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Reminds me of that old joke (not sure if it's true or not) that NASA spent millions of dollars developing a ballpoint-pen that could work in zero gravity, and t
by drKarl 4y ago
Reminds me of that old joke (not sure if it's true or not) that NASA spent millions of dollars developing a ballpoint-pen that could work in zero gravity, and the soviets just used a pencil.
- coredog64 4y agoThe Fisher space pen was developed outside of NASA. The Soviets used a pencil, but it came with the very real downside risk of graphite particles migrating everywhere.
- dilyevsky 4y agoFree graphene!
- hinkley 4y agoFlammable materials migrating into circuitry.
- KMag 4y agoTo expand a bit on what you wrote. The Fisher space pen was developed entirely with private funds, and sold to NASA to fill a real need to not release graphite to be inhaled or cause short circuits.
- rvnx 4y agoCool stuff! How it's made / how it works: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mjmAzf4oKs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mjmAzf4oKs
- p_l 4y agoThe complete story is that NASA was spending millions on space pencils, because of floating, very sharp, bits of graphite creating various risks. This was also after the tragedy of Apollo 1. Meanwhile Soviets used grease pencils, which while safer, were horrible in usability. Fischer's private development of space pen was quickly picked up by both US and Soviet space programs to solve the problem of writing in space.
- moloch-hai 4y agoI bought a Fisher Space Pen, as a teener. It leaked. Not very badly.
- stonogo 4y agoNASA spent no money developing pencils. They bought a batch of already-existing mechanical pencils, from a regular pencil manufacturer, and they paid too much. The total bill came to something around $140 per pencil, for a total expenditure of just over $4,000. This caused an outcry and eventually evolved into the "millions of dollars" urban legend.
- p_l 4y agoI didn't say they developed them. However, they did a lot of tests on top of that $140 per pencil purchase which helped propel the extrapolation of "millions" (probably in TCO, spread over time)
- stonogo 4y agoZero available sources corroborate that. It was purely the cost of the products that caused the blowback.
- jjtheblunt 4y agonot sure if you are aware of this https://www.spacepen.com/ https://www.spacepen.com/
- deelowe 4y agoA story that is 100% B.S.