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The Centristation Wet-Launch Classical Wheel Space Station Concept
By James E. D. ClineHere is a composite document from the documents put on the Genie compute network, theauthor's websites, and a peer reviewed formally published technical paper on the subject,along with some related photos and drawings.Explore the Centristation concept for a highly efficient and low-risk way to build the classicalwheel-shaped rotating space station in Low Earth Orbit, by designing and building itscomponent wheel segment modules to serve as their own fuel tanks during launch. The mile-diameter wheel is first built and tested for integration of all living and mechanical systemswhile on the ground, then taken apart and docked sequentially in LEO each module servingas its own fuel tank during launch by unmanned reusable vehicles consisting of an engineflyback tug vehicle and a strap-on air breathing booster vehicle. Below is a composite graphicof it all, including a photo of the author taken while at the conference when he presented theconcept in 1995 to the Space Studies Institute.
A quick look:
 
 
This concept is built around the basic idea of building each habitat module's primary shellstructure as a pre-equipped fuel tank which is used for its own launch into Low Earth Orbit;there the emptied fuel tank in orbit, pre-outfitted for habitation and utilization in space, willbecome lots of room for people who are living long-term in space, when they all are dockedtogether in the spoked wheel configuration again. And when linked into a circle and spun up,these modules form an artificial gravity environment enabling fairly normal lifestyles inside.We build upon this basic idea here. The modules are first outfitted into the mile-diameterconfiguration on the ground, except each temporarily rotated 90 degrees to accomodate thedifferent "down" direction when on the ground, and there the space station is de-bugged onthe ground into a fully functional semi-self-sufficient space station for 200 - 1000 people'shomes, their sustaining agriculture and light industrial shops. When the complex blend ofmechanical and living systems is working adequately, the items which need non-cryogeniclaunch conditions are removed, then the wheel is dissassembled and each modules islaunched into high LEO to be re-docked up there into the same configuration. The firstmanned presence would not be needed until it is readied for initial low-g spinup. To see theprocess more easily, it is also available described here in adventurous form in J. E. D. Cline'sscience fiction novel "Building Up" beginning in Chapter 4.
Background efforts:
 This concept was conceived and expanded upon by the author (J E D Cline) over the yearsstarting in 1989, and various attempts to provide awareness of the concept and its potentialswere made, including files put on the GEnie Space and Science library, such as the 1989 fileGeSp1071 , preparing camera-ready copy for a technical paper that was peer reviewed andpresented by the author at the Space Studies Institute space conference at Princeton in 1995and published in the proceedings, and later correspondence efforts with Rockwell Corporationwho would have surely benefitted greatly by such a follow-on project to the space shuttle,upon which much of the technology would be easily adaptable.Following are two of the files put on the Genie Information Network, which was a computernetwork available to the public before the internet became available. Genie's “SpaceportSpace and Science Library” was available free to members of the National Space Society / L5Society at the time, and was where many of the author's early efforts to tell of his concepts tothe world were placed for public access. Then follows the formally published paper, and aphoto of the author and a subsequent drawing of the assembled launch vehicle.
 
 CENTRISTATION IIIJ. E. D. Cline Dec. 17, 1989A pair of unmanned engine/control system flyback modules boost a segment of a centrifugalspace habitat toroid into LEO; during launch, space station segment is serving as the fueltank.This document outlines a conceptual design that is squarely on the path to spacecolonization. A low-cost, safe centrifugal space station, with its launching system, that isworthy of the 1990's. See sketch. This very economical space station conceptual designperhaps can rekindle America's interest in the adventure of space, while providing a solidstepping- stone towards extending mankind's living resources beyond earthsurface. Anadventurous, yet practical, Space Station Habitat.Features:--utilizes proven technologies.--a low-cost, versatile, rotating centrifugal 1-gee large space station is created.--a new class of launch vehicles is created, consisting of a pair of winged flyback modulescontaining only engines and control systems ... the first flyback engine cluster module dropsoff prior to orbital insertion, and the second smaller single-engine-module returns afterplacement of the habitat-module in position in orbit; and an upper stage which is built both asa furnished space station habitat module, and also as the fuel tank during launch.This Space Station Habitat design is a segmented toroid, for indefinitely long habitation, aprecursor to an Island-One Stanford Torus space habitat. Each segment of the torus
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