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Old June 30th 11, 08:55 PM posted to rec.aviation.military,sci.space.shuttle
snidely
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Default NASA Video: Space Station/Space Shuttle docked in orbit

On Tue, 28 Jun 2011 18:58:15 -0500, "Jorge R. Frank"
wrote:


There are many independent requirements that have to be satisfied in
solar array positioning, so the final positioning chosen is not
necessarily intuitive.

Among the requirements is to avoid partial longeron shadowing. The
longerons are the struts running down the middle of the solar arrays. If
a solar array shadows one side of the longerons but not the other,
differential thermal expansion could cause the array to buckle.


Thanks, Jorge!

/dps