posted 12-08-2018 08:27 AM               

He got these artifacts from a long time NASA employee who was given the artifacts to fabricate presentation pieces for those involved in the mission. The mission designations were well documented along with their flown status. The two photos illustrate the same artifacts as retrieved from Apollo 13 and Skylab II.

I photographed the Skylab artifacts with a macro lens. The round "O" ring or gasket is a perfect fit for the metal cap. The curved sections of material are obviously woven but I can't discern what the material is. The Apollo 13 image appears to show similar artifacts in a more intact form.

Thanks for any help you can provide.

posted 12-08-2018 10:20 AM               

I have a section dedicated to these presentations on my website.

The pieces you show are items that were sometimes removed from the plugs before being encased in lucite for presentation.

posted 12-08-2018 12:33 PM               

I have a heatshield plug from Apollo 11 and have seen several others but they are only about 1/2" diameter. The "O" ring pictured in my Skylab image is about 1" in diameter which is a lot larger. Your Apollo 13 image certainly appears to show a similar "O" ring and metal cap. I guess there were several different size plugs used in the Apollo heatshield.

posted 12-08-2018 10:18 PM               

The items in your original post are from the Aft Heatshield and are a larger diameter than those found on the Crew Compartment Heatshield as depicted in the image below.

There were 59 threaded Aft Heatshield plugs, each with an o-ring seal around a metal base with "fiberous glass thread seal" according to an early NAA training manual. This design ensured a tight fit in the over-sized hole which itself allowed for access to the heatshield attachment bolts. The windows, hatch, and even access panels for the RCS and electrical connections utilized the smaller diameter ablative plugs, which numbered significantly higher across the Crew Compartment.

The image below, showing an Aft Heatshield plug as removed but not encased in lucite, is helpful to identify the various parts of the plug not often included as part of the presentation.

Typically it was the larger Aft Heatshield plugs that were encased and presented, with the thread seal almost always removed. Those with lucite presentations can see that small amounts usually remain near the top, as it was hard to separate from the charred outer surface (thanks to Scott for the hi-res photo above).