For the Christmas Season - Marley's Speech

From 'A Christmas Carol' by Charles Dickens; some of the best writing I've ever read:

“It is required of every man,” the Ghost returned, “that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow men, and travel far and wide; and if that spirit goes not forth in life, it is condemned to do so after death. It is doomed to wander through the world...and witness what it cannot share, but might have shared on earth, and turned to happiness!...I wear the chain I forged in life...I ...made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to you? Or would you know the weight and length of the strong coil you bear yourself? It was full as heavy and as long as this, seven Christmas Eves ago. You have laboured on it, since. It is a ponderous chain!”

“But you were always a good man of business, Jacob,” faltered Scrooge...

“Business!” cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. “Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!”

Seat Mockup

In the images above, the seat mockup, using various lumber clamped with carriage bolts to a dining chair. The suit, minus helmet and gloves, is loosely set in the seat, and very close to pressure testing in a week or two. The balloon carriage (gondola) I'll build will be different from most in one main respect; I will be seated for takeoff, flight and landing, rather than standing (though on landing I do need a standing option). Since the seat will be be the foundation of the carriage, I'm starting with this mockup to get my basic dimensions, so I can start drawing up plans that will 'grow out' from the seat. The testbed in in the background, and after the pressure tests it will be disassembled and rebuilt into a functional cockpit for the carriage. The plan is for balloon flight training in 2012!

Seat Integration

In the photo above, I've built armrests and leg restraints around a dining chair that I'll use for the full-pressure, seated test of my integration with the flight instrument panel testbed. The whole instrument panel will be rebuilt after this test--an exciting project that will improve it significantly--but for the moment this is the 'proof of concept' stage, integrating me in a seated position with all of the hoses I need to support life (breathing gas in/out, suit pressurization gas in [pressure out is valve on the suit itself], suit coolant in/out, communication cables in/out) in position; not too long, not too short etc. Most of the wood used to build the armrests etc. is just wood I've found on the streets, here and there, and the carriage bolts used to connect it all, without any drilling or damage to the chair itself, cost just a few dollars at the hardware store.

Waiting for just a few last components before being ready for the full pressure test coming up, hopefully next weekend. I've pushed the date back a few times, but that's as it should be, as I'm not answerable to any equipment sponsors. I'll only look for a few sponsors once the life-support system is entirely built...and maybe not even, then, really, because from previous experience I know that expedition sponsorship = pressure, and I can't be pressured with this project, where my life is in the balance and I need to just progress on my own building schedule.

Uganda Space Plane

Currently being assembled...the plan is to fly this vehicle to an altitude of 80,000 feet; the government has promised the project about 56,000$US for the project, which is scheduled to be ready some time in 2012: link here. I wish them good luck!

Great!

Continued Sewing

Closing in on very final details now, further sewing on the pressure restraint garment after installing the coolant hose port, as seen in the top two images. It's come a long way since starting to figure this out, in Feb 2010 (final image)!

System Overview Video

Video review of the system at present:



If it doesn't show properly on the screen, you can see it in a new window, here.