Well, this can’t be good:
Problem with Soyuz MS-22 on the ISS right now! pic.twitter.com/V4Ymvnn2D1
— Chris Bergin – NSF (@NASASpaceflight) December 15, 2022
Good thing the US has it’s own ride now. SpaceX, stand by with a couple Dragons…
Dec 142022
Dec 072022
Some years ago I produced a range of cyanotype blueprints of a number of aerospace subjects. The hardware needed for this was disposed of when I left Utah at the end of 2019, so starting again seemed unlikely. However, someone has expressed interest in a special commission. Rebuilding the hardware needed will be an expensive chore, and sadly getting the large format transparencies printed looks like it will be much more difficult here than it was in Utah. Nevertheless, at this point it looks probable that I will restore that capability sometime in the next few months, assuming one further detail can be ironed out.
You can see my now-defunct catalog here:
https://www.aerospaceprojectsreview.com/catalog/cyan.htm
When I get back to it I will probably focus on the larger format stuff rather than the smaller prints. I have plans on how to improve upon the prior hardware to make things work better and more efficiently. If there are any of the former large format prints you’d like to see returned to production, or you have any prints you’d like to see, let me know. And once this is up and running I plan on trying to take commissions, working with a local print shop to find customers interested in this somewhat unusual and certainly obsolete form of art.
If you have a diagram you’d like me to turn into a cyanotype, contact me. Commissions aren’t going to be restricted to aerospace subjects; naval, architectural, movie props, whatever you’ve got, so long as it *can* be blueprinted, once things are in place I should be able to do it. 
Dec 062022
This “experiment” seems like all kinds of fun. It also seems like the sort of thing that would attract the attention of the ATF. Or the DoD.
I gotta admit I like the method of production of the nozzle. Adopting that process for a more advanced rocket might be a chore… a refractory metal nozzle made this way would be great, but I have doubts that it’d be possible.
Nov 252022
The Vertol Model 107 became the Boeing Vertol CH-46 Sea Knight. It has been a fabulously successful helicopter; development began almost *70* years ago, and some are still in service.
One suggested modification from 1961 would have seen the helicopter (designated HC-1A at the time) modified into an anti-tank variant using wire-guided anti-tank missiles. The artwork depicts the Model 107 modified with a “trapeze” that would lower from the belly holding one such missile (appears similar to the SS.11 / AGM-22) ; after launching the missile the launcher would retract back into the cargo bay where it would be reloaded and redeployed. At the rear of the bay is a manually loaded rocket launcher (though it looks more like a recoilless rifle to me) that would, after loading, swing down into a forward-firing position. Further rocket launching tubes were built into the extended rear landing gear sponsons; machine guns were fitted ahead of the cockpit.
Nov 202022
The National Reconnaissance Office is starting a series on the history of the Manned Orbiting Laboratory, a small space lab that was designed in the early/mid 1960s for the Air Force. Officially just a basic space lab, in reality it was an advanced (for the time) spy satellite. So far there is only Part One on the NRO website, and there’s not much to it… but we’ll see how it goes.
The story of the Manned Orbiting Laboratory – part one
As a reminder, there is a whole freakin’ mountain of MOL documents on the NRO website:
Index, Declassified Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) Records
Nov 202022
NASA spent *decades* launching the Shuttle, so it’s a little surprising that the launch of the SLS caused this much damage.
Huh.
Nov 192022
Included here are not only the closeups, but also a view from the public area showing just how brightly the exhaust lit the world.
Nov 182022
A mere sixteen years ago I posted artwork of the Martin “EGRESS” ejection capsule meant to fling crew from a stricken spacecraft anywhere up to and including orbit. Those scans came from photocopies of a conference paper. I have at last now scanned the same work, producing slightly better results. The artwork is remarkable for one detail in particular: of the two crewmen, one is clearly Lance Squarejaw, wholly unfazed at his situation. The other is… not unfazed. I’d pay real money to get at the original color painting.
The whole thing – diagrams and art scanned at 600 DPI – will be offered up to APR Patrons & Subscribers soon.
Nov 152022
You know, NATO MEMBER Poland. Two Polish civilians killed.
Strikes put Ukraine in darkness; missiles cross into Poland
Everybody got their bombs shelters ready?
Nov 112022
The Zambian space program was a magnificent Other Way Of Space Knowing. Did it fail due to machinations from the bigger nations? Or did it succeed, and right now Mars is populated by enlightened Zambians?