Österreichisches Weltraum Forum Austrian Space Forum
By Benedikt Stingl.
Read Benedikt’s first blog post from the beginning of his internship here!
Some time has passed since the end of March and I would like to keep you updated on what has happened since my last blog post.
On the 11th of April the spaceflight community celebrated the Yuri´s Night and I was asked to hold a presentation at the Gymnasium in St. Johann in Tyrol. Around 30 interested students came to hear about the AMADEE-18 mission where just hours ago the last container arrived from his long journey. We also participated in the ‘Lange Nacht der Forschung’ or long night of research where different institutions and organizations throughout Austria participate to give the interested public an insight into the questions of today.
Yuri’s Night talk in St. Johann with interested students.
In terms of outreach we were further asked to display our current spacesuit simulator, Aouda, in the ZDF Terra-X documentation with the famous Harald Lesch that was shown on television because of Alexander Gerst´s launch to the ISS on the 6th of June. We showed up with one large transporter and another small car but were amazed by the equipment that the German television brought up – four gigantic trucks with two being equipment and a portable workshop!
We were recorded during donning and then again in a separate session. It was my first donning and clearly, I was a little nervous, but I was not alone. I was guided through each step by an experienced and amazing crew, so I relaxed quickly. We even completed the donning way too fast, so I was given an additional introduction into the electronic systems. Later I manned the OPS (Operations) position and was tasked to steer the fan speeds inside the suit so that the interview could be conducted without disturbing noises. It was truly amazing to be a part of this production and I am very thankful to have made this experience!
Donning for the ZDF documentary. Screenshot via ZDF.
During the ZDF interview.
In terms of my research for my Bachelor thesis I finished the literature survey although I still receive notifications for interesting publications. The next step in the development was the evaluation of the different types of load carriage. From it a preliminary configuration resulted which can be seen in the picture below. It was heavily influenced by a system that we already had in our workshop. An optimal configuration was also found but you´ll have to read my thesis for that. ?
An important milestone in my work was, as mentioned in the last blog post, the Medical Review. One member of our Analog Astronauts and the Biomedical Team respectively had a look onto the preliminary configuration. Obviously, the head carriage system caused a lot of discussions. One of the concerns were the impediments of the head movement that this system might cause because the ability to move freely is an essential feature of a good space suit. Although the system was not rejected it was agreed that my thesis should focus on the distribution of the weight via shoulder straps and hip belts. Should the currently planned weight of the new suit be exceeded by far the idea might be reconsidered with much more research involved.
I´d like to express my gratitude towards my reviewer’s patience and time here. Thank you for your input! I think we have had some good discussions and arrived at a reasonable conclusion!
Finally, we also built the first hardware to explore future spacesuit concepts. We are now able to try out rear entry methods with our suitport-structure. But not just that we are also able to change the inclination and height of the entry. Also, the entry itself can be exchanged and in the near future we want to add exchangeable wires that resemble the suit structure so that we are just as restricted as with a real suit that is attached to the suitport. Thanks go to Matthias Mair who took care of the statics behind it, this wouldn´t have been possible without you!
Testing the suitport!
Overall a lot is going on here and there is still a lot to come!
Author: Benedikt Stingl
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