Incoming material (via rail, air, etc.) is off-loaded, inspected, inventoried, and stored in warehouses. Component packaging (for construction material, consumables, spares) is very significant for construction as well as space transportation. Packages must meet dimensional and weight constraints of the launch vehicle and have appropriate mass density for cost effective space transportation. Figure 34 illustrates the dimensions, density and part counts of various SPS components. As indicated, densities vary from a low of 12 kg/m^ for antenna subarray elements to about 2500 kg/m^ for power conductors. To obtain desired densities, components must be packaged in appropriate mixes as indicated in figure 35. Such packaging minimizes the number of launches, thereby reducing transportation costs. The silicon option requires 375 HLLV flights and the GaAlAs option requires 225 HLLV flights to transport construction material for 10 GW (two 5 GW units) capability. Construction personnel are launched in an updated shuttle Personnel Launch Vehicle. Operations in LEO include COTV construction and maintenance, payload transfers between HLLV's and COTV's, POTV stage mating, crew transfers, vehicle and base maintenance, and propellant storage and transfer. After payload transfers, COTV's travel to GEO over a period of several months. At GEO, a small interorbital transfer vehicle docks to and moves the cargo to the construction base. After off-loading, the COTV returns to LEO with packing materials, damaged or defective equipment, and parts and consumables containers. At LEO, argon tanks and thruster grids are replaced, the vehicles refurbished and readied for the next transit. Personnel arriving at LEO from earth, transfer to POTV’s for the trip to GEO, which takes a few hours. Personnel returning from GEO transfer to Personnel Launch Vehicles for the trip back to earth. Because detailed construction techniques, both for COTV's and SPS's, for the Reference System have not yet been developed, the reader is referred to the Appendices. Appendix A discusses construction issues while Appendix B presents techniques that were developed for the Rockwell and Boeing independent systems. The techniques for the Reference System would be similar in general concept.
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