Bob the Unbeliever
Well-Known Member
There is a classic Friend of a Friend story that floats around, and occasionally pops up on my feed now and again.
That NASA wasted $1,000,000 developing a pen that writes in zero gravity. It seems that during the Mercury project, astronauts were quick to figure out that they needed writing tools-- in fact, this was likely seen from the beginning. Experiments readily show that ordinary ball point pens won't write in micro-gravity: try it sometime. Hold a tablet or clip-board over your head, and try writing. After a short while, the pen goes "dry" and you either have to shake it hard, or write in a downward position to get it working again.
Enter early Mercury, and NASA engineers purchased some mechanical pencils (to avoid creating wooden shavings in the capsule, a dangerous thing) for a few pence apiece but had to modify them to work with clumsy "space gloves"-- anyone working in Engineering, will tell you a custom one off, or even a dozen or so, is expensive. But I'm telling the story-- watch the video...
That NASA wasted $1,000,000 developing a pen that writes in zero gravity. It seems that during the Mercury project, astronauts were quick to figure out that they needed writing tools-- in fact, this was likely seen from the beginning. Experiments readily show that ordinary ball point pens won't write in micro-gravity: try it sometime. Hold a tablet or clip-board over your head, and try writing. After a short while, the pen goes "dry" and you either have to shake it hard, or write in a downward position to get it working again.
Enter early Mercury, and NASA engineers purchased some mechanical pencils (to avoid creating wooden shavings in the capsule, a dangerous thing) for a few pence apiece but had to modify them to work with clumsy "space gloves"-- anyone working in Engineering, will tell you a custom one off, or even a dozen or so, is expensive. But I'm telling the story-- watch the video...
