APR Extra: Moderately gigantic drawing of Sea Dragon

[Scott Lowther]

I've posted a very large (6750X2525 pixels) drawing of the Sea Dragon
HLLV on my site. This vehicle was to be bigger in diameter than some
launch vehicles are *long*.

http://www.up-ship.com/apr/extraspace.htm

[Rusty]

Scott Lowther wrote:
> I've posted a very large (6750X2525 pixels) drawing of the Sea Dragon

> HLLV on my site. This vehicle was to be bigger in diameter than some
> launch vehicles are *long*.
>
> http://www.up-ship.com/apr/extraspace.htm


I posted this info before, but for those who didn't see it the first
time:

Sea Dragon concept. Volume 1: Summary - Jan 1963 - 284 pages PDF
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19880069339_1988069339.pdf

Sea Dragon concept, volume 3: - Feb 12, 1963 - 418 pages PDF
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19880069340_1988069340.pdf


Rusty

[Damon Hill]

Scott Lowther > wrote in news:389_d.767
:

> I've posted a very large (6750X2525 pixels) drawing of the Sea Dragon
> HLLV on my site. This vehicle was to be bigger in diameter than some
> launch vehicles are *long*.
>
> http://www.up-ship.com/apr/extraspace.htm
>

Why has the Big Dumb Booster never caught on? Seems like it could have
been scaled down to EELV level... Beal did try to go that design route;
SpaceX didn't.

--Damon

[lexcorp@ix.netcom.com]

Damon Hill wrote:
> Scott Lowther > wrote in
news:389_d.767
> :
>
> > I've posted a very large (6750X2525 pixels) drawing of the Sea
Dragon
> > HLLV on my site. This vehicle was to be bigger in diameter than
some
> > launch vehicles are *long*.
> >
> > http://www.up-ship.com/apr/extraspace.htm
> >
>
> Why has the Big Dumb Booster never caught on?

Not near sexy enough.

[Derek Lyons]

Damon Hill > wrote:

>Scott Lowther > wrote in news:389_d.767
:
>
>> I've posted a very large (6750X2525 pixels) drawing of the Sea Dragon
>> HLLV on my site. This vehicle was to be bigger in diameter than some
>> launch vehicles are *long*.
>>
>> http://www.up-ship.com/apr/extraspace.htm
>>
>
>Why has the Big Dumb Booster never caught on?

Because no need for it has emerged.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL

[Damon Hill]

(Derek Lyons) wrote in
:

> Damon Hill > wrote:
>
>>Scott Lowther > wrote in
>>news:389_d.767 :
>>
>>> I've posted a very large (6750X2525 pixels) drawing of the Sea
>>> Dragon HLLV on my site. This vehicle was to be bigger in diameter
>>> than some launch vehicles are *long*.
>>>
>>> http://www.up-ship.com/apr/extraspace.htm
>>>
>>
>>Why has the Big Dumb Booster never caught on?
>
> Because no need for it has emerged.

There are lots of programs out there that aren't
'needed', except for national pride. Seems like someone
who didn't have a lot of money or deep technology base
(name arbitrary second or third world nation/group)
might have chosen this route because of the relative
technical simplicity.

Why is simple not a design choice?

--Damon

[OM]

On Fri, 18 Mar 2005 12:23:35 -0600, Damon Hill
> wrote:

>Why is simple not a design choice?

....Because it's not only not taught in the colleges anymore, there's
federal laws against it as simple tends to not require bureacratic
waste, such as trophy secretaries and three-martini lunches.

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[James Nicoll]

In article >,
OM <om@our_blessed_lady_mary_of_the_holy_NASA_research _facility.org> wrote:
>On Fri, 18 Mar 2005 12:23:35 -0600, Damon Hill
> wrote:
>
>>Why is simple not a design choice?
>
>...Because it's not only not taught in the colleges anymore, there's
>federal laws against it as simple tends to not require bureacratic
>waste, such as trophy secretaries and three-martini lunches.
>
As opposed to trophy lunches and three-martine secretaries...
--
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/immigrate/
http://www.marryanamerican.ca
http://www.livejournal.com/users/james_nicoll

[Henry Spencer]

In article >,
Damon Hill > wrote:
>Why has the Big Dumb Booster never caught on? Seems like it could have
>been scaled down to EELV level... Beal did try to go that design route;
>SpaceX didn't.

Some of the philosophy *has* caught on, it's just not publicized very
much. The Ariane 5 designers had a conscious philosophy of addressing any
performance problems by just making the core stage bigger, rather than by
trying to squeeze more performance out of the engine etc.

The pure form of BDB -- large low-tech vehicles with very small payload
fractions -- hasn't been appealing enough to attract money. Even Beal was
using carbon-fiber tanks, not shipyard steel.

Remember that on most government programs -- and that's what the EELVs
were designed to be, even though in the end, the companies ended up paying
part of the development bill -- you get paid for effort, not results. The
rational thing to do in such a situation is to choose approaches which
maximize effort.
--
"Think outside the box -- the box isn't our friend." | Henry Spencer
-- George Herbert |

[Henry Spencer]

In article >,
Derek Lyons > wrote:
>>Why has the Big Dumb Booster never caught on?
>
>Because no need for it has emerged.

Remember that Big Dumb Booster is not the same thing as heavylift booster.
BDBs don't necessarily have large *payloads*; the point of the approach is
to make the *rocket* bigger, keeping the same payload with a smaller
payload fraction and hence less demanding technology.
--
"Think outside the box -- the box isn't our friend." | Henry Spencer
-- George Herbert |

[Damon Hill]

(James Nicoll) wrote in
:

> In article >,
> OM <om@our_blessed_lady_mary_of_the_holy_NASA_research _facility.org>
> wrote:
>>On Fri, 18 Mar 2005 12:23:35 -0600, Damon Hill
> wrote:
>>
>>>Why is simple not a design choice?
>>
>>...Because it's not only not taught in the colleges anymore, there's
>>federal laws against it as simple tends to not require bureacratic
>>waste, such as trophy secretaries and three-martini lunches.
>>
> As opposed to trophy lunches and three-martine secretaries...

Oh come ON guys, let's have some thinking here, not
toss-offs.

--Damon

[lexcorp@ix.netcom.com]

Short reason why no BDB's: nobody has had payloads for one. A million
pounds of payload in one shot would be great... we could build SPSs,
giant space stations, Mars vehicles, etc. easily. However.... nobody
really seems to be funding SPSs, giant space stations, Mars vehicles,
etc..

[Scott Hedrick]

"Damon Hill" > wrote in message
31...
> > As opposed to trophy lunches and three-martine secretaries...
>
> Oh come ON guys, let's have some thinking here, not
> toss-offs.

Well, after three martinis, the secretary might become a trophy. Better
clear off that desk...

[Pat Flannery]

Damon Hill wrote:

>There are lots of programs out there that aren't
>'needed', except for national pride. Seems like someone
>who didn't have a lot of money or deep technology base
>(name arbitrary second or third world nation/group)
>might have chosen this route because of the relative
>technical simplicity.
>
>Why is simple not a design choice?
>
>

It would be interesting to figure out what all the propellants for one
flight of this thing would cost in today's market; it can't be cheap to
tank this monster up.

Pat

[lexcorp@ix.netcom.com]

Pat Flannery wrote:

> It would be interesting to figure out what all the propellants for
one
> flight of this thing would cost in today's market; it can't be cheap
to
> tank this monster up.

It would be *glorious* if the cost of propellant was an actual cost
driver for the launch.

[Pat Flannery]

James Nicoll wrote:

> As opposed to trophy lunches and three-martine secretaries...
>
>
"I like to have a Martini, two at the very most; three, I'm under the
table, four, I'm under my host! ..."- Dorothy Parker. :-D

Pat

[Pat Flannery]

wrote:

>It would be *glorious* if the cost of propellant was an actual cost
>driver for the launch.
>
>
Yeah, I don't know if we are ever going to get to that point, unless
somebody comes up with a really reliable and maintenance free RLV.
Looking at Sea Dragon, one can see why the ocean launch concept was
chosen- I'd like to see the crawler transporter that could move this thing.
I was surprised to see that in one version the first stage was to be
expendable- low-tech it is, but there's still going to be a lot of metal
and man-hours in that first stage, and one would think you'd like to
reuse it.
Was the propellant injector design of the first stage motor pretty
simplistic also?

Pat

[Scott Lowther]

Pat Flannery wrote:

>
>
> wrote:
>
>> It would be *glorious* if the cost of propellant was an actual cost
>> driver for the launch.
>>
>>
> Yeah, I don't know if we are ever going to get to that point, unless
> somebody comes up with a really reliable and maintenance free RLV.
> Looking at Sea Dragon, one can see why the ocean launch concept was
> chosen- I'd like to see the crawler transporter that could move this
> thing.
> I was surprised to see that in one version the first stage was to be
> expendable- low-tech it is, but there's still going to be a lot of
> metal and man-hours in that first stage, and one would think you'd
> like to reuse it.
> Was the propellant injector design of the first stage motor pretty
> simplistic also?
>
Reasonably so, yeah. Very low pressure, too, so that simplified things.

[Matt]

Was there ever serious military involvement in Sea Dragon?

Matt Bille

[Andrew Gray]

On 2005-03-20, Matt > wrote:
> Was there ever serious military involvement in Sea Dragon?

You mean *other* than the brief "We'd like to put NORAD in orbit. Yes,
including the mountain" proposal, of course... <g>

--
-Andrew Gray

[Scott Lowther]

Matt wrote:

>Was there ever serious military involvement in Sea Dragon?
>
>

Nope.

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Lowther wrote:

> Matt wrote:
>
>> Was there ever serious military involvement in Sea Dragon?
>>
>>
>
> Nope.

Which is almost surprising given Truax's involvment in the Polaris
program. It would of made a great sea-launched ICBM- we would have had
something to counter this terror with:
http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/n11gr.htm :-)
(Mark Wade has to do something about those Godawful new ads on the top
of his site.)

Pat

[Derek Lyons]

Pat Flannery > wrote:

>Which is almost surprising given Truax's involvment
>in the Polaris program.

According to everything I've read (that wasn't written by Truax), his
involvement seems to have been in a lesser (supporting) role. Niether
Spinardi, Friedman, or Craven mentions him.[1]

[1] Unsurprising in the case of Craven, as his autobiography is one of
the most shameless pieces of self promotion I've ever read.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL

[Herb Schaltegger]

In article >,
Pat Flannery > wrote:

> (Mark Wade has to do something about those Godawful new ads on the top
> of his site.)

His site also now joins Drudge and one or two others using a new
Javascript pop-under technique to open ad windows in Firefox and
Safari, despite having pop-up blockers enabled, damn it. :-/

--
Herb Schaltegger, B.S., J.D., GPG Key ID: BBF6FC1C
"The loss of the American system of checks and balances is more of a security
danger than any terrorist risk." -- Bruce Schneier
<http://dischordia.blogspot.com>
<http://www.angryherb.net>

[Scott Lowther]

Pat Flannery wrote:

>
>
> Scott Lowther wrote:
>
>> Matt wrote:
>>
>>> Was there ever serious military involvement in Sea Dragon?
>>>
>>>
>>
>> Nope.
>
>
> Which is almost surprising given Truax's involvment in the Polaris
> program. It would of made a great sea-launched ICBM- we would have had
> something to counter this terror with:
> http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/n11gr.htm :-)


The closest American equivalents that I'm aware of are:
1: Dyna Soar: Boeing suggesting building several dozen Tiatn III/DS
silos, and strapping at least 2 H-bonbs to the transtage, and launching
on a moments notice. Crew of two each.
2: Orion Ground Launch: General Atomics designed an 8-meter Orion
designed to be lofted (again from a silo) by a cluster of 156-inch solid
rockets. The Orion would flit about Earth orbit directing reprisals
against the Soviet Union
3: Orion Space Based: 86-foot diameter spacegoing battleships located in
cislunar space would wreak horrible, horrible Babs Streisand-esque
vengeance upon the Soviets from deep space.

[Pat Flannery]

Derek Lyons wrote:

>Pat Flannery > wrote:
>
>
>
>>Which is almost surprising given Truax's involvment
>>in the Polaris program.
>>
>>
>
>According to everything I've read (that wasn't written by Truax), his
>involvement seems to have been in a lesser (supporting) role.
>

Way I heard it, he was in on the fluid (freon?) injection system for TVC
and the missile's steam ejection system from the launch tube.
According to this, the Polaris system was basically his idea:
https://www.peterson.af.mil/hqafspc/history/Truax.htm
The part about the steam missile ejection system makes sense from his
input on Evel Knievel's Skycycle, and its steam propulsion system.

Pat

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Lowther wrote:

>
> 3: Orion Space Based: 86-foot diameter spacegoing battleships located
> in cislunar space would wreak horrible, horrible Babs Streisand-esque
> vengeance upon the Soviets from deep space.


That gets mentioned in Freeman Dyson's book "Weapons and Hope" IIRC. He
talks about the Pentagon's reaction when the military supervisor of the
project showed up with his plans and graphs for the project to brief the
Generals. They thought he was unhinged, and that was the end of that.
Reagan would have loved it though. :-D

Pat

[D. Scott Ferrin]

On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 00:14:17 -0600, Pat Flannery >
wrote:

>
>
>Scott Lowther wrote:
>
>>
>> 3: Orion Space Based: 86-foot diameter spacegoing battleships located
>> in cislunar space would wreak horrible, horrible Babs Streisand-esque
>> vengeance upon the Soviets from deep space.
>
>
>That gets mentioned in Freeman Dyson's book "Weapons and Hope" IIRC. He
>talks about the Pentagon's reaction when the military supervisor of the
>project showed up with his plans and graphs for the project to brief the
>Generals. They thought he was unhinged, and that was the end of that.
>Reagan would have loved it though. :-D
>
>Pat


It mentions in the Orion book that they showed on to Kennedy that
would have been armed with numerous 25 Mt bombs and that his reaction
was 'appalled". With Orion and Project Pluto on the drawing boards
it's hard to imagine the Russians ever topping those two as far as
scariness goes.

[Damon Hill]

D. Scott Ferrin > wrote in
:


> It mentions in the Orion book that they showed on to Kennedy that
> would have been armed with numerous 25 Mt bombs and that his reaction
> was 'appalled". With Orion and Project Pluto on the drawing boards
> it's hard to imagine the Russians ever topping those two as far as
> scariness goes.
>

Similar N-1 variants were proposed along the same lines. Although
given its record, it's more likely to have taken Kazahkstan off the
map.

--Damon

[Pat Flannery]

D. Scott Ferrin wrote:

>It mentions in the Orion book that they showed on to Kennedy that
>would have been armed with numerous 25 Mt bombs and that his reaction
>was 'appalled". With Orion and Project Pluto on the drawing boards
>it's hard to imagine the Russians ever topping those two as far as
>scariness goes.
>
>

And of course the obvious question is how exactly difficult would it be
to intercept a warhead coming in from the Lagrange point beyond the Moon
if you had a couple of days to do it in? This was a very dorky idea.

Pat

[Pat Flannery]

Damon Hill wrote:

>Similar N-1 variants were proposed along the same lines. Although
>given its record, it's more likely to have taken Kazahkstan off the
>map.
>
>

And let's have another look at the ICBM from hell, shall we?
http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/n11gr.htm
To me, that warhead attachment method looks a bit too structurally and
aerodynamically unsound to trust... :-D

Pat

[Rusty]

On Sun, 27 Mar 2005 01:41:22 -0600, Pat Flannery >
wrote:

>
>
>Damon Hill wrote:
>
>>Similar N-1 variants were proposed along the same lines. Although
>>given its record, it's more likely to have taken Kazahkstan off the
>>map.
>>
>>
>
>And let's have another look at the ICBM from hell, shall we?
>http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/n11gr.htm
>To me, that warhead attachment method looks a bit too structurally and
>aerodynamically unsound to trust... :-D
>
>Pat


That looks like something the Acme Fireworks Company would sell to
Wile E. Coyote.



OMG! The Aussies have an Acme Fireworks Company!

http://www.acmefireworks.com.au/default.htm


Rusty

[Scott Lowther]

Pat Flannery wrote:

>
>
> D. Scott Ferrin wrote:
>
>> It mentions in the Orion book that they showed on to Kennedy that
>> would have been armed with numerous 25 Mt bombs and that his reaction
>> was 'appalled". With Orion and Project Pluto on the drawing boards
>> it's hard to imagine the Russians ever topping those two as far as
>> scariness goes.
>>
>>
>
> And of course the obvious question is how exactly difficult would it
> be to intercept a warhead coming in from the Lagrange point beyond the
> Moon if you had a couple of days to do it in? This was a very dorky idea.

There are advantages to cislunar nuke basing. Basically, strikes against
both terrestrial and cislunal missiels sites cannot be simultaneous, so
if the Soviets nukes the US and all the boomers off the map, they'd know
that in 8-24 hours, a rain of bombs that they couldn't stop would
shellac 'em.

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Lowther wrote:

>
> There are advantages to cislunar nuke basing. Basically, strikes
> against both terrestrial and cislunal missiels sites cannot be
> simultaneous, so if the Soviets nukes the US and all the boomers off
> the map, they'd know that in 8-24 hours, a rain of bombs that they
> couldn't stop would shellac 'em.


Why couldn't they stop them? They could see them coming on radar, and
use some large exoatmospheric ABMs to get them.
Descent speed of the warheads would be very high, but they would be
coming down toward you at a more vertical trajectory than an ICBM's
warhead, and might be easier to target due to that fact.
In fact, would the warheads be immune to the EMP generated by
exoatmospheric nuclear detonations as they descend?
Could that as well as neutron or X-ray flux serve as a kill mechanism?
With their plasma trails behind them, would the warheads tend to siphon
the energy released by the EMP effect into themselves via the conductive
plasma?

Pat

[Scott Lowther]

Pat Flannery wrote:

>
>
> Scott Lowther wrote:
>
>>
>> There are advantages to cislunar nuke basing. Basically, strikes
>> against both terrestrial and cislunal missiels sites cannot be
>> simultaneous, so if the Soviets nukes the US and all the boomers off
>> the map, they'd know that in 8-24 hours, a rain of bombs that they
>> couldn't stop would shellac 'em.
>
>
>
> Why couldn't they stop them? They could see them coming on radar

Probably not. Steathing a spacecraft that does not need to maneuver much
would be pretty straightforward. They'd see (visually) the launch, and
they'd pick up the warhead as it enterred the atmosphere... but in the
intervening time... it'd be pretty easy to make it invisible to radar.

>
> Descent speed of the warheads would be very high, but they would be
> coming down toward you at a more vertical trajectory than an ICBM's
> warhead, and might be easier to target due to that fact.

Unlikely. There'd be only seconds between detection and impact.


> In fact, would the warheads be immune to the EMP generated by
> exoatmospheric nuclear detonations as they descend?

EMP? Sure. Neutron radiation might pose a problem... but that woudl pose
a problem for the defenders using neutron bombs to defend themselves, too.


> Could that as well as neutron or X-ray flux serve as a kill mechanism?
> With their plasma trails behind them, would the warheads tend to
> siphon the energy released by the EMP effect into themselves via the
> conductive plasma?

All the warhead electonics woudl need would be a Faraday cage, I believe.

[Herb Schaltegger]

On Sun, 27 Mar 2005 13:14:40 -0600, Pat Flannery wrote
(in article >):

>
>
> Scott Lowther wrote:
>
>>
>> There are advantages to cislunar nuke basing. Basically, strikes
>> against both terrestrial and cislunal missiels sites cannot be
>> simultaneous, so if the Soviets nukes the US and all the boomers off
>> the map, they'd know that in 8-24 hours, a rain of bombs that they
>> couldn't stop would shellac 'em.
>
>
> Why couldn't they stop them? They could see them coming on radar, and
> use some large exoatmospheric ABMs to get them.
> Descent speed of the warheads would be very high, but they would be
> coming down toward you at a more vertical trajectory than an ICBM's
> warhead, and might be easier to target due to that fact.
> In fact, would the warheads be immune to the EMP generated by
> exoatmospheric nuclear detonations as they descend?
> Could that as well as neutron or X-ray flux serve as a kill mechanism?
> With their plasma trails behind them, would the warheads tend to siphon
> the energy released by the EMP effect into themselves via the conductive
> plasma?
>
> Pat

You'd need a damned big nuke to ensure you'd have some kind of
reasonable chance to stop the incoming warheads at those velocities,
baring something way beyond the state of the Soviet art (or anyone's
art, at these closing velocities). Miss your detonation target by a
millisecond at typical lunar-return velocities (even ignoring motion of
the interceptor) and you've missed by 37 feet; miss by a half-second
and you miss by three and a half miles.

Add in a a warhead closing at a few thousand feet per second of its own
and you increase the problems arithmetically. Add in a few hundred
additional warheads, and a few thousand additional decoys which all
*look* like warheads until they hit atmosphere, and you've complicated
things geometrically if not exponentially, especially if a dozen or so
are optimized for EMP and high-altitude detonation.

--
Herb Schaltegger, GPG Key ID: BBF6FC1C
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety
deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin, 1759
<http://www.angryherb.net>

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Lowther wrote:

>
> All the warhead electonics woudl need would be a Faraday cage, I believe.

Still, the system sounds a bit expensive to develop, compared to
building more SLBMs and getting around the vulnerability problem via
weight of numbers. :-)
Do you know if this was an outgrowth of the Lunar surface based missile
idea, which seems to have been one of the aims of Project Horizon? Or
were the Orion missile carriers something of a case of reinventing the idea?
I assume they are supposed to hang around the L2 Lagrange point so that
the Soviets couldn't detect their exact position from Earth; but this
would lead to communication problems and require some sort of Lunar
orbiting relay stations to keep in touch with them; considering the
challenge of building the main system, that would be a minor
problem...but what's to stop the Soviets from building a series of
unmanned interceptor spacecraft and putting them in Lunar orbit also?
That would be far cheaper than the Orion ships, and if you nailed the
Orions and their comsats as act one of a surprise attack via your
interceptors, you could remove them as a threat.
Of course, the other alternative is Soviet Orion ships also out there
around the Moon, and the two space armadas both ready to blow each other
up inside of a few minutes- not a very stable situation either.
And you know what that could lead to...an Orion Gap! ;-)

Pat

[Scott Lowther]

Pat Flannery wrote:

>
>
> Scott Lowther wrote:
>
>>
>> All the warhead electonics woudl need would be a Faraday cage, I
>> believe.
>
>
> Still, the system sounds a bit expensive to develop,

And that's the problem. Boomers are cheaper to design, build and maintain.

>
> Do you know if this was an outgrowth of the Lunar surface based
> missile idea, which seems to have been one of the aims of Project
> Horizon? Or were the Orion missile carriers something of a case of
> reinventing the idea?

Convergent evolution.

> I assume they are supposed to hang around the L2 Lagrange point so
> that the Soviets couldn't detect their exact position from Earth; but
> this would lead to communication problems and require some sort of
> Lunar orbiting relay stations to keep in touch with them; considering
> the challenge of building the main system, that would be a minor
> problem...but what's to stop the Soviets from building a series of
> unmanned interceptor spacecraft and putting them in Lunar orbit also?

Admiral Heinlein wouldn't let the Soviets build spacecraft.


> That would be far cheaper than the Orion ships, and if you nailed the
> Orions and their comsats as act one of a surprise attack via your
> interceptors, you could remove them as a threat.

You assume:
1: that you could launch a sneak attack
2: that you could take out an Orion battleship.

Neither of these is certain. Everythign in cislunar space woudl be
tracked, no matter how well radar-stealthed it is, since there'd be
months and years to scan the skies; anything that goes missing, all the
alarms would go off.


> Of course, the other alternative is Soviet Orion ships also out there
> around the Moon, and the two space armadas both ready to blow each
> other up inside of a few minutes- not a very stable situation either.


Once parity in power was reached in Cislunar space, then clearly
dominance would be determined in the asteroid belt, and then in the
Jovian Trojan asteroids, then in the Jovian system, then around Saturn,
etc. I'd be just crushed if in this alternate history, by the year 2005,
we had a raging arms race (with all the attendant logistics and supply
chains, with hundreds of manned bases betweeen here and there) out in
the Oort cloud.

That'd be just tragic.

[Pat Flannery]

Herb Schaltegger wrote:

>You'd need a damned big nuke to ensure you'd have some kind of
>reasonable chance to stop the incoming warheads at those velocities,
>baring something way beyond the state of the Soviet art (or anyone's
>art, at these closing velocities). Miss your detonation target by a
>millisecond at typical lunar-return velocities (even ignoring motion of
>the interceptor) and you've missed by 37 feet; miss by a half-second
>and you miss by three and a half miles.
>
>

They had a monster ABM they developed out of the SS-11 missile called
"Taran" (battering ram):
http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/taran.htm
With a 10 megaton warhead, it would have had the destructive power
needed to get a good kill radius (particularly if it was encased in gold
like Spartan's to increase the neutron yield) and the Taran had the
range to get quite a ways out from the Earth.

>Add in a a warhead closing at a few thousand feet per second of its own
>and you increase the problems arithmetically. Add in a few hundred
>additional warheads, and a few thousand additional decoys which all
>*look* like warheads until they hit atmosphere, and you've complicated
>things geometrically if not exponentially, especially if a dozen or so
>are optimized for EMP and high-altitude detonation.
>
>

The big problem with this idea would be the expense of designing and
deploying the Lunar missile fleet, plus keeping the Lunar fleet's crews
supplied with food, water, and oxygen.
Even with nuclear pulse propulsion this would be a very big task to
accomplish year in and year out.
The number of mini-nukes needed to make this all work in a deployed
system would be very large indeed, and sooner or later you would start
to get a real fallout problem from all the launchings, assuming you are
going to use surface launched Orions for supply. And you'd have to do
that for the sake of economics to make this work.

Pat

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Lowther wrote:

>
> Once parity in power was reached in Cislunar space, then clearly
> dominance would be determined in the asteroid belt, and then in the
> Jovian Trojan asteroids, then in the Jovian system, then around
> Saturn, etc. I'd be just crushed if in this alternate history, by the
> year 2005, we had a raging arms race (with all the attendant logistics
> and supply chains, with hundreds of manned bases betweeen here and
> there) out in the Oort cloud.
>
> That'd be just tragic.


With unlimited supplies of money you could make it work, but one of the
major nails that went into the lid of the Soviet Union's coffin was the
amount being spent on things like the Energia booster, Buran shuttle,
Typhoon submarine, SS-18 missile, and the Blackjack bomber.
We had more money to throw around, but even Apollo made a measurable
dent in the federal budget, and this would make Apollo look cheap by the
time you got it ready to go. Sooner or later you do hit the upper limit
on spending that doesn't generate more national treasure than it costs.

Pat

[Scott Lowther]

Pat Flannery wrote:

>
>
> Scott Lowther wrote:
>
>>
>> Once parity in power was reached in Cislunar space, then clearly
>> dominance would be determined in the asteroid belt, and then in the
>> Jovian Trojan asteroids, then in the Jovian system, then around
>> Saturn, etc. I'd be just crushed if in this alternate history, by the
>> year 2005, we had a raging arms race (with all the attendant
>> logistics and supply chains, with hundreds of manned bases betweeen
>> here and there) out in the Oort cloud.
>>
>> That'd be just tragic.
>
>
>
> With unlimited supplies of money you could make it work, but one of
> the major nails that went into the lid of the Soviet Union's coffin
> was the amount being spent on things like the Energia booster, Buran
> shuttle, Typhoon submarine, SS-18 missile, and the Blackjack bomber.

Those programs did not generate entirely new economies. Unlike space
colonization.

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Lowther wrote:

>>
>> With unlimited supplies of money you could make it work, but one of
>> the major nails that went into the lid of the Soviet Union's coffin
>> was the amount being spent on things like the Energia booster, Buran
>> shuttle, Typhoon submarine, SS-18 missile, and the Blackjack bomber.
>
>
> Those programs did not generate entirely new economies. Unlike space
> colonization.


Considering the number of Orion launches needed to colonize the Moon and
Mars, you would have a great incentive to colonize space... because
Earth's atmosphere would rapidly become quite radioactive.

Pat

[Scott Lowther]

Pat Flannery wrote:

>
>
> Scott Lowther wrote:
>
>>>
>>> With unlimited supplies of money you could make it work, but one of
>>> the major nails that went into the lid of the Soviet Union's coffin
>>> was the amount being spent on things like the Energia booster, Buran
>>> shuttle, Typhoon submarine, SS-18 missile, and the Blackjack bomber.
>>
>>
>>
>> Those programs did not generate entirely new economies. Unlike space
>> colonization.
>
>
>
> Considering the number of Orion launches needed to colonize the Moon
> and Mars, you would have a great incentive to colonize space...
> because Earth's atmosphere would rapidly become quite radioactive.


Only if you were moron enough to use Orion as a space launch system,
rather than as an in-space propulsion system. Just as ocean liners do
not trundle up to your front door, you take an appropriate taxi to the
big ship.

[D. Scott Ferrin]

On Sun, 27 Mar 2005 17:11:55 -0600, Pat Flannery >
wrote:

>
>
>Scott Lowther wrote:
>
>>
>> Once parity in power was reached in Cislunar space, then clearly
>> dominance would be determined in the asteroid belt, and then in the
>> Jovian Trojan asteroids, then in the Jovian system, then around
>> Saturn, etc. I'd be just crushed if in this alternate history, by the
>> year 2005, we had a raging arms race (with all the attendant logistics
>> and supply chains, with hundreds of manned bases betweeen here and
>> there) out in the Oort cloud.
>>
>> That'd be just tragic.
>
>
>With unlimited supplies of money you could make it work, but one of the
>major nails that went into the lid of the Soviet Union's coffin was the
>amount being spent on things like the Energia booster, Buran shuttle,
>Typhoon submarine


I read recently that the damn thing was made out of TITANIUM!. I knew
the Alphas and Sierras were (Akula is basically a steel Sierra) but I
didn't know the Typhoon was. That must have cost a few bucks.

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Lowther wrote:

>>
>>
>> Considering the number of Orion launches needed to colonize the Moon
>> and Mars, you would have a great incentive to colonize space...
>> because Earth's atmosphere would rapidly become quite radioactive.
>
>
>
> Only if you were moron enough to use Orion as a space launch system,
> rather than as an in-space propulsion system. Just as ocean liners do
> not trundle up to your front door, you take an appropriate taxi to the
> big ship.


You'd still have to get the cargo to be used for the colonization effort
from the surface of the Earth to the Orion in either LEO or the gap
between the inner and outer Van Allen belts... I still think there's
going to be a EMP problem when you rev up the Orion's motor (remember
that those Project Argus devices weren't that powerful, and that's how
we first found out about EMP effects, and the damage that nuclear
detonations in space could wreak on satellites.) in Earth orbit, and the
further away from the planet's magnetosphere it is, the better.
You also have to move all the nuclear devices to be used for the Orion's
drive up to the ships.
That means having a large-scale conventional surface to orbit capability
comparable to building a solar power satellite array if you have even
very modest colonization in mind- and although we probably could build a
space solar power array with today's technology, no one is exactly
jumping at the idea at the moment, even though it could generate income
in the fairly near future, as opposed to the space colonization effort.
The only real way to make full use of Orion's exceptional ISP is to
surface launch it, as that is where most of the energy for getting mass
to the Moon or Mars is expended.
Then you run into the radiation problem from the detonations during
launch and ascent and possible EMP effects as it clears the atmosphere
and ascends.
You can save trip times to Mars with higher velocity between the two
planets (I don't know if the Moon is even worth it in regards to higher
velocity; it would be a "hurry up and stop" situation at Lunar
distances), but except for crew and passenger movement does it really
matter if you get your colonization cargo from point "A" to point "B" in
a week, or via a Hohman transfer orbit? That extra speed you used to get
there has to be damped out at the arrival at the destination, and that's
wasteful.

Pat

[Scott Lowther]

Pat Flannery wrote:

>
> You'd still have to get the cargo to be used for the colonization
> effort from the surface of the Earth to the Orion in either LEO or the
> gap between the inner and outer Van Allen belts... I still think
> there's going to be a EMP problem when you rev up the Orion's motor
> (remember that those Project Argus devices weren't that powerful, and
> that's how we first found out about EMP effects, and the damage that
> nuclear detonations in space could wreak on satellites.) in Earth
> orbit, and the further away from the planet's magnetosphere it is, the
> better.

Keep in mind that this is an alternate historey discussion, not a "let's
do it now" discussion. That being the case, if Orion was a going concern
in the early sixties, satellite makers would know what was coming, and
would beef up satellite shielding accoridingly. Since this alternate
history woudl require vastly more space lift capability than the real
world, perhaps on the order of a Sea Dragon a day or more, space launch
woudl be dirt cheap... and thus so would satellites.


> The only real way to make full use of Orion's exceptional ISP is to
> surface launch it,

Incorrect. Launch from ground to orbit requires nothing fancy, and in
fact suffers when launch vehicles are desired to be at the bleeding
edge. A Sea Dragon, obviously, would do it. Orion provides *no* benefit
here. The point is not to get the best mass fraction from Earth to
orbit, but to get the lowest cost per pound from Earth to orbit. But
Orion can send a ****load of stuff from Earth orbit to Jupiter... Sea
Dragon can't.

>
> You can save trip times to Mars with higher velocity between the two
> planets (I don't know if the Moon is even worth it in regards to
> higher velocity; it would be a "hurry up and stop" situation at Lunar
> distances), but except for crew and passenger movement does it really
> matter if you get your colonization cargo from point "A" to point "B"
> in a week, or via a Hohman transfer orbit? That extra speed you used
> to get there has to be damped out at the arrival at the destination,
> and that's wasteful.
>
Remeber, we're talking about military. These are the guys who regualrly
bust Mach 1 getting from here to there. Civilians do not do that.

[Reunite Gondwanaland]

On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:59:23 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:


> Remeber, we're talking about military. These are the guys who regualrly
> bust Mach 1 getting from here to there. Civilians do not do that.

Yes, we do. We even exceeded Mach 3 now and then and we are civilian
to the core.

Mary

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer
or

[Reunite Gondwanaland]

On Mon, 28 Mar 2005 19:25:01 -0700, D. Scott Ferrin
> wrote:

> I read recently that the damn thing was made out of TITANIUM!. I knew
> the Alphas and Sierras were (Akula is basically a steel Sierra) but I
> didn't know the Typhoon was. That must have cost a few bucks.

They had the titanium and attendant capability right there, though.
The US even bought the titanium for the A-12s and SR-71s from the
USSR.

Mary

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer
or

[Chuck Stewart]

On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:59:23 +0000, Scott Lowther wrote:

> But Orion can send a ****load of stuff from Earth
> orbit to Jupiter... Sea Dragon can't.

But the real question is this: how many Dyna-soar
modules can the Sea Dragon launch into orbit at once?

"U.S. Space Command Armada 14, ready to launch!"

--
Chuck Stewart
"Anime-style catgirls: Threat? Menace? Or just studying algebra?"

[Scott Lowther]

Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:

>On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:59:23 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>>Remeber, we're talking about military. These are the guys who regualrly
>>bust Mach 1 getting from here to there. Civilians do not do that.
>>
>>
>
>Yes, we do.
>
Indeed? Civilians *regualrly* bust Mach 1? Not since Concorde was grounded.

> We even exceeded Mach 3 now and then and we are civilian
>to the core.
>
Not really. Who's paying?

[Pat Flannery]

D. Scott Ferrin wrote:

>I read recently that the damn thing was made out of TITANIUM!. I knew
>the Alphas and Sierras were (Akula is basically a steel Sierra) but I
>didn't know the Typhoon was. That must have cost a few bucks.
>
>

This says part steel/part titanium:
http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/slbm/941.htm
that would partially explain why it sits so high in the water when
surfaced, which seems a bit much even with the complex internal
arrangement of multiple hulls.
The internal hull layout is a a lot more complex than the above site
says- I've got a cutaway of one- stern to bow, its laid out like this:
Twin side-by-side small diameter cylinders with the propulsion systems
in them, fairing into...
Twin side-by-side large diameter cylinders, housing the steam turbines
and reactors, fairing into...
Twin side-by-side medium diameter cylinders (living quarters?) with the
conning tower cylinder sitting on top of them in a triangular
arrangement, fairing into...
Twin side-by-side small diameter cylinders with the two rows of missile
tubes placed between them, and joining into...
A single(?) large ovoid bow torpedo compartment.
The building halls for the titanium Mike, Alphas, and Sierras* were
really something- giant airtight buildings completely filled with argon
gas. The guys doing the welding wore breathing gear that supplied them
with air, and carried away their exhaled breath so as not to contaminate
the environment and damage the titanium as it was being welded.
It really must have been something to see.

* Sierras were assembled at the Krasnoe Sormovo shipyard in Gorkiy.

Pat

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Lowther wrote:

>
> Keep in mind that this is an alternate historey discussion, not a
> "let's do it now" discussion. That being the case, if Orion was a
> going concern in the early sixties, satellite makers would know what
> was coming, and would beef up satellite shielding accoridingly. Since
> this alternate history woudl require vastly more space lift capability
> than the real world, perhaps on the order of a Sea Dragon a day or
> more, space launch woudl be dirt cheap... and thus so would satellites.

You've still got all the infrastructure to support that sort of
spacelift capability; the more Sea Dragons you build, the more the R&D
is divided up between the vehicles, so that cost drops...but the
vehicles themselves still cost money for the material to build them, and
the man hours that go into their assembly, and that will drop as
efficiency of large scale production cuts cost, but it never will be
dirt cheap- the Russians have built literally thousands of R-7 Semyorkas
in various variants, but they still cost a fair amount apiece. And the
satellite itself can be a significant part of the overall price of
launch; you can build large numbers of low-tech heavy and cheap
satellites if the launch price drops significantly, but you end up with
a really severe space debris problem, as well as how many you have to
put on one Sea Dragon launcher to make a launch worthwhile...that's the
problem with the thing- it's very economical- provided that you can use
its total payload capacity on every launch, otherwise the price starts
going up.

>
>> The only real way to make full use of Orion's exceptional ISP is to
>> surface launch it,
>
>
> Incorrect. Launch from ground to orbit requires nothing fancy,


It was going to take 2-3 Saturn V launches to put a 33 ft. diameter
Orion's components into orbit and get it all ready to go... and that's
into LEO. The full size Orions that gain the full efficiency of the
motor concept are probably take more than a Sea Dragon could carry (550
metric tonnes) In fact, the original surface launched Orion design
weighed in at 10,000 tonnes.

> and in fact suffers when launch vehicles are desired to be at the
> bleeding edge. A Sea Dragon, obviously, would do it. Orion provides
> *no* benefit here. The point is not to get the best mass fraction from
> Earth to orbit, but to get the lowest cost per pound from Earth to
> orbit. But Orion can send a ****load of stuff from Earth orbit to
> Jupiter... Sea Dragon can't.


There are two things about this rosy scenario that make me think that
implementing it might be a tad harder to accomplish than it at first seems:

1.) The Sea Dragon's designer is the man who built the rocket to shoot
Evel Kneival across the Snake River Canyon... it got around halfway across.
Then he got hold of some surplus Atlas vernier rockets and designed a
rocket to shoot a guy named "The Human Fly" IIRC up to the edge of
space, Prof. Fate cape and all.
This never got built.

2.) The Orion's big champion is the guy who suggested building a shell
around the Sun with a diameter of one Earth orbit, even though there
isn't enough raw material in the entire solar system to make such a
shell structurally sound. He also overlooked the fact that the Sun would
be effectively weightless inside this sphere, and could drift all over
inside of it...so that it would require some means to keep it centered,
or bad things will occur when it decides to leave one day and melts its
way through the sphere's surface.

This whole concept needs one thing added... a means of getting the
colonists around on the Martian surface, given how rocky it is...I'm
thinking modified Moller Skycars driven by small cold fusion reactors
might be just the ticket to solve that problem. ;-)

>
>>
>> You can save trip times to Mars with higher velocity between the two
>> planets (I don't know if the Moon is even worth it in regards to
>> higher velocity; it would be a "hurry up and stop" situation at Lunar
>> distances), but except for crew and passenger movement does it really
>> matter if you get your colonization cargo from point "A" to point "B"
>> in a week, or via a Hohman transfer orbit? That extra speed you used
>> to get there has to be damped out at the arrival at the destination,
>> and that's wasteful.
>>
> Remeber, we're talking about military. These are the guys who
> regualrly bust Mach 1 getting from here to there. Civilians do not do
> that.


It doesn't work very well at distances as short as the Earth/Moon run; a
couple of decades ago (boy, but I'm getting old) I came up with the
ultimate space passenger/cargo ship- it had a drive that generated a 1G
thrust for as long as you wanted it... travel consisted of accelerating
toward you destination at one G, turning around at the halfway point,
and decelerating for the rest of the way there- no weightlessness, no
bone mass loss... you saved time on the Earth/Moon run, but it really
paid off in regards to Mars and the outer planets.
The travel times to Jupiter and beyond were spectacular.
What was the propulsion system to be? Okay, that's a small detail, but
I'm sure that with a little work..... ;-)

Pat

[Pat Flannery]

Chuck Stewart wrote:

>
>But the real question is this: how many Dyna-soar
>modules can the Sea Dragon launch into orbit at once?
>
>"U.S. Space Command Armada 14, ready to launch!"
>
>

I checked- with their transtages at orbital weight, and assuming that
the Dyna-Soar weight estimate (and my math) was correct, around 62.

Pat

[Peter Smith]

Pat Flannery wrote...
>
> This whole concept needs one thing added... a means of
> getting the colonists around on the Martian surface,
> given how rocky it is...I'm thinking modified Moller
> Skycars driven by small cold fusion reactors
> might be just the ticket to solve that problem. ;-)

Might have to upgrade to the luke-warm fusion since in the 1psi atmosphere
those Skycar turbofans are going to need a major boost.
;)

- Peter

[D. Scott Ferrin]

On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 02:12:19 -0600, Pat Flannery >
wrote:

>
>
>D. Scott Ferrin wrote:
>
>>I read recently that the damn thing was made out of TITANIUM!. I knew
>>the Alphas and Sierras were (Akula is basically a steel Sierra) but I
>>didn't know the Typhoon was. That must have cost a few bucks.
>>
>>
>
>This says part steel/part titanium:
>http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/slbm/941.htm
>that would partially explain why it sits so high in the water when
>surfaced, which seems a bit much even with the complex internal
>arrangement of multiple hulls.
> The internal hull layout is a a lot more complex than the above site
>says- I've got a cutaway of one- stern to bow, its laid out like this:
>Twin side-by-side small diameter cylinders with the propulsion systems
>in them, fairing into...
>Twin side-by-side large diameter cylinders, housing the steam turbines
>and reactors, fairing into...
>Twin side-by-side medium diameter cylinders (living quarters?) with the
>conning tower cylinder sitting on top of them in a triangular
>arrangement, fairing into...
>Twin side-by-side small diameter cylinders with the two rows of missile
>tubes placed between them, and joining into...
>A single(?) large ovoid bow torpedo compartment.
>The building halls for the titanium Mike, Alphas, and Sierras* were
>really something- giant airtight buildings completely filled with argon
>gas. The guys doing the welding wore breathing gear that supplied them
>with air, and carried away their exhaled breath so as not to contaminate
>the environment and damage the titanium as it was being welded.
>It really must have been something to see.
>
>* Sierras were assembled at the Krasnoe Sormovo shipyard in Gorkiy.
>
>Pat



Given that a Typhoon is as big as two Ohios side-by-side that's still
a LOT of titanium :-)

[Jonathan Silverlight]

In message >, Pat Flannery
> writes

>2.) The Orion's big champion is the guy who suggested building a shell
>around the Sun with a diameter of one Earth orbit, even though there
>isn't enough raw material in the entire solar system to make such a
>shell structurally sound. He also overlooked the fact that the Sun
>would be effectively weightless inside this sphere, and could drift all
>over inside of it...so that it would require some means to keep it
>centered, or bad things will occur when it decides to leave one day and
>melts its way through the sphere's surface.
>

Sorry, but no.
The original concept was for a shell of independently orbiting bodies
like asteroids. I know the concept has been changed since then, and
authors such as Larry Niven and Jack Williamson add control systems to
stabilise the shell or whatever.
--
Remove spam and invalid from address to reply.

[Pat Flannery]

D. Scott Ferrin wrote:

>
>
>Given that a Typhoon is as big as two Ohios side-by-side that's still
>a LOT of titanium :-)
>
>

This was their pride and joy; the Super Submarine that was finally to
jump past anything that America had, and rule the seas with its Oscar
class sidekick. Years ago, the Naval Institute's magazine "Proceedings"
had an brief interview with the Typhoon's designer; he stated that the
design was extremely complex to engineer, and that he never wanted to do
anything like that again...one got the impression he didn't think very
much of the finished item, and that the whole thing was more of a
political show item than a rational submarine design.
Although it never did have the dread MHD like the Red October, that
really wouldn't have been a surprise- considering how much time and
money they stuck into designing and building it. In fact, one would have
almost expected the VTOL capability and bow drill of the Atragon on the
thing....plus the glazed bow of the Seaview....the ability to ram ships
that the Nautilus had...and the Skyski One interceptor fighter that
detaches itself when P-3 Orions approach. :-D
I've never seen details of it, but it did have a SAM system installed on it.

Pat

[Scott Lowther]

Pat Flannery wrote:

>
> There are two things about this rosy scenario that make me think that
> implementing it might be a tad harder to accomplish than it at first
> seems:
>
> 1.) The Sea Dragon's designer is the man who built the rocket to shoot
> Evel Kneival across the Snake River Canyon... it got around halfway
> across.

So? The parachute system screwed up. Same thing happened with von
Braun's A-3.

> 2.) The Orion's big champion is the guy who suggested building a shell
> around the Sun with a diameter of one Earth orbit, even though there
> isn't enough raw material in the entire solar system to make such a
> shell structurally sound.

No, he didn't.

With such blatant disregard for the facts, you're making it difficult to
take you even remotely seriously.

[Reunite Gondwanaland]

On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 07:18:35 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:

> Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
>
> >On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:59:23 GMT, Scott Lowther
> > wrote:

> >>Remeber, we're talking about military. These are the guys who regualrly
> >>bust Mach 1 getting from here to there. Civilians do not do that.

> >Yes, we do.

> Indeed? Civilians *regualrly* bust Mach 1? Not since Concorde was grounded.

We do so regularly. It's part of the PMCFs, if nothing else.

> > We even exceeded Mach 3 now and then and we are civilian
> >to the core.

> Not really. Who's paying?

The taxpayers, including both civilians and members of the military.
They're paying through NASA, a civilian organization. They pay
Treasury their taxes and Treasury, at the direction of the civilian
legislative branch, pays the money out at the direction of NASA,
actually.

Mary

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer
or

[Greg D. Moore \(Strider\)]

"Jonathan Silverlight" > wrote
in message ...
> In message >, Pat Flannery
> > writes
>
> >2.) The Orion's big champion is the guy who suggested building a shell
> >around the Sun with a diameter of one Earth orbit, even though there
> >isn't enough raw material in the entire solar system to make such a
> >shell structurally sound. He also overlooked the fact that the Sun
> >would be effectively weightless inside this sphere, and could drift all
> >over inside of it...so that it would require some means to keep it
> >centered, or bad things will occur when it decides to leave one day and
> >melts its way through the sphere's surface.
> >
>
> Sorry, but no.
> The original concept was for a shell of independently orbiting bodies
> like asteroids. I know the concept has been changed since then, and
> authors such as Larry Niven and Jack Williamson add control systems to
> stabilise the shell or whatever.

Well, Niven's was a ring.. which is completely unstable. While a star may
float inside a sphere, inside a ring, once it goes off-center, itcontinues
to accelerate.

Sorta like once Niven's writing about Ringworld started to go bad, it went
bad quickly.


> --
> Remove spam and invalid from address to reply.

[Scott Lowther]

Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:

>On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 07:18:35 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:
>
>
>
>>Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>>On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:59:23 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>
>
>
>>>>Remeber, we're talking about military. These are the guys who regualrly
>>>>bust Mach 1 getting from here to there. Civilians do not do that.
>>>>
>>>>
>
>
>
>>>Yes, we do.
>>>
>>>
>
>
>
>>Indeed? Civilians *regualrly* bust Mach 1? Not since Concorde was grounded.
>>
>>
>
>We do so regularly. It's part of the PMCFs, if nothing else.
>
>

OK. Where can I buy a ticket to fly to Chicago?

>
>
>>>We even exceeded Mach 3 now and then and we are civilian
>>>to the core.
>>>
>>>
>
>
>
>>Not really. Who's paying?
>>
>>
>
>The taxpayers, including both civilians and members of the military.
>They're paying through NASA, a civilian organization. They pay
>Treasury their taxes and Treasury, at the direction of the civilian
>legislative branch, pays the money out at the direction of NASA,
>actually.
>
>
Government employees, then.

[Andre Lieven]

"Greg D. Moore \" ) writes:
> "Jonathan Silverlight" > wrote
> in message ...
>> In message >, Pat Flannery
>> > writes
>>
>> >2.) The Orion's big champion is the guy who suggested building a shell
>> >around the Sun with a diameter of one Earth orbit, even though there
>> >isn't enough raw material in the entire solar system to make such a
>> >shell structurally sound. He also overlooked the fact that the Sun
>> >would be effectively weightless inside this sphere, and could drift all
>> >over inside of it...so that it would require some means to keep it
>> >centered, or bad things will occur when it decides to leave one day and
>> >melts its way through the sphere's surface.
>> >
>>
>> Sorry, but no.
>> The original concept was for a shell of independently orbiting bodies
>> like asteroids. I know the concept has been changed since then, and
>> authors such as Larry Niven and Jack Williamson add control systems to
>> stabilise the shell or whatever.
>
> Well, Niven's was a ring.. which is completely unstable. While a star may
> float inside a sphere, inside a ring, once it goes off-center, itcontinues
> to accelerate.

Thats why the Ringworld had attitude control engines. The problem came
from when the Ringworld civilisation fell, and the survivors decided
that they could " harvest " those motors for starship engines, not having
considered their purpose on the rim.

> Sorta like once Niven's writing about Ringworld started to go bad, it
> went bad quickly.

The sequel was pretty good.

Andre

--
" I'm a man... But, I can change... If I have to... I guess. "
The Man Prayer, Red Green.

[Greg D. Moore \(Strider\)]

"Andre Lieven" > wrote in message
...
> Thats why the Ringworld had attitude control engines. The problem came
> from when the Ringworld civilisation fell, and the survivors decided
> that they could " harvest " those motors for starship engines, not having
> considered their purpose on the rim.

Exactly, but note that he "added" them to them to Ringworld in the second
book... after it was pointed out to him Ringworld was unstable.

>
> > Sorta like once Niven's writing about Ringworld started to go bad, it
> > went bad quickly.
>
> The sequel was pretty good.

Which one.. I've only gotten to the 3rd book in the series and think they've
continued to go downhill.

>
> Andre
>
> --
> " I'm a man... But, I can change... If I have to... I guess. "
> The Man Prayer, Red Green.

[Reunite Gondwanaland]

On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 04:44:08 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:

> Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
>
> >On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 07:18:35 GMT, Scott Lowther
> > wrote:
> >
> >>Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
> >>
> >>>On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:59:23 GMT, Scott Lowther
> > wrote:
> >
> >>>>Remeber, we're talking about military. These are the guys who regualrly
> >>>>bust Mach 1 getting from here to there. Civilians do not do that.
> >
> >>>Yes, we do.
> >
> >>Indeed? Civilians *regualrly* bust Mach 1? Not since Concorde was grounded.
> >
> >We do so regularly. It's part of the PMCFs, if nothing else.
>
> OK. Where can I buy a ticket to fly to Chicago?

What makes you think I'm talking about commercial service? You just
said "getting from here to there", not flying scheduled flights with
passengers.

> >>>We even exceeded Mach 3 now and then and we are civilian
> >>>to the core.
> >
> >>Not really. Who's paying?
> >
> >The taxpayers, including both civilians and members of the military.
> >They're paying through NASA, a civilian organization. They pay
> >Treasury their taxes and Treasury, at the direction of the civilian
> >legislative branch, pays the money out at the direction of NASA,
> >actually.
> >
> Government employees, then.

Well, yes, government employees are taxpayers, too. That's pretty
obvious. But we spend everyone's taxes on NASA, not just the
government employees'.

Mary

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer
or

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Lowther wrote:

> Pat Flannery wrote:
>
>>
>> There are two things about this rosy scenario that make me think that
>> implementing it might be a tad harder to accomplish than it at first
>> seems:
>>
>> 1.) The Sea Dragon's designer is the man who built the rocket to
>> shoot Evel Kneival across the Snake River Canyon... it got around
>> halfway across.
>
>
> So? The parachute system screwed up. Same thing happened with von
> Braun's A-3.

I was just pointing out that his design, simple as it was, had defects
in it. Remember how it was going to use a X-15 guidance unit to operate
small nose mounted canards and keep it stable? Remember how that got
pulled out at the last minute?
Remember how he bragged up his part in the Polaris program?
This guy has a Moller/Bede/Barnum smell about him. If he's such a
brilliant inspired designer, how come he's trying to shoot a guy in a
cape over a canyon, and another guy in a cape up in a homemade rocket,
rather than working at The Skunk Works on the FDL-5?
The more I consider his history, the more the sign that points toward
the Sea Dragon factory reads "To The Egress!". :-D
For starters, we had serious combustion instability problems with a
motor the size of an F-1. Sea Dragon has a first stage motor bell the
size of a small volcanic crater...exactly how simple is it going to be
to get smooth combustion in an engine of that size?

>
>> 2.) The Orion's big champion is the guy who suggested building a
>> shell around the Sun with a diameter of one Earth orbit, even though
>> there isn't enough raw material in the entire solar system to make
>> such a shell structurally sound.
>
>
> No, he didn't.


You got me there, he proposed a huge number of independent planetlets
orbiting a sun with solar collector arrays on them.
From http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/dysonFAQ.html#WHAT

"The Dyson sphere (or Dyson shell) was originally proposed in 1959 by
the astronomer Freeman Dyson in "Search for Artificial Stellar Sources
of Infrared Radiation" in Science as a way for an advanced civilization
to utilize all of the energy radiated by their sun. It is an artificial
sphere the size of an planetary orbit. The sphere would consist of a
shell of solar collectors or habitats around the star, so that all (or
at least a significant amount) energy will hit a receiving surface where
it can be used. This would create a huge living space and gather
enormous amounts of energy.

A Dyson sphere in the solar system, with a radius of one AU would have a
surface area of at least 2.72e17 km^2, around 600 million times the
surface area of the Earth. The sun has a energy output of around 4e26 W,
of which most would be available to do useful work.

The original proposal simply assumed there would be enough solar
collectors around the star to absorb the starlight, not that they would
form a continuous shell. Rather, the shell would consist of
independently orbiting structures, around a million kilometres thick and
containing more than 1e5 objects. But various science fiction authors
seem to have misinterpreted the concept to mean a solid shell enclosing
the star, usually having an inhabitable surface on the inside, and this
idea was so compelling that it has been the main use of the term in
science fiction. The earliest appearance of this version seems to be
Robert Silverberg's novel Across a Billion Years."

<>It would be a ball to figure out the orbital paths of all those
objects given their gravitational interactions- the Three Body Problem
would have nothing on this mess, which would be like some giant game of
cosmic pinball, with lots of the steel balls bouncing off things and
falling into the Sun.
It is also a somewhat ambitious plan, although the above site says he
wasn't the originator of it, but was inspired by Golden Age science
fiction:

"Was Dyson First?

No, he admitted himself that his original inspiration came from The Star
Maker by Olaf Stapledon
<http://euro.net/mark-space/bioOlafStapledon.html>, written in 1937.

As the aeons advanced, hundreds of thousands of worldlets were
constructed, all of this type, but gradually increasing in size and
complexity. Many a star without natural planets came to be
surrounded by concentric rings of artificial worlds. In some cases
the inner rings contained scores, the outer rings thousands of
globes adapted to life at some particular distance from the sun.
Great diversity, both physical and mental, would distinguish worlds
even of the same ring.

Stapledon, in turn, may have got the idea from J. D. Bernal, who also
influenced Dyson directly. Bernal describes in The World, the Flesh, and
the Devil <http://www.hia.com/hia/pcr/bernal.html> spherical space
colonies:

Imagine a spherical shell ten miles or so in diameter, made of the
lightest materials and mostly hollow; for this purpose the new
molecular materials would be admirably suited. Owing to the absence
of gravitation its construction would not be an engineering feat of
any magnitude. The source of the material out of which this would be
made would only be in small part drawn from the earth; for the great
bulk of the structure would be made out of the substance of one or
more smaller asteroids, rings of Saturn or other planetary detritus.
The initial stages of construction are the most difficult to
imagine. They will probably consist of attaching an asteroid of some
hundred yards or so diameter to a space vessel, hollowing it out and
using the removed material to build the first protective shell.
Afterwards the shell could be re-worked, bit by bit, using
elaborated and more suitable substances and at the same time
increasing its size by diminishing its thickness. The globe would
fulfil all the functions by which our earth manages to support life.
In default of a gravitational field it has, perforce, to keep its
atmosphere and the greater portion of its life inside; but as all
its nourishment comes in the form of energy through its outer
surface it would be forced to resemble on the whole an enormously
complicated single-celled plant.

- - -

A star is essentially an immense reservoir of energy which is being
dissipated as rapidly as its bulk will allow. It may be that, in the
future, man will have no use for energy and be indifferent to stars
except as spectacles, but if (and this seems more probable) energy
is still needed, the stars cannot be allowed to continue to in their
old way, but will be turned into efficient heat engines. The second
law of thermodynamics, as Jeans delights in pointing out to us, will
ultimately bring this universe to an inglorious close, may perhaps
always remain the final factor. But by intelligent organization the
life of the universe could probably be prolonged to many millions of
millions of times what it would be without organization. Besides, we
are still too close to the birth of the universe to be certain about
its death.

According to Stefan E. Jones >;, Raymond Z. Gallun, an
american SF author may have come up with a similar concept independently."

This should be another warning- he's getting ideas from science fiction,
and taking them seriously as possible real-world engineering. It's
supposed to work the other way around- the scientists and engineers come
up with a new idea, and the science fiction writers extrapolate on it
and show what it might lead to. To have it go the other way shows that
Dyson's engineering experience might not be too firmly grounded in
day-to-day reality, but rather might have a bit of Laputan technology
about it.
A lot of the ideas ARPA got interested in were like that; they have the
Grand Concept, but the devil is in the details. In this case it's that 8
man crew on the 125 day Orion Mars mission that is supposed to go up on
two Saturn Vs- we know what a Saturn V can lug into orbit- it can lug
something of Skylab's weight into orbit. Could something of Skylab's
weight carry enough supplies for 8 people and 125 days (assuming half
the weight is the Mars ship's crew quarters and half is the Orion drive
unit and it's bombs)? Yeah, that should be possible.
Can you get the weight of the the Orion stage and its propulsion bombs
down to that of a Skylab? I don't know about that.
Can you do this for 1.5 billion in 1964 dollars, of which the two
Saturn V's account for over 50% of that cost?*
Get ****ing Real.... it's things like that that make one stop dead in
their tracks, and just back away from the individual who is proposing it
until the guys with the butterfly nets show up.

* http://www.friends-partners.ru/partners/mwade/articles/probirth.htm


>
> With such blatant disregard for the facts, you're making it difficult
> to take you even remotely seriously.


Hey, you're the guy who wants to fly the seat-of-your-pants hypersonic
bombing run in the Dyna-Soar; I really want to see how you work the
sextant with one hand while you fiddle with your joystick with the other.
Don't worry- if you get stuck in orbit I can show up in a Bottle Suit
and rescue you. Normally that rocket engine six inches over my cranium
would be a noise problem, but I've heard it's possible to make a silent
rocket engine. And the Bottle suits alignment gyros run for days with
the amazing new EER electrical storage device, constantly recharged by a
postage stamp sized solar cell mounted on the suit's exterior.
Orion was a great idea, and it would be effortless to implement.
Sea Dragon would drop the surface-to-LEO launch cost to almost nothing.
The TSR2 would have single-handedly saved the British aerospace industry.
The Avro Arrow would have been capable of taking on a F-15 on even terms.
And any day now the sky is going to be full of Moller Skycars. ;-)

Pat

[Damon Hill]

Pat Flannery > wrote in
:


> For starters, we had serious combustion instability problems with a
> motor the size of an F-1. Sea Dragon has a first stage motor bell the
> size of a small volcanic crater...exactly how simple is it going to be
> to get smooth combustion in an engine of that size?

Beal was the only serious effort I know of to attempt a Big Dumb
Booster design, and actually get to serious hardware; I wonder what
kind of fun they had getting their second stage engine to work? I'm
sure they had some problems along the way. Too bad they couldn't
get to the testing point with the first stage engine.

> Hey, you're the guy who wants to fly the seat-of-your-pants hypersonic
> bombing run in the Dyna-Soar; I really want to see how you work the
> sextant with one hand while you fiddle with your joystick with the
> other. Don't worry- if you get stuck in orbit I can show up in a
> Bottle Suit and rescue you. Normally that rocket engine six inches
> over my cranium would be a noise problem, but I've heard it's possible
> to make a silent rocket engine. And the Bottle suits alignment gyros
> run for days with the amazing new EER electrical storage device,
> constantly recharged by a postage stamp sized solar cell mounted on
> the suit's exterior. Orion was a great idea, and it would be
> effortless to implement. Sea Dragon would drop the surface-to-LEO
> launch cost to almost nothing. The TSR2 would have single-handedly
> saved the British aerospace industry. The Avro Arrow would have been
> capable of taking on a F-15 on even terms. And any day now the sky is
> going to be full of Moller Skycars. ;-)
>
> Pat

Skepticism is a healthy thing, Pat. Good on yer!

--Damon

[Andre Lieven]

"Greg D. Moore \" ) writes:
> "Andre Lieven" > wrote in message
> ...
>> Thats why the Ringworld had attitude control engines. The problem came
>> from when the Ringworld civilisation fell, and the survivors decided
>> that they could " harvest " those motors for starship engines, not having
>> considered their purpose on the rim.
>
> Exactly, but note that he "added" them to them to Ringworld in the second
> book... after it was pointed out to him Ringworld was unstable.

Sure, as Larry's not a working scientist, and as the book took off,
loads of science students did all sorts of analyses on the structure
of the Ringworld. So, data that he didn't have when he wrote the first
book, became available to him later on, and he was well able to use it
to good story effect, in the second.

>> > Sorta like once Niven's writing about Ringworld started to go bad, it
>> > went bad quickly.
>>
>> The sequel was pretty good.
>
> Which one..

Sorry, I should have specified the immediate sequel, which would be
Ringworld Engineers.

> I've only gotten to the 3rd book in the series and think they've
> continued to go downhill.

The last one, fourth, did wrap it up pretty well. IMHO, of course.
<g>

Andre



--
" I'm a man... But, I can change... If I have to... I guess. "
The Man Prayer, Red Green.

[Ami Silberman]

"Reunite Gondwanaland" > wrote in message
...
> On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 04:44:08 GMT, Scott Lowther
> > wrote:
>
>> Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
>>
>> >On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 07:18:35 GMT, Scott Lowther
>> > wrote:
>> >
>> >>Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
>> >>
>> >>>On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:59:23 GMT, Scott Lowther
>> > wrote:
>
>> >>>We even exceeded Mach 3 now and then and we are civilian
>> >>>to the core.
>> >
>> >>Not really. Who's paying?
>> >
>> >The taxpayers, including both civilians and members of the military.
>> >They're paying through NASA, a civilian organization. They pay
>> >Treasury their taxes and Treasury, at the direction of the civilian
>> >legislative branch, pays the money out at the direction of NASA,
>> >actually.
>> >
>> Government employees, then.
>
> Well, yes, government employees are taxpayers, too. That's pretty
> obvious. But we spend everyone's taxes on NASA, not just the
> government employees'.
>
> Mary
>
> --
> Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer
> or

Uh oh. If the next thing that Scott posts is that government employee's
aren't civilians, we might have a clue as to the true identity of someone
whose unaffection nickname is the same as British Slang for "Plush Toys".

[OM]

On 30 Mar 2005 16:38:48 GMT, (Andre Lieven)
wrote:

>The last one, fourth, did wrap it up pretty well. IMHO, of course.

....And coming from a man who thinks Harlan Ellison's **** doesn't
stink, that "O" doesn't stand for much :-P

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[Steve Vernon]

"Reunite Gondwanaland" > wrote in message
...
On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 07:18:35 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:

> Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
>
> >On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:59:23 GMT, Scott Lowther
> > wrote:

> >>Remeber, we're talking about military. These are the guys who regualrly
> >>bust Mach 1 getting from here to there. Civilians do not do that.

> >Yes, we do.

> Indeed? Civilians *regualrly* bust Mach 1? Not since Concorde was
grounded.

We do so regularly. It's part of the PMCFs, if nothing else.

Conceded that you bust Mach 1 on a regular basis, but do you go from "here
to there"?
Or just from "here to here" not as a means of fast transportation, but
rather going to Mach
1 just to find out something about Mach 1.

Steve Vernon

[Pat Flannery]

Andre Lieven wrote:

>
>
>>I've only gotten to the 3rd book in the series and think they've
>>continued to go downhill.
>>
>>
>
>The last one, fourth, did wrap it up pretty well. IMHO, of course.
><g>
>
>
>
>

That was "God Emperor of Ringworld", wasn't it? ;-)

Pat

[D Schneider]

Andre Lieven > wrote:

>
> "Greg D. Moore \" ) writes:
[...]
>> Well, Niven's was a ring.. which is completely unstable. While a star
>> may float inside a sphere, inside a ring, once it goes off-center, it
>> continues to accelerate.
>
> Thats why the Ringworld had attitude control engines. The problem came
> from when the Ringworld civilisation fell, and the survivors decided
> that they could " harvest " those motors for starship engines, not having
> considered their purpose on the rim.
>
[...]

Does that mean we should attach attitude control engines to Saturn's
rings? There'd be lotsa local fuel around for steam jets....

/dps

--
Using Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/

[OM]

On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 11:45:48 -0800, "D Schneider"
> wrote:

>Does that mean we should attach attitude control engines to Saturn's
>rings? There'd be lotsa local fuel around for steam jets....

....This applies only to a solid, contiguous structure. Saturn's rings
have been proven to be anythng but.

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[Pat Flannery]

OM wrote:

>
>
>
>>Does that mean we should attach attitude control engines to Saturn's
>>rings? There'd be lotsa local fuel around for steam jets....
>>
>>
>
>...This applies only to a solid, contiguous structure. Saturn's rings
>have been proven to be anythng but.
>
>

It was James Maxwell in 1856 who first figured out that Saturn's rings
couldn't be solid, as the tidal stresses would rip them apart IIRC.

Pat

[Andre Lieven]

OM (om@our_blessed_lady_mary_of_the_holy_NASA_researc h_facility.org) writes:
> On 30 Mar 2005 16:38:48 GMT, (Andre Lieven)
> wrote:
>
>>The last one, fourth, did wrap it up pretty well. IMHO, of course.
>
> ...And coming from a man who thinks Harlan Ellison's **** doesn't
> stink,

No proof offered ? Claim fails.

I have had disagreements with Ellison's views, as I pretty much have
had, with anyone's. So, to state or imply that I hold Ellison's views
as somehow " above " that, is inaccurate and self-serving.

> that "O" doesn't stand for much :-P

As my general view about Ellison is in agreement with Hugo voters,
nebula voters, and the editors of the various best of the year's
fiction collections, I dare say that my " O " is well supported.

And, I will add that Larry Niven is a very gracious dinner guest,
too.

:-)

Andre
--
" I'm a man... But, I can change... If I have to... I guess. "
The Man Prayer, Red Green.

[Andre Lieven]

Pat Flannery ) writes:
> Andre Lieven wrote:
>>
>>>I've only gotten to the 3rd book in the series and think they've
>>>continued to go downhill.
>>
>>The last one, fourth, did wrap it up pretty well. IMHO, of course.
>><g>
>
> That was "God Emperor of Ringworld", wasn't it? ;-)

Well, it was the one where Louis Wu went to the Ringworld's desert
to " prepare to meet thy Dune ". <g>

Andre

--
" I'm a man... But, I can change... If I have to... I guess. "
The Man Prayer, Red Green.

[Andre Lieven]

"D Schneider" ) writes:
> Andre Lieven > wrote:
>
>> "Greg D. Moore \" ) writes:
> [...]
>>> Well, Niven's was a ring.. which is completely unstable. While a star
>>> may float inside a sphere, inside a ring, once it goes off-center, it
>>> continues to accelerate.
>>
>> Thats why the Ringworld had attitude control engines. The problem came
>> from when the Ringworld civilisation fell, and the survivors decided
>> that they could " harvest " those motors for starship engines, not having
>> considered their purpose on the rim.
>>
> [...]
>
> Does that mean we should attach attitude control engines to Saturn's
> rings?

Well, its not like the indiginous population is having a problem
with the spin cycles...

> There'd be lotsa local fuel around for steam jets....

But, what if we get thirsty ? <g>

Andre

--
" I'm a man... But, I can change... If I have to... I guess. "
The Man Prayer, Red Green.

[OM]

On 30 Mar 2005 21:24:22 GMT, (Andre Lieven)
wrote:

>As my general view about Ellison is in agreement with Hugo voters,
>nebula voters, and the editors of the various best of the year's
>fiction collections, I dare say that my " O " is well supported.

....Most of those chumps are just scared of Harlan and/or don't want to
hear him whining about not winning.

Bottom Line: he's still a whining little jerk, and when he finally
dies with our luck he'll get reincarnated as Spooky the Tuff Little
Ghost.

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[Andre Lieven]

OM (om@our_blessed_lady_mary_of_the_holy_NASA_researc h_facility.org) writes:
> On 30 Mar 2005 21:24:22 GMT, (Andre Lieven)
> wrote:
>
>>As my general view about Ellison is in agreement with Hugo voters,
>>nebula voters, and the editors of the various best of the year's
>>fiction collections, I dare say that my " O " is well supported.
>
> ...Most of those chumps are just scared of Harlan and/or don't want to
> hear him whining about not winning.

No proof offered ? Claim fails.

> Bottom Line: he's still a whining little jerk, and when he finally
> dies with our luck he'll get reincarnated as Spooky the Tuff Little
> Ghost.

Ad hominem. No argument offered, thus no refutation needed.

Hate is a poor way to spend life.

Andre

--
" I'm a man... But, I can change... If I have to... I guess. "
The Man Prayer, Red Green.

[Reunite Gondwanaland]

On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 13:12:06 -0500, "Steve Vernon"
> wrote:

>
> "Reunite Gondwanaland" > wrote in message
> ...
> On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 07:18:35 GMT, Scott Lowther
> > wrote:
>
> > Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
> >
> > >On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:59:23 GMT, Scott Lowther
> > > wrote:
>
> > >>Remeber, we're talking about military. These are the guys who regualrly
> > >>bust Mach 1 getting from here to there. Civilians do not do that.
>
> > >Yes, we do.
>
> > Indeed? Civilians *regualrly* bust Mach 1? Not since Concorde was
> grounded.
>
> We do so regularly. It's part of the PMCFs, if nothing else.
>
> Conceded that you bust Mach 1 on a regular basis, but do you go from "here
> to there"?

Sometimes. At least as much as the military, since most of their
flights are local (take-off and landing at the same place),
particularly the supersonic ones.

> Or just from "here to here" not as a means of fast transportation, but
> rather going to Mach
> 1 just to find out something about Mach 1.

Not for a PMCF, we don't. Those are never research flights because
they're only flown by support aircraft. Research aircraft don't fly
PMCFs. They're strictly for operation aircraft, not experimental
aircraft.

Mary

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer
or

[Scott Lowther]

Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:

>On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 04:44:08 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:
>
>
>
>>Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>>On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 07:18:35 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>>Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:59:23 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>>Remeber, we're talking about military. These are the guys who regualrly
>>>>>>bust Mach 1 getting from here to there. Civilians do not do that.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>Yes, we do.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>Indeed? Civilians *regualrly* bust Mach 1? Not since Concorde was grounded.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>We do so regularly. It's part of the PMCFs, if nothing else.
>>>
>>>
>>OK. Where can I buy a ticket to fly to Chicago?
>>
>>
>
>What makes you think I'm talking about commercial service? You just
>said "getting from here to there", not flying scheduled flights with
>passengers.
>
>
And just where do these putative civilains *regularly* go at supersonic
speeds?

[Steve Vernon]

"Reunite Gondwanaland" > wrote in message
...
On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 13:12:06 -0500, "Steve Vernon"
> wrote:

>
> "Reunite Gondwanaland" > wrote in message
> ...
> On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 07:18:35 GMT, Scott Lowther
> > wrote:
>
> > Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
> >
> > >On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:59:23 GMT, Scott Lowther
> > > wrote:
>
> > >>Remeber, we're talking about military. These are the guys who
regualrly
> > >>bust Mach 1 getting from here to there. Civilians do not do that.
>
> > >Yes, we do.
>
> > Indeed? Civilians *regualrly* bust Mach 1? Not since Concorde was
> grounded.
>
> We do so regularly. It's part of the PMCFs, if nothing else.
>
> Conceded that you bust Mach 1 on a regular basis, but do you go from "here
> to there"?

Sometimes. At least as much as the military, since most of their
flights are local (take-off and landing at the same place),
particularly the supersonic ones.

> Or just from "here to here" not as a means of fast transportation, but
> rather going to Mach
> 1 just to find out something about Mach 1.

Not for a PMCF, we don't. Those are never research flights because
they're only flown by support aircraft. Research aircraft don't fly
PMCFs. They're strictly for operation aircraft, not experimental
aircraft.

Ok then. Learn something new every day. BTW what does PMCF stand for?

Steve Vernon

[Scott Lowther]

Pat Flannery wrote:

>
>
> Scott Lowther wrote:
>
>> Pat Flannery wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> There are two things about this rosy scenario that make me think
>>> that implementing it might be a tad harder to accomplish than it at
>>> first seems:
>>>
>>> 1.) The Sea Dragon's designer is the man who built the rocket to
>>> shoot Evel Kneival across the Snake River Canyon... it got around
>>> halfway across.
>>
>>
>>
>> So? The parachute system screwed up. Same thing happened with von
>> Braun's A-3.
>
>
> I was just pointing out that his design, simple as it was, had defects
> in it.

And Rutan's Voyager's wingtips broke off. **** happens, and only a MORON
takes that as a sign that the preliminary designer had a flawed concept.

>
> This guy has a Moller/Bede/Barnum smell about him. If he's such a
> brilliant inspired designer, how come he's trying to shoot a guy in a
> cape over a canyon, and another guy in a cape up in a homemade rocket,
> rather than working at The Skunk Works on the FDL-5?

Perhaps because shooting a guy over a cayon was a project that actually
went somewhere?


> The more I consider his history, the more the sign that points toward
> the Sea Dragon factory reads "To The Egress!". :-D
> For starters, we had serious combustion instability problems with a
> motor the size of an F-1. Sea Dragon has a first stage motor bell the
> size of a small volcanic crater...exactly how simple is it going to be
> to get smooth combustion in an engine of that size?

Won;t know until we try.


> This should be another warning- he's getting ideas from science
> fiction, and taking them seriously as possible real-world engineering.

Oy vey. How many real-world sceintists and engineers were inspired by
Jules Verne or Star Trek?


> It's supposed to work the other way around- the scientists and
> engineers come up with a new idea, and the science fiction writers
> extrapolate on it and show what it might lead to.

Sometimes. I guess you don't read too much science fiction, or you'd
know that a great many of the things we have today were first envisioned
by sci-fi authors.


> To have it go the other way shows that Dyson's engineering experience
> might not be too firmly grounded in day-to-day reality

So what? Dyson was not and is not an engineer. Neither was Einstein.

How does your strange little arguement point a flaw in the notion of a
cloud of a vast number of space colonies, when the guy was talkign about
civilizations vastly more advanced than ours?

>
>
> Hey, you're the guy who wants to fly the seat-of-your-pants hypersonic
> bombing run in the Dyna-Soar; I really want to see how you work the
> sextant with one hand while you fiddle with your joystick with the other.

You have outlived your interestingness.

<plonk>

[OM]

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 01:43:01 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:

>Oy vey. How many real-world sceintists and engineers were inspired by
>Jules Verne or Star Trek?

....A lot more than most people either admit or give credit for, it
would seem.

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[OM]

On 30 Mar 2005 23:06:33 GMT, (Andre Lieven)
wrote:

<Rest of Andre's circular brownnosing of Angry Smurf deleted>

>Hate is a poor way to spend life.

....Which is why Harlan needs to hurry up and put himself out of our
misery.


OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[Reunite Gondwanaland]

On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 20:36:50 -0500, "Steve Vernon"
> wrote:


> Ok then. Learn something new every day. BTW what does PMCF stand for?

I'm sorry, I wrote it out and then edited it away.

A PMCF is a Post-Maintenance Check Flight. It's a pre-defined flight
that you go through to be sure that everything got fixed correctly
after you do certain kind of maintenance, like changing out an engine.

The reason research aircraft don't fly PMCFs is that they're always
having being maintained, unlike operational aircraft. If we did PMCFs
every time we did any maintenance, we'd never fly any research
flights. We do engine runs to check that part, though.

Speaking of PMCFs, except that they have a different name, the
airlines have test pilots who fly check flights on airliners after
major maintenance and before revenue flights. You'll never ride on an
airliner that's just out of the "take it apart into bits on the hangar
floor and then put it back together" level of maintenance because some
brave, underpaid[1] test pilot will have already taken the risks to be
sure you don't have to.

[1] They make about a third what the senior captains do and they work
a lot more hours, according to my friend who is one

Mary
..
--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer
or

[Reunite Gondwanaland]

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 01:43:01 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:

> And Rutan's Voyager's wingtips broke off.

Actually the winglets, not wingtips, got rubbed off going down the
runway at takeoff, because the wings drooped more than they thought
they would.

Mary

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer
or

[Andre Lieven]

OM (om@our_blessed_lady_mary_of_the_holy_NASA_researc h_facility.org) writes:
> On 30 Mar 2005 23:06:33 GMT, (Andre Lieven)
> wrote:
>
> <Rest of Andre's circular brownnosing of Angry Smurf deleted>

Thanks for proving your prejudice, which is a form of bigotry, if
you are *unable* to even let my own words speak for me, rather
than fulfill your Fox "News" like need to create straw women for
yourself...

>>Hate is a poor way to spend life.
>
> ...Which is why Harlan needs to hurry up and put himself out of our
> misery.

Your inability to perform self diagnosis is thus shown, and your deep
seated, and pathological hate, that of the religiously moved True
Believer. The kind that burnt the Library of Alexandria.

But, that last comment of yours... just makes my original point all the
more for me.

I prefer not to interact with projecting knee jerking ideologues.
So, as my taking of my responsibilities, I think that I will decline
any further posting with you, as it can serve no good purpose. That
doesn't mean that I won't read you, as you do offer good stuff, when
you stay on topic, and with the facts.

But, my life is on a very positive track these days, and interacting
with pathological haters isn't something that will help that.

Andre

--
" I'm a man... But, I can change... If I have to... I guess. "
The Man Prayer, Red Green.

[Scott Lowther]

OM wrote:

>On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 01:43:01 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:
>
>
>
>>Oy vey. How many real-world sceintists and engineers were inspired by
>>Jules Verne or Star Trek?
>>
>>
>
>...A lot more than most people either admit or give credit for, it
>would seem.
>
>
Indeed. It does not matter than the Columbiad would be a suicidal way to
get to the moon, or that transporters break numerous laws of physics, or
that the Nautilus could not possibly submerge that deep. What matters is
the sense of hope and inspiration that science fiction, even sometimes
the cheesist sci-fi, can inspire in people. Poeple can be inspired by
what they see or read, and want to devote their lives to making it
happen in some way.

[Scott Lowther]

Peter Stickney wrote:

>>>
>>>
>>And just where do these putative civilains *regularly* go at supersonic
>>speeds?
>>
>>
>
>If you're one of the several civilian owners of supersonic aircraft
>(The U.S. Civil Register has a bunch of MiG-21s, 3 or 4 F-104s, an
>F-4, some T-38s, an F-100, an F-8, and a Draken or two that aren't
>being flown by NASA or whoever took over from Tracor), then there's a
>supersonic corridor over Lake Superior. IIRC, it's also possible just
>off the coasts. All you need are friends, and money.
>
>
Again: how *regularly* do civvies bust Mach 1 just to get someplace?

[Peter Stickney]

In article >,
Scott Lowther > writes:
> Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
>
>>On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 04:44:08 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>>Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>>On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 07:18:35 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>Reunite Gondwanaland wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>>On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:59:23 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>Remeber, we're talking about military. These are the guys who regualrly
>>>>>>>bust Mach 1 getting from here to there. Civilians do not do that.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>Yes, we do.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>Indeed? Civilians *regualrly* bust Mach 1? Not since Concorde was grounded.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>We do so regularly. It's part of the PMCFs, if nothing else.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>OK. Where can I buy a ticket to fly to Chicago?
>>>
>>>
>>
>>What makes you think I'm talking about commercial service? You just
>>said "getting from here to there", not flying scheduled flights with
>>passengers.
>>
>>
> And just where do these putative civilains *regularly* go at supersonic
> speeds?

If you're one of the several civilian owners of supersonic aircraft
(The U.S. Civil Register has a bunch of MiG-21s, 3 or 4 F-104s, an
F-4, some T-38s, an F-100, an F-8, and a Draken or two that aren't
being flown by NASA or whoever took over from Tracor), then there's a
supersonic corridor over Lake Superior. IIRC, it's also possible just
off the coasts. All you need are friends, and money.
(Oh, yeah, and if it's one of the MiG-21s, a landing spot close by.
It took Dave Sutton 3 stops to get his MiG-21 from Burlington, VT to
Deepiniharta, New Jersey.

--
Pete Stickney

Without data, all you have are opinions

[Pat Flannery]

Andre Lieven wrote:.

>And, I will add that Larry Niven is a very gracious dinner guest,
>too.
>
>:-)
>
>

Right up till the time he extends his claws, growls "Food!" in the
Hero's Tongue, and tries to eat your arm.
He's been kicked out of more than one household for behavior like that-
generally with his host's rear leg.

Pat

[Pat Flannery]

Andre Lieven wrote:

>Well, it was the one where Louis Wu went to the Ringworld's desert
>to " prepare to meet thy Dune ". <g>
>
>
>

No, this one is where Leto II meets Vaughn Bode and becomes the
inspiration for the comic character
"Sietch Wizard". :-)

Pat

[OM]

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 05:03:17 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:

>Indeed. It does not matter than the Columbiad would be a suicidal way to
>get to the moon, or that transporters break numerous laws of physics, or
>that the Nautilus could not possibly submerge that deep. What matters is
>the sense of hope and inspiration that science fiction, even sometimes
>the cheesist sci-fi, can inspire in people. Poeple can be inspired by
>what they see or read, and want to devote their lives to making it
>happen in some way.

....Agreed. And that's part of what dreams are all about. Sometimes
you've got to go through with them, even if physics is stacked against
you.

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[OM]

On 31 Mar 2005 04:39:37 GMT, (Andre "Harlan
Ellison's Favorite Brownnoser Next To Tom Galloway" Lieven) wrote:

>Thanks for proving your prejudice, which is a form of bigotry, if
>you are *unable* to even let my own words speak for me, rather
>than fulfill your Fox "News" like need to create straw women for
>yourself.

....Hmm. Harlan Ellison as a straw woman. Throw in a lit match, and
I'll buy one, Andre.

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[OM]

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 00:47:13 -0600, Pat Flannery >
wrote:

>No, this one is where Leto II meets Vaughn Bode and becomes the
>inspiration for the comic character >"Sietch Wizard". :-)

....Pat, you're cut off for a week after that one.

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[OM]

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 00:39:51 -0600, Pat Flannery >
wrote:

>Right up till the time he extends his claws, growls "Food!" in the
>Hero's Tongue, and tries to eat your arm.

....No, that's Harlan. Larry just chews the carpet and brings you only
one of your slippers.

....On a side note, Andre? I'm currently listening to some old "Dr.
Demento" shows. I'm hereby dedicating "Deteriorata" to you, son.

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Lowther wrote:

>>
>>
>> I was just pointing out that his design, simple as it was, had
>> defects in it.
>
>
> And Rutan's Voyager's wingtips broke off. **** happens, and only a
> MORON takes that as a sign that the preliminary designer had a flawed
> concept.


The thing was a leaky pressure cooker with fins and a cockpit on it, and
worked about as well as something Wile E. Coyote got from Acme....come
to think of it, it also _looked_ like something Wile E. Coyote got from
Acme.

>
>>
>> This guy has a Moller/Bede/Barnum smell about him. If he's such a
>> brilliant inspired designer, how come he's trying to shoot a guy in a
>> cape over a canyon, and another guy in a cape up in a homemade
>> rocket, rather than working at The Skunk Works on the FDL-5?
>
>
> Perhaps because shooting a guy over a cayon was a project that
> actually went somewhere?


Yeah, right into the canyon... hey, he should have worked on Copper
Canyon.

>
>
>
>> The more I consider his history, the more the sign that points toward
>> the Sea Dragon factory reads "To The Egress!". :-D
>> For starters, we had serious combustion instability problems with a
>> motor the size of an F-1. Sea Dragon has a first stage motor bell the
>> size of a small volcanic crater...exactly how simple is it going to
>> be to get smooth combustion in an engine of that size?
>
>
> Won;t know until we try.
>
>
>> This should be another warning- he's getting ideas from science
>> fiction, and taking them seriously as possible real-world engineering.
>
>
> Oy vey. How many real-world sceintists and engineers were inspired by
> Jules Verne or Star Trek?


I'm pretty sure Gerald Bull's space cannon was inspired by Jules
Verne....who was smart enough not to have The Baltimore Gun Club try to
bombard Israel with it.
But Hyman Rickover didn't demand his Nautilus do 60 mph or punch holes
in Soviet ships with a bow ram.
And unlike Star Trek, our spaceship Enterprise hardly ever had a
perilous adventure, which is more than you can say for its sisters,
unfortunately.

>
>
>
>> It's supposed to work the other way around- the scientists and
>> engineers come up with a new idea, and the science fiction writers
>> extrapolate on it and show what it might lead to.
>
>
> Sometimes. I guess you don't read too much science fiction,


No, I don't....I used to read it fairly often, but as I got older the
stories looked more and more improbable, and less and less well written.

> or you'd know that a great many of the things we have today were first
> envisioned by sci-fi authors.


I did notice that the original Orion design looks more than a little
like Verne's "Columbia"...but I still want Cavorite for my spaceship.

>
>
>
>> To have it go the other way shows that Dyson's engineering experience
>> might not be too firmly grounded in day-to-day reality
>
>
> So what? Dyson was not and is not an engineer.


Yeah, and you can tell that, too. Especially in regards to the price of
the Saturn V Orion Mars project.

> Neither was Einstein.


And other than that work to fix the Navy's torpedo fuze, he stuck to
what he knew about. Being a former patent office employee, he could
probably spot whacky ideas a light year off.

>
> How does your strange little arguement point a flaw in the notion of a
> cloud of a vast number of space colonies, when the guy was talkign
> about civilizations vastly more advanced than ours?


Apparently ones where the laws of gravity don't apply, given the thought
of all those thousands and thousands of solar collectors orbiting around
the star in every inclination from zero to ninety degrees. This reminds
me of the book "The Future Of Flight" by Leik Myrabo and Dean Ing.
They've got wonderful ideas for laser powered surface-to-space craft
that are going to change the world; and all we need to make them work
are a vast array of 10 GW lasers in orbit...okay...so that's around a
thousand times more powerful than any laser that's been built, so there
might be a few small hurdles to leap...but its been only 20 years since
the book was written they've already have shot a laser-powered vehicle
the size of a small pie tin nearly 250 feet into the air! And they did
that five whole years ago, as shown in their current "Breaking News":
http://www.lightcrafttechnologies.com/news.html
By now they might have cracked 1000 feet!

>
>>
>>
>> Hey, you're the guy who wants to fly the seat-of-your-pants
>> hypersonic bombing run in the Dyna-Soar; I really want to see how you
>> work the sextant with one hand while you fiddle with your joystick
>> with the other.
>
>
> You have outlived your interestingness.


And interest itself, given the 18¢ in my bank account at the moment. On
a lark I should reply to one of those Nigerian bank fraud emails and let
them embezzle it...God knows, given the standard of living in Nigeria,
they might actually try. :-)
I admire your in-depth responses and trenchant citations to back up your
positions on this and other topics. Don't worry, I won't killfill
you...I find your take on spelling far too amusing to ever lose. And who
can forget when you posted a link to a photo of yourself to the
newsgroup...the one where you were flipping the finger at everybody?:
http://www.up-ship.com/Dscf0008.jpg
That's a great photo, it shows not only an individual, but even an
individual's attitude.

>
>
> <plonk>


(How long does everyone think it will be before that photo vanishes from
his website? I've saved a copy, and here's the posting that it came
from:
http://groups-beta.google.com/group/sci.space.history/msg/c1a523bda532aa7c
God, but I love having the ability to remember obscuria from years
ago... :-) )

Pat

[Pat Flannery]

OM wrote:

>On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 01:43:01 GMT, Scott Lowther
> wrote:
>
>
>
>>Oy vey. How many real-world sceintists and engineers were inspired by
>>Jules Verne or Star Trek?
>>
>>
>
>...A lot more than most people either admit or give credit for, it
>would seem.
>
>

Thunderbirds was supposed to be big in the British aircraft designer's
community...and you know, you really can picture a HOTOL in
International Rescue markings, can't you?


Pat

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Lowther wrote:

> Indeed. It does not matter than the Columbiad would be a suicidal way
> to get to the moon, or that transporters break numerous laws of
> physics, or that the Nautilus could not possibly submerge that deep.


That eight meter long, 20,000 to 25,000 kg giant squid is a bit on the
odd side also; no wonder it could stop the sub's prop with its beak-
that sucker's made out of solid iron!
You forgot the hollow earth, and the fact that the Albatross is made
out of cardboard and driven by cutting through the magnetic lines of
force around the Earth.

> What matters is the sense of hope and inspiration that science
> fiction, even sometimes the cheesist sci-fi, can inspire in people.
> Poeple can be inspired by what they see or read, and want to devote
> their lives to making it happen in some way.


Let's hope they aren't watching the Planet Of The Apes movies, we don't
need that **** going down.

Pat

[Herb Schaltegger]

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 03:00:23 -0600, Pat Flannery wrote
(in article >):

> .I find your take on spelling far too amusing to ever lose. And who
> can forget when you posted a link to a photo of yourself to the
> newsgroup...the one where you were flipping the finger at everybody?:
> http://www.up-ship.com/Dscf0008.jpg
> That's a great photo, it shows not only an individual, but even an
> individual's attitude.
>
>>

The Johnny Cash version was better . . . :-)

<http://macante.tripod.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/cashfi
nger.jpg>

--
Herb Schaltegger, GPG Key ID: BBF6FC1C
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin, 1759
<http://www.angryherb.net>

[Andre Lieven]

Pat Flannery ) writes:
> Andre Lieven wrote:.
>
>>And, I will add that Larry Niven is a very gracious dinner guest,
>>too.
>>
>>:-)
>
> Right up till the time he extends his claws, growls "Food!" in the
> Hero's Tongue, and tries to eat your arm.

Actually, we found him to be almost... shy.

> He's been kicked out of more than one household for behavior like that-
> generally with his host's rear leg.

No, that was Jerry Pournelle... <g>

Andre

--
" I'm a man... But, I can change... If I have to... I guess. "
The Man Prayer, Red Green.

[Scott Lowther]

Herb Schaltegger wrote:

>On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 03:00:23 -0600, Pat Flannery wrote
>(in article >):
>
>
>
>>.I find your take on spelling far too amusing to ever lose. And who
>>can forget when you posted a link to a photo of yourself to the
>>newsgroup...the one where you were flipping the finger at everybody?:
>>http://www.up-ship.com/Dscf0008.jpg
>>That's a great photo, it shows not only an individual, but even an
>>individual's attitude.
>>
>>
>>
>
>The Johnny Cash version was better . . . :-)
>

Indeed it was. I guess Johnny's ability to look ****ed off at whatever
it was he was ****ed off at was better than my ability on 9-11-2001,
which was when that picture of me was taken.

Here's a more recent one:

http://up-ship.com/Stuff/close-enough.jpg

[Scott Hedrick]

"Reunite Gondwanaland" > wrote in message
...
> Well, yes, government employees are taxpayers, too.

Mary, dear, *government* isn't exactly "civilian", regardless of what the
law says.

My business, Southern Justice, is an entirely civilian entity, because it
was created by a civilian (that is, non-government) person and is funded
entirely by those who want the service from non-government funds. Legal Aid
Services, or what's left of it, performs many of the same functions as my
business, but it is funded (poorly) by the government, with occasional
largess from lawyers with a guilt complex. NASA is a government agency,
funded with government money (although, if it were permitted, I'd certainly
volunteer funds for specific projects, like keeping the Vikings running).

I am paid from whatever desperate party that manages to enter my door. You,
on the other hand, were paid by an entity that extracted money by threat of
force, some of whom did not want your immediate employer to exist at all.

"Military" is a subset of "government". Using a Venn diagram, NASA would be
both a "civilian" and a "government" organization, which makes it
"quasi-civilian" at best. You're a civilian *now*, Mary. You *were*
non-military government.

Of course, what you *really* are is an indispensable member of the group,
and we fall down and worship you.

What I'd like to see is you...in that itsy bitsy teeny weenie yellow polka
dot bikini...sunning on the teak deck of my catamaran, hand raised to get
the attention of the thong-clad cabin boy toting the tray of margaritas...

First, I'll have to finish the deck. Well, actually, *first*, I'll have to
buy the boat...

[David Higgins]

Scott Lowther wrote:
> Here's a more recent one:
>
> http://up-ship.com/Stuff/close-enough.jpg

LOL.

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Lowther wrote:

>
> Indeed it was. I guess Johnny's ability to look ****ed off at whatever
> it was he was ****ed off at was better than my ability on 9-11-2001,
> which was when that picture of me was taken.


Jeeze, I thought you'd seen a lawyer or something. :-)

Pat

[Ami Silberman]

"Scott Hedrick" > wrote in message
...
>
> "Reunite Gondwanaland" > wrote in message
> ...
>> Well, yes, government employees are taxpayers, too.
>
> Mary, dear, *government* isn't exactly "civilian", regardless of what the
> law says.
>

Or the dictionary. You are getting perilously close to espousing arguments
last heard from the mouth of he who should not be named. (You can guess
which one.) So, was the Apollo program military or civilian?

[Pat Flannery]

Ami Silberman wrote:

>Or the dictionary. You are getting perilously close to espousing arguments
>last heard from the mouth of he who should not be named. (You can guess
>which one.) So, was the Apollo program military or civilian?
>

Since Apollo 12 had a all-Navy crew, does that mean that both Yankee
Clipper and Intrepid were comissioned Naval vessals?
It's time we all checked up on our knowledge about the Moon and Apollo,
don't you think? Rusty isn't the only one who can find obscure NASA
pdfs: http://ares.jsc.nasa.gov/Education/publications/curatorcolorbook.pdf

Pat

[OM]

On Fri, 1 Apr 2005 13:08:20 -0500, "Ami Silberman" >
wrote:

>Or the dictionary. You are getting perilously close to espousing arguments
>last heard from the mouth of he who should not be named. (You can guess
>which one.)

....Oh, **** Brad Guth.

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[OM]

On Fri, 01 Apr 2005 12:40:17 -0600, Pat Flannery >
wrote:

>Since Apollo 12 had a all-Navy crew, does that mean that both Yankee
>Clipper and Intrepid were comissioned Naval vessals?

....Considering I argued this way back as a Mid/4c back in '80 with one
of my NOI's, this works for me. In fact, once I get this promised 3DS
file of the CSM from someone who claims he's got a really good version
of one, I'll reskin it accordingly. Can'd determine if I want
Battleship Grey or Angels Blue, but I *will* add kill stickers in the
shape of a Soyuz or two :-)

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[OM]

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 21:18:07 -0500, "Scott Hedrick"
> wrote:

>My business, Southern Justice...

....So, what procedures do *you* use for a proper lynching under your
jurisdiction?

Grand DragOM

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

[Scott Hedrick]

"Ami Silberman" > wrote in message
...
> So, was the Apollo program military or civilian?

It was *government*.

[Scott Hedrick]

"OM" <om@our_blessed_lady_mary_of_the_holy_NASA_research _facility.org> wrote
in message ...
>Can'd determine if I want
> Battleship Grey or Angels Blue, but I *will* add kill stickers in the
> shape of a Soyuz or two :-)

Please send me a copy, jpg or gif format. If I ever complete the new edition
of my "Interplanetary Conflict" game, it would be appropriate.

[Scott Hedrick]

"OM" <om@our_blessed_lady_mary_of_the_holy_NASA_research _facility.org> wrote
in message ...
> On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 21:18:07 -0500, "Scott Hedrick"
> > wrote:
>
> >My business, Southern Justice...
>
> ...So, what procedures do *you* use for a proper lynching under your
> jurisdiction?

My dear OM, whenever someone opposes my father in court, it *is* a lynching.

[Pat Flannery]

Scott Hedrick wrote:

>Please send me a copy, jpg or gif format. If I ever complete the new edition
>of my "Interplanetary Conflict" game, it would be appropriate.
>
>
>

I assume it's going to be going up against this thing and _its_ cool
paint job.
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/soyuzvi.htm

Pat

[Andrew Gray]

On 2005-03-30, Pat Flannery > wrote:
>
>>...This applies only to a solid, contiguous structure. Saturn's rings
>>have been proven to be anythng but.
>
> It was James Maxwell in 1856 who first figured out that Saturn's rings
> couldn't be solid, as the tidal stresses would rip them apart IIRC.

I believe he also proved they couldn't be fluid either, and therefore
had to be particulate. One of his more impressive proofs. But he came up
with better.

Somewhere around here I have a copy of "A Problem In Dynamics"; the only
poem I've ever seen to include an introductory diagram and have nine
equations as footnotes... the proof of the problem was correct, too. You
have to admire the guy.


Ah, here it is - http://www.livejournal.com/users/shimgray/46063.html

--
-Andrew Gray

[Derek Lyons]

Pat Flannery > wrote:

>>It mentions in the Orion book that they showed on to Kennedy that
>>would have been armed with numerous 25 Mt bombs and that his reaction
>>was 'appalled". With Orion and Project Pluto on the drawing boards
>>it's hard to imagine the Russians ever topping those two as far as
>>scariness goes.
>
>And of course the obvious question is how exactly difficult would it be
>to intercept a warhead coming in from the Lagrange point beyond the Moon
>if you had a couple of days to do it in?

Medium hard to difficult actually.

First you have to spot the warhead... then you have to have an
interceptors positioned to take advantage of the detection. Which
pretty much means either some biggish ones waiting in orbit, or the
ability to launch on short notice, or terminal (point defense)
systems.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL

[Ami Silberman]

"OM" <om@our_blessed_lady_mary_of_the_holy_NASA_research _facility.org> wrote
in message ...
> On Fri, 1 Apr 2005 13:08:20 -0500, "Ami Silberman" >
> wrote:
>
>>Or the dictionary. You are getting perilously close to espousing arguments
>>last heard from the mouth of he who should not be named. (You can guess
>>which one.)
>
> ...Oh, **** Brad Guth.
>
> OM
>
Is that your final answer?

[meiza]

Scott Lowther > wrote:

> Once parity in power was reached in Cislunar space, then clearly
> dominance would be determined in the asteroid belt, and then in the
> Jovian Trojan asteroids, then in the Jovian system, then around Saturn,
> etc. I'd be just crushed if in this alternate history, by the year 2005,
> we had a raging arms race (with all the attendant logistics and supply
> chains, with hundreds of manned bases betweeen here and there) out in
> the Oort cloud.

> That'd be just tragic.

Have you by happenstance read Stanislaw Lem's "Fiasco"? :)
It's published in 1986 when the arms race was still going
on, although it deals with the subject in an indirect way.

--
meiza

[Scott Hedrick]

"Damon Hill" > wrote in message
31...
> Why has the Big Dumb Booster never caught on? Seems like it could have
> been scaled down to EELV level... Beal did try to go that design route;
> SpaceX didn't.

Gimme OTRAG any day!