jccooper

59 ms·

631.
by jccooper 10y ago
That's part of the basket of "moral rights" that originated in Germany and France. In the US, the tradition of being able to sell (or commission) exclusive rights is seen as mostly incompatible with obligatory attribution. Th
632.
by jccooper 10y ago
SpaceX can and will land on land when the mission allows it. See ORBCOMM-2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANv5UfZsvZQ Blue Origin's mission allows it because it's suborbital. That is: it doesn't actually go
633.
by jccooper 10y ago
SpaceX is inconsistent about what videos they provide after a flight. They'll usually pick one or two that are good from a marketing perspective. (New and/or impressive.) I wouldn't be surprised to see an edited Vine of the s
634.
by jccooper 10y ago
Barring major infrastructure and cultural changes, or general purpose ambulatory robots, delivery trucks will still need humans on board to handle the delivery (and pickup) part. No self-driving car is delivering to the seventh floor, and I
635.
by jccooper 10y ago
The SpaceX network is said to be mostly for upstream connections, rather than consumer devices. They want to replace fiber, not cell towers. That's useful just about everywhere.
636.
by jccooper 10y ago
So is there a Hearthstone-like card game builder for aliens? Robots? Replicants?
637.
by jccooper 10y ago
> They have separated lines. That's not quite correct. Tesla have at least one general assembly line that can do both Model S and X: http://www.fool.com/investing/2016/09/19/tesla-factory-tour-...
638.
by jccooper 10y ago
Almost all of the instruments on Juno are non-visual. The camera was included mostly for PR purposes. 6MB is pretty good for one-dimensional data streams.
639.
by jccooper 10y ago
There are many standard components, though satellites are low-enough volume that almost nothing is really "off the shelf". The custom bits and integration are plenty of work (and time) in themselves.
640.
by jccooper 10y ago
> I was just wondering how SpaceX guards their lunch pad from aerial intrusions Mostly by being on an Air Force base, many miles away from anywhere someone might operate a "drone". Wouldn't help much against a fixed-wing
641.
by jccooper 10y ago
SpaceX already uses carbon fiber on their rockets in the interstage and payload shroud. They do provide some insulation: they're covered in cork. But most of the rocket body encounters extra low temperatures more than high temperatures
642.
by jccooper 10y ago
SpaceX in particular uses an AL-Li alloy, which is even stranger.
643.
by jccooper 10y ago
Von Braun in known for designing ever-larger rockets, culminating in the Saturn V (and continuing on paper). Goes along with "click to enlarge".
644.
by jccooper 11y ago
Some fan calculations suggest it could handle even more, but SpaceX knows more about their coefficients of friction and center of gravity than we do.
645.
by jccooper 11y ago
In the press conference, Elon credited 50mph winds for the tilt.
646.
by jccooper 11y ago
Pretty much. GPS is really good these days. It does have a radar altimeter, but that's only for height. F9 has demonstrated landing in fog and at night, so visual cues are clearly unnecessary.
647.
by jccooper 11y ago
You realize the rocket is 15 stories tall and made of aluminum foil under high pressure, right? Any means of "catching" it is indistinguishable from a collision. That's besides the absurd scale and cost of building such a thi
648.
by jccooper 11y ago
It has very good inertial guidance as well. The GPS is probably the best available; considering they launch GPS satellites, I'd expect they aren't restricted. However, civilian GPS use isn't really much different anymore; int
649.
by jccooper 11y ago
They have jacks that attach to the hold-down points; those jacks will probably be welded to the deck. Elon also mentioned the metal shoes over the legs some time ago, and they may also have those, but there's less evidence of those. (Y
650.
by jccooper 11y ago
F9 is not believed to have any information from ground sources during descent, based on FCC filings. The altitude of the barge only changes by a meter or so in decent seas, and the legs can withstand a drop of several meters, so probably th
651.
by jccooper 11y ago
Pretty much every large business and government is also explicitly hierarchical. For a particular firm it's such a common choice one has to imagine it's a good one. For organizations or broader scope than a single firm (industries
652.
by jccooper 11y ago
There is also good evidence that there were extensive agricultural urban civilizations around and along the Mississippi. But they were so thoroughly destroyed (by the Little Ice Age, drought, and disease) that by the time European settlers
653.
by jccooper 11y ago
Well, kind of. The F9-1 would be on it's way to orbit, but not there. It's a first stage after all. It would certainly have much higher energy, and is huge in comparison.
654.
by jccooper 11y ago
The concept of LEO being "ridiculously easy to get too" is mad. No amateur rocket has made orbit or even come close. The difficulty of building a vehicle to make LEO is not comparable to building one to raise altitude once in orbi
655.
by jccooper 11y ago
They're nice, but they're small. Since many operational costs (gates, pilots, infrastructure) don't change with plane size, and because many airports are already flight-limited, it usually makes sense to use larger airplanes.
656.
by jccooper 11y ago
ATSC (well, 8-VSB) is pretty terrible at handling multipath. I live 12 miles from the antenna farm and ought to be able to get great reception with a bit of aluminium foil, but because I have a tree (who would have trees, right?) any one an
657.
by jccooper 11y ago
Probably they will switch as vehicles get into higher performance requirements. Alcohol's a great fuel to work with: clean burning, room temp, good cooling properties, but it'll be tempting to switch to something else when you nee
658.
by jccooper 11y ago
They have that: http://www.ttlclock.com/
659.
by jccooper 11y ago
No; all US launches are over ocean to satisfy FAA that you have a very small chance of damaging something on the ground. You could launch over land if you could prove that your rocket was about as likely to fail as an airliner, but there&#x
660.
by jccooper 11y ago
And China: https://twitter.com/SinoDefence/status/637174369677123584

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