07-04-2004 02:11									#61
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quote: Originally posted by Kucinich It's not the size that matters, it's how you use it. They didn't make it to the moon, did they?

No, through sloppy work and brazen failure of following safty procedures, they blew one up on the pad while screwing around with the fuel, killing hundreds of personel, the largest space exploration disaster, a majarity of thoses killed in the filed

	07-04-2004 02:49									#62
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My country is bigger than yours. Neener neener neeeeeneerrrrr

	07-04-2004 03:08									#63
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quote: Originally posted by Lefty Scaevola No, through sloppy work and brazen failure of following safty procedures, they blew one up on the pad while screwing around with the fuel, killing hundreds of personel, the largest space exploration disaster, a majarity of thoses killed in the filed

N1s blew up, yes.
The launching pad was destroyed on the 2nd launch, yes.
Killed personnel, no.
The largest space exploration disasters would be Challenger/Columbia.

	07-04-2004 03:12									#64
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quote: Originally posted by Comrade Tassadar My country is bigger than yours. Neener neener neeeeeneerrrrr

Where do you get your maps Comrade Tass?
From this map it looks like Appatity is some major city with an airport, unlike St. Petersburg

	07-04-2004 03:14									#65
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Well, do people count space pad explosions as exploration disasters? I don;t think so.

20 odd Brazilian scientists were killed when one of their prototypes blew up, and yet that won't be mentioned as the greatest space exploration disaster.

	07-04-2004 03:19									#66
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quote: Originally posted by chegitz guevara The Secret Service let a missile be dragged into D.C.?!?

It's about time we had our own version of a May Day parade!

	07-04-2004 03:33									#67
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quote: And next time don't parrot me when I say it's launched in Suriname. Do some fact checking.

it is that i wasnt here to tell you so....

	07-04-2004 05:28									#68
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quote: It's about time we had our own version of a May Day parade!

I always find it amusing how on July 4th we parade muskets.

	07-04-2004 06:56									#69
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quote: Originally posted by Whoha the explosions are prettier as well.

It was a software error. They probably installed Windows on it.

	07-04-2004 07:00									#70
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Seen a Saturn V in person, as well as been in that building.

	07-04-2004 07:18									#71
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quote: Originally posted by ErikM Where do you get your maps Comrade Tass? From this map it looks like Appatity is some major city with an airport, unlike St. Petersburg

I just googled "Russia map" and hit large....

	07-04-2004 07:19									#72
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I think Asher just missed that latest comment Colon.

	07-04-2004 07:21									#73
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quote: Originally posted by Colon It was a software error. They probably installed Windows on it.

They ran it on OpenVMS.

	07-04-2004 07:26									#74
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quote: Originally posted by DanS Your parents must have had the coin. Didn't it cost something $5,000 for only a couple week course?

I went 2x in the early-mid 90's (space camp and academy 1) each time I think it wasn't more than 500-1k, my middle class teacher mother could afford it. Though the second time was International week, and the ferners got all the attention...

	07-04-2004 08:30									#75
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quote: Originally posted by Kucinich I'd hit it [/striker]

	07-04-2004 08:34									#76
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asleep: We're probably both remembering the prices correctly. I wanted to go in the early-mid 80s, right after the first shuttle launches, so there was way too much demand.

	07-04-2004 08:50									#77
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probably right. by the time I went, it was a well oiled machine, operating year round.

	07-04-2004 09:15									#78
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All you computer nerds will love this...

Regarding flight computers, take a look at this PCB, which is the flight computer for the Falcon I. Looks to me like a 4 inch x 4 inch board.

This flight computer has much more power than the Saturn V flight computer, which was as big as a house!

Falcon I's flight computer contains a Xilinx FPGA -- a generic programmable chip (the biggest chip on the board) -- so that they can make changes on the fly with no chance of a blue screen of death. Dual PowerPC CPUs are embedded on the FPGA.

The total hardware cost on this was probably about $500 dollars, including fabrication of the PCB and assembly with all of the chips and other parts. I can only imagine how many tens of millions of dollars the flight computer for Saturn V cost and they used one up on each launch.

Communication and control in the Falcon I are through standard ethernet.

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Last edited by DanS on 07-04-2004 at 09:24

	07-04-2004 09:35									#79
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quote: Originally posted by DanS The total hardware cost on this was probably about $500 dollars, including fabrication of the PCB and assembly with all of the chips and other parts.

Wow. That's expensive. The field programmable gate array (FPGA) doesn't cost that much.

	07-04-2004 10:01									#80
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Let's see. That looks like a Virtex II Pro 2VP family. Avnet has it at $334.40 apiece for the cheapest in the family with 2 CPUs at low quantities.

I'll raise my estimate to $650 for the printed and assembled board.

	07-04-2004 10:07									#81
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DanS what's the Falcon 1?

	07-04-2004 10:15									#82
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You know, I always thought that the giant, tracked vehicle that carried the rockets was far cooler than the rockets themselves.

Seems that giant crawler must have some military application. I bet it could support armor plating ten or twenty feet thick, which would allow it to survive anything short of direct hit by a nuclear weapon. Slow but unstoppable.

	07-04-2004 10:16									#83
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Ted: The Falcon I is the first (very small) rocket in SpaceX's line of cheap boosters that use the Saturn V as inspiration (kerosene and liquid oxygen engines, etc.).

SpaceX is a small start-up in El Segundo that was created by the founder of Paypal and will be launching its first rocket as early as May from Vandenburg Air Force Base.

More info earlier in the thread.

	07-04-2004 10:22									#84
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Awesome.

Glad to see another player in the game. Hopefully they will apply some pressure to lower costs and improve quality.

	07-04-2004 10:39									#85
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quote: Originally posted by DanS Let's see. That looks like a Virtex II Pro 2VP family. Avnet has it at $334.40 apiece for the cheapest in the family with 2 CPUs at low quantities.

Actually it doesn't.

	07-04-2004 10:41									#86
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It doesn't what?

quote: Glad to see another player in the game. Hopefully they will apply some pressure to lower costs and improve quality.

I'm tired of the US space industry being undercut by the Russians.

USA! USA! USA!

	07-04-2004 10:42									#87
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For those to whom SIZE does matter ...

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	07-04-2004 10:43									#88
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FYI, that thing has a max cruising speed of 1 mile per hour.

	07-04-2004 10:44									#89
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You all can have your rockets. Give me something BIG with TRACKS.

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	07-04-2004 10:47									#90
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quote: Originally posted by DanS FYI, that thing goes 1 mile per hour.

It may not be swift, but hey, it's payload and power that count. If you want to race, don't drive anything with tracks.

And while it might take a while to get somewhere, but there's absolutely no mistaking when you arrive.