

How did Orion withstand temperatures twice the melting point of steel? - gordon_freeman
http://www.theverge.com/2014/12/5/7339431/nasa-orion-heat-shield-molly-white-engineer

======
Mithaldu
For those who are curious about the answers, but don't care about the 90%
filler that this article is made of:

\- they had documentation on the apollo shields, but few people who'd actually
worked on it

\- NASA redeveloped Avcoat, a combination of fiberglass and high-tech
plastics, that was used, in an earlier form, for Apollo’s heat shield

\- if it worked as intended, about 20 percent of the shield burned up on the
way down

In addition to being almost entirely filler and answering the titular question
for no good reason whatsoever only in the last 25% of the article; none of the
numbers are in SI.

I really hate modern journalism.

~~~
vibrolax
In the following film, you can watch them make and test the Apollo ablative
heat shields and capsule blankets.

Apollo Spacecraft Status Report #2 - 1966 NASA Educational Documentary -
WDTVLIVE42
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mk5QI0-k6nc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mk5QI0-k6nc)

> I really hate modern journalism. In my opinion, the journalism of the 60's
> wasn't any better. Technical matters have always been simplified to a degree
> that scientifically educated people find distressing. At least today, the
> internet gives the interested person access to source documents nearly as
> easily as depicted in "Star Trek".

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mikeyouse
A much more substantive article:

[http://spaceflightnow.com/2014/11/05/engineers-recommend-
cha...](http://spaceflightnow.com/2014/11/05/engineers-recommend-changes-to-
orion-heat-shield/)

 _The Orion heat shield’s titanium skeleton and carbon fiber skin was
fabricated by Lockheed Martin — the craft’s prime contractor — in Colorado.
The skeleton was shipped to Textron Defense Systems in Massachusetts for
installation of a fiberglass-phenolic honeycomb structure._

 _More than 330,000 individual cells make up the honeycomb, and Textron
technicians — using a special dispensing gun — filled the cells by hand with a
material called Avcoat._

 _The Avcoat insulation is supposed to ablate away during the Orion
spacecraft’s re-entry, protecting the underlying structure from searing
temperatures. The Apollo moon capsule used the same type of manually-applied
material for its heat shield, and it worked so well Lockheed Martin and NASA
decided to dust off the design._

 _But a review of the heat shield on the Orion spacecraft set for launch Dec.
4 revealed the Avcoat was slightly more uneven than expected, according to Jim
Bray, crew module director at Lockheed Martin, Orion’s prime contractor._

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njharman
Um wild guess here, but. By using something that isn't steel? Also
intelligence insulting fluff articles have no place on HN.

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fallingmeat
The part about knowledge like heat shield technology, rotting away, is kind of
disappointing. It seems that's at least one area that would be under
continuous development and the art would only be improving, not retreating.

~~~
TallGuyShort
There was a similar article some time back about attempts to retrieve and
study Rocketdyne F-1 engines from the first-stage of the Saturn V rockets from
the Apollo missions because understanding of their design was lost. I can't
find the article, but someone did point out that in many ways the Space
Shuttle's liquid-fueled engines were superior, albeit less powerful. It's just
a fact that we haven't done anything quite like a manned moon mission in
decades and a lot of that experience is unique, and is now "retired". I agree
it's sad to see. I've been reading a few books on the computer systems from
the program and it's fascinating - I recommend Digital Apollo if you're
interested in what we still know about that aspect.

~~~
avmich
May be this one - [http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/04/how-nasa-brought-
the-...](http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/04/how-nasa-brought-the-
monstrous-f-1-moon-rocket-back-to-life/) ?

