Three cheers for late 1970’s nostalgia. Who remembers Skylab coming down?
When Will China’s ‘Heavenly Palace’ Space Lab Fall Back to Earth?
It *seems* that the Tiangong-1 space station *may* have lost control. Wheeeee!
Jul 132016
Jul 122016
My interview on the Space Show is now available for downloading as a 26 megabyte MP4 right HERE. This one covers Project Orion, ol’ nuclear bang-bang. The discussion kinda wanders around some.
So, download, give it a listen, point and laugh. I’m listening to it now and recognizing once again that while I have a face for radio, I have voice for print. At least this time, the audio troubles that plagued my last interview don’t seem to have arisen this time.
Jul 102016
The mysterious syndrome impairing astronauts’ sight
Short form: zero gravity over a span of weeks or months shifts fluids up into astronauts heads, applying pressure to the back of eyeballs, trashing their vision. One astronaut went from 20/20 to 20/100. It’s not yet clear if this is temporary or permanent, but it’s moderately disastrous for long duration spaceflight such as trips to Mars.
There is, of course, a simple solution: artificial gravity. Centrifugal force will do the job. But the question is, what level of gravity is needed? If you go to 3/8 of a G, Mars gravity, will you be just fine forever, or will it just take longer? Can we get by on 1/6 G, Lunar gravity? 1/10 of G? 1/20? 1/100?
These are questions that *cannot* be answered on the ISS. We need a real space station, one that either has different rotation rates over a span or years, or multiple levels with different G-levels. This would obviously be a better setup then pure zero-g fr a “space hotel.” It’s not even remotely certain that all space tourists will be able to well tolerate or even want zero-g non-stop for the duration of their stay; a rotating station, especially one attached to a zero-g module via a rotary bearing airlock, would provide both environments within just a moments travel.
Best solution: develop some good zero-g, vacuum-capable 3D printers that can work with aluminum and steel and titanium, and send to the ISS along with a modified woodchipper. Feed the ISS into the chipper then the printer a module at a time, turning it into a properly designed station, one with inflatable modules and artificial gravity.
Jul 082016
A while ago I was asked by another aerospace historian if I had any artwork of the “Dual Keel” version of the Space Station design from the mid/late 1980s. This was a predecessor to the International Space Station (the “Russians” being the “Soviets” at the time) and was to be used not just as an orbiting shack for some basic research, but also as an assembly area for manned missions to the moon and Mars. Turns out I had a fair amount of Dual Keel art. As is the way of things, a lot of that art is moderately poor… scanned from dusty slides, in many cases. Still, it’s what I had. It dawned on me that others might be interested in it, so I put all the images into the same size and format (standard 8.5X11) and made a PDF out of it, seventy some pages. I have uploaded Part One to the “APR Extras” Dropbox site into the “2016-07 APR Extras” folder. This is accessible to all APR Patreon patrons at the $4 level and above (if you are such a patron and don’t have access, send me a message via Patreon, I’ll get you fixed up).
Jul 062016
NASA released this video celebrating Juno’s arrival in the Jovian system, complete with the first true video ever shot from a spacecraft showing the moons of Jupiter in motion:
And audio of the Juno spacecraft passing Jupiter’s bow shock and magnetopause:
Jul 032016
Not the most revealing video, but this shows the restored NCC-1701 USS Enterprise filming miniature on display at the National Air & Space Museum:
A photo gallery showing the model in its new state is available HERE. Alright, nerds, commence ta fightin’! What’d they get wrong? What blasphemous errors were made?
Jul 022016
July 11, at 2PM Pacific time, I’m to be interviewed on The Space Show. The subject will be nuclear pulse propulsion; I am pondering several sub-topics to narrow down the focus. Including:
- The history of Project Orion (probably been done to death as far as listeners are concerned)
- The engineering of Orion technology – ships and pulse units
- How nuclear pulse propulsion has been depicted – often wrongly – in popular culture. And how to depict it accurately and interestingly.
- And of course, Pax Orionis. Because.
- I was on The Space Show once before, in December 2013, discussing aerospace history archiving, Dyna Soar and the like.
Suggestions?
Jul 012016
A photo of a McDonnell Douglas X-30 NASP display model that has seen better days. Has anyone seen another copy of this model, or art depicting the same configuration? The tails on both sides are missing, so reconstruction without references would be at best speculation.
The configuration seems fairly generic. McD released a lot of art on the NASP back in the day, along with the vaguely-related “Orient Express” idea for a hypersonic transport. While the NASP and the OE were *not* the same vehicle, they were meant to at least share some similar technologies, but the aerodynamics was something that differed substantially, for example, here’s a McD Orient Express model in the National Air and Space Museum:
The two clearly come from the same line of thinking, but the NASP has a much deeper fuselage. This makes sense… going to orbit as an SSTO requires stuffing as much fuel as possible into the fuselage, and the relatively flat HST has a less efficient volumetric efficiency.
Jun 282016
NOTE: Not the best photos, but… ehh, what’re ya gonna do…
I have a new batch of physical media… digital prints and old-school cyanotype blueprints. What sets these apart is that they are BIG.
First, a book: Space Transportation System Diagrams. This is a collection of 27 wide format (the standard 11 inches high… but up to *40* inches wide) Space Shuttle diagrams. They are all official NASA.industry diagrams, painstakingly cleaned, depicting all aspects of the STS. Includes numerous instrument panel diagrams as well as structural arrangements, general arrangements, insulation/tile layouts, etc. This is available for $75. Ten were printed. NOW SOLD OUT..
STS Diagrams book: $75
Second, some very large digital prints of the Shuttle orbiter underside tile maps. Three maps provided… left wing, right wing and fuselage. They are all 20 inches high, with the centerline diagram being about 80 inches long. Shows you where every tile goes, all for only $30. This has sold out. If you are interested, send me an email and I’ll let you know when/if more are made available.
Third: 1/72 scale cyanotype blueprints, handmade, of the Space Launch System Block 1 launch vehicle. This blueprint is 24 inches wide by about 67 inches long, based on a CAD layout of my own creation and is available for $80.
1/72 SLS Cyanotype Blueprint: $80 Sold out
All of these are likely going to be available for only a limited time. I’ve had ten copies of the STS Diagram Book printed; each is individually numbered. So far, one sold. The 1/72 SLS is also likely to be only limited print run; while undeniably awesome, it is kinda big, and I think I’d do better to replace the 1/72 diagram with a 1/144 version. So snap ’em up fast before they become collectors items!
As always with physical items, postage is required. A single flat fee is charged no matter how many items… if you’re in the US, you pay $10 in postage is you order one item or a dozen (so order a dozen). Elsewhere… costs a little more.
US postage: $10
Jun 252016
A heavily illustrated USAF brochure on turbine engine technology included, among a vast number of little photos of engines and aircraft, a few illustrations that might be of interest.
Several futuristic concepts here, several old ones. Of particular interest is the “Supersonic Multirole Fighter,” which looks like a cross between the old Lockheed Hopeless Diamond concept and the Northrop XST design… tailless with an inlet on top, with features reminiscent of the F-117, but blended rather than faceted.
Of these “Emerging Concept Needs,” several are distinctly old. The middle row of three designs are all 20+ year-old concepts.
