Kerbal Space Program - Carrier Mod - Landing on a Postage Stamp... or not.
Infinite Dice messaged me recently asking if I'd like to look at the latest release of his Carrier parts mod, and the correct answer was a hearty 'Hell Yeah'.
I mainly wanted to land my rocket assistem STOL cargo plane on the deck, unfortunately while the landing deck is immune to most rocket exhausts, it apparently melts like butter under heat of sepatrons.
The Antares rocket is not the best known rocket, except when it exploded, then everyone noticed. The Antares grew out of the same commercial orbital services program that launched the Falcon 9. The design used a Ukrainian built first stage with Russian engines, and a solid upper stage to launch the Cygnus cargo vehicle. The Engines themselves have a story worth telling.
This collection of existing technologies meant it was built quickly and is considered a low cost option compared to Atlas.
Background music by DJ Rkod
http://ccmixter.org/people/DJ_Rkod
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ttmG-HBUXE
I'm putting the final touches to the Interplanetary ship, a change in design halfway through construction is causing some minor problems, but otherwise we're ready for departure to Jool by the end of the episode.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUl_YPHdoVE
The Augmented reality features of Pokemon Go use technology that was derived from rocket guidance system, and miniaturization of computers made the Apollo Guidance system possible long before you could fly simulated moon landings in your smartphone.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rwFgnQS4Sw
It turns out the that hangar module for Star Citizen actually contains a hidden level that lets you fly some of the ships, although this is clearly early in development and not really supposed to be accessible to end users. The actual mechanics of flying are unlikely to be representative of the official release, but it's fun to mess around with this nevertheless.
Credit Should go to CharlieBrownAU for discovering the level switch (http://www.youtube.com/user/charliebrownau) , and BenKuroshin for creating the custom mission.xml files to add all the ships (http://www.youtube.com/user/BenKuroshin)
http://www.youtube.com/user/BenKuroshin
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QX48u3SmzCg
A collection of footage from a pilot training session around dusk, this is a Cirrus SR20 with Perspective+ Avionics giving a full glass cockpit with the exception of the 2 backup instruments. I'm flying with Rebecca, my flight instructor, in the right seat who's largely observing and critiquing my maneuvers and procedures, but occassionaly steps in to clean up my radio calls.
Disclaimer - I am not a flight instructor, don't consider anything I say as the definitive word on any of this. If you want to learn to fly then find a qualified instructor.
All the footage we captured uses hands free camera mounts, which wouldn't interfere with the operation of the aircraft, distract us, or reduce our visibility.
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https://twitter.com/DJSnM
I have a discord server where I regularly turn up:
https://discord.gg/zStmKbM
If you really like what I do you can support me directly through Patreon
https://www.patreon.com/scottmanley
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DezE8cO-Rds
The Space Shuttle began development in the 1970's and even before it flew for the first time engineers were developing new ideas to 'improve' the Space Shuttle hardware. Expanding its cargo envelope by putting payloads on the external tank, 'hammerhead' & 'lenticular' fairings, getting rid of the crew section, adding a massive passenger section and of course going full Xzibit and adding mini boosters to the regular boosters.
Most of these pictures come from a review paper published in 2004, after the Columbia disaster, but before Constellation was decided upon.
Shuttle Variations And Derivatives That Never Happened - An Historical Review
Carl F. Ehrlich, Jr. & James A. Martin
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qi7wtXcaFws
Now that Call of Duty has taken a giant step into deep space I wanted to cast a scientific eye over the settings and set pieces and how they compare to scientific reality.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NJ293dfv00
Heat Signature is a game about illicitly boarding spaceships to steal things, capture or assassinate people and occasionally get knocked through a window into space. It's a fantastic little game that combines a pile of mechanics into a unique sci-fi take on the stealth/assault genre.
http://www.heatsig.com/
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLI4nBWypAE