Using a mountainside might help with structural integrity, but it's not likely to give much air resistance advantage if I'm reading the math correctly. The 5 highest peaks in the US are all in Alaska and and range from just under 5km to just over 6km. Commercial jets using air resistance/density for lift fly at about 10km and even at 38km aerodynamic lift still carries 98% of the weight of the plane (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C3%A1rm%C3%A1n_line)

Air density is halved at 5km compared to sea level, but air resistance doesn't diminish as quickly (due to it being multiplied by velocity squared and drag coefficient), and only becomes irrelevant (for short-term purposes) around 100km at the Karman Line.

If we had a 5km peak in Florida, the lack of logistical costs might make the benefits worth it, and if we could build on one of Equador's 5km peaks, then there's the further advantage of equatorial location for optimal rotational advantage (part of the reason we launch from South Florida)

It is incredible. I'm not sure how well they'll manage an aerodynamic approach to a moon landing, but they've surprised me before! 🤯

This I agree. ST is indisputably more science based than SW, and deservedly earned that respect. It's fun to argue whether warp drive can/can not exist and all that, but to just compare the different warp speed of different ships, across different classes is kind of pointless, as the numbers are arbitrary to begin with, no?

Say, if the video instead compares Mach speed between F-15/16/18/22 etc. and argue which fighter got the more advanced engines (accounting for weight/speed/aerodynamic profiles factors) then I see the point...

When it comes to flying, if you get it wrong it mostly leads to death. This is not something you learn by just doing. Even the wright brothers had a fair grasp of aerodynamic, thermal dynamics, and if they took to the sky how they would get down before attempting their first flights.

Frankly getting into the air is the easy part, the landing is the hard part. Thankfully the plane was small light but rigged enough that it didn't crumple on a hard landing.

"The Ghia had good aerodynamics from the start..."
It has terrible aerodynamics. That rounded front pushes air underneath the body.

Over 300kph? (~190mph) I don't think so.
Only in very short bursts. They show him hitting 174mph but I'm guessing he backed off quick.

I have about 130hp in mine and I once had it just under 120mph At that speed, the front wheels were scary loose. It felt like a sudden headwind would have sent me airborne. It's fun for short bursts of acceleration though.

A few years ago I had lunch at a restaurant with my extended family for some event (can't recall specifically), and as we were standing around talking in the parking lot afterwards, the AN-225 flew over us. We were pretty close to the airport and it was either landing or taking off, so it was quite low to the ground and surprised the hell out of us. We didn't have the slightest idea what it was, but the configurations of the landing gears and six jets made it clear it was damned unusual. Found out later that the beast was one-of-a-kind and a bunch of people were at the airport watching for it, which made it clear how lucky we were to randomly catch that.

I had no idea there was a propeller-based counterpart. I don't know enough about aerodynamics to understand how stacking the propellers like that makes any sense, so I'm just going to assume it's some sort of Soviet technomagic.

The two key words there are "vortex" and "spin". A nerf vortex WILL spin, whereas these guys almost certainly designed this NOT to spin (probably at the cost of aerodynamic efficiency).

I am seriously tempted.

My only worry would be losing the damn thing in the trees!

When I rode 30+ miles a day, almost 30 years ago, I used to do something similar on downhills. I wouldn't take the toe clips off, but I would hang my ass over the rear wheel with the seat in my gut. This flattened my body and made me more aerodynamic (but not nearly as much as he is) and put my weight farther back and lower, meaning I could brake much harder without going over the front. His center of gravity probably goes higher in this position with his legs that high. Since my feet never left the pedals, I could still pedal if needed and get back upright in an instant.

I never raced, so I don't know if this would have been against any specific rules, but taking your feet off the pedals that way would make you far less stable, imagine if he had to brake or swerve, and reattaching at speed is no walk in the park either, so it's probably considered a likely hazard to others and banned...but that is just a guess.

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Um...who called you a pig? The voices in your head? Certainly not me. I don't know why you would say you can't be both though. That's just silly. ;-)


That's a pretty big 'If it can' that's already been proven to be an 'it can't'. Even IF it did everything it was supposed to, yes, it's 10 years too late and at least double an acceptable price tag, and still not ready for prime time, or even the 2am slot.
Yes, modification happens, but the idea is not to produce something that needs to be modified out of the box in order to do anything well.
No, many bombers are in use that were designed as bombers. Sorry, but that's just wrong.
Once again, the idea of the F-35 doesn't grant air superiority, neither does a few of these planes, especially if we are too afraid to lose a $200+ million plane so we just don't use them, which is the most likely outcome. It is in NO way a deterrent to full scale war with any foe we might ever use it against, like Russia. If it was some magic anti-war bullet, that might be money well spent, but is simply isn't in any way and NEVER will be, so that argument is just silly.
In 10 years, the stealth properties of this plane will be 5 years past obsolete....and it may STILL not be in the air.
There are no countries with air forces that can come close to ours, not one. I don't think there's even a group of 10 nations combined that come close to ours. We will NEVER be in a fair fight excepting a nuclear one where every one dies, and we'll still out nuke everyone else 10-1, it just won't matter.
Yes, Trump likely would take us to war, that's no reason to waste more money on unneeded weapons for a possible, unknown, unlikely future conflict with an unknown, unestimated enemy.
Still testing....and still testing....and still testing....$1.3 TRILLION later.....Still testing (and failing those tests)....still testing...still testing. Eventually it should be admitted that it's a failure, more testing won't help (it hasn't yet), and quit throwing mountains of good money after bad.
No, it doesn't. It's TASKED with all the same stuff the aging, multi types of planes do, but it can't do it. Stealth is not something new, BTW, we have many stealth planes already, better ones that work.
Again, out of the box needing to be upgraded is a fail. A massive, indisputable fail. That an engine powerful enough to move this pig like other planes already can doesn't exist should tell you something. It's aerodynamic....great....that's one part of a dozen that have to fit together.
The price tag is multiplied 10 fold because it has a pilot.
You want them to eventually pass ALL required tests...not fail them all, then change the parameters so it isn't canceled.
Nope...Warthog.
Not so far. So far, other stealth planes do what it's supposed to...better. Upgrading them is clearly a better plan.
Not true. All I hear is 'it sucks' because I don't read Lockheed Martin's press releases. When you look at test results, it sucks. When you look at price, it sucks. When you look at upkeep, it sucks ass. When you look at a fleet of them doing everything a dozen different planes today do, we're bankrupt and far less capable militarily, and that sucks.

But it seems no amount of logic and results will dissuade you from your love of this unmitigated debacle. That's your choice, but you aren't convincing anyone else to go along with you.

You've almost certainly got it with that. Displacement is enough to give the ball initial inertia in the right direction, then the "Rayleigh jet" or "Worthington jet" boosts it. It's perfect timing combined with a near perfect cannonball.
Think of the speed a splash goes skyward. If you accelerate something with more mass, especially something aerodynamic like a mini football to the same speed, it's going to shoot up like a rocket...which is what happened here.

The return was from about twice the altitude of the Blue Origin booster, with a vehicle that's significantly larger and more powerful. I don't have the numbers for the aerodynamic stresses, but I'd be pretty surprised if that was the case.

Here's a comparison of their flight trajectories - http://i.imgur.com/ATkpdAX.png

And here's a comparison of the vehicles - https://i.imgur.com/zrLWBLJ.png

I don't want to take anything away from the ridiculously awesome achievement of Blue Origin, they have the record for first landing of a reusable booster from edge of space and good luck to them.

The booster is not orbital. It's on a ballistic, suborbital flight just as for the Blue Origin booster. The second stage goes to orbit and note that they are not trying to recover that one at all, let alone land it.

In fact, the SpaceX booster does several deceleration burns in space, and so experiences less aerodynamic stress than does the Blue Origin booster, which actually flies faster, according to the article I linked above.