Word: balloon
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...electrowriting machine that uses telephone wires to transmit facsimile handwriting and sketches, 5) an automatic merchandiser that dispenses clothing, makes change from dollar bills, 6) an electronic system linking an airline's ticket offices throughout the U.S., 7) a cart for big-chef barbecues, 8; a plastic balloon building, 9) a 50-ton log stacker, 10) a tree crusher, 11) a transistor radio as small as a sugar cube, 12) a language-translating machine, 13) an underwater torpedo retriever, 14) a movable island crane, 15 ) a high-speed ditch digger, 16) a "pickle picker," 17) a hay pelletizer that...
Millions of people have watched Echo, the U.S. balloon satellite, as it crosses the sky. And most of them have noticed that it twinkles like a star and also brightens and dims slowly in a way that no star does. Why does it perform in this odd fashion? Last week the explanation came from Dr. Leonard Jaffe of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Echo's quick twinkling, said Jaffe, is caused by the same atmospheric irregularities that make stars wink. Some of its slower dimming may be due to thin patches of clouds, invisible at night-but most...
...space is a tough neighborhood for frail balloons. Microscopic meteorites punctured Echo's skin, allowing the gas inside to seep out. Sunlight exerted a slight but persistent pressure. Gradually Echo lost its regular shape; flat places and wrinkles appeared on its shiny surface. "She's prune-faced already," says Richard Slater of G. T. Schjeldahl, Northfield, Minn., the company that made the balloon. When Echo turns deliberately about once in eight to ten minutes, flat places sometimes act as mirrors, making the sun's reflection momentarily brighter. Wrinkled places dim the reflection. The radio waves that...
...weeks after launching, Echo stayed entirely outside the shadow of the Earth, but on Aug. 24 it dipped into darkness for two minutes while passing over the U.S. West Coast. Each day its stay in the shadow will increase, until in late December the balloon satellite will be in darkness for 35 minutes of its 118-minute orbit. When it goes into the shadow, it shrinks a bit, but Dr. Jaffe does not know how much...
Guns Galore. A shower of new products and processes is augmenting man's age-old efforts to get in out of the rain. Minnesota's Schjeldahl Co.'s polyester plastic balloon structures can be built in half a day, need only an ordinary building fan to keep them inflated, will last five to ten years. Quonset-shaped, the Schjel-dome will work in the arctic or the tropics, can be used for garages and greenhouses, swimming pool covers and grain warehouses, is repaired with a hot iron...