Strength of materials and designs for space habitat

For tables of strength of materials see:

http://www.nas.nasa.gov/About/Education/SpaceSettlement/75SummerStudy/
4appendA.html

Also, see

http://www.nas.nasa.gov/About/Education/SpaceSettlement/75SummerStudy/
4appendC.html

For a discussion of various shapes and their consequences, see

http://www.nas.nasa.gov/About/Education/SpaceSettlement/75SummerStudy/
Chapt4.html#Shape

On Nov 23, 2003, at 4:53 PM, Brian and Marilyn Smith wrote:

> I look at suspension bridges and consider the loads they can bear. It
> makes me wonder about how an O'Neill habitat would actually be
> constructed. In this spacesettlers group, I read that O'Neill
> calculated the maximum size for a titanium spehere would be about
> 19KM. I see pictures of O'Neill cylinders with no cables from the
> central axis. Is this possible? Where can I find discussions of the
> forces on the hulls of space habitats with 1G environments? I don't
> want to read too much about miraculous new material. But I would like
> to see some simple discussions of the centrifigal forces an how
> current materials measure up to the requirements. Is it better to
> have cables radiating out from central support? Would a torus or
> sphere be able to sustain the force vectors resulting from a 1G spin?
> How does the amount of "soil" or shielding affect the calculations?
> I guess I am looking for links and pointers as much as answers...
> TNX >>>>
>
> Canada.
>

The dinosaurs were destroyed by an asteroid because they weren't
space-faring. It's almost as if Gaia then thought "Well, dinosaurs
worked pretty well, but space-faring is necessary. Maybe I'll should
try mammals this time." Humanity is now developing systems to detect
and deflect asteroids, and could build orbital space colonies to spread
beyond Earth to insure life would survive a planetary catastrophe.

Al Globus
CSC at NASA Ames Research Center
http://www.nas.nasa.gov/~globus/home.html

Views expressed in this email are only my opinions and are not the
position of any organization I'm familiar with.