Episode 1: Scott's Cool List o' Links

Outer Space
Amateur Radio Satellites: www.amsat.org

Communications:

Power:

Propulsion:

• Chemical Rockets
• Electric Propulsion
• Solar Sails
  Cosmos 1 Solar Sail of the Planetary Society
• Other

Navigation:

Environment:

Food:

Other Planets:

Institutes:

Interesting People:


Near Space
Oklahoma Research Balloons
Oklahoma State ASTRO

Amateur Radio
The American Radio Relay League: www.arrl.org

VHF Comms

HF Comms

Propagation:

Modes:

Antennas:

Equipment Vendors:



Computers
Hardware:

Apple CPUs / motherboards

Intel CPUs / motherboards


Programming:

MacOS X / Unix

Windows

Java

JavaScript

Popular Mechanix: Rocket To The Moon?

ROCKET TO THE MOON?

Link to some very old (well, WWII-era) art work of rocket ships and the like. Man, what if we really kept up the space race ?

Gimli Glider - Wikipedia

Gimli Glider -

Air Canada Flight 143 shows that the Space Shuttle isn't the only large object that has done a lot of gliding. Sometimes 767s are pressed into that mode of operation.

**excerpt **

The Gimli Glider is the nickname of an Air Canada aircraft which was involved in an infamous aviation incident. On 23 July 1983, a Boeing 767-200 jet, Air Canada Flight 143, ran completely out of fuel at 41,000 feet (12,500 m) altitude, about halfway through its flight from Montreal to Edmonton. The crew was able to glide the aircraft safely to an emergency landing at Gimli Industrial Park Airport, a former airbase at Gimli, Manitoba.^[1]

Ranger 3: Facts, Discussion Forum, and Encyclopedia Article

Ranger 3: Facts, Discussion Forum, and Encyclopedia Article

Above link is for a 60's spacecraft program called Ranger. Ranger missions crashed into the moon while making live television transmissions toward the end. Idea being that even "standard definition" TV (I don't have frame rates and resolutions for this yet) was superior to the earth-based telescopic observations of the day.

Now, Ranger 3 carried a "hard lander" built of -- get this -- ordinary balsa wood.

I am going to have to check this out.

YouTube - How to letter with lead

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmttakfeyVA

In above link, Doug Patt shows you how to write... like an architect.

Digital Apollo (Part 2)

Okay, so I wrapped up Digital Apollo recently (MIT Press, David Mindell) and I thought it was overall pretty good. The part I enjoyed the most was at the end when he talks you through the landing process and then talks about the landing experienced by each crew. They were all a little different.

You also get a good explanation of the genesis of the Apollo Hardware. Provided I remember some earlier late night reading sessions, the hardware has heritage in a computer intended for a Mars mission. The packing techniques were from guided missiles (makes sense). I'd heard that before. And the software (which was considered something of an afterthought at first) did a lot of simulating analog solutions to problems. This section of the book is something I want to go back over in greater detail sometime. Most other versions of this story concentrate on the word width, memory size, clock speeds, so on and so forth, but not what needed to be done.

Also inside, some good discussion on the X-15 and how much intervention the astronauts wanted. Should the astronauts literally fly the ship or just supervise systems ? Some folks thought you'd use stick and rudder and fly the rocket off the pad, literally. Another camp was for fully automatic (Ranger, Surveyor) operation. What happened was a mix of the two, a sort of semi-automatic mode. Really, I think the Apollo flight software would have been smaller / simpler if the pilot didn't have so much control over the trajectory. Why? Because a lot of points had to be coded into the software where you gave the operator (oops, astronaut) the chance to change control, or edit a setting, so on and so forth. Maybe two separate programs (each on a computer) with a big toggle switch (auto, manual) would have been worth looking at ?

Anyway, it's a fun book if you're into technical history.

Ten beautiful computers | Boing Boing Gadgets

Ten beautiful computers | Boing Boing Gadgets

Above is a link showing "1o Beautiful Computers." Most of these are small British machines. They're worth taking a quick look at.

DHC-2s

www.dhc-2.com is one of my favorite aviation websites. I found it after Tiffany and I were up in Canada. See, we were on the ferry from Victoria to Vancouver and they had a Canadian gift and bookshop on the ferry. One of the books I picked up was "The Immortal Beaver". Turns out these are fascinating and rugged bush planes. We had the opportunity to ride later on in the trip. This was "our" plane we rode on: http://www.dhc-2.com/id185.htm

Teardrops & Tiny Trailers

Teardrops & Tiny Trailers

Okay, use above link to check out these 'tiny trailers'.

What do we need to make one of these an off-grid power station (wind turbine parts, batteries inside, solar panels on outside surfaces ?) then another trailer to camp in, etc. ? Maybe keep the radios in it ? Could be interesting...

High Power Rocketry: N - Prize

High Power Rocketry: N - Prize

Okay, so in recent posts I talked about ancient and contemporary homebrew rocket efforts. There is an X-Prize (called N-Prize) effort out there to help organize and encourage this mess.

Above link discusses a hybrid approach to an orbital payload using rockets and balloons.

Ham radio folks and the homebrew microprocessor sets have been working in the high altitude balloon area for a while now.

Let's see where this goes !

Scale Saturn V

Baltimore City Paper - News Features: Rocket Men

If you haven't heard by now, Steve Eves just set a 'model' rocket record with a 1700 lb. Saturn V. Check out the above link. This project reminds me of the old BIS Lunar mission that I talked about earlier in the year.

The homebrewers are starting to catch up with the NASAs of the world.

Home-Grown Simulators

Quite a while back in Air & Space Smithsonian, there was an article about folks who built some pretty sophisticated mock-ups so they could better enjoy MS-Flight Simulator and similar products. I was glad to see the article put on the Internet archive.

Some of the folks did jumbo jet bridges with multiple computer monitors.
Note Daren Knightsbridge's simulator: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8wN50X3Y8s

Others did fighter cockpits that required surrounding themselves with controls.

Additional link: http://www.avsim.com/partners/Home_Cockpits/

More Book News: Digital Apollo

I got a Borders gift card from my relatives for my birthday. It didn't take long to check the email for a coupon and get the card emptied out pronto.

Digital Apollo is a book about the history and background behind the Apollo Guidance Computer.

I'm looking forward to checking this out in greater detail. Some time ago, Eldon Hall wrote a book called Journey to the Moon from the AIAA press. It was really good and showed how the AGC had its origins in the Polaris missile and other clever, simple machines like Bush's Differential Analyser.

I'll get into it later, but the AGC has been "resurrected" in both computer simulators and homebrewed hardware...

more to follow...

73
Scott
KD5NJR

"Read You Loud And Clear"

Every once in a while, you find something cool and cheap. Or free.

The guys at NASA's history department have done it again. "Read You Loud and Clear" (13 MB Adobe Acrobat ".pdf" format) is about the Minitrack, SATAN, STADAN, Mercury and other tracking and communication networks that were deployed for the space program.

What I've read so far, a variety of frequencies (HF, VHF, SHF) were used as well as a variety of modes. (radar, SSB, teletype) for tracking, telemetry and comms.

Looking forward to exploring the book more. I guess maybe 40 or 50 years later, some of this could be homebrewed... sounds like fun.

73
Scott
KD5NJR

Dreaming and the BIS Lunar Lander

I got caught up on a few back issues of Outside and National Geographic Adventure, then I went for a smoothie. After that, I went for a nice walk today and when I got home, I made some replies to Gene's blog and posted to Stan's a little ditty about the BIS Lunar Lander. It wasn't pretty... but isn't that good enough ? Little steps and all that. Not bad for an afternoon in which the wife was at work.

73
Scott Haley
KD5NJR

http://ke5lep.blogspot.com/2009/02/dreaming-is-good.html

Update for Summer 2008

"Update for Summer 2008" doesn't seem like a very good title for a blog post unless the title of your last post some 2 years earlier was "Update for Summer 2006". Anyway, with "Science Friday" on in the background (a discussion on an amateur astronomy and a new(er) galaxy or something) let me type just a few words to bridge the gap.

Namely I've been married for 2 years now. I wouldn't really change a thing. We stay super busy with family and church so that is where most of the time goes. By the time we both get home in the evenings seems like there is just enough time for some TV. Thank goodness for a DVR and plenty episodes of Ice Road Truckers, Deadliest Catch and Discovery Science. I've also tried to catch up on all the books I've "collected" at Borders over the years. As I get those wrapped up, they're going on BookMooch (look for me, KD5NJR) I brought a whole box back home of new books from the Holland Hall (prep school) Book Fair too, so there are tons of books to read.

KC5JKU (Gerry) and KD5RHF (Kevin) have been helping out with the Broken Arrow Amateur Radio Club's Monday Night Net. That is still a good time to get everyone together on the air or in person most Monday nights.

Ahhh... the computer farm. The "daily driver" is a Mac Mini. I never did build another DOS machine from parts like I had intended too (bought a case, power supplies and incidentals 3 days before I got married) but as long as this little machine holds together and I don't need to write code or anything, I'll be fine.

I don't think I'm going to maintain a big outline of links like I had set up on earlier posts. Delicious seems to handle that. www.delicious.com/KD5NJR.

Hear lately I have discovered Google Reader so that is letting me add links to Delicious account at an alarming rate. Helps my memory and Bookmarks organization. Jay says my memory is starting to go. I'm not suprised.

I discovered Facebook too. There is getting to be a fair percentage of my high school friends showing up on that. I'm surprised. That has been a lot of fun. Zack, Jay, Curt and some others from college are on there too.

I upgraded my amateur radio license to General class just to do it. I haven't put up antennas yet. Living down in a bit of a valley, I know it won't really help things on VHF anyway. Not a lot of regular ballooning activity like there used to be. I miss that, but the club has sponsored a foxhunt (hidden transmitter hunt) every month this year. That is fun in its own right.

With all these new web apps and blogs like MAKE: I'm sure I'll get the inspiration to try something new. I need to look over the documentation on Twitter this weekend.

How could I forget, after a couple years of working with television transmission (Vyvx) I moved from Level3 Communications to American Electric Power. I know I am going to enjoy it.

73 for now.
KD5NJR
Scott

Update for Summer 2006

Wow, where did the first half of the year go ?
Well, helping get the missus-to-be ready for the wedding was easily a full-time job.
So besides slowly adding to the collection of junk in the shack with the help of eBay, not a lot has gone on radio-wise. I have to admit that watching an active blog like www.makezine.com/blog makes it hard for me to write my own !

Yes, the wedding was great. Then we were off on a driving tour and cruise hitting
* Seattle
* Victoria
* Vancouver
and then
* Juneau
* Glacier Bay
* Skagway
* Victoria.

Despite all the data crunching and planning, OSU didn't balloons again as far as I knew. But Gerry Paschal has been really helpful with the Broken Arrow Monday Night Net. 146.910 (-) NO tone. Monday 8p CT.

All the computer gear is still around. Just waiting for a reason to get hooked up and used again.

I'm Back !!

Where did time go:

It seems like it's almost been a year and what do I have to show:
1) working in a different dept. at work than I used to.
2) I'm engaged.
3) Santa (and work) was good to me and I have a heap of new toys to experiment with this year including:
4) Posting furiously on the ASTRO (Okla. St. U. high altitude ballooning) forums. w5yj.okstate.edu for more info.

a) a Heath ET-3400 microprocessor board (6800-based)
b) a BasicStamp board
c) an Intel play microscope with a USB port
d) a charcoal smoker....

so, a cool clock ? a flight computer for the balloon missions ? a torture chamber for electronic parts ? a computer-driven smoker ? stay tuned...

73
Scott

Scott's Apple Mac Stuff

Here is where I want to talk about the Apple Mac -- most notably the Mac Mini. My first reaction to this mac was that is seemed inexpensive. Mac users tend to be fanatic and for good reason. The device works well. Mine was really loaded (Bluetooth entry devices, wireless 802.11g communications, expanded memory and the DVD burner) but still I was off and running in about 5 minutes.

Interesting still is that it is very small (less than 7" by 7" by 2") and runs a Unix varient at heart.

As a result, there has been a lot of chatter regarding the Mini, mods, hacks and that applies for the iPod as well. Some folks are embedding Minis in older all-on-one Macs to make a very unique device. I'l eventually like to write code for the Mac family, starting with widgets, which I think will code quickly, then going backwards to more portable UNIX scripts and perhaps older System 7 compatible code if old iron appears useful in my balloon, rocket, amateur radio and history interests.

I'll try to track my favorite Apple resources here.

Contact me if you find something of interest !!

73
Scott

IPOD
hacks
http://www.ipodhacks.com/

mods
http://www.ipodmods.com/

after market products
http://www.griffintechnology.com/ <= remote controls, FM modulators, other stuff for Apples
http://www.everythingipod.com/

other sites
http://www.ipodlounge.com/


MINI
hacks
http://www.engadget.com/entry/1234000663032664/

mods
http://macs.hackaday.com/

other sites

APPLE OS X PROGRAMMING
http://www.apple.com/macosx/tiger/dashboard.html

APPLE SYSTEM 7 PROGRAMMING

OLD MACS
http://www.applefritter.com/main
http://www.lowendmac.com/

Update for 4/9/05

Man, it's been a busy time since I last wrote anything. A couple hours ago I got back inside from a couple hours of yard work. Mostly pulling weeds from the flower beds. I'd like to make them look a bit nice this year. I can probably just keep things trimmed and weeded better, but to add anything I'll probably need to make deeper beds. Maybe I can set out some flower pots. From time to time I'll see a nice looking container garden that catches my eye.

Anyway, what have I been up to lately. Well, praise band at church takes a lot of time on Wednesdays and Sundays. Besides that, I run the BAARC net Mondays on 146.910. TARC officer's and general meetings are on Tuesday evening and its getting time to put the finishing touches on Field Day.

At the same time, I'm trying to throw away or pack away the stuff I'm not using right now, and consolidate what I do use into a space where they actually get used. Easier said than done. I'm an awful pack rat. While I'm at it, I'd like to get the 6m and SSB antennas finshed up. I got a VHF tuner to try my hand at building antennas. Maybe I can have something for Field Day.

The W5YJ group hasn't worked much on ballooning lately, but their ham shack is improving. I'd like to get some procedure lists and software tools developed on a variety of common or small or cheap platforms for those guys.

The BAARC is in the process of tweaking their two repeater sites, and I'm trying to get involved with that effort.

Derek metioned trying model rockets again, so we are. And he is studying for his ham radio license.

Obviously this is a lot of stuff and I'd like to share how I'm doing it, what I'm using and how it is coming along. So I'll try to have period updates here that tell what is changing on the blog, which is layed out in a hierarchy.

PROJECTS

IDEAS

STUFF

TECHNIQUES

PEOPLE

PLACES

73

Scott