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capekwasright

121 karma · joined January 24, 2019

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capekwasright··on Paper map sales are booming
Ward Maps in Cambridge, MA?
capekwasright··on FAA NOTAM System Outage
This is an Air Traffic Control System Command Center (ATCSCC) advisory: https://www.fly.faa.gov/adv/adv_otherdis.jsp?advn=28&adv_dat...
capekwasright··on Low Energy Chest Fridge
It's a little awkward, but it makes sense in the context of determining an energy budget or the daily operating cost on grid power.
capekwasright··on American Airlines agrees to purchase Boom Supersonic Overture aircraft
The original design was meant to use 3x turbojets, not turboprops.
capekwasright··on Quake on the Game Boy Advance [video]
Which, as it turns out, was written by the same person as features in the OP, Randy Linden
capekwasright··on US Army's Land Trains (2020)
In an episode released a few years back, Omega Tau spoke with two individuals who had worked on the DEW Line back in the day: https://omegataupodcast.net/248-dew-sage-and-the-f-106-delta...
capekwasright··on A passenger with no flying experience landed a plane
To be fair, the Cessna 208 is a significantly larger aircraft than your run-of-the-mill Cessna 172

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cessna_208_Caravan

capekwasright··on What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)
That's wild, thanks for sharing. I'd have to imagine it's served as some level of inspiration for Simon Stålenhag's work.

Ex: http://www.simonstalenhag.se/bilderbig/by_procession_1920.jp...

capekwasright··on Vegetable Oil for Lubricating Chainsaws (2008)
Tangentially related: Boston Dynamics' BigDog, which utilizes hydraulic actuators, would constantly leak hydraulic fluid while operating, be it through normal weepage or catastrophic leaks (e.g. burst hoses). Initially, they used petroleum-based hydraulic fluid, but as they began to operate out in the woods etc, this proved to be untenable, so they eventually switched to using a vegetable-based hydraulic fluid that would biodegrade within a month.

Bonus: when catastrophic hydraulic leaks inevitably occurred and sprayed hot hydraulic fluid over the hot exhaust, you would be rewarded with the lovely smell of a deep fryer!

capekwasright··on The Czech Play That Gave Us the Word ‘Robot’
R.U.R is a fantastic work that unfortunately has been perpetually shrouded in obscurity, despite its outsized popular influence. I highly recommend reading it.
capekwasright··on Major nuclear fusion milestone reached as ‘ignition’ triggered in a lab
In terms of the NIF's broader goal, as opposed to the specific goals for their ICF work, the NIF is meant to keep nuclear physicists fresh on research relevant to nuclear weapons design in the aftermath of the end of the Cold War and Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Ignition_Facility#NIF...

capekwasright··on The Bagel Language
+1, I've smoked my KitchenAid multiple times making this recipe but the results are well worth it
capekwasright··on Father builds exoskeleton to help wheelchair-bound son walk
They actually did, as part of DARPA's Warrior Web program [1]. They ultimately spun off the program to Ekso Bionics as a consequence of the Google acquisition back in 2014 [2].

[1] https://www.army.mil/article/125315/darpas_warrior_web_proje... (the first image is of BD's system; you can just make out "BOST" around the center of the left thigh)

[2] https://www.globenewswire.com/fr/news-release/2014/10/02/670...

capekwasright··on HD scan of the 1611 King James Bible
There was a comment thread on the John Carmack/JPEG post discussing the Internet Archive's use of JPEG 2000 to store archival images of scanned books, could be a tangent stemming from that?
capekwasright··on Why American construction costs are so high (2019)
The section discussing (inter/intra)agency turf battles reminded me of a recent article discussing how the pandemic has led to some significant reevaluation of what the role and purpose of traditional "commuter rail" is within public transit as a whole (particularly focusing on the MBTA/Boston, contrasting the quote from Frank DePaola):

https://www.governing.com/now/taking-the-commuter-out-of-ame...

capekwasright··on A New Satellite Can Peer Inside Buildings, Day or Night
Correct; optical, not SAR. Should have made that clear in my original post.
capekwasright··on A New Satellite Can Peer Inside Buildings, Day or Night
This is likely the best recent example (from last year):

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/29634/trump-tweets-int...

capekwasright··on Pfizer Covid vaccine approved for use next week in UK
A similar controversy exists in the Arab world about what to call the Persian Gulf, where the names "Arabian Gulf" or simply "The Gulf" are preferred. [1]

Amusingly (but perhaps not surprisingly), British imperialism briefly waded into this dispute as well:

> Following British attempts to control the seaway in the late 1830s, the Times Journal, published in London in 1840, referred to the Persian Gulf as the "Britain Sea", but this name was never used in any other context.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Gulf_naming_dispute

capekwasright··on Throwable Robot Car Always Lands on Four Wheels
Boston Dynamics tackled this problem with the SandFlea robot ca. 2010, albeit in a single axis while exploiting the intermediate axis theorem. You can see it in action @ 0:17 in their sole released video[1], where the robot snaps flat during the ascent phase.

This was done primarily to increase the likelihood that the vehicle would land on all four wheels, in order to maximize energy dissipation by the wheels on landing and thus minimize shock seen by the body. As a secondary benefit, footage from the onboard camera stood a chance to be usable during a hop, instead of being a blurry mess. Lots of great details in their patent filing for the robot[2].

Source: I helped design this robot

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6b4ZZQkcNEo [2]: https://patents.google.com/patent/US8849451B2/

capekwasright··on Boston Dynamics CEO talks profitability and the company’s next robots
Many don't realize that for the first ~decade of its existence, BD was not the robotics/hardware business, but rather developed and sold human simulation software. Their main product, DI-Guy[1], was a modest success, and eventually provided the underpinnings for BD's core biomechanics sim tools.

When they got back into the hardware business in the early 2000's, those projects were primarily funded by DARPA/DOD contracts, but the steady income stream provided by e.g. DI-Guy helped fill the gaps between contracts, allowing them to run a business that, though lean, stayed in the black. Eventually, as a part of the Google acquisition, DI-Guy was divested to VT MAK, another local company in the modeling/sim software business [2].

Source: former employee that worked at BD for the better part of a decade from the mid 00's to late 10's

[1]: https://www.mak.com/products/visualize/di-guy [2]: https://www.mak.com/products/visualize/70-landing-pages-1/la...

capekwasright··on Power tool manufacturers and who owns them
Shoutout to https://www.hfqpdb.com/ for collecting the myriad coupons Harbor Freight sends out in one centralized, easy to use database.
capekwasright··on Power tool manufacturers and who owns them
The converse of Maslow's hammer is such a common scenario that Wera actually sells a ratchet designed to be used as a hammer (think mechanic working under a car): https://www-us.wera.de/en/great-tools/koloss/
capekwasright··on Piper Announces First GA Aircraft with Autoland Capability
The short answer is that higher speeds come at a steep price. The relationship between velocity and the power required to overcome drag at that velocity is cubic, so that large business jet requires on the order of 50x more power to fly at 450 kts than it would flying at 120 kts, like the little Cessna might.