Skylab Tools Examination

Engineers at NASA’S Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) examine tools considered for use in freeing the solar array wing of Skylab. Enhanced television pictures showed that the wing was being held to the side of the Skylab by a strip of metal from the micrometeorite shield. The device at the center is a cable cutter that clipped an identical strip of metal in a test at MSFC, requiring 90 pounds of force. The cutter is one of several heads which could be attached to extension rods. At right is the handle end of a rod. The small object at left is the attachment head for a two-prong "rake" device for use on the end of a pole made up of one, two, or more five-foot sections of extension rods. The tools were tested in underwater EVA tasks in the MSFC Neutral Buoyancy Simulator.