The Space Station V kit will come with at least 2 Orion III spaceplanes. The question, of course, is how to scale the Orion III with the station, since there is no official size for either. One stated diameter for the SSV is 1,000 feet, which was apparently a size specified before filming. That’d be fine, except that apparently Kubrick thought that the Station looked small compared to the Orion III, and had it optically scaled up by a factor of two, leading to a diameter of 2000 feet.
The Orion III is also officially unsized. However, I believe that a good case was made for a span of 109 feet by Ian Walsh of Stargazer Models, described here. And so, one of the Orion III spaceplanes will be scaled to the station by a ratio of 109 feet/1,000 feet, as shown here:
This is clearly wrong when you look at how the two objects scale against each other as actually filmed. However, it’s actually a pretty good match, and it really looks like this was how the two were originally intended to be scaled:
On the other hand, when they are scaled to a ratio of 109/2,000, they look fairly right compared to the screen.
So at least these two size of Orions will be included, so that the model builder can choose their own scale for the kit. Depending upon production costs, a third or even a fourth intermediate size of Orion may be included (such as one to depict the station being 1500 feet in diameter).
11 Responses to “Space Station V & Orion III”
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
Good work on these. They are two 3D models I’d love to add to my collection!
Agree that Ian Walsh of Stargazer did a very convincing analysis of the shuttles size. Interesting how its cargo bay and general size “coincidentally” matchs the actual space shuttles?
As for the station, I guess you have to use the size you see relative to the movie – that makes the floor spacing look weird ets – but its much more “cannon” then the pre filming concept size
I’m holding out for the idea that SS-V was intended to have a diameter of 2000 feet. At that size, a modest rotational speed of 1.21 rpm yields a tangential velocity just a bit over 77 m/sec, giving the folks at the Howard Johnson’s on level six a perceived gravity of precisely 1 G. At r=1000′, the rim spin speed would have to be some 40% higher to get the same G value. It can’t be a coincidence.
It also looks more majestic.
The implications are staggering. SS-V, with two wheels at r = 2000′ each, is going to be as wide as two U.S. Navy supercarriers. I’d guess something like that built to the standards seen in the movie (i.e. customer-class accommodations, not a military outpost) would mass in the 400,000 ton range. And there are presumably four other stations of similar size as well!
A civilization that can put two million tons of space station into Earth orbit over a thirty-year period is impressive by any standard. No wonder they had a city at Clavius — they must have been pulling sixty or seventy thousand tons of titanium and other high-grade metals out of the moon every year and lofting it into Earth orbit. I would have loved to have seen their heavy lifters, mining, ore processing, and milling facilities.
New to the argument, so bear with me if I’m rehashing old stuff.
Is there anything out there estimating the diameter/circumference of the ring based on the scene with Heywood Floyd talking to the Russians in the lounge, or is that so far off as to not be worth anything?
> or is that so far off as to not be worth anything?
It’s a good theory, but trying to estimate the radius of the set is a non-trivial task.
Sorry. I meant to say a radius of 1000 feet. At r=1000′, an angular v of 1.71 rpm yields a tangential v of 179.37 ft/sec for a perceived gravitational acceleration at rim of 1 g. Sorry for the mixup.
How does the width of the hub compare to the diameter of some of the larger HLLV concepts?
Sea Dragon loks to be wide enough for the innermost facing parts of the hub, where the bottom of a Nexus turned into a wet-stage type station module looks to be about as wide as the widest point of the hub. Not as pretty, but perhaps a quick and dirty way to have a wide, open area…
I think Ian Walsh’s reasoning for internal set sizes are probably the closest that anyone can come to the actual sizes. I don’t entirely agree with the final external sizes he comes to, but his argument for scales are probably the best. He also readily admits that fitting internal sets to a model exterior is also probably unreasonable. On a thread of this at SM-forum, I argued that given available photos of the SSV the station appears to be more on the order of the 800+’ with a margin for error that could put it in the low 900′ range (novel ref 900). I’m working on the paper model of the Orion III & using various shots web refs, including Ian’s, figured that the wingspan was more in the range of ~150 to ~180 feet (novel ref 200 on system). A quick sketch showed (like yours) they are still dockable, but it doesn’t “look” right. Undeniably doubling SSV “looks” better. Giving a choice of Orions is probably the best solution.
Oh Wow…I just ordered a station model from FP, and decided to look for more on it… and found this.
I am shaken. Wow oh wow. Do I read it right that my scaling played a part in this ‘Fantastic’ kit/work
(pun intended)
Ian (stargazer) Walsh
Sort of. The station was declared to be either 1000′ or 2000′ in diameter, meaning the fixed-size physical model would represent two different scales. But the Orion is *not* so variable; your scaling of that has been taken to be authoritative, so several Orions are to be included representing the different scales.
The issue that is not discussed, or I didn’t find it, is the size of outer ring, given size of Orion and dock in the middle and ratio of dock to pillars, it seems to me would be at least 21-2m in diameter, this than also dictate the width and thinks of outer ring at least 22m (in fact it appear to be rectangular so 26×22 perhaps) – the issue is, if it is 26 can fit 8 story building, so why the stations will have only two levels? If it will have 2 levels with lights + 1 level without than we have no more then 10m x 8m but than also beams between outer ring and hangar has to be much thinner…