Search found 15 matches

by Damon Hill
Tue Jan 04, 2011 7:35 am
Forum: News
Topic: A new potential rocket fuel molecule. Trinitramid.
Replies: 25
Views: 12512

Actually, I think it's the nitrogen tetroxide they're even more scared of; turns to nitric acid when contacting water. You don't even want to catch a whiff of this stuff--or get it in your eyes. The hydrazines are extremely unfriendly, too. It's partly why rockets are gradually getting away from usi...
by Damon Hill
Fri Dec 24, 2010 9:47 am
Forum: News
Topic: A new potential rocket fuel molecule. Trinitramid.
Replies: 25
Views: 12512

Definitely needs a reality check. Sounds more like a potential for a high explosive than a controllable propellant.

Although nitroglycerin has been successfully been used as a propellant (in a plasticized binder).
by Damon Hill
Thu Oct 07, 2010 6:47 am
Forum: News
Topic: More about EEStor
Replies: 24
Views: 12041

Never mistake motion for actual work.
by Damon Hill
Mon Sep 27, 2010 3:12 am
Forum: General
Topic: Mega-breakthrough? Super-efficient thermo-electrics?
Replies: 19
Views: 7975

Never trust extrapolations based on theoretical models, when working devices have yet to be built.
by Damon Hill
Sat Aug 21, 2010 6:04 am
Forum: News
Topic: This is Progress.
Replies: 31
Views: 18059

Today, I bought my first LED lamp with a Edison screw-in base. About $7 at WalMart, made by Feit. Draws barely a watt, and produces a miniscule 70 lumens, though still enough to be useful to me. And get this: it's shaped like a pyramid on the inside, IsweartoGodI'mnotkidding. Got to appeal to Certai...
by Damon Hill
Mon Aug 09, 2010 8:36 am
Forum: News
Topic: Quark Soup and Strange Stars
Replies: 0
Views: 2533

Quark Soup and Strange Stars

Yet more forms of matter beyond neutronium?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quark_star

I just stumbled across this in the science news and am trying to wrap my poor brain around the concepts. Maybe the LHC has a nasty surprise waiting for us after all?
by Damon Hill
Sat May 15, 2010 7:35 am
Forum: News
Topic: This is Progress.
Replies: 31
Views: 18059

I was a relatively early embracer of CFL technology in my home, and happier as the price came down and "daylight" CFLs became available. I figured on cutting power use by two-thirds, and it also helped in summer in some rooms by the reduction of radiated heat. However...I wasn't quite as happy with ...
by Damon Hill
Fri May 14, 2010 6:44 pm
Forum: News
Topic: This is Progress.
Replies: 31
Views: 18059

At around $40 a lamp, it's hard to see any benefit recovered from the investment. Prices will have to come down to CFL levels for me to begin to be interested.

And precisely how efficient are these LED lamps compared to incandescent and CFL?
by Damon Hill
Mon Mar 22, 2010 8:54 am
Forum: News
Topic: Potential Negative Economic Impacts of Successful Polywell
Replies: 28
Views: 10314

Depends on how fast polywell-based fusion can be moved into the power generation market; I'd assume it would displace older coal-based technology first but there might be a couple of decades before the polywell technology is >fully< developed into a reliable service. Since fusion isn't obviously des...
by Damon Hill
Sat Feb 14, 2009 10:33 pm
Forum: General
Topic: Hobbies other than polywell?
Replies: 46
Views: 26570

My main hobby is electronics with an emphasis on audio, and test and measurement. I like to build and modify audio amplifiers, as mindset and budget allows. The test bench is mostly geriatric Heathkit with a few bits of Hewlett Packard (courtesy Boeing Surplus) and Tektronics. Music preferences are ...
by Damon Hill
Thu Jan 01, 2009 1:08 am
Forum: Theory
Topic: Why 10-25 times net power?
Replies: 114
Views: 53411

Why not just start blithering on about anti-matter interstellar propulsion while you're at it. Direct energy recovery from fast p11B ions is blithering, twiddling, utter-and-complete, undemonstrated, lacking-in-fundamental-understanding-of-the-engineering, can-only-be-imagined-in-the-mind-of-a-theor...
by Damon Hill
Wed Dec 31, 2008 8:42 pm
Forum: Theory
Topic: Why 10-25 times net power?
Replies: 114
Views: 53411

This thread is getting frustrating. Is it not understood that a reactor doesn't earn money until it delivers electricity to the grid? A reactor that produces 300 MW of thermal energy doesn't get paid for >that<, it gets paid for the fraction that can be converted into electricity--and the conversion...
by Damon Hill
Wed Nov 26, 2008 11:47 pm
Forum: General
Topic: The Hard Stuff Is Pretty Slick
Replies: 5
Views: 3607

Aren't friction and drag essentially two different things? Here we're dealing with two solids, not a solid surface and a fluid.
by Damon Hill
Wed Nov 12, 2008 1:30 am
Forum: News
Topic: Radioactive Decay not a constant ?
Replies: 49
Views: 24092

A possible test of that theory would be the decay rate of RTGs used to power planetary probes as they traveled far from the Sun. Was a measurable variation in the power decay observed? I don't recall any mention of unexpected changes from them.
by Damon Hill
Tue Nov 11, 2008 6:33 am
Forum: Implications
Topic: Fusion Generators, or peak oil and another Great Depression?
Replies: 18
Views: 16863

The villagers are accustomed to their creature comforts and will do whatever it takes to keep them. Those who want to go back to the farm and pull plows can do so. I don't expect it will be easy. I >do< hope fusion works out, especially aneutronic fusion, but barring a big breakthrough a la polywell...