Slashdot Mirror
11-Pound Model Plane Vs. The Atlantic, Again
Luap Nanreffeh writes "Last year, (/. Story 1, /. story 2) Maynard Hill and some retired NASA buddies tried to set a record for flying a model aeroplane across the atlantic ocean (from Newfoundland to Ireland). Their plan, using GPS, onboard controllers, and a gallon of gas, would have been the first to cross the Atlantic under FAI rules. They didn't have much luck last year, but now they're at it again. The first launch should be tonight."
all of us from slashdot send Charles "Lucky Hammy" Hamster our support.
good luck and godspeed, brave hamster.
Mike
instead of giving an exact date, just waiting until weather conditions are perfect to fly it?
I have over 70 freaks, do you?
Save weight and save fuel by removing the GPS requirement.
Once you develop the flight plan, some simple on-board sensors should take care of carrying that out.
GPS is overrated anyway.
Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate. Ex-O'Reilly/MIT employee, now a full-time Google employee.
So, how long until drug runners send little planes from Columbia to Florida?
This gives me too many ideas...
"The market alone cannot provide sufficient constraints on corporation's penchant to cause harm." -- Joel Bakan
...my neighbor tried to make his toy remote control car across the street, only to be crushed by the UPS guy.
So this is what a job market over-saturated with people with degrees and experience produces?
Or maybe they were just tired of people laughing when they told people that they worked for NASA.
-Valiss
The first launch? What are they planning on doing, supergluing back together the shattered pieces they find floating in the ocean after it crashes?
Get in touch with the English Channel skydiver and set up a cross promotion: Skydiver Flies (and Flies Model Plane) Across Atlantic.
Q. Which reminds me of an old joke: what do you get when you cross the Titanic and the Atlantic Ocean?
A. About halfway.
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
They much rather the use of big planes like L1011s and 747s. These much larger aircraft have proven to be far more reliable than tiny drones. Additionally, the larger craft are capable of carrying much larger loads which is a very important feature to the highly competitive drug trade. Basically, if the transport can't handle a ton or more of product, the more respected cartels won't touch it.
Drug Smuggling anyone? Or maybe strong encryption smuggling. Can't be radar visible if it's that small.
I went to battle MC Escher, but drew a blank
They forgot to add in the additional weight of the coconuts.
Bowie J. Poag
Now, they let you know it's a DUPE right in the title. Progress people, progress.
The engineering experience gained from this endeavor will only help humans create better autonomous craft for Earthbound and space-based uses. Glad they're doing this, and I wish them luck, although if they see any German guys with ladders in their backyard, get the ol' shotgun ready.
Why don't they just build a dozen of these, and launch them an hour apart. The whole advantage of small inexpensive craft is the "swarm" approach.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
I set get in.... CLICK
You know you're reading Slashdot when "GPS" and "FAI" are assumed to require less background info than "Newfoundland".
In the news today a nearly blind and deaf man was arrested for terrorist acts after his home built guided missile traveled the atlantic and started a fire at a shoreside housing complex, a terrorized elderly couple lost 16 cats in the fierce blaze.
So this is a automatous GPS-guided long-range flying vehicle? Isn't that a cruise missle?
Admittedly, there would be some scaling up before poeple could fit a 2000lb warhead on it. But for bio/chemical WMDs, here's your cheap unstoppable delivery device.
I wish them luck, regardless.
All in all, I was much more impressed by the Balloon 1.0 project, even though an unpowered balloon isn't half as cool as a powered and automatically guided RC aircraft travelling such a huge distance unaided.
Does anyone have any good links for other projects in a similar vein which aren't so coy about the gory technical details?
A potential terrorist device?
I can see it now. Our next military campaign will be to eradicate model airplane building materials from the rest of the globe.
"The airplane(s) we launch this month will be called 'The Spirit of Butts Farm' - Check back later to learn why."
Sounds to me like a blatant ploy for sponsorship dollars from RIM. . .
The only acceptable defense of scientific results is to say that they were the product of the Scientific Method.
After they make the flight and decide to sell the plane:
"So, you boyus used to work for NASA, huh?"
"Yep."
"Well I dont really know if this is the kind of plane I'm looking for. You say it get's 3,000 miles per gallon?
"About that."
"I'm really in the market for something that gets more like 4,000 miles to the gallon. Plus it looks real used, what with all the bird crap and scratches on it. I'll give ya 50 bucks."
"But we made a world record with this!!"
"Yeah but the paint is chipped. 60 bucks is my final offer."
"Fine, we'll take it. There's oour retirement!"
-Valiss
I guess lack of vocabulary never stopped you from opening your mouth,eh?
aeroplane
\A"["e]r*o*plane`\, n. [A["e]ro- + plane.] (A["e]ronautics) A light rigid plane used in a["e]rial navigation to oppose sudden upward or downward movement in the air, as in gliding machines; specif., such a plane slightly inclined and driven forward as a lifting device in some flying machines; hence, a flying machine using such a device. These machines are called monoplanes, biplanes, triplanes, or quadruplanes, according to the number of main supporting planes used in their constraction. Being heavier than air they depend for their levitation on motion imparted by one or more propellers actuated by a gasoline engine. They start from the ground by a run on small wheels or runners, and are guided by a steering apparatus consisting of horizontal and vertical movable planes. There are many varieties of form and construction, which in some cases are known by the names of their inventors.
"Oh, wait, 11 *pounds*? Damn, we did all our calculations for an 11 *kilo* plane!" (sound of a spash)
"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."
The new formatting is much better. It increases readability and is generally easier on the eyes. There is still no mention of several Troll staples such as; goatse, tubgirl, the giver, the penis bird, ascii art, lameness filter bypass, etc..
Getting better though.
Bah, a plane is easy. I want them to try to fly a model helicoptor across the big pond...
From the website: "The airplane(s) we launch THIS month will be called "The Spirit of Butts Farm"
No, I'm not making that up. Check it yourself, if it's not slashdotted already.
3000 miles per gallon? not bad
Does the name Pavlov ring a bell?
The Zerg strategy:
They should be making these things cheaply on a mini-assembly line. It would lower the overall cost and time of production and greatly reduce their turnaround when one of their planes fails again.
Odds are that one of 'em *will* get through eventually.
Only african modles carry coconuts.
These days we ignore anything larger than an eagle on radar, under the premise that any plane of war would be masked to appear much smaller.
This plane will be shot down before it leaves US waters.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
Goddamnit, don't make the /. code start reverse DNS'ing IP's. That's the IP of goatse.cx, I learned the hard way. Icccck.
I realize you are trying to be funny, but your attitude about animal cruelty just promotes violence against non-human species like hamsters and all other animals.
I believe that we as humans do not have the right to slaughter and test products on animals. I believe that we as humans should not have the right to own animals. Forgot about tradition and how our ancestors survived. This is 2003 -- it's time to suspend your traditional beliefs, and surrender to your innate moral centre.
Animal cruelty is a serious issue, and should not be something that we as an advanced society joke about.
Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate. Ex-O'Reilly/MIT employee, now a full-time Google employee.
simpsons did it!
I thought anyone with a few bucks and a few days could do that kinda thing no problem? Why would a bunch of retired NASA guys be wasting there time with this? Geeze, a self-directed, small plane capable of flying the atlantic is *sooo simple*. one could even be built to carry reasonable payload of some kind if one wished.
I'll probably die from the excitement if an American ever gets this right.
Anyone else think this article was talking about seriously underweight fashion model consuming the Atlantic ocean?
Exactly WTF is an "aeroplane"? I've heard of an "airplane" before... is this some sort of strange dialect?
I believe it's the original form, still in common use in some English-speaking countries, of which "airplane" is an American English contraction.
(But I'm sure somebody can correct me if I'm wrong. B-) )
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Can't be radar visible if it's that small.
I believe that's why the Lear Fan private jet model was aborted.
Made mostly of composites, with the biggest single piece of metal being the spindle of the Jet and the bulk of the metal being the avionics, it had such a small radar cross-section that it didn't show up on airport search radar until it was actually over the field...
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
a) Adjust for wind, which messes up distance calculations
b) Adjust for deviations in the magnetic compass as a result of proximity to the earth's magnetic pole
c) Figure out where the plane ended up assuming it actually gets to the other side of the pond
Of course, maybe you just have a different notion of what constitutes a "simple instrument".
'd think more geeks would be into it, especially with all the equipment you get to work with.
But DANG would this be an expensive hobby! If you can get some financial backing or sponsorship it would be ok. But that's a lot of high quality, lightwight devices. And we all know that
high quality + heavy = expensive. And
high quality + small and light = super-expensive!
And the thing that really gets me, is that once you load up your huge investment into a tiny plane, you send it out to its almost certain destruction!
Now I'll spend money on something I'm going to improve on and keep for a long time. But dropping cash on a big project like this would be like shooting $100 bills into the ocean.
Without a better success rate, you'd have to be a drug smuggler just to afford the little marvels.
Slashdot Syndrome: the sudden, extreme urge to correct someone in order to validate one's self.
Luck to the project - a bit like long-distance amateur radio contacts with just a few mW of transmitted power, just pushing the limits of what can be done.
Eating/testing is the safest way of dealing with these menaces to society.
What is FAI (Football Association of Ireland?) and what rules do they have governing this?
....or your low scores in the SAT verbal?
Look at these people in the picture. They're old! They probably figure they're going to die soon and have money to burn.
Some poor Irish guy is gonna be standing on the beach all alone, get nailed in the head with a model plane, and get REALLY confused.
Defender of Microsoft and Communism!!!
these nerds need to be taught a lesson
That's how they are getting to the moon.
Laws are for people with no friends.
Just look at this picture. The brown guy on the far left is obviously a TERRORIST. They are probably testing this as a method of biochemical weapon delivery. ARREST THEM NOW.
Crapflooding is a legitimate type of trolling. If you don't get it, maybe it's because you aren't smart enough or cynical enough.
They forgot to add in the additional weight of the coconuts.
The problem wasn't that they forgot. The problem was that one engineer used Metric Coconuts and another engineer used British Standard Coconuts.
[Whistle] Foul on the play. Trying to combine two obscure, geek references.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
..They're already REALLY confused...
Seamus and Murphy were walking in the woods when they came across a sign saying, "Tree Fellers wanted". So Murphy said, "Ye know, it's a damn shame Paddy isn't here. We could have gotten that job."
PS: I'm sorry.
It consists of being given some source material which uses a correctly spelled word, and then writing a summary of the material replacing all instances of that word with the variant British spelling.
I don't think I did very well at that part of the SAT. Heck, I don't even remember it.
If they built it for 11 kg and it only instead weighs 11 lb, then that means it'll climb higher and go faster and farther on even less fuel. 1 kg = ~2.2 lb dumbass.
11 lb, 1 Gallon of "gas" - I wish that the ./ editors would make at least some attempt at acknowledge that the overwhelming majority of the world uses metric units. For "news for nerds" site, you'd hope that if nothing else, they'd make an attempt at least at being scientific (even the US uses metric units in all science).
And some people in Europe complain about US arrogance. Arrogance? What arrogance?
Here's a company that sells all equipment necessary to autonomously fly a model plane. Obviously you can define several GPS coordinates, and the plane will go pass them all.
http://www.micropilot.com/
Here's an open-source effort to autonomously fly a helicopter. Heli's are more difficult to manouver than planes.
http://autopilot.sourceforge.net/
if he's standing on the beach instead of sitting in a bar.
Thanks, I'll be here all week. Be sure to tip your waitress.
"Would it kill you to put down the toilet seat?" -- Maya Angelou
Without a better success rate, you'd have to be a drug smuggler just to afford the little marvels.
No problem. I've had lots of practice playing GTA3: Vice City (I'll let you decide if I mean with flying the little planes, or being a drug smuggler).
Everyone knows you have to fly from the USA to France to "cross the Atlantic". This Newfoundland to Ireland is horse-crap.
Asses are for crapping, not screwing.
From the FAQ:
Q. Can this be loaded with five pounds of weight in the nose?
Yes, it can be, but why would one want to do that and launch it across the ocean?
"Has [being a kidnapped teenage girl, raped repeatedly for months] changed you?" - Katie Couric to Elizabeth Smart
Did they fire frozen chickens at it to make sure it would survive a bird hit?
No it is about you assuming that using an appropiate spelling for a word was somehow a typo or editorial error. Most people know that an airplate and an aeroplane are the same, most people with a minimum verbal variety that is. Hence maybe, just maybe the editors were trusting the "education level" of most readers of the story, and never thought twice about it since it made perfect sense. Then again, they should also have considered those who got a low SAT verbal score, hence representing those whit a reduced vocabulary. cheers.
Don't you slashdot?
Some crackpot in New Zealand is building a cruise missile from COTS part for $3000 US!
Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
A DIY Cruise MIssile
"Watch me build one for under $5000."
Huhuhuhuhuhuhuh. Dammit, Beavis!
http://tam.plannet21.com/Projstar.htm
There exists no way of exchanging information without making judgments. --Bene Gesserit Axiom
I was reading some of their documents, and I did not find a specific definition of the rules for this type of aircraft.
There was a UAV which crossed the Atlantic years ago. It was designed and built by a collaborative effort betwen the Insitu Group, and the University of Washington's AA department (my alma matter).
I'm just wondering if there are additional restrictions under FAI rules for the vehicle.
The relevant FAI is the Federation Aeronautique Internationale. The aeromodelling page is here; world records are available here.
...lay our own trans-alantic cable.
I thought anyone with a few bucks and a few days could do that kinda thing no problem? Why would a bunch of retired NASA guys be wasting there time with this? Geeze, a self-directed, small plane capable of flying the atlantic is *sooo simple*. one could even be built to carry reasonable payload of some kind if one wished.
This thing is probably just a tad slower than a cruise missile. In fact, several tads.
.
I mean, this is just a friggin' airplane. You scale it up to carry a 2000lb warhead, and you're gonna start needing a much larger and sturdier body, wings, fuel tank, and engine . .
'Scaling' this would still just be giving you a vehicle with the capability of a personal airplane. It's going to be pretty slow, very expensive (given that even gutless airplanes generally cost around $500k), and it will show up on radar unless you make it even more expensive -- meaning that the army would have plenty of time to shoot it down if they were so inclined.
It still has potential, but the longer the range, the more speed becomes an issue (can be targetted, blown up). I don't see it being very practical or widely applicable -- it might undercut cruise missiles on cost, but it would be so very ineffective militarily that I don't see this being all that important. I see it being more applicable to things like unmanned air cargo planes.
Aerobaticso bat
Aeronautic
Aerospace
Aerodrome
Aer
Aerotow
etc...
I guess 'aero' is just too hard to say.
Ahh to hell with that we'll just make up our own words, screw everyone else there just god damn foreigners anyway...
I demand that this "petrol" you speak of be referred to as "benzin" as it is in the proper German you insensitive clod.
Please mod parent down to troll... sigh
If you'd like to know more about our airplane technology, check for our web pages on medellin.gov.co and drones.af.pentagon.mil. For more information on cocaine, check out Consumer Reports.
Cheers, Ernie
I'll just stand up in the way with a butterfly net, catch one, toss the drugs back in the ocean, and keep the little airplane! Imagine when I show up on Saturday morning at the local model airplane store, and want some paint and nazi decals to dress up my "find".
...Or perfectly acceptable English English.
:)
We don't mind using ae together in words. It's just the Americans who seem to have an aversion to it. Maybe it makes them harder to spell or something
Piloted airplanes had a much higher than 10% success rate, especially since they could fly 10 feet over the water which is below radar altitude, and there were enough guys willing to risk a couple years in jail in order to make a couple million dollars that the cartels could simply do auctions on cocaine delivered to Florida or South Carolina, and could write off the airplanes after they got to the US.
It was an amazing, amazing economic time, with far more leverage than the high-tech business ever had, simply because the stupid US drug laws created market conditions with a 1000% profit margin, unlimited-demand unsaturated market, ready supply (suppliers were also making a few thousand percent profit margin), small quantity of material to move, and a one-shot deal could get you all the disco and babes you wanted to retire on as long as you weren't stupid enough to sample the merchandise or greedy enough to try to rip off your business partners. (And if you didn't think you'd made enough on one trip, it was still pretty safe and undetectable to make a second one, at which point you've made as much extra money as you'd have gotten by ripping off your partners, and nobody goes after you with a chainsaw.)
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Sure, it's definitely cool to cross the Atlantic - you've basically got one shot, win or lose. But I'd think they'd first try to get it across North America on land, so if something goes wrong they can get some information out of it rather than just knowing roughly where it sank in the ocean.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
in 1998.
http://www.aerosonde.com/drawarticle/4
Hey, it sounds faster than avian carriers, though perhaps less reliable....
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Atlantic: You dare challenge me again, little 11-Pound Model Plane? Your whirly propeller is no match for my spinning hurricanes of doom.
11-Pound Model Plane: My light weight allows me to cross great distances! You shall not stop me!
Atlantic: WTF? I'm the freaking Atlantic Ocean. Come here you little punk ass 11-Pound Model - wha?
Gecko: Excuse me. Did you know you can save 15% or more on your car insurance by switching to Geiko?
Atlantic: Impressive, green one!
Upstairs Dog, Downstairs People.
Their tam 3 made it 479 miles which they called 1/4 of the way there. So it is actually getting around 1000 miles per gallon.
alzali
And that's exactly what they need to make this flight.
Now I don't mean to be a Negative Nancy, but I do know a thing or two about aircraft design. If they want this thing to go very far on very little fuel, they will need a very high aspect ratio wing. They have a standard model wing on it!
They need something that looks like a U-2 spyplane.
oops 2000 mpg i mean.
alzali
So a 747, which does not have propellers actuated by a gasoline engine, is not an airplane, then?
Just change the spec to 400 miles range
Nice to see him keep up with his passions.
A Shadeless room is a brighter room.
But DAMN that (tam.plannet21.com) has got to be the UGLIEST web site I know of. Check it out. I hope this means that they spent all of their effort on the plane ;^)
Maybe if two planes held the coconut bewteen them on a string....
More info about this, please?
Colombia is the name of the country, not Columbia.
The project reminds me of this project. (Building a home made cruise missile)
But Imagine the possibilities what terrorists could do if they get hold of the plans to this "model plane".
It seems that somebody already successfully sent a model plane across the atlantic ,
and
although I don't know what "under FAI rules" means.
So now, terrorists can target most places in the world pretty safely. I wonder if this scenario has been taken into account by the Pentagon and what they can do about it.
If you can't find a hyperlink for Ireland, there's not much chance for the plane:
http://www.ireland.travel.ie/home/
hIghLiGhT mE mAgIc EyEs ImAge HigHLiGhT mE MaGiC eY
.|;x:|W3OZ#B]x?g%+:. O0 .;|qWdqu#OO#mgxj]|:. _O0 ... : -N#b|u+3###0OO000Hh;.. d00 :: . !*4mej#000OO0000k;. . '?# :; "!+|NOOOOO0O0{; . : O .,||. | jO ,:--- |+ j# .?1 j@9 #` dO .*#Wga_. . :OA Q _ |OO .+NO#WNO#e:: ..4Ok :a_*! #0O .:J#OXXN#p` :|##f - _O00 .|4#GqW4T :yOOT .|y. jOOO .:+3mW00^ _mWmR) ,:~|... ._aaWOO0 ..:jOO#< .?#O00) =;:|x: . "0#O0OO ...:N#@ |yydO0000) .::.|. . O0O00O0O ..:%#k .-?!!4O0O0q_, ::,- j0O00OO00 ..--:0k;. 4O#@^?NA . : jOOOOOOO0O .. |*9xn,.. a.~~ . . _00O00OO00O .:!+|C= |O#OA :: jOO#OO0O0O0 .|-:- . 4@WO0 . .000O0000OOO .0OOOO0OOO0O
OF .
O1 . .
O`
0
0.
01 |< +`|OO<4#*-
01 |; 01 |OP ?~-
O00 c.. .
O00.1.. _a_. ~ - a_. ^. 0O
O000T:
0OO01..
0000<.
OO00;
O0O0) .
0OOOi
OOOO1.
0000k;
O0OOWi
0O00O1
00O0F+
OOOO1
0OO0l ____#-!!N ?#O0O00O0000
00P' . -- "La*9
0 - ` !0OOO00OOOO
O i ga. !9#00000
0 . "*##s . . !4
O !9X#OOV'? 4
0 -- 3
HiGhlIgHt mE MaGiC eYeS ImAge hIgHLiGHt mE MaGic Ey
blah blah blah! blah de blah blah!
Too late! Unless the "under FAI rules" is supposed to make a difference, it's been done already. See: www.aerosonde.com.au
...they were so coked off their heads they wanted you to know how great they were...
Yes, they need to teach some of the robosharks to do the pickup.
o boshark.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/devon/outdoors/nature/2003/r
No AWACS, no sonars, nothing will pay attention. Except Baywatch perhaps.
http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.slashdot.org Errors found while checking this document as HTML5!
their web site totally sucks and it only has two freakin' pictures! what the! damn you aol easy builder, DAMN YOU TO HELL!!!!
fact: microsoft > linux
I think the joke goes:
Q: What do you get when you cross the Atlantic with the Titanic?
A: Wet
It's that what we are doing now - marking dupes with "again" ?
Realize that even as reliable as GPS is, satellites can give false information. There's a system to counteract this problem, called RAIM, but it requires 4 birds to be visible to detect a problem, and 5 to remove the faulty signal from nav calculations, assuming you have a redundant, GPS-compatible, digital barometric altimeter on board. Otherwise, you need 6 birds visible.
Guidance seems to be relatively straightforward: figure out where you are (with 95% confidence), and aim toward your next waypoint. Here's a quick overview of what that entails:
- Determine lat/lon for you and the waypoint
- Determine true (ground) course
- Determine magnetic course after correcting for the aforementioned deviation
- Determine magnetic heading after correcting for wind
- Determine compass heading after correcting for onboard instrument magnetic interference
- Issue commands to the flight control system to head that way
The wind correction is non-trivial. Last I checked, winds in the flight route were generally sustained at around 15 knots, and varied by a full 180 degrees relative to the course. This plane flies at about 40 knots. Grabbing a calculator and doing some trig, wind correction could be as much as arctan(15/40) = 20 degrees. Onboard interference is typically up to 10 degrees in GA aircraft. Here's a concrete example: if you want to fly due east (090) in the North Atlantic with a 45 degree deviation and winds from the south at 15 knots, with onboard interference of +10 degrees, you'd have to fly a compass heading of 165! That's almost due south.That leaves flight controls. You need to maintain proper attitude, keeping in mind that there's gonna be turbulence. In order for any magnetic navigation system to properly realigned (remember gyroscopic precession?), you need to be flying straight and level, which requires extensive compensation for unsteady flight dynamics. It's not as simple as saying "pitch up" when your speed gets too high or your altitude is too low. What if you get inverted? It can happen. Even human pilots don't do so well flying instruments only -- see the NTSB findings in the JFK junior crash. Maintaining stability and control over dynamical systems is a hard problem, which is why many colleges offer entire majors in CDS.
Disclaimer: I am a Space Shuttle enthusiast and a student pilot (hopefully, that will change in two weeks). I know that NASA have the expertise to overcome these problems, and I'm willing to give these engineers the benefit of the doubt. I wish them good weather and no system malfunctions.
This post expresses my opinion, not that of my employer. And yes, IAAL.
Model airplanes don't kill people - hamsters kill people!
You were 80% angel, 10% demon. The rest was hard to explain. - Over The Rhine
"Math in a song is good."-Linford
This project is much more interesting. $5000, that's the price of a third-hand car. How many of these puppies can an Al-Qaeda-like organisation build ?
In Soviet Russia, our new overlords are belong to all your base.
No, but it might be an Aeroplane.
More details here