Posts by Vladimir Plouzhnikov

There are generally 2 ways to go about progress in commercialisation of a difficult and risky high-energy technology, such as space travel:

1) making incremental steps from simple to more complex, risking an occasional disaster but keeping the commercial risks manageable; or

2) sitting and waiting for the government to do all the development work and bring it to you wrapped up in gift paper and ready for use.

If you choose No.2 you will wait for 100 years for it to become ready and when you get it you will realise that it's too heavy to fly, too expensive to operate and you can't actually use it because of health and safety and anti-money laundering regulations. In the meantime, your competitors will have been running their commercial operations for years and you'd stand no chance of competing with them in any case.

If you choose No.1 - you have to do it like Branson unless you are Carlos Slim or Bill Gates and can afford to burn a few billion USD in the case it all goes kaput (technically or commercially).

Re: Love and Hate @dan1980

"The West" would rather see Russia run as a stable, democratic nation with a functioning economy. For the security and happiness of its people, and also "ours".

As I said - it's for another discussion. But you are being very naive, anyway. "The West" is comprised of multitude of powerful groups but so it happened that the oligarchy which currently runs the US wants to see Russia as anything but what you say.

From the Russian media sources it appears that the whole thing happened something like this:

- the "monument" (a large touch-screen monitor in the shape of an oversized iPhone 4) was initially installed by some sort of private PR agency a few month ago.

- a few days ago (before Tim Cook has made his announcement) they have notified the authorities that they will remove the object for repairs.

- yesterday they dismantled the thing but claimed Tim Cook's announcement was the reason (plus that Apple is a tool of the NSA anyway).

- promptly, a well known local right-wing religious nutcase Milonov - the official author of the anti-gay propaganda law - attached himself to the event.

"Will you now give up the use of iPhone, Mr Milonov", - asked him the journalist. "Don't be a fetishist - iPhone is just a phone for me", - was the answer.

So, a broken electronic ad display in need of repairs, commandeered not once but twice for odious-PR-opportunity-du-jour self-promotion stunts - that's what it all is.

Re: Love and Hate @dan1980

"At least in principal, 'western' countries like the ones you mention, believe that humans are equal and should have equal rights."

I disagree with that. I don't think anyone among the ruling classes in the West actually believe in equality and freedom. However, they know very well that letting hoi polloi have an illusion of equality and freedom makes them work better and be less of a threat to the powers that be.

And much of the "tolerance" apparently existing in the Western societies is unfortunately based on the enforcement of social rules and laws rather than on intrinsic natural virtue. If you one day declare all anti-discrimination laws null and void - the pogroms and lynchings will start within hours.

On the other hand, while I don't think our system is stable and sustainable in the long term it still is arguably much preferable to the paroxysms of medieval bigotry gripping Russia at the moment.

Russia is plunging into a period of darkness, no doubt.

Much if not most of the blame for it lies with the West and that is a subject of another discussion.

Re: In this case, it's not the technology.

"The big issue is "why?"

The press-release said "a turbopump-related failure" which is very vague and it would be really interesting to know exactly.

It is was indeed a turbopump failure then most likely it's either due to pitting corrosion or general deterioration of the crystalline structure of the metal due to aging. It would be downstream of the pump - in the outlet casing or even in the feed lines - a burn-through resulting in a massive pressurised fuel leak. It still does not rule out a failure in the new articulated piping made by Aerojet.

In any case, continuing using these engines is out of the question for Orbital as it will present an unacceptable political and reputational risk for the company.

Re: Terrorists!

"So the West has values just as the Muslim world has values. It just has tolerance in addition to its values."

That hasn't always been the case though. Ironically, the Jews have experienced the Western "tolerance" on their own skin many times and not only in the 20th Century...

Muslims are simply going through their aggressive phase now, which Christians have already gone through (or so we like to think and certainly hope).

I am quite sure that with time Muslims will denounce the satanist cults in their midst and will look back at the likes of ISIS like we look at Senior Torquemada & Co today.

"Those plagued by it need help thru love"

What they usually mean by that is "tough love". Like beating the crap out of you, followed by a stint in an iron maiden, culminating in chopping your head off. All for the sake of saving your immortal soul or ensuring you go to heaven #7 with 7.0E1 virgins at your service.

Re: Over-Speed lock

The whole thing with this feathered mode is that it is meant to be used at very high speeds. However, it appears that it must not be engaged while under power, so an engine-feathering interlock would be more appropriate.

P.S. Eh, DropBear beat me to it! :-)

Re: "Wealthy customers have signed up in large numbers to see a black sky "

"Climb a remote mountain or sail offshore - at night"

Aha. Or just close your eyes and shout "whooosh!!!"

Re: RB's real interest isn't space, that's just a bonus.

It all really depends on how tight his budget is for this project.

This will push back any prospect of commercial operations by 2 years at least - does he have cash to fund it through? What will the delay do to the NPV of the project and will it be able to recover? Is he prepared to take the risk while sinking more capital into it or is he going to cut the losses and stop?

"And yet nothing deterred their dreams, or the companies that pushed ever higher, ever faster designs.

What will happen here?"

Yes, to put things in perspective - one person died and one has been seriously injured in this accident.

Not a second later there was a media storm with "experts" and commentators crawling out of all corners shouting that they always knew spaceflight was unacceptably dangerous, that it can never be safe and that this is the end of commercial spaceflight.

At the same time "A search for two missing fishermen whose trawler sank in the North Sea has been called off, the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) said". Few days ago there was a fire at a fireworks warehouse leaving 2 people dead. There has been many road accidents around the world, no doubt killing lot more people - just in the day or so since the SS2 crashed. I still don't hear any impassioned calls for abandoning commercial fishing as unacceptably dangerous or banning all motor transport on safety grounds.

When Columbia broke up on reentry - 7 people died and it was the cause of a great political bruhaha, STS flights suspended for years due to "unacceptable safety risks", yet at the same time over 100 people died in a night club fire somewhere in Long Island and no one called for immediate closing down of all night clubs for fire risk evaluation and implementation of "return to dance" program.

The bottom line is - politicians and pundits couldn't care less about the loss of human life. They only put a mournful look on their faces when a particularly "sexy" death gives them a nice PR opportunity.

Re: Not Necessarily the Engine

The Chief Investigator is now saying that there has been an uncommanded feathering (although without saying that it was the cause of the accident at this stage).

Slowing device 'deployed early'

Re: Principled guy

No, he just suggested they should consider investing elsewhere if they don't like the way he runs the company. Just a little bit of a hubris here, not the evidence of a principled position.

I guarantee you, he would have been less defiant if he knew that the people he proposed it to had enough votes to sack him, though.

"Do you have similar 'logical' objections to people saying that they're pround to be Russian/British/American/etc. or proud to be a member of the Plouzhnikov/Ly/Jackson/etc. family?"

Yes. Proud for their achievements but feel lucky/happy to belong.

Re: Depressing @Mark 85

"The second was that the designer was killed on the Launchpad when a rocket being fueled blew up."

That is not the case. You probably mistaken it for the Nedelin accident - that was an ICBM being tested on the pad, fully fueled when the 2nd stage motors ignited because of a fault in the sequencer electronics. That thing had totally different engines, operating on hypergolic fuel.

Now, N1-L3 (with NK-15 engines - the precursors to NK-33/AJ-26 on Antares) did blow up on the pad during one test, producing one of the largest non-nuke explosions in the history of humanity, but that was when the engines were unnecessarily cut off by on-board automatics after it detected a problem with one (of 30!) turbopump. Basically, the rocket took off then fell back down on the pad - similar to Antares. No one was killed or injured in the accident.

Re: Soviet Products

There was never Soviet vodka in the Soviet Union.

We had Soviet Whisky, Soviet Gin, Soviet Champagne but vodka was always "Russian" or "Moscow" or "Stolichnaya" etc. 8-|

Re: Whereas....

A human on Earth (say in Antarctica) won't last 20 minutes if you leave him outside naked. But people don't go outside naked in Antarctica (unless from out of a sauna and then only for a few seconds).

Dressing appropriately for the occasion is the key.

Yep. Let's see how well can the Opportunity wipe the dust off its solar panels. Ah, no, let's not look at that, let's just watch the Curiosity switching that spare tyre... What do you mean it drives backwards now?! You mean it can't swap a tyre?

"humans are no longer necessary in space exploration"

How so?

Re: just like the good old days.

Turbopumps are notorious for being a failure point but it appears in this case either a nozzle or a fuel line has ruptured. Although the video is not of sufficient quality to say for sure but before the explosion there was a big flare up in the direction of the exhaust, which suggests that the fuel was still being supplied at pressure for a while but it was burning outside of containment.

Re: Excellent!

I have it and it's good fun. The only problem is that the print resolution is not as good as that of a photo film and, inevitably, you see the dots making up the image. But that is the fault of the media and not the authors...

Re: @Reg Number of electrons != current

Yeah, this thread is going to cause a great re-Volt in modern physics...

Re: Endangered Species

"I'm still using my original Kindle, sadly the damn thing simply won't die, so I've got no excuse to upgrade."

Now I'll have to - some time ago they sent me a questionnaire. Standard stuff, "do you like this or that about Kindle", "what would you like to change" etc. So, I replied - "I want page turning buttons - add the buttons and I'll buy a new one". And what did they do? They've made a new one with buttons!

Now I'll have to buy a Voyage when it's out - man has to keep his promises and all that...