New solar array debuts on space station (mission extended 2 days to repair thermal blanket)

AP on Yahoo ^ | 6/12/07 | Mike Schneider - ap

[NormsRevenge]

HOUSTON - A new set of solar panels gleamed in the sunlight Tuesday on the international space station as the freshly installed array started opening up.

The first pair of solar wings was fully deployed by early afternoon. The other solar panel would be unfurled later in the day.

It's a slow process. Each wing is unfolded halfway, then allowed to warm in the sun for about 30 minutes to prevented the solar panels from sticking together.

The installation of the new array — part of the station's third pair of solar panels — started on Monday, when two astronauts hooked up the new panels, which have a total wingspan of more than 240 feet, during a spacewalk. Engineers at Mission Control then began remotely unfolding the array from its storage box during the night.

On Wednesday, an older solar array will be folded up so it can be moved during a later shuttle mission. The retraction of that array will allow the newly installed pair of panels to rotate, following the direction of the sun.

Atlantis arrived at the space station on Sunday and will be spending an extra couple of days in orbit to allow its astronauts time to fix a thermal blanket near the shuttle's tail that peeled back during launch.

Experts don't believe the gap would pose any threat to the astronauts, though it could allow damage to the shuttle during its re-entry into Earth's atmosphere.

Engineers at Johnson Space Center in Houston were already were practicing techniques the astronauts might use to repair the thermal blanket.

"It was a 100 percent consensus that the unknowns of the engineering analysis and the potential damage ... under the blanket was unacceptable and we should go in and fix it if we could," said John Shannon, chairman of the mission management team.

The thermal blankets are used to protect the shuttle from searing heat during re-entry into Earth's atmosphere. Engineers didn't think the intense heat generated by re-entry could burn through the graphite structure underneath it and jeopardize the spacecraft, but they worried it might cause some damage that would require repairs on the ground.

With three additional shuttle flights to the space station planned this year, NASA can't afford delays.

The repair to the thermal blanket, covering a 4-by-6-inch area over an engine pod, likely will involve an astronaut attached to the end of the shuttle's robotic arm and boom reaching the shuttle's tail area. No decision has been made on whether it will be made during a previously planned third spacewalk or if a fourth, extra spacewalk will be added.

The rest of the shuttle appeared to be in fine shape, Shannon said.

___

AP Writer Juan A. Lozano contributed to this report.

[NormsRevenge]

This still image from NASA video shows US space shuttle Atlantis Mission Specialist Danny Olivas working outside the International Space Station. NASA has added two days to the shuttle Atlantis's mission so that astronauts can repair a damaged thermal blanket on the vessel's exterior, the US space agency said late Monday.(AFP/NASA-HO)

[NormsRevenge]

Shuttle mission: STS-117

Image above: The forward array of the space station's new solar array wings waits to be fully unfurled. Image credit: NASA TV

[bicyclerepair]

Just WOW!

[operation clinton cleanup]

"It was a 100 percent consensus that the unknowns of the engineering analysis and the potential damage ... under the blanket was unacceptable and we should go in and fix it if we could," said John Shannon, chairman of the mission management team.

Did they consult the HAL 9000?

[suffering_fools]

It's been kinda cool, actually really cool, watching it get deployed live on NASA TV.

AND be able to listen to Rush at the same time. What a country!

Pissed me off a little bit that I had to troll all the public access channels on my cable system for quite a while to finally find the unannounced NASA TV broadcast, but I eventually found it. Not before I missed the launch though.

If anyone ever wants to witness American Shock & Awe in a non-military context, I highly recommend planning a DisneyWorld vacation to coincide with a shuttle launch. Show the kids what American "can do" can do.

Looks like #2 panel is getting deployed as I write.

[edcoil]

What does the station now look like in total?

[P-40]

I’m going to have to get some photographs of it passing overhead. Just got a new camera. :)

[Unmarked Package]

"What does the station now look like in total?"

The overall configuration of the International Space Station (ISS) structure after the successful completion of each Space Shuttle assembly flight can be seen at Spaceflight Now.

The current Shuttle flight is STS-117 for reference. The P6 starboard solar array retraction remains to be done on this mission. Upon successful retraction of the P6 solar array, the ISS structure will resemble the picture shown for STS-117 at the link provided.

[edcoil]

Does it need that many panels for the existing configuration or, are these panels in first then adding more living spaces?

[Unmarked Package]

"Does it need that many panels for the existing configuration or, are these panels in first then adding more living spaces?"

The solar arrays added on this mission, together with the relocation and redeployment of the P6 solar array later in the year, are needed to provide the power requirements for the new Columbus European research module scheduled to go up in December, 2007.

A fourth set of solar array wings and the Japanese Kibo experiment and research modules will be added to the ISS structure next year.

[edcoil]

Thanks.

Do you know of an artist rendition of what the final product will look like? I tried googling but got nada.

[Unmarked Package]

"Do you know of an artist rendition of what the final product will look like?"

Computer-generated artist’s rendering of the completed International Space Station. (Credit: NASA)

High resolution photo (965 Kb)

Low resolution photo (88 Kb)

[af_vet_rr]

New solar array may not have been such a hot idea: According to NASA officials, the computers aboard the space station appear to be sensitive to the noise created by the electrical interference from the solar arrays.

"They did find that these were sensitive to this power noise and in fact, a couple of instances on the ground where activating compressors around the test stands would cause them to have upsets and shut themselves down," Mike Suffredini, NASA space station program manager, told ABC News.

Basically, there may have been a surge from the deployment that wiped out some computers that handle some flight control portions of the ISS (they still have controls in another part of the station.

What I don't get is if that NASA official is right, they knew of "a couple of instances" where there were problems. You don't mess around in space when you have "a couple of instances" of problems on the ground during testing.