SUBMITTED BY ARTHUR N1ORC - AMSAT A/C #31468

Expedition 15 Crew Busy With Station Maintenance Tasks

Flight Engineer Sunita Williams began Tuesday with the second session of the new Elastic Memory Composite Hinge experiment, which studies the performance of an advanced type of composite hinge to determine its suitability for use in space. Building new spacecraft structures in space necessitates unfolding items that have been launched from Earth, and elastic memory technology may eliminate the need for highly complex deployment mechanisms by providing a simpler, lighter-weight alternative.

ISS015-E-05649 --- Sunita Williams works with the Lab-on-a-Chip Application Development-Portable Test System experiment Image to right: Sunita Williams works with the Lab-on-a-Chip Application Development-Portable Test System experiment. Image credit: NASA - TO VIEW IMAGE GO TO: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

Williams' main task Tuesday was the removal and replacement of the failed Remote Power Controller Module that governs electrical routing for several systems in the Destiny Laboratory.

Flight Engineer Oleg Kotov and Commander Fyodor Yurchikhin performed inflight maintenance to remove a defunct air conditioner and the crew also spent time working on the Elektron oxygen-generating system.

Yurchikhin and Kotov again had an hour each allocated for station familiarization and adaptation to help in adjusting to their new surroundings and activities. These unstructured and discretionary sessions have become a valuable standard requirement for new station occupants.

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