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Simulation of the outside of the Shuttle as it heats up to over 1,500 °C [1] during re-entry. LI-900 is a type of reusable surface insulation tile developed and manufactured by Lockheed Missiles and Space Company in Sunnyvale, California.
Both the orbiter and booster were to be protected with the LI-1500 silica tiles similar to those eventually used on the Space Shuttle, a design that had recently been introduced by Lockheed and quickly became a baseline design for all of the shuttle contenders.
Typical Space Shuttle TPS tiles have remarkable thermal protection properties. An LI-900 tile exposed to a temperature of 1,000 K on one side will remain merely warm to the touch on the other side. However, they are relatively brittle and break easily, and cannot survive in-flight rain. [46]
Much of the shuttle was covered with LI-900 silica tiles, made from essentially very pure quartz sand. [1] The insulation prevented heat transfer to the underlying orbiter aluminium skin and structure. These tiles were such poor heat conductors that one could hold one by the edges while it was still red hot. [4]
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STS-114 marked the return to flight of the Space Shuttle after the Columbia disaster and was the second Shuttle flight with a female commander (Eileen Collins, who also commanded the STS-93 mission). The STS-114 mission was initially to be flown aboard the orbiter Atlantis , but NASA replaced it with Discovery after improperly installed gear ...
The tile materials comprising much of the orbiter's outermost layer were mostly air held within near-pure silica fibers, which made it efficient at refractory insulation that absorbed and redirected heat back out into the air, and covered in silicon borides and borosilicate glass, with blacker tiles covering the lower surface, and whiter tiles ...
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