What’s the use of a gunship without guns?
The Tachi/Rocinante looks best with its PDCs out…
Jun 192016
Jun 182016
The EM drive has caused a lot of debate, in no small part due to the fact that it seems to violate the known laws of physics… and because other experimenters haven had difficulty replicating it. Well, it *seems* some experimenters have gotten it to work *and* have come up with an explanation for how it works… and how it works without busting Newtons laws.
New paper claims that the EM Drive doesn’t defy Newton’s 3rd law after all
In short: the “exhaust” spat out by the EM drive is just photons. It’s a photon rocket, something that has been understood for decades. But the EM drive has been confusing because it hasn’t been seen to emit photons. The theory here is that it *does,* though. But rather than just your standard flood of photons (such as you’d get from a flashlight, a laser, a microwave oven or a social justice warrior who has undergone spontaneous proton decay), in this case each photon is paired up with another. And the two are paired up in such a way that they cancel each other out… they are emitted, their momentum is transferred, but their not detectable because the crest of the wave of Photon A is matched with the trough of the wave of Photon B. Or so goes the theory, anyway.
Gotta admit this one is a bit of a headscratcher. On one level I get the idea of the waves cancelling each other out; junior high school double-slit experiment stuff. But imagine if the EM drive was *ridiculously* powerful. Say, it spat out a hundred megawatts of “invisible” energy. If you put something fragile and easily damaged behind it (like an industry standard Trigglypuff), you’d be dumping a whole lot of energy into it that’s undetectable. So does your Triggytarget burst into flames or not?
Buh.
Jun 172016
This 1/48 kit should be pretty straightforward to assemble. The hollow construction should also allow more enthusiastic modelers to scratchbuild an interior if so desired. Not shown: an astronaut figure, currently being made the old fashioned way (plastic and sculpting).
Jun 152016
Today’s launch resulted in the Falcon 9 first stage hit the barge hard, apparently due to inadequate thrust on one engine. However, it was entirely successful in putting its payload into orbit.
Good launch & flight vid, suck landing vid:
Just the landing, such as it is:
Jun 152016
An illustration showing the interesting high temperature materials used on the 1960’s ASSET re-entry lifting test article.
Jun 142016
Some future releases in the PDF-diagram line. Obviously some are a little further along than others, and some will be multi-sheet diagrams…
Jun 132016
After comments and some discussion, I’ve slightly revised the MIS ship. The forward fuselage is slimmer, the aft flare more pronounced; the details on the aft flare changed a bit. The top version is the previous iteration of the design. Comments?
Jun 112016
I drove past this truck yesterday, north of Brigham City. To me it sure looks like an old Minuteman ICBM transporter truck; if so, it almost certainly wasn’t actually transporting an ICBM, or I’ve expected more of an escort.
Screenshots from my craptacular $35 dashcam.
A bit of googling finds that that’s almost certainly what it was…
Minuteman III ICBM Transporter Erector: My former office on 32 wheels
What you don’t want to do with one of these things:
Missile accident blamed on poor training
Whoops.
Now, a thought occurs to me. I suspect that these transporters just aren’t used as much as they once were. I suspect most of them have been recycled. But if – *if*, mind you – you had excess money *and* you were able to get one of these surplus… imagine what an *awesome* RV you could make out of it. Heck, design it to keep the “erector” function, with necessary amenities either properly locked down or able to rotate so that it’s functional either horizontal or vertical. And way up front, that’s where you’d put your combination bedroom/observatory, complete with telescope.
Jun 102016
This one is new to me… apparently the Germans used standard railway tracks and RATO-bottle-boosted sleds to launch replica Messerschmitt Me 163’s, with variable success. Given the fuel-hoggishness of the rocket plane, anything that would get them up to speed and into the air quickly would seem to be an advantage.
Jun 042016
Well, here it is. There’s still a bit of time yet before it needs to be shipped off to be 3D printed, so if you see something that you think needs to be added or changed, let me know. Not shown here is the airlock door (fits flush). Also not shown is a yet-to-be-sculpted *probable* astronaut doing a spacewalk. A metal rod would connect the spaceship to the base.
This model is to be made available through Fantastic Plastic and will be 1/48 scale, a bit over 9″ long.
UPDATE: turns out there’s a book about “Men Into Space.” Anybody know if it’s any good? Specifically… good imagery, diagrams, etc.?