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19 votes

Why aren't the radiators on the ISS straight?

From the horse's (Vought) mouth, the angle created between each panel and its corresponding scissor beam (20°) is to "provide structural stiffness": The deployment is achieved by rotating ...
  • 1,996
21 votes

Why aren't the radiators on the ISS straight?

This is a scissor mechanism, as used in lifts and pantographs. A fundamental property of the scissor mechanism geometry is that it cannot "open completely" (90* rotation of members) due to ...
  • 14.2k
18 votes

Why aren't the radiators on the ISS straight?

The radiators are jointed because they were launched folded up into a flat stack. This screenshot from the official NASA visualization tool DOUG shows one of the radiators partially retracted. This ...
24 votes
Accepted

How close was the ISS to running out of supplies after the failure of CRS-7?

Hobbes' answer to How long can a 2 person crew survive on ISS totally cut from Earth? has links to articles that include NASA press releases from around that time. In Progress Failure Puts Burden on ...
  • 6,969
4 votes
Accepted

What is the relationship between the power supply system and the thermal control system?

If my previous reasoning is correct, they would have to take over 100,000 J per second from the air. All the heat resulting from the use of electricity does not end up in the cabin air. A lot of the ...
8 votes
Accepted

How many printed novels have been in space to date?

I did some research and even though I couldn’t find an exact number I did find a handful of books brought by different astronauts into space. These were: "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy&...
3 votes
Accepted

At what wavelengths and for what particle types have astronomical objects been imaged or at least directionally resolved from the ISS?

Not claiming to be exhaustive, but there are/were: MAXI, is a soft X-ray all-sky monitor (0.7-20 keV) AMS, is a cosmic ray detector CALET, is again a cosmic ray detector working in synergy with AMS ...

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