It's a wonder

...that Vista works at all.

I spent the better part of Thanksgiving week updating and securing my loaner laptop. After downloading and installing some 9,378,461 Windows updates, I have finally run into a wall. There are four updates that refuse to install. It's a larger problem for 64-bit Vista than for 32-bit. This means that the help available is for 64-bit, and of course this is a 32-bit machine. The last bit that I could find in the Microsoft Knowledge Base suggested that the fault is due to having the OS load for the first time without having certain hot-fixes and firewalls installed and running (a chicken-and-egg problem if ever there was one.) The solution was (as it always seems to be) to format and reinstall. Of course.

So mu initial research into vortex precipitation is not real promising. This page suggests that a high power laser could do the trick. Of course, you'd have to power the laser with a nuclear reactor, making it somewhat inconvenient for use on an aircraft.

Another page reports that cloud seeding in the Southern Ocean is more successful than average due to the purity of the air. Meaning the converse, dirty air would be more difficult to seed, is probably true. I wonder if you'd need to use traditional seeding techniques to get the energy in a wake to dissipate.

SpaceX might end up beating Scaled and Armadillo to orbit. They have their re-entry license, which is kind of a big deal for the coming back home part of spaceflight.

The Air Force sees utility in hypersonic weapons platforms. I thought that these ideas had died out with the crash of the Valkyrie. Not that I'm opposed, mind you. The engineering challenges are enormous - and fun.

Baby news. Our most recent doctor's visit went smashingly. Baby and mother continue to do very well. We will do the genetic counseling because we're old, but I expect that to be a non issue.

More Wednesday.

Cheers,

-- Zach

Friday!

It's Friday night, and none of my children want to sleep. Sometimes I wish they came with off switches.

School updates. Calculus test this morning. I either got an A or I got an F. Someday I'll feel comfortable with the material. Physics has been going very well of late. My first test was an F, my second an A. With a little luck, I'll do well in this class. I need to have a good first Physics class. Momentum and all that. History is pretty easy, and it's quite enjoyable. I've a paper due Tuesday, but it should be fairly easy to complete. It's simply a book report on our massive textbook. My oceans class is too easy to be a three thousand level course.
 
On to science type things. NASA will try to launch Discovery December 3rd. The GUCP issue has been resolved and the external tank repair is on track. This will be the first time the tank has been repaired on the pad. Ironic that it happened for the last launch of Discovery.

The troubled life of the F-35 has encountered a new, even more troubling problem. It seems that the rear bulkheads are cracking after 1500 simulated hours instead of the 8000 hours they're designed to last. This issue only affects the B model, because it (the Marine Corps jet) uses a lighter materiel for the part. The best case scenario is that a faulty test regime is to blame for the problem. The worst case scenario is that the problem is a design flaw. That might actually kill the program.

I'd love to have Mike Suffredini's problem: "How are we going to utilize this wonderful vehicle that we've assembled in space?"

In other news, Saturn radiates heat unevenly over its surface. Nobody knows why.

The next space race has begun, but it's about economics, not pride. I think that this has the potential to be the right way forward. Unfortunately, it's going to be difficult without at least some government regulation. Too often the race to be first to market claims safety as its first victim. I'd hate to see good people die because someone was in a hurry to make his money back on a billion dollar investment.

Starting next week, I'd like to add a segment about whatever secondary projects I'm working on. You all know about my involvement with the RGSFOP, and that progress will be recorded there. For my next trick, I'd like to at least research precipitating the energy out of wake turbulence.

Have a great weekend. I and my stomach ache are off to the teevee for a while.

Cheers,

-- Zach

Super Slappy Science Updates

Happy hump day, intrepid readers. Normally, I'd be at apogee preparing for the terminal dive phase of my week. Unfortunately, my plans were derailed by sleeping almost ten hours last night. Oh well. I suppose I needed it.
Super slappy science, in no particular order.
Collapse? What Collapse? Societal Change Revisited
The concept that societies simply vanish, or that they die a fiery, cataclysmic death, is one that Hollywood loves. It would seem, however, that it's not consistent with reality. Large societies tend to weather large stressors well, and it is almost impossible to point to one event and say "Yes, the sack of Rome by the Visigoths caused the collapse of Western Civilization."
Civilizations are like tires with slow leaks. Problems exist for long periods of time, occur slowly, and tend to mask their effects. The people comprising the society may not even notice that there's a problem until long after the society is gone.
This is fascinating stuff. Applied to our own civilization, it shows that the fall of the US is not imminent.
NASA - Shaping the Shuttle
It's stories like this that persuaded me to get into this field in the first place. This is why I want to be an engineer.
NASA - NASA to Show Live Webcast of Nanosatellite Launch
Nanosatellites offer the promise of high launch frequency and low launch cost. Of course, miniaturization is an issue...
I just found a post that was supposed to have gone live on October 24^th. Oops. It's included here below for the sake of completeness.
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You know that you're old when your Saturday night is spent furtively trying to get children to sleep (and back to sleep). I put the little ones down at about 8 or so, then promptly passed out. Smersh fell asleep pretty quickly, but SWWNO fought it until almost midnight. Smersh woke up about 12:30 am, likely from nightmares or night terrors. When that happens, the only way to get her back to sleep is to stand in the middle of the living room under the bright bright light and twirl slowly. Counterclockwise. For an hour.
Of course, SWWNO woke back up at 6:30 and woke her sister up shortly thereafter. I thanked my wife for a "rockin' Saturday night" and got up to begin the new day.
Rockin' Saturday nights when you're old. Why didn't they mention this in school?
The failed NASA balloon launch has been studied. From the report:

In summary, the causes for this mishap evolved from: (1) a flawed underlying assumption, (2) a problematic historical mindset, and (3) an ineffective organizational structure.

This is actually kinda neat. I saw a show on TDC about the folks that launch the majority of NASA's balloons. Their professionalism was impressive.
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That's all I have time for right now. Until Friday...
Cheers,
-- Zach

Finally getting caught up

It's incredible. Even with all the best intentions, updating this blog is still incredibly difficult. Here goes.

Family life proceeds apace. My wife was sick for a while. Then I caught an unexpected case of strep throat. Then SWWNO came down with the same thing. My daughter and I both had to go to the doctor in order to get better. I'm still not anywhere near 100%. Maybe by December I'll be back to myself. I sure wish I knew what it was that we caught.

School is kicking me. Hard. Calculus is more difficult than it was last semester, but I think I'm doing better. We didn't focus as much on logs and trig last time. I'd like to think I'm becoming good at trig and inverse trig. Now, we're working on integration by parts. This wasn't even covered in my last class.

I'm doing much better in physics now, thank you very much :-) It seems that I'm much better with relativity and quantum mechanics than I am with waves and optics. I know what to work on for the final, at any rate.

This post is coming to you from a loaner laptop that my kind neighbors are letting me use. They have three total and can only use two at a time. It's about three years old, 17" Gateway (which is at this point really HP), and incredibly heavy. I always think of the old Compaq Portable computer as I lug it around campus. On the other hand, I love it. I can't imagine trying to do all the stuff I'm trying to do without a laptop.

caveat: it's missing the "a" and the "4" keys, and I broke the number "6". Anybody know how to replace keys on a full sized laptop keyboard?

Two quick aeronautics items today:

Boeing refits old Seattle plant for P-8 aircraft production

They made B-29s here. That alone is reason enough to keep the plant active.

FAA reinstates requirement to stay back from Boeing 747-8

So, I guess I'll start looking into precipitating wake turbulence again. I wanted another project!

That's about all I have time for today. It is my intention to get on a Monday-Wednesday-Friday posting schedule. I have tons of material available, so the weak link is me taking the time to write it up. Wish me luck, fellow netizens...

Cheers,

--Zach