Skylab 1 payload shroud

OM wrote:
There was only one remaining all-up flight ready S1B, and that was the
one the 5-seater was stacked on top of. IIRC there was *one* that
could have been cobbled together from spare parts, and two others
needing certain parts fabricated - tail fins on both, now that you
mention it


That comes up on the marking on the tail fins of the ASTP Saturn IB in
Alway's "Rockets Of The World".
Alternating fins are supposed to be numbered " I, II, III, IV" - but on
the actual one launched the numbering and tracking paint scheme gets
screwed up...to where there are two fin "III"s on it sitting next to
each other.
I never could figure out the idea of numbering the fins on the Saturn I
or V... if you somehow do get it on the pad either ninety or
one-hundred-and-eighty degrees out-of-line, you will be able to tell
this by the fact that the crew's entry hatch won't be at the end of
walkway, nor the fueling lines have anywhere to attach.
It would have made more sense to paint "N, E, S, W" on the sides of the
booster, and one would have thought that "N" would have sufficed if they
pad crew had obeyed the "This Side Up" instructions. :-)

Pat

On Fri, 27 Jun 2008 20:20:43 -0500, OM
wrote:


No, 203 and 204 used the standard SLA panels (Spacecraft/Launch
Vehicle Adapter) with an Apollo BPC (Boost Protective Cover) on top.

...Brian, care to cite source for this? First *I've* heard about it.

I take it back. Apollo 5 did use the standard SLA structure, but not a
BPC on top.

http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/Hi...67-50927HR.jpg

I think the "aerodynamic nose cone" is the thing wrapped in blue
(sidewall angles are too steep to be an Apollo or BPC.. or is there
some fisheye lensing going on here?)

Brian

On Fri, 27 Jun 2008 22:06:35 -0500, Pat Flannery
wrote:


By diameter maybe, (Ariane V has a very large one on it also), but
certainly not by overall size.
That award would certainly go to the huge fairing over everything above
the third stage of the Soviet N-1:
http://www.astronautix.com/graphics/n/n1f.jpg
http://www.astronautix.com/graphics/n/n1cut.gif
That thing was so large that you could but a complete Titan II booster
with a Gemini spacecraft atop it inside the fairing.... with lots of
room to spare.
That fairing is around 18 feet in diameter at its widest point by 100
feet long...without including the LES.
As to why they thought it needed to be that huge is a very good question.

They were likely not thinking of it as a payload fairing, but as a
vehicle fairing. The US did the same thing with Delta's second stage
(which is still the old narrow "Thor Able"-like stage inside a fairing
the same diameter as the first stage) making the "Straight 8"
configuration.

Of course, N-1 took it to monstrous proportions, but the principle is
the same.

Brian

"OM" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 27 Jun 2008 00:47:49 -0700 (PDT), Neil Gerace
wrote:

On Jun 26, 11:39 pm, Orval Fairbairn
wrote:

A complete backup was built for Skylab and was stored at MSFC for
several years. The backup Skylab ended up at the Smithsonian.

Yes I know :-) but what about its payload shroud?

...One would think, but *I* can't find any reference to it, either. I
suspect if it were made, when Skylab-A made it into orbit, it was
probably scrapped. However, what I suspect is that since, compared to
the rest of the entire stack, a fairing is *cheap*, they probably
ordered one at a time because ordering two wouldn't have saved NASA
any money. Had B flown, they'd have just ordered a new one.

OM

I remember reading that there had been a series of shroud sep tests
conducted, but I don't remember where those tests happened. I would think
that the shroud for Skylab B would have been made when the station itself
was built - B was an operational vehicle, but NASA ran out of money before
it could be launched.

On Fri, 27 Jun 2008 22:58:28 -0500, Pat Flannery
wrote:

I never could figure out the idea of numbering the fins on the Saturn I
or V... if you somehow do get it on the pad either ninety or
one-hundred-and-eighty degrees out-of-line, you will be able to tell
this by the fact that the crew's entry hatch won't be at the end of
walkway, nor the fueling lines have anywhere to attach.

This seems to have been a holdover from the good old Vergeltungswaffe
days. The V-2 had its fins numbered too (Arabic rather than Roman
numerals) . I don't know if it was for the benefit of the launch crew
or for alignment during manufacture.

Regards
Ralph

Ralph Currell wrote:
This seems to have been a holdover from the good old Vergeltungswaffe
days. The V-2 had its fins numbered too (Arabic rather than Roman
numerals) . I don't know if it was for the benefit of the launch crew
or for alignment during manufacture.


In that case it would have been for aligning the missile properly on its
launchpad.
The upper part of the mobile launchpad was cranked around with the
missile on it till the correct side of the missile was on the proper
azimuth to strike its target when launched. By having the missile preset
to fly a ascending arc in one direction when launched, the guidance
system was considerably simplified.
Launch sites were pre-surveyed with objects on the horizon being noted
as to their azimuth bearing, so that by using them the missile could be
aligned properly.
Redstone used the same system, and IIRC, Jupiter did as well.

Pat