Going horizontal...
May. 22nd, 2010 09:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexpgpThe business of launching a payload into space is punctuated repeatedly by tests of various kinds to make sure mechanical items are properly installed and electrical circuits are reliably connected. By about 4 pm this afternoon, the satellite manufacturer was ready to sign off on its readiness to tilt the stack constructed yesterday (consisting of the upper stage, the adapter system, and the satellite) from the vertical position into the horizontal position, in preparation for a process called "encapsulation."
Encapsulation consists of placing two halves of a fairing, which you can think of as a streamlined protective cover, around the stack and then making sure everything is set for the fairing to jettison cleanly away from the rocket once the payload and the upper stage have been boosted above the Earth's atmosphere by the launch vehicle. That jettisoning occurs as the result of detonating a series of precise pyrotechnic charges, which must be very carefully installed on the fairing.
After two days of work from after lunch into the evening, I'm the 9-to-5 interpreter tomorrow, so I better get some rest. There are just under two weeks remaining until launch.
Cheers...
Encapsulation consists of placing two halves of a fairing, which you can think of as a streamlined protective cover, around the stack and then making sure everything is set for the fairing to jettison cleanly away from the rocket once the payload and the upper stage have been boosted above the Earth's atmosphere by the launch vehicle. That jettisoning occurs as the result of detonating a series of precise pyrotechnic charges, which must be very carefully installed on the fairing.
After two days of work from after lunch into the evening, I'm the 9-to-5 interpreter tomorrow, so I better get some rest. There are just under two weeks remaining until launch.
Cheers...
