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Category Archives: Models
Hovering Vehicle Tilt Control, Part Zero
Someone was asking on ARocket about where to start with building a differentially throttled hovering vehicle. Lots of advice were given by various people. I’ll show some stuff I quickly sketched back in 2007 with Simulink. It’s such an easy … Continue reading
Posted in Homebuilt, Models, Motivation, RLV:s, Spacecraft, Suborbital
Tagged Digital Valve, Feedback, Hovering, PD, PID, Tilt, Valve, VTVL
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Asteroid Threats in Context
id Software’s upcoming game Rage uses asteroid Apophis as the scene setter for a post apocalyptic world. (id is part of Zenimax now, which also owns Bethesda, who did Fallout, a similar scene but done with nuclear weapons…) Is this … Continue reading
Posted in Journalism, Models, Motivation, NASA
Tagged Apocalypse, Apophis, Asteroid, id Software, Impact, Rage
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Economics and the Price of Nature
Assume a glacier that provides summer water for a billion people. What is its value, if it is destroyed by global warming? Since it currently provides services for free, it could be calculated as zero, according to some. Hence, a … Continue reading
Posted in Climate, Demotivation, Energy, Global, idiocracy, Journalism, Models, Nature, Science Links
Tagged climate change, Cost, Costanza, Economics, Nature, Sagoff, Valuation
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First big thing
I think it’s Doug Cooke, presenting NASA things to the panel: Key exploration objectives slide: 2. To ensure sustainability, development and operations costs must be minimized Oh my. Next thing: [these things] “drives you to heavy lift”. Excuse me? EDIT: … Continue reading
Posted in Architecture, industry, Models, NASA, RLV:s, Science Links, Spacecraft, Uncategorized
Tagged Augustine
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Augustine Panel First Hearing
Ongoing. Norm Augustine You can stream NASA TV with VLC, just paste this link into it: http://www.nasa.gov/55644main_NASATV_Windows.asx
Posted in Architecture, Depot, Models, NASA, RLV:s, Science Links, Spacecraft, Suborbital
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Air France Flight 447
2009-06-01 Air France flight 447 crashed with over 200 passengers on board in the Central Atlantic. At this early point it seems the failure was initiated by severe turbulence. Wings have been known to snap off because of very strong … Continue reading
Posted in industry, Models, Science Links, Transportation
Tagged 447, Air France, Airbus, EADS, Turbulence
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FLEX – Flexible Exploration Architecture
I wrote this architecture proposal, FLEX, a few years ago. It analyzes NASA’s approach that the ESAS study picked and notices how most of the mass in a lunar exploration stack in LEO is actually liquid oxygen. By using a … Continue reading
Posted in Architecture, Depot, industry, ISRU, Lunar, Models, Motivation, NASA, RLV:s, Spacecraft
Tagged Architecture, Ares V, ESAS, exploration, FLEX, Griffin, liquid oxygen, NASA, propellant depot, VSE
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Pump Power
There’s been some discussion of pump power. It is extremely easy to calculate it when using SI units. A flow front in a tube has a power: W power, F force, v speed. The force is Where A is cross … Continue reading