USBP on Amazon update

 aircraft, blather, books, drawings, history, new products, nukes, projects, spacecraft, US Bomber Projects  No Responses »
Oct 242014
 

I have – I *think* – just corrected an error in the listing that should open sales up worldwide. If some of all y’all furriners would like to take a look and see if it’s still unavailable, that’d be helpful. Note, though, that USBP#02 has been uploaded and is going through review… and – again I *think* – should be far better in terms of image resolution. If I get confirmation from a customer or three that #2 is better than #1, I will re-upload #1. I don’t know if previous purchasers can download the new, better version or not…

#2 took freakin’ *forever* to get properly formatted. I couldn’t find a way to get the “Caliber” converter on my computer to *not* reduce the image resolution, so I had to use the Amazon system directly, which meant uploading the thing and waiting for it to process, then looking through the annoyingly slow previewer for the innumerable and mysterious formatting issues. After around 20 cycles of this, I *think* I’ve got it hammered into shape with full-rez images. So while this is formatted and laid out differently from the standard PDF version, the image quality should be as good.

Unless something screwy happens (and, gosh, when has *that* ever happened), USBP#2 should be available on Amazon in the next some hours. I have high hopes of being asleep at the time.  So if you’d like to be the first kid on your block with a copy, or want to help out be getting a copy early and providing feedback (if so, thanks), just search for “US Bomber Projects” on Amazon.

 

My plan at this time is to keep publications at Amazon about five or six issues behind those on my website.

 Posted by at 10:06 pm

Back to Messiah

 art, models, science fiction, spacecraft  11 Responses »
Oct 212014
 

It has been a good long while since I’ve worked on this. But now that my arm has regained functionality and I’ve gotten THESE out of the way (come on, folks, buy up!), I’m back to working on the “Deep Impact” Messiah model for Fantastic Plastic.

Note: Some photoetch is pretty much inevitable for this kit. But there are some parts, I’m thinking mainly of the structural supports that hold the “outrigger” boosters, that would benefit from something like laser-cut aluminum parts about 1/8 inch thick. Is this even remotely feasible on a budget? Anyone know anything about such things?

2014-10-21

 Posted by at 9:57 am

US Bomber Projects #11, US Transport Projects #01 now available

 aircraft, art, awesomeness, books, drawings, history, new products, news, projects, rockets, sales & specials, spacecraft, US Bomber Projects, US Transport Projects  1 Response »
Oct 202014
 

As well as the 11X17-format PDF collection of diagrams for USBP07 through 09.

———————————-

USBP 11

Issue 11 of US Bomber Projects is now available (see HERE for the entire series). Issue #11 includes:

  • Boeing Model 464-40: The first all-jet-powered design in the quest for the B-52
  • North American D-118: A turboprop conversion of the F-82E into a ground attacker
  • Boeing Model 701-218: A twin engined supersonic concept
  • NAA Model 705-00-04: A ramjet cruise missile with a manned rocket booster
  • Northrop Nuclear Flying Wing: A well defended if rather hypothetical design
  • Martin Model 223-11: *almost* the XB-48
  • Boeing B-1: The design that might have beaten the Rockwell concept
  • Bell/Martin 464L: The submission that most closely resembled what the Dyna Soar eventually became

USBP #11 can be downloaded as a PDF file for only $4:

——–

usbp11ad

usbp11ad2

———

USTP 01

And also available, issue #01 of US Transport Projects. Done in the same format as US Bomber Projects, USTP will cover flying vehicles designed to transport cargo, passengers and troops. Issue 01 includes:

  • Redstone Troop Transport: An Army concept for a troop & supplies launcher
  • Lockheed CL-334-1: A small STOL battlefield transport
  • NASA LH2 747: A “three fuselage” hydrogen-fueled jetliner
  • Douglas DC-8-1004: A very clean pusher-prop passenger liner
  • Bell/Boeing/NASA ATT: A wasp-waisted transonic concept
  • Boeing Model 733-94: An early SST
  • Aereon Dynairship: A giant modern airship
  • Boeing Model 473-10: One of the earliest jetliner designs

USTP #01 can be downloaded as a PDF file for only $4:

——–

 

ustp01ad

ustp01ad2

———

Large format USBP drawings, Issues 07-09

The CAD drawings created for USBP reformatted and rescaled for 11X17 collected in a separate volume. Drawings have in some cases been corrected, improved and added to.

USBP 11X17 07-09 collects the diagrams created for issues 07, 08 and 09, including:

Boeing model 464-25; Boeing Model 828-2; Fairchild N-12; Rockwell D645-3; Boeing Model 701-273-7; Martin Model 223-7; Convair 464L Dyna Soar I; Convair 464L Dyna Soar III; Bell MX Hovercraft; Bell mobile defense platform; Boeing Model 464-27; Rockwell D645-6; Republic M-4.25; Martin MAMBA; Boeing Model 484-2-2 (twin-pod); Martin Model 223-8; Douglas 464L Dyna Soar I; Boeing Model 800-11A; Boeing Model 464-33-0; Consolidated Army Bombardment Type; GE Supersonic System 6X; Convair B/J-58 B-58C; Boeing Model 484-2-2; Martin Model 223-9; Northrop N-206 Dyna Soar I/II/III; Boeing Model 800-15A

USBP11x17-01-03 can be downloaded as a PDF file for only $10:
————–

usbp11x17-07-09ad

———

 

 Posted by at 7:35 am

X-37B return in photos

 aircraft, history, Hmm..., news, photography, rockets, spacecraft  No Responses »
Oct 182014
 

The X-37B has been lurking in orbit since December, 2012 doing… whatever it was it was doing. Suspicions generally revolve around it performing recon missions of some kind. But it has returned at last to a safe runway landing. Some good photos from an just after that landing are here:

 Posted by at 9:17 am

Bootstrapping a Solar System Civilization

 Hmm..., I'm from the government, news, politics, spacecraft  6 Responses »
Oct 172014
 

The White House floats a rial balloon:

Bootstrapping a Solar System Civilization

If we want to want to create a robust civilization in our solar system, more of the energy, raw materials, and equipment that we use in space has to come from space.  Launching everything we need from Earth is too expensive.  It would also be too expensive to send all of the factories required to manufacture everything necessary to support a solar system civilization.

Ultimately what we need to do is to evolve a complete supply chain in space, utilizing the energy and resources of space along the way. We are calling this approach “bootstrapping” because of the old saying that you have to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps.  Industry in space can start small then pull itself up to more advanced levels through its own productivity, minimizing the cost of launching things from Earth in the meantime.  Obviously, this isn’t going to happen overnight, but I think that it is the right long-term goal.

…

Have ideas for massless exploration and bootstrapping a Solar System civilization? Send your ideas for how the Administration, the private sector, philanthropists, the research community, and storytellers can further these goals at massless@ostp.gov.

It would be nice to think that this is the sort of thing the administration was actually interested in doing something with. But let’s just say I won’t be holding my breath on this.

 Posted by at 7:17 pm

PDF Review: STS tiles. Every. Single. Vertex.

 aircraft, history, Hmm..., models, Patreon, rockets, spacecraft  23 Responses »
Oct 162014
 

This is the second of four “PDF Reviews” I plan to have in October, to make up for the lack of any in September. The idea is to present interesting online resources for those interested in the sort of aerospace oddities that you can find in the pages of Aerospace Projects Review. This little project is supported through my Patreon campaign; at current levels, I’ll post two such reviews per month. If you’d like to see more, or just want to contribute to help me along, please consider becoming a patron.

This one is a bit different from usual. Instead of a report full of art and diagrams and charts and, well, sentences, this one has none of those. Instead, what it does have is 5,271 pages of data. Data, specifically, on the X-Y-Z positions of every single vertex of every single tile on the Shuttle. Of what value is that? Well, someone with a whole lot of patience could, I presume, feed this data into a 3D modeling program and produce a *really* accurate model of at least part of the Space Shuttle. So… knock yourself out.

Orbiter Coordinates of All the Vertices on the Outer Mold Line (OML) of Each of the OV-ID5 Tiles

The abstract page is HERE.

The direct download link for the PDF file is HERE.

 Posted by at 12:49 am

Patreon bonus: “The colonization of space”

 blather, history, new products, news, Patreon, projects, spacecraft  3 Responses »
Oct 132014
 

While my right arm theoretically heals up (I hopped a ride to the doc at o’dark thirty this AM, waited around for an hour till they showed up, got an X-Ray and a jab right in the damage with a shot of cortisone and pain reliever, and the tentative diagnosis is simple tendonitis, though there may be a bone spur that’ll need to be Dremel’ed off), my ability to do CAD drafting is seriously compromised. Still trying to make some progress, and I hope to have something to show later today.

So rather than just sit around and do nothing, I’m sitting around and doing scanning. One of these decades I’d like to have scanned in everything I have, which would be  a neat trick, but every little bit helps. Some things are just photocopies of journal articles and the like. One was something I’d been looking for for a while, and couldn’t find when actively searching for it (but which turned up when searching for something else), Gerard K. O’Neill’s 1974 Physics Today article on space colonization via vast rotating cylinders. hat has now been scanned in an uploaded to the APR Patreon “creations” section, as a downloadable bonus for all APR Patrons.

I’ve a bunch more things like this that I plan on posting  for APR Patreon patrons of various levels. These are all, of course, in addition to the promised “rewards.” All the “creations” get wiped out at the end of each monthly billing cycle, so if you’d like to get in, time’s a-wastin’…

 Posted by at 1:35 pm

Space Shuttle Enterprise visits Vandenberg

 aircraft, awesomeness, history, photography, rockets, spacecraft  5 Responses »
Oct 122014
 

A page with some good photos showing the Enterprise on an ET with SRBs stacked up at the Slick Six western launch site:

1985: Space Shutle at Vandenberg

Whether it would’ve made good sense to fly the Shuttle from California can be debated… but undeniable, I think, is the view that it would have been a damn fine show.

Had Challenger not gone FOOM in ’86, the SLC-6 site *might* have been used for Shuttle launches to high inclination orbits. This, presumably, would ahve opened the door for the Shuttle to be more useful. *Perhaps* it would ahve led to a better system. With launch and recovery processing done by the USAF rather than NASA, *maybe* Vandenberg would have been able to fly Shuttle for much cheaper, more reliably and more often than NASA in Florida. Maybe.

 Posted by at 11:01 am
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