Customer Reviews

Spacecraft Structures and Mechanisms from Concept to Launch (The Space Technology Library)

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This book is a must for anyone involved with spacecraft
structures and mechanisms engineering. Well written, with plenty of practical, real world spacecraft information, and a good amount of theoretical/analysis info. I think this is the only book of its kind. Written by real experts in the field, who obviously know what they are doing! Explains design, analysis, testing , and even nails down such things acceptance and qualification testing philosophies. The book is biased towards the structures side as this constitutes 3/4 of the text. Congratulations to all who contributed to this classical book!

Sarafin has complied a wealth of useful information on the entire spacecraft structural design lifecycle. The information presented is both detailed, and well backed up by comprehensive references. The book also includes a very good overview of how structural design fits into the larger context of a spacecraft development program. A good book for both practicing structural engineers looking for an introduction to spacecraft structural issues, and systems engineers looking for a better understanding of the issues involved in designing and developing spacecraft structures.

This book's greatest strength was its organization and presentation of information regarding spacecraft structures. As the subtitle says "from Concept to Launch". Information is presented first in the conceptual manner to gain the basic understanding of what goes into the design of a structure. He then follows this conceptual information with more detailed explanations of the behaviors and effects that specific components or types of structures exhibit which include the effects these provide to other spacecraft subsystems through the launch phase and while in space.

His use of equations in describing the topics within the book is very to the point and he also includes plenty of figures and diagrams to help to concisely illustrate the topics at hand. In short he educates the reader to new topics very efficiently while not drowning in the details. For readers who want to delve into a subject more completely he presents references at the end of each chapter.

The book's weak point is its treatment on mechanisms. Regarding mechanisms his treatment is more of a broad overview which is rather unfortunate. In the development of reliable spaceflight mechanisms the devil really is in the details. For anyone who wants a good reference for spaceflight mechanisms I recommend the book "Space Vehicle Mechanisms: Elements of Successful Design" or try to gather information from the proceedings of the Aerospace Mechanisms Symposium.

I feel that it is a very practical book for young engineers who are already working for spacecrafts.

Chapter 16 is amazing. James D. Christensen is amazing. He must be a genius. It is the best chapter of the book. Everything in this chapter is presented clearly and concisely. Overall the book is very useful, but Chapter 16 stands head and shoulders above the rest