<i>>'It seems amazing to me that he looks so calm and cool when they were actually being poisoned by their own CO2 and without knowing if they were going to make it alive to Earth.'</i><p>Though our problems aren't close to same order of magnitude - keeping calm under pressure is something I feel is rare and under-appreciated in technology.<p>More than once I've seen a person start shaking so bad they couldn't type or slot in a replacement module while working a serious outage.<p>Amusingly, I've also had a new manager flip-out and actually interfere with my triage efforts because I <i>'didn't look like I was taking the problem seriously'</i> (read: calm).<p>I wonder what sort of techniques could be adapted from elsewhere to teach the tech engineers of the world how to hold it together?
The hack is awesome, but to me the real lesson is the importance of modularity. If North American Aviation and Grumman had standardized on the same part the hack would have been moot. Just take the part from the LEM and stick it in the CSM. End of story.<p>I fully comprehend the tradeoff here though, particularly when it comes to tight deadlines and weight tolerances. The CO2 scrubber in the CSM didn't need to be as beefy as the one in the LEM, and the two air filtration systems were designed by different companies where coordination would have been a bitch.<p>It's the classic software engineering trade off, isn't it? Add more dependencies or DIY. I wonder how the ISS deals with this in the US vs Russian parts of the station?
On my first day of engineering school we were given this problem and similar materials to work with.<p>Pretty much the best possible "real world" exercise that focuses on limited materials, time, and most importantly, simplicity of design and manufacture.
>This is the mother of all hacks, the genius device that saved the Apollo XIII crew from dying in their emergency return to Earth,<p>Not to detract from the accomplishment; but I'm confident that the astronauts would have been able to figure this out by themselves if needed, and didn't do so because of the command/control nature of NASA missions.<p>The instructions could have been shortened to: Fit the Command Module scrubber filter to the Lunar Module's filter hole. Use tape and plastic to seal the rig for proper airflow.
That scene in the movie ("you have to make this, fit into this, using these") was a big aha moment for me, in realizing just how fundamentally hard space travel really was. I'm very glad to learn it wasn't movie-exaggerated.
Pretty sure this thread from 2011 is the source, has all the same text and images:<p><a href="http://www.therpf.com/showthread.php?t=105500&s=b4fc00db6d1b757d8c879f3fe0555fc5&p=1516704&viewfull=1#post1516704" rel="nofollow">http://www.therpf.com/showthread.php?t=105500&s=b4fc00db6d1b...</a><p>I skimmed the thread and it looks like at least two people made their own replicas. The most surprising thing to me is that you can get used Apollo lithium-hydroxide canisters just like those pictured on ebay!