A few more hurdles...

Monday was a day we were dreading - we had to go through a Test Readiness Review (TRR). We had been told that this was the day they were going to 'grill' us on our Testing and Experimental Data Plan (TEDP) that we had put together in Feburary/March. We had continued to work on this document with the help of our mentor (see below) until basically the day before we flew. This was the document that included the structural analysis that we just couldn't seem to get right.

So, Monday morning we show up bright and extra early because not only do we have a mandatory meeting, but we also have that surprise full ground test that we were notified of on Friday afternoon. I ran to the meeting and left Tanya and Hannah to explain the project, and when I got back we were just finishing up and getting some suggestions from the people looking at our set-up. (Which, by the way, is 'set-up' one or two words or is it hyphenated? I have no idea!) We made the needed changes and then just sat and chatted for the next while before our TRR. Because of the ground test, we were ready way before we needed to be for the review.

The TRR committee was composed of about 20+ people from all areas of expertise. We just had to introduce ourselves, go through our experiment, and highlight all the safety precautions we had taken. When the time came, virtually no one had questions and there was nothing they asked us to change. One gentleman was very interested in our hypothesis and the science, less concerned about the safety side of things.

So, after the moved along to the next group, we thought we were home free. Until we weighed our project with everything finally attached. It was 40lbs too heavy. 'Non-trivial' as one of the engineers who had been working with us said. Apparently, we underestimated the weight of the frame by about 20lbs. This caused stress because our structural test did not test for the full weight of the apparatus. So, we frantically tried to get the weight down by pulling off everything we could and began combing through our structural analysis to see if we could find an equation to plug the new weight into and then see if we could still be fine. Well, first off, we couldn't find the right equation, but our engineer took some measurements and worked out a diagram on paper to see if the test we had done last thursday would cover the new weight. And miraculously, it did - by less than 60 pounds of force. The tested amount of stress was good up to 2075 pounds of force (or something...not really sure) and our equation for our structure came out to 2017 pounds. We barely scraped by.

After finally getting through that hurdle, we reassembled the parts that we had removed and then took it to be installed in the plane. But, once again, things did not go easily. Apparently, the bolt holes on the floor are not perfectly spaced, so we almost only got 2 of the 4 bolts in. This caused more math headaches, as we had only tested for 3 bolts, which meant that the engineer was going to do more math to see if our structure would pass muster. But, we jimmied the metal frame over just a few more holes and finally got a third bolt in!

And after that, we thought we might be good to finally go, but yet again, we had one more hurdle. They thought that the microwaves would interfere with the pilot's/plane's instruments and communication, especially since we were the closest group to the cockpit. So, some more NASA guys got out a bunch of equipment and ran a test while the microwave was microwaving. The microwave was apparently well-shielded and caused no noise or blips on their measurer.

Finally we were all ready to go and got to go get fitted for our flight suits! I must admit that in this whole project, I have most looked forward to getting and wearing my flight suit...they just look so cool! I was issued one long olive green suit and given a name tag. I get to keep the name tag, but not the suit :(

Here is a picture of our whole team in our suits in front of our work table and sign:

Pretty sweet, yes?

Now I'd like to add a word about our mentor, Tamra George (who goes mainly by George):

She is a very short woman, but she holds her own. She has a degree in Welding Engineering from Ohio State and plays indoor and outdoor soccer. At JSC, she is one of three engineers who work on designing and building tools for the astronauts to use in space. How cool is that! Apparently it takes about 6 months from initial conception to flight date to develop a new tool and train the astronauts to use it. There are stress and materials people who also work with the developers along the way. Apparently, one tool that they wanted to send up with the latest shuttle was to be used during one hour of a spacewalk but was pulled two days before launch because of some retro-fitting concern. During spacewalks, the three engineers cycle through watching the astronauts use the tools. There is always one person watching. Apparently, you can only use tools for the purposes they were intended for in space, so you couldn't use a screwdriver for a lever, etc. There is also a whole group dedicated to watching the spacesuits, as they might get small rips or tears as they work and any tear could potentially depressurize the suit. Glove checks are among the most common procedures during a spacewalk.

Anyways, she has a cool job, but volunteers her time to mentor. She works with us for 4+ days and it is all her vacation time! During and after her time with us, she continues to work on her real projects.

She is going to fly with Tanya on Tuesday because we are one person short. Here is a picture of her that I found on a volunteer website for a Darfur benefit basketball tournament (I think):

P.S. If you want to fly on the plane commercially, it'll cost you about $10,000. We fly on the Zero-G plane, and if you go on their website they sell a 12-15 parabola package for a hair over $5,000 and we experiance about 30+ parabolas. But, you get to keep your Zero-g flight suit, whereas I do not. I might a suit for outreach, however...