SpaceX touches down in California as Voyager 2 spies interstellar space SpaceX were cock-a-hoop this morning as the company landed its first booster at California's Vandenburg Air Force Base. NASA merely coughed politely and pointed toward its Voyager 2 probe, which looks to be about to enter interstellar space. SpaceX SAOCOM success SpaceX's Falcon 9 booster left its launchpad at Space Launch …
You don't want cars built that way. In the last century, car safety has noticeably improved every year, accumulating huge gains. If cars were made to last a lifetime, there would be too many old, unsafe cars on the streets, driving up the injury rates a lot.
Once cars have been perfected is the time to talk of durability.
"You don't want cars built that way. In the last century, car safety has noticeably improved every year, accumulating huge gains. If cars were made to last a lifetime, there would be too many old, unsafe cars on the streets, driving up the injury rates a lot."
All this is getting severely off the point and so on, and that's a perfectly valid point, but here's another angle:
The thing about the Voyager spacecraft is that they were engineered to do a particular job. The engineering was done appropriately, which is how come they are still just about working - albeit with some bits breaking and them generally being on their last legs what with the power supplies fading away. If I'd been involved in designing or building those craft, I'd be extremely proud of my work.
"Appropriate engineering" is exactly what's needed for cars, just as with the Voyager spacecraft - it's just what's appropriate for cars is not the same as for interplanetary space probes intended to run for decades.
Alternatively, you could take the view that the Voyager spacecraft were engineered with absolutely the best that could be done at the time, taking all things fully into account. If cars had been engineered like that in the 1970s, we'd've had cars operating with very nearly current safety levels 50 years ago (crumple zones, airbags, and anti-lock brakes were all "things" back in the 1970s; electronic stability control could have been by the end of the decade at least [yes it would have been bulky and expensive and power hungry and probably high-maintenance], and pre-tensioner seatbelts); and they'd be highly recyclable/reusable too - best possible engineering, remember - thus having a significant trade-in value, so replacing them when they got tatty and the new model had better fuel economy/comfort/whatnot would be more attractive than you might otherwise think. Also, there'd've been far less pollution if only because hardly anyone would have been able to afford the things...
The software has had regular updates since launch - I believe at least one major upgrade (in 1990) to make it more autonomous has taken place. It's also a small amount of code (64KB RAM I think on them, with a tape drive for storage!) so when picked apart by a team at NASA you'd hope all bugs are caught early in development.
"64KB RAM I think on them,"
Computer Command System, 4096 18-bit words; Attitude and Articulation Control System, 4096 18-bit words; Flight Data System, 8198 `16-bit words (there are two of each of the three computers, not necessarily for redundancy).
"with a tape drive for storage!"
Two digital 8-tracks, 1280 megabits, primarily used to buffer acquired data before the long, slow transmission back to Earth. Also not necessarily redundant.
Planned obsolescence isn't really a thing most of the time. Or at the very least not a conscious choice by the manufacturer. It's simply driven by cost. Cheaper stuff sells better, even if it lasts shorter. So margins go down, your competitor is undercutting you on price and you are losing sales. Do you A: Keep doing what you are doing and hope the average Joe looking for your products realises and cares your product lasts longer or B: Cut a few corners, shave a few dollars of the production cost and undercut or pricematch your competitor?
I can tell you manufacturers will go for B, because A doesn't make sense. People are stupid idiots, and that appreciation for quality and lifetime is often not important.
Cars are engineered to last roughly 3 to 4 years before requiring major maintenance. Because that's how long the average buyer keeps the car before buying another anyway. Second owners can either get bent or are profitable to dealerships in maintenance fees and spare parts sales (Plus, you've already sold the car to the first guy, so you don't care).
Yes they can make cars that'll last dozens of years without problem. It would be very expensive, probably rather heavy and still require regular upkeep to stay reliable. Meanwhile people are buying that new Volkswagen Passat or BMW 3 series because its cheaper to own over the 4 years they'll have it in their possession.
Meanwhile people are buying that new Volkswagen Passat or BMW 3 series because its cheaper to own over the 4 years they'll have it in their possession.
I can't see how that can be possible.
A 4 year old 3 series will have lost more than half its value. Unless it then goes on to need a new, well, almost everything, it isn't going to cost as much as the depreciation cost the first owner.
An entry level cooking variety 3 series costs a few pounds under 28k. Auto trader has them going from 8k in 2014 spec. That's a 20k loss in depreciation. There's no way on Earth that it'll cost more than that in repairs over the next 4 years; it won't cost more than a couple of grand unless you buy a thrashed & badly maintained car.
I have no earthly idea why any (not-rich) person would buy a brand new car and pay the VAT and massive depreciation.
I think it depends on the car. Expensive flash things it doesn't make sense. My nearly-30-year-old Porsche 944 cost me £2500, and a few grand since then on maintenance.
But for the everyday car, it's often a good deal to buy a fairly basic thing (Skoda Fabia?) for new for maybe £10K (and the dealers offer some good cash deals!) and then drive it carefully for the next 10-15 years. Depreciation under £1K per year. Or buy a low-mileage one that's 4 years old for £6K, so again costing about £1K per year.
And buying from new you know who has sat in those seats!
how much the abilities of NASA, indeed our abilities as mankind to think in long-term projects, build long-lasting stuff, make very much from very basic ingredients have deteriorated, and how much our expectations have kept pace on this downward spiral.
I do hope, that the speed of this change doesn't increase any more - lest I am still alive, when it hits the fan.
"Does The Goblin go out into 'interstellar space' before coming back again in its orbit?"
I presume so. I think interstellar space is defined as "where the Sun ceases to be the dominant influence on the local environment". In practice, that means when the solar wind drops below the local speed of sound (that's "sound" including magnetic waves), because nothing (*) outside that bubble can propogate inside (upstream). Put another way, inside the solar system the only thing you can hear is the Sun.
(* Well, nothing that is except light, cosmic rays and lumps of rock. I suppose that's not exactly nothing, but very little stops those things if they are minded to travel in your direction!)
There are no clear definition on what the boundaries of the solar system are. The one they use here is where the galactic wind overcomes the solar wind. Another would be the farthest out planet. A more common one would be where the gravitational pull of the sun is no longer dominant. This will be much much farther out.
In a galaxy, as we are, it would be usefully to think that the boundary is the border to next solar system and thus you would use gravitational border. But if you have some rouge object skipping through the galaxy it will never be outside of a solar system, but can you say that this object really have visited us if it pass us a light years distance? Also, will an intergalactic system (if there is such a thing) then have no boundary?
But if you use the "solar wind" boundary does that mean that comets and such regularly leave the solar system before returning?
It is simple, use the one that gives the best headlines.
Fortunately, someone has been keeping count:
Some people really are interested in our fancy remote control gadget, that happens to be about to cross the heliopause, sampling a second, vital scientific data point on this previously theoretical zone of solar space.
So please stop giving poor old NASA grief over it. They don't get much right, but the Voyagers are very sweet spacecraft. If I could claim credit for them I'd never shut up!
Umm... Actually, the amazing thing about NASA is how little it gets wrong. Oh yes there are all sorts of things wrong with the US space programme and how it's managed, but if you look into it, most of that it caused by politicians: e.g., insisting on NASA money being spent in *their* states, and routinely (i.e., every new president in recent times) changing what NASA's supposed to be doing.
The thing about the famous big cock-ups under the NASA banner is that most people who have been interested in space for a few decades can actually list them.
Think about it: there's Apollo 1 and two Space Shuttle disasters in the crewed space programme as the only three times NASA programmes have killed astronauts. Given the risks involved, that's pretty impressive. Admittedly, when you find out the details of those three horrible events and just how straightforwardly avoidable they all were, it seems a good deal less impressive - but still, the actual number of fatal accidents is low, given the risky nature of the business. I mean, think about Apollo 13: despite it all, the crew got back to Earth alive. That's a combination of the crew (and ground support staff) all having "the right stuff", and pretty much all the engineering being first-rate.
High profile uncrewed NASA spacecraft cock-ups? Mars Climate Orbiter and Hubble are the two most famous ones partly due to the avoidable nature of the failures - and Hubble was sorted out to a large extent. But NASA's tried to put four rovers on Mars to explore the planet. Every attempt succeeded and they have all exceeded their planned operational life. Both Viking landers got to Mars and worked fine too.
Oh yes, I'm sure the US space programme could be operated better, certainly more cheaply given the high price charged by the usual suspects for launchers (which is being dealt with right now by SpaceX and others), but NASA really does do rather excellent engineering almost all the time.
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
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The SpaceX landings are amazing enough, but the fact that they're landing at the launch site (versus a continent or so away) is the really astounding part. That maneuver sounds a lot like the shuttle's RTLS abort mode (although the shuttle would have more "parts" to ditch and then would have glided to a landing).
The El Reg article from a few days back had a quote describing RTLS as "continuous miracles interspersed with acts of God to be successful".
The maneuver is very little like the shuttles RTLS abort. In that, they stop boosting up to orbit at a random and unplanned point and jettison the rocket boosters and fuel tank, then turn the shuttle into a glider and then loop around and land on a runway.
The SpaceX rockets were designed to land afterwards, and even then you'll note that the first quite a few attempts didn't exactly go according to plan and required several design changes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9FzWPObsWA
@Peter, not quite. In a RTLS they had to burn the SRBs to completion in the normal ascent path, the boosters would then be ditched and the main tank stayed attached. The shuttle then boosted up and slowly did a sort of half loop while burning to kill the speed and raise the apogee sufficiently. Only once sufficient velocity back towards the Cape had been achieve would the main tank be ditched and the shuttle would glide from that point on.
(See this video by Scott Manly for instance: https://youtu.be/Iwn3kk-q1YU, sort of showing the maneuver in Orbiter)
The main thing with SpaceXs Falcon is that a RTLS isn't an abort mode and the stage has burned most of it's fuel and most of the mass it was carrying. Which means compared to the ascent a little fuel goes a long way. For the STS RTLS abort the shuttle was still carrying a lot of fuel in the external fuel tank, OMS and RCS systems which it needed to ditch to be able to land, hence the long drawn out back-flip to burn off fuel (All the while also firing the OMS and RCS systems continually).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARPANET
The kernel of the Internet started as a US Department of Defense project. The DoD was worried about internal communications during a nuclear attack on the US, and they wanted a distributed system that would be able to work around damaged areas of the network. Thus the first packet switching nodes were built and lo, it was Good.
The WWW part is merely HTML, which did have one vital new feature over previous markup languages: The >hyperlink<. Anyone with a mouse could easily operate them! So easily in fact, that the great unwashed masses soon occupied most of the space, alas.
"The kernel of the Internet started as a US Department of Defense project. The DoD was worried about internal communications during a nuclear attack on the US, and they wanted a distributed system that would be able to work around damaged areas of the network."
Incorrect. In The Beginning, the first two nodes of what became TehIntraWebTubes were at SRI and UCLA, conceived, designed, implemented and run by students and professors. With no Pentagon oversight, input or anything else "intellectual". Money, yes. Oversight, no.
The "designed to survive nukes" is oft repeated, but completely untrue. ARPANET was just a research network designed to research networking. The "nuke" myth came about much later than I started mucking about with it. How long ago was that? Well, there were fewer than two dozen nodes on it. The term "internetworking" had not yet been coined. Cerf & co were probably a year or so away from contemplating the project which eventually became TCP/IP.
The current crop of failed gyros turn out to be because of their spacecraft being subjected to intense solar winds. The voyager crafts are so far out that they aren't subjected to the same charging effects that led to the demise of the failed gyros. They are also subjected to far less loading for similar reasons, so aren't subjected to the same kind of forces. I doubt Voyagers gyros would have lasted the same amount of time if they'd stayed at around 1 AU.
"the Falcon 9 performed nominally"
This always slightly irritates me. Why do these Space types always say 'nominally' when they mean 'as intended' or even 'normally''?
Nominally: adverb
1. by or as regards name; in name; ostensibly:
"He was nominally the leader, but others actually ran the organization."
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