NAUTILUS -X U.S.S. Frank Borman

By John Moscato

I build models to put in my classroom to inform and inspire my students. This the USS Frank Borman (commander of Apollo 8, the first deep space mission in human history). It's in 144th scale - the actual spacecraft would be approximately 80 meters long. It is based on the NASA concept NAUTILUS-X design (Non-Atmospheric Universal Transport intended for Lengthy US Explorations). The two attached landers are based on NASA designs (protective shells are missing for clarity). The ring is an inflatable intended to rotate to produce 0.2g without significant Coriolis effect. The capsule is an Orion 607 variant, with the ESA service module. As for construction - it's made primarily from Evergreen sheet plastic and railroad trusses. There's also a bit of hacked Revell ISS model in there (the pieces that were in the original design but never made the final configuration, primarily the solar arrays), and a little bit of 144th scale Space shuttle parts as well. And yes there is an homage to the Apollo spacecraft in there in the form of a 125th scale LEM repurposed for the Command deck. I like to make posters for the classroom as well to show the vehicle on mission. The two I included here are Borman headed to Jupiter and on orbit, with Io. Both are photos from the Cassini Mission via NASA. You can see more of my work on my Facebook page. Image: Left/ front view Image: Right/ front Image: Left/ front low Image: Right/ front low

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