RED STAR IN ORBIT

Looking through my Smithsonian Air and Space book and the Soviet Space history books I got recently, I was reminded of the huge difference in technology between Russia and the United States. Whilst the first american satellite was the baseball like Vanguard, which struggled to leave the pad - the soviets were preparing Object D, a trabant sized orbiting laboratory close to three tons. As the Kremlin were keen to snatch a propoganda victory over the struggling US, the Chief Designer, Korolev was put under pressure to produce results. So Sputnik 1 was hastily assembled and shot into orbit to worldwide acclaim. Meanwhile Object D would eventually be launched successfully as Sputnik 3, shortly after.

 The odd cone-shaped body has always fascinated me, with its multitude of curved antennae, so I decided to make something loosely based on the design. Using a mustard bottle top, some paperclips and two of the ridiculously fiddly tools that Apple provide for fishing a sim out of an iPhone, I set to. A handful of model parts from the scrap box and voila!

In order to balance out the homespun space race, I whipped up a US Ranger analogue too, in homage to the lunar surface plotting series of satellites.

  

RANGER 4

SPUTNIK 3