Slashdot Mirror
USS Enterprise Finally Flies
apetime writes "Found on Slashdot Japan: Model builder Kaname of Kumamoto, Japan has built a flying radio controlled model of the original Star Trek's USS Enterprise. (Scroll to the bottom of the page for a video. Or go here for an mpeg, and here for a WMV.) The ship measures from 75 cm, and only weighs 16 grams. It's a wobbly flight, but makes you think what else in Star Trek might work if it were tried."
But now the question is, if you transported inside of it, would you shrink?
If you like what I've said here, and want to read more, go to http://www.krillrblog.com
I may be wrong, but I don't remember the original enterprise having a propellor. The article indicates that technology from that show may work in real life, but it's using old technology. cool to watch, but only for a slow friday night.
Uhm. I'm sure the USS Enterprise was designed to fly in a vacuum; you know.. cause.. space is a vacuum.
*ahem*
A local radio-controlled airplane hobbiest announced today that he has built a working model of (cue tympanis ... Bum bum bum bum bum bum bum) MEGA MAID.
Unknown host pong.
It's a wobbly flight, but makes you think what else in Star Trek might work if it were tried.
Actually, no, It doesn't.
.....just with wires.
Here is my local mirror on a server that won't be ./'ed...
mpg format
wmv format
You should see my model Borg cube...
I'm not sure what he used for control surfaces (in fact, I'm not sure it has any control at all, and maybe just flies forward), but I think it says in the description that it took him four days, and he used a motor from a CD-ROM.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
With the right size engine, you can make anything fly. This isn't a demonstration of how well the "Enterprise" could fly. It's a demonstration of how you can make even a brick fly with the right thrust to weight ratio.
I like Star Trek as well as the next geek, but this is just plain silly.
Now, where can I get one???
is it real flying if it is not a function of lift versus gravity? You can't have lift in the vacum, so is it actually flying?
Estes is the company that makes the model rockets that a lot of us shot as kids.
They made, later in my youth, model jets powered by "glow" engines, that burned for a few minutes instead of a few seconds. This way, you could fly a model jet around.
I think that they had a Star Trek Enterprise model that took glow engines. I know that they had a model that you could launch off your pad.
I don't know if this is the same model. Probably not, since the guy would get badly burned if he shot glow engines off in his face.
I never owned a model that took glow engines though. I think that most of them piggybacked on more powerful boosters off a launch pad, and then the user remotely fired the glows when he could see the thing clearly enough to control it.
Darn you posters who don't read the article! It quite clearly says: "OEã1"NSÔÉí½ÁÄ1"ú1ñÈãSY"-OEfZ¦"Âð`FbNé ;B"
slashdot japan?!
what?!
you mean to tell me ive been reading this all this time and i couldve been the uber1337 version from the land of the rising sun?!
sezu-sai....
time to go learn japanese.....
Should'nt Star Trek have its own icon?
Starwars does...
Be you Admins? nay, we are but lusers!
Doesn't the saucer portion disconnect for atmospheric flight?
Still way cool though.
Sigs? We don't need no stinking sigs!
If only there were something like a communicator. That would be cool. A handheld walkie talkie-like thing only able to talk to almost anybody on the planet. It could maybe even open up like a clam. Sigh. I guess it will never be.
Q:How many libertarians does it take to stop a Panzer division? A:None. Obviously market forces will take care of it.
There's something here even more amazing than a flying enterprise. They've got a server hosting 4 Mb video files on slashdot's frontpage, and it hasn't crashed yet!
what sig?
The babelfish translation of the Japanese site says that he has some "compound rudder, aileron, elevator" at the rear of the disk.
As a pre-teen in the early '70's, I read the "Making of Star Trek" book, which I believe was authorized by Roddenberry and Paramount. Among the things I remember from the book:
- It stated that the Enterprise wasn't designed for atmospheric flight.
- The saucer section was said to be designed to separate from the rest of the ship. (Though this wasn't shown until either one of the TNG episodes or a TNG movie. I'm getting old, so I can't remember which. :-) )
- NBC censors considered a woman's nipple and underside of the breast to be verboten. (Quote from the book: "Perhaps they are afraid moss grows under there?")
- The studio asked Leonard Nimoy if he would consider plastic surgery to have his ears pointed for the show. He refused.
- The Enterprise was about a 10' long model mounted on a black pylon, with a star pattern on a wall behind it. The film crew ran the camera past the model on a dolly.
- For many years, the Smithsonian Institution's Air & Space Museum in Washington, DC had the actual filming model of the Enterprise hanging from the ceiling. (I think this is the only time it ever hung by wires.) Alas, the exhibit was taken down several years ago. It was one of my favorites.
- Dr. McCoy's portable "body scanner" devices were actually salt and pepper shakers found by the prop crew at a discount store.
- The shimmering "transporter effect" was done by attaching Christmas tree tinsel to sheets of wood and having stagehands shake them. The tinsel and live action film bits were merged together in post.
- There was a list of possible Vulcan male names, all of which "had to" (according to the book) start with "S" and end with "k", and contain only 5 letters. Among them was "Spork."
And before anyone accuses me of being a Trekkie, let me emphatically state that I am not. I have only watched almost every episode of all the series over the last four decades. I have never been to a convention, I have never worn a Starfleet uniform on Halloween or at any other time, and I do not know that any variant of "NCC-1701" is always called "Enterprise." So there.
And please don't read my sig.
Let's play Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. I'll be Pestilence.
Reports have been surfacing all over the net that a flying spacecraft was seen in the vicinity of Japan... news at 11...
Damn good thing they didn't fly this thing near Area 51 or we might have been misled to believe a lone motorcyclist spotted it.
Feed my eyes...