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HISTORY OF TECHNOLOGY, TECHNOLOGY, OBJECTS AROUND US
Orbital space station. History of invention and production
Directory / The history of technology, technology, objects around us Orbital station - a spacecraft designed for long-term stay of people in near-Earth orbit for the purpose of conducting scientific research in outer space, reconnaissance, observations of the surface and atmosphere of the planet, astronomical observations, etc. It differs from artificial Earth satellites in the presence of a crew that is periodically replaced by transport manned spacecraft (including reusable), delivering to the OS a crew change, supplies of fuel and materials for the functioning of the station’s technical systems, crew life support, personal correspondence of its members, spare parts for the repair and modernization of the station itself, blocks of equipment for expanding its functions, materials for conducting new research, etc. The descent vehicle of the transport ship delivers to Earth the replacement crew members and the results of the research and observations.
Although the history of astronautics spans only a few decades, it has already passed through a number of important stages. The beginning of the development of near-Earth space was laid by short (lasting, as a rule, several days) expeditions on standard spacecraft. The astronauts who piloted them made many important observations and discoveries. But at a certain stage, these short shuttle flights beyond the atmosphere ceased to satisfy science. Spaceships were small and had many specific features that did not allow them to be used for long-term serious scientific research. To become a firm foot in space, the cosmonauts had to be accommodated here with at least minimal amenities and have at hand a lot of various scientific equipment. The first orbital stations became such a space house and at the same time a space laboratory. Their appearance was an important milestone in the history of manned flights: together with them, the heroic era of the pioneers was replaced by the time of everyday life and hard everyday work. What is an orbital station? In a sense, it can be considered a large spaceship. The same stringent requirements are imposed on its reliability. The same life support systems that are described in the chapter on spacecraft function here. But the station has its own peculiarities. It is not meant to be returned to Earth. As a rule, it does not even have its own propulsion system, since its orbit is corrected using the transport ship's engines. But it has much more scientific equipment, it is more spacious and comfortable than a ship. Astronauts come here for a long time - for several weeks or even months. During this time, the station becomes their space home, and in order to maintain good performance throughout the flight, they must feel comfortable and calm in it. The first orbital space station in history was the Soviet Salyut, launched into orbit on April 19, 1971. On June 30 of the same year, the Soyuz-11 spacecraft docked at the station with cosmonauts Dobrovolsky, Volkov and Patsaev. The first (and only) watch lasted 24 days. Then, for some time, Salyut was in automatic unmanned mode, until on November 11 the station ended its existence, burning up in the dense layers of the atmosphere. The first Salyut was followed by a second, then a third, and so on. For ten years, a whole family of orbital stations worked in space one after another. Dozens of crews conducted many scientific experiments on them. All Salyuts were multi-purpose space research laboratories for long-term research with a removable crew. In the absence of astronauts, all station systems were controlled from Earth. For this, small-sized computers were used, in the memory of which standard programs for controlling flight operations were laid. The total length of the station was 20 meters, and the volume was 100 cubic meters. Mass "Salyut" without a transport ship - 18900 kg.
Inside, the station was divided into three compartments, of which two - transitional and working - were hermetic, and the third - aggregate - non-hermetic. Both hermetic compartments were inhabited. The transition compartment was made in the form of a cylinder with a diameter of 2 m and a length of 3 m. It included a docking station. A bulkhead with a manhole separated it from the working compartment, which was a comfortable laboratory adapted for rest and long-term scientific work. The main part of the research equipment was located here, as well as devices and units for controlling the station, a life support system, power supply and radio communication devices. The compartment had 15 windows and consisted of two cylindrical zones connected by a conical part. The small cylinder had a diameter of 2,9 m and a length of 3,8 m, and the large cylinder had a diameter of 4,15 m and a length of 4,1 m. The width of the conical part was 1,2 m. The cosmonauts spent most of their time in the working compartment: worked, exercised, ate and rested. In the zone of small diameter there was a table for eating. A tank with drinking water was also fixed here. (The water in the containers was preserved by adding silver ions; each astronaut used an individual mouthpiece attached to a hose for drinking.) Nearby was a food warmer. In this zone, items necessary for the astronauts to spend their leisure time were stored: a library, an album for drawing, a tape recorder and cassettes for it. Sleeping places were located in the large diameter zone on the starboard and port sides. They had devices to fix the body in any position. There were also refrigerators with stocks of food and water tanks. A toilet was placed on the back bottom of this zone. It was separated from the rest of the working compartment and had forced ventilation. A special cesspool device was used to remove liquid and solid waste products. There was no washbasin and shower on the first "Salute". The toilet consisted of wiping the face and body with special sanitary napkins and towels. In the conical part, there was a complex of means for performing physical exercises and medical research, in particular, a treadmill. During physical exercises, the cosmonauts wore special suits that prevented the spread of the smell of sweat. Means of manual control and control of the main systems and scientific equipment of the station were located at seven posts. There were four posts in the small diameter zone. One of them is the station's central control post. It was designed for the simultaneous work of two people. There were two chairs in front of which the control panel was located. From here it was possible to control the engines and the station's orientation system. At the other six posts, observations and research could be carried out. The station housed a lot of various equipment, including the large Orion telescope and the Anna-III gamma-ray telescope (for studying cosmic gamma radiation). Behind the working compartment was a non-working aggregate. It housed propulsion systems, antennas of radio communication systems, a thermal control system, and a television camera. Radio communication with the Earth on the first Salyut was maintained mainly by telephone. There was also a television system, but it required a lot of energy. The power supply system included solar and rechargeable batteries. The former were rigidly fixed on the station body and in order for the sun's rays to be perpendicular to their plane, they required a special orientation to the sun. The cadmium-nickel battery worked together with the solar battery in the "charge-discharge" mode, since about 40% of the time on each orbit the station was in the Earth's shadow. In addition, the Salyut had a backup battery in case of powerful and long-lasting power outages. The thermal control system consisted of independent liquid cooling and heating circuits with internal and external lines. Excess heat, if necessary, was radiated into space by a radiator-cooler. If, on the contrary, it was required to bring heat to the station, then it was removed from the radiator-heater on the sunny side. Thus, the temperature in the residential compartments was maintained within 15-25 degrees. The life support system maintained the necessary gas composition, absorbed odors and dust, provided the crew with food, water, and removed waste products. The supply of oxygen and the absorption of carbon dioxide took place in the regenerator blocks. At the same time, the air, passing through a highly active chemical substance, was enriched with oxygen and freed from carbon dioxide, and driven by fans through filters, it was cleaned of dust and litter. Gas analyzers were placed in different places of the station, which constantly monitored the gas composition. Following the USSR, the United States launched its orbital station into space. On May 14, 1973, their SkyLab station was launched into orbit. It was based on the third stage of the Saturn-5 rocket, which was used in previous lunar expeditions to accelerate the Apollo spacecraft to the second space velocity. The large hydrogen tank was converted into utility rooms and a laboratory, while the smaller oxygen tank was converted into a waste container.
"Skylab" included the actual block of the station, a lock chamber, a berthing structure with two docking nodes, two solar panels and a separate set of astronomical instruments (it included eight different devices and a digital computer). The total length of the station reached 25 m, weight - 83 tons, internal free volume of 360 cubic meters. To put it into orbit, a powerful Saturn-5 launch vehicle was used, capable of lifting up to 130 tons of payload into low-Earth orbit. Scalelab did not have its own engines for orbit correction. It was carried out using the engines of the Apollo spacecraft. The orientation of the station was changed with the help of three power gyroscopes and micromotors operating on compressed gas. During the operation of Skylab, three crews visited it.
Compared to the Salyut, the Skylab was much more spacious. The length of the lock chamber was 5,2 m, and its diameter was 3,2 m. Here, on-board gas supplies (oxygen and nitrogen) were stored in high-pressure cylinders. The station block had a length of 14,6 m and a diameter of 6,6 m. It was divided into laboratory and household sections. The household compartment, in turn, was divided into four rooms for sleeping, for personal hygiene, for training and experiments, for spending leisure time, for cooking and eating. Their height was 2 m. The sleeping room was divided into three sleeping cabins according to the number of astronauts. Each of them had six small lockers and a sleeping bag. The entrance to each cabin was hung with a curtain. The hygiene room was equipped with a washbasin and waste bin. The washbasin was a closed sphere, which had two holes for hands, equipped with rubber flaps. There was also a shower, separated from the rest of the room by a curtain. The water drops sprayed through the atomizer were then sucked into the collector by an air stream. Each astronaut had his own personal toiletry locker. The room for rest, cooking and eating had a table with burners for heating food, a stove, cabinets and refrigerators. The astronauts had a wide range of frozen foods, including cold cereals, potato salads, beef tenderloin dishes. The table was equipped on three sides with three individual taps for drinking water. Each astronaut had his own tray with cells for heating food. The tray magnets supported the knife and fork. In the same room were three armchairs, a tape recorder and books. A bicycle ergometer was placed in the room for training and experiments. The laboratory compartment was twice the size of the domestic one. Its inner diameter was 6,4 m. On September 29, 2011, the Tiangong-1 space station was launched by China. This was the first Chinese spacecraft of the orbital station class, created under the Project 921-2, referred to as the target module and designed to develop rendezvous and docking technologies for spacecraft.
The first dockings in the Chinese space program are connected with Tiangong-1: Tiangong-1 receives unmanned and manned Shenzhou spacecraft. The station module consists of two sections of different diameters. General data: weight - 8506 kg; length - 10,4 meters; width (for solar panels) - 17 meters; living volume of the station - 15 cubic meters. In place of the descent vehicle and the utility compartment (orbital module), a laboratory compartment with a diameter of 3,4 m was installed, made in the form of a cylinder. An androgynous-peripheral docking unit of the APAS-89 type is installed in the front part of the compartment (and the entire module) (similar to those installed on the Kristall module of the Mir orbital station, as well as those installed on the hermetic adapters of the ISS AS, on the Zarya (FGB) facing the ISS NS were installed on space shuttles), the rear end of the compartment is connected through a conical adapter to the service compartment. The service (instrument-aggregate) compartment has the same diameter of 2,35 m as in the ships of the Shenzhou series, but is shorter than on them. It also has two solar panels with a capacity of about 7000 watts. Author: Ryzhov K.V.
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