The Mitsubishi Zero is a long-range carrier-capable fighter aircraft. It was operated by the Imperial Japanese Navy from 1940 to 1945. The Zero got its name from 0 being the last digit of the imperial year 2600 (1940) when it entered service with the Navy.
In early combat operations, the Zero achieved an outstanding kill ratio of 12 to 1, but by mid-1942 a combination of new tactics and the introduction of better equipment enabled Allied pilots to engage the Zero on generally equal terms. By mid 1943 the deterioration of fighter pilot training in the IJNAS contributed to making the Zero less effective against newer Allied fighters.
By 1944, the A6M had fallen behind Allied fighters in speed and was regarded as outdated but still capable if operated by trained pilots. The Zero continued to serve in a front-line role until the end of the war in the Pacific. During the final phases, it was adapted for use in kamikaze operations. Japan produced nearly eleven thousand Zeros during the war.
The Vought F4U Corsair is an American fighter aircraft that saw service primarily in World War II and the Korean War. Designed and initially manufactured by Chance Vought, the Corsair was soon in great demand; additional production contracts were given to Goodyear, whose Corsairs were designated FG, and Brewster, designated F3A.
The Corsair was designed and principally operated as a carrier-based aircraft, and entered service in large numbers with the U.S. Navy and Marines in World War II. It quickly became one of the most capable carrier-based fighter-bombers of the war. Some Japanese pilots regarded it as the most formidable American fighter, and U.S. naval aviators' claims suggested an 11:1 kill ratio. Early problems with carrier landings and logistics led to it being eclipsed as the dominant carrier-based fighter by the Grumman F6F Hellcat, powered by the same Double Wasp engine first flown on the Corsair's initial prototype in 1940. The Corsair's early deployment was to land-based squadrons of the U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Navy.
The Corsair served almost exclusively as a fighter-bomber throughout the Korean War and during the French colonial wars in Indochina and Algeria. In addition to its use by the U.S. and British, the Corsair was also used by the Royal New Zealand Air Force, French Naval Aviation, and other air forces until the 1960s.
From the prototype delivery to the U.S. Navy in 1940, to final delivery in 1953 to the French, 12,571 F4U Corsairs were manufactured in 16 separate models. Its 1942–1953 production run was the longest of any U.S. piston-engined fighter.
Distributism is an economic and social philosophy advocating that the means of production should be widely owned by individuals and families rather than centralized in the hands of the state (socialism) or mega-corporations (capitalism).
First articulated in the early 20th century by Catholic thinkers like G.K. Chesterton and Hilaire Belloc, it acts as a "third way" that champions widespread private property, decentralized communities, and family-owned enterprises.
Totally enjoyable. Jonesy takes apart an ancient machine tool and gives us a history lesson along the way. It's funny how there seems to be a sharp dividing line between people who are mechanically inclined and people who aren't.
I first ran into Whitworth when I bought a custom Triumph Bonneville when I lived in Houston. It had an Italian front brake, so there were some metric parts. The engine may have been older than the frame, or maybe it was vice versa. In any case some of the nuts and bolts were American and some were Whitworth. It came with a set of Whitworth wrenches, which I had never seen before, or since, for that matter.
Whitworth has pretty much gone away, but back in his day, he was a big deal.
The Heinkel He 111 is a German airliner and medium bomber designed by Siegfried and Walter Günter at Heinkel Flugzeugwerke in 1934. Through development, it was described as a wolf in sheep's clothing. Due to restrictions placed on Germany after the First World War prohibiting bombers, it was presented solely as a civil airliner, although from conception the design was intended to provide the nascent Luftwaffe with a heavy bomber.
The Mitsubishi G4M was a twin-engine, land-based medium bomber operated by the Imperial Japanese Navy from 1940 to 1945. It was commonly referred to by Japanese Navy pilots as Hamaki ('cigar', literally 'leaf roll') due to the cylindrical shape of its fuselage and its tendency to ignite after a hit. The Allied reporting name was Betty.
The G4M boasted good performance, excellent range and was considered the best land-based naval bomber of the time. This was achieved with flimsy structure and almost total lack of crew protection, with no armor plating or self-sealing fuel tanks. The G4M was introduced in 1941, but its problems resulted in heavy losses.
It was the most widely produced and most famous bomber flown by the Japanese during World War II, and it served in nearly all battles during the Pacific War. Attacks by G4M and G3M bombers resulted in the sinking of the Royal Navy battleship HMS Prince of Wales and battlecruiser HMS Repulse, the first time capital ships actively defending themselves were sunk solely by air power while in the open sea. G4Ms and G3Ms were also credited with sinking the heavy cruiser USS Chicago during the Battle of Rennell Island. The G4M later served as mother ships that carried the Yokosuka MXY-7 Ohka, the anti-ship suicide weapon. Of the 2,435 G4Ms produced, no fully intact aircraft have survived, though several airframes exist as unrestored wreckage or in partial states of restoration.
Probably the best-known incident involving a G4M in the war came during the top secret mission to intercept the aircraft carrying Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, resulting in Yamamoto's death. On 18 April 1943, sixteen P-38 Lightnings shot down a G4M1 carrying Admiral Yamamoto.
As part of the negotiations for the surrender of Japan, two demilitarized G4Ms, given the call-signs Bataan 1 and Bataan 2, flew to Ie Shima, carrying the first surrender delegations on the first leg of their flight to Manila. The G4Ms were painted white with green crosses and were escorted by American P-38 fighters.
How Long Might a Generation Starship Last in Interstellar Space?
Silent Abyss
I'm only posting this video as a curiosity. It showed up on YouTube the day after I mentioned Nemesis by Isaac Asimov in a post. I only listened to few minutes. Who's got three hours to spend listening to someone drone on endlessly about generation ships? I dunno, maybe I could listen to him if I was busy doing something else, but usually, if I am working on something I will listen to music, which requires no thinking, as opposed to listen to someone talking. I do listen to audio books when I go for a walk. So far I've just been listening to free audio books on YouTube Music. Some are wretched, but some are okay. You have to be careful because if you search for Audio Books (or is it Books on Tape?), half of the items it returns will be music by a band with that name.
Nemesis did get me restarted thinking about interstellar travel. Right now the only way we know how to go anywhere in space is to throw things in the opposite direction. That can get us to the Moon, and can get robots to Mars, but rockets are not going to get us to the stars. Tsiolkovsky's rocket equation puts a limit on how fast you can go, but it is based on your rocket's exhaust velocity. If you can get that velocity up some large fraction of the speed of light, you could reach the stars, but getting that high velocity would be a bit of a trick. We can do it with particle accelerators, but they are only working with particles. We would need to do it with a continuous stream of matter.
Of course, none of this matters if we don't have a destination. Astronomers have detected numerous exoplanets, that is planets orbiting another star, but we have scant information about the planets themselves. One of these days astronomers are going to find one that looks like it might be worth going to visit. Probably want to send a probe before we send a manned mission. Also give us a chance to test our particle beam rocket engine.
Even with a super particle beam rocket engine, it will probably take years to get to the star. And it will be even longer before we hear anything back from our probe. And will we even be able to hear it? Our current deep space network has limited bandwidth, and we are only dealing with small fractions of interstellar distances. Lasers might work, but I suspect it would have to be one heck of laser. Sending actual physical mail might work better, but you would need the probe to return home to deliver the package.
Problem: if you use half of your mass as reaction mass to get you to your cruising velocity, then you will need half of your remaining mass to slow down to visit your destination. Now you've collected your data and you want to return it to Earth, you will need half of your remaining mass to accelerate to cruising speed, and then half of you remaining mass to decelerate.
100 tons x 50% = 50 tons
50 tons x 50% = 25 tons
25 tons x 50% = 12.5 tons
12.5 tons x 50% = 6.25 tons
Start with 100 tons and you will only have 6 tons for your spacecraft. But using only 50% of your mass is probably highly optimistic. You are more likely to need 90%, which means you will only have 10% of your starting mass that you began that stage with. So your fuel consumption will look like this:
100 tons x 10% = 10 tons
10 tons x 10% = 1 tons
1 tons x 10% = 0.1 tons
0.1 tons x 10% = 0.01 tons
Start with a 100 ton rocket and you return package will only weigh 20 pounds. Somehow I don't think you are going to be able to make a nuclear powered particle accelerator rocket engine and pack it in a 20 pound package with all the necessary sensors and recording equipment. So a ton in this case is liable to mean a zillion pounds.
On the other hand, some whiz kid might conjure up a warp drive, an astronomer will discover a whole raft of possibly habitable planets, and all this speculation can be ignored.
Seems the Chinese are busy, getting involved in all kinds of things. They seem to be our biggest competitor these days. Russia seems to be rather preoccupied with Ukraine, but they are still messing about in Africa, though I don't know how effective that is. On the other hand, we are doing something about Iran, or at least I thought we were. I still think Iran needs to be pounded flat until the clerics lose their hold over the country. I mean Iran is basically a boil on civilization and it needs to be popped. Remember, they killed 30,000 protestors less than a year ago. I guess Russia and China don't mind dealing with Iran as they are familiar with mass murder as well.
