Feb 212022
 

I see your “modern art” and raise you…

Art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art art. Art.

 

 Posted by at 1:37 am
Feb 162022
 

In March of 1961, “Space World” magazine published a few articles about what the future would look like thanks to the onrushing new technologies of the space age. It is… well, it’s wrong.

The article is jam-packed with predictions of a glorious technological and economic future to be brought about by the Space Age. And from the standpoint of 1961, it probably made sense: technology was advancing by leaps and bounds, the budget for NASA was beginning to explode, overall space and related science spending by both government and industry were shooting upwards. It *should* have been a glorious new age. But the experts did not count on a few things. Viet Nam, for example and, worse, LBJs “Great Society” economic and social suppression/dystopia promotion programs.

Some of the predictions for 1971:

1) The “Space Industry” would be the biggest industry in America

2) The “middle class” would be working high-paying skilled jobs and would make up 80% of the population

3) Skyscrapers would dwarf the Empire State Building, using girders made from beryllium, tantalum and niobium

4) Tape recorders would be the size of a cigarette

5) You could easily send a fax from, say, New York to Australia. You’d scan the page, beam it up to a satellite passing overhead, the satellite would store the scan and, when it some time later passed over Australia, the fax would be beamed down. That’s… not how international satellite communications works, but OK.

6) There’d be cities in Antarctica

7) There’d be regular, routine and affordable suborbital rocket passenger transport. Such as from Antarctica to New York, several flights a day.

Amusingly, these predictions are considered likely to be too conservative; people would look back to the predictions and “wonder why the prophets of 1961 were so shortsighted.”

“Today it is rocket time, and the coming decade will carry us all into the Age of Astronautics.”

 

They could not have known that their glorious future would only last a small handful of years. By 1968, the Apollo program was already terminated, with no follow-on. And the maximum spending for NASA occurred only in 65-66 or so, peaking at about 4% of the federal budget. Imagine if the upward trend had continued to, say, 1970. Perhaps 6, maybe 8% of the federal budget. What a world it could have been.

Awww. I gave myself a sad.

Sigh.

The full-rez scan of the article has been uploaded to the 2022-02 APR Extras folder on Dropbox. This is available to all $4 and up Patrons and Subscribers. If you would like to help fund the acquisition and preservation of such things, along with getting high quality scans for yourself, please consider signing on either for the APR Patreon or the APR Monthly Historical Documents Program.




 

 Posted by at 11:51 pm
Feb 082022
 

The package of Shuttle II stuff (actually, “Shuttle Evolved”) arrived today and has been scanned and uploaded to Dropbox (some 350 megabytes). Enough funders came on board to drop the per-funder price to a mere $13. The artwork was particularly nice; it was scanned in at 600 dpi and provided both as-scanned, and with some process to de-age and brighten the art. The documents have been turned into PDFs, as well as providing the raw scans.

The collection of stuff was expensive, but crowdfunding it made it inexpensive for everyone. If you see anything on ebay or elsewhere that might benefit from such an approach, don’t hesitate to point it out.

 

Funders who have paid the $13 should have received a Dropbox notification about the uploads providing access to the files.

 Posted by at 12:37 am
Feb 022022
 

So a lot of “Shuttle II” stuff appeared on eBay for an exorbitant price. I’m becoming increasingly leery of plunking down excessive sums for this sort of thing… not only due to my own finances and the onrushing economic meltdown, but because doing so incentivizes sellers to slap even more exorbitant prices on things. But, I put this lot before my APR patrons/subscribers as a potential crowdfunding opportunity, and enough signed on that I went ahead and purchased the lot. It should arrive early next week.

As with all my APR crowdfunds, the cost of the item is split evenly among the funders; the more funders, the lower the price per person. Each funder will receive a complete set of high-rez (300 DPI, full color… higher rez if called for) scans of the items. Typically  these crowdfunded items then get sent on to appropriate archive, library or museum, though this time I’m not quite sure where they should go.

If you would be interested in signing on, send me an email    . There are currently enough funders that the per-funder price is ~$24 under $14; the more sign on, the lower it’ll get. If you have a price limit noticeably lower than $14, let me know in your email. This will remain open until the stuff arrives, presumably early next week. At that point it’ll be closed and the price set.


Additionally: the box shown below, loaded with blueprints/diagrams, is somewhere in the system headed my way. It was procured sight unseen; I have high hopes. This sort of thing is made possible by the APR Patrons/Monthly Historical Documents Program subscribers. If you want to help preserve aerospace history and get in on these goodies, please consider subscribing.

 




 

 Posted by at 5:19 pm
Jan 202022
 

World’s First Space-Based Entertainment Studio To Launch In 2024; S.E.E. Unveiled As Studio Behind Tom Cruise Space Film

Their plan is to launch a *studio* to the ISS in 2024, and then separate it from the ISS to become a free-flying platform in 2028.

How serious are they? Dunno. Will it come to pass? Dunno. Is it frivolous, compared to the likes of space telescopes, missions to the Moon, Mars colonization? Definitely. Is it a good idea? If it is carried out honestly, with a proper budget and engineering rigor… you damn betcha it’s a good idea. This sort of thing should help spur not only direct improvements in space technologies such as life support, launch and the understanding of how regular folk do in microgravity, it should also help spur general interest in space. If the “studio” mechanically works well, it could lead to practical space hotels and other space-based commercial enterprises.

Assuming, of course, it’s not a disaster. Videos of Tom Cruise turning various shades of green and spewing nonstop for weeks on end might not be so great. But say what you will about Cruise, man’s a consummate pro when it comes to acting; wouldn’t surprise me if he could act right through space sickness and make it look like he’s having a blast.

 

 Posted by at 2:24 pm
Jan 192022
 

Radian announces plans to build one of the holy grails of spaceflight

The “holy grail” in this case is an SSTO spaceplane. It is to *not* incorporate airbreathing or wacky unproven technologies; instead, it is to use fairly conventional liquid propellant rocket engines in the tail of a cranked-delta spaceplane. To lob it off the ground, it will use a powered sled for a horizontal runway launch.

Ehh.

Same basic concept as the Sanger Silverbird of 1944 vintage, or the Boeing “Windjammer” and RASV concepts from the 70’s. If they can get the mass ratio to work… sure, it’s possible. They’re claiming a 48-hour turnaround. Uh-huh. I’ll believe it when I see it. I wish them the best, but I’ve seen far too many such press releases since the 90’s to get all excited.

A few patent applications that might be of interest:

Earth to Orbit Transportation System

Rocket propulsion systems and associated methods

The not terribly enlightening website is here:

https://www.radianaerospace.com/

Curiously, one of the names attached to both patent applications that might be of interest to readers of this blog is Gary Hudson, of the Phoenix SSTO, Air Launch and Roton fame. But he doesn’t seem to be listed on the website.

 Posted by at 1:58 pm