Author Topic: What you're supposed to do with Liquid Hydrogen (Read 7712 times)

SparWeb · « **on:** March 16, 2011, 01:02:56 AM »

Hi, this is a little "off topic" (maybe I should embellish with RE references wherever possible).
I had a business trip to Florida, but really is was an opportunity for me to act like a 12-year-old and run around going oooh-ahhh at rockets!

It also happened to be the day of Discovery's last return to earth. The space shuttles have been running for almost my entire living memory. I haven't decided yet if that's an indication of how long NASA has kept these orbiters going, or if it just means I'm getting old. I heard the sonic booms as it approached, but I was too far away to see much, as it approached the runway far to the north. Couldn't get any pictures of it. I got LOADS of pictures of the Saturn 5 though:

Plus a few others:

bj · « **Reply #1 on:** March 16, 2011, 08:54:41 AM »

It's an awesome place to visit. I was there around the first shuttle launch. My son is now older than I was then

Your pics bring back all the memories, Thanks

TomW · « **Reply #2 on:** March 16, 2011, 12:38:31 PM »

Hah, just kids.

I remember hearing Kennedy's "we are going to land a man on the moon" speech live on TV. And the subsequent missions getting there.

A lot of "stuff" we use daily is directly descended from the science we used to do it from velcro to computers.

Nice post.

Tom

bj · « **Reply #3 on:** March 16, 2011, 03:52:06 PM »

"Just kids" Tom? Might be too close to call between us.

taylorp035 · « **Reply #4 on:** March 16, 2011, 09:32:13 PM »

I went and saw all of that

That rocket was huge in your first pic in real life! Sure beats going the Disney for a day!

SparWeb · « **Reply #5 on:** March 17, 2011, 12:32:20 AM »

I went to Disney and Epcot when I was little. The thought of going back 30... 20... uh several years later and seeing all the same stuff had no appeal.

At least I'm not as decrepit as some of the geezers 'round here.

(cheap shot)

MagicValleyHPV · « **Reply #6 on:** March 17, 2011, 04:19:22 AM »

Interesting.

I spent a few years at the helm of an 85 foot, 500 ton parabolic USB antenna following Apollo-Soyuz, Skylab, ERTS-A, ERTS-B and a few other distance birds. This was at NASA's Goldstone site just north of Barstow, California. Loved the work... hated IBEW

... this was a few moons ago

Got my first taste of 'puters there too.. a Univac 1218 and 642b

bj · « **Reply #7 on:** March 17, 2011, 09:26:56 AM »

"decrepit as some of the old geezers around here" Tom, are you going to let a whippersnapper talk to you like that?

Bruce S · « **Reply #8 on:** March 17, 2011, 10:02:47 AM »

Quote from: MagicValleyHPV on March 17, 2011, 04:20:30 AM

Deleted dupe post

Pic too nice to respond to

To get an idea of perspective, I'll bet the propane tank was a 500 gal one.
I'd be sure that USB didn't stand for the same thing then as it does now :-)

Nice pic too!

It looks like there's people on this post old enough to remember when dirt was clean and iodine was used for knee scrapes

Cheers
Bruce S

bj · « **Reply #9 on:** March 17, 2011, 01:46:51 PM »

Might just be Bruce. And speaking of fuel

ghurd · « **Reply #10 on:** March 17, 2011, 02:37:32 PM »

NASA: "Guys, you sit on top of that, and it shoots you to the moon,
then you sit in that little cone and fall from the moon into the ocean."
Me: "You are talking to the wrong person."

electrondady1 · « **Reply #11 on:** March 17, 2011, 03:33:07 PM »

i have been wondering about something lately.
if people in the states, especially people my age who witnessed Kennedy's
speech and the moon landing and all.
does it feel kind of embarrassing to realize that for the foreseeable future, America will need to hitch a ride into space with the Russians .
the Russians !

ghurd · « **Reply #12 on:** March 17, 2011, 03:52:19 PM »

"Components. American components, Russian Components, ALL MADE IN TAIWAN!"
-Lev Andropov 1998

TomW · « **Reply #13 on:** March 17, 2011, 04:01:47 PM »

Quote from: electrondady1 on March 17, 2011, 03:33:07 PM

i have been wondering about something lately.
if people in the states, especially people my age who witnessed Kennedy's
speech and the moon landing and all.
does it feel kind of embarrassing to realize that for the foreseeable future, America will need to hitch a ride into space with the Russians .
the Russians !

Don't get me started

Tom

rjames · « **Reply #14 on:** March 17, 2011, 04:03:42 PM »

"does it feel kind of embarrassing"

Embarrassing is not the word I'd use, but it works...

Bruce S · « **Reply #15 on:** March 17, 2011, 05:44:59 PM »

Quote from: ghurd on March 17, 2011, 03:52:19 PM

"Components. American components, Russian Components, ALL MADE IN TAIWAN!"
-Lev Andropov 1998

Armageddon, that was a cool movie and great quote!!

zap · « **Reply #16 on:** March 17, 2011, 06:15:06 PM »

Quote from: electrondady1 on March 17, 2011, 03:33:07 PM

does it feel kind of embarrassing to realize that for the foreseeable future, America will need to hitch a ride into space with the Russians .
the Russians !

Maybe it's time "us yanks" start bummin' off of others?

ghurd · « **Reply #17 on:** March 17, 2011, 07:47:18 PM »

Quote from: electrondady1 on March 17, 2011, 03:33:07 PM

does it feel kind of embarrassing to realize that for the foreseeable future, America will need to hitch a ride into space with the Russians .

How many countries have put a man on the moon?

Or in space?

wooferhound · « **Reply #18 on:** March 17, 2011, 07:54:44 PM »

When I was young, many decades ago, my dad would wake me up early in the mornings to watch the men riding into space on rockets. I was amazed and eventually was astonished when men were riding a rocket to the moon. I have been absorbed into the space program from the very start.

I live here in Huntsville Alabama where a third of NASA is located. We also have a huge museum that is known as Earths Largest Space Museum. The original Space Camp is there also which is also where the Space Camp movie was filmed at.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Space_%26_Rocket_Center
It is about a mile from my house and I visit fairly frequently. Here are some of my pictures . . .

The engines on the Saturn V first stage

The Rocket Garden, this is about 1/3 of the rockets out there

There is a real Saturn 1B and a full sized model of the Saturn V standing out there too

The Shuttle "Pathfinder" was built in the early days to prove the size requirements of the internal components and to help create the Boeing 747 that was to ferry the shuttles around the country. Here it is atop a real fuel tank and some used solid rocket motors. I could not get far enough away to take a proper picture.

And lastly, this is me sitting in a mockup of a Manned Maneuvering Unit for doing spacewalks around the shuttle

But since there are only 2 more shuttle flights planned, we may not get anymore American space hardware for display here?

wooferhound · « **Reply #19 on:** March 17, 2011, 08:00:16 PM »

Quote from: ghurd on March 17, 2011, 07:47:18 PM

How many countries have put a man on the moon?
Or in space?

America is the only country to launch men to the Moon
Russia and China are the only other countries to Launch men into space
India is planning to be the next country to launch men into space

bj · « **Reply #20 on:** March 17, 2011, 08:06:10 PM »

Nice pics Woof. A treat to have that almost in your back yard.
For me it all started when a neighbor gave me a book on the X-15. Been hooked ever since.
Thanks for the share

SparWeb · « **Reply #21 on:** March 18, 2011, 01:00:08 AM »

Woofer:
The "Pathfinder"? What happened to the "Enterprise"? (no I'm not talking about Star Trek).

I remember when I was a kid (must have been 10 years old) seeing the Enterprise on its 747 carrier in Ottawa, as NASA toured it around the world.

Easy google search: The Enterprise is in the Smithsonian now. Of course. I should have known that. The NASM is the next item on my list of things to go and see in the USA, when I get a chance.

Bruce S · « **Reply #22 on:** March 18, 2011, 09:20:53 AM »

Woof great pictures!! THANK YOU for posting those.
I still have my weekly readers that came out while in grade school both of the Apollo 1 and the one they put out about it burning.

The principal interrupted the entire school to put the news flash on the speaker system so we could listen each time a rocket would take off.
WE even watched the launches one School TV channel 1.

The size of these are very hard to capture with any retail style camera. They are truly awesome.

And to think that most of the early stuff was done with slide rules.
Come to think of it how many still have theirs AND still know how it use them

For those who don't know what that is here's a picture of mine.

I still use it for electronics it even has Ohm's law Resistance and Resonance on the back.

SparWeb · « **Reply #23 on:** March 18, 2011, 03:05:13 PM »

Bruce,
That slide rule is far too big, and just takes up space, doesn't. You should part with it.
Just sell it on E-bay. You could probably get a dollar or two for it.
And if a guy named sparweb bids a generous 4$ on it, just flip it over to "buy it now" to save him the trouble of bidding over and over again.

!!!!!

Oops that was the evil sparweb twin posting there...

Disregard.

Bruce S · « **Reply #24 on:** March 18, 2011, 04:44:08 PM »

Not til I can't move the slides anymore

I would then have to write down or worse try to remember all those formulas.
How many can remember Ohm's law for DC being[ I=E/R= √ P/R=P/E] or for AC [I=E/R=√P/Zcos Ã˜ = P/E cos Ã˜.?
I surely couldn't.
Good try though

12AX7 · « **Reply #25 on:** March 18, 2011, 10:26:47 PM »

When I was a youngster my dad worked at a plastics company... one day he attended a plastics convention and brought home a magical piece of material. It looked like aluminum foil but you could crush it into a tight little ball, and when released it would bounce back to it's original shape. It was a sample of the material that the ECHO was made from.

Today we call that stuff mylar.

Took the tour at NASA.. was pretty cool, got the same pics!

Tritium · « **Reply #26 on:** March 18, 2011, 11:08:05 PM »

I still remember participating in a UIL contest with the slide rule when I was in school. I did not see a calculator till my senior year of high school.

Thurmond

birdhouse · « **Reply #27 on:** March 18, 2011, 11:26:38 PM »

i tend to be kinda a youngster around here at age thirty.

just to put it into perspective. i've never used a slide rule, and don't know how. the first computer in my classroom was in fifth grade. an apple IIE i think. the all in one with a screen barely bigger than a graphing calculator. did manual drafting in 6-8th grade, and started CAD on a 386 my freshman year. ran a small CNC my junior year with a 486. anyone still use versacad?

i feel lucky to kind of bridged the gap between drafting, and "cadding".

adam

SparWeb · « **Reply #28 on:** March 19, 2011, 01:38:53 AM »

Quote from: birdhouse on March 18, 2011, 11:26:38 PM

i feel lucky to kind of bridged the gap between drafting, and "cadding".

I personally feel lucky to have "bridged that gap" too. When I was a teen, my dad once showed me (probably annoyed by some snotty thing I said) just how fast he could solve a problem with his slide rule. I got out my pocket calculator, and when the pressure was on, I found myself pushing the wrong button at times, while dad already had the answer.

Now, with about 20,000 hours running CAD, I don't think I possibly could go back to hand drafting!

Trivia: on the internet you can find PDF's of the system schematics from Apollo!

wooferhound · « **Reply #29 on:** March 19, 2011, 01:56:10 PM »

Quote from: SparWeb on March 19, 2011, 01:38:53 AM

Trivia: on the internet you can find PDF's of the system schematics from Apollo!

http://www.apollosaturn.com/
http://www.thespacerace.com/
http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/basics/index.php

The "Messenger" spacecraft inserted itself into orbit around Mercury yesterday after a 5 year trip to get there
http://messenger.jhuapl.edu/

bj · « **Reply #30 on:** March 19, 2011, 11:46:19 PM »

More food for the junkies.

Thanks Woof

electrondady1 · « **Reply #31 on:** March 27, 2011, 09:53:15 AM »

i remember the excitement i felt when john glen launched.
i remember just standing up in class and making the announcement that a man was in space and orbiting the earth.
i wouldn't do any school work, i just wanted to listen to the broadcast.
and i was trying to track his flight path with some string and some plastercine on a map.
i remember i wanted to use a globe but that was in the seniors room and they wouldn't let me use it.
i remember the teacher becoming impatient with me to get to work.

even though i was just a kid i was thinking that people finally had something that was a replacement for war .
that it was just as difficult and that people could show how brave they were.

i know i watched every launch on TV i could.
i remember, i knew i was a Canadian. and it said USA on the side of the rockets
but it didn't matter much to me because Americans were on our side and what was happening was important for humans all over the world.

i was 18 when Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon.
it changed the way i looked at my life and my world.

News:

Author Topic: What you're supposed to do with Liquid Hydrogen (Read 7712 times)