Internet Interesting concept comes back.

Wayland

Wayland

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I ran into this over the weekend while I was researching spacesuits.

http://mvl.mit.edu/EVA/biosuit/biosuit_images/index.html

I remember this from Jerry Pournelle's "Exiles to Glory" around 1977, but apparently it's been around since at least 1968 as the Space Activity Suit.

[ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_activity_suit"]Space activity suit - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]

The SAS seems to be alive and well at this time.

http://www.elasticspacesuit.com/

Anyone want to try an UMMU mesh/texture set for these?


Wayland

"There is a great force that holds the Universe together, young Jedi. It is called Duct Tape." - Master Yoda.
 
:shifty: Yeah, great in concept. Not so great in reality. I'll track down some pics later today and post them to show why.
 
They appear to be somewhat similar, but the XR2 crew look like they have rigid, or semi-rigid reinforces in various locations, like Imperial Stormtroopers. They might wear a skinsuit under the "armor".

Wayland

"Mistakes made there will be. Blame others, they will." - Master Yoda

---------- Post added 02-28-12 at 03:08 PM ---------- Previous post was 02-27-12 at 10:04 PM ----------

Good eye, walsjona. I EVA'd an XR2 crew and compared screenshots with some of the line art from the MIT site, and they are indeed, very similar.

Wayland
 
Yeah, the problem is a) they're apparently difficult to put on, and b) it gets a bit problematic of specific body parts don't conform to the shape of the suit.

Also, sci fi illustrations just love to put sexy women in these things. In reality not everyone is blessed with such a physique.
 
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According to the article, a laser mapping system is used to generate a pattern, and the suit is precision built to fit you and only you, Probe help you if you should lose or gain weight. There was mention of foam pads to fill in void areas, also. I imagine it is similar to putting on a diver's wet suit.

All cover artists tend to populate their covers with sexy women, it sells books. I suspect that having to wear one of these suits a lot would tend to make anyone a little more aware and careful of their personal appearance. ;)

Wayland

There is, or there is not. There is no maybe! - Master Yoda
 
You just nailed all the key problems with the idea. However, the technique would be perfect for use with gloves, provided you wear some sort of thermal protection over it in cold environments, like a snow glove for space.
 
From what I understand, it should be no more difficult to get on than a slightly too tight wetsuit. However I personally have never tried to put on a slightly too tight wetsuit, so it could be extremely difficult for all I know...
 
There are materials which harden on sudden compression and which are used for bullet proof vests. If they could come up with something similar which tries to reduce its volume on some kind of external impulse, then it may eliminate the donning problem. The material would be flexible while putting on the suit but could be hardened in select areas afterwards.

Dunno how they 'll get it off though :P

the technique would be perfect for use with gloves
Click to expand...

Yeah one can imagine a heterogeneous suit where the parts which need maximum flexibility use pressure suits while the other parts are inflated....engineering nightmare ? maybe not :)
 
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Electroactive polymers, perhaps? Run a current one way, they contract, and compress the suit. Run it the other way, and the extend, and release the suit. Just an idea I had a while ago. Problem is, where's the entry point on the suit? Zippers ain't gonna work with this idea... :shifty:
 
Well, the zippers wouldn't contract, while the suit would. You would then get a wavy zipper and that leads to pockets of no pressure. Also, I am not sure that they can be made entirely airtight, so you would get a string of tiny leaks along the length of the zipper.
 
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Ah yes, hmmm maybe a inner jacket with the zipper in a different place then, over which the outer jacket is worn ? Then the inner zipper region is pressed by the outer jacket and vice versa.
 
Might work. However, the whole concept is still in the future... or is it?
:hmm: BRB. :leaving:

---------- Post added at 08:39 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:33 AM ----------

Yep. Thought I'd seen it before:
4218daa87c0912908e2095110186_grande.jpg

USAF partial pressure suit worked on the same principles. Early U-2 pilots wore them as well.
 
Tailor-made to fit a specific person by means of a laser scan doesn't sound good at all. You want to be able to accomodate as many people as you can (that's why the EMU has swap-in components to accomodate different size percentiles).

Also, I'd rather have an active system to make getting into the suit easier (i.e. expand the suit somehow) rather than make sure the suit works. Forgive me as my knowledge of electroactive polymers isn't all too good, but what if the battery dies?
 
Interesting, any details available about how it was put on, its construction etc.
 
Well, you have a power supply in your PLSS, right? you hook up the PLSS pack, and the suit is powered up and contracts. That way, you have one power supply.
 
Hm, it seems I forgot that the PLSS has a power supply in it already. :lol:

But... if the suit itself didn't require active power, drain on the PLSS batteries would be lower. And some sort of failure involving the constriction of the suit could still increase risk.

Of course is the suit can be constricted permanently (but reversibly on command) by a temporary charge, then the issue is a moot point.
 
Yes the issues remaining with SAS were concluded to be primarily mechanical in nature. Its interesting that human skin is more or less gas tight even under vacuum conditions. That means the gases accumulating in empty pockets around the suit could be evacuated by a simpler system of flexible pipes along the suit.


Wonder if suit has been tried again with more modern techs.

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Ah I see the Bio suit has already reached 25 kilopascals & they need about 30....come on MIT !! :)
 
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@T.Neo: That's the idea that I had. Think of it as an electrically-activated memory plastic, but instead of holding a shape, it holds a length.
 
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