Completd Projects

1997 - 2003

The LCC

The Missile Launch Complex in Oplin, Texas – Site 5 of the 578th Strategic Missile Squadron (SMS) – and home of the Atlas Missile Museum of Texas, has had a number of projects undertaken and completed over the years. Remodeling the Launch Control Center (LCC) in to a residence where the owners have lived for the past 25 years was the beginning and a major goal.

2000 - 2005

The Door

One of the first - biggest - projects was making the overhead silo door functional. This required finding, and acquiring, an original hydraulic cylinder/actuator, and installing it. The installation required opening the 75 ton overhead door using a 100 ton capacity crane. While only one door was made operable, that did allow sufficient access to the silo to make other improvements to the silo including cleaning and removing debris from several floors. The door was finally opened and the ram installed in 2002. The door became operational in November, 2005. The ram was found in a scrap yard in Houston, Texas, which had 6 of them.

2001- 2004

The Door Bracket

As part of the door project a door mounting bracket had to be found or made. The silo door bracket, the large cast fitting that attaches the ram eye to the overhead door did not come with the ram and the original, along with the ram, had been removed during salvage operations in the late 1960s. We could not find a bracket. So Dick Meade of Ebba Iron in Eastland, Texas, made one. Dick did the drawings, made the mold and cast the 1800 lbs mounting point from malleable iron. It took the better part of two years to complete the design and casting process, followed by mounting it to the door using an extension forklift, pictured below with Dick taking measurements. It fit perfectly. Once the bracket was in in place, the ram eye was attached and the door could then be tested and made operational.

2021 - 2023

The Launch Control Console

Another major project was recently completed. A group of silo owners had acquired an original launch control console from an Atlas F site in Nebraska. It sat, untouched, in storage for more than 20 years when Jeff Stephens decided he wanted to restore it. After a year of machining new parts, sourcing switches, lights and gauges, and creating the programming to control the timing and sequencing of the console indicator lights, the face frame of the console – now functioning - was reinstalled and ready for display. Completed, the console will on command mimic a successful Atlas F launch sequence much as it would have appeared when originally used.

2024 - 2025

The Floor

This is part of the Alice the Inflatable Atlas Missile project. There is no launch platform in the silo to work with, and the inflatable requires a floor to sit on, so a floor needed to be fabricated and installed on Level 5 of the silo. This allows the placement of the inflatable missile so that it is in a similar position it would have been pre-launch had a launch platform remained.

The floor was fabricated locally by Duane Allen from spare trusses acquired from a member of a local car club – the Keepers of West Texas - to which Duane and the silo owner belong. The fabrication took several months to complete and was a challenging one man job. The trusses were modified and arranged into two halves. Then they were decked with expanded metal grating and lowered into place fitting into the silo where they would be joined to form a floor. The goal was to complete the floor above ground so that only fitting it into the silo was needed. No additional welding or cutting was required.

The crane work was done by Rodney Goins of a local crane service who coaxed a couple of his operators to help along with several car club volunteers and a neighboring silo owner who provided the muscle to wrestle the floors into place.

Installing the inflatable will be the next step. When completed, the goal is to provided those in the silo a visual experience of an in-silo Atlas F.