Inflatable module for ISS

[Bill Phil]

Rubbish. Did Gemini crews go crazy ? Do submarine crew go crazy? Truck drivers? Cubicle workers? Miners? Flight attendants?

Nothing to do with space sickness. The size of the ISS is driven by the mission equipment that needs to be on board.

There are detrimental effects to large volumes. See Skylab. One of the lessons was that astronauts routinely go stuck in the middle of the volume with nothing to grab on to. ISS modules are designed so that astronauts are always in arm's reach of a wall or a handle of some sort.

Likewise, inflatable modules will never be used as large open spaces. They need outfitting with walls and floors

So u take it you would like to sit down for 14 days in a cramped chair? That's what Gemini 7 did.

Crazy was an exaggeration, submarine crews spend months at a time in cramped spaces, but the subs today are still bigger than the ones in the past. Truck drivers can see the world around them, and cubicle workers are used to spending hours at a time in a box. If I were to work in one, I would walk around the building. Miners also come back to the surface, working in pretty large caverns. Flight attendants can walk around the whole aircraft, and they're usually very big.

Source? It has triple Mir's volume. And Mir did pretty good.

No, that's detrimental effects to large spaces. Mir and the ISS have large volumes, too. You would have that problem in a lot of places. But you could give the astronauts an extendable device to grab onto something.

You our could put those walls and floors in the module's core. Then the first crew could climb about the module and deploy everything.

A lot of stuff on most space stations need to be deployed.

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Sorry to go off on a tangent here. But nuclear thermal rockets only hit high ISP values because their exhaust gasses are so light. It is true that you get roughly 1k ISP when you use liquid hydrogen, but this comes at a price. Reaction mass like Liquid hydrogen and ammonia are so ridiculously low density that you need very large tanks to get good dV. Very large tanks means a lot of added structural mass and insulation mass. This means that the increase in dV from switching to nuclear thermal is much less than you'd expect. ISP goes up, but mass fraction goes down.

Try it out in KSP for yourself. If you install the Realfuels mod you'll notice that the NERVA is not nearly as OP as it is in stock. It is only better in some limited situations, and then only marginally.

This is off topic...

I take it you don't of any of the tricks of the trade, then? Balloon tanks? Or maybe the fact that in space you need much less structural mass? The gain is there.

[Kibble]

submarine crews spend months at a time in cramped spaces, but the subs today are still bigger than the ones in the past. Truck drivers can see the world around them, and cubicle workers are used to spending hours at a time in a box. If I were to work in one, I would walk around the building.

What's your point? That the untrained average person who has never lived or worked in small spaces would be uncomfortable in small spaces? We are talking about professionals - astronauts!

[Bill Phil]

What's your point? That the untrained average person who has never lived or worked in small spaces would be uncomfortable in small spaces? We are talking about professionals - astronauts!

Try: spending months at a time without a way out. With no connection to the world other than a computer. In a tight space.

[Kibble]

Try: spending months at a time without a way out. With no connection to the world other than a computer. In a tight space.

Okay, at least 216 other people have done it successfully. This is a non-issue!

[Bill Phil]

Okay, at least 216 other people have done it successfully. This is a non-issue!

Trained people. Training for years.

[Nibb31]

Trained people. Training for years.

And your point is?

As I said, the extra space is nice to have, but it is in no way a showstopper for any planned mission. It has never been an issue for the navies around the world that have used submarines for over a century, and it hasn't been an issue for space flight either.

Edited March 15, 2015 by Nibb31

[Kibble]

Trained people. Training for years.

Are any untrained people going to be flying in space anytime soon? Even all the space tourists went thru months of astronaut training.

[Nibb31]

Are any untrained people going to be flying in space anytime soon? Even all the space tourists went thru months of astronaut training.

Agreed. And space tourists won't be signing up for more than a few days of weightlessness anyway.

[Bill Phil]

And your point is?

As I said, the extra space is nice to have, but it is in no way a showstopper for any planned mission. It has never been an issue for the navies around the world that have used submarines for over a century, and it hasn't been an issue for space flight either.

It hasn't been a problem for navies because only recently were the subs actually capable of spending long amounts of time underneath the waves. Even the WW1 and 2 subs couldn't be submerged for all that long. And the newer subs are bigger anyways. They have nuclear payloads and such.

My point is that the average human being can have mental problems when in small soaces for large amounts of time. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that Kibble is probably an average human. And his/her claim that he/she would be fine in a box doesn't really hold up.

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Obviously NASA sees something in it otherwise they wouldn't be testing it.

[Kibble]

My point is that the average human being can have mental problems when in small soaces for large amounts of time.

We're not talking about average humans, we are talking about astronauts! And people rich enough to afford to become spaceflight participant.

Kibble is probably an average human.

I'm a dog. Bark bark!

And his/her claim that he/she would be fine in a box doesn't really hold up.

Personally, I wouldn't mind spending 6 months in Mercury, if it meant I could fly in space!

[magnemoe]

An inflatable module for IIS would mostly be for increased comfort that is unless they have some more projects who need space but not much equipment.

IIS is designed to manage without it and already have an habitation module.

For an deep space mission it would be very interesting to save weight, here you would like dedicated crew quarters and don't need lots of science lab space so you use an inflateable module and an life support/ technical module, as it would not be inhabited continuous it can be more cramped think Jefferies tubes http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferies_tube

And the subs are probably more cramped than ISS, it only hold 6-7 people long term if not mistaken, just the last generation of US subs has dedicated beds, all previous used hot bunking, I have been inside a WW2 sub and it was extremely cramped, more fun it was not very insulated so if you operated in the arctic it was freezing inside or above 30 centigrade if you operated in the tropic.

[GreenWolf]

What no one has mentioned yet is that NASA was working on the TransHab concept back in the 90s before Congress passed legislation explicitly forbidding them from continuing work on it. So NASA sold all the patents to Bigelow, and they finished developing it. And now Bigelow has cheap, expandable, habitat modules, and NASA doesn't.

Gotta love that political interference.

[Bill Phil]

What no one has mentioned yet is that NASA was working on the TransHab concept back in the 90s before Congress passed legislation explicitly forbidding them from continuing work on it. So NASA sold all the patents to Bigelow, and they finished developing it. And now Bigelow has cheap, expandable, habitat modules, and NASA doesn't.

Gotta love that political interference.

I did mention the 90s thing.

[Starwaster]

The problem with inflatables is you have to launch them empty, of supplies, and of other stuff like the standard payload racks (the things that makes station modules useful). So its only useful for empty space, unless you want to go to all the effort of installing stuff on the walls.

No, you give it a rigid core and the things you need will be stored there and either unfold out automatically or be manually moved into place or a combination of the two.

[Kibble]

No, you give it a rigid core and the things you need will be stored there and either unfold out automatically or be manually moved into place or a combination of the two.

How much can you pack into a rigid core while still making it slim enough for its reduced diameter to matter?

[vger]

[Bill Phil]

How much can you pack into a rigid core while still making it slim enough for its reduced diameter to matter?

Quite a lot. If it's the sane length of the BA 330, and large enough to house docking ports, then you could house quarters for the crew, consumables, life support, and many other non critical things.

The core is there to house the equipment to expand the module. That equipment can be big, sure. But you need life support anyways, and you're going to expand it with breathable atmosphere. Might as well add quarters, food, waster, and a few other things.

[DaveofDefeat]

Modern nuclear submarines actually have several things designed for human comfort, including hot tubs!, I would like to see a space station with hot tubs.

"SSBNs are so large that some people even run marathons by running around the perimeter of the missile compartment many thousands of times!"

http://www.navy.mil/navydata/cno/n87/faq.html

Edited March 15, 2015 by DaveofDefeat

[sgt_flyer]

nevertheless, ISS is currently capable of housing 6/7 persons - but with boeing CST-100 and dragon-V2, that number might change so they might need a bit more space (even if they just use the inflatable section as only a 'storage' room for common supplies (until they are confident enough with it) it'll still free some space elsewhere in the station for more crew quarters / other experiments.

[Kryten]

nevertheless, ISS is currently capable of housing 6/7 persons - but with boeing CST-100 and dragon-V2, that number might change

Nope, crew will increase to seven only. The limits are in the life support systems, not transport.

[smjjames]

I thought the Jeffries tubes were basically just maintainence shafts, also hiding places and something to use if you absolutely had to.

[Brethern]

What's your point? That the untrained average person who has never lived or worked in small spaces would be uncomfortable in small spaces? We are talking about professionals - astronauts!

Truck drivers, cubicle workers, submariners, and men on the ISS all have one thing in common. In the back of their mind they know there's a way out. But when you're months away from being able to get out of the box you're trapped in knowing that death is just outside the door things change. You don't have that security, you don't have that way out.

[vger]

Truck drivers, cubicle workers, submariners, and men on the ISS all have one thing in common. In the back of their mind they know there's a way out. But when you're months away from being able to get out of the box you're trapped in knowing that death is just outside the door things change. You don't have that security, you don't have that way out.

Furthermore, if space is ever going to become more casual - as in something that will be accessible to people besides astronauts, we need to work on making it a bit more cozy. The current target demographic for recreational space is already ridiculously limited by wealth. And then there's the physical requirements to think about. It would be beneficial if "can handle living in a suitcase for weeks at a time" wasn't an additional limiting factor. More living space will ease up a bit on the strict psychological requirements.

I don't have claustrophobia as far as I know. I'm perfectly fine with spelunking through narrow cracks in the Earth. But I STILL don't know what space might do with me. Even in the case of a deep cavern, I know I can crawl back out if I need to.

Edited March 16, 2015 by vger

[Kibble]

Truck drivers, cubicle workers, submariners, and men on the ISS all have one thing in common. In the back of their mind they know there's a way out. But when you're months away from being able to get out of the box you're trapped in knowing that death is just outside the door things change. You don't have that security, you don't have that way out.

People in submarines have no way out - if the submarine breaks they all die. In the event of an emergency on orbit, assuming they don't immediately die, they can just get in the Soyuz and deorbit. Home in a few hours!

Furthermore, if space is ever going to become more casual - as in something that will be accessible to people besides astronauts, we need to work on making it a bit more cozy. The current target demographic for recreational space is already ridiculously limited by wealth.

When do you think trips onto orbit won't be limited to people who aren't astronauts or the ridiculously wealthy? Anybody who wants to go to space probably knows its going to be a little smaller than their 8-bedroom manor.

And do I have to mention again that not a single person in history has gone crazy or whatever from the tight spaces on orbital spacecraft?

[Brethern]

Furthermore, if space is ever going to become more casual - as in something that will be accessible to people besides astronauts, we need to work on making it a bit more cozy. The current target demographic for recreational space is already ridiculously limited by wealth. And then there's the physical requirements to think about. It would be beneficial if "can handle living in a suitcase for weeks at a time" wasn't an additional limiting factor. More living space will ease up a bit on the strict psychological requirements.

I don't have claustrophobia as far as I know. I'm perfectly fine with spelunking through narrow cracks in the Earth. But I STILL don't know what space might do with me. Even in the case of a deep cavern, I know I can crawl back out if I need to.

The other biggest issue is having things to do. For commercial space travel you need enough of a variety of activities to ensure the person is mentally stimulated enough. All the while somehow figuring out how to get them without affection ship operations.