NASA extends trial of steerable robo-stunt kite parachute NASA will soon be testing high-altitude parachute systems that let astroboffins land valuable scientific research payloads from altitudes of 60,000 feet. The technique, using parafoils – cellular aerofoils of the same sort used to make high-performance stunt kites – will, so NASA hopes, allow it to recover scientific …
The Karman line has traditionally been used as the measure of where space begins, and that's pegged at 100 km above ground. The US however tend to use 80 km as the transition point. Either way, 60000 feet is barely 18 km up, so not even a quarter of the way there.
"Either way, 60000 feet is barely 18 km up, so not even a quarter of the way there."
Strictly speaking you're correct, but 60,000 feet is well into the 'space equivalent zone', so for low speed objects the atmosphere is so thin that you may as well be at 300,000 feet for all the difference it makes, therefore it's a good enough test for 'edge of space' tech.
Yeah, it struck me as odd that kept going on about stun kites. They are controlled from the ground and a couple of 60,000' control lines are going to be a tad unwieldy. As you say, what they are designing is a paraglider or, for that matter, little more than a present day steerable parachute but with a "robot" pulling the cards instead of a person.
The term 'stunt kite' usually refers to the super-agile delta-shaped kites which perform stunts whilst controlled by a relatively static human.
The inflatable aerofoil kites which are used by people performing stunts on surfboards are known as power kites.
Nice use of the technology though.
Well if it were released on the 14th Feb it could be a Cupid Stunt Kite?
With all due respect to the late great Kenny Everett
For our 'merican cousins:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLBW8L198GQ
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/books/article-2360476/The-shocking-truth-Kenny--CUPID-STUNTS-THE-LIFE-AND-RADIO-TIMES-OF-KENNY-EVERETT-BY-DAVID-AND-CAROLINE-STAFFORD.html
NASA's early 60s projects were Rogollo wings (which evolved into hang gliders and delta kites) and were for the Dyna-soar project, not Mercury/Gemini.
Dyna-soar was part of the manned space plans which included the Sea Dragon launcher (600 feet long, built from 8mm submarine steel in a shipyard, 100% reusable, no turbopumps (engine pressurisation via liquid nitrogen boiloff). The engine bell of the launcher would have been large enough to completely cover a Saturn V first stage)
Stunt kites (actually power kites, only the smaller ones are stunt models. Anything bigger than 1.8 metres simply can't manouevre quickly) are a derivation of parafoils, not the other way around.
I built a few Rogollo wings as a teenager when interested in kites. The advantage over Deltas was that having no rigid spars meant they were easily compactable (useful in a returning capsule) - but that also meant they were susceptable to crosswind gusts collapsing them at inopportune moments when close to the ground - not the greatest thing to happen when carrying a manned capsule, and that's why normal parachutes + water landings were used throughout the US manned programs. I did build one with inflatable spar pockets and it worked very well, but having something like that would be far too risky for spaceflight (if the pockets didn't inflate you're back to the same problem as before).
The first A in NASA
Improving recovery accuracy is one of those "enabler" technologies that should multiply the utility of experiments by getting the results back to the lab faster and hopefully leave the equipment in better condition to be reflown, a key benefit of balloon and sounding rocket development programmes.
It was quite some years ago that there were reports of remote-controlled or automatically steered parafoil type parachutes, carrying cargo right to a target. As Neil Barnes points out, skydivers (sports parachutists) generally land within a few meters of their target and "accuracy" competitors routinely nail it within centimeters.
In any case, this is not exactly new, and I wonder why it is being described as novel.
Back in the 1960's NASA did look into a steerable parachute for landing the Gemini capsules, called the Rogallo wing. This looks like a computer controlled version of the same.
The US military have also been testing steerable parachutes for airdrops.
According to the notes in the little book that came in my Revel Mercury/Gemini 1/48 scale kit set back in 1969, this idea dates back to Project Gemini.
It would have been deployed there and used to land capsules on a runway had Project Apollo not been prioritized in the face of aggressive rooskie space-posturings thereby sucking up all the dollars. Apollo was based around earlier Project Mercury ideas on landing, involving round parachutes and landing ass-backwards into an ocean.
Have a balloon attached to a rope and real it back in?
There is probably some reason why you can't do this, such as the weight of the line cannot support itself, but does anyone know exactly why this won't work?
If it is the weight of the line, why not a series of shorter lines between a series of balloons?
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