NASA G2

[irregularmedic]

I'm surprised no one caught this one:

 

"Robots might install rocket engines to send dead spacecraft careering back into the atmosphere, or ground-based lasers might be used to zap debris."

 

Ummm, the laaaaazer is gonna fire through ALL the atmosphere and still pack enough oomph to destroy orbital debris?

Well, there's your 'big fucking thing' right there! Besides being HUGE and a black hole in the budget, we'd have to brown out the entire nation to fire it!

There are so many more plausible ways to to get rid of space debris than ground based lasers...

[BP]

Doesn't have much to do with NASA G2, but we went on the Kennedy Space Center tour last weekend. Just seeing that Apollo V up close in its stand in the exhibit hall was tremendously inspiring. I mean massive, technologically important and visually impressive. And tremedously dissappointing as well, as we haven't done so inspiring in the past 30 odd years.

 

Oh, as a tanker I also dug the crawler vehicle as well.

[Jeff]

Oh, as a tanker I also dug the crawler vehicle as well.

Mount Dora on the crawler and you'd have one heck of a tank.

[BP]

Mount Dora on the crawler and you'd have one heck of a tank.

 

I like the way you think, pardner.

 

 

Who wants to go Godzilla hunting?

[Ivanhoe]

Do you tankers have the patience for a machine that tops out at 1-2 mph?

[Harold Jones]

Mount Dora on the crawler and you'd have one heck of a tank.

 

 

And we could name it Bun Bun.

[BP]

Do you tankers have the patience for a machine that tops out at 1-2 mph?

 

Listen, the average MBT can run over a small third world house/hut. Bun Bun can run over a small first world town. Tradeoffs can be made. . .

[Jeff]

Speed is unimportant when the outcome is inevitable, in fact it can enhance the terror effect in your enemy.

[Jim Martin]

HOUSTON -- In labs at Johnson Space Center, away from the buzz about NASA's new spaceship and its new missions to the moon and Mars, a group of engineers are plodding away at another piece of the puzzle: spacesuits.

 

http://www.redorbit.com/news/space/879853/...uits/index.html

[Corinthian]

And we could name it Bun Bun.

 

ROTFLOL!

 

http://www.illumatie.nl/bunbuns/viewer.html

[Ivanhoe]

Speed is unimportant when the outcome is inevitable, in fact it can enhance the terror effect in your enemy.

 

I still see some 2-star glued to his LCD monitor, watching progress on Google Earth, and trying to backseat drive from his office suit at Knox; "Slow down, watch out for that boulder, when was the last time you did PM, ..."

[Jeff]

I still see some 2-star glued to his LCD monitor, watching progress on Google Earth, and trying to backseat drive from his office suit at Knox; "Slow down, watch out for that boulder, when was the last time you did PM, ..."

Heck, just give him a joystick, make it an ROV and make the TC's 2-stars.

[BP]

Heck, just give him a joystick, make it an ROV and make the TC's 2-stars.

 

A Shuttle crawler with Dora mounted on it. I can just imagine the gunnery qualification tables- especially the TC's engagement. "Bun Bun, this C92. Prepare reduced crew operation. Safely dismount 475 loaders and crew and prepare for the TC engagement."

[Harold Jones]

A Shuttle crawler with Dora mounted on it. I can just imagine the gunnery qualification tables- especially the TC's engagement. "Bun Bun, this C92. Prepare reduced crew operation. Safely dismount 475 loaders and crew and prepare for the TC engagement."

 

 

Crap you'd need a crane and a hydraulic assist to get the MBD in for boresighting. Of course the real problem is that Bun Bun wouldn't be C130 transportable.

[Corinthian]

Crap you'd need a crane and a hydraulic assist to get the MBD in for boresighting. Of course the real problem is that Bun Bun wouldn't be C130 transportable.

 

Strap several Hindenburg blimps on it and you solve the air transportability problems.

[Corinthian]

Forgive me for my piss poor photo editing skills....

 

 

Bun Bun

[irregularmedic]

Looks like there's still lots of room left over for multiple 8" gun turrets...

 

You'd have to guard it against Jawa's though, they'd think it was the mother sandcrawler that birthed all theirs!

Edited March 25, 2007 by irregularmedic

[Jeff]

Forgive me for my piss poor photo editing skills....

 

 

Bun Bun

Nice Tomas! I think that fulfills the 8" requirement.

[BP]

Nice Tomas! I think that fulfills the 8" requirement.

 

3.9735 times over!

[BansheeOne]

It would fulfill the 8 decimeter requirement, even.

 

Strap several Hindenburg blimps on it and you solve the air transportability problems.

 

Let's see:

 

Crawler weight: 2,721 metric tons.

 

Dora weight (including undercarriage): 1,350 metric tons.

 

Hindenburg lift capacity: 74 metric tons of fuel, 40 metric tons of water ballast, 11 metric tons of mail and cargo.

 

You do the math ...

[Gregory]

Strap several Hindenburg blimps on it and you solve the air transportability problems.

 

Not even close - the Hingdenburg had the lift capacity of about 100 tons. The transporter alone weights 2700 tons.

[Corinthian]

Scrap the Hindenberg then. Saturn V rockets or the new rocket being developed for NASA's Return-to-the-Moon program.

[Jeff]

Scrap the Hindenberg then. Saturn V rockets or the new rocket being developed for NASA's Return-to-the-Moon program.

 

Heck use the plot item from Footfall and plant some nukes under it to lob it into space.

[DB]

Heck use the plot item from Footfall and plant some nukes under it to lob it into space.

You couldn't do that - the US government would never countenance naming any of their kit for an angel...

 

David

 

calling/naming grammar, ugh.

Edited March 27, 2007 by DB

[SCFalken]

New Space Shield May Help Make Mars Mission Reality

Richard A. Lovett

for National Geographic News

 

March 23, 2007

 

Scientists working toward a manned Mars mission say they're closing in on a new, high-tech material that can shield astronauts from deadly deep-space radiation. Known as graphite nanofiber, the new material would be much lighter than the dense materials used on Earth as radiation shielding in nuclear power plants.

That's good, because radiation is one of the biggest dangers to long-distance space travelers.

Intense bursts from solar flares can kill quickly. But even normal background radiation levels in interplanetary space are high enough to pose dangers, including an increased risk of cancer. (Related: "Space Weather Could Scrub Manned Mars Mission" [August 9, 2005].)

While adequate shielding can easily be made with existing technology—a few feet of concrete would work admirably—such materials are too heavy to launch into space.

"If we don't get off the ground, we are not in business," Ram Tripathi, a senior research scientist at NASA's Langley Research Center, said at a meeting of the American Physical Society in Denver, Colorado, earlier this month.

This thorny safety issue can't be solved the same way on a Mars mission as it was on the International Space Station or the Apollo expeditions to the moon, Tripathi added. (See a photo gallery of the top photos from the space station.)

The Apollo trips, he said, were "little hops," so there wasn't time for background exposures to reach dangerous levels.

And in the space station, astronauts are close enough to Earth for its magnetic field to protect them from the worst types of radiation.

On occasions when short-lived solar flares overpower that protection, the astronauts can huddle in a cramped radiation shelter that doesn't add vastly to the station's weight.

Nuclear Shrapnel But in deep space the radiation takes the form of larger particles that are more difficult to stop. Worse, the wrong type of shielding can actually increase the danger, Tripathi said.

That's because incoming particles doesn't simply plow into the shielding and stop, like bullets hitting a bucket of sand. Rather, the particles collide with atoms of the shielding material, like billiards cues hitting their targets.

The radiation can be so energetic that it shatters the shielding atoms. This microscopic "shrapnel," if it makes it completely through the shielding, is just as dangerous to the ship's crew as the original particles.

This is a big problem in shielding made of normal spaceship construction materials, such as aluminum, whose atoms are relatively heavy and produce powerful shrapnel.

"You need a new material," Tripathi said. "You do not want a heavy material that produces debris."

Tripathi believes that the best choice is the lightest of all atoms: hydrogen.

Of course, it's not possible to build spaceship walls from hydrogen. But it is possible to build superstrong materials from graphite nanofiber, then enrich them with trapped hydrogen.

Tripathi refused to speculate on how much of this material would be needed or how much it would weigh. That depends on the mission, he said.

On short trips, he pointed out, astronauts can put up with cramped conditions. But on longer ones, the travelers will need more room to work, sleep, and relax.

"Then you need a bigger shield and more weight," he said.

Key Obstacle?

Other experts are also beginning to realize that new forms of radiation shielding are an important need for long-distance space flights.

Dealing with radiation will be "a major headache," said science fiction author Mary Rosenblum, who researched the topic extensively for her 2006 novel Horizons.

Humans are far more sensitive to radiation than NASA's robotic probes, so more powerful protection is needed.

Rosenblum is excited by Tripathi's research. "Effective shielding," she said, "has to come first on the list of necessities."

 

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/20...ce-shields.html

 

 

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