New Big Gemini model
Pat Flannery
http://www.fantastic-plastic.com/BigGeminiCatalogPage.htm
Looks to be a really sharp model.
Pat
Alan Erskine
90 bucks? PHEW!
Pat Flannery
Resin small production run ones always run high in price; they don't
expect to sell all that many of them, so they recoup their design and
production costs by charging a lot for each kit.
You want to get something that everyone will really notice, try this on
for size:
http://www.fantastic-plastic.com/ProjectOrionBattleshipCatalogPage.htm
I really like the destroyer gun turrets. :-)
Pat
Alan Erskine
Looks like the missiles even have wings - improved performance against
U.F.O's? If only the Purple-haired Ladies had this baby in their arsenal!
scottl...@ix.netcom.com
> >http://www.fantastic-plastic.com/ProjectOrionBattleshipCatalogPage.htm
> Looks like the missiles even have wings
Those aren't missiles... those are the "landing boats" used for
resupply and crew up/down transfer.
Pat Flannery
>> http://www.fantastic-plastic.com/ProjectOrionBattleshipCatalogPage.htm
>> I really like the destroyer gun turrets. :-)
>>
>> Pat
>>
>
> Looks like the missiles even have wings - improved performance against
> U.F.O's? If only the Purple-haired Ladies had this baby in their arsenal!
IIRC, those are crew transport vehicles; the missiles are in those
rectangles of small circular hatches forward of the gun bays, with a
total of 90 missiles being carried.
The Orion battleships were supposed to make up the Deep Space
Bombardment Force, hanging around out in orbits at lunar distances,
ready to retaliate for any Soviet surprise attack that destroyed the
complete US strategic triad of ICBMs, missile subs, and bombers.
One obvious place to put them would be near the unstable L2 Lagrange
point behind the Moon, so that their exact position couldn't be
determined from Earth-based observations.
Pat
Quadibloc
> In 1/48th scale:http://www.fantastic-plastic.com/BigGeminiCatalogPage.htm
> Looks to be a really sharp model.
They could have had the equivalent of the Space Shuttle by 1971, even
if it wasn't reusable?
John Savard
rfd...@optonline.net
For some reason, the proportions don't look right to me. Of the capsule or the
service module. It just doesn't look like every picture I've every seen of the
package.
Pat Flannery
The thing was considered an alternative to the X-20 Dyna-Soar.
The width of the back equipment module makes it look like it's supposed
to ride into orbit on the top of a Saturn I or Saturn IB.
NASA had a hell of a time convincing McDonnell-Douglas to stop
presenting new Gemini-derived ideas to them in competition to Apollo on
a almost monthly basis.
Want to see the ultimate Gemini derivation?
Let's land one on Mars:
http://www.ninfinger.org/~sven/models/gemini/wg_02.jpg
Little did they know that in the movie "Robinson Crusoe On Mars" not
one, but two, modified Geminis were going to crash-land on Mars, with a
50% fatality rate: http://membres.multimania.fr/marsetsf/rc2/snap01034.jpg
He's the lucky guy; he got out of that before it blew up.
The other astronaut - Adam West - had his come straight down on a spire
of rock and blow up before he had a chance to get out of it.
Pat
Pat Flannery
The overall design never did finalized, although there was one
full-sized mock-up of a version of the reentry module made:
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/bigemini.htm
The one the model seems to represent is a fly-alone variant that will be
used for space station crew change/cargo delivery, similar to the fourth
illustration in that article
Pat
rfd...@optonline.net
Okay, I get it now. Wgen I posted that the proprtions didn't look right, I
though this was a BIG model of a Gemini capsule. I hadn't heard of a BIG Gemini
project to carry more personnel and more supplies. Interesting concept.
Alan Erskine
There were different SM sizes for different launchers - one was only 3m
diameter for the Titan IIIM and another was 6m diameter for the Saturn Ib.
Pat Flannery
Its merits are still debated.
Here's McDonnell-Douglas trying to hijack the Moon program:
http://www.astronautix.com/articles/bygemoon.htm
Something very much like those designs showed up in the Robert Altman
movie "Countdown", where a astronaut made a solo one-way flight to the
Moon in a Gemini mounted atop a LM descent stage.
Pat
M
As I recall the only post-Gemini program hardware that flew of any
kind was the Skylab.
The EVA hatch on the airlock module was of Gemini design.
Pat Flannery
> As I recall the only post-Gemini program hardware that flew of any
> kind was the Skylab.
> The EVA hatch on the airlock module was of Gemini design.
It took me a while to track down a photo of it, but here's the Gemini
hatch as the airlock door on the Skylab:
http://history.nasa.gov/EP-107/p75.htm
Pat
Dr.Smith
"Alan Erskine" <alan.e...@bigpond.com> wrote in message
news:WGUeo.5008$FH2....@viwinnwfe02.internal.bigpond.com...
You would think if they were going to show Skylab with two solar wings they
would have removed the tarp solar shade on the box cover.
Pat Flannery
Hadn't spotted that little slip.
MOL or MORL would have been a better choice for space stations.
Pat