Daily Inspections Keep Your Spitfire In Tip-Top Shape

October 18, 2023 by Richard Baguley 22 Comments

What ho, chaps? Look, we know this is a bally nuisance and all, but those desk jockeys at HQ want us all to watch this film about daily insepction of your Spitfire. No Vera and no Greta in this one, more’s the pity, but it is jolly important. We all know that our Spitfires are complicated buckets of bolts, but those kites won’t stay in the air if we don’t maintain them. Yes, the boring stuff, like purging the fuel system of water and refueling outside of the hanger. And, yes, Captain Molesworth, that means putting out that cigar while the tech boys are topping off your tank. Now shut up and watch the film we’ve placed below the break, what?

All right, all right, wake up at the back there. I heard you snoring, Peason. The bally Germans could hear you snoring. I know that wasn’t Errol Flynn, but this stuff is damned essential. You may be pilots, but you all rely on those people you just saw. Your lives depend on the riggers, armorers, instrument repairers, and others. While you are out carousing, these men are taking your plane apart and ensuring the engine is running smoother than the legs of the barmaid at the Dog & Duck. Every time one of you chaps calls Bingo Fuel, you get home because some chap checked your fuel gauge was accurate. Every time one of you glances at the Rate of Climb indicator to judge an intercept, you are relying on the chap who tested and zeroed it while you were snoring in your bunk, sleeping off last nights debauch. So, don’t forget that you are part of a team. You may be full of dauntless spirit up there, but you won’t get anywhere without those chaps on the ground.

Now, let’s talk about tonight’s mission…

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ESA Juice’s RIME Antenna Breaks Free After Some Jiggling And Percussive Action

May 13, 2023 by Maya Posch 22 Comments

After ESA’s Jupiter-bound space probe Juice (Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer) launched on April 14th of this year, it initially looked as if it had squeezed out a refreshingly uneventful deployment, until it attempted to unfurl its solar panels and antennae. One of these antennae, for the RIME (Radar for Icy Moons Exploration) instrument that uses ice-penetrating radar to get a subsurface look at Jupiter’s moons, ended up being rather stuck. Fortunately, on May 12th it was reported that ESA engineers managed to shock the sticky pin loose.

Release of the jammed antenna coinciding with the actuation of the NEA ('NEA 6 Release'). The antenna wobbles about before settling in a locked position. (Credit: ESA) — Release of the jammed antenna coinciding with the actuation of the NEA (‘NEA 6 Release’). The antenna wobbles about before settling in a locked position. (Credit: ESA)

We previously covered the discovery of Juice’s RIME antenna troubles, with one of the retaining pins that hold the antenna in place in its furled position stubbornly refusing to shift the few millimeters that would have allowed for full deployment. Despite the high-tech nature of the Juice spacecraft, the optimal solution to make the pin move was simply to try and shake it loose.

Attempts were initially made using the spacecraft’s thrusters to shake the whole vehicle, as well as by warming it in sunlight. Each of these actions seemed to help a little bit, but the breakthrough came when a non-explosive actuator (NEA) was actuated in the jammed bracket. This almost fully fixed the problem, leading the team in charge to decide to fire another NEA, which finally allowed the pin to fully shift and the antenna to fully deploy and lock into place.

Assuming no further issues occur during Juice’s long trip through the Solar System, Juice is expected to arrive at Jupiter after four gravity assists in July of 2031. There it will perform multiple science missions until a planned deorbit on Ganymede by late 2035.

Hackaday Links: March 29, 2020

March 29, 2020 by Dan Maloney 19 Comments

It turns out that whacking busted things to fix them works as well on Mars as it does on Earth, as NASA managed to fix its wonky “mole” with a little help from the InSight lander’s robotic arm. Calling it “percussive maintenance” is perhaps a touch overwrought; as we explained last week, NASA prepped carefully for this last-ditch effort to salvage the HP³ experiment, and it was really more of a gentle nudge that a solid smack with the spacecraft’s backhoe bucket. From the before and after pictures, it still looks like the mole is a little off-kilter, and there was talk that the shovel fix was only the first step in a more involved repair. We’ll keep an ear open for more details — this kind of stuff is fascinating, and beats the news from Earth these days by a long shot.

Of course, the COVID-19 pandemic news isn’t all bad. Yes, the death toll is rising, the number of cases is still growing exponentially, and billions of people are living in fear and isolation. But ironically, we’re getting good at community again, and the hacker community is no exception. People really want to pitch in and do something to help, and we’ve put together some resources to help. Check out our Hackaday How You Can Help spreadsheet, a comprehensive list of what efforts are currently looking for help, plus what’s out there in terms of Discord and Slack channels, lists of materials you might need if you choose to volunteer to build something, and even a list of recent COVID-19 Hackaday articles if you need inspiration. You’ll also want to check out our calendar of free events and classes, which might be a great way to use the isolation time to better your lot.

Individual hackers aren’t the only ones pitching in, of course. Maybe of the companies in the hacker and maker space are doing what they can to help, too. Ponoko is offering heavy discounts for hardware startups to help them survive the current economic pinch. They’ve also enlisted other companies, like Adafruit and PCBWay, to join with them in offering similar breaks to certain customers.

More good news from the fight against COVID-19. Folding@Home, the distributed computing network that is currently working on folding models from many of the SARS-CoV-2 virus proteins, has broken the exaFLOP barrier and is now the most powerful computer ever built. True, not every core is active at any given time, but the 4.6 million cores and 400,000-plus GPUs in the network pushed it over from the petaFLOP range of computers like IBM’s Summit, until recently the most powerful supercomputer ever built. Also good news is that Team Hackaday is forming a large chunk of the soul of this new machine, with 3,900 users and almost a million work units completed. Got an old machine around? Read Mike Sczcys’ article on getting started and join Team Hackaday.

And finally, just because we all need a little joy in our lives right now, and because many of you are going through sports withdrawal, we present what could prove to be the new spectator sports sensation: marble racing. Longtime readers will no doubt recognize the mad genius of Martin and his Marble Machine X, the magnificent marble-dropping music machine that’s intended as a follow-up to the original Marble Machine. It’s also a great racetrack, and Martin does an amazing job doing both the color and turn-by-turn commentary in the mock race. It’s hugely entertaining, and a great tour of the 15,000-piece contraption. And when you’re done with the race, it’s nice to go back to listen to the original Marble Machine tune — it’s a happy little song for these trying times.