STS-88 (56Kers warned)

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Screens from STS-88 in Space Shuttle Mission 2007 sim. Will update as I complete more of the flight.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS-88

PD

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I'll try and make this a bit less cluttered and more sensible...

OMS circularization burn in 10 minutes. OPS105 tells us the burn will move us 103 miles and last 1 minutes and 9 seconds.


External shot of the burn.


After the burn I manually rotate the orbiter to the proper orbit attitude.


During this time I'm also setting up the computer for orbit, disabling the MPS and dumping its remaining propellant, activating all the heaters necessary to keep equipment at the right temperature, opening the payload doors, deploying the radiators, and activating navigation systems (star trackers, GPS, KU antenna). Here is a shot from the commander's seat looking out the window.


View of the payload bay doors coming open from the rear window.


Monitoring the fuel cells after they were purged using the aft CRT.


Endeavor in orbit on the dark side of earth, payload bay doors open and radiators deployed. All the post ascent housekeeping is taken care of and my next task will by to grapple the Unity module with RMS and attach it to the shuttles docking system. Then I will rendezvous with the Zarya module and attach the Unity module.



PD

[PeriscopeDepth]

More spam from me. Hi mom!

I usually move the Canadarm over above they payload bay and then set the attitude of the wrist to give me a better idea of the correct RMS positioning.


MON1 and the two RMS camera's (one at the elbow, the next further down at the wrist) are my best friends during this stuff.


Gettin' there...



RMS capture!




Positioning the Unity module over the APDS (the Russian made docking system the Shuttle utilizes) is a pain. It's at the outer limits of the Canadarm's movement and I often move it too far, causing the yellow REACH LIMit light to illuminate. I then have to move the RMS one joint at a time back to its limits.


But finally, I get it and watch the APDS seal itself to the Unity. This only takes a few minutes.


To Zarya, and beyond!


PD

[PeriscopeDepth]

I'm half way through my first EVA in the mission (and my first ever in the sim) and will post more shots this weekend. EVA in the sim has proven to be a frustrating orbital game of pin the tail on the donkey that just doesn't add much to an excellent systems/procedures sim, and frankly I think the sim would be better off without it. But perhaps it's not as bad during other EVAs.

PD

[Skybird]

Quite some work to post that plenty of shots!

If they would not have ingored my questions and the activation sequence after installation would not be like it is (limited number of reinstallaton, hardware-depending code-genheration), I would be into this sim myself. I love button-pressing.

[PeriscopeDepth]

Originally Posted by Skybird

If they would not have ingored my questions and the activation sequence after installation would not be like it is (limited number of reinstallaton, hardware-depending code-genheration), I would be into this sim myself. I love button-pressing.

Small sim developers aren't likely to stray from rigorous activation methods anytime soon. With their small audience and piracy being as rampant as it is, you'll be locking yourself out of a lot of good sims. I guess paying $50-$70 and being subject to wacky DRM is just the price of admission these days. I stay away from the really malignant stuff (Starforce), but the rest is just how things are now for the most part.

And this one's especially a good one, been a long while since I've gotten this into a sim.

PD