SunlitZelkova

Yes. Interestingly, I recall an interview with a project member of this rover being specifically asked about how he felt now that it was decided for good that the LEV/SEV would not be going to space. He said he was disappointed considering how much time and effort went into it, but understood the international nature of Artemis compared to Constellation, and was glad to see new nations being able to participate in lunar exploration. He also noted that Japan’s experience with the auto industry would be beneficial in their development efforts. Checking now these are actually separate statements from different people. Mark Kirasich, who at the time was the acting director of Advanced Exploration Systems, said that Japan’s auto industry was related to the decision here https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/07/nasas-first-lunar-habitat-may-be-an-rv-like-rover-built-by-toyota/ and “Senior Lunar Scientist” Clive Neal said he thought it was unfortunate the SEV wouldn’t land on the Moon, but the link to it is dead. Mr. Kirasich also stated the decision wasn’t purely related to the ideal nature of Artemis, but also to cut American costs in the program.

Yes, I was thinking this too. One of their early SLBM tests (seven years ago now) was also speculated to have been launched from a submerged barge despite them claiming to have fired it from a submarine.

I wrote about the crazy basing methods proposed for the MX/Peacekeeper missile program back in the 70s awhile back. This was one of the ideas. Fun fact: North Korea claims they have become the first ever nation to employ such a method of ballistic missile housing, some 45 years after the US first created the concept. https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/dont-laugh-at-north-koreas-lake-launched-ballistic-missiles As far as I can tell, it is not clear whether it is actually operational though. This would also qualify for the "Real Life Kerbalisms" thread!

It's a Desert RATS mission! NASA PR must be pretty sporadic at times because I didn't realize this until now. Here's the blurb from NASA- NASA crew: Jessica Meir (astronaut, participated in first all female spacewalk) Sarah Shull (systems engineering and integration manager for the EVA & Human Surface Mobility Program had to copy paste that and previously worked at MCC) JAXA crew: Hoshide Akihiko (astronaut, has the record for most spacewalking time among Japanese astronauts) Kanai Norishige (astronaut, lieutenant and Diving Medical Officer in the JMSDF) Ikeda Naofumi (systems integration and driving systems engineer for pressurized rovers also had to copy paste that, worked in the auto industry (consumer and racing related research) before joining JAXA) Yamasaki Yusuke (engineer, is now working on the rover but previously worked with the Kibo module on the ISS, and prior to that he worked as a test engineer in a "commercial airplane development program", possibly the Mitsubishi Regional Jet) They are taking turns and going out on different excursions in teams, the rover isn't big enough for all six.

I did not. Thanks! They have ones in the 100 kiloton+ range too. I think the bigger ones would be for cities and smaller ones reserved for things like air bases and ports. They could use multiple ones too. The US did a study in the late 40s, estimating it would take 40x (!) Fat Man sized weapons to destroy Moscow. This is probably why one of the loadouts for the B-36 was 4x Mk 4 bombs (modernized, production Fat Man).

Yes, I meant that. I flip flopped on how to format this so the numbers are all over the place (like the 1000km missile but 1000km range radar) It has been theorized that Tokyo could firestorm. There is lots of flammable material on buildings intended for thermal control/energy efficiency. Some speculations on nuclear war claim fallout shelters will simply save lives but I have seen at least one early 1960s take from some professor claiming these- from subway to basement- would end up much like the basements of Dresden and Tokyo and asphyxiate people. Yep. The talk of early warning and sheltering is pretty bizarre considering even Britain, as far away as it was from the western USSR, was generally seen as doomed to little to no warning in media (Threads and When the Wind Blows feature nuclear detonations within seconds of the characters receiving a warning) and government policy (letters of last resort - I’d assume this meant they didn’t expect to be around to order retaliation). The irony of it all is that these fallout shelters being discussed in Japan aren’t just for common people, they are intended to keep the entire government functioning, probably including the 100+ member National Diet. IKR. But given the Izumo class helicopter carriers were built with a flight deck capable of accommodating the F-35B takeoff and landing despite promises that they would never be deployed on such ships, I think something else may be afoot here. ——— So getting back to something closer to science… How fast do people run on average when running for their lives? I have only found one article with no source claiming 12mph/19kmh, or about 300 meters in one minute. Which is a lot more than I thought, but that doesn’t take into account running over people who have fallen or the bottleneck at the entrance to a shelter, or people shoving you back to get ahead of you. Japan is known for public orderliness in crisis but I can’t see how lining up and calmly filing into a shelter is going to work, when there is a minute and half or so until the missile hits- although people are so oblivious to the actual severity of the danger there I would not be surprised if people did calmly file in expecting 10 minutes or so of evacuation time, only to get vaporized or blasted. But IIRC MythBusters tested the “everybody just cram into the airplane” method of airliner boarding and it kind of worked, right? So maybe we will be ok, right? No. There is little to no concept of civil defence there, in stark contrast to South Korea. It’s silly considering how strong natural disaster preparedness is. My question was related to civilians sheltering rather than getting retaliatory missiles off.

About how much of an early warning would Japan have of incoming ballistic missiles coming from 1000 km away? I ask here as Google will not give a straight answer. The US would have 30 minutes or so thanks to early warning IR sats. But no else apart from Russia has these systems. France had the Spirale IR sats… for a brief period of time in 2009. Contrary to the misleading claims that Japan’s IGS sats can be used for “missile early warning”, this is only by looking for signs of missile deployment- not round the clock warning- not taking into account the existence of solid fuel missiles. It is unclear if US early warning info is transmitted to allies or not*. This leaves them to rely on their radars for detecting incoming missiles. These radars have pretty poor range (within the context of BMEW), about 1000 kilometers max, but I would assume these would have worse range when it comes to targets from space. This question arose as Japan’s PM announced his intention to have the government study the potential for construction of fallout shelters. Not only is the survivability of them questionable, but I wonder whether it is worth the cost if we are only going to get 1 minute-40 seconds of warning. *I assume it is not clear because despite Wikipedia claiming DSP provided “timely warning” of launches during the Gulf War, Japan began sounding sirens only after a missile had splashed down recently. Also this counts as a spaceflight related question, right?

Nope. The “Phantom” (F-4) is already the Phantom II. Here is the Phantom. It actually had its first flight during WWII! So the F-35 would be the Phantom III, but given we already call the F-4 the Phantom, would could also just drop the number when referring to the F-35. Panther is technically taken by the Navy F9F Panther, which came in straight wing and swept wing flavors and served throughout the 1950s. It is interesting that Air Force pilots would use it. If anyone is feeling controversial, feel free to try out the original proposed names for the F-4: Satan or Mithras.

I would go as far as to say they are given in bad taste. Who’s idea was it to name a disposable spacecraft, that is, one that will burn up in the atmosphere, after Kalpana Chawla, a victim of the Columbia disaster? Its like a patriotic shooting target manufacturer naming their latest human shaped board “the JFK” in honor of the former President…

This is a great guide. Thanks!

How are Starlink profits connected to Starship funding? It may not necessarily be a big thing, but Musk’s comments have me curious.

I see two options. The F-105 was called the Thunderchief, which got shortened to Thud. So we could shorten Lightning to “The Lig”. The A-10 was named the Thunderbolt II but was also called the Warthog because of how ugly it was. So we could call the Lightning “the Beemer” because of how expensive it is.

It's not that dumb of an idea, the Tu-16 and Tu-95 both became airliners after all, as did the B-29, while a Tu-4 conversion was proposed too. I think rather than any detailed engineering reasons, it is just a matter of design common sense. A bomber is designed to carry payload to a target and RTB. Not carry luggage and people, not have fancy accommodations. In the same way that converting the Concorde into a bomber would have been silly- it would be more efficient to design a purpose built bomber- converting a bomber into an airliner is not the best choice. If you can, it is better to build a purpose built airliner. Conversions of anything- ships, fighting vehicles, aircraft- usually are lacking compared to purpose built alternatives. An example of this is the WWII Japanese aircraft carrier Junyo. It was converted from an ocean liner that was under construction, and thus had awful handling characteristics when compared with its larger purpose built comrades. Despite being huge it also had a small aircraft capacity. The Tu-95 became the Tu-114 out of convenience. If you have to do it it will work, but purpose built is better. Like how a Toyota Hilux does work as a combat vehicle if you have to, but a HMMWV would be better.

I didn't say he was right I think saying "screw cost" is feasible for simple catch up like China is currently doing. Once they need to maintain that level of space capability, they will need reusability. They are aware of this, which is why Long March 9 will no longer be an expendable rocket, and the Long March 5DY and its LEO variant, which will replace the LM-2F and LM-7 in the space station transport and crew launch role, have also shifted to a semi-reusable configuration.

What I meant was cadence and *stuff* rather than cost. China’s space based observation capabilities have expanded at a ridiculous rate when compared with Russia, India, or the EU. Space historian David S. F. Portree has criticized SpaceX’s (and basically everyone’s) fixation on cost and stated that in his opinion, we just need to accept that space is expensive and get over with it. I think China may have temporarily adopted such a stance, which is why they are so willing to launch expendable rockets at the rate they do while Japan has been taking two decades to build a simple 10~ sat missile early warning constellation that apparently doesn’t work. The various Sino-Falcon 9s and the Long March 9 will come by 2030. I think SpaceX will certainly overtake China when Starship gets going, but China will make a comeback in the 2030s. Still, with rapid reuse/tanker launches SpaceX will probably be in an eternal lead in number of launches. Long March 9 is basically a giant Falcon 9 (semi-reusable only) and thus would have similar cadence limitations.

Nice. Mengtian on the LM-5B is targeted for the same day, so we may get two HLLVs launching on one day. When Scott Manley does his videos recapping launches over the month, it is crazy how it is practically one Falcon 9 and one Long March variant per week. Musk isn’t kidding when he says he views China as his competitor.

Barbecue and then pool? South Pacific graveyard is below the equator so it is happening in the summer.

After many forays into the slippery slope of space *not politics but policy*, I must say I am enjoying reading this space economics discussion Economics is a science, right, right? I was thinking this was some inside joke I didn’t understand, but then I had a flash of memory. The barred owl is quite a problem here and in Washington. It is a major danger to the northern spotted owl, which is endangered. Doing a little searching just now it sounds like “NorCal” (or whatever it is called) has it too. The article came from this January and said WA and OR’s culling programs are “on hold pending federal guidance”. Planning was still ongoing in OR as of the end of August, couldn’t find any info on it since then. So no, unfortunately. What lottery money does do though is help prevent this from happening again.

Here in Oregon the lottery is used to fund forestry work. Not sure to what extent, but that is what the commercials say.

So here’s another question- if 遥测 is used for rockets, what he used for spacecraft like Shenzhou or Tianzhou? 机体? (機体/airframe, random guess based on Japanese terminology) As I didn’t realize Y was an abbreviation, I have been using aircraft serial numbers in the documents I have listing Chinese launches. Like 92101 for the first Shenzhou.

Your welcome! It’s because of the romanization system. Wade-Giles was used by the ROC and thus Taiwan. Pinyin is used on the mainland and was created there. I don’t speak Chinese, but just from listening, Wade-Giles feels butchered to make it easier for someone with a thick Latin-based language accent to pronounce, while Pinyin is closer to how it actually sounds.

Nice. Thanks, I now have a “space power something” to fit into my “crazy space and crazy nuclear proliferation” world

One exception to this could be in the development of the AH-1 Cobra. Bell created a concept called the D-225 Iroquois Warrior. It was rejected by the military, but when the desire for an attack helicopter came knocking in 64-65, Bell went to work building one based on the UH-1. It ended up more or less having the same design layout as the D-225, and heli pilots loved it. It was apparently exactly what was needed (according to pilots themselves) at the time despite the concept having been developed prior to that war taking the shape it did. ——— Now some questions from me (for anyone). 1. Do military engineering related questions now belong in this thread? 2. Would a hand-cranked backup to the powered turret system be feasible in a tank with an uncrewed turret? 3. Specifically asking this because I’m aware we have at least two ex-tankers on this forum- is the use of a hand-cranked turret “hard”? Like a piece of back breaking labor as compared to normal tasks. 4. Another thing I thought of while writing this- I learned about “tank bites” recently. Does this only apply to Warsaw Pact tanks or does this happen in Western ones too?

Dunno. That would require higher performance rockets probably as you don’t have the Earth’s turn to assist you on the way up. Proton and Shuttle did just fine launching ISS modules into inclined equatorial LEO, not sure if they have the same payload capability to any polar orbits.

Question: Is “Y55” the name/designation of the vehicle/flight article (like “Soyuz TM No. 201” or “Atlas V AV-412”) or the designation for the mission (like “Soyuz TM-18” or “NROL-91”)?