Here’s the other high-rez piece of artwork from the Ira G. Ross Aerospace Museum archive showing the Bell “Remora” space work-pod concept. The first piece was HERE. The original posting with crap-quality versions of the images is HERE.
I have posted other “space pods.” For example:
Cleveland Pneumatics Industries, Inc.
Hmm. Thought I’d posted a Lockheed space pod, but seems like not. It’s around here somewhere…
I’ve no idea if the spaceplane in the background was a real design or not. Given the era (circa 1960), it certainly looks like the sort of simple lifting body designs aerospace companies were producing; but the plethora of windows along the sides argues in favor of it being simply artistic license.
3 Responses to “Remora Redux 2”
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Looking at the spaceplane, I’m thinking the windows are in the wake shadow at realistic reentry attitudes of 30-50 degrees angle of attack, while the engine and space pods aft are more exposed. Artistic license is likely.
> the windows are in the wake shadow
Sure. But windows are heavy and kinda useless… not too many “real* designs had ’em except for the pilot.
> the engine and space pods aft are more exposed
Actually, at the time, that wasn’t that unusual. The rocket would be used for orbit circularization and de-orbit burn and whatnot… and then cut loose to burn up on its own. A number of designs from the time had that feature, including a fair number of Dyna Soar concepts. The space pods, I would *guess,* would be left with the space station. What use would the be back on the ground?
Quite similar to a ‘space pod’ I scratch built some years ago based on Clarke’s story ‘Summertime on Icarus.”