The authors will provide both the reader with an appreciation of spacesuits and US suit efforts, through development challenges to their role in space exploration. The text will explain how the routine use of clothing provides a link to the function of spacesuits and why spacesuits are far more than garments. They are a last refuge for survival in disaster or a personalized spacecraft that allows direct contact and interaction with everything beyond our world. Successfully meeting the challenges to creating safe, reliable and comfortable spacesuits is an ongoing effort that has spanned over four decades.
The book will detail the technical evolution of U.S. spacesuits from their roots in high altitude aviation and vacuum tube development to the present day, with an additional look into the future. This primary source of spacesuit information will explain the function, historical development, and use of spacesuits from a worldwide perspective in a readable way.
The story includes many technically and historically interesting efforts that never reached flight, and were either misunderstood or not widely reported. TOC:Introduction.- Reaching Upward and Outward.- The Basics of Space Suits.- Crew Escape, Rescue and Survival Spacesuits.- Gemini, The First Approaches to Exploring and Working in Space.- Walking and Riding on the Moon.- Advanced Development for Cancelled Apollo Missions.- US Air Force Extra-Vehicular Spacesuit Efforts.- Skylab and Apollo-Soyuz Test Project Efforts.- The Space Shuttle Program - Orbital EVA Comes of Age.- The Next Generation of Spacesuits.- Epilogue.- Bibliography.- Index.
