Away 36 and Away 37 are now just a memory (and video and data). The team broke both down to components. Systems, batteries, carbon poles and parachutes are back on the shelves waiting for their next reincarnation.
The data is in a bit of disarray. During the mission the documentary crew would asked up to shut down the mission control vans generator for a few minutes. It’s noisy and interfered with filming. We did this about a dozen times. The problem was we weren’t setup for battery only operation (we were running a lot of gear on this mission). We would hold our breaths, break contact with the vehicles in the air and smile for the camera. We would hold our breaths, fire it all back up and see if are craft would still talk to us. Kudos to Kevin for his truck load of patiences in mission control. Aside from becoming nervous wrecks it was a great training exercise. When we have a telemetry dropout as we head to orbit the team won’t bat an eye. I digress, all this messing with comms in flight have left the flight logs littered with holes and artifacts. Sorting through it is like cleaning out the garage, very dusty and you never know what you’ll find.
We’re taking the time between the missions to make a few upgrades on Away 35. Here’s the Away 35 modifications:
Adding the Data system
This is our new data gather system. We need it from the more complex missions on the horizon. It will sample
eighteen sensors fives times a second. It stores the information on a memory stick and transmits it to the ground.
It’s a expanded version of the system flown on Away 36 and 37.
4000g balloon (up from the 3000g balloon)
Test for Tandem: Performance and low nozzle technique
120,000+ foot peak altitude
Additional digital camera and camera controller. This bumps Away 35′s still camera count to seven. The other six are ad pictures the new one will be a horizon shot. If were going over 120,000 feet I want a picture.
No horizon video; to keep the weight down we’re pulling one of the two video cameras.
Spot unit; This is a satellite uplinked GPS. It flew before on Away 36.