August 7, 2024 Quick space links
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.
- Outpost Space touts its proposed re-entry system for orbital spacecraft
The animation shows a variation of the system ULA eventually wants to use to recover the first stage engines on its Vulcan rocket.
- ULA’s CEO touts the number of Atlas-5 stages stacked in their warehouse, waiting launch
These are simply the last Atlas-5s before the rocket is retired.
- Another relatively boring press release of an image from Europe’s Mars Expresss orbiter
I post so few images from Mars Express because Europe releases so few, and when they do, they don’t usually provide enough good information to understand what one is looking at. For example, this release never really tells us the global location of the picture, info that is crucial to understanding it. I could look it up, but the image itself is just not that interesting.
- Blue Origin touts a short 5-second video showing a test firing of the attitude thrusters on New Glenn’s first stage
It is unclear if the video shows an actual first stage, or simply a mock-up for mounting the thrusters. Blue Origin was targeting September 29th for the first New Glenn launch, but based on the present status, that’s increasinly appearing unlikely.
- Roscosmos lost 17 billion ruble in 2022 (better than predicted) and 14 billion in 2023
It blames the losses on the actions of “unfriendly” countries, which is a hoot because it was Russia’s uncalled for invasion of the Ukraine that made it a pariah. If anyone demonstrated unfriendliness, it was Russia.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.
- Outpost Space touts its proposed re-entry system for orbital spacecraft
The animation shows a variation of the system ULA eventually wants to use to recover the first stage engines on its Vulcan rocket.
- ULA’s CEO touts the number of Atlas-5 stages stacked in their warehouse, waiting launch
These are simply the last Atlas-5s before the rocket is retired.
- Another relatively boring press release of an image from Europe’s Mars Expresss orbiter
I post so few images from Mars Express because Europe releases so few, and when they do, they don’t usually provide enough good information to understand what one is looking at. For example, this release never really tells us the global location of the picture, info that is crucial to understanding it. I could look it up, but the image itself is just not that interesting.
- Blue Origin touts a short 5-second video showing a test firing of the attitude thrusters on New Glenn’s first stage
It is unclear if the video shows an actual first stage, or simply a mock-up for mounting the thrusters. Blue Origin was targeting September 29th for the first New Glenn launch, but based on the present status, that’s increasinly appearing unlikely.
- Roscosmos lost 17 billion ruble in 2022 (better than predicted) and 14 billion in 2023
It blames the losses on the actions of “unfriendly” countries, which is a hoot because it was Russia’s uncalled for invasion of the Ukraine that made it a pariah. If anyone demonstrated unfriendliness, it was Russia.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Well, countries do stupid things sometimes with long term impacts that can last for centuries https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/address-to-congress-declaration-of-war-against-germany
The speech could have been written recently
In the news
https://techxplore.com/news/2024-08-newly-loop-pipe-kw-electricity.html
“A team of researchers from Nagoya University in Japan has developed a loop heat pipe (LHP) that can transport up to 10 kW of heat without the need for electricity. This heat transport capability is the largest in the world.”
New solar film
https://techxplore.com/news/2024-08-solar-energy-farms.html
Their new light-absorbing material is, for the first time, thin and flexible enough to apply to the surface of almost any building or common object. Using a pioneering technique developed in Oxford, which stacks multiple light-absorbing layers into one solar cell, they have harnessed a wider range of the light spectrum, allowing more power to be generated from the same amount of sunlight.
This ultra-thin material, using this so-called multi-junction approach, has now been independently certified to deliver over 27% energy efficiency, for the first time matching the performance of traditional, single-layer, energy-generating materials known as silicon photovoltaics. Japan’s National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), gave its certification prior to publication of the researchers’ scientific study later this year.
“During just five years experimenting with our stacking or multi-junction approach, we have raised power conversion efficiency from around 6% to over 27%, close to the limits of what single-layer photovoltaics can achieve today,” said Dr. Shuaifeng Hu, Post Doctoral Fellow at Oxford University Physics.
“We believe that, over time, this approach could enable the photovoltaic devices to achieve far greater efficiencies, exceeding 45%.”