a thin light material that cannot handle the weight of the joints. When I was at SPAR this summer for thier open-house,the arm they had on display was as how I saw it in the video. Rather amaizing device. -Scott McMahon -- S.H. McMahon - 4A Electrical Engineering - University of Waterloo UUCP : {allegra,decvax,utzoo,clyde,uunet}!watmath!watvlsi!smcmahon BITNET: smcmahon@watvlsi.UWaterloo.ca CDNnet: smcmahon@watvlsi.waterloo.cdn