A Meteorite Older Than Earth? Control Panels from Soviet Space Shuttle? - Steve's Space Museum II

About "If you have any info on this". I was in the Finnish Army 1977 and we made Intel 8080-based tester for Russian Missile Controller. The tester generated various flight paths and verified the controller outputs. The original Russian tester was all optical, it read parameters optically from a film and write dots on film with blinkin lights. I only briefly saw that Russian tester and it was round brown "hat box" very much like that.

Regarding the tape wrapped around the Instrument Unit components: There's a former IBMer who volunteers at the US Space & Rocket Center who actually emailed about this: "There were thermal issues with the sublimator used for cooling; it cooled too well. Early missions actually added an extra battery and heaters on several of the cold plates to keep from freezing some of the components. The batteries and heaters added cost and weight. They also interfered with the desire to use the fourth battery to power the CCS Transponder and CCS Power Amplifier for ~80 hours until lunar impact. "It was determined that there was enough heat generated by the equipment so if more heat could be ‘held in the system’ then the sublimator temperature control would be OK. So, most of the equipment and all of the cold plates were covered with aluminum tape [the kind used in HVAC ductwork]."

This is how my friend and I are when we've both had coffee. The excitement is palpable.

So fun to listen in on. Two crazy space-geeks (in the best possible meaning), geeking out on space stuff. SO awesome. Thank you for this. And thousands of thanks to Steve Jurvetson for collecting all of this amazing stuff. You both ROCK.

I could easily nerd-out in this guy’s house for WEEKS looking at every little tiny piece of history. This is so amazing.

The energy Scott and Steve have in these videos reminds me of when my train nerd friends get together and look at a cool locomotive. It’s the same excited freneticism, I love it!

Brilliant. It reminds me of when a school friend comes to your house for the first time and you can’t wait to show them all your toys.

Half-way through the video I almost became unsure if I was watching SmarterEveryDay or Scott Manley. The vibes synched up. Great stuff.

I have met Steve a few times at wildlife conservation events where we have had our ambassador cheetahs. Steve’s photo of Kgosi, our “king” cheetah, is on the Wikipedia article about cheetahs. I knew at the time I met him that he was collecting space memorabilia, but I had no idea of the scale and scope of his collection. I have to confess that I am a bit jealous of your opportunity to get such a detailed, personal tour of his collection!

They say the easiest way to find out the real truth about a device or whatever is to make a wrong statement about it on the internet and you will have loads of people happy to set you straight.

I could not work in that office, I'm already distracted by my company's little cabinet of history every time I walk by it

Thanks Scott and Steve. It was great to see/hear you two nerd out together. What an amazing collection!

This is amazing. That SpaceX photo signed by the Apollo crews always really gets me. But that meteor! Ho-lee cow.

I am SO happy there's a part 3, I never want this to end!

Fantastic collection and videos. Looking forward to watching all of them! VTR expert here. Your tape recorder with the speckled tape is a conventional linear tape recorder. There are two prominent structures that are almost certainly fixed head stacks. The threading path shown on the lid is also that of a fixed head linear tape recorder. A recorder with helical scan would have a rotating head with a complex set of tape guides to make sure the tape wraps around the head at a precise angle. Instead, the stacked tape reels are done to conserve space. By stacking at an angle, it makes it easier to achieve a spot where the tape can pass linearly over the heads. Most of the tape guides are there to create this place for the heads. I tend to agree with the other posters about the speckles on the tape. I seriously doubt that they would manufacture a tape that way. In any case, an interesting device!

Imagine being able to hold in your hand a chunk of lava that had melted and flowed in a protoplanet that existed and was destroyed before Earth was formed! What an unbelievable experience!

I'm loving every minute of these. This is absolutely how 2 people who love a topic interact "So this.." "no way, you have one?" "yea, but it was a story on how. So it started, oh, that came from this mission" "it even has the scratches" "oh you know about those? I was told it was important but they never responded ti explain" "well you see, uh, do you have a thing that I can compare it to?" "I have 3" "3?! I only know 2 versions..." it's basically perpetual incomplete interactions of pure joy and back and forth knowledge share. As I know it from Meet the Robinson's: "I know this place like the back of my hand... oh, that's new"

The best part is all the background stories. Magnificent collection.

No better way to spend a lunch break - hell yeah

thrown casualy: "Oh, do you wanna hold Mars?" "Oh yes, a chunk of Mars. " I shall watch this tour many many many times and live vicariously through your Iphone lens.