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Lego Launches International Space Station with Rotating Solar Panels and Tiny Astronauts

posted by Fnord666 on Thursday January 23 2020, @03:32PM   Printer-friendly
from the not-actual-size dept.

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

Lego launches International Space Station with rotating solar panels and tiny astronauts:

It took NASA and its partners many years to assemble the International Space Station. You should be able to pull off the Lego version of the feat in much less time.

Lego announced on Tuesday it will launch an 864-piece plastic-brick version of the ISS on Feb. 1.

The ISS set includes three cargo spacecraft, two astronauts microfigures and a tiny NASA space shuttle. The space shuttle is outdated technology at this point, so you'll have to craft your own Soyuz, SpaceX Crew Dragon or Boeing Starliner to get with the times.

"The realistic set features a posable Canadarm2 and two rotating joints that coincide with eight adjustable solar panels, to replicate the out-of-this-world complexity of the real space station that orbits the Earth sixteen times a day," Lego said in a release.

The station measures out to 19 inches (49 centimeters) wide when assembled.

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  • (Score: 3, Funny) by zocalo on Thursday January 23 2020, @04:16PM (4 children)

    by zocalo (302) on Thursday January 23 2020, @04:16PM (#947478)
    They should talk to SpaceX. Elon Musk seems to appreciate things like this and it probably doesn't weigh much, so I wouldn't be at all surprised if they could get one shipped to the actual ISS on the next Dragon resupply mission. Might need to be glued together for safety reasons though.

    Assuming Elon hasn't already made the necessary arrangements, of course. :)
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  • (Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday January 23 2020, @04:51PM (2 children)

    by takyon (881) <takyonNO@SPAMsoylentnews.org> on Thursday January 23 2020, @04:51PM (#947493) Journal

    Lego pieces must never reach the real ISS.

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    • (Score: 2) by Mojibake Tengu on Thursday January 23 2020, @05:13PM (1 child)

      by Mojibake Tengu (8598) on Thursday January 23 2020, @05:13PM (#947503) Journal

      There is no health risk from tread on some Lego piece in the real ISS. Maybe... only if some astronaut eats it. But I am sure no true kosmonaut would do that.

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      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 23 2020, @05:45PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 23 2020, @05:45PM (#947517)

        It's not that, but if they had LEGOs to distract them, they wouldn't get any actual science done!
        (Okay, fine, no actual science once they exhaust all the "experiments" that involve assembling LEGOs in micro gravity.)

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 24 2020, @03:53AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 24 2020, @03:53AM (#947836)

    To advertise this toy, Lego could have one put in orbit by Cringely's latest venture -- micro sats ride on a small-ish solid fuel rocket, with initial launch off an F-104 at Mach 2+, https://www.cringely.com/2020/01/23/not-dead-yet-what-bob-cringely-has-been-up-to/ [cringely.com]

    The last operating Starfighters are based at Cape Canaveral, https://flyastarfighter.com/ [flyastarfighter.com] I'm guessing these are the launch vehicle(s).