Pax Orionis: The Patreon?

 art, blather, books, Hmm..., My Fiction, Nuclear Pulse Propulsion, Patreon, Pax Orionis, science fiction, spacecraft  6 Responses »
Sep 022015
 

Patreon works two different ways. The first way, the way used on the Aerospace Projects Review Patreon campaign, is that patron are charged once a month, and they get rewards once a month. The other way Patreon can work is to only charge patrons when the content-creator actually has new content. This seems to be used a lot for web-comic creators… when they produce a new comic, the patrons get charged and get the comic. Whether that happens once a week, once a month or with a gap of three months, the patrons only get charged when there’s new stuff.

I’ve been contemplating using that second model as a way to help get Pax Orionis going.  Use Patronage to write the book a bit at a time. But there are a few questions:

  1. The book will be composed of many different bits of wildly different lengths. A one-page memo here, a thirty-page narrative there. Charge the same for the release of a self-contained section, regardless of page count? Or charge for the release of sections of particular page counts (which might mean that it’ll take several releases to get a complete section out)?
  2. And then, how much to charge? Obviously not very much… fifty cents, seventy five, a buck at most. Given fees and such, i don’t think it can go below fifty cents.
  3. What to do for “premium” patrons? One the APR Patreon, patrons who pledge more per month get higher-rez versions of the rewards and additional CAD diagrams and other bits and pieces. For the Pax Orionis Patreon, I’m thinking that higher-level patrons would get a bonus technical illustration… anything from a CAD diagram of an Orion vehicle, to a weapons system, launch vehicle, spacecraft, aircraft, a map, etc. I don’t think I’d do more than two, maybe three levels of patronage.

So… what do y’all think? Suggestions? Worth doing? Anyone know of a similar sort of thing with someone successfully creating a novel a bit at a time via Patreon?

A good case can be made that I’d be better off simply making P.O. available for free bits at a time, available to all. So perhaps… the P.O. Patrons get these releases, say, three months before the world as a whole? Get to see ’em in the first draft, and get to critique and perhaps see their suggestions incorporated?

 Posted by at 8:54 am

Construction Base in Space

 art, awesomeness, blather, history, Patreon, projects, rockets, spacecraft  3 Responses »
Aug 312015
 

Boeing art from the late 1970s depicting the construction of a base in low Earth orbit, which in turn would be used to construct components of solar power satellites, which would then be slowly boosted to geosynchronous using electric propulsion. Even though the base would be dwarfed by the SPS itself, the base was monumental in scale compared to any other manned space facility proposed before or since.

SPS construction

The artwork (scanned from a brochure that was folded down the middle, thus there’s a half-repaired fold line) depicts not only a Space Shuttle orbiter, but also the second stage of a ballistically recoverable Heavy Lift Launch Vehicle.

I have posted the full-rez version at the APR Patreon Extras Dropbox folder for 2015-08 (while it’s 2015-09 now, the file began the process of uploading at 11:59 PM by my watch, so…). If interested, please check out the APR Patreon and consider joining. Lots of benefits!

patreon-200

 Posted by at 11:19 pm

Some large-format scans

 aircraft, art, awesomeness, blather, drawings, history, models, nukes, Patreon, rockets  1 Response »
Aug 272015
 

Today I picked up four large format scans from a local print shop. All were scanned in full color at 300 DPI; the B-52 diagram was so large that I had to reduce it in size a bit – from 300 to 250 DPI – to make it work in most of my image processing programs. Still… with an original 110 inches long, scaling down a bit really isn’t much of a loss.

First: a Boeing model shop diagram of a B-52B display model at 1/40 scale. Model shop diagrams are often the best bets for clear, accurate aircraft diagrams.

1-40 scale B-52 BW 1-40 scale B-52

Second, an old Boeing diagram of the Model 80 trimotor:

Boeing Model 80

Then the USAF “supersonic escape capsule” which sure looks a lot like Fat Man:

supersonic escape capsule

And then a Rocketdyne diagram of the Atlas booster rocket engine:

Atlas booster engine

These will likely be offered up to APR Patreon Patrons. If you want in on that, and to help out on the effort to procure these things (trust me, they’re *not* cheap!), please consider signing up for the APR Patreon.

patreon-200

 Posted by at 7:17 pm

Star Raker Art

 aircraft, art, awesomeness, history, Patreon, projects, rockets, spacecraft  57 Responses »
Aug 202015
 

In the late 1970’s Rockwell international studied the “Star-Raker,” a large airbreathing horizontal takeoff and landing SSTO designed to support the Solar Power Satellite program. This 2,268,000 kg gross weight vehicle would have a payload of 89,200 kg; the claim was that this vehicle could fly roughly daily and very cheaply. Of course, at about the same time Rockwell was claiming that the Space Shuttle would have a two-week turnaround and would be the cheapest ticket to space…

While Star-Raker was far from the biggest or most powerful launcher studied for SPS, it was certainly one of the more interesting concepts. While a number of SPS reports have described the Star-Raker, to my knowledge a dedicated Star-Raker design report has not come to light. If anybody knows of such a thing, by all means let me know.

Star-Raker garnered a bit of press back in the day, likely due in part to the fact that Rockwell released a number of pieces of concept art, like the one below showing the vehicle in orbit.

2015-08-200353

I have uploaded the full-rez version of this to the APR Patreon “Extras” folder for 2015-08 on Dropbox. It is available for all $4 and up APR Patrons.

 Posted by at 6:14 pm

Early Shuttle Launch Artwork: 2

 art, history, Patreon, projects, rockets, spacecraft  No Responses »
Aug 142015
 

A Rockwell illustration showing an almost-but-not-quite-final Space Shuttle design. The only obvious major difference between this design and actual Shuttle is the rounded dome on the nose of the ET. This *may* have been a cover over a de-orbit solid rocket motor, but if so it was a small one. Other changes include differences in the booster sep motors; this painting shows four nose BSMs in a straight vertical line and four tail BSMs in a straight vertical line. As built, the forward BSMs were in a 2X2 square array, while the at BSMs were arrayed around the nozzle. Some minor difference in thermal tile pattern on the forward fuselage of the Orbiter.

The full-rez version has been made available for $10-level patrons at the APR Patreon.

Old Shuttle Art - SRB Sep

 Posted by at 6:16 pm

PDF Review: History of MOL

 history, Patreon, projects, spacecraft  2 Responses »
Aug 142015
 

Just released today… an official “History of the Manned Orbital Laboratory” by Carl Berger of the MOL Program Office, 1970. This originally Top Secret history still has a number of blacked-out text redactions and, sadly, no illustrations in its 356 pages. I’ve only skimmed through it, but it looks to be an interesting read.

Direct link to the “History of MOL” PDF file

The table of contents:

MOL contents

 

 Posted by at 3:52 pm

PDF Review: European Space Launch projects

 art, history, Patreon, projects, rockets, spacecraft  14 Responses »
Aug 112015
 

Here’s a presentation describing a number of European space transport concepts, including the HOTOL, Sanger II and Hermes spaceplanes, Automatic Transfer System and a few others. As a presentation, it is loaded with illustration. I have clipped out some of the better Hermes illustrations and included them below.

 

European Space Transportation System Projects since 1998

hermes 1hermes 2 hermes 3 hermes 4

Much more aerospace stuff is available via the APR Patreon.

patreon-200

 Posted by at 12:07 am

Shuttle-Derived Vehicle art

 art, Patreon, projects, rockets, spacecraft  3 Responses »
Aug 012015
 

I have added the full-rez version of this to the 2015-07 sub-folder of the APR Patreon “Extras” folder on Dropbox. What is depicted is a 1985 Martin Marietta design for an Unmanned Launch Vehicle, a Shuttle derived vehicle that replaced the Orbiter hanging off the side with an inline payload shroud up top and a small propulsion/avionics module that would have three SSME and two OMS engines, in much the same positions as the Orbiter engines. This would allow the booster to lift off from existing Shuttle facilities with minimal modifications. The P/A module would be a biconic lifting body allowing recovery and re-use. Not only would the P/A module go into orbit, but so would the external tank. Each flight of this vehicle would have the potential to orbit the shell of a fantastic space station. This vehicle was described in greater detail in US Launch Vehicle Projects #2. MM Inline Shuttle Derived Vehicle 1985 If you are interested in the high-rez version of this, it and many more are available to all $4 and up patrons at the APR Patreon.

 Posted by at 9:12 pm
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