The outer space is big and curved

The exterior of this NASA facility proved
a challenge, but VIP stood up to the test!

The Space Power Facility at NASA Glenn Research Center’s Plum Brook Station, in Sandusky, is the world’s largest space environment simulation chamber. It provides the capability to test large space-bound hardware in a severe environment similar to that encountered in space. It has been used to test a myriad of space hardware, and it is now undergoing renovation for use as the facility for integrated environmental testing of the Orion crew exploration vehicle.
According to VIP’s Gary Browning, who headed the team that handled the exterior renovation for NASA, the SPF dome is 125 ft to the top, and has a 72-ft exterior radius, with a smaller interior test chamber. “It is the first project VIP has ever done as far as a dome,” he says. This made accessing the building a difficult task. A 250-ton crane was used to reach the center point of the dome, and then anchors were put into the surface at multiple points. NASA policy required pull tests for these anchors far in excess of any need, for added safety.
A swing stage cable was used to set up a power scaffold for the VIP crew of five. VIP specializes in exterior inspection work, helping building owners do pre-emptive repairs in a cost-effective manner, prioritizing need and helping fine tune bidding. Thus, this project was right up its alley, even with the outsized differences seen in this project. With a building so large, says Browning, the company had to actually scale the dome before the scope of the project could actually be realized. “When it gets higher than 10 stories, you can’t see exterior problems from the ground,” says Browning.
While power scaffolds are meant to get up and down the sides of buildings, this one, being on a curved circumference, meant that the scaffold tilted into the building toward the top. Therefore, much of the work had to be done while rappelling, with VIP’s well known and established safety provisions paramount. “It was a different experience,” says Browning. The size of the facility and its curvature created an unusual difficulty of access, he adds, so the project team ran into a lot of concrete patching that was unforeseen, some 1,000-sf of concrete. Inspection and repair were often done on the spot.
“This was the crew’s first job at Plum Brook,” Browning adds, but it was well up to the challenge. The dome, he says, had only been coated twice before since its 1950s construction. Neogard was used with two layers of gray base coat covered with a final white topcoat. “To my surprise, the white coat covered the gray very easily,” says Browning. “In fact, the product is designed so that when you do see the gray undercoat become
evident, you know it is time to recoat.”