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wrote in message
... Well, yabut, not everyone wants to go into space. Sure it's grand what he's doing and he's being wonderfully unique about his approach, but it's freakishly expensive to do and horrifyingly dangerous. I wish he'd come back down to earth and help reduce the cost of ordinary fixed wing flying, instead of spending millions on something that incredibly few people will benefit from. Corky............ Unless you can figger out some way to keep humans from breeding like lemmings, the only other alternative for survival is more real estate. "Incredibly few people"? This is the most important thing for the future of us ALL. Rich S. |
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On Thu, 24 Jun 2004 05:28:59 GMT, Ron Wanttaja
wrote: Anyway, you do have it backwards...orbital velocity decreases with circular orbit altitude. ~25,200 FPS at 200 nm, ~10,100 FPS at geosynchronous altitude (~19320 NM). You're right about the potential energy, though. Dropping from geosynchronous altitude to ground level, you'll hit the atmosphere at over 23,000 miles per hour. And if you're an old-timer like BOb, you'll have the turn-signal flashing the entire way.... Thanks. I've had an aversion to orbits ever since an undergraduate dynamics final exam question: "There is an object over the pole. It's polar coordinates and velocity are _______. Should we launch a counterstrike?" A question from a world which is now mostly gone. RWR, RIP. An example of the velocity-altitude plot I mentioned is at: http://www.ase.uc.edu/~munday/pics/trajectories.ppt You can see Mach 3 is a long way from the STS (Shuttle) LEO return. I assume AOTV is that winged orbit transfer trick you refered to, Ron. -- David Munday - Webpage: http://www.ase.uc.edu/~munday "Adopt, Adapt, and Improve" -- Motto of the Round Table |
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On Thu, 24 Jun 2004 07:52:56 -0500, Darrel Toepfer
wrote: Ron Wanttaja wrote: By the way, NASA has "Astronauts," Russia has "Cosmonauts." We need a name for the ordinary folks who fly on SpaceShipOne: I hereby suggest "Commonauts" for those lucky SOBs who get to ride Burt's space bird. Can't they be "Space"men? er. Spacepeople, what was I thinking... G "Please take me along, I won't do anything wrong." Dave "Byrds and Beas" Munday -- David Munday - Webpage: http://www.ase.uc.edu/~munday "Adopt, Adapt, and Improve" -- Motto of the Round Table |
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On Thu, 24 Jun 2004 15:47:49 +0100, anonymous coward
wrote: The difference is Apollo 1 was flooded with pure O2 where jet fighters push O2 from a LOX converter to a face mask. Big difference. Even then, Chuck Yeager get half his face burnt in a fire when he ejected, IIRC. You're right, but he didn't get burned because of his oxygen mask. He got hit in the face by the still-glowing rocket motor that had powered the ejection seat. Ron Wanttaja |
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Ron Wanttaja wrote:
You're right about the potential energy, though. Dropping from geosynchronous altitude to ground level, you'll hit the atmosphere at over 23,000 miles per hour. And if you're an old-timer like BOb, you'll have the turn-signal flashing the entire way.... Ron Wanttaja Hey Ron, help me out some more here on rec.aviation.homebuilt.spacecraft. For the reentry phase from orbit... For the sake of argument (and ignoring the increased fuel required) wouldn't slowing down too much before reentry be a problem? Steeper path, higher G load, and even more reentry heat? Richard (air breathing, gravity bound) Lamb |
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On 24 Jun 2004 10:11:45 -0700, (pacplyer) wrote: Ron, No one's sneering at brilliant aerospace Columbus types like you guys Ron. But the era of expensive government-only exploration is over. Burt Rutan is Mayflower. He's trying to get the rest of us slobs over to the New World for a new life. What Burt *has* always sneered at is the lack of follow through by the government so that all this fantastic technology will trickle down to the common man. The common man is what Burt has always been about. Well, yabut, not everyone wants to go into space. Sure it's grand what he's doing and he's being wonderfully unique about his approach, but it's freakishly expensive to do and horrifyingly dangerous. I wish he'd come back down to earth and help reduce the cost of ordinary fixed wing flying, instead of spending millions on something that incredibly few people will benefit from. Corky Scott Let's see, he's done quite a bit towards making aircraft cheaper with his composite designs and innovations. Who knows what spinnoffs will come from this program? Dan, U.S. Air Force, retired |
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On Fri, 25 Jun 2004 01:03:19 +0000, Ron Wanttaja wrote:
On Thu, 24 Jun 2004 15:47:49 +0100, anonymous coward wrote: The difference is Apollo 1 was flooded with pure O2 where jet fighters push O2 from a LOX converter to a face mask. Big difference. Even then, Chuck Yeager get half his face burnt in a fire when he ejected, IIRC. You're right, but he didn't get burned because of his oxygen mask. He got hit in the face by the still-glowing rocket motor that had powered the ejection seat. http://www.ejectionsite.com/f104seat.htm has a paragraph about the accident. The motor started his suit burning, but the oxygen made the fire burn much more fiercly. AC |
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On Thu, 24 Jun 2004 22:05:10 GMT, Dillon Pyron
wrote: On Thu, 24 Jun 2004 16:32:15 -0400, wrote: Well, yabut, not everyone wants to go into space. Sure it's grand what he's doing and he's being wonderfully unique about his approach, but it's freakishly expensive to do and horrifyingly dangerous. That's what people told my ancestors when they shipped out to Jamestown. True, but when your ancestors arrived, they had atmosphere they could breathe, water they could drink, wind that would power any ships they cared to build from the wood that surrounded them, and fertile ground that would, with luck, provide limited ready-to-eat food and allow them to grow the foodstuffs they'd need to survive. The solar system isn't suitable for colonization. Nowhere but on Earth can humans survive without a HUGE infrastructure first being established. That costs money; money not likely to be available without some sort of chance of the investors receiving a return on the investment. Even if it's government funded, most taxpayers will never benefit from it. The keystone of that required infrastructure is reliable, low-cost, *high-capacity* space transportation. Emphasis on 'high capacity.' I can go out and buy a launch vehicle for $8 million, but all that gets me is about 500 pounds into a 1000 mile circular orbit. Apollo made it to the Moon, but with only enough infrastructure to support two humans for a few days (plus a return trip, of course...not needed if the occupants are colonists). I'd be willing to bet that the rest of the infrastructure necessary to support space colony life exists. We can probably develop movable factories to manufacture air from lunar or martian soil, we can probably come up with the hydroponic farms to grow food, and nuclear power can provide the juice. It's just the problem of *getting* it there. How much mass would have to be soft-landed on the Moon to be able to send over a "colony kit," complete with air-generators, power plants, water-distillers, air locks, structural beams, and hydroponics farms sufficient to set up a vacuum-based colony that'll support, say, 100 people. A half-ton per person, maybe? Plus you have the assembly crew, who'll need air, power, water, and rations until the colony is set up. Not to mention the lander itself, and the mining equipment needed to dig up and process the hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen-bearing ore that will have to be there to have any hope of the colony being viable. We're probably talking a million pounds. I agree with Rich that population is the world's biggest problem. But terraforming the Sahara or the seabed is almost within the grasp of current technology, while soft-landing a million pounds on the moon is not. The Apollo LM weighed about 32,000 pounds and probably had about 25,000 pounds of payload capacity (one-way trip). So you'd need ~40 Saturn Vs to set up one 100-person colony. To quote Larry Niven: "The entire universe is waiting for us to invent anti-gravity." :-) Ron Wanttaja |
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