NASA torches?

Ok..we all know that the astronauts drink Tang, use Fisher Space Pens, love to play with Velcro...anyone know what kind of torches make it into zero gravity?

I was at the Imax theatre a few weeks ago watching the movie about the International Space Station. One of the astronauts was using a Minimag.

Not to dog the Minimag, but after my exposure to truly great flashlights, it seemed kind of sad to see a Minimag in use when there are so many flashlights that would have been more suitable.

As much as the ISS have to use their hands, they really would benefit greatly from a headlamp.

You know, CPF could really use a few astronauts on board. If NASA got into the flashlight business, just think of the amazing designs we might see! Surely their must be some astronaut Flashaholics out there.

I read somewhere recently that NASA spent *millions* developing a pen that would write in zero gravity, and in -40C temperatures, etc.

The Russians simply use pencils....

But you'd think that NASA would figure out that a headlamp is far, far more practical than a MiniMag.

I can remember about 20-25 years ago there were lithium powered flashlights that had been developed by NASA available for sale in some local stores and mail order houses. They were metal, turned on by rotating the top half of what was basically about the size and shape of a Brinkmann Long Life: a short, squat cylinder; no real bezel.

I can't remember the price, although I remember it was fairly expensive, and the battery was sealed into the flashlight; no replacement available. They were advertized as having a ten year self life, and this was before alkaline batteries, or before they were common, I believe.

Those of us who are old enough remember if we left batteries in a flashlight for 2 or 3 years, odds were about 50/50 that you would find dead, leaking batteries in it.

mini maglites are fine.....robust, reliable and well-made; simple in design yet failproof for the most part. all they need to do is drop in a newbeam led replacement module

Hi Gandalf,
are you talking about the FIVE YEAR FLASHLIGHT ? They were made around 1978.

There were other flashlights designed with aid from Nasa...

quote from NASA TechFinder:
Systems redundancy is a NASA term for using backup units for critical spacecraft systems so that if the primary system fails there will be a backup to take over its work. One use of this technique is in a home flashlight from Rayovac Corporation. The Luma 2 flashlight has an extra-bright primary bulb and an independent backup system including a separate battery, bulb and switch. The flashlight uses lithium power cell and corrosion proof switch technologies developed by NASA. Rayovac was assisted in the design of the flashlight by NERAC, Inc., one of NASA's Industrial Applications Centers (IACs).

Here is a video of the Rayovac LUMA 2 Flashlight: 56.7 K , broadband .

Since the $10K toilet seat issue, the govt' has this policy of using existing consummer technology out of the box for their projects.

We need to let the astranauts know we are here!

How about the ultimate application for the SF A2?

I remember reading "somewhere" that the original Photons were used by astronauts - and were given as gifts to the russian cosmonauts.

Originally posted by Gandalf:
I read somewhere recently that NASA spent *millions* developing a pen that would write in zero gravity, and in -40C temperatures, etc.

The Russians simply use pencils....

Click to expand...

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Urban legend.

I saw the Imax movie this week. I saw the minimags along with the astronauts best friend-DUCT TAPE! They had duct tape on their person in many shots.

I couldn't help thinking what if they had a CPF mod in one of those mini mags.
G

Originally posted by Gandalf:
I read somewhere recently that NASA spent *millions* developing a pen that would write in zero gravity, and in -40C temperatures, etc.

The Russians simply use pencils....

Click to expand...

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">One good reason to have a pen instead of a pencil:

Graphite is conductive. Would you want to be in space, travelling at 32,000 mph, in a tin-can, with exposed circuits behind the instrument panel, and have conductive dust floating around with you, and back in with all the electronic components?

And its an irritating urban legend because EVERYONE likes to tell that story!! Heard it on the radio countless times too. It gets more outrageous everytime someone tells it too...

"Oooo...guess what I heard?? The government spent BILLIONS designing a pen for use in space when the Russians just used a pencil. Isn't our government stupid?" ...as I'm resisting the urge to reach for my Baby Eagle and put this poor soul out of its misery.

As for NASA flashlights, who knows what they use that we aren't aware of. I wonder if NASA public relations would answer questions about that...

Perhaps an email is in order.

Mark

Originally posted by Minjin:
And its an irritating urban legend because EVERYONE likes to tell that story!! Heard it on the radio countless times too. It gets more outrageous everytime someone tells it too...

"Oooo...guess what I heard?? The government spent BILLIONS designing a pen for use in space when the Russians just used a pencil. Isn't our government stupid?" ...as I'm resisting the urge to reach for my Baby Eagle and put this poor soul out of its misery.

As for NASA flashlights, who knows what they use that we aren't aware of. I wonder if NASA public relations would answer questions about that...

Perhaps an email is in order.

Mark

Click to expand...

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Hey, don't shoot the messenger! Like Will Rogers said 'all I know is what I read on the Internet'.

And you have to admit it's pretty easy to believe, given the past antics of our government, and NASA. I for one am happy to hear it's not true...Lord knows our government has no shortge of ways to waste the hard earned money they extort from me in taxes..

if i'm not wrong the $10K toilet seats is just another silly urban legend. basically when doing their accounts, its common practice to misquote the expenditure on various items, so its harder to guess what's what. in the same way that they listed a toilet seat as costing $10K, they may have listed the shuttle's rocket booster and navigation computers as $10K as well. basically, to confuse people

I'm pretty sure fisher (sp?) developed the space pen for NASA for free, with the idea that they'd make a mint on if with the publicity. (Which they did.)

What kind of batteries would they use? Obviously wet cell would be out.

ACR made a light that was used on the Apollo missions. Stuart Schneider's "Collecting Flashlights" book has a picture of one on page 144. It is made of brass. Has a flat bezel, #14 screw base bulb, and appears to operate on 2 AA cells. Probably more of a flood light than a beam. Don't need much of a beam when the farthest thing away is 8 feet! Give me some time and I can scan the photo and post it.
Kirk

I used to work at JPL. (In fact, I worked on the SIR-C project, which produced some of the pictures referenced in that "volcanos" thread over in the Cafe...) Rest assured, there are people in NASA that would make your rabid CPF flashaholic look like a caveman with two wooden sticks.

Lots of interesting research going on in the areas of NiMH battery technology, fuel cells, other portable power sources. I dunno of much directly to do with LEDs. But portable power affects everything...

Exotic batteries+exotic designs=your tax dollars at work.
Not to be a smarta$$ (ok maybe a little bit ) but wouldn't it be better (and more cost efficient) just to give them a case of Princton Tec40s and a bunch of AA batts--I'm sure NASA can get a good deal on bulk batteries.
Lighter and brighter than Maglites as well as cheaper too, all you'd have to do is just glue a strip of Velcro on the side of it and sew a corresponding strip in a strategic location on their duty suit for a hand's free light.

I got curious about the $10k toilet seat and did a quick search on the web. It seems it cost $640 and was a fiberglass cover for the toilet on a Lockheed C-5 Galaxy military airlift jet. The high cost was due to the need for structural integrity in crash landings. The fiberglass cover was needed because the original aluminum covers corroded from "overspray" which resulted from inadequate manual guidance.

Interesting take on the $600 hammer and other supposed Government over-spending:

http://207.27.3.29/dailyfed/1298/120798t1.htm

Think it`s the Men In Black movie where they`re visiting Area 51 with vast underground hamgers and such, asked "how did you pay for all this?" the answer is " hey, you didn`t think we actually paid $10,000 for a toilet seat...."

One I do remember is NASA spending a fortune developing high tensile bolts for mounting rocket engines, the Russians used steam boiler bolts tried and trusted technology.

Adam

russians seem to have a knack for developing stuff that's cheap to manufacture, reliable, and simple