The thrust of curiosity that leads men to try to go where no one has gone before. (The Space thread)

[G'day Mate]

Why do people think Nasa are in the business of faking a photo of the moon? What's Nasa got to gain from it?

[Godson]

Exposure. ;)

[Alan P]

Mind=blown.

http://i.imgur.com/7S93or7.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/7S93or7.jpg

It's BIG.

Blows my mind that some worlds have clouds, CLOUDS of metals.

[G'day Mate]

I found Earth! Mars was pretty well hidden too

[Leon]

This is just an awesome time (era) to be a space nerd.

There is just SO MUCH stuff happening and being discovered at the moment.

[Rare White Ape]

I gotta disagree Leon. I'm born too early to explore space, born too late to explore the earth.

Although 1960 would have been a nice time to be 20 years old. Good drugs, excellent music, and awesome automobiles dotted the landscape.

[overpowered]

http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/styles/full_width/public/thumbnails/image/nh-pluto-day_1.jpg

http://www.nasa.gov/feature/a-day-on-pluto-a-day-on-charon

[Random]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pillaOxGCo

Blue Origin broke the 100km "barrier" and managed to land their rocket stage safely. :up: :up:

Boy, that thing comes screaming in! :D :eek:

[Freude am Fahren]

That capsule landing looks a bit rough! Would it be meant for water?

[Rare White Ape]

That landing does look a bit rough but...

[PURE SPORCULATION AHEAD]

Yes that's right. Sporculation.

It looked to me like it has landing rockets like the Soyuz capsules do, which fire a few meters off the ground to dampen the impact, which explains the dust cloud.

Secondly, if it was designed for water splashdown they would have tested it over water. But this gizmo looks like it is selling suborbital flights to paying tourists and a water landing would be unsuitable and a tad dangerous* for this sort of thing, I'm guessing.



*relative to the whole exercise of putting a number of humans in a can and exploding stuff behind them until they fly out of the atmosphere, that is.

[Crazed_Insanity]

So awesome to see these tech companies or folks using profits made from tech companies to do some 'real' engineering such as rockets, planes and automobiles! :up:

[Freude am Fahren]

That landing does look a bit rough but...It looked to me like it has landing rockets like the Soyuz capsules do, which fire a few meters off the ground to dampen the impact, which explains the dust cloud.

I think you're right. I thought the cloud looked big for the speed, which doesn't look too bad. Watching again, it looks like the cloud does come just before touchdown.

[overpowered]

Closer up images of the surface of Pluto

https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/a-full-view-of-pluto-s-stunning-crescent

[overpowered]

Falcon 9

http://www.theverge.com/2015/12/21/10640306/spacex-elon-musk-rocket-landing-success

[Random]

:up: :up:

[Random]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCBE8ocOkAQ

https://scontent-sjc2-1.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xfa1/v/t1.0-9/12391881_10156855260165131_1398902774058281027_n.j pg?oh=82e7b5f901df009469a33070db310343&oe=56DD7CEE

[Crazed_Insanity]

Amazing work!

[Phil_SS]

That is so fricken cool! :D:up:

[Dicknose]

Great work, but I'm not sure if landing at the same location is the best plan. Seems it needs to do a u-turn and that takes a lot of energy.
I wonder how much energy would be needed to complete an orbit compared to turning around.

[Godson]

Richard, I think it was more along the lines of testing to see it done first. I am sure a flight with take off, orbit, and landing is in order.

[Random]

They looked into the orbit plan for recovering the 2nd stage, but concluded that the added heat-shielding and whatnot impacted payload capacity too much (according to what I read yesterday).

There's reportedly a 30% payload penalty for recovering the first stage to the launch pad, and a 15% penalty for landing it on the barge downrange.

[Crazed_Insanity]

It'd be interesting to find out if there's really an optimal spot between throw away rockets and reusable shuttles. We've already proven the reusable shuttles are more expensive... besides weight penalties, but also tremendous maintenance costs and turn around time. Until we develop a more robust heat shielding, shuttle just isn't the way to go due to tedious process of inspecting and repairing heat shielding tiles.

As for rockets, I wonder how many successful missions a reusable rocket has to do in order to make it worthwhile.

To put things into non-spaceX terms, typical rocket launches are about $250 million and it'd take NASA about $500 million to refurbish the shuttle for its next mission. (That's not including the cost of the space shuttle!) SpaceX supposed to be able to do a LOT better than these #s, but I just wonder how much does it cost Musk to build one of his rockets though...

[Random]

We've proven that one implementation of reusable shuttles is more expensive.

Development costs:


In 2014, SpaceX released total combined development costs for both the Falcon 9 and the Dragon capsule. NASA provided US$396 million while SpaceX provided over US$450 million to fund rocket and capsule development efforts.


SpaceX is quoting just over $61 million for a Falcon 9 launch to Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit.

[Rare White Ape]

Great work, but I'm not sure if landing at the same location is the best plan. Seems it needs to do a u-turn and that takes a lot of energy.
I wonder how much energy would be needed to complete an orbit compared to turning around.

To get the first stage into orbit, you'd pretty much have to make the whole idea of staging redundant in the first place, wouldn't you? Separation occurred while travelling at 6000km/h, you need another 20,000km/h to make it into orbit on the trajectory it was on.

Plus launch to separation was something like 2:20 into launch, and landing was 7 minutes later, so it was a much slower trajectory without a payload which would need less energy than the first two minutes of the mission.

[Dicknose]

The landing down flight seems a much better economic solution.
Moving the rocket with a ship rather than smaller payloads or lower orbit.

[JSGeneral]

The landing down flight seems a much better economic solution.
Moving the rocket with a ship rather than smaller payloads or lower orbit.

I think this is just proof that they have options. I'd imagine that there are some hidden costs when now there is a situation where a launch can be aborted due to the weather conditions at the launch site and at a remote landing site as well.

This can be mitigated if you land the sucker in the same locale as you launched it.

Also, if you put it back right near where the facility to refuel/reset this rocket, that would help alleviate transportation costs of the vehicle.

[Dicknose]

But it's a bit cost to the payload or orbital height.
They might just do case by case, small payload land at launch site, bigger payload land down track.

[Rare White Ape]

Did their recent launch not reach the target orbit and deliver the payload that the customer wanted up there?

[sandydandy]

Is Earth Actually Flat? (http://youtu.be/VNqNnUJVcVs)

Don't know if this has been posted already...or if it belongs in the Science thread.

I got a bit of a chuckle out of watching this.

[Rare White Ape]

You should check out Vsauce's other videos. They're really great.

[sandydandy]

How could I possibly take any of his other videos seriously when this one is beyond silly?

[Rare White Ape]

Yeah that's the point of it. It's 100% silly but none of it is incorrect, and you learn something in the process. Like I never even considered that gravity would pull you to the center of mass (back to the middle of the flat earth) rather than "down" into space. That sort of out-of-the-box thinking is good to have.

Watch the videos on awkwardness or juvenoia for an off-the-wall learning experience. It's one of the best channels on YouTube.

[overpowered]

The fact that gravity would force a disc into a sphere is totally intuitive to me. It's the near speed of light stuff that didn't occur to me.

[Dicknose]

But if you are flat earth you have to explain gravity in a different way.
Either it's not due to mass or the geometry of the Earth is not a flat disc but the end of a long cylinder, it's centre of mass is far enough away that the sidewards different is negligible compared to the width.

Also a flat earth that is North Pole centred would show up biases to the northern hemisphere. Sailing around the southern oceans would be a very long trip.

[Rare White Ape]

Regarding the SpaceX reusable rocket landing, from the mind of Phil Plait. He says it in a way that I simply cannot, because 1. He's a qualified space geek 2. He's got all the facts, and 3: He's a professional writer. From here: http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2015/12/28/gallery_of_spacex_photos_of_the_december_2015_falc on_9_rocket_landing.html


So this is what SpaceX did: They took a 12-story rocket weighing 20,000 kilograms moving at 6000 kph, slowed it, stopped it, turned it around, let it fall nearly 200 km to the ground, reignited the engines, had it follow a descent path, automatically correcting its orientation and attitude, until it landed within a few meters of the pre-chosen spot.

That is (in part) why I was excited about this feat: It was an astonishingly complex technological process, and they nailed it. And now the booster will be checked out to see how it fared during all this. It may get cleaned up to be reused, though in a press conference after the launch Elon Musk noted they may keep this one as a memento to the achievement.

So as I pointed out in my original article, the story is not yet done. This was the first step: getting the booster back on the ground. The next step, the critical one, is to reuse the booster (or whichever one is brought back down to the ground next). Once that has been achieved, then Musk and SpaceX will have shown they can reuse that rocket, and potentially save tens of millions of dollars on a launch into orbit.

Musk estimates the cost to build a first stage Falcon 9 at about $60 million while the fuel costs around $200,000. If they can reuse that booster, then even if it costs a few million bucks to fix it back up, that’s a savings of more than $50 million in launch costs … on a launch that costs roughly $90 million to start with.

If this works, then launch costs can be cut in half. And that is the second part of why I was so excited about this landing. I hope this all works. Between this effort, Blue Origin’s recent flight into space and back, NASA’s Orion capsule, Boeing’s CST-100 capsule, Sierra Nevada’s Dream Chaser, and Virgin Galactic (despite the awful loss of its SpaceShipTwo in 2014), we are in an unprecedented moment: More human-rated spaceships are in development now than in any time since the Space Age began.

Where will we be in 20 years? I can’t say for sure, but if everything goes well, more humans will be in space than in all of history. That is a future I very much look forward to.

[overpowered]

On 20 January, all five bright planets – Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn – will appear in a line, visible to the naked eye.

http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/news/2016/01/the-planets-are-about-to-align

[overpowered]

There may be a 9th planet after all.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/new-planet-discovered_us_569fbf96e4b0875553c28ac0

[LHutton]

And so the race begins to land something on it.

[Dicknose]

I think the race is to find it.
Landing on it will be a 10+ year mission

[Rare White Ape]

Nobody has landed on or orbited anything further out than Titan, and lots of real estate closer to home hasn't even been properly studied yet.

[LHutton]

Didn't one land on Pluto?

[Dicknose]

Passed by Pluto.
And this planet is expected to be a lot further out. 10 year travel time is probably a good guess.

[LHutton]

Oh, I thought I'd heard something about a visit to Pluto, must have just been the pass.

[Rare White Ape]

If only there was a way to look that up....

[LHutton]

I just found out without even doing that.

It's a case of the media using misleading terminology again. When they say, "the first to visit all 9 planets," what they actually mean is, "the first to fly reasonably close to 9 objects, only 8 of which are planets."

[overpowered]

Passed by Pluto.
And this planet is expected to be a lot further out. 10 year travel time is probably a good guess.Pluto took about 9.5 years to get to.

It would have taken a bit longer if we had tried to put something in orbit around it because it would have taken a while to slow it down enough to do that. It also would have required a bunch of fuel to do the slowing down and get it into orbit. After the slingshot around Jupiter, New Horizons hit 55,000 mph.

[LHutton]

https://i.imgflip.com/xqur6.jpg

[Alan P]

So busy looking out. Around 95% of the sea floor hasn't been accurately mapped yet.

[Dicknose]

Was talking about the sea floor with a mate and I suggested that something like Google would make an effort and just send out a bunch of units to do the sea floor. The number of lost ships and planes that might be found!
Much tougher than space since the environment is harsher in some ways (high pressure is worse than vacuum) and visibility is poor. You might get 10m visibility at depth.
But imagine 100 units working in a line at 10m spacing with a surface ship to co-ord, doing km wide sweep. Start with English Channel, Med, Baltic and coastal waters. Full Google mapping style.

[MR2 Fan]

Was talking about the sea floor with a mate and I suggested that something like Google would make an effort and just send out a bunch of units to do the sea floor. The number of lost ships and planes that might be found!
Much tougher than space since the environment is harsher in some ways (high pressure is worse than vacuum) and visibility is poor. You might get 10m visibility at depth.
But imagine 100 units working in a line at 10m spacing with a surface ship to co-ord, doing km wide sweep. Start with English Channel, Med, Baltic and coastal waters. Full Google mapping style.

we can't even find the f-ing loch ness monster, or prove it doesn't exist

[overpowered]

Pluto's distance to the sun ranges from 29 AU to 49 AU

This new planet is projected to have an elliptical orbit that ranges from 200 AU to as much as 600-1200 AU. It's a lot further away than Pluto. It's going to take a lot more than 10 years to get there.

That distance is probably also why it's so hard to find. It's getting a lot less light than even Pluto so it's going to have less to reflect back.

[Rare White Ape]

Please bear in mind that no planet has been discovered yet. This is all just throwing around hypotheses for now until something concrete comes up, though it is a 90% chance that there is a ninth planet.

The clues we have for the so-called planet nine's existence is through observation of six other objects in the outer solar system and questioning why they have a certain trait, which in this case is the alignment of their orbits where they all appear to line up. The question was asked about why they line up and one of the possible answers is that a 10-earth-mass planet is shepherding them. It's similar to how Neptune was discovered, through a mathematical prediction rather than direct observation.

With regards to it being so hard to find, nope, it's not distance, or brightness, or albedo, or anything like that. We've found objects at long range and imaged them. The reason we haven't found it is because nobody was looking.

Astronomers have telescope time booked and are looking for it now. It could take five years for it to be found.

[overpowered]

Simulated flyover of Ceres based on photos taken by Dawn:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJiw2NxqoBU

http://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/new-animation-takes-a-colorful-flight-over-ceres

[overpowered]

China's on the moon:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/02/160202-china-moon-lunar-lander-photo-picture-space/#/01china_moon.ngsversion.1454450400664.jpg

http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2016/01281656-fun-with-a-new-data-set-change.html

[Godson]

Sweet!

[21Kid]

Pretty soon we're going to be able to explore the moon with Google Street view. :D

[Rare White Ape]

That thing landed, like, two years ago.

[George]

It took that long for the signal from the moon to get through all the air pollution in Beijing.

[Godson]

It took that long for the signal from the moon to met through all the air pollution in Beijing.

A+. Would read again.

[Rare White Ape]

Heh!






*teeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeechnically, if it was sent in the radio spectrum, which is almost 100% likely, then the signal would see right through any clouds and reach any waiting antenna on the ground without an issue

[overpowered]

Space shuttle engineer who carried guilt of explosion 30 years finds relief via NPR public outpour

http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2016/2/26/1491359/-Space-shuttle-engineer-who-carried-guilt-of-explosion-30-yrs-finds-relief-via-NPR-public-outpour

[Random]

:up:

I thought it was nice that the people above him (who were really to blame) reached out, even as they declined to be interviewed.

[Kchrpm]

Yeah. I read the NPR article, it was those people, and the note from the spokeswoman for the NASA administrator, that really got him over the hump. The phone call from the people who didn't listen to him must have been really tough on all involved parties, but worth it.

[Phil_SS]

Right now, there is a show on PBS about Scott Kelly's year in space. Neat.

[overpowered]

Clouds on Pluto.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2079549-exclusive-photos-clouds-seen-on-pluto-for-first-time/

[Godson]

NASA successfully tested the Mars rocket module.

Full burn video here:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=njb9Z2jX2fA

[Phil_SS]

From what I understand they are reusing Shuttle engines for the main body of the SLS. And that is what that engine is. Pretty cool to see. We are less than 2 years away from the first launch of the SLS. :up:

And when they finally go to Mars. I'm gonna have to be there for the launch.

[Rare White Ape]

NASA successfully tested the Mars rocket module.

Full burn video here:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=njb9Z2jX2fA

Dude that is a fucking sweet video.

[LHutton]

Going nuclear to reach Mars.

http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2016/04/03/15-years-to-mars-russia-could-do-it-in-15-months.aspx?source=yahoo-2&utm_campaign=article&utm_medium=feed&utm_source=yahoo-2

[Godson]

And the race begins.

[Rare White Ape]

Going nuclear to reach Mars.

http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2016/04/03/15-years-to-mars-russia-could-do-it-in-15-months.aspx?source=yahoo-2&utm_campaign=article&utm_medium=feed&utm_source=yahoo-2

I have read this far and already found a fault:


Russia has significant experience in this field, having launched no fewer than 32 satellites and other spacecraft powered by nuclear fission between 1970 and 1988.

Their electrical systems were powered by nuclear fission, but the propulsion to get to Mars (or anywhere) was by good ole rocket power, and by waiting a long time.

The road to Mars (or anywhere beyond the earth's atmosphere) is not a road paved with hope and dreams. You can't just fucking hit the brakes on this road and come back, like the article says.

Oh, and I read a bit further and it says that NASA is involved with... something.

One of which "is three times as powerful as "current low-power NASA systems.""

Which means it will take months to gain as much speed as is required to leave earth's orbit and fly to other parts of the solar system.

It's all plain bullshit.

[Alan P]

Dude that is a fucking sweet video.

Agreed! I love the liquid oxygen through the pipes making them freezing cold yet only a couple of metres away there's a rocket engine burning at thousands of degrees.

[Dicknose]

I don't think any of these engines are for getting out of Earth orbit. They will use conventional rockets to get up and past the moon.
What they are after is thrusters that they can use for days or weeks. Low(ish) power, low thrust but working for long periods will add significant speed and cut the journey time.
Just that most of these engine types are used as tiny thrusters for maintaining orbit. And on satellites much lighter.
So it will need to scale up a lot to be useful.
But it does seem that electric thrusters could be a good assist. And that nuclear would be a reasonable power source. Especially if you are already looking at decent power requirements for the craft and crew.

[G'day Mate]

A bit more on NASA's "impossible" drive ...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3509774/Is-Nasa-s-impossible-fuel-free-thruster-step-closer-reality-Controversial-EmDrive-finally-undergo-peer-review.html

So is this just a whole bunch of hoo-har over not much at all or is this legitimately exciting?

[Godson]

Not really exciting...yet.

[G'day Mate]

Yeah, I know it produces bugger-all thrust at this stage

[LHutton]

I don't think any of these engines are for getting out of Earth orbit. They will use conventional rockets to get up and past the moon.
What they are after is thrusters that they can use for days or weeks. Low(ish) power, low thrust but working for long periods will add significant speed and cut the journey time.
Just that most of these engine types are used as tiny thrusters for maintaining orbit. And on satellites much lighter.
So it will need to scale up a lot to be useful.
But it does seem that electric thrusters could be a good assist. And that nuclear would be a reasonable power source. Especially if you are already looking at decent power requirements for the craft and crew.
That's how I understood it. High impulse, low thrust, long duration.

[Dicknose]

Saying that impossible drive if "fuel free" is a bit misleading.
Any electric drive that uses solar power is fuel free.
It's that it is propellant free that is the amazing part.

Also the "to the moon in 4 hours", really? How much thrust does it produce?
Forget a payload, what thrust/weight can it get just compared to its solar panels?
Also talk about going to other stars when it's solar powered is also a pretty silly bit. The power source drops off very quickly!

[Godson]

See, I was thinking the same thing. The farther away from a star, the less UV light and power you'd get.

[G'day Mate]

Also the "to the moon in 4 hours", really? How much thrust does it produce?

Exactly - those bits sounded more than a little wishful and speculative.

Still ...

https://frinkiac.com/img/S07E23/636451.jpg

[overpowered]

Also talk about going to other stars when it's solar powered is also a pretty silly bit. The power source drops off very quickly!Light (and other unfocused radiation) diminishes in proportion to the square of the distance (inverse square law) so it's an exponential drop off which is indeed very quick.

[LHutton]

You know these slow continuous drives are pretty amazing. At just 10m/s^2, after one hour your speed is increased by 81,000mph. Extrapolate that over a day or a month!

[Dicknose]

But when the Orion craft is around 25,000kg and these thrusters are less than 1N. Even a few at 2.5N will only produce 0.001m/s^2
That would be less than 1mph every hour.

[Godson]

25,000 kg would weigh how much in "zero"g?

[Random]

25,000 kg would weigh how much in "zero"g?

:? kg are a measure of mass and don't change in the absence of Earth's gravity.

[Crazed_Insanity]

Mass is mass. Force=Mass*Accel

Under 1g condition, Accel can be replaced by 1g. Force then would be weight. Weight=Mass*1g

Even when there's 0g... which resulted in 0 weight, but the mass is still there.

Anyway, point is if you want a piece of mass accelerating at a certain rate, there's gotta be necessary amount of force pushing it or vice versa... in gravity/accel field, we end up feeling the force as weight.

Regarding deep space travel, our best bet now is probably nuclear electrical rockets..., until we figure out warp drive!

[Godson]

:? kg are a measure of mass and don't change in the absence of Earth's gravity.

Basic laws of physics escape me after being in surgery for 10+hours

[Rare White Ape]

25,000 kg would weigh how much in "zero"g?

It would be weightless. Weight is a measurement of a mass being acted on by gravity, so without gravity there's no weight.

Though it still has mass, and mass is always there. This is why we compare objects such as stars as being equivalent to x-amount of solar masses.

[Random]

Basic laws of physics escape me after being in surgery for 10+hours

:toast:

[LHutton]

But when the Orion craft is around 25,000kg and these thrusters are less than 1N. Even a few at 2.5N will only produce 0.001m/s^2
That would be less than 1mph every hour.
Isn't VASIMR supposed to be better though?

And you need an extra zero in there.

[Freude am Fahren]

They did it.

https://twitter.com/NBCNightlyNews/status/718547681182748672

http://media.cmgdigital.com/shared/img/photos/2016/04/08/11/51/spacex.jpg

[Dicknose]

Does look odd. But damn fine work.

[LHutton]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5bTbVbe4e4

[G'day Mate]

Space Chips (http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/04/12/473960826/forget-starships-new-proposal-would-use-starchips-to-visit-alpha-centauri?utm_campaign=storyshare&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=social)?

[Kchrpm]

Once you pop (into the space between solar systems) you can't stop!

[LHutton]

I'm seeing problems with shielding.

[Godson]

What shielding do you speak of? From my knowledge, you wouldn't need much, if any shielding.

[Rare White Ape]

I'm thinking he refers to the shielding you need when TIE fighters start attacking you.

[LHutton]

I'm referring to shielding the nanochips from radiation and EM interference, especially through the magnetosphere and Van Allen belts, and then you have dust and shit. Given the size of them they could be extremely vulnerable.

Fortunately they will probably be too small for TIE fighters to detect but the Borg could pose a problem.

[G'day Mate]

For not much more than the cost of sending one they could send hundreds - maybe even tens of thousands.

[Drachen596]

Zerg Rush satellites?

[Rare White Ape]

For not much more than the cost of sending one they could send hundreds - maybe even tens of thousands.

Isn't that the goal?

They might cost something like $20 each, but getting them off the ground and into space will cost millions, let alone the cost of shooting them into interstellar space with new technology. Might as well jam as many as can fit into the top of the rocket. It'll be like a biblical plague of space locusts. Beings living in the vicinity of the target system will freak out!


I'm referring to shielding the nanochips from radiation and EM interference, especially through the magnetosphere and Van Allen belts, and then you have dust and shit. Given the size of them they could be extremely vulnerable.

In all seriousness, if you can think of it, the team of engineers who will spend decades designing and building these things will think of it too. It's not like there hasn't been a spacecraft sent beyond our planet before.

[LHutton]

Not one the size of 1nm.

[retsmah]

They did it.

https://twitter.com/NBCNightlyNews/status/718547681182748672



Hey this is what I worked on while I was at SpaceX! Specifically the grid fins:

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1640/23779742713_e080ff9932_z.jpg

(...also I didn't realize this place still exists!)

[Crazed_Insanity]

:up:

[Drachen596]

I hear those fins can be used to make some awesome mashed potatoes as well!

Congrats to you guys on the successful landing.

[LHutton]

Interestingly they seem to have copied that fin design from the R-77.

[retsmah]

Yeah there are a bunch of different rockets and missiles have used grid fins, definitely not something we came up with. Although it is a little uncommon to see them at the top of a rocket! You can see some smaller ones on the capsule on Soyuz launches as part of the escape system.

[LHutton]

http://www.popularmechanics.com/space/rockets/a20468/roadside-footage-spacexs-falcon-9/


Roadside Video Drives Home How Big SpaceX's Falcon 9 Really Is


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uC3Szb5raXE

[Freude am Fahren]

Would you just look at it?

http://www.theexcomedy.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/Zach_galifianakis_3443101.jpg

[LHutton]

I didn't think it was that big. I thought it was more ICBM-size.

[Drachen596]

It's about half as tall as the Saturn V they used for the Apollo launches if the things google pulled up are accurate.

The Falcon 9 is also a bit under 3 times as large as the current US ICBM the Minuteman III.(they're about 59 feet long/tall)

[LHutton]

You mean a bit under 4 times (230ft).

Also Saturn V just over 363ft, so Falcon 9 is nearer 65% of its size length and 55 in % diameter. But mass-wise it's only 18%.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_V

[retsmah]

For anyone that hasn't seen it, this is a pretty neat chart (http://pop.h-cdn.co/assets/15/06/1423159478-world_rockets.jpg) showing the size of different rockets.

[Godson]

Some of the rockets have some seriously impressive records, good and bad.

[Freude am Fahren]

Yeah, imagine the meeting in Moscow in 1972 after that 4th failure of the N1.

[Rare White Ape]

Yeah, imagine the meeting in Moscow in 1972 after that 4th failure of the N1.

In the same vein, the Russian government put in place a 10 minute embargo on the Soyuz launch from the new Vostochny launchpad this week, in case there were any embarrassing mishaps. Seems the Ruskies are still sensitive souls.

Also this. This is cool as fuck.

http://www.theverge.com/2016/4/29/11541506/spacex-rocket-landing-ocean-360-degree-vr-virtual-reality

[Random]

SpaceX launch in about 5 min: http://www.spacex.com/webcast

[Random]

Nice, they successfully landed the first stage on the barge again. :D Added degree of difficulty this time because they are sending the satellite to a geosynchronous orbit, so the first stage was going twice as fast as the previous attempt. Strong work. :up:

[Rare White Ape]

Oh nice!

I wonder if they're planning to land the first stage of the Mars capsule as well.

(Surprisingly, it won't need to be giant, like the 1st and 2nd stage of the Saturn V rockets were)

[retsmah]

I think Elon's twitter mentioned at some point that for the Dragon mission to Mars the side boosters should be recoverable, but the center core may have to fly expendable. Sending the Dragon capsules to Mars will be on Falcon Heavy, but manned missions are going to be on a new rocket, which will be on the same size scale as Saturn V.

I liked the landing video, a lot of the earlier landing attempts looked like that, you'd see the barge start to light up, then the video would start cutting out, you'd see one frame that's just a bunch of fire, then another cut out, then the video would come back to a barge with rocket parts scattered over the deck... was cool to see the video come back with the rocket on it!

[Crazed_Insanity]

If I remember correctly from school, one of my prof said that if we're going to Mars directly from the surface of the earth, given current rocket technology, we'd need a rocket the size of empire state building in order to get there. Saturn V is what's necessary to get to the moon only.

What makes more sense is to have a space station or a moon based as a spring board. Trying to escape earth's gravity directly while carrying enough fuel to get to Mars just doesn't make sense. I don't think we've made that much progress in terms of rocket technology. Can SpaceX really reach Mars with a rocket size of Saturn V?

[retsmah]

Yeah another aspect of the Mars mission would be that this Saturn V size rocket would be refueled in earth orbit before leaving for Mars. So it'd take multiple rocket launches to get one spacecraft on it's way to Mars. Or at least that was the plan the last time I had heard. The new engine being developed for this rocket uses methane for fuel rather than kerosene, and unlike the moon on mars you should be able to produce both methane and oxygen, so that has the potential to change the equation on how much mass you need to carry if you don't have to bring along fuel for a return trip.

The size of the rocket depends on your payload though, SpaceX plans on sending a pretty large vehicle capable of carrying a lot of people and supplies. A Falcon Heavy will be capable of sending a Dragon capsule one way to Mars, and then the curiosity rover only required an Atlas V to get there.

[Crazed_Insanity]

Ah, that makes more sense. Refueling in orbit and making it only a one way trip certainly can reduce the size of the rocket to mars...

As for payload, surely a trip to mars by default will have a much larger payload than a trip to the moon if we considering amount of food we have to bring! We can perhaps recycle water, but can't really recycle shit! :D

BTW, I heard rumors saying Musk wants to personally go to Mars, that's why he's keeping SpaceX a private company... so that he can have complete control of it... without others telling him that he cannot go! Any truth to that rumor? ;)

Another reason is perhaps to just to keep the financial info hidden. I'm really curious how SpaceX can do so much with such a low price. I'm working on the competing crew capsule... and our capsule is like a basic version of Toyota Yaris and the SpaceX's version is like the Model S... yet, we're charging NASA higher price for the Yaris compared to SpaceX's Model S.

Really curious to see if Musk can pull this off... to revolutionize both the auto and aerospace industry!

[Rare White Ape]

For a one-way trip, you actually require less fuel to land something on Mars than you do the Moon. The difference is the atmosphere of Mars, which can slow a spacecraft down without even needing to do an orbit insertion then a landing burn. The fuel needed to leave Earth and push a payload to Mars is only marginally higher. All the big savings happen at the landing phase.

To send humans, you can do it with current tech. Send multiple spacecraft to LEO and dock them together. We've done that with ISS. Something much smaller than ISS can support a crew with enough supplies for a year-long journey. You can also send supplies in advance of a crewed vehicle, and even send a whole station to Mars orbit, ready for a mission, with fuel for a return. They key here is... wait for it... sending a little bit at a time.

To leave the Martian surface, it's a lot easier than leaving Earth's surface. It has a very thin atmosphere and less gravity. You don't need a 50-meter stack to get to Mars orbit. This will be the only part of the mission that has never been done before; figuring out the best way to land, have enough fuel to lift off again, and do science and bring back a payload to an orbiting platform.

[Freude am Fahren]

Of course! DockSyde was an rocket scientist!!

[Godson]

Ffs, does this mean we were just trolled?

[Rare White Ape]

A minor trolling occurred, but all of what I said is genuine.

:toast:

[overpowered]

If Mars' atmosphere is so thin, how much slowing will it actually provide?

[Random]

Enough that it seems like a bunch of the recent missions have used it.

[Rare White Ape]

Yep, at a guess I'd say that every Mars lander ever has used atmospheric drag as its primary slowing-down-thingy.

Watch this IMAX clip chronicling the Spirit rover launch and landing. It launched atop a Delta II (refer to chart posted a few pages ago for size comparison) and was traveling at thousands of miles per hour when it entered Mars' upper atmosphere. At that speed any atmosphere seems thick. The 'chute deployed at over 11,000mph and slowed it all down to just over 170mph when the retro rockets fired.

https://youtu.be/XRCIzZHpFtY

With the SpaceX capsule, they're not going to use a parachute. It will be flown like a wing through the mid-atmosphere aiming for a height of 20km while it kills horizontal speed, then only using landing rockets for the last couple of minutes of descent.

[overpowered]

Enough that it seems like a bunch of the recent missions have used it.I didn't ask if it was used.

[Random]

I didn't ask if it was used.

I don't think missions to other planets are in the habit of doing useless things. Ergo, if several missions use aerobraking, there must be enough of an effect for them to bother.

[overpowered]

Apparently it's a lot more than enough to be worth the bother, as RWA's video showed.

[Random]

Three views of the most recent SpaceX landing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHqLz9ni0Bo

[Random]

And here's a rocket's eye view, but not from the Falcon 9. This video is from Blue Origin's most recent launch (and landing) in early April. So cool.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JNPpdHYD8jo

[Crazed_Insanity]

That recently landed rocket suffered too much damage during re-entry to fly again...

http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/nation-now/2016/05/17/spacex-rocket-suffered-damage/84479716/

Pretty impressive that it landed safely!

Hope they can figure out ways to fix the thermal shielding, yet still maintain quick and cheap way of overhauling the thermal shielding in order to make reusable rockets viable.

That was shuttle's biggest issue. It just cost NASA too much money to check and fix the thermal tiles after every flight... not to mention the tiles could be damaged during flight which caused one of them to subsequently crash... Shuttle's ambitious goal was to fly every week, but that certainly never materialized.

[retsmah]

Another successful Falcon 9 landing today (https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/736313075385540608), starting to make it look easy! This time around the livestream showed video of the first stage's reentry burn, which was pretty neat.

[Rare White Ape]

Awesome :up:

Any idea on when they'll be launching their first refurbished rocket?

[retsmah]

I think we'll see one refly this year probably.

[overpowered]

We may finally see a black hole.

http://www.iflscience.com/space/astronomers-prepare-for-first-ever-black-hole-image-with-new-algorithm/

[LHutton]

It's one big motherf.....

http://observer.com/2016/06/the-worlds-largest-rocket-will-launch-tomorrow-with-a-top-secret-mission/

https://nyoobserver.files.wordpress.com/2016/06/0rs1.png?w=953&h=584
The United Launch Alliance Delta-4 Heavy rocket at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (Photo: Robin Seemangal)

CAPE CANAVERAL, FL – A clandestine satellite built for the notoriously secretive National Reconnaissance Office is slated ('http://www.ulalaunch.com/delta-iv-heavy-to-launch-nrol37.aspx') to be launched on Thursday atop the most powerful rocket available, the United Launch Alliance ('http://www.ulalaunch.com/delta-iv-heavy-to-launch-nrol37.aspx') Delta-4 Heavy.

The heavy-lift rocket will leave from Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 37 at 1:59 PM ET to deliver its large top-secret payload to space.

[Rare White Ape]

Meh. The shit I build in Kerbal is twice as large and lifts half as much.

[LHutton]

When you look at the Saturn V, it's as if no progress has been made at all in the last 47 years.

[Crazed_Insanity]

We're just not dealing with electronic devices here...

Automobiles have stayed pretty much the same for the past 47 years and we have multiple companies building them and new models every few years. Same IC engines... same 4 wheels... Even hybrid cars only makes up small % of overall market, not to mention EVs.

With rockets, there just hasn't been a whole lot of customers... or not enough to make any significant improvements, probably not even minor improvements. People are happy as long as rockets don't blow up! ;) Unless we have some sort of revolutionary invention, things are already optimized pretty good.

Hopefully SpaceX will be successful at disrupting the rocket/aerospace industry with more innovations.

At the moment, with US govt cash poor, pretty much all private aerospace companies are just in a shrinking/surviving mode. Trying to milk as much as possible out of existing programs and not really thinking about innovating anything...

[Rare White Ape]

When you look at the Saturn V, it's as if no progress has been made at all in the last 47 years.

Well, the whole conventional chemical rocket thing was sorted out back when the rocket equation was written. Our payloads haven't gotten larger, and most payloads only need to reach orbit around the earth. What progress are you looking for? Bigger rockets? Faster rockets?

In fact, there has been a lot of progress. Russia will retire the Proton rocket in the not-too-distant future, as its first stage uses the dodgy hydrazine propellant, for the safer kerosene-fuelled Angara rocket. Russia's Soyuz has had a major upgrade, and the new Soyuz MS will replace the current Soyuz TMA-M when it launches a crew to ISS in a few weeks time. Most of the improvements in rocketry are through lightweight materials use and incremental improvements in efficiency; all of this is happening right now. You're familiar with what SpaceX is doing, and along with Boeing, are getting closer to sending crewed missions to low earth orbit, the first time that private contractors will have ever done this.

The next big thing won't be anything like conventional rockets. It'll be a big leap, similar to the jump from vinyl records to CDs. It'll be something like warp drives, but it won't come in our lifetime because we still don't know how gravity works, or what the fundamental nature of space-time is. Once the particle physicists figure that one out, we'll be able to make devices that can manipulate space itself and bend it to our will.

[Crazed_Insanity]

Actually all aerospace companies had been private companies... Just using taxpayers money. NASA never builds anything, but contracts private companies to do the job... Whether it's Saturn or shuttle....

I think what sets SpaceX apart is that Elon Musk isn't in the market to just milk off of Govt dollars... He actually has personal ambition to goto mars!!!

[FaultyMario]

I am somewhat proud to live in the same time and country as Dr. Alcubierre.

[LHutton]

Well, the whole conventional chemical rocket thing was sorted out back when the rocket equation was written. Our payloads haven't gotten larger, and most payloads only need to reach orbit around the earth. What progress are you looking for? Bigger rockets? Faster rockets?

In fact, there has been a lot of progress. Russia will retire the Proton rocket in the not-too-distant future, as its first stage uses the dodgy hydrazine propellant, for the safer kerosene-fuelled Angara rocket. Russia's Soyuz has had a major upgrade, and the new Soyuz MS will replace the current Soyuz TMA-M when it launches a crew to ISS in a few weeks time. Most of the improvements in rocketry are through lightweight materials use and incremental improvements in efficiency; all of this is happening right now. You're familiar with what SpaceX is doing, and along with Boeing, are getting closer to sending crewed missions to low earth orbit, the first time that private contractors will have ever done this.

The next big thing won't be anything like conventional rockets. It'll be a big leap, similar to the jump from vinyl records to CDs. It'll be something like warp drives, but it won't come in our lifetime because we still don't know how gravity works, or what the fundamental nature of space-time is. Once the particle physicists figure that one out, we'll be able to make devices that can manipulate space itself and bend it to our will.
I just keep thinking someone should have gone to Mars already. The people of 1969 would be disappointed.

I also think there are a couple of steps in between chemical rockets and warp drives. E.g. Nuclear thermal rocket, VASIMR, fusion propulsion, nuclear pulse propulsion, anti-matter propulsion etc.

I guess back in the 1960s, people just did it, did to beat the USSR and fuck the cost. Now people want to know if it's profitable, which it isn't, so that holds progress back.

Out of interest, the Proton was actually a super-ICBM design (the UR-500) that became a launch vehicle. It was designed to carry a 150Mt warhead.


I am somewhat proud to live in the same time and country as Dr. Alcubierre.
But until someone discovers negative mass his concept is purely theoretical, whereas there are other validated concepts to be getting on with.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spacecraft_propulsion

Then again, matter gets ejected from black holes somehow, negative mass proof of existence?

[Crazed_Insanity]

You absolutely need profitability to be sustainable... Or at least foreign threat to make spending justifiable.

After we beat the Russians to the moon, or after we beat the Russians in general, we just don't know what else to do. Cold War was really the best thing that happened to us. Lots of cool thing sprang from it.

Anyway, for now, we need a commercial station. Probably Las Vegas style. Hope well see that in our life time.

[LHutton]

But the Russians put a lander on the moon and Mars first and put the first man in space and first satellite.

[Crazed_Insanity]

Yes, their 1sts prompted us to catch up, once we caught up, then we get bored.

Maybe the Chinese will soon begin to play the role to entice the US the race her.

[FaultyMario]

Without looking I'll venture and say: but that's exactly what Mick said!!

[LHutton]

Yes, their 1sts prompted us to catch up, once we caught up, then we get bored.

Maybe the Chinese will soon begin to play the role to entice the US the race her.
I think they're more interested in making ridiculous territorial claims over surrounding waters, which have zero basis under international law.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/de/South_China_Sea_claims_map.jpg

[Crazed_Insanity]

I want a race, such as space race, not actual conflicts!

[LHutton]

I want a race, such as space race
You mean like aliens.













;)

[Freude am Fahren]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19mnsxcgjR0&ab_channel=ajw61185

[retsmah]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z824KfFUick

It's crazy how quickly the success rate on these first stage landings has increased. One is going to be standing upright in front of the SpaceX building on Crenshaw Blvd. in LA, another should have it's second flight this year.

On a related note, I ended up taking a new job at SpaceX, test engineer this time instead of a build (basically manufacturing) engineer. Unfortunately can't share any inside secrets though!

[Crazed_Insanity]

I need to know how are you guys building a better and cheaper capsule than Boeing please! You can PM me if you like? ;)

[Kchrpm]

Changing the world, one GTXFer at a time.

*goes back to spreadsheeting*

[Rare White Ape]

One is going to be standing upright in front of the SpaceX building on Crenshaw Blvd. in LA

My imagination is running wild about how they plan to get it there.

[retsmah]

Well this will be a little disappointing, but it's already here, and was just towed by a truck.

It would be interesting to work at another company like Boeing for a while and see how much different it is... I suspect a lot!

[Crazed_Insanity]

I've heard nothing but bad things regarding how Elon musk slaves drive people whether at SpaceX or tesla. We had a summer intern who also interned with SpaceX earlier vowed to never return to SpaceX! Guess he must be a slacker like me...

Boeing will have a much relaxed environment that's for sure..., but also with a lot more older and uglier people! ;) (a colleague of mine interviewed there and was really impressed by the gorgeous receptionists at SpaceX, something we never seen at Boeing!)

Anyway, work over there must be helluva lot more interesting and challenging..., maybe I could cut it there if I were still single...

[21Kid]

Death Dive! Comet Plunges into the Sun at Mind-Blowing Speed (http://www.space.com/33651-comet-death-dive-into-sun-video.html)

[overpowered]

https://www.engadget.com/2016/08/09/nasa-hirise-photos-mars/
http://www.uahirise.org/katalogos.php?page=1

[overpowered]

Requesting a flyby. It's time to buzz the planet.

https://www.missionjuno.swri.edu/news/juno_to_soar_closest_to_jupiter_this_saturday

[Dicknose]

Exciting!

[overpowered]

SO, NASA Got Sick of all that Conspiracy Thing and Released over 10,000 Photos from the Apollo Moon Mission

https://www.thevintagenews.com/2015/10/05/so-nasa-got-sick-of-all-that-conspiracy-thing-and-released-over-10000-photos-from-the-apollo-moon-mission/

[Godson]

Lol, they've had long enough to fake 10,000 photos.


I still believe we landed, that's just what those fuckers will say.

[Crazed_Insanity]

I think there are about 7% of Americans who believe moon landing is faked by NASA...

Who cares what those 7% think? Their beliefs are not going to stop NASA from doing space exploration or scientific research...

Can't please everybody.

[Dicknose]

SpaceX had a rocket explode on the launch pad.
Was a test firing before a launch in the weekend (reports now say refuelling for the static test)


http://www.floridatoday.com/story/tech/science/space/spacex/2016/09/01/explosion-reported-spacex-pad/89710076/

[Sad, little man]

Is it wrong to be happy that the rocket exploded because it creates a setback for Fuckerberg in his quest to pretend he's doing something nice by bringing facebook to poor people?

[Freude am Fahren]

If it is, I don't wanna be right.

"Hey guys, did I mention I'm in Africa?"


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BgJEXQkjNQ&ab_channel=USLaunchReport

[dodint]

China lost a rocket/payload today as well.

We were talking in chat earlier today. The Amos 6 was insured under a marine cargo policy for $265M. Since the unusual explosion happened pre-ignition the policy should be collectible.

[Rare White Ape]

Is it wrong to be happy that the rocket exploded because it creates a setback for Fuckerberg in his quest to pretend he's doing something nice by bringing facebook to poor people?

Not only is the explosion really spectacular (if sadly disappointing), but you'd enjoy watching the payload fairing containing said satellite fall to the ground into a pit of fire.

[retsmah]

So for some positive SpaceX news, the first landed booster is now on display in front of the main building on Crenshaw Blvd. here in LA, glass wall is getting installed and temporary fence taken down. You can see it from the 105 freeway, although it's definitely cooler to get off the freeway, park and check it out from the sidewalk!

1921

[G'day Mate]

Not only is the explosion really spectacular ...

It looks more like a Hollywood explosion than a real life one!

[overpowered]

It looks more like a Hollywood explosion than a real life one!Real explosions meant to blow things up tend to be very short duration. Hollywood likes its explosions to last a little longer and have more fire because that looks better. Rockets are basically bombs meant to have a sustained controlled explosion that lasts long enough to get a payload into space. Being meant to last longer results in more fire, hence their explosions will tend to look more like a Hollywood explosion than a bunch of C4, dynamite or ANFO (I love Mythbusters).

[retsmah]

Somebody posted an overlay on twitter of the Dragon 2 pad abort test overlaid with this failure, obviously not a completely accurate simulation but provides a visual of how quickly the new crew capsule can get away from the rocket: https://twitter.com/StateMachines/status/771535425328459780

[Rare White Ape]

That's a pretty clever visualisation.

With the CRS-7 failure, apparently the capsule made it to the water intact. Didn't last long tho, it wasn't equipped for launch abort so was destroyed on landing.

[retsmah]

It actually had all the equipment needed to survive that particular failure (specifically, parachutes), it just wasn't programmed to deploy them and it couldn't be done from the ground fast enough. It was a pretty unusual case in that it had no abort system, but ended up intact and detached from the rocket.

edit: on the topic of abort systems, for anyone that hasn't seen it, the Apollo in-flight abort test was pretty awesome: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AqeJzItldSQ

[Crazed_Insanity]

Cool!

At the same time kinda uncool... that rocket science hasn't changed much over the decades! :p

[balki]

NASA Telescope Reveals Largest Batch of Earth-Size, Habitable-Zone Planets Around Single Star (https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-telescope-reveals-largest-batch-of-earth-size-habitable-zone-planets-around)

[Freude am Fahren]

The interesting thing to me is the idea that you can have an earth like condition (tempurature), so close to the star with such a short orbit. I get the star being cool enough, but what about gravity, radiation, angular velocity(?)? How different would it be on each side of the planet, etc.

[Rare White Ape]

The main issue would be radiation and whether each planet has a strong magnetic field or a lot of mass. If there's a lot of radiation (very likely in a low mass star, or a close orbit) or a weak magnetic field (very likely if the planet is not high in iron content at the core) then the chances that any atmosphere will be stripped away and any liquid water will quickly follow.

Mars is a very good example. It's magnetic field is weak, so it wasn't protected from the sun like ours is and being relatively low mass it doesn't have the pull of gravity to keep an atmosphere like Earth. It has lost a lot of its atmosphere and almost all of its liquid surface water, even though its further away from the sun than we are.

[FaultyMario]

I didn't get the habitable "bands" due to the planets being probably tidal locked to their star.

Anybody care to explain?

[Rare White Ape]

Well, tidal locking occurs when one side of an object always faces the body that the object orbits, for instance the moon is tidally locked to earth, so from our perspective we only see one side of it. Another example is Iapetus, which orbits Saturn. It's brown on one side and white on the other, because it's always flying with one side facing in the same direction picking up dust from one of Saturn's rings.

Now I'm guessing that a habitable band on a tidally locked planet would be the ideal strip of terrain right in between the too-hot day side, and the too-cold night side, assuming that the atmosphere doesn't maintain extremely hot temperatures across the entirety of the planet.

And another thing, tidally locked planets may be able to orbit closer in or further out from the normal habitable zone of a star and still be habitable, because one side will always be heating up to massive temperatures and one side will always be cooler, thus extending the range of planets that could be habitable. But again this could all be moot if the atmosphere (if the planets have any) is constantly spreading the heat to the night side and making the whole thing too hot.

[FaultyMario]

I'm no astronomer or geophysicist, but wouldn't a lot of heat on one side of a geologically active body let a lot of hilarity ensue, seismologically?

[balki]

Most of the solid part of Earth is +500K, should have minimal seismological affects
The atmosphere would be a different story, but with a thick enough atmosphere and/or large enough ocean the temperate swing (on any given day the Moon is both much hotter than a Death Valley summer day and much colder than an Siberian night)

The twilight area (sans any crazy wind) that RWA mentioned could be pleasant, as would the ocean and anything just below the surface
The biggest problem might be the host star; crazy stellar flares and massive starspots make the need for a thick atmosphere (and strong magnetosphere) even greater

[Rare White Ape]

I'm no astronomer or geophysicist, but wouldn't a lot of heat on one side of a geologically active body let a lot of hilarity ensue, seismologically?

I have an answer for this too!

And the answer is no :(

Even Mercury, the closest planet to our sun, doesn't get past 430C (800F) during its months-long days. The temperature of lava as found on Earth is triple that. In other words, Stellar Fuel Doesn't Melt Silicate Rocks. You might get some expansion on the day side through heating, but it's doubtful that it would cause any surface quakes. In the case of Mercury, it may experience mercuryquakes even today, but that would be caused by its hot iron core shrinking and cooling.

If you want an example of a body being externally heated enough to cause geological shenanigans, look to Io, a moon of Jupiter. It is the smallest and closest to Jupiter of the four major Galilean moons, and during its orbits, it's pulled at and tugged around by Jupiter and the other three of its large companions. This causes tidal heating, where the constant internal friction of its shape being squished and stretched through gravity is enough to heat up the core and cover almost the entire surface in large volcanoes. Io is the most geologically active body in the solar system, yet it is hundreds of times further from the sun than Mercury is.

[Phil_SS]

The Google header today is fantastic. Big big :up:

[balki]

this one? pretty cool.https://www.google.com/logos/doodles/2017/seven-earth-size-exoplanets-discovered-6423181526040576.2-hp2x.gif
now, how do i post pics (keep getting invalid url)

[Kchrpm]

I think the .2-hp2x. part confuses the image tool on the forum.

[balki]

No, it's the part where i leave "Retrieve remote file and reference locally" checked off

back to science;
if we equip a probe a with quantum computing instruments and send it to a black hole can we see the future as it approaches the even horizon?

[MR2 Fan]

Twitter:

"Elon Musk‏

Fly me to the moon ... Ok"


http://www.spacex.com/news/2017/02/27/spacex-send-privately-crewed-dragon-spacecraft-beyond-moon-next-year

[Rare White Ape]

back to science;
if we equip a probe a with quantum computing instruments and send it to a black hole can we see the future as it approaches the even horizon?

Nope. You can't see the future. Not even in a black hole.

We even won't be able to see the 'future' of the probe as it gets closer to the EH. It will appear to slow to a halt and then fade in to blackness, because the light that is emitted by it will be stretched by the gravitational pull of the black hole so much that it will red-shift until it can't be seen by human eyes. Eventually it's signal will only show up as a very faint speck of light in the far, far, far radio spectrum, and it will be the same signal for billions of years.

[FaultyMario]

That's just a theory.

[Rare White Ape]

Damn straight.

[G'day Mate]

Is this not a quantum entanglement question?

[balki]

Yes
If you were on the probe, would you not be going into fast forward before the super stretchiness happens (say a supermassive black hole where the EH has friendly local gravity)? That's what I meant about a quantum probe sending (I don't understand black holes and entanglement).

[Kchrpm]

You're still on the same timeline as everyone else, you're just experiencing it differently. You would have only experienced an hour, but a year would have passed.

[drew]

If that's the case, sign me up for a 20 minute trip, after I invest some things.

[FaultyMario]

Damn straight.

Well played, good sir.

[Dicknose]

That's just a theory.
Exactly, it's a well tested theory.
It's not just a hypothesis.

[FaultyMario]

Oh, i know. I've wanted to use that line forever.

[Rare White Ape]

Yes
If you were on the probe, would you not be going into fast forward before the super stretchiness happens (say a supermassive black hole where the EH has friendly local gravity)? That's what I meant about a quantum probe sending (I don't understand black holes and entanglement).

If you were an observer crossing an event horizon (the probe in this case) you'll think that time isn't changing at all. Events still happen at a normal rate. You might even cross the event horizon and not even notice anything different.

The issue arises when you try to compare the sequence of events with what someone else experiences, especially if their spacetime has not been stretched or squeezed to an extreme amount like someone near a black hole has.

So we're dealing with one of the many misconceptions about black holes.

Another misconception to address is what exactly quantum computing is. Einstein's confusion that quantum entanglement is "spooky action at a distance" does imply that you can instantaneously know what a particle at an arbitrarily long distance is just by looking at its entangled partner, but you still have to verify the result, and that's still constrained by the speed of light. And that doesn't mean that a probe crossing the event horizon can instantly send a signal to us by using entanglement.

What a quantum computer can do, however, is lots of calculations really quickly - faster and more frequently that we've ever been able to do before. They harness entanglement to do this, but the result still has to be verified.

[drew]

Space/time is the ultimate mind fuck.

[Rare White Ape]

It wouldn't be so bad if nothing moved. I mean we're always moving through time, that's a given.

But since objects have an annoying tendency to also move through space, then it gets complicated.

[Dicknose]

Space and time are tied together, but time flows onwards, but space doesn't.
From a mathematics point of view, space is "real", time is "imaginary"

And of cause special relativity also says whatever speed you do, you are still no closer to getting to the speed of light.
Stand still (whatever that means! No absolute frame of reference) and light goes at c.
Accelerate so you are now going at 10% c, light still the same, it's still going at c compared to you.
Go at 50% (compared to your starting speed!) and light... you haven't gained a bit, it's still at c compared to you.

[Freude am Fahren]

That's always confused me. If light travels at c, isn't it only c from it's source?

So say, hypothetically, you have two objects that are 1 light year away from Earth that materialize instantly, one stationary compared to earth, one travelling at .5c as it momentarily passes right next to the other object, then instantly vanishing. On Earth, would you see the "moving" object a half a year before the stationary one, despite them existing right next to each other at the same time?

[Dicknose]

No!
Light travels at c compared to all sources and viewers.
That's the weird bit.

So that light from both would reach earth in 1 year.
The only difference is that the one moving towards us would be frequency shifted (blue shift)

If you asked someone on each of these objects to check the speed of the light leaving them they would agree it was at c.
Get them to check the others light source and again c.

Both would think that the other is moving at 0.5c relative to themselves, which means both would think the other is "half way to c". But they are not, no matter how fast they go, any light is always at c compared to them.

The frequency of the light will change as you change speed. But the speed of light is always c.

[Rare White Ape]

Yep, the only thing that matters in your reference frame... is your reference frame.

An object that is moving toward you appears brighter, because the light that is emitted by that object has more energy (to you), not more speed.

[Rare White Ape]

Now let's say you're the one who is moving. You emit light at c compared to the object you're flying past.

To you, the light you emit is travelling at c, but you're also moving past another object like a galaxy or something at 0.1c. So, to you, you think the light is travelling at your speed, plus the speed of light, which equals 1.1c, amirite?

But from the galaxy's perspective, you're travelling at 0.1c but the light you're emitting is still at c and you look a bit brighter while you approach and dimmer while you move away.

This can't be right, can it? Well what's the answer?

The answer is that time slows down. You might think that light emitted from you is going past the galaxy at higher than c, but in reality time has slowed and it is preserving the cosmic speed limit, so light still moves away from you and past the galaxy at c. You can't perceive this yourself. All you know is that you're travelling at 0.1c and there's a galaxy moving past your window, and clocks on your space ship still run at 1 second per second per second.

But wait a minute! How can you know for sure that you're the one who is moving? What if you're stationary and it's the galaxy that is moving past you?

Well, you would still feel time passing at 1 second per second per second, and you would still see a galaxy passing your window at 0.1c. But what about the time for an observer within the galaxy? You would perceive their time to be passing slower than yours. And the kicker? That's the exact same thing you'd perceive of the galaxy if it was definitely you who was moving.

The key to all of this is what DN said on the previous page: there is no absolute frame of reference.

No observer is the final authority on the flow of time or space. All that should matter to you is your frame of reference.

[Freude am Fahren]

So strange to try and understand.

Like, say there was a planet 10 light years away that is completely stationary in relation to Earth. We develop a craft that can go .6c Let's say for arguments sake, it accelerates to that speed nearly instantaneously. After 10 years, it should be 6/10ths of the way there, moving at .6c. Now, let's say that it dropped a second craft, that also could nearly instantly reach .6c. Logic would say that as observer on that craft in relation to the two planets it travelling at 1.2c. Could that craft reach a planet 10 light years away in less than 10 years? No, right? If you were to Take a snap shot of the planet the moment the craft leaves from planet b, there's no way the craft would reach you before you saw it leave.

[Rare White Ape]

Well, remember that the faster you go, the more energy is required to go faster. It's super simple to accelerate a car from 30 to 60MPH. At normal 2017 human spacecraft speeds like we have now, if you pour more energy into the system it's pretty easy to go twice as fast. You just need a much bigger fuel tank.

But at speeds as fast as 0.6c you'd need a fuel tank the size of Jupiter to go faster.

Say we could drop some sort of futuristic fusion-powered high speed craft of a reasonable size from another high speed craft. Just getting to 0.61c would take a heap of effort, since it is already travelling close to it's limit. There's no way that it would get anywhere near 0.9c unless you found a way to harness all of its stored energy in an instant, but then you'd run out of fuel pretty quickly and you'd have no spacecraft left because it got vapourised.

On to your second point about taking a photo. If you took a shot the actual moment it leaves, you'd have a picture of a stationary spacecraft, because it would be ten years before you observe the spacecraft moving.

But if you took a photo at the moment you saw it moving, for you it would look like it only took four years for it to arrive.

[Rare White Ape]

Here's a bonus for anyone who seems interested:

A few years ago the MIT Game Lab built a game called A Slower Speed of Light. The idea behind it is as you move about the level picking up orbs, the speed of light lowers down to near walking speed. This leads to some trippy-as-hell visuals when relativistic effects come into play. It's free to download and try yourself.

http://gamelab.mit.edu/games/a-slower-speed-of-light/

[Crazed_Insanity]

Trippy indeed!

Hey, maybe certain drugs can slow down speed of light in our brains without using MIT's game engine! :D

[Freude am Fahren]

Space-X will be Re!-launching a Falcon 9 tonight!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xsZSXav4wI8

[Dicknose]

Cheap bastards using a second hand rocket!

[Crazed_Insanity]

SpaceX recycling the Falcon9 making it great again!!! Impressive indeed! :up:

[Dicknose]

Success!
It was the unit that made the first successful landing last year.
I wonder how many uses they will get out of them.

[Rare White Ape]

I’m surprised how quiet this thread has been, given the incredible events of yesterday and SpaceX ‘s attempt to launch a car towards Mars.

Here it is from a different perspective. Absolutely watch this with good headphones on, and TURN IT UP.


https://youtu.be/ImoQqNyRL8Y

[Crazed_Insanity]

So cool! Thank you Elon!

[Freude am Fahren]

Ended up talking a bit about it in the what are you watching and Tesla threads, but yeah, this is pretty awesome. All the videos of the dual landing are amazing.

Too bad about the core, but hopefully there's surviving video, since it sounds like it was quite a spectacular touchdown.

[Rare White Ape]

I just found out that the Tesla in space has a Hot Wheels car with a little spaceman stuck on the dashboard and a copy of Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy in the glovebox.

[FaultyMario]

Nerd!

[Dicknose]

A friend just asked me if the Falcon rocket was still in orbit, since he saw something at around midnight. It blinked on and off about every 10 seconds.
Sorry mate, they boosted out of orbit a while ago. I think that might have been planet Qantas

[Dicknose]

So another test of the EM “impossible” drive has shown it produces thrust...
But that the thrust was in the same direction, no matter what direction the engine faced.
Conclusion is that it’s likely an interaction with the earths magnetic field.

So can we drop this stupid idea and work on things that might be possible and useful.

Also - can we blow up science reporters who continue to say “doesn’t require fuel”. If you don’t understand the difference between fuel and propellant you shouldn’t be reporting on space craft engines. Heck just invest a few minutes on Wikipedia and learn some shit. You are suppose to be informing and educating others, maybe start with yourself.

[Rare White Ape]

The only reason it got any traction in the midis is because it was talked about on a forum called nasaspaceflight.com.

It has NASA in the name but it’s not run by NASA in any official way. It feels like just saying the word NASA has some sort of mystical cachet in shitty science reporting.

[Dicknose]

yes as soon as it was "proved by nasa" it exploded.
A place that has money from nasa showed it produced some tiny amount of thrust.

Not sure what it weighed but the thrust was originally reported in milli-Newtons and later tests had it in the micro range.
Something that weights even say 10kg producing 1/1000th of a Newton - could have 1/100,000 of a G acceleration. That might be useful if harnessed over days or weeks. But that is just on the engine. Put the engine as less than 1% of the total weight and you are at a tiny acceleration. Probably not even useful in low orbit because atmospheric drag would be bigger!

[Godson]

The main reason they were researching it wasn't for getting out of the atmosphere, but more so once they were in space and could continue to accelerate after in orbit.

[Rare White Ape]

Well if was rocket assisted into a solar orbit and then used an EM drive for interplanetary travel then it might be ok.

But then you’re firmly into ion thruster territory, and those are small, light, efficient, already “require no fuel” and are a proven technology that is available right now.

[Godson]

Right, I think you are still missing the point though.

I want to say they were investigating it as an additional thruster if the could figure it out. Ya dig?

[Rare White Ape]

Yeah I do dig but that’s trying to compete with already available ion thrusters. It’s not worth pursuing unless there’s some alarming breakthrough, or they get out of millionths-of-a-newton territory.

[MR2 Fan]

Usually when organic matter and methane is found it's a bad thing.

But when it's found on Mars, it's a good thing:

https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/07/us/nasa-mars-curiosity-rover-findings/index.html

[Crazed_Insanity]

Whoa, somebody farted on mars?!?!?!

[MR2 Fan]

Space Helicopters!


https://twitter.com/astroengine/status/1166829650133184512


"Engineers attached NASA's Mars Helicopter, which will be the first aircraft to fly on another planet, to the belly of the Mars 2020 rover today in the High Bay 1 clean room at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California."

[Tom Servo]

Hey, now Martians will also know when a police pursuit is going by!

[George]

^ Sounds like you live in L.A.

[Phil_SS]

Space Helicopters!


https://twitter.com/astroengine/status/1166829650133184512


"Engineers attached NASA's Mars Helicopter, which will be the first aircraft to fly on another planet, to the belly of the Mars 2020 rover today in the High Bay 1 clean room at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California."

Can we have a high def color fuckin camera as well. Thank you!

[FaultyMario]

Can we have a high def color fuckin camera as well. Thank you!

Yeah, I wonder why they went with such high risk technology when a 'high def color fucking camera' could have awed the general public more. I don't think it's a choice of "instead", either.

[Rare White Ape]

The battery power requirements for a high-def colour fuckin camera, as well as it’s data bandwidth, might be too much for the wee helicopter to handle.

It will only manage 1 minute and 20 seconds of flight time per day, using a small solar panel to recharge. Part of its power will go to the electric motors, while the rest is used for navigation and comms back to the rover. It’ll be processing a lot of data just to keep itself stable and land autonomously. Overnight it needs power reserves to stop its electronics from freezing.

The engineers say that the ideal time of day for flights will be at about 11:30 in good weather, to take advantage of a warm atmosphere and high sunlight. Later in the program if all is going well they might adjust to later afternoon flights.

It’s a 2020 version of “this machine has less processing power than a wrist watch” if you take into account the current smart wrist watches we have today.

[Dicknose]

Wow a helicopter on Mars will be impressive.
Because the atmosphere is much thinner - like 1% of Earths. So thats got to be real hard work keeping up.
Quick google - the pressure is an equivalent altitude on Earth of 30-50km.

Gravity is a bit less - but not 1%!!!!

[dodint]

X-Plane was fun, it had Mars. The wingspans of the planes and their takeoff distance were huge because of the atmospheric density. A helicopter would be outrageous. Fun.

[FaultyMario]

@rwa

I meant a hdcfc on the rover, I understand the chopper is actually a high-tech dragonfly.

[FaultyMario]

Did you guys hear? The Navy prefers that we call them 'Unidentified Aerial Phenomena' and not UFOs.

Oh and BTW, its spokesperson has said that they have a new policy (https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/43jv7d/the-us-navy-wants-pilots-to-report-ufo-sightings)in which “The information obtained from each individual [internal report of anomalous aerial vehicles] of any suspected training range incursion will be investigated in its own right. The information obtained in these reports will be catalogued and analyzed for the purpose of identifying any hazard to our aviators”.

[Dicknose]

I do like this one...
https://www.xkcd.com/1235/

https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/settled.png

[Crazed_Insanity]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acOFK3Bsj58

Boeing's crew capsule is slowly catching up to SpaceX's. Just had a successfully launch pad abort test. It wasn't a 100% success because only 2 of the 3 parachutes worked. However, the vehicle was designed to be able to handle one chute failure...

Next month will be the 1st unmaned flight hope that one will be successful too.

Then perhaps NASA will be able to fly astronauts to the space station starting next year without Russians meddling with our space program! ;)

[FaultyMario]

Did Voyager 2 make a transmission from the interstellar medium or from the heliopause?

[Crazed_Insanity]

I think 'heliopause' is basically the "line" or boundary that Voyagers crossed over in order to get to the interstellar medium, right? So it must've transmitted from the interstellar medium... or maybe it was transmitting as it crosses that boundary? Don't recalled the details. Anyway, point was that they are really really out of our solar system now...