Apr 282010
 

From APR original print issue V5N4 comes a 30-page article by Thomas Mueller, presnting a multitude of wildly different seaplane jet bomber designs from the Soviet Union. Loaded with 40view drawings created specifically for this article by Jens Baganz.

Download for only $5.40.

Order it (and all the other currently available APR articles) here: http://www.up-ship.com/blog/eAPR/articles.htm

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 Posted by at 8:27 am
Apr 282010
 

It may be hard to believe, but there once was at time when the United States not only had a thriving automotive industry but ALSO a thriving aerospace industry. And perhaps shockingly, the automotive industry sometimes got into the aerospace business, and sometimes quite successfully. One case of that was Chrysler, which built, among other things, the first stage of the Saturn I and Ib. They also wanted to build the Space Shuttle… and their design for it was the Single-stage Earth orbital Reusable Vehicle (SERV).

 From APR original print issue V5N3 comes a 13-page article on the Chrysler SERV, loaded with diagrams showing the SERV both inside and out as well as the MURP (Manned Upper-stage Reusable Payload) spaceplane that was to go with the SERV.

Download for only $2.40.

Order it (and all the other currently available APR articles) here: http://www.up-ship.com/blog/eAPR/articles.htm

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 Posted by at 8:21 am
Apr 282010
 

From APR original print issue V5N2 comes a 7-page article on one of the more unusual launch vehicles ever conceived, the Global Range Mach-29 Aerospaceplane (GRM-29A) from McDonnell Douglas. This vehicles launched vertically and landed horizontally… not too unusual for an SSTO design, but the method by which it achieved vertical launch was unique, to say the least.

Download for the tragically low price of only $1.30.

Order it (and all the other currently available APR articles) here: http://www.aerospaceprojectsreview.com/

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 Posted by at 8:13 am
Apr 272010
 

This is just… sad.

http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=2951040

So, what horrible, horrible thing was done to this precious snowflake?

The claim stems from a 2006 incident in which Luc, now 11, said he was reprimanded by a school hall monitor for eating his lunch by breaking up the food with a fork and pushing it onto a spoon, a traditional Philippine way of eating.

The hall monitor is alleged to have told Ms. Gallardo that her son “ate like a pig,” while the principal is alleged to have told her Luc should eat “like a Canadian.”

If Canadians want their country to survive, they need to take these bullcrap “human rights tribunals” and shove them off on an arctic ice floe.

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 Posted by at 9:55 am
Apr 272010
 

From APR original print issue V5N1 comes a 14-page article on the Boeing Advanced Multipurpose Large Launch Vehicle (AMLLV), which was virtually the polar opposite of the Sea Dragon in terms of design philosophy… all the latest bells and whistles. It was also perhaps the most powerful booster ever envisioned… in it’s most powerful configuration, nearly four million pounds of payload could be carried by a vehicle with a launch thrust of 108 million pounds.

Download for only $2.90.

Order it (and all the other currently available APR articles) here: http://www.up-ship.com/blog/eAPR/articles.htm

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 Posted by at 9:31 am
Apr 272010
 

From APR original print issue V4N6 comes a 27-page article on the Aerojet “Sea Dragon” extremely large launch vehicle concept. In an era when rocket designers were trying to produce the most technologically advanced booster designs, using the lightest, most bleeding-edge structual materials, Aerojet decided to go another direction… a rock-simple vehicle made out of conventional aluminum, built in a shipyard to shipyard standards. The end result was a truly gigantic and novel design. This article reveals the design in great detail.

Download for only $4.90.

Order it (and all the other currently available APR articles) here: http://www.up-ship.com/blog/eAPR/articles.htm

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 Posted by at 9:24 am
Apr 262010
 

An episode of “Stargate: SG-1” some years back featured a character who committed murder and then used neato advanced technology to remove the memory of having done so from himself. Additionally, the ability to selectivelty alter or delete memories is a common idea in science fiction. If such memory-tinkering-tech was available, then it’s clear that, on occasion, people would use the technology to delete their own memories of having comitted crimes… either for the purposes of being able to pass lie detector tests (hit men might find this tech appealing) or because of feelings of guilt & remorse, especially in cases of crimes of passion.

 The question would then become, what’s the proper legal punishment for someone who commits a crime of passion and then deletes the meory of the crime and the incidents that led up to it? Do you jail someone for a crime they don’t remember, and could not imagine themselves doing?

On the one hand, yeah, I can see the ethical problem there.

On the other hand, we regularly lock up drunk drivers and drugged-up jackholes who commit crimes and then cannot recall them once sober.

On the gripping hand, if we have the tech to delete memories, we might have the tech to *add* memories. Thus perhaps the memory of the crime could be re-installed… even if the memory has to be re-created from scratch.

 Posted by at 8:27 am
Apr 242010
 

OK, this is just odd. Anybody who has been reading along, especially comments, for the past day or so has noticed that something screwy has been going on WRT the Paypal buttons. Someone clicks to buy “art18,” they get “art20.” Someone clicks to “comment,” suddenly they find they’re in the process of buying “art19.” Finally, just a little while ago I decided to search my own blog for a posting about NJ governor Christie. So I type “Christie” into the search bar, hit the button… and get re-directed to the Paypal shopping cart. BAH!

Not having the slightest idea of anything else to do, I went into the posts on the front page that had Paypal buttons and deleted the buttons, replacing them with cut-and-paste text directing those interested to the regular webpage. And viola… the search function functions again.

I have not the slightest clue how, but text in a post somehow reprogrammed the whole damned blog. If I could figure out exactly how that worked, maybe I could put some text onto a T-shirt that would program women to find me attractive. Or fill out a five dollar deposit form that would reprogram my bank account into something to be proud of.

 Posted by at 4:13 pm
Apr 242010
 

Where I live out in the sticks, few aircraft are ever in evidence. The occasional high altitude jet; during summer a private plane sprays anti-skeeter chemicals, sometimes cropdusters, and some bastard who I hate with the fire of a thousand exploding suns often goes bopping around in a powered parafoil (damn you and your easy ability to go flying whenever the hell you feel like it!!!!). So imagine my surprise yesterday when I heard the thop-thop-thop of a low-altitude heavy helicopter. I grabbed the camera and dashed outside in time to catch a Chinook flying overhead.

Then imagine my surprise when it was joined by a second.

And then a third.

The Chinooks came out of the west, presumably from – or at least over – the ATK facility. They orbited around once, and then wandered off towards the mountains and Brigham City. Damned if I know what they were up to. One had an opened loading ramp for some reason.

Conspiracy Paranoia Note: While these helicopters were probably dark green, the combination of the dark color and the sun angle makes them look black. I can’t spot any markings in any of the photos. So, there ya go, a trio of black helicopters out doing mysterious stuff.

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 Posted by at 12:38 pm