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Groda posted:Sunday Punch, I should probably add that, as a nuclear engineer, just seeing this picture caused me to make a Professor Frink "narf" out loud. Yeah it's a ball-shriveller. Who took that photograph? They didn't have rad-hardened robots to do the dirty work back then  .MA-Horus posted:I thought I was a space/rocket nerd. Sunday Punch you take the loving cake, homeboy. Ha! I did say I love talking about rockets  . I also love all the promotional art that was done for these projects, you don't really see as much of this sort of thing anymore.   All-solid Saturn concept is pretty nifty. It's unusual to see solid motors as entire stages rather than just strap on boosters.  
Sunday Punch fucked around with this message at 17:23 on Apr 4, 2011 |
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Apr 4, 2011 17:21
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The F111 had an escape capsule instead of ejection seats. Why did the designers go this route and what are the pros and cons of this?
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Apr 4, 2011 22:14
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Iron Squid posted:The F111 had an escape capsule instead of ejection seats. Why did the designers go this route and what are the pros and cons of this? Pros: Looks badass. Cons: If Harrison Ford is on board, he will refuse to use it and will instead steal an MP5 and shoot people. But seriously, I'd like to know this answer as well.
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Apr 5, 2011 00:02
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Iron Squid posted:The F111 had an escape capsule instead of ejection seats. Why did the designers go this route and what are the pros and cons of this? I believe it was because people weren't sure about what ejection at mach 2+ at insane altitudes would do, so you got happy-time fun pod!
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Apr 5, 2011 02:56
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As seen on IRC!  NASA has an image archive of neat pictures, including some somewhat larger resolution ones. gently caress tables. http://grin.hq.nasa.gov/index.html
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Apr 5, 2011 03:30
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Flanker posted:I believe it was because people weren't sure about what ejection at mach 2+ at insane altitudes would do, so you got happy-time fun pod! Also, if the President's plane is shot down over the penitentiary that NYC has become, he has a chance of surviving.
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Apr 5, 2011 04:44
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Sunday Punch, do you know why SSRBs aren't used as entire booster stages? It seems as if they're a hell of a lot more stable, so you can just strap a hella whackload of them together. I know they're very bad for the environment, but they seem like a reliable launch system.
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Apr 5, 2011 05:11
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You can't turn them off, and their failure modes all tend to start with the word "catastrophic."
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Apr 5, 2011 05:52
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Yeah like Wkarma says, you can't turn them off once they're firing, which is a bad thing if you need to abort for whatever reason. Also, they have lower specific impulse than liquid bipropellant rockets. They can provide high thrust though, which is why they're generally used in first stages like on the space shuttle. The SRBs on the shuttle provide about 80% of the liftoff thrust, each one produces 12.5 meganewtons of thrust. For comparison the Saturn V's F-1 produced 6.6MN.
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Apr 5, 2011 06:19
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Ygolonac posted:As seen on IRC! Now that, that is a lead sled. It still amazes me that something with that shape has a land-able glide slope.
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Apr 5, 2011 15:54
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This isn't Cold War but with all the rocket chat I thought it was worth mentioning SpaceX has announced they'll fly their Falcon Heavy rocket next year. 1.2 thousand pound capacity (twice Delta!). This is a really loving big rocket. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12975872 BBC posted:The Californian SpaceX company says it plans to launch the most powerful rocket since the Apollo era next year.
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Apr 5, 2011 18:18
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Sunday Punch posted:Yeah like Wkarma says, you can't turn them off once they're firing, which is a bad thing if you need to abort for whatever reason. Also, they have lower specific impulse than liquid bipropellant rockets. They can provide high thrust though, which is why they're generally used in first stages like on the space shuttle. The SRBs on the shuttle provide about 80% of the liftoff thrust, each one produces 12.5 meganewtons of thrust. For comparison the Saturn V's F-1 produced 6.6MN. In addition to all that, they're not throttleable. Granted for a 1st stage they're probably going balls to the wall but still.
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Apr 5, 2011 21:03
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Did I read somewhere that with the shuttle design the SRBs can be just disconnected right on the launch pad if something goes awry so they just take off on their own, leaving the orbiter and the fuel tank sitting on the pad? That'd be quite the sight. Perhaps I just imagined it.
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Apr 5, 2011 21:56
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priznat posted:Did I read somewhere that with the shuttle design the SRBs can be just disconnected right on the launch pad if something goes awry so they just take off on their own, leaving the orbiter and the fuel tank sitting on the pad? Not just "no", but "hell no". The whole shuttle stack rests on the SRBs on the pad. If you sent the SRB separate commands early, the orbiter and ELEVENTY HOJILLION POUNDS OF LIQUID HYDROGEN AND LIQUID OXYGEN are going to drop a few feet, fall over sideways, bust open, and wipe that pad off the face of this planet. Edit: Not to mention the excitement of sitting down there in the SRB exhaust plume. Sexual Lorax fucked around with this message at 22:57 on Apr 5, 2011 |
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Apr 5, 2011 22:53
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Yeah I guess it'd just be a fuckit we're launching this bastard and then bail out over the atlantic or whatever. I wasn't sure if the shuttle rested on the SRBs or if there was some kind of structure below the main engines, but that'd have to be quite the weight bearing structure. It's been years since I've watched a shuttle launch, can't you tell. Still, that'd be quite the sight with the SRBs just flying off at crazy angles 
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Apr 5, 2011 23:21
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priznat posted:Still, that'd be quite the sight with the SRBs just flying off at crazy angles  
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Apr 5, 2011 23:48
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From the pad directly that is.. Without blowing anyone up 
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Apr 5, 2011 23:51
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priznat posted:Did I read somewhere that with the shuttle design the SRBs can be just disconnected right on the launch pad if something goes awry so they just take off on their own, leaving the orbiter and the fuel tank sitting on the pad? You can kind of make out the points where the explosive bolts are mounted to the booster. Even if the boosters could be separated (as said they can't) since they're not guided there is a real possibility they'd smack right into the ET and cause a challenger explosion right there either way. I seem to recall reading on Nasaspaceflight something about that even if the explosive bolts failed, that stack is going and it has enough thrust to rip itself free from the pad.
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Apr 6, 2011 01:15
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Well we were scratching our heads at the Soviet rocket with 30 engines, but Space X wants to go with 27 Merlins on the Falcon Heavy. Crazy. slidebite posted:I seem to recall reading on Nasaspaceflight something about that even if the explosive bolts failed, that stack is going and it has enough thrust to rip itself free from the pad. Yes and stud hang ups have happened without major issues, although I believe the firing mechanism was improved for reliability to reduce it from happening. Still it blows my mind the entire stack is mounted on those eight relatively small posts, and the flex and compression engineered into the "twang" after SSMEs start. Styles Bitchley fucked around with this message at 01:46 on Apr 6, 2011 |
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Apr 6, 2011 01:42
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priznat posted:From the pad directly that is.. Without blowing anyone up Here you go. LGM-118 Peacekeeper, I have been told it's first stage is the same as the SRB's. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCSoN1tqmgU edit: not a PK but its MM3 brother, and a loving awesome video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7S6EDNrfSsA B4Ctom1 fucked around with this message at 05:47 on Apr 6, 2011 |
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Apr 6, 2011 05:37
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I have to wonder just how much advance warning needs to be given to other countries before tests of that nature can be safely performed. After all, you don't want to surprise any other nuclear state with things like ICBM launches.
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Apr 6, 2011 08:42
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Well how about that?
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Apr 6, 2011 15:19
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Since we are talking space poo poo cracked had a neat article about the soviet space program.
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Apr 6, 2011 15:40
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Other than the engines being some miracle of engineering, why do Canadians care so much about the Avro Arrow? It seems to me like caring about the XF-108. I'm really not trying to derail or insult - but why is the Avro Arrow such a big deal even today?
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Apr 6, 2011 17:38
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because canadians are so canadian its greek
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Apr 6, 2011 17:40
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slidebite posted:You can kind of make out the points where the explosive bolts are mounted to the booster. I've always wondered about the wisdom of using a parallel staging design for the shuttle. It would seem to be a lot safer to put your crew vehicle on top of the stack where it's out of the way of falling chunks of frozen insulation foam, and not right next to the volatile SRBs and the honking great tank of LOX/H2. If the crew vehicle is on top you've probably got more abort modes available too. I guess this stuff is easy to say with hindsight though. The Dynasoar configuration was like this:  I also like this Boeing design for a manned two stage launch system. The first stage is equipped with jet engines and flies back to the launch site after separation, the second stage glides back from orbit like the STS we all know and love. It's pretty big!  One downside is it looks like the first stage has its head up the second stage's rear end.  Bonus image of a shuttle-like design with a hovercraft aircushion instead of standard landing gear   The supposed advantage was wider distribution of stress on the runway when landing, higher landing speeds and rough terrain and water landing capability! That would have been quite something to see.
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Apr 6, 2011 18:00
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Enker posted:I have to wonder just how much advance warning needs to be given to other countries before tests of that nature can be safely performed. After all, you don't want to surprise any other nuclear state with things like ICBM launches. I don't know the exact requirement, but it is at least a week or two. Beyond that, we only launch ICBM tests from Vandenberg, and we have no operational missiles with nuclear warheads on board at Vandenberg and have openly stated as such, adding another safety step to the system. Of course, this hasn't always been the case. One of the many many stupid saber rattling things that SAC did during the Cuban Missile Crisis was deploying nuclear warheads on the missiles in test silos at Vandenberg...and then going ahead with a test launch after telling the world they were in the process of arming all the test missiles with nuclear warheads and putting them on operational alert. All the Soviets would have known was that there was a missile launching from Vandenberg and that missiles at Vandenberg were supposed to be operational/cocked on alert. Yeah. But when Curtis loving LeMay calls you "not stable" and a "sadist," you might have a problem. (See also, broadcasting a message in the clear to all the airborne alert SAC forces discussing the likelihood of an impending nuclear war and SAC's readiness to carry out a nuclear strike...after which, SAC bombers continued past their fail-safe points towards Soviet airspace before finally turning back just short. How we didn't wind up in a nuclear war I really don't know.)
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Apr 6, 2011 18:50
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Sunday Punch posted:Bonus image of a shuttle-like design with a hovercraft aircushion instead of standard landing gear Who proposed this? Did it have a name?
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Apr 6, 2011 18:50
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Sunday Punch posted:I've always wondered about the wisdom of using a parallel staging design for the shuttle. It would seem to be a lot safer to put your crew vehicle on top of the stack where it's out of the way of falling chunks of frozen insulation foam, and not right next to the volatile SRBs and the honking great tank of LOX/H2. If the crew vehicle is on top you've probably got more abort modes available too. I guess this stuff is easy to say with hindsight though. The Dynasoar configuration was like this: Early in the program, they really didn't think foam shedding or ice damage were going to be of a real concern or of any major consequence so they didn't worry much about it. I don't have #s or cites handy, but I seem to recall the number being floated around that a loss of vehicle event pre-Challenger was thought of to be something like 1:10,000 with the most pessimistic being 1:100. It was later recalculated to be something less than 1:10.  I suspect knowing what they do now, they would have done it differently. If not the configuration in general, molded in some sort of guard system or something else. slidebite fucked around with this message at 18:54 on Apr 6, 2011 |
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Apr 6, 2011 18:51
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slidebite posted:There is never really any doubt that the vertical configuration with the crew compartment on the top is safer, the unknown was how dangerous it really would be being a side stack. Yeah hindsight is a wonderful thing. It's hard to foresee all the potential problems in such a complex system. Really what we should have been getting a second generation of reusable spacecraft off the ground by now, hell we should have had them 10 years ago at least. The shuttle never really lived up to its promise of cheap orbital access with quick turnaround times, using everything we've learned we could probably do a much better job of it with a new spacecraft. Instead the STS is obsolete and going out of service, with no replacement available now and only the vague promise of one some time in the future. How long will it be, five years? Ten? Who knows? Groda posted:Who proposed this? Did it have a name? It was part of a design study from Bell carried out in 1970. Everything you could ever want to know about air cushion landing systems can be found in this PDF of the report. Enjoy!
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Apr 6, 2011 19:16
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Sunday Punch posted:It was part of a design study from Bell carried out in 1970. Everything you could ever want to know about air cushion landing systems can be found in this PDF of the report.
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Apr 6, 2011 19:23
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MJP posted:Other than the engines being some miracle of engineering, why do Canadians care so much about the Avro Arrow? It seems to me like caring about the XF-108. Short answer: controversy. Long answer: Complex mix of your average Canadian's innate inferiority complex or little brother syndrome towards the US, and the lasting impacts of the cancellation that still affect us today. Some people think that the Arrow was canceled due to pressure from the US who didn't want another competitor supplying high end jets to NATO allies. It's a fact however, that a lot of talented engineers packed up and moved south to work for companies like Lockheed and Northrop Grumman, helping the US put together some awesome poo poo like the SR71 and Apollo lunar missions. To this day, many students complete various degrees here in Canada with the express intent to move south and make more money, we call this the 'Brain Drain'. The Arrow wasn't just canceled, the company was shut down, along with the bulk of our domestic aviation industry. The Arrow cancellation also launched the massive downward spiral of military neglect in Canada from which we are only recovering from in the last several years. While we're back on the Arrow, I don't hold the individual jet in the same light as many Canadian aviation enthusiasts. It was made to be a dedicated high speed high altitude interceptor, not an air dominance fighter or anything else for that matter. Vietnam demonstrated that high speed, radar missle only 'fighters' were getting slaughtered in dogfights with cheaper made Russian MiGs. But what may have followed the Arrow will forever remain a mystery and masturbatory speculative fiction orgy for Canadian aviation junkies. TLDR: the Avro Arrow was our one shot at fame and Simon Cowel/Diefenbaker spit in our mouth halfway through our audition.
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Apr 6, 2011 19:32
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Flanker posted:TLDR: the Avro Arrow was our one shot at fame and Simon Cowel/Diefenbaker spit in our mouth halfway through our audition. No, you guys had Gerald Bull also until his funding got cut.
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Apr 6, 2011 19:45
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Sunday Punch posted:One downside is it looks like the first stage has its head up the second stage's rear end.  
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Apr 6, 2011 22:25
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Naramyth posted:I have yet to bring myself to watch that on Netflix.
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Apr 7, 2011 01:20
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slidebite posted:I have yet to bring myself to watch that on Netflix.  Just watch this instead.
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Apr 7, 2011 01:22
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slidebite posted:I have yet to bring myself to watch that on Netflix. From the trailer, it looks like he thwarts all escape attempts and ends up sewing them together and chanting Yes! YES!!! over them in a spooky accent. Eh, there have been far worse horror movies.
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Apr 7, 2011 02:28
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Sunday Punch posted:Those photos are great. I never really got why the USAF used the boom method while everyone else goes for probe and drogue. I know both have their advantages and disadvantages but it seems a little wasteful to have two entirely different aerial refueling systems being used in parallel, instead of just picking one. Increased flow rate for heavies I think is the big reason. Drogues are good since they take up a lot less space. Doing buddy stores with a boom would be interesting. Also from earlier the other difference between the A-12 and the SR-71 single seat/2 up.
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Apr 7, 2011 02:36
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Did anyone ever fire a ICBM test shot over the pole? (North or south.) Some WWIII stuff I read years ago suggested that such launches might not have the predicted accuracy due to magnetic-field effects or the aurora borealis or Santa's defense grid or something. (Might have been Dean Ing, might have been The Guardians. I don't think it was in Twilight: 2000, in any case.)
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Apr 7, 2011 05:07
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Ygolonac posted:Did anyone ever fire a ICBM test shot over the pole? (North or south.) Some WWIII stuff I read years ago suggested that such launches might not have the predicted accuracy due to magnetic-field effects or the aurora borealis or Santa's defense grid or something. (Might have been Dean Ing, might have been The Guardians. I don't think it was in Twilight: 2000, in any case.)
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Apr 7, 2011 05:46
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