Aug 092018
 

A 1959 NASA depiction of the Ernst Stuhlinger “Umbrella” ship. This design was nuclear-electric, the electricity powering a bank of ion engines providing a trickle of high ISP thrust. The large circular “umbrella” was the radiator for the nuclear reactor, located at the far end of the “handle.” This design is a little different from the usual depiction with the crew compartment divided into two semi-toroidal segments. Normally this design is shown with a single torus with a maximum diameter much smaller than that of the radiator; here the crew compartments are shown to be relatively gigantic. I assume that this is artistic license as it also depicted the crew compartments as having *vast* circular windows in the floor. The crew compartments would spin (apparently independent of the rest of the ship) to generate some amount of artificial gravity to keep the crew healthy.

 Posted by at 10:26 pm