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To: Unmarked Package
Maybe the ISS designers had that in the back of their minds when they developed the concept.

No, it's for a entirely different, very practical reason. The ISS solar arrays have to rotate in order to keep their front surface with its thousands of solar cells aimed at the Sun as the ISS makes its orbits around the Earth. Unless they do that, they only generate power for a limited part of the orbit. All high-power satellites rotate their deployed solar arrays for that same reason.

The station in "2001: A Space Odyssey" rotated to create artificial gravity in the rim part of the wheel. Come to think of it, I don't remember (or maybe it was never stated) how it generated its power ...

14 posted on 12/11/2006 8:27:58 PM PST by SFConservative
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To: SFConservative
"No, it's for a entirely different, very practical reason. The ISS solar arrays have to rotate in order to keep their front surface with its thousands of solar cells aimed at the Sun as the ISS makes its orbits around the Earth. "

Yup, I understood the reason the solar arrays will be rotating on ISS.

I was merely making note of the rough similarity in general appearance between the two spacecraft, two rotating "wheels" connected by an "axle", and wondering out loud if the ISS designers made the same association in their minds to the space station in 2001: A Space Odyssey as they worked on the project. I wasn't very clear, my fault.

15 posted on 12/11/2006 8:56:20 PM PST by Unmarked Package
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