Anybody want a Saturn I booster?

 history, Hmm..., news, rockets, spacecraft  No Responses »
Aug 142019
 

NASA Giving Away Apollo-Era Saturn Rocket to Anyone who Wants It

It’s free to a good home. Just pay the modest $250,000 shipping fee.

I have an obvious choice: SpaceX. The Saturn S-1 stage was, as we all know, originally intended to be recovered after flight via parachutes with an ocean splashdown; this option was eliminated as a mass and cost savings measure, as were plans to add Rogallo wings or parafoils for a horizontal runway landing.  I suggest that SpaceX get this stage, refurb it, fix it up and fly it, using one of the several proposed recovery methods.

Why? Because it would be cool, that’s why.

 

 

 

 Posted by at 4:39 pm

Rockets Don’t Work

 AARRRGH, Crazy, dumbassery, Gah., rockets, youtube, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Aug 112019
 

Obviously, rockets *do* work. And yet, there are people who believe they don’t. These people are sometimes flat Earthers, who cannot reconcile space travel with their world view and thus conclude that Its A Conspiracy. Sometimes they are people who fundamentally misunderstand basic physics and believe that rockets need something to push against, thus they can’t work in a vacuum. And then there’s this guy. At least Sir Sic’s mockery of him is entertaining.

As it turns out, I approve of this kind of “other ways of knowing.” I fully support the idea of the US federal Government expending considerable time, funds and efforts to promote this kind of thinking. It’s just that I want them to promote this kind of things *elsewhere.* Convince the Chinese and the Norks and the Iranians to accept this sort of thing and base their space programs around it.

 

 Posted by at 6:20 pm

SpaceX: Another Competitor

 Hmm..., news, politics, rockets, spacecraft  No Responses »
Aug 112019
 

This time, Chinese.

Congrats, of course. But SpaceX might want to take a look at their security procedures. Not saying the ChiComs couldn’t have done this on their own, but it’s hardly unlikely that they cheated.

 

 Posted by at 4:17 pm

BLAMMO goes Russia

 AARRRGH, Gah., Hmm..., news, nukes, rockets, russian empire, weapons, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Aug 092019
 

There seems to be something wrong with our bloody Russians this week.

A Russian military ammo depot that blew up earlier this week just exploded again

But wait! There’s more!

‘Brief radiation spike’ after rocket engine blast in northern Russia

Ummmm…

Radiation levels peaked between 11:50 and 12:30 (08:50-09:30 GMT) before falling and normalising by 14:00, the city administration in Severodvinsk said on its website, without reporting how significant the spike had been.

…

“They advise everyone to close their windows and drink iodine, 44 drops per glass of water.”

And…

Is Putin covering up a nuclear disaster? Ambulances covered in protective film transport six Russians who suffered severe radiation poisoning in mystery explosion during ‘test of new hypersonic missile’

UMMMMM…..

The Daily Mail article suggests that this was a “Zircon” hypersonic missile that exploded. The 3M22 Zircon is an experimental scramjet-powered anti-ship/land target missile with  range of about a thousand miles, with the capability of carrying a 600 kiloton thermonuclear warhead. If there was a radiation release, that would indicate that the missile was carrying an actual nuclear warhead… something that seems *really* unwise for a peacetime test flight. it’s unlikely that the warhead actually detonated; that would be Big News virtually impossible to hide. Instead I guess the warhead must have either been blown apart by the chemical explosives, or trashed on impact. in either case, it seems a little odd that the radiation spike would go back down.  You’d think there’d need to be a substantial cleanup. Unless, I suppose, the plutonium actually caught fire and burned and the smoke rifted downrange…

There is also speculation that this wasn’t a Zircon, but a Burevestnik nuclear-powered cruise missile. The existence of a truly nuclear powered Burevestnik is by no means certain, but who knows. In the unlikely case that this what what crashed, then perhaps the burst of radiation came from the engine melting down in flight or on impact; the drop in radiation coming as the reactor sank into mud or a pond or even just the dirt. Shrug.

 Posted by at 5:31 pm

SpaceX: A challenger rises

 awesomeness, news, projects, rockets  No Responses »
Aug 082019
 

Rocket Lab is, it seems, planning on recovering and reusing the first stage of their small Electron launch vehicle. The means of recovery is a lot lower tech than that of the Falcon 9… the Electron will pop a drogue ballute to stabilize, then open a parafoil to slow down and drift in the direction of a recovery ship. Before splashdown it will be air-snatched by a large helicopter then flown to the ship. Should be doable; the small size of the booster makes recovery of the entire first stage via this method practical, while Lockheeds Vulcan is, last I checked, only planning on recovering the engines and avionics.

This is of course no threat to SpaceX, which is going increasingly Bigger And Bigger. Still, it will be good to see yet more space launch systems working towards reusability and truly low cost.

On the other hand: no matter how capable Rocket lab gets with future boosters, their choice of launching from new Zealand will be a limiting factor. New Zealand has been since 1984 a “nuclear free zone,” excluding from its territorial waters any ship powered by nuclear reactors. While this would not necessarily seem to exclude nuclear powered spacecraft… why would  someone with such a payload risk it?

 Posted by at 3:29 am

SPECTRE Bird One Booklet of General Plans

 blather, drawings, Hmm..., rockets, science fiction  No Responses »
Aug 072019
 

I’m putting the finishing touches on this one. My hope, if I go into production with a number of these BoGPs, is to release at least two at a time: saves on shipping costs. But the “SPECTRE” BoGP will be a test case of sorts. If it is popular, more will come. If it tanks… well…

I’m still tinkering with the diagrams, but you can see below what I’m planing on including. Along with the diagrams will be a mess of explanatory text. Some will be on the diagrams themselves, as you can see; others will be on a separate cover page. For the science fiction designs, the intent is to describe the vehicle as if it was real, with an in-universe  description. Sometimes from the people or organizations involved (which will be the case for SSV), and sometimes from the viewpoint of outsiders trying to describe them (such as is the case with the SPECTRE vehicle). Consequently, there will be more than just the dry statistics of length and weight, but also history and analysis from someone who may or may not understand the thing, and may or may not *like* the thing, and who may or may not be the sort of person you’d *want* to understand the thing.

For the SPECTRE, I have about three pages of text. To me it seems god, but I’ve been wrong about this sort of thing before. So I’m looking for three (3) people willing to give the cover pages (*just* the cover pages, not the mess-o-diagrams) a look, and then review in the comments section below what they think. Undoubtedly there’ll be spelling and grammatical errors, but what I’m interested in is… was it worth reading? Did it keep you interested? Make you more interested in the full booklet? Basically… was it good?

If you are interested, leave a comment expressing interest below, and if you’re one of the first three to do so I’ll send along a PDF of the cover page. This:

But not yet this:

Thanks.

Note: the in-universe text will be for different universes. The SPECTRE Bird vehicle isn’t from the same reality as the War Rocket Ajax or the Helicarrier or the Messiah. It might be interesting to try to create a Grand Unified Theory of Fiction slapping everything into the same continuity but… nah.

 

 Posted by at 5:50 pm

Starship to fly soon?

 awesomeness, Hmm..., news, projects, rockets, spacecraft  No Responses »
Aug 042019
 

Hmmmm…..

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk says first orbital Starship prototype flight debut is just weeks away

An update on the whole program is due August 24, and flights of a full-scale Starship “prototype” soon thereafter.
SpaceX is building *multiple* flight test vehicles, both in Texas and in Florida. They are building them outside, which is pretty much by definition as far from “clean room” conditions as you can get, unless you go the extra step and build them within a malfunctioning and overflowing sewage treatment plant. The Starship prototypes are clearly not space-capable, but seem to be aimed mostly or entirely as subsonic or just maybe low-supersonic aerodynamic “flying mockups.” The skins are far, *FAR* from the smooth, featureless outer mold lines you want to have for something that will deal with hypersonic airflows. Still, if they can demonstrate a death swoop and pinpoint landing with a vehicle with the same aerodynamics as a true Starship, with the same weights, propulsion systems, center of gravity, etc. as the real deal…. they’ll be a heck of a lot closer to a truly reusable large launch system than anyone else ever.
 Posted by at 7:52 pm

SLS vs. Progress

 AARRRGH, Gah., Hmm..., news, projects, rockets, spacecraft, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Aug 012019
 

It seems that Boeing, prime contractor for the Space Launch System, tried to shut down development of orbital fuel depots and orbital propellant transfer. Because if you can stash a lot of fuel in orbit easily and cheaply, you don’t *need* the bloated irrational monstrosity that is SLS.

The SLS rocket may have curbed development of on-orbit refueling for a decade

What’s interesting; if this story is true, Boeing opposed fuel depots because they threaten SLS. But SpaceX, now working on “Super Heavy” rockets with roughly the same capability as SLS, are *actively* supporting fuel deports. Why the difference? Because SLS was never meant to really do anything. Launch once a year, one extremely expensive mission maybe to the moon, call it good. Pretend to be moving outwards again, but the minimum possible steps taken as slowly as possible. SpaceX wants to lob dozens of people to *Mars* in just the next few years. Same launch capability, but fundamentally different goals.

*IF* this story turns out to be true, someone needs to have their ass handed to ’em. Congressional investigations at least on par with the “Trump is a Russian stooge” investigation, because this one has had clear and obvious impacts on the US: Billions spent on a system nobody wants, years wasted that that the US could have used to conquer the heavens. Hell, just imagine what we could have done with SLS money by way of building breeder reactors.

 Posted by at 10:12 pm

A “Man Conquers Space” quandary

 AARRRGH, blather, Crazy, Gah., history, Hmm..., rockets, science fiction, spacecraft, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Aug 012019
 

So I was cleaning out some junk when I stumbled across a printout of a circa 2009 version of the “Man Conquers Space” screenplay. At that time the story was in constant motion, with major changes and updates occurring very rapidly. It had, honestly, become damned bloated by that point, encompassing a *lot* of history and events and characters; it would have been a nightmare to actually get made, and probably would have been a mess unless there had been  *lot* of trimming and good editing. Of course, we all know how MCS ended up; it will never be made.

Finding the printout made me go digging through old digital storage, and I found two versions of the screenplay, one from 2008, another from a few months later in 2009. It’s made me wonder what, if anything, should be done with them. They are marked “Copyright” both David Sander and one other fella who may well now wish to remain completely and permanently anonymous.

At some point I plan on reading through them again, just for giggles. I may well also print them out, plug them into a binder and place it on my growing “well, THAT didn’t work” shelf.

I’m left to wonder what else can and should be done with them.

 Posted by at 1:26 am
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