JoeSchmuckatelli

Can be done. Will be expensive. Return on investment often measured in decades and you are likely to be 'upside down' forever. You're getting good technical advice above - but if I can offer my $.02: if you can afford it, spend some of that on a lawyer to inform you of the regulatory impact of the choice / decision. Mind you, I know nothing about SA law, but I have heard of jurisdictions that require homes to be hooked up to the grid where available. In many places the 'sell back to the provider' isn't optional (it's required) and the rate scheme is completely in favor of the utility company. The technical difficulties are often easier to solve than the legal, FWIW.

Practice. Practice. Practice. Interesting fact - all those guys are within 1 inch of height of each other.

@Lewie Thanks for sharing! We went to a lot of the same places on my son's recent 8th grade trip. Missed out on 8th and I - although I have seen the show several times. Band is amazing. Did you get a chance to see the Silent Drill Team?

Too bad it's on PS... My daughter would tear it up! 'Play has no limits'??? (no sense of Irony at Sony)

Don't you jinx it!

I forgot the name - but some Mars Mission series did exactly that. Makes sense.

Hey - Physics People! Torus-hab on a spacecraft question: is there any difference in the ability of a craft to maneuver that depends upon the orientation of the 'wheel'? Most of the time when artists depict a craft with an attendant torus habitat, the axis of rotation is in line with the engines and thrust. But what would happen if the torus was in line with the direction of travel (axis of rotation perpendicular to thrust) ? The engines are placed either side of the axis or the ship is built like a bicycle fork (placing the engines centerline but outside of the torus)? Given approximately the same mass, does orientation of the wheel affect maneuvering in spaaaaaaaace?

We see what we want to see.

July 12 is the scheduled date for release of color images from the team. "The first two instrument modes, NIRCam imaging and NIRISS imaging, have been declared ready for science; watch the “Where is Webb” page as the team works their way through the other 15 instrument modes. After commissioning is finished, the fun – and discoveries – will start: implementing the hundreds of peer-reviewed science programs that have been selected for Webb’s first year. The area on the sky that Webb can see at any given time is called the field of regard. Deciding which observations to make on which day is a complicated process designed to optimize observational efficiency and manage the observatory’s resources" My reading suggests that early priority is being given to certain projects that, together, will showcase the range of science that Webb can provide as inspiration for the community... To stimulate new proposals and, perhaps novel science.

I don't know the answer - but I like where you are going! Be interested in the responses from those who have solid chemistry backgrounds!

I had to look that one up. Not a bad choice, given some recommend it as a top two contender for a 'whole world, one gun' game round. (Anything that can reliably take out elephant, African Buffalo, Salties and Tygre? Probably a solid choice for a man killer). Full disclosure - not a sniper, myself - but did work 'sniper adjacent' for a number of years, listening to those guys and their armorers talk shop... My read on the current direction is that there is a difference between something like the Brenneke and the H&H (good rounds with solid terminal ballistics) and that which makes a good sniper round - where precision and predictability and long range and portability are the most desired features - thus terminal ballistics simply needs to be acceptable and not detract from the others. (also edited post above to add 7.62 content) Editing again: long range precision rifle fire is a fascinating topic - one where science and human ability mingle. At the professional level, the weapons are so good that they can be accurately described as 'a system of compromises that minimize limiting factors to accomplish a given task'. (For a brief period the Army and USMC both looked for a single, modernized rifle to do all sniper missions... But then life /real-world raised its head and intervened) This is why, instead of a one-size-fits-all ultimate sniper rifle you get: Every aspect of the construction, add-ons and employment is fascinating. Optics choice has exploded recently. When I started, 10 power was standard. With the advent of the Barrett and later Lapua, larger higher power optics proliferated. And later, as snipers found themselves in multi-range engagements, variable optics with 0 - 4, 6,or 8x magnification started popping up. And - at least in the Marines, where long range accurate rifle fire is an 'everyone' skill (cooks, truck drivers and repairmen all can hit 500m targets with iron sights) - the line between who is a sniper and who's not is blurred (OK, let's use the word 'designated marksman' to distinguish between the jobs )

A lot to unpack. Short stuff first. You are always prepared for the last war by the time you get into the current one. 'Rifle Combat occurring closer than 200m' came about because of the terrain of Vietnam. USMC updated the M16-A1 to a heavier barreled and more accurate for longer range engagement with the M16-A2. (We like to shoot 500m+ with iron sights). But Army... Maybe they're not on board with long range precision shooting in the 80s? Still convinced short range engagements - because data. Army does get on board with the A2 for a while... But then Army goes all in on the M4 because it's a cool carbine and you can hang cool stuff on it and look like a Ranger (also "easier to get in and out of vehicles and buildings" ). Problem was for both of them (starting in 2003 and ~ GWOT) a few things: 1. that full sized M16-A2 would drop a guy hit in the open (Marines) but the M4 just wounded them (Army). Army has a lot more people than Marines so it was a big problem. Reason? The shorter barrel dropped the chamber pressure drastically reducing the terminal ballistics of the exact same round. Round did not perform as advertised - leaving a bunch of lightly wounded pixed off guys who still had their own guns. 2. The 5.56 round fired from a full sized rifle is great for targets in the open and less than 500m. Iraq was urban (not in the open) and Afghanistan / Syria had long range engagements at times (800 to 1200m). Both had mud-brick as a common building materials and rounds would not penetrate walls. 7.62 rifles started coming out of the armories (storage) or new ones being made up (SCAR-17, etc) - but 7.62 is heavy and you cannot carry 180 - 210 rounds per person easily, so you get logistical problems. (Plus, Army = lots of bodies, including shorties so 7.62 (incl recoil) needs to go) 3. Body armor tech not only proliferated, it got cheap. So the plates that protect the US troops are now in everyone's hands (or carriers). The new stuff will stop 5.56 and 5.45 - so that's not good when the Red Team has plates, too. So now, Army wants a harder hitting round that can retain the short barrel thing they like. Enter the 6.8. It penetrates plates, walls and other stuff. Vis sniper? .336 Lapua is pretty dam good. Not doing the math but it's getting close to 8mm. Does both anti personnel and anti material (so do the .50 and 12.7) without being quite as heavy as the classics. But for traditional sniper stuff,. 336 is a lot of gun - so likely 7mm(+/-) will be around for a long time.

The fact that humans can fly and land something the size of a building will never cease to amaze me

You guys both bring up good points - and I'm not quoting either wholesale b/c long posts. Still, I like what you have written. I'm not a game developer, but I read a lot and have paid attention to several people who do have game development experience and extensive coding backgrounds. Based on this, my intuition is that the combination of multi-player and warp is the bridge too far. I respect that the team is taking extra time to make good on the promised intended features they have advertised, but the game is due in a year and within the next 6 months they will have to S-or-get-off-the-pot with the decision of what features will be in the published game. If in fact MP is the conflict, the sooner they S-can the feature the better the end product will be. Think about it. KSP2 can be a wholly realized success w/o MP. But - what of the other features can be scrapped without the game ultimately being a failure?

I've only seen the first two - but I have to agree with @KSK... The series looks a lot better than I first feared

I don't disagree - and in fact had completely forgotten about this thread (where it is on point). Thanks! I just heard him say that and it tickled my funny bone

Tangentially related: Neil deGrasse Tyson, "We can launch a probe from one moving, rotating planet and land on a COMET... we can measure, via LIGO, a wiggle less than the width of a photon... and yet Congress spends its time and money because someone saw a Tic-Tac on the screen of a Navy jet in a restricted airspace??? That's your best evidence for 'little green men'??? C'Mon!"

Old World. Civ-Like. ... Not Civ.

Mercury in retrograde https://astrostyle.com/mercury-retrograde/

Between May 23 and 25, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope sustained an impact to one of its primary mirror segments ... This most recent impact was larger than was modeled, and beyond what the team could have tested on the ground. ... After initial assessments, the team found the telescope is still performing at a level that exceeds all mission requirements despite a marginally detectable effect in the data This recent impact caused no change to Webb’s operations schedule, as the team continues to check out the science instruments’ observing modes and prepares for the release of Webb’s first images and the start of science operations From the blog (FWIW - my pucker factor was high as I read about this)

I thought about this a short time after my quip... There is a certain elegance to kerbiloid's suggestion. Essentially, 'if you have the Power - use it in a less destructive way'. The US and Soviets actually did a lot of this during the Cold War. It's how we ended up with so many pocket dictators scattered around the world. The problem is the classic 'Teddy Roosevelt situation': https://www.nytimes.com/1998/12/06/weekinreview/the-nation-big-time-from-trustbusters-to-trust-trusters.html Too often you spend the money, but the guy you paid won't stay bought. ... There is a problem in government and military circles that is an extension of the 'Expert Problem'. (The 'Experts' have a deep understanding and knowledge of their field and see ways of using their expertise to solve most problems using their methods - the 'Problem' is twofold: 1, that they are often blind to other solutions outside of their expertise that might be better solutions, and 2, because they are expert at providing the solution they are also inured to the fallout / cost of their solution (if it works - it's worth the price regardless of the cost). The 'Expert' is also a feature of the post-WWII / Cold War - and we are starting to see the problems of the over-reliance on Experts in big ways (Covid response, for one) - where generalist leaders with a broad knowledge base may have been able to provide a more nuanced approach. ... There are a lot of people who want America to go on Adventures - but we only have one funded and populated group capable of Adventuring: the military. And when you're a military Expert and your only tool is a hammer... Every problem looks like a nail. ... Too often we see nations sending in their military without a clear-eyed, realistic political end for it to accomplish. This brings me back to Ambrose Bierce: 'War is the untying of a political knot with the teeth that would not yield to the tongue.' The thing to remember about war is that the problem at hand is ultimately a political one. Political problems should have many solutions - with the hammer or teeth being only one among many. Acknowledged - humans are stubborn, and sometimes the best tool for a political problem is the military... But in my opinion it should not be the first tool you bring out, or the one that you use in almost every situation.

You ain't lyin!

Soviet doctrine is extremely fires (arty, whether rocket or gun, mostly - along with some air power) heavy. Both combatants draw directly from that doctrine. The result is that the artillery is the primary, rather than the supporting arm and unintentional casualties are common - but as for drawing lessons, any fight between two fires heavy combatants is going to be ugly, with high arty casualties and the concomitant destruction of civil areas and civilian casualties. You might compare that with the American adventures and see different results / percentages.

This video from @Beccab's post is what I was talking about. Second attempt Shortly after the camera picks up the sound there is a green flash. Wondering what that might be... as well as whether it looks to anyone else if they throttled down at some point later

There's your profit center, right there!