Have you done work for NASA :directly or indirectly?

[Dick Sexstone]

I was going to put this under a different topic but then decided that this is an appropriate  “Show & Tell” post…..I watched a story about high schoolers working on a NASA project this morning and it got me thinking about how many of you out there have directly or indirectly worked for NASA?  I think the per capita amount is higher among the people on this forum than the general population…..

I am one of the ones who has indirectly worked for NASA… I did maintenance for a company that does thin film deposition ….. in a vacuum a layer as thin as atoms of elements are deposited on a piece of glass ….. That is made into filters that specific wavelengths of light will or will not pass thru….think spectrograph…..Most of us know the history but incase you have forgotten or were not alive at the time here’s a quick history….. When the the Hubble space telescope was launched the big mirror was ground to the wrong specs….it was Out of focus… so “glasses” were made for the Hubble and at the same time the spectrograph package was upgraded …. The company I did maintenance for got a contract to make some of the new filters….. I maintained the vacuum  machine that ‘shot” the some of the filters that went into the new optics package that was was installed on  one of the repair missions to Hubble….

 

So my question is have you worked directly or indirectly for NASA?  And have you any stories or objects you would like to “Show and Tell”? 

 

I told my story …..here is my show……

Hubble folder…….one side the Hubble the other side view of  Saturn taken from what I thought was Hubble but turned out to be taken by one of the Voyager missions…..

5&1/2” long ….. handle : 203E boarder ,pure iron background , gold inlay and silver stars…. Blade 15n20 boarder …15n20 stars in 1095 background.. 

My photos could have used some new focus  too!!!  Ha ha ha 

 

[Jeroen Zuiderwijk]

I've done a lot of space related work, designing satellite and rocket structures. But in terms of directly for NASA, I took part in the engineering of the Orion spacecraft solar arrays, that just recently made a trip around the moon:

. 

If I'd list all of the projects I've worked on, it would sound like I'd be making it all up. It's quite bizarre what you can roll into when you do this kind of work  

Edited February 22 by Jeroen Zuiderwijk

[Alan Longmire]

No direct connection, but I've learned a lot from Jim Batson, who did work directly for NASA...  and I have a NASA cap I got at the Huntsville Space Center when I was 14. 

 

That's one heck of a folder, Dick!  

 

And Jeroen, I've always liked that you do bronze and iron age stuff for fun when you do space stuff for money. 

 

Now, if they ever find an 18th century Anglo-American colony on the moon, I'm the guy to do the excavations! 

[Dick Sexstone]

Thank you Alan…. I envy your trip to Huntsville…I talked my mother into letting me skip school to watch the first launch of the Jupiter rocket that exploded on the pad…. I had a scrapbook of space news I collected as a kid that got lost somewhere along the line…..

 

”bronze for fun .space for money” sounds like a Mark Knopfler song…..lol

 

Jeron, I also envy your experience ….. so what is the most bizarre project  that you rolled into? 

 

I hope there are some more who have  work to show  or stories to tell  related to NASA

[Jeroen Zuiderwijk]

On 2/25/2023 at 4:40 PM, Dick Sexstone said:

Thank you Alan…. I envy your trip to Huntsville…I talked my mother into letting me skip school to watch the first launch of the Jupiter rocket that exploded on the pad…. I had a scrapbook of space news I collected as a kid that got lost somewhere along the line…..

 

”bronze for fun .space for money” sounds like a Mark Knopfler song…..lol

 

Jeron, I also envy your experience ….. so what is the most bizarre project  that you rolled into? 

 

I hope there are some more who have  work to show  or stories to tell  related to NASA

Hard to pick one. I've also worked on various launchers, the Herschel space telescope, missions to Mars and Jupiter, but also on the ITER nuclear fusion reactor and currently on a flying car. I mean, if you are working making scifi stuff real, you have to have a flying car on your resume  

[Gazz]

Way back I worked at a small micro electronics place in Rochester NY as a circuit trimmer.  Semi conductors were quite new at that time and we sort of handmade circuits there with very low production numbers and my job was to adjust the resistors by microscope while they were mounted on a x/y table with a vibrating diamond stylus to trim the resistor material from the substrate.  The chips were about the size of the fingernail on your pinky and had 27 or 29 resistors on each one.  I would place electrical probes on the connection points, measure the resistance and then select the area to be trimmed by looking through the microscope while targeting the x/y position with the crosshair eyepiece, lower the stylus and move the x/y table while the stylus chewed off tiny bits while I watched the resistance values on digital display.  Today a chip that size would have thousands of resistors and would never be hand tweeked for values.   Some of the devices made there were used in the Apollo Moon Missions which I thought pretty cool as a young lad.  I think most of the stuff made there was bought by the military or military contractors like Raytheon as the Viet Nam war was ongoing at the time.  More recently a friend was awarded a contract by NASA to continue development of an electron beam wire feed 3D printer.  The plan is for machines to be installed on space stations or other vessels so that if a part is needed, it can be printed as needed.  While my shop is equipped with stuff that might be 100 years old, I was able to provide quick turn around for some sheet metal parts and most recently reworked some electron beam optical components.  Just yesterday he picked up a box full of 2"OD aluminum tube stand off things that he needs for some kind of demo for a potential buyer of his company.

Very nice space knife by the way!

[Dick Sexstone]

Gazz….. cool story …. Thanks…. I grew up in Rochester…. And spent 5 years independent study at the  School for American Craftsmen in the Rochester Institute of Technology …..I attended Gates Chili highschool….. I recently saw a short story about printers in space… I wonder if it was friend….I think back in the 50’s Rochester was the “silicon Valley of the east” …..and thanks for the nice  knife comment…..

 

Jeroen, did you work on Cassini to Jupiter? Or one of the Voyagers? That flying car is probably something you can’t talk about ?

[Dan Hertzson]

Also a School for American Craftsman alum, class of '91 (but in glass) here.  Prior life I designed a couple of Clean Rooms for the space effort including for the space shuttle directly down in Florida as well as one for McDonnel Douglas to pretest assemblies.

[Jeroen Zuiderwijk]

16 hours ago, Dick Sexstone said:

Jeroen, did you work on Cassini to Jupiter? Or one of the Voyagers? That flying car is probably something you can’t talk about ?

On the JUICE mission, soon to be launched: https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Juice More precisely, it's a mission to 3 of Jupiters moons. 

 

The flying car is the PAL-V: https://www.pal-v.com/

[Charles dP]

Nice but… I was kinda hoping for a DeLorean 

[Gazz]

The company I worked at was called Megadyne on Buffalo Road, almost across the street from GC high school, where I also went.  In fact, I was on the JV football team with your brother.  Pm incoming.

[Gazz]

The forum says you can't receive messages so no PM.

[Dick Sexstone]

Gazz…..I didn’t know i could not receive messages…. I went looking but didn’t see a PM that I could turn on …..where is that?

 

[Gazz]

If I click on your name there is an option to send a message.  I wrote one and when I hit the send button I was told that were not or could not receive pm's.  I don't know how to fix that, maybe somehow in your user profile?  I just looked but couldn't find an answer.  Maybe need somebody like Alan to fix it.

[Dick Sexstone]

I sent a message to Alan…. Thanks letting me know

[Alan Longmire]

Apparently you can't send them either...  Looks like your box is not only full, but overflowing.  When you were an admin you had unlimited message storage, as a member you are limited to 50 messages.  You have 85.  You can either delete a bunch of messages or re-up for admin duty.  Either way is fine with me, you were a fine admin!

[Gazz]

Another thing that you may find interesting is that my friend who owns the electron beam printing company also went to Gates Chili HS, class of '68.  When you get the message thing sorted out let me know.  I believe we have some other shared acquaintances not from high school.

[Dick Sexstone]

Ah ,that explains it…… thank you Alan….. I’ll sleep on it and make a decision tomorrow…..

Gazz, I’ll PM you when i get myself together……

 

Up to watch  Space X Crew 6 launch 

[Dick Sexstone]

I emptied my message box…. The latest  message was from 11 years ago….time flies doesn’t it?

 

the Space X launch was right on time ….. I don’t catch all of the launches but last nights was the first one that the video streaming didn’t crash as the first stage was landing …..the launches are one thing …. The first stage returning &  landing is Buck Rogers from my childhood…

I laugh every time I watch one….

 

Jeroen, I read about the JUICE mission….. Cool!!  It always seems so far in the future when they get there and when they do it was just yesterday they launched ….I won’t wish our time away though….

[Will Robertson]

On 2/28/2023 at 9:52 PM, Dan Hertzson said:

Also a School for American Craftsman alum, class of '91 (but in glass) here.  Prior life I designed a couple of Clean Rooms for the space effort including for the space shuttle directly down in Florida as well as one for McDonnel Douglas to pretest assemblies.

Did you say glass?

I didn't realize there was anyone else working with metal and glass - the two seemed to go naturally together for me because they both needed a knowledge of refractory and furnace design, a bit of dexterity handling hot heavy things and an understanding of some odd areas of chemistry.

[Dan Hertzson]

 

Yes, glass.  I suspect it may be more common than expected, for just the reason you state.  Some of my work from back in the day (staff series were around 4' long and the sculptural vessels around 2' tall.

 

I switched to forging since it gave me the option to continue playing with fire to make things without having to pay to keep a glass furnace up to 2,000 deg. F continuously.  Actually I was by Albert Paley's shop shortly before he closed it down, and he had been experimenting with the chemists over at Corning to produce a glass formula that was more compatible with steel from a thermal expansion standpoint.  

Edited March 19 by Dan Hertzson

[Will Robertson]

5 hours ago, Dan Hertzson said:

 

Yes, glass.  I suspect it may be more common than expected, for just the reason you state.  Some of my work from back in the day (staff series were around 4' long and the sculptural vessels around 2' tall.

 

I switched to forging since it gave me the option to continue playing with fire to make things without having to pay to keep a glass furnace up to 2,000 deg. F continuously.  Actually I was by Albert Paley's shop shortly before he closed it down, and he had been experimenting with the chemists over at Corning to produce a glass formula that was more compatible with steel from a thermal expansion standpoint.  

Those are very beautiful!

As far as I can work out, very few people make their own colored glass now - most folk seem to buy it in ready made - with no idea of the physics, chemistry or toxicology of what's involved.

I cracked the easy colours first - copper and cobalt blue, then on to beautiful chromium green, finally working on the striking (nanoparticle colloid) gold and copper reds and silver yellow. It was extremely hard to find information when I started off but that lead to a lot of study of the underlying chemistry and a lot of of experimentation - leading to some beautiful iridescent silver colloids and manganese violets.

Lead crystal glasses being outlawed in Europe made some colours much more difficult to make than they were in the past.

From there I got in touch with a handful of others - professional glass artists - making their own coloured glass from remelted clear glass or from raw ingredients.

The cost of running a furnace is enormous - so I got started a few years ago trying to work out how to make it affordable using the newest available technologies - I think with SiC (Silicon Carbide) heating elements and modern IGBT inverters and microcontrollers on the electrical side and high efficiency heat exchangers on the combustion side it may be possible.

With fuel costs rising, the efficiency improvements from advanced refractory technologies seem to be becoming more and more relevant to blacksmithing and knife making as well.

[Dan Hertzson]

Thanks for the positive feedback.

 

My first glass experience was in an elective class in the materials science department at MIT that was run by Pam Vandiver back in the late 70's.  We didn't know a whole lot about blowing techniques, but we did melt our own colors.  Copper reds and opaque colors were the most difficult as I recall.  After graduation I spent some time at Haystack Mountain School of crafts where I was lucky enough to have teachers like Mark Peiser, Andy Magdanz, Mike Tayor, and even Leno Tagliapietra, among others, show me the ropes of more sophisticated techniques.  At that time I was introduced to use of premanufactured color, which as you note, most folks use these days.

 

As I'm sure you are aware, electric furnaces with either silicon carbide or molybdenum heating elements are already in production.  In my opinion they are vastly superior to cheaper ones with wound nichrome elements.  However there is still the issue with needing to keep the furnace running 24/7 to both keep the refractory from cracking as well as maintain glass quality.  As you note, they are typically more energy efficient than gas furnaces since there is less loss to exhaust, but whether they are more economical depends on your utility rates.

Edited March 19 by Dan Hertzson

[Alan Longmire]

There's an artist's co-op in western North Carolina that uses methane vented from a landfill to fire their glassmaking studio.  Of course, that requires a nearby landfill...

[Dick Sexstone]

When I was at School for American Craftsman  mid 70’s the glass shop made up their own recipes ….. I remember arguments about someone baulking at mixing chemicals….

 

The the book Pillar to the Sky by William R. Forstchen……( really cool read) a space elevator to the sky with a solar array the size of Manhattan would supply all the power the country uses…. It is an actual idea of a Ukrainian Couple had 100 years ago….. We don’t have the technology to build it yet ….. But someday…… induction forges and the power to use them will be in expensive….. 

 

Dan , those glass staff’s are cool….I imagine them as swizzle sticks for giants …..Have you made metal ones?