https://peertube.dngr.us/videos/watch/4cbc75a9-2224-4348-be8d-23d145e51238 Want to support this channel and help us preserve old films? Visit https://www.patreon.com/PeriscopeFilm Visit our website www.PeriscopeFilm.com Developed by NASA Langley researcher John D. Bird in 1965, Jet Shoes were an early experiment in enhancing extravehicular activity by allowing an astronaut to control his position and attitude in space while at the same time freeing up his hands for useful work. The concept was initially inspired by the Hiller “Flying Platform” design, in which the pilot controlled thrust vector by pushing against the soles of his feet. (Incidentally, John D. Bird appears in the early portion of this film, wearing a suit and hat, and also at 3:56) As you will see in this recently rediscovered film, Bird's concept involved placing single jets on the soles of the shoes. These were activated on demand by depressing a toe switch. Movement of the feet and legs was used to direct the jets to produce the desired change in attitude and position. The switches were individually controlled and activated by a toe switch, a bite bar, or a sip-switch (the latter options involve the subject’s mouth). According to the NASA Langley Research Center website, the Jet Shoes experiment hardware consisted of a gas storage backpack assembly and portable show mounted solenoid thrust valves. The pneumatic system was designed to use gaseous oxygen and to deliver two pounds of thrust from each thrust valve nozzle with a pressure at a regular outlet of approximately 165 psi. The gas storage tank was designed to contain a minimum of 15 pounds of gaseous oxygen at 6000 psi. Several facilities at Langley and elsewhere were employed for simulating a zero gravity environment. Experiments were conducted with and without a space suit. The Rendezvous Docking Simulator in the large flight research hangar at Langley was used (see :59). A targeted vehicle was suspended at one end of a track attached to the hangar roof while a movable vehicle was driven along the track to move toward the target during a docking maneuver. The simulator allowed test subjects to experience the feeling of weightlessness while attempting to reach the target vehicle. The film also shows Martin Marietta's Space Operations Simulator in Denver, Colorado being used at 12:00, and the Manned Space Flight Center Air Bearing Facility at 6:42. An Air Bearing Simulator at Convair in San Diego is also mentioned at 10:00. The concept of the air-bearing test simulator was that the test subject lay on his side, while held up on a flow of air, permitting zero drag over a leveled surface. The floor of this type of facility was also surfaced with an extremely smooth plaster surface which was well-suited to low friction air bearing testing. The Langley facility also contained a whipple-tree suspension which was ideal for testing jet shoes because it gave three degrees of linear freedom and angular freedom about the vertical axis. In the Visual Simulator, complete six-degree-of-freedom motion was obtained from three angular degrees of freedom of a small model of a target vehicle, translation of the model in front of the television camera, and a servo-driven mirror placed to the right of the pilot’s head. There were several advantages to the Jet Shoe. Because the jets are directed and controlled by the feet and not by the hands, both hands are free for other tasks. The utilization of only two jets for the entire locomotion process rather than a greater number of jets was also simpler and more reliable than other designs. However, criticism of various models was that they were heavy, inconvenient to put on, and needed adjustment. Eventually, Langley researchers to move on to a new design, the Foot Controlled Maneuvering Unit. On April 6, 1967, Deke Slayton, Direction of Flight Crew Operations, requested Jet Shoes to be removed from the experiment program. The Foot Controlled Maneuvering Unit was eventually tested within Skylab before being passed over in favor of the Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU) for the Space Shuttle program. But who knows, perhaps one day Jet Shoes will return to NASA and make their way into space. We encourage viewers to add comments and, especially, to provide additional information about our videos by adding a comment! See something interesting? Tell people what it is and what they can see by writing something for example: "01:00:12:00 -- President Roosevelt is seen meeting with Winston Churchill at the Quebec Conference." This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IajkFBnny1o Mirrored from Periscope Film (https://www.youtube.com/@PeriscopeFilm) Thu, 11 Jun 2026 06:46:06 GMT https://validator.w3.org/feed/docs/rss2.html PeerTube - https://peertube.dngr.us https://peertube.dngr.us/lazy-static/avatars/41a6fee9-7f57-42d0-a5fc-5db4f1af2e31.png https://peertube.dngr.us/videos/watch/4cbc75a9-2224-4348-be8d-23d145e51238 All rights reserved, unless otherwise specified in the terms specified at https://peertube.dngr.us/about and potential licenses granted by each content's rightholder.