On the Toronto International Bike show

The weekend is the Toronto International Bike Show. Sigrid (see the Blog roll on the right) and I went together. Sigrid scored a few jerseys and I believe met her new racing team, although to be honest I wasn't really on top of what she was doing. I was too busy haggling over bike prices. Ultimately I got a 2006 Specialized Roubaix (for anyone who is wondering, it comes nicely loaded with a Shimano 105 group) I also bought shoes, Specialized again (the side of the box is labeled Sport Road, not sure if that's the model), and Shimano 105 pedals. The store I bought all this good stuff from threw in a water bottle cage for good measure. Later I bought a pump from another store. Total spent, $1518. Of course since I don't have $1500 in small change under the couch I've had to pay a deposit and will pay for the rest probably next month or so. As a result I don't even have any pretty pictures, ironically I actually had a chance to take some but it completely slipped my mind until after we left the show.

Actually there's a silly story in that. I figured, as we were leaving I should get some pictures but then it occurred to me I can admire pictures any time I want, after all, when I went to Rochester last time a guy at a bike shop there gave me a Specialized Catalog. Only, that catalog is for 2008, my bike, like I said is a vintage 2006, oh well. Hey 2006 was a good year for red wines I hope its a good year for red (and black) bikes.

Previously I promised to put up pictures of the trip to Houston. Sorry, no bike, but well this is pretty fast too:
Pictured above is the T-38 Talon, these aircraft are used for training purposes, notice the NASA Meatball insignia on the tail. This photo is outside the visitor's center of the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Flight Center, in south Houston TX.

Sign at the enterence to the Johnson Space Center.


Above is a toilet in the Space shuttle.


These are controls for the Cryogenic systems on the Space Shuttle, these would be of concern to EECOM in the Apollo period. In low Earth orbit I suppose the consumables are not such a major concern, worst case, the space shuttle can always return ahead of schedule. Notice the primitive push button nature of the control systems.

The flight deck of the space shuttle.

The control systems on the space shuttle, notice the Apollo era computer systems. Contrast this with a modern cockpit.

Control systems for the Canada Arm, note the maple leaf. Canadians be proud, a small part of our taxes goes to greatness.

Breakfast of champions, a meal fit for an astronaut.

A Saturn V booster with an Apollo Command and Service Module, note that each stage is physically detached from the other stages. Boosters like this one landed the Apollo astronauts on the moon, when stacked up on launch pad 39A at Cape Kennedy it weighed in at 6.3 million pounds and stood 363 feet into the air.

I am including this picture to give an idea of scale. Recall at launch the entire assembly weighed 6.3 million pounds, by the time the command module splashed down in the Pacific eight days later only 11 thousand pounds were left. The command module is the rusted part just above and behind me.

One of the massive F-1 engines that powered stage 1 of the Saturn V missile, each engine developed an average of 1.5 million pounds of thrust, but at full throttle could produce almost 1.9 million pounds of thrust.

The bottom of the Saturn V missile, there are 5 F-1 engines, they are powered by LOX (Liquid OXygen) and kerosene. (Besides lamps, kerosene is also used in jet engines, to my knowledge the Saturn V stage 1 was the only booster to use kerosene.)

The F-1 Engine, the white note on the engine reads:

A cluster of five engines like this one provided the power for the first stage of the Saturn V launch vehicle during the Apollo-Saturn test flights, manned flights to the moon, and the launch of the Skylab orbiting laboratory into Earth orbit.

The engines were powered for 2-1/2 minutes lifting the Saturn V to an altitude of about 41 miles and a speed of about 6000 miles per hour. Each engine weighed 15,650 pounds and developed a thrust of 1,500,000 pounds.

An F-1 Engine, not far from a Redstone MRBM (Medium Range Ballistic Missile) with a mercury capsule on top. It was an arrangement like this one that made Alan Bartlett Shepard the first American in space on the flight of Freedom 7 on May 5, 1961.