They were once considered to be the future "flying car" and were theorized by some to eventually grace every garage in America. But they are prohibitively expensive, difficult to fly and require a level of training and certification that not many people would ever bother themselves with.
But I maintain that helicopters will be our best shot at the "flying car" at least until the end of this century.
No one, with the exception of exuberant millionaires is going to by a "car" with folding wings that you need to drive to the airport to operate... Isn't the whole point of the flying car that you DON'T need an airport?!
So... bottom line: We need publicly funded campaigning?
You seem knowledgeable about this field. Care to comment on why we can't just change campaign funding laws?
There is, however a simple solution to that issue... Simply make the "marketing" a publicly funded thing; equalize the playing field for everyone running for office.
"The idea of a completely spinning engine is very seductive, but the actual results of forty years of careful research has not delivered a spinning engine that's better than the 'tossing potatos'."
I call it: "the age of liability." Everyone is afraid of being sued by people who are incapable of accepting the consequences for their mistakes. So there is this paranioa everywhere you go... "caution, wet floor" "caution, this coffee is HOT" "caution, do not try to stop chainsaw chain with hand" It makes life so much less entertaining... You see someone do something stupid and all you can think of is the legal recourse. I am a pilot, and because of the insane cost of everything in aviation, I have seen potentially the most dramatic shift in liability-driven paranoia... The stuff we used to do back in the 80's would land us in jail today. Everything is so much less fun: you have to really worry about things like noise-abatement over sensative areas where rich assholes live.
I agree, it is cowardice. And it's nice to see it blow-up in their faces. I'm hoping that sooner or later, a balance will be struck between the fear of being sued for someone's mistake, and the outrageous measures taken to prevent said person from making the same mistake.
Ok... I watched the WHOLE DAMN VIDEO... and read everything I could find about the Polywell fusor, and it seems universally deemed to be the proven method of fusion; decades ahead of, and orders of magnitude more realistic than ITER. The resounding story seems to be that Bussard can't raise a simple $200 million after touring the world with his idea and freely presenting his (patented) design for the IEC Polywell fusor to every conceivable entity, from Google Co. to China and the US NAVY.
I used to ponder that question frequently and found that Neil Stephenson's "the diamond age" had a "cool" solution to the problem...
Basically, imagine a cube with holes drilled through it in a 3-d grid pattern... then just run water/coolant through it... or use the extra surface area throughout the holes as a vaporizer medium at the bottom of a heatpipe and move the heat to a heatsink bank somewhere above the processor
Sigh... I came up with this about three years ago... Uncanny, actually: I have sketches that look EXACTLY like this thing. -The problem I ran into with the design is that it is SEVERELY limited in it's maximum speed. -As the craft accelerates into clean air, the atmospheric air striking the front surface breaks up the stream of laminar air moving over the surface of the "belly" of the coanda foil... This causes a rapid loss of lift in the front and results in a foreward tumble/catastrophic loss of control due to the imbalance in lift between the rear and front portions of the disk.
I toyed with fixes to allow for much higher cruise speeds, but they added too much weight.
Wierd to see this thing in my sketchbook flying around in a video on the internet... it's like the twilight zone or something.
"The newspaper said WARF recently started waiving the fees if the research is conducted at universities or by non-profit groups." -Just your friendly neighborhood Klingon doing his part to ensure fair use to non-profit groups the world over!
As a commercial pilot, I can honestly say that 5 nautical miles is an eternity in an aircraft. In uncontrolled airspace (and even many times in controlled A/S) I routinely close to within 1 nautical mile of other aircraft before either of us becomes aware of eachother. On half a dozen or so times, I've had a "narrow miss" where my flightpath converged to within a few hundred feet of someone else... I've crossed the exact coordinates of other aircraft and would have hit had we not been separated by 1-200 feet of altitude. Trust me, it happens ALL the time in general aviation. If you research midair collisions, you'll find that they are extremely rare. -If the debris had hit the airplane, what would have changed? It would be an astronomically improbable albeit unlucky event. The passengers have more of a chance of having a catastrophic engine/structural failure. but do we worry about that? Do you read headlines that say "Airliner narrowly misses it's annual inspection, hundreds nearly die as wing nearly falls off" -Shameful media... that's all. It should have said something like "Passengers get to witness russian satellite burnup" -And I think that "behind the aircraft" is describing the pilot looking out the side window and noting that the fireball was to the side and behind... say at the 8 O'clock position... more to the side, but still behind and easily seen by the pilot.
Actually, the tritium comes from a lithium reaction... Best case scenario, we run out of lithium just like we will with oil and uranium.
it's a tough game.
Slashdot Mirror
So what you are saying is that (.5X+$2,299.00)÷(.9X+$42.99) ought to be enough for anybody?
It's called a "Helicopter"
They were once considered to be the future "flying car" and were theorized by some to eventually grace every garage in America. But they are prohibitively expensive, difficult to fly and require a level of training and certification that not many people would ever bother themselves with.
But I maintain that helicopters will be our best shot at the "flying car" at least until the end of this century.
No one, with the exception of exuberant millionaires is going to by a "car" with folding wings that you need to drive to the airport to operate... Isn't the whole point of the flying car that you DON'T need an airport?!
"Rove said the first thing he plans to do after leaving the White House is "go dove hunting in West Texas with family and friends..."
Oooh cool! If he brings along Cheney, they could shoot his friends AND family in the face!!!
Seriously though... Who the hell shoots doves??? Isn't that like drowning babies?
"The wonderful thing about standards is that there are so many of them..."
Isn't this going to bring back the problem of gaussing/degaussing screens?
That'll teach those bastards a thing or two!!!
So... bottom line: We need publicly funded campaigning? You seem knowledgeable about this field. Care to comment on why we can't just change campaign funding laws?
There is, however a simple solution to that issue...
Simply make the "marketing" a publicly funded thing; equalize the playing field for everyone running for office.
I hope so... HVD's are way cooler.
http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm
Be careful what you wish for.
If anyone finds an old leather-bound book in the fissure, please send it to:
"Atrus, Son of Ghen."
5 Riven St. Apt 233
D'ni, K'veer. II DI KI II III
(Note: I know the LCD panel on page 1 looks pretty, but please refrain from touching it...)
"The idea of a completely spinning engine is very seductive, but the actual results of forty years of careful research has not delivered a spinning engine that's better than the 'tossing potatos'."
C orporation
t _Tiny_(MYT)_Engine
http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory:StarRotor_
http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory:Massive_Ye
-Animation: http://www.angellabsllc.com/animation.html
Two highly innovative, extremely efficient rotary engines...
I call it: "the age of liability."
Everyone is afraid of being sued by people who are incapable of accepting the consequences for their mistakes. So there is this paranioa everywhere you go... "caution, wet floor" "caution, this coffee is HOT" "caution, do not try to stop chainsaw chain with hand"
It makes life so much less entertaining... You see someone do something stupid and all you can think of is the legal recourse.
I am a pilot, and because of the insane cost of everything in aviation, I have seen potentially the most dramatic shift in liability-driven paranoia... The stuff we used to do back in the 80's would land us in jail today. Everything is so much less fun: you have to really worry about things like noise-abatement over sensative areas where rich assholes live.
I agree, it is cowardice. And it's nice to see it blow-up in their faces. I'm hoping that sooner or later, a balance will be struck between the fear of being sued for someone's mistake, and the outrageous measures taken to prevent said person from making the same mistake.
Ok... Let the penis-size jokes ensue!
Ok... I watched the WHOLE DAMN VIDEO... and read everything I could find about the Polywell fusor, and it seems universally deemed to be the proven method of fusion; decades ahead of, and orders of magnitude more realistic than ITER.
a merica) claim that the funding he requested from the Navy was denied because the IEC concept is a direct threat to the Navy's other fusion baby: ITER.
The resounding story seems to be that Bussard can't raise a simple $200 million after touring the world with his idea and freely presenting his (patented) design for the IEC Polywell fusor to every conceivable entity, from Google Co. to China and the US NAVY.
The articles I read (Eg. http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?F=2584496&C=
So why is the Navy funding this other cold fusion technology?
And what is it about Bussard's research that makes it so dismissable?
Of course that's where they found it!!! I saw some guys from pfizer bury it there after they realized they wouldn't make any money from it...
I used to ponder that question frequently and found that Neil Stephenson's "the diamond age" had a "cool" solution to the problem... Basically, imagine a cube with holes drilled through it in a 3-d grid pattern... then just run water/coolant through it... or use the extra surface area throughout the holes as a vaporizer medium at the bottom of a heatpipe and move the heat to a heatsink bank somewhere above the processor
Sigh... I came up with this about three years ago... Uncanny, actually: I have sketches that look EXACTLY like this thing.
-The problem I ran into with the design is that it is SEVERELY limited in it's maximum speed.
-As the craft accelerates into clean air, the atmospheric air striking the front surface breaks up the stream of laminar air moving over the surface of the "belly" of the coanda foil... This causes a rapid loss of lift in the front and results in a foreward tumble/catastrophic loss of control due to the imbalance in lift between the rear and front portions of the disk.
I toyed with fixes to allow for much higher cruise speeds, but they added too much weight.
Wierd to see this thing in my sketchbook flying around in a video on the internet... it's like the twilight zone or something.
"The newspaper said WARF recently started waiving the fees if the research is conducted at universities or by non-profit groups."
-Just your friendly neighborhood Klingon doing his part to ensure fair use to non-profit groups the world over!
I honestly thought this was an April Fools post...
As a commercial pilot, I can honestly say that 5 nautical miles is an eternity in an aircraft. In uncontrolled airspace (and even many times in controlled A/S) I routinely close to within 1 nautical mile of other aircraft before either of us becomes aware of eachother. On half a dozen or so times, I've had a "narrow miss" where my flightpath converged to within a few hundred feet of someone else... I've crossed the exact coordinates of other aircraft and would have hit had we not been separated by 1-200 feet of altitude. Trust me, it happens ALL the time in general aviation. If you research midair collisions, you'll find that they are extremely rare.
-If the debris had hit the airplane, what would have changed? It would be an astronomically improbable albeit unlucky event. The passengers have more of a chance of having a catastrophic engine/structural failure. but do we worry about that? Do you read headlines that say "Airliner narrowly misses it's annual inspection, hundreds nearly die as wing nearly falls off"
-Shameful media... that's all. It should have said something like "Passengers get to witness russian satellite burnup"
-And I think that "behind the aircraft" is describing the pilot looking out the side window and noting that the fireball was to the side and behind... say at the 8 O'clock position... more to the side, but still behind and easily seen by the pilot.
Actually, the tritium comes from a lithium reaction... Best case scenario, we run out of lithium just like we will with oil and uranium. it's a tough game.
That means it'll be another 18 months before I can fry an egg on my CPU... That's ok, I can wait...
*taps foot*
Don't you mean: "Africanamericanest Material"
Don't let Princess Nell anywhere near that thing...