Iain's Spacesuit Diary

Production team

Day One

After the isolation of working on my own in the last programme, it was great to hear from Kate that our next challenge would involve us working together as a team. On the face it if there were two separate challenges – first to build a refrigeration unit to make a water coolant (Mike, Kathy and me), and second to build a circulation system to pump that water round a make-shift spacesuit (Jonathan and Ellen).

Actually, whether or not this was going to work would hinge on the two teams designing this together. So our morning was really about putting our heads together to see what the options were. That’s what’s nice about the Rough Science format – the instances of jeopardy and the backdrop of healthy competitiveness never take away from the fact that scientists tend to want to work collectively on problems rather than beaver away on their own. At the end of the day it’s a team sport.

Mind you, as a geologist I confess that I wasn’t much help in thinking of how our system would work – I mainly fiddled nervously with my hammer. I just couldn’t think how my geological skills were going to help here. As the new kid on the team, I’d also got the feeling that our production team had fingered me for the final test – walking in the spacesuit in the searing temperatures of Death Valley.

Perhaps that’s what the geologist would be good for in this programme – bait. Ellen – bless her – put a stop to that, arguing passionately that we were all equal members of the team and that it wasn’t fair to pick on anyone (even a geologist). Rallying to support her, I pointed out that the spacesuit was too big for me anyway. Perhaps less helpfully, I pointed out that it was perfect fit for Ellen. Clothed in bright red cotton, I think she wished she’d kept quiet.

As the day wore on and hard graft started looming, I finally thought of something geological I could do. Our idea is to make a refrigeration device by creating a partial vacuum, inside which water will turn into steam, cooling as it does so. Normally, of course that happens at 100C, but if we get the pressure low enough we ought to get steam at normal air temperature. The trouble is that the steam will condense back into water, reversing the reaction and giving off heat.

To solve the problem, Mike has caught onto the fact that the washing powder in our trunk contains zeolite, a mineral substance that draws water vapour into its crystal structure and holds it there. I had no idea that zeolite was in washing powder, but I did know that it occurs naturally in volcanic rocks. At last, a chance to escape the workshop and get into the wilderness. Kate, keen for more offroad driving, is a willing chauffer.

Now to most geologists zeolites are rather boring, unimportant minerals – quickly passed over in most geology lessons. But to chemists, zeolites are amazing minerals, with hundreds of different uses. For me, the worry is that their crystals come in lots of shapes and forms. Often they appear as tiny glass-like bubbles in volcanic ash (tuffs) or lava flows, but sometimes mixing of water and heat in deposits underneath lava flows can convert the whole deposit into a thick layer of whitish powdered zeolite. This is a particularly common in the desert volcanic landscapes of western USA, so that’s the form I was hoping to find.

Finding volcanic ash layers and ancient lava flows is no problem around our silver mine home – much of the geology of the area is volcanic. The problem is distinguishing our zeolite layers from common old clay, since both have that fine whitish appearance. Zeolite minerals tend to have a sheen that clay particles don’t have, but the real test is to heat it up. Zeolites adsorb (take in) water vapour without chemically reacting with it, so later, when heated, they release the water back again. That’s where they get their nickname – ‘boiling stones’.

Armed with a bucket and a primus stove, Kate and I hunted nearby volcanic rock outcrops for our powdered prey, until we struck lucky. A few smacks of the hammer and a quick burst of flame and we had our frothing stew of zeolite. Almost good enough to eat!

Production team

Day Two

One of the great things about Rough Science is how everyone just mucks in when there’s work to be done. Kate and I had come back with a pile of zeolite the previous evening, but this morning there were more mundane problems to solve. Trying to get a decent vacuum on the cooking pots was proving a pain – the metal tins kept imploding. What was needed was some basic wooden bracing to put inside them and give internal support, so armed with a saw, some nails and the trusty hammer I did my best. The results might not have people taking orders for shelves, but it did the job.

On the whole, day 2 was one of those grinding days that is so common in science but which is a million miles from the public face of scientists ‘in action’. We just all grafted away at our various chores, tweaking things here and there, modifying the design, testing this and that, going up ladders and down snakes trying to get the different parts of the cooling, circulation and pumping system to work. For most of the day I was pulverising and cooking up my zeolite, trying to make sure that I drove off all the moisture that over many years had accumulated in its crystal structure. There’s only so much fun you can have cooking zeolite.

So, it wasn’t that much of a surprise then when the boredom set in and the mind wandered onto more trivial matters. By mid-afternoon, a wee knock-about baseball game was in full flight – the various parts of the space system left scattered around us. At first the camera crew filmed from the sidelines, but of course that didn’t last. Sound booms and cameras were laid aside and the serious baseball started. It was great fun, even when, after diving in the dirt gloriously failing to catch the ball, I was left bruised and grazed. It ended 20 minutes later, our consciences tugged by our series producer Jonathan pacing the outfield like an expectant father, anxious to see car windows unscathed and a refrigeration system that actually cooled something. To put his mind at rest, we set everything up for our first full test. It failed.

Production team

Day Three

The morning started out much as yesterday had (minus the baseball) with us trying various ways to improve the suction for the vacuum, refine the pumping and cool the water. Mike had been preparing a back-up chemical cooling system and with us unable to get low enough pressures to bring the boiling point of the water down to air temperature to kick start the cooling, we didn’t have much choice. We also didn’t have much time, since the journey to the hottest part of Death Valley would take a good few hours. Lunchtime was the deadline for having the whole thing ready. It was all hands to the pumps – or rather to the saws and drills as we threw together the wooden trolley that would carry the fridge across the desert. It was close but we made it, though without any time to check that the various components were working. If the previous evening was anything to go by, dismal failure was waiting for us in Death Valley. Little did we know it would be one of the funniest things any of us could remember, and certainly in the top 5 ‘Funniest things ever to have happened in Death Valley’ contest.

Now Death Valley has got to be one of the most spectacular places on Earth. The flat white desert floor against the rising dark mountain ranges that flank both sides give you a sense of being from another planet. It also makes for a vicious suntrap. But as well as the temperatures, filming in Death Valley is no easy matter. For one thing, you are given a ranger that tells you where you can film and makes sure that you abide by the rule of not going more than 50 m off the tarmac road. Also, you’re not allowed to disturb the surface of the salty desert crust, even though the next rainstorm will completely reshape this jagged miniature landscape of cracked, thrusted and heaved salt blocks. Our wooden wheeled trolley certainly raised an eyebrow in this regard, but the sight of Ellen putting on her copper tubing basque and then her white space suit (a late design change) presented enough of an enigma to make our ranger curious about what on Earth we were planning. In the end, to our astonishment, it all went to plan. Mike’s fertiliser cooled the water, our frantic pumping gave a decent partial vacuum and Ellen headed out across the desert surface, as if powered by our magical mechanical enema. For me, what made it a great moment wasn’t that the temperature dropped as she went, but more that the trolley slowly disintegrated en route, its wheels first sagging, then tilting then falling off, forcing a valiant Ellen to unceremoniously haul the thing to its destination. The scientists, the production team, the ranger and even some passing tourists that had stopped to watch were in hysterics. Six hours ago few if any of us gave this any hope of working. Even the fridge had tried its best to self destruct on us. But it was great to see that when you throw some basic science and some enthusiastic determination at a problem, sometimes it can actually come off. Wonderful stuff!