Current spacesuits won't cut it on the moon. So NASA made new ones.:
A spacesuit is more like a miniature spacecraft you wear around your body than an item of clothing. It's pressurized, it's decked out with life support systems, and it's likely to look pretty cool. But should the suit fail, you're toast.
No one has ever died because of a faulty spacesuit, but that doesn't mean current models are perfect. Whether it's for launch into space or reentry back to Earth, or for an extravehicular activity (EVA, colloquially known as a spacewalk), astronauts have never been completely satisfied with the gear they are forced to put on for missions.
[...] The most interesting work, however, has to do with NASA's next-generation spacesuit for astronauts going to the moon—the eXploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit, or xEMU. It is ostensibly the successor to the spacesuits worn by Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and other Apollo astronauts when they set foot on the lunar surface half a century ago.... The goal behind Artemis is to have people living and working on the moon. New spacesuits will be critical to ensuring that the experience is safe and comfortable.
"We are so excited about putting people back on the moon," says Richard Rhodes, a spacesuit engineer at NASA who's working on the xEMU. "Our main goal is that the crew doesn't even think about us. They put the suit on, and they do their work—the science, the exploration—and do not even think twice about how mobile they are or how effectively they can work. That's a tall order, but we're trying to get as close to that as possible. We want to be invisible."
The article cites the xEMU as having such things as better mobility (especially for walking), protection from dust, better headset audio, and improved gloves relative to older spacesuit designs.
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SpaceNews.com: NASA selects Axiom Space and Collins Aerospace for spacesuit contracts
NASA awarded contracts to Axiom Space and Collins Aerospace to provide spacesuits for International Space Station spacewalks and Artemis moonwalks, although neither the agency nor the winning companies offered many technical or financial details.
NASA announced June 1 it selected the two companies for Exploration Extravehicular Activity Services, or xEVAS, contracts to support the development of new spacesuits as well as purchasing spacesuit services. The companies will own the suits they develop and will effectively rent them to NASA for space station and Artemis missions, while also being able to offer the suits to other customers.
The goal, NASA officials said at a briefing about the awards, is to have lunar spacesuits ready for the Artemis 3 lunar landing mission, currently scheduled for no earlier than 2025. NASA will also conduct an "orderly transition" from existing, decades-old suits on the ISS to the new suits around the same time.
[....] the companies provided few technical details about their suit designs, and NASA did not even have illustrations of the winning designs to show, electing instead to release an illustration of two moonwalking astronauts wearing suits not necessarily associated with either company.
(Score: 0, Troll) by fakefuck39 on Monday January 04 2021, @12:06AM (13 children)
I thought they were using this thing tusk designed. why are they designing a new one?
https://www.space.com/spacex-spacesuits-five-star-astronaut-review.html [space.com]
too lazy to research this semi-uninteresting topic, but oh man, if spaceX is not letting NASA use this design on non-spaceX flights, that would be wild, like bean and corn jalapeno vomit wild. Whatever money NASA is spending on designing and building a new suit, I'm sure it's millions more than just buying them from tusk.
If NASA is going to embrace supplementing their capacity with commercial offerings, what the hell is the point of this expensive effort when they have a commercial product they loved and approved?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 04 2021, @12:37AM (1 child)
Musk has already made a spacesuit. Now, he's making a moonsuit. Sometime next year, we can expect him to unveil his new marssuit. And, of course, you won't want to wear any of those among the asteroids, so we can expect a new roidsuit eventually.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 3, Funny) by fakefuck39 on Monday January 04 2021, @08:37AM
roidSuit? like steroid Suit or assTeroid Suit - you know, for assteroids. The assteroid suit could have a built in whoopy cushion in the but to make it less painful to sit. and it becomes a moon suit when you don't wear your tidy whities under it.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by requerdanos on Monday January 04 2021, @12:39AM
As I understand from the article, the "extremely comfortable" SpaceX/Boeing spacesuit is designed for a space environment, while, in contrast, NASA's xEMU (mobility and walking enhancements, extra dust protection) is designed for walking and working on the Moon.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 04 2021, @12:39AM (4 children)
Why?
Because why use something that has worked before when you can go through a whole new design and development cycle and risk introducing new modes of failure?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 04 2021, @12:45AM
Uhhhhhhmmmmmm, may I ask a silly question?
When was the last time we used a moonsuit to walk on the moon? Hasn't it been over fifty years? Give it another fifteen to twenty years, and those suits will be back in style - among groundhogs maybe.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 4, Informative) by FatPhil on Monday January 04 2021, @01:37AM (2 children)
Why do you hate advances in science?
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by fakefuck39 on Monday January 04 2021, @08:33AM (1 child)
Yeah, but how many advances have we had since the NASA suit has been released, which was a year ago.
But as another person answered, this thing is only good for flight, not moonwalks. Before we had the same suit for both (I'm 99% sure). So I'd say modify the spaceX suit released last year to also walk on the moon, or maybe swap a component or two. The space is super limited, two sets of suits for a whole crew is a lot of wasted space.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 04 2021, @11:46AM
EVA suits such as Apollo carried are a lot bulkier and heavier than the pressure suits astronauts wear during launch and landing since they need radiation and micro-meteorite protection. Pressure suits are worn during launch and re-entry in case the cabin develops a leak, which would otherwise kill the crew, but aren't meant to be worn outside. Any mission that might require the astronauts to go outside requires EVA suits, otherwise they just wear pressure suits. For example, on Shuttle missions only the ones who were going to be working outside brought full EVA gear while the rest just brought pressure suits.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Monday January 04 2021, @01:50AM (3 children)
SpaceX and Boeing made "flight suits". They aren't designed to be used outside of the Dragon and Starliner spacecraft.
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-52787365 [bbc.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by fakefuck39 on Monday January 04 2021, @08:24AM (2 children)
I thought it might be something like that. But doesn't this now mean two different space suits? From what I understand they def need spacesuits for landing. Back in the day, the russians didn't have them inside the capsule, allowing them to have a smaller capsule, and is the reason they made it to space first. But Gagarin had to jump out of the flaming fireball capsule with a parachute just to land - because no suit.
So now one suit for transportation, and another to be picked up at baggage claim when they land, in order to walk on the moon. I wonder how much different those are that a whole new suit is needed, instead of some hybrid, with a changeable part or two - which saves space and weight. And I wonder if they're not making a hybrid one because musk's thing is his thing, so take it as is whole, or make a whole other one.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 04 2021, @11:59AM
An EVA suit requires integrated full-body radiation shielding, a sun rated visor, and an armour layer to protect against micro-meteorites. These are not minor changes or something that can simply be worn over a pressure suit, and anyone going outside will need one of their own since they are custom fitted for each astronaut. A 'hybrid' suit would be identical to a full EVA suit since it already requires everything the pressure suit has. They also aren't something you want to wear inside if you can help it due to their bulk and limited range of motion.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Monday January 04 2021, @08:08PM
It remains to be seen what involvement SpaceX will have in Project Artemis. It could end up being: Falcon Heavy + Dragon XL used to send cargo to build a Lunar Gateway orbiting the Moon, SLS used to send astronauts from Earth to the Gateway, and Starship (exclusive lunar variant that kicks up less dust on landing) to get the astronauts to the surface. Except they are competing against Blue Origin and Dynetics [spaceflightnow.com] for that last part.
The SpaceX flight suit might only ever be used on Falcon 9 + Dragon flights to the ISS. The design should probably be recycled for something else they do, since they got a Hollywood costume designer to work on it and it looks better than all the other space/flightsuits.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 04 2021, @04:13AM
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(Score: 2, Touché) by looorg on Monday January 04 2021, @01:05AM (2 children)
Current spacesuits won’t cut it on the moon? Have they not already been on the moon? Or?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 04 2021, @01:18AM
No, current spacesuits have never been on the moon. Never.
The choices for moon suits were, make up some new suits just like they wore on the moon half a century ago - or make some new moonsuits, using current technology.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday January 04 2021, @01:44AM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 04 2021, @02:39AM (2 children)
The Moon is one of the strangest so called planets in the universe. It defies any traditional laws of physics, with astonishing pin point precision. It has always been the one planet which really gets astronomers scratching their heads.
Much of the scientific evidence found over the past 50 years has supported these claims. The mass of the Moon, it is 25% or one fourth of the Earth’s nearly eight thousand mile diameter. How is this possible that the mass of the Moon is so much less than Earth, only 1.2 percent of Earth when it should be the same ratio as volume. It would take 81 and a half Moons to equal the amount of matter in the Earth.
The moon is a pipe dream, take your vaccine and vote democrat if you want to achieve progress.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 04 2021, @03:29AM (1 child)
You're just trolling, right?
The moon could be larger than the earth, and still mass less than the earth. Earth has an iron core, remember? Over which there is a rocky mantle, and a rocky crust. Part of that crust is covered with water. Each of those components are rather dense, with a lot of mass.
Moon rock seems to maybe be less heavy than a lot of earth rock. Considerably less dense than the iron core.
Can I interest you in a subscription to "How Things Work", to be delivered into your inbox each and every morning, including national holidays?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 04 2021, @10:05AM
You mean persontle? Right?
When you pray do you say amen, or awomen?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 04 2021, @03:27AM (1 child)
TFA doesn't mention how the spacesuit wearer deals with noxious methane emissions. Such emissions can actually cause clothing to rot.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 04 2021, @03:31AM
There's a methane barrier for the innermost layer.
(Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 04 2021, @04:10AM (1 child)
YOU GET WHAT YOU FUCKING DESERVE!
(Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 04 2021, @04:11AM
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