Space Shuttle

 

This 1/16th scale model,the same scale shuttle  as the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum shows the three different parts of a space shuttle. These are the orange external tank, the two solid rocket boosters, and the orbiter.

The Orange external tank is filled with liquid hydrogen fuel and liquid oxygen oxidizer. This part is only used once. The two white solid rocket boosters provide 83% of liftoff thrust and are reusable. The orbiter is what carries the astronauts and cargo payload.

This design by Maxime Faget was the first partial reusable spacecraft. It was designed to withstand 100 launches or 10 years of operational life.

Total Gross Lift Off: 4.5 million lb.
Total Thrust at sea level lift off: 6.781 million lb.

Solid Rocket Booster Segment

The boosters supply the main thrust needed to lift the space shuttle up to 150,000 ft or 24 nautical miles. These boosters carry the complete weight of the external tank and the orbiter. The two boosters weigh 1,300,000 individually at launch.

The solid Rocket boosters are made up of four of these segments. Each segment has to be shipped seperatly to the launch site.

 

Complete Set of Mission Tires

This tire display from the space shuttle Atlantis represents all the rubber used on a single landing for the 10 day mission of STS-81.  The Stafford Air & Space Museum is the only facility to display a full flown set of space shuttle tires from a single space mission.

The landing gear tires (bigger tires) fly on one mission, while the nose tires fly on two. Instead of being filled with air, these tires are filled with nitrogen. The main landing gear tires are inflated to 340 psi and the nose tires to 300 psi. These tires can carry 3 times the load that a Boeing 747 jet is capable of withstanding.  The tires cost $5,560 each, the maximum allowable load per main landing gear tire is 123,000 pounds, and they are rated at 258 mph.

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