Vessel Advanced Technology Space Station Concept for 2025 (designed in 1987)

[Urwumpe]

Some past science fiction from NASA:

Some nice large space station, with non-rotating core, rotating habitat ring and counter-rotating sections for controlling inertia.

The full report can be found here:

https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19870010907.pdf

I think, something like that could look nice in Orbiter and be a good starting point for some missions, especially the large docking and erection bay could be nice for assembling spacecraft or refueling them.

 

[Andy44]

Solar dynamic power collectors? As in solar boilers? In 1987? Photovoltaics were pretty good by the 80s; that seems pretty 1950s tech.

Still, though, it's pretty cool. I always thought an opportunity was wasted by not spinning part of the ISS.

 

[jedidia]

Photovoltaics were pretty good by the 80s; that seems pretty 1950s tech.

If I remember right, they still had a pretty significant degradation problem back then. So if that thing is supposed to run for 50 years or so, it's imaginable that they considered photovoltaics an insufficient solution.
Then again, if you can build this, shuttling up replacement panels shouldn't be that expensive.

 

[Urwumpe]

Also its a matter of power density. At a power level, that we managed to push back with improving photovoltaics technology, a solarthermal generator gets lighter than a comparable PV array. And this station has a lot of power in its requirements.