Two spacewalking astronauts are inspecting a fouled-up solar wing rotary joint at the International Space Station while engineers test a new motor drive they installed earlier today.
The 10-foot-diameter rotary joint is designed to turn the station's starboard solar wing like a paddlewheel as the outpost circles Earth. But engineers shut it down late last year after detecting high voltage readings and higher-than-normal vibrations. Significant contamination -- metal shards -- were found during three subsequent spacewalking inspections, an indication that internal bearings and gears might be grinding.
The joint and the motor drive, which is used to pivot or tilt the wing on its long axis, work in tandem to keep its power-producing solar arrays optimally pointed at the sun. NASA needs to get to the root of the problem with the Solar Alpha Rotary Joint to restore full power-generation capability at the station - a key to completing outpost assembly.
Whitson and Tani are removing blanket-like thermal covers so they can photograph bearings and other internal parts of the rotary joint. Like the previous inspections, the astronauts are reporting contamination within the joint.
You can watch the action unfold here in The Flame Trench. Simply click the link below the image above to launch our NASA TV viewer and refresh this page for periodic updates.
A detailed timeline for the 6.5-hour excursion is here: Spacewalk Timeline.
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