Dec 18 1978
From The Space Library
JSC announced that one of the world's most unusual freight airplanes, the Super Guppy, would deliver a high-fidelity mockup of the Space Shuttle orbiter crew compartment from the contractor in Calif. to neighboring Ellington AFB in Tex. for transfer to NASA, marking first use of the Super Guppy for delivering Space Shuttle equipment. NASA would install the mockup (a detailed model of the cockpit and living quarters on the Space Shuttle orbiter) in a JSC training area for use in crew familiarization. The nonworking mockup was built by Rockwell International, prime contractor for the orbiter.
The Super Guppy took aboard the mockup at Los Alamitos Naval Air Station near Los Angeles and flew it to Ellington, refueling at Davis Monthan AFB, Tuscon, and Dyess AFB, Abilene. A modified Boeing YC-97J, the Super Guppy had the world's largest internal dimensions in an aircraft; it could accommodate the fuselage of a 747, if sectioned. Its present configuration, test-flown by late NASA pilot Joe Walker in late 1965, was first used by NASA early in 1966. The Super Guppy, equipped with 4 Pratt & Whitney T34 turboprops, had flown more than 2 million mi carrying NASA cargo and had seen extensive use in the Apollo and Skylab missions. It had last landed at Ellington AFB in June 1976. (JSC Release 78-58)
LaRC announced selection of Telos Computing, Inc., Santa Monica, Calif., for negotiations leading to award of a contract to develop software for the Natl. Transonic Facility (NTF) wind tunnel at LaRC that would allow networking of four medium-sized computers to be the nucleus of NTF's instrumentation complex. The contract would cover collection and display of all research measurements, as well as automatic control of many wind-tunnel test parameters. Telos estimated the value of the cost-plus-fixed-fee contract at $1.2 million. Work would be performed at LaRC over a 3-yr period. (LaRC Release 78-86)
Engineers from Rocketdyne and NASA were trying to determine why a liquid-oxygen heat exchanger on a Space Shuttle main engine had failed during a test at the Natl. Space Technology Laboratories, Bay St. Louis, Miss., Av Wk reported. This was the first failure of a heat exchanger (an engine component converting liquid oxygen to gaseous oxygen to pressurize the Space Shuttle's external propellant tank). Earlier in 1978 the Natl. Research Council's Assembly of Engineering had noted that, although the exchanger had not encountered any difficulties, the system "poses a potential threat to the total shuttle system" from a single-point failure standpoint. The committee said that, whereas redesign to add systems redundancy was impractical at that: point, the system warranted continued examination for potential design improvements. NASA agreed with that assessment.
Inflight heat-exchanger failure might start a serious fire or explosion that could result in loss of the spacecraft. Failure during the test had resulted in some engine damage, but none to the test-stand. Testing with different engines was continuing. (Av Wk, Dec 18/78, 8)
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