Kickstarter funds will help conserve Neil Armstrong spacesuit

Online crowdfunding started for rebooting Neil Armstrong’s spacesuit that he has worn during his historic moon walk came to an end on Wednesday.

We wrote about the campaign in July, the Smithsonian calling on space fans to help fund the restoration project.

An online fundraiser reaches its $700,000 goal for a destination moon exhibition.

Shepard wore a silver pressure suit in America’s first manned space flight in 1961. For this and other superfun facts about the painstaking process of creating the suit, read the Smithsonian piece here.

Shepard was the first American in space, flying on the Freedom 7 spacecraft.

It will be part of the new exhibition called Destination Moon. After raising funds, the Smithsonian is planning to restore the Armstrong’s white spacesuit and helmet, so that it can be ready for public viewing by the 50th anniversary in 2019. Over the past four decades on Earth, the suit’s component materials have begun to break down.

The campaign, “reboot the Suit”, continued for one month.

Both iconic spacesuits will be digitally scanned so that 3D models of the garments can be utilized by educators, their students and the public.

The campaign on Kickstarter raised almost $720,000 over the past 30 days. Most of the supporters chose to either give $20 in return for a cling-on decal of a bootprint on the moon or $55 for a special mission patch designed by “Star Trek” and NASA designer Mike Okuda.

The Smithsonian got the Kickstarter going once it found the suit worse for wear after taking it out of climate-controlled storage after nine years.