Author: Administrator

Here’s the second firing:

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We did the first two firings of the mini MHD generator today.

This unit can be unclamped and easily disassembled. This gives up a rapid turn around for a lot more testing.

Here’s a pics from our Away 25 mission at 100,000 feet.

Today we’re going to be working on the crew module mockup and the MHD generators. We’re experimenting with a stand up configuration for the crew for the module. The nice thing about a full size mockup is that you get to experiment and find out quickly what works and what ideas to later pretend you never had.

We’re finishing up a mini-MHD generator. This one will use even smaller rocket motors. The mini will be used as a base for testing the sensors. With the smaller engines we can fired several times a day pretty cheaply.  If all goes well with the sensor we’re going to try and get a firing in on the quads MHD generator.

We still have the 50 foot airbeam we want to test at 4 psi. However that’s best done outside and it looks like rain tomorrow, (we fire the rockets under an awning).

We’re been studying other people’s magnetohydrodynamic generators. This one is pretty interesting. It’s a Russian space based MHD generator that uses a liquid rocket engine at it’s core.

At least the Ascender is. Check out page 210 of the new illustrated edition of SuperFreakonomics. There is an illustration of two Ascenders carrying a hose up into the stratosphere. We consulted on that project and they went with Ascenders in their planning. However we were not credited in the SuperFreakonomics book. Oh well, you can’t win them all.  There are so many folks involved it would take an entire book just to credit everybody.

The Ascenders do look cool though holding up the hose to the sky.

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Today we did the third test of our MagnetoHydroDynamic generator.

Not the rocket engine, nor the high powered amplifiers, or even the band saw can beat the Neodymium magnets as the most dangerous  thing in the shop.  Regardless of how careful we handle them you always get bit one way or another.

I went to get the  magnets to put them back on the MHD generator.  Each set was wrapped in three inches of bubble wrap then double wrapped in woven nylon bags then put in a box of packing peanuts. They had been in this box for about a week. All the while the pair had been slowly popping the bubble wrap and inching closer together. When the bubble wrap was gone they started compressing the plastic into a thin film. When I opened the box instead of finding two magnets six inches apart I found one solid block separated by 1/32 inch smear of plastic.

Two vices, four large plastic wedges, a pry bar and  hour and a half later they were separated once again ready for mounting on the generator.

A film crew was in Saturday to shoot some scenes for an upcoming show on JPA.  This was their third time shooting with with. Last summer they were out in the desert with us getting some action shots. The director says only one more session to go before to goes to editing.

We turned the cameras on them while they were turning the cameras on us.

At the end of a very chaotic day all that was left was the gaffer tape on the floor. The best guess is that this will all go to air in a few a months.