Aren't all orbits "looping orbits"? All orbits are elliptical, anyway.
All orbits (about a single body) are conic sections, not necessarily ellipses. Given just barely enough energy to escape the body results in a parabolic orbit, and having excess energy results in a hyperbolic one. If the orbit is 'captured,' it has an elliptical shape.
I agree though, that 'looping' and 'elliptical' shouldnt be used as synonyms.
Economically, aerobraking is definitely the way to go. Putting large amounts of propellant on board would make the mission more expensive, or take the place of instruments, radio gear, computers, etc.
Until we get really advanced propulsion technologies that are both powererful and economical (high thrust, high specific impulse), we're going to need to use methods like this.
Ahhh a new owner of Visual Fortran
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HP Buys Compaq
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· Score: 2, Funny
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As I understood it, the launch was a sub-orbital parabola, to test the deployment of the sails. So it was going to crash back to earth by design, the failure is in that the sails did not separate and deploy correctly.
Forgot to mention this is the first mission to orbit Earth-Sun Lagrange Point 2, soon to be followed by Next Gen Space Telescope.
Very impressive, but unfortunately no free taco's
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Mir: Rest in Pieces
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· Score: 3
Its nice when something in the space industry goes as well as this did.
Unfortunately, hopes of free taco's have gone unfullfilled.
If by some off chance you havent seen the video of it over Fiji yet, check it out.
http://www.cnn.com/2001/TECH/space/03/23/mir.desce nt/index.html
Very cool stuff. Congratulations and condolences to everyone who helped to bring it down so successfully.
Chalk up one for hydrogen, it's lighter than air
on
Hydrogen Powered Cars
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· Score: 1
Should hydrogen begin to leak from the tanks or fuel lines it will rise into the air, rather than pooling under the car waiting for a spark to ignite it like gasoline would.
As for the reluctance to have a tank of hydrogen in one's car...
We already have automobiles with tanks full of gasoline. When it comes down to igniting a fuel, it doesnt make much difference whether its gasoline or hydrogen, if it ignites you have a huge problem one way or the other.
As much as I want to see a replacement to the shuttle, I have to agree with the reasoning behind this decision.
The capability of the X-33's aerospike engines has been demonstrated, why build aluminum tanks just to flight test the engines?
Its a shame they waited so long to make this decision, a lot of money was spent that need not have been.
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Dos 6.22's scan disk has saved my floppies time and again when 9x/NT/2000 would just choke on them
All orbits (about a single body) are conic sections, not necessarily ellipses. Given just barely enough energy to escape the body results in a parabolic orbit, and having excess energy results in a hyperbolic one. If the orbit is 'captured,' it has an elliptical shape.
I agree though, that 'looping' and 'elliptical' shouldnt be used as synonyms.
Economically, aerobraking is definitely the way to go. Putting large amounts of propellant on board would make the mission more expensive, or take the place of instruments, radio gear, computers, etc.
Until we get really advanced propulsion technologies that are both powererful and economical (high thrust, high specific impulse), we're going to need to use methods like this.
MS Visual Fortran 4 begets
Digital Visual Fortran 5 begets
Compaq Visual Fortran 6 begets
HP Visual Fortran 7?
As I understood it, the launch was a sub-orbital parabola, to test the deployment of the sails. So it was going to crash back to earth by design, the failure is in that the sails did not separate and deploy correctly.
Never blame on budget cuts that which its more appropriately attributed to mismanagement, miscommunication, and misfortune.
Forgot to mention this is the first mission to orbit Earth-Sun Lagrange Point 2, soon to be followed by Next Gen Space Telescope.
Its nice when something in the space industry goes as well as this did. Unfortunately, hopes of free taco's have gone unfullfilled. If by some off chance you havent seen the video of it over Fiji yet, check it out. http://www.cnn.com/2001/TECH/space/03/23/mir.desce nt/index.html
Very cool stuff. Congratulations and condolences to everyone who helped to bring it down so successfully.
Should hydrogen begin to leak from the tanks or fuel lines it will rise into the air, rather than pooling under the car waiting for a spark to ignite it like gasoline would. As for the reluctance to have a tank of hydrogen in one's car... We already have automobiles with tanks full of gasoline. When it comes down to igniting a fuel, it doesnt make much difference whether its gasoline or hydrogen, if it ignites you have a huge problem one way or the other.
Ive always said "wor-shis-ter" But then I never was any good at pronouncing stuff.
As much as I want to see a replacement to the shuttle, I have to agree with the reasoning behind this decision. The capability of the X-33's aerospike engines has been demonstrated, why build aluminum tanks just to flight test the engines? Its a shame they waited so long to make this decision, a lot of money was spent that need not have been.