Leszek

There is nothing here. Nothing at all. Why? Because N-Rays, that is why. Let me explain. (I have posted about this before but people like to forget posts they can't respond to.) A scientist in France discovered N-Rays. They were at the margins of what we could detect. Many labs confirmed the result. (Not 3, but 120 scientists and approximately 300 published papers.) It turns out N-Rays do not exist. It is very dangrous to work near the margins of detection. If you are a scientist and you think you have found something novel, but it is at the margins, you have 2 choices. They are: 1) Work to find a way to make more sensitive equipment and push back the margins. 2) Work to find a way to make the effect more detectable and move out of the margins. You do not have the choice to assume you are detecting something real. Not if you want everyone to take you seriously. As for the whole reason this is getting so much attention. Is because it is sensational and it didn't fall flat after the first lab. And also because it is sensational. It defies commonly accepted science. And it is sensational. You will note that it is not because it has merit. This is because it hasn't yet been shown to have merit. The bottom line is that as long as they stay on the margins of what is detectable, you can safely discount EVERY claim they come out with. It is just too easy to fool yourself and everyone else why you are in the margins.

There is no need to accuse Paul March of lying or not. It is in a vacuum, trust me, doesn't work no matter who you are. You need to record the procedure and the data and show your results. If you don't, then it doesn't matter if it is in a vacuum, no one will take you seriously. It doesn't matter who you are. It doesn't matter how trustworthy you think you are. It just doesn't matter. Now Paul March might have perfectly good reason to not release the full spiel. Perhaps they are making sure the i's are dotted and the t's are crossed. But until they do, no one is going to take them seriously and rightly so. They can't get their stuff published in peer review journals, this is because they aren't accounting for all the sources of error that can cause a spurious result. Or at least they can't show they can. Like I said before they have to release all the data or no one is going to take them seriously. When you are working near the margins of what can be detected, it is very hard to account for everything. You have to worry about things like traffic outside skewing your results. The EmDrive team is working to get around this by scaling things up to more detectable levels. Many possible sources of error disappear as you move away from the margins. I am not saying the device doesn't work. Just that they haven't shown it to work yet. Until they do, they have nothing. Period. I am not saying we shouldn't take them seriously. They are working to scale up the device and produce definitive results. Pseudoscientist do not do that, they stay in the margins. I am saying is that until they have something real to show otherwise, the expectation is that the device almost certainly doesn't work. The odds are really stacked against it. I am not going to enumerate the reasons why yet again in this thread.

Sigh. EmDrive probably doesn't work. It probably never worked. It has been point out time and again that there hasn't been a definitive test. I remember pointing out that they are near the limits of detection. I remember pointing out how dangerous that is for drawing conclusions. People here keep insisting that "it is doing something we can't explain." NO IT IS NOT. That would be definitive already. The experiment needs to be scaled up and run properly, they are working towards it. When they get there, if it works, you can celebrate. Everything up until now, every positive post, has been hopelessly optimistic. You think the article is being biased against EmDrive? You are getting emotionally swayed from objective, you proved it when you thought it read "And now we have a claim that the test was INTENTIONALLY tampered with to produce false results?" And when that was pointed out to you, you didn't re-evaluate your position, you asserted more against the article. NO ONE WANT'S EMDRIVE TO FAIL! Pointing out reality isn't the same thing! IF the scaled up test does finally show something definitive, it will take several years and millions of dollars to complete the research. Think about it, it is a whole new propulsion system that we don't know how it works. We would need to build several versions of it, in several scales, with several other modifications just to explore the technology before we could put a real prototype on a satellite. Yes, we could cut that way in half and just slap the first definitively working version on a satellite and go, but that would be a pointless waste of money and time since we will not have any way to predict all the relevant variables needed to do a real mission to somewhere. The two million dollars and 6 years the article talks about strikes me as optimistic if anything. "I guess this is one of those times when the 'burden of proof' really becomes an unfair burden. " No, and the article doesn't say it is either. If you can't even demonstrate that it works, you don't have anything. Spaceships aren't powered by hope. These guys are working to scale up the device to produce performance that isn't near the limits of detection. When they get there, if it works, they will not hurt for funding. The 2 million dollars the article suggests will be given to them in a heartbeat. It is a drop in the bucket cheap. Until then, the article is correct, they don't have anything yet. You might disagree, that is too bad, the still will not have anything yet. It isn't definitive until it is definitive. Period. Now I am trying to be firm here but not rude. I should point out that this post is to be taken as mater of fact. It is hard to tell someone they are being overly optimistic without them taking offense. But just in case, you should not take offense because non is intended.

If this were any other forum, this would be a discussion about who is better between the Bulls or the Pistons. There is not normally much balance in this kind of discussion. That is why I am going to vote for SNC. Dream Chaser for the win!

All of the engines are less efficient then they used to be. That means that they will either burn through the fuel faster, or they will have less thrust, or both.

Neither. Why choose? Multiple players keep things from stagnating and that is the #1 concern. Do you think ULA would have a new rocket now if not for SpaceX? I root for whomever is pushing innovation at the current moment. Right now that is SpaceX, note that it does not matter if their F9 Heavy will ever be fully reusable or meet all its hype. Other companies are obliged to keep up just in case they can.

I flipped a coin, it hasn't come down yet. Flipped another, I can't find it. Flipped yet another, tails.

Reflectors require collimation. The reflector typically has two mirrors. One at the bottom and one tilted 45 degrees to aim for the eyepiece. These mirrors have to aligned. Most scopes do this with the help of screws. My telescope (and most similar sized reflectors) has 6 screws for the main mirror, 3 to lock it in place and 3 to adjust its angle. The 45 degree mirror had a simpler arrangement but I can't remember without looking. The basic procedure is to look through the empty eyepiece socket and adjust the main mirror until everything is centered. The 45 degree mirror then gets adjusted forwards and back to make sure it is in the center. The angle itself isn't adjustable, we just move the mirror so that it is in the center. Transport of the telescope out to a field to look around may jostle the mirror. Smaller scopes like the sort you are looking at would typically need to have this done once or twice a season, larger scopes might need to do this every time they setup. The scope normally comes with instructions on how to do this, but if not the internet has many tutorials on the subject. Some scopes come with a collimation eyepiece, which basically is just a smaller hole to look through to make things easier. I use a laser collimator for my scope, it fits in the eyepiece and when the laser comes right back straight you are setup. This sort of thing is overkill for most scopes of the level you are looking at. It should be doable, mounts can be purchased separatly. Look at websites like telescopes.com for general idea of what is available. The local stores can usually order them for you and save on shipping and it is easier if you know what you are looking for. Having said that, it isn't that hard to manually aim and point your scope. Most planets are easy to see and the learning curve overall wasn't nearly as hard as the first time I tried to get to orbit in KSP. If your scope doesn't come with one, I would recommend giving it a try. Many days when I setup I don't bother lining up my scope anymore. Finally a computerized mount can do things like track the stars for you. They are moving across the sky faster then you think, within about 45 seconds they are normally out of view, a tracking scope can help that a lot. Over all I would say if your scope doesn't come with one, try without first. It isn't that hard. I would talk to a local club before I went out of my way for that stuff. Light pollution filters work by filtering out the light at around the colour of incandescent streetlights. Nowadays many cities are going to fluorescent or LED streetlights and those are a different colour. A local club would know how well they work in your area.

The fix I was referring to was that I deleted the Tantares folder and pasted the latest version in. Deleting the partdatabase.cfg worked just fine. Thanks a ton.

Beale, your parachute fix works! Unfortunately the Gemini one at lease isn't strong enough to slow capsules down before they hit the water/ground and so they explode. 1.0.X may be awesome but it is doing a real job on the mods. 4 of my must haves aren't even updated yet.

Lots of good advice above, I am going to point out some general principals to consider: 1) Aperture size is the #1 most important stat. Many newbies think it is magnification sometimes called power. This is false. The issue is that things are FAINT and hard to see not SMALL and hard to see. A 150 power magnification is way more than enough to see anything you want to see with a telescope in light polluted areas. Even if you do decide to go for magnification, aperture is still the most important feature as a larger aperture allows a larger useful magnification. Many cheap telescopes have a small 60 mm aperture and 500 magnification. That means they have the optics that mathematically works out to 500+ power so they are allowed to claim it, but they don't have the aperture to support it and you will not be able to really see anything at that power. In addition they use a cheap Barlow to boost the power. A Barlow is an adapter that increases the power by a factor of 2 or 3. So a 3x Barlow turns a 150 power telescope into a 450. The problem with that is a cheap one will also boost the flaws in the mirrors or eyepieces and ruin your picture. The takeaway from all this: Ignore magnification/power, go for aperture. #1 most important stat. By far. 2)Aperture is king. Yes this is a repeat. 3)The kinds of telescopes available to you vary. The two big ones are reflectors and refractors. Reflectors give the most aperture for you money but also more maintenance. I still recommend reflectors though, Dkmdlb above recommended a reflector. 4) I paid $550 Canadian Dollars for my reflector, it was a 5 1/4 inch (135 mm) reflector, it has a computerized mount that after a simple lineup procedure, will point to things like Mars, Andromeda, Orion Nebula. Just to give you an idea of what you can get for your budget. 5) Consider getting a cheaper one like what Dkmdlb suggested and then also getting an eyepiece set. A set of eyepieces from the same manufacturer can often be changed without wrecking your focus. Also keep a lookout for eyepiece filters, they often come in eyepiece sets and often include a light pollution filter. A light pollution filter is not magic, but it helps a great deal. 6) Telescope cameras are readily available that fit into standard telescope eyepices slots without adapters. The only concern I have with that is, looking at dkmdlb's recommended scope, I see it is a kind of reflector called a light bridge, are those rods durable enough to hold a camera in the eyepiece? Probably they are, but this is just a heads up on the sort of things to be considered. 7) Check your local area for a astronomy club. They can give you specific advice for your local area as well as give you an opportunity to try out different telescope styles before you buy one.

I have a bug to report as well: The Gemini parachute causes the capsule to descend on about a 45 degree angle. Just like the pp parachute above. (I am not sure which one that is, I don't think the PP one is Gemini.)

Among the Stars

This thread is growing faster then I am reading it so I am skipping a few pages to post this. Hopefully I didn't duplicate: Guess not, just an illusion. https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20091101182315AAsbiTP Regarding the what is the number for 9-1-1, that is a Simpsons quote. Your friend might have been joking.

Regarding the Mercury Atlas and the gimbal. If the players do not have a vernier, like the way keeper that comes with Tantares, there is no way to control the rocket. I use passinglurker's mercury capsule. With the way keeper, the rocket is very controlable. So you don't NEED a gimbal, if you get the verneir out. One just a bit stronger than Tantares. If you aren't going to do a Vernier soon, then you should put gimbal. Even if you don't change the model and just add .25 gimbal as a stop gap. Otherwise people who don't have Tantare's can't really use the rocket. I mentioned a few pages back about adding alternate configs for the Atlas V/Centaur, I still want to do that. I am just waiting for RT to update to 1.0.X standards first. Oh and YAY on 1.0.x compatibility , I missed OMSK. Edit: I should point out that the Tantares way keeper engine, is the right way to do Vernier. The stock Vernier is garbage, none of this turning on RCS crap.

The yellow strip is to make it go faster. In actual fact this is perfect, the fins that come with the game later on are way to big.

According to the historical documents, this gets invented this year! You are not doubting the historical documents are you?

Very nice. I started a game without, missed it much. Time to start a new game.

If you set your speed to surface, you would see that you are about 25 m/s short of the target. Agreed that ambiguity like this should be more explicit but this isn't a fail.

I see, I learn. Danke.

Very nice. But, does it come in blue?

Are you sure? I have been trying to find information on that I can't. Here is an up close picture of Mercury-Atlas: The source for this picture says "Not visible are two small vernier engines, for fine control." Which is annoyingly vague. Source: http://www.robsv.com/cape/c14lv.html Here are some Stats: http://www.astronautix.com/engines/xlr1055.htm#more Here is a link: http://historicspacecraft.com/Rockets_Atlas.html#Sustainer But I haven't found anything that states outright that the engine does or doesn't gimbal.

That would be AWESOME. Just think if they prove it this week, we could have hover boards by xtmas. <ahem> But yea don't get excited about yet.

If I wanted a very accurate capsule, I would go to FASA. I think the stock alike area is where this mod is needed. I mas making my own Mercury capsule when this one came out and filled the need perfectly. (Infact the ONLY difference in how you did it, is that my retros were going to be mono prop and controllable. Err and I did my own textures. (poorly)) My two cents.

It hasn't left "Bah! Humbug!" until it is verified. We don't know it is doing "something we can't account for" yet. The definitive tests are starting now, after that we will know one way or another. Before that keep your enthusiasm in check. There isn't anything to get excited about until there is something to get excited about.