By now, everyone has seen the Intravehicular Activity (IVA) suit that SpaceX makes for those who fly to the ISS or other Earth orbit missions that don't require exposure to the harsher conditions outside the controlled environment inside vehicles. The first view of those happened on Bob and Doug's first Crew Dragon test flight and many have pointed out how different those suits look from the older generation suits we've been used to. This post from a couple of days before the first manned flight shows SpaceX's suit in one picture and NASA suits (from the Space Shuttle days) in the next.
The new Extravehicular Activity (EVA) suits have been seen here more recently, and SpaceX has released quite a lot of information - including a video - on the suit as the Polaris Dawn EVA is scheduled for 2:23 AM ET on Thursday morning. Never shy about big plans, the video on X has a header that reads: “The EVA suit is a scalable design with the intent to create millions to help make life multiplanetary.”
"It's kind of like a suit of armor made of fabric," SpaceX principal spacesuit engineer Erik Kraus says in the new video.
New features, including enhanced mobility through new joints, a helmet and visor with a display, and a fabric-based material for ease of manufacturing, are detailed in the video.
While based on the IVA suit, the EVA suit's soft portions become rigid when pressurized, requiring flexure and rotational joints for ease of movement. It also has an added Faraday layer, or a conductive cage, around the suit that shields it from external electric fields.
A reality of any EVA suit is that it will be used in a very hostile
environment, and that's the real emphasis of the suit. An old
observation about the moon gives a useful perspective. On the side facing the
sun, it can reach over 200 F while on the side facing deep space it could drop
to -200 F. A person isn't big enough to support that large a temperature
difference but it's worth thinking that's what the environment is trying to do
the suit wearer.
"The EVA suit visor is made of polycarbonate and is coated with copper and ITO, or indium tin oxide," said Kraus in the video. "These two coatings together reflect the sun away from the crew, as well as reflecting infrared heat back to the crew when they are facing deep space."
It's worth noting that the suit was designed and built at SpaceX in Hawthorne, California, with the focus on in-house manufacturing, according to Maria Sundeen, manager of spacesuit fabrication, also appearing in the video. And, for ease of manufacturing, the team developed a new, fabric-based material.
The thing most noteworthy to me is almost a shocking line toward the end of the video.
"The ultimate goal is that you can put on the spacesuit and go out and get work done anywhere in the solar system and not feel like you're wearing anything more than you normally wear everyday," said Trigg.
I can't work outside here in Florida and be as comfortable working as inside the air conditioned house in any outfit. Maybe I need one of their EVA suits.
Screen capture from an animation of the suit at PolarisProgram.com
Created, tested, recreated and retested for far less than the cost of a standard NASA style IVA suit.
ReplyDeleteI wonder when the Suit Shop is moving to Texas.
And, yes, these are the space suits we were promised for the 21st century.
The EVA is set to be live streamed on both Space X and X(ex-Twitter) accounts.
ReplyDeleteIn other news, apparently launch pads at FLA and South TX are simultaneously flooded or receiving massive rains. I suppose it was bound to happen sooner or later.
ReplyDeleteFWIW, that's the first I've heard of flooding around here. I'm not super close to the cape, about 30-40 miles depending on exactly which launch pad and we've had a few days in a row without rain. The NWS has flood warning spots sprinkled across the state, but nothing near there. Maybe 50 miles at closest.
DeleteThe Cape, being part of an estuary consisting of the Indian and Banana 'rivers,' drains easily and isn't subject to flooding from rains.
DeleteNow the peat bogs in the west side of Brevard County are subject to flooding. Good thing that there's no NASA or SpaceX infrastructure out in the peat bogs to worry about.
As to Boca Chica, you'll get temporary flooding from heavy rains and some flooding from storm surge. Nice thing is, once the pressure's off, the water goes away quickly.
It's one of the things about living 2-3 feet above sea level. Smart people build the inside of buildings a foot or so higher than ground level and that usually takes care of any incidental flooding from rains to storm surge.
Though I'm sure that since Starbase has been flooded twice now, that SpaceX will berm all around the site and put in pumps and such to mitigate both blast damage from launches and flood damage.
>not feel like you're wearing anything more than you normally wear everyday
ReplyDeleteSo if I put consumables on a cart and hook up the umbilicus, I could walk the polar regions in comfort? The continental shelves? The Saudi peninsula?
If so, they'll sell millions.
Pretty much seems like what they're saying. They're implying if you're working on one of Jupiter's moons, you're as comfortable as you'd be doing the same stuff on Earth.
DeleteUm. The suits are (or should be) designed to deal with radiative heating / cooling effects, primarily, with perhaps some special thoughts to conduction via the feet if they're going to used on the moon.
DeleteAdding an atmosphere adds convective and conductive heat transfer, so it's really a different - and I would think harder - problem.
Flooding didn't stop the launch from SLC-40 this morning, or the landing booster.
ReplyDelete