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Midtown Manhattan, Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States
Built in 1929-31, Shreve, Lamb & Harmon’s 500 Fifth Avenue Building is a soaring 59-story Art Deco skyscraper, located at the northwest corner of 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue. The building was constructed concurrently with the Empire State Building. Because the site was so valuable and so small, measuring only 100 feet by 208 feet, the building was designed to the maximum height and floor area allowable under the 1916 zoning code. Located in two zoning districts with differing setback requirements, it is asymmetrically massed with setbacks at the 18th, 22nd, and 25th stories on Fifth Avenue and a recessed light court beginning at the eighth story and setbacks at the 23rd, 28th, and 34th stories on West 42nd Street. Sheathed in limestone, terra cotta, and buff brick, the facades are enriched with carefully scaled Art Deco motifs, which accentuate the building’s sculptural massing and emphasize its verticality.
On Fifth Avenue the limestone and black granite main entrance is treated as a pylon framed by stylized gilded palmettos and capped by an allegorical relief by sculptor Edmond Amateis “symbolizing the genius of the modern skyscraper.” Capping the setbacks and tower are a series of angled brick and terra-cotta panels decorated with chevrons that read as pleated cresting against the skyline. When it opened in March 1931, 500 Fifth Avenue was the crowning achievement of real estate developer Walter J. Salmon, who was responsible for rebuilding the north side of West 42nd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues in the first decades of the 20th century. Shreve, Lamb & Harmon was one of the leading architectural firms in the country specializing in skyscraper design. In addition to 500 Fifth Avenue, Shreve Lamb & Harmon designed the Empire State Building . 500 Fifth Avenue continues to be used as an office building with street-level stores.
DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS
History and Development of Midtown and the 500 Fifth Avenue Site
The area surrounding Fifth Avenue between 42nd Street and the southern end of Central Park remained rural in character until the second half of the nineteenth century, when speculative residences and mansions began to be constructed on lots newly mapped by the city. By 1900, the character of the neighborhood on the blocks north of 42nd Street began to change with the construction of, or the conversion of private residences to, exclusive retail shops, restaurants, and office buildings. By 1923, so many banks and trust companies had established uptown branches near the intersection of Park Avenue and 42nd Street and on the blocks of Fifth Avenue north of 42nd Street, that Rider’s New York City guide reported the area was popularly known as “Little Wall Street.” 42nd Street, which linked this business district to Times Square, became one of the busiest thoroughfares in New York while Fifth Avenue remained the most fashionable shopping street in the city, leading Real Estate Record & Guide to declare the parcel at 500 Fifth Avenue, at the northwest corner of 42nd Street, as “the most valuable building site on Manhattan Island north of Wall Street.”
In 1903 a young and ambitious real estate entrepreneur named Walter J. Salomon , who later changed his surname to Salmon, leased the corner lot and the adjacent L-shaped lot, which fronted on Fifth Avenue and West 42nd Street. Salmon then converted the existing building, the eight-story Hotel Bristol, into a commercial and office building and renamed it the Bristol Building. This property was to form the core of Salmon’s redevelopment plan for 500 Fifth Avenue, his crowning achievement as a real estate man and the final puzzle piece in the transformation of the entire block front into an imposing wall of modern commercial structures.
New York’s Art Deco Skyscrapers
America’s involvement in World War I, followed by a recession in the early 1920s, caused a construction lull in New York City, as in other parts of the country. By the mid 1920s, the economy had bounced back, and demand for new and larger commercial buildings was booming. Fifteen new office skyscrapers were erected in New York in 1925, and 1926 saw the construction of 30 more. This building frenzy lasted through the 1929 stock market crash, as construction went forward in the early 1930s on buildings that had already been planned and financed; although largely finished by 1932, the boom left behind a “rich array of towers,” many of them executed in what is known today as the Art Deco style. Indeed, several of New York’s most spectacular skyscrapers from this period—including the Chanin Building , the Chrysler Building , the Empire State Building and the General Electric Building , all designated New York City Landmarks, are among the country’s most significant examples of Art Deco design.
Into the 1910s, no limits on building height or bulk existed in New York City. In 1916, New York implemented the nation’s first zoning regulations, which permitted unrestricted height on one quarter of a building site, but required skyscrapers to taper as they rose to allow light and air to reach the street. Six years later, architect and critic Harvey Wiley Corbett and architectural delineator Hugh Ferriss published a group of influential renderings that explored zoning’s impact on the shape of tall buildings. Presented as a series of illustrations progressing from the abstract, pyramidal shape of the zoning envelope to a stepped-back practicable building form, these drawings catalyzed a trend in which “buildings endeavored to take on the feeling of sculpted mountains, their shape suddenly more important than their historical detail or even their style.” So pervasive were the new stepped-back skyscrapers that by the mid-1920s, architects and critics spoke of an emerging “setback style”.
Another important influence on 1920s skyscraper design was Eliel Saarinen’s 1922 competition entry for the Chicago Tribune’s new tower. With its straightforward shape, vertical emphasis, and limited ornament, Saarinen’s ahistorical design was “taken to be style-less and was thought in the twenties to have freed architects from what seemed the inevitable alternatives in skyscraper design, Gothic solutions on the one hand and vertically stretched Classicism on the other.”
The issue of what constituted “modern” design was expounded upon in the press and occupied many architects, who sought an appropriate means of expressing the societal changes brought about by new technology and manufacturing processes. A dichotomy existed, according to Ada Louise Huxtable, between the “modern” architecture of Europe and the “modernistic” new skyscrapers of New York:
‘Modern’ was radical, reductive, and reformist; ‘modernistic’ was richly decorative and attached to conservative and hedonistic values. ‘Modern’ was the austere, abstract, elite, avant-garde work of … [Walter] Gropius, Mies [van der Rohe], and Le Corbusier, united in its early days under the rubric of the International Style. ‘Modernistic’ was neither pure nor revolutionary; it fused the ornamental and the exotic for what was really the last great decorative style.
Only a handful of International Style skyscrapers were constructed in the United States before World War II. Far more popular was the “modernistic” style, which was later termed “Art Deco” based on its debt to the 1925 Paris Exposition Internationale des Arts Decoratifs et Industriels Modernes. Flamboyant, dynamic, and dazzling to the eye, Art Deco’s primary characteristic was its “sumptuous ornament, and the lush textures and colors achieved by combining several materials, such as stone, brick, terra cotta, and metal.” Gilding and shiny materials were frequently used, and favorite decorative motifs, drawn from the natural world and geometric forms, included “spirals, sunflowers, steps, zigzags, triangles, double triangles, hexagons, fragmented circles, and seashells.” Frequently, facades were given a woven fabric treatment, in buildings including One Wall Street and the 21 West Street Building . Wall surfaces read as thin decorative veneers, as “stage sets” to a public infatuated with movies and the theater.
As Art Deco was conquering New York, a new skyscraper form, the slab, emerged. Into the 1920s, the city’s tallest skyscrapers were typically constructed on enormous lots. These sites were big enough, as with the Chrysler Building, to allow for “geometrically pure” square, needle-like towers that broke free of their bases and pierced the sky. But as large lots became rarer and developers sought to construct tall office buildings on narrow lots, this approach became unfeasible; the square tower, if made too small, lost too much of its internal space to elevators. As a result, new skyscrapers on narrower lots took on a slab-like form, their long and rectangular upper stories seemingly extruded from their bases. The pioneering slab skyscraper was H. Douglas Ives’ and Sloan & Robertson’s 38-story Fred F. French Building at Fifth Avenue and 45th Street, which was constructed on a relatively small lot.
But the master of the slab at the end of the 1920s was Raymond Hood, whose Daily News Building marked the most radical departure of any tall building from previous skyscraper form. Despite the rich Art Deco bas-relief over its main entrance, Hood’s building, with its artfully planned setbacks and flat, unornamented roofline, came closer to abstract sculpture than any skyscraper before; falling, in style, “between modern and modernistic,” it forsook the decorated crown of the Art Deco skyscraper and approached the purity of the International Style. Hood built upon his experience with the Daily News Building in designing another of the city’s great slab skyscrapers, the RCA Building at Rockefeller Center , which was completed in 1933.
Located just three blocks from the French Building, and similar in design and materials to the Daily News Building, 500 Fifth Avenue’s slender, slab-form tower situated the building within this group of transitional skyscrapers, precursors to the postwar office building. But with the Depression remaining entrenched and money for office buildings drying up, few Art Deco skyscrapers were completed in New York after Rockefeller Center, and the style, increasingly employed for government and institutional buildings, became considerably more restrained.
Shreve, Lamb & Harmon Richmond Harold Shreve William Frederick Lamb
The architectural firm of Shreve, Lamb & Harmon, formed in 1929, was one of New York City’s premier design teams, known primarily for their modern office buildings and especially the Empire State Building . The three principal designers had traditional architectural educations and experience with important New York firms before they joined together and created buildings specifically adapted to the design requirements and technological advances of the modern era.
Richmond Harold Shreve was born in Cornwallis, Nova Scotia. He studied architecture at Cornell University, graduating in 1902, and spent the next four years on the faculty of the School of Architecture there. While at Cornell, he supervised the construction of Goldwin Smith Hall, designed by the New York firm of Carrère & Hastings, and at the conclusion of the project he joined the firm. William Frederick Lamb, son of New York builder William Lamb, was born in Brooklyn. Graduating from Williams College in 1904, Shreve subsequently studied at the Columbia University School of Architecture, and then went to Paris to study at the Atelier Deglane. After receiving his diploma from the École des Beaux Arts in 1911, Lamb returned to New York and joined the firm of Carrère & Hastings where he met Shreve. In 1920, Shreve and Lamb became partners in the new firm of Carrère & Hastings, Shreve & Lamb.
By 1924, they decided to establish their own partnership, and five years later they were joined by Arthur Loomis Harmon to form Shreve, Lamb & Harmon. Harmon, who had been born in Chicago, studied at the Art Institute there and graduated from Columbia University School of Architecture in 1901. He worked as a designer in the firm of McKim, Mead & White between 1902 and 1911. From 1912 to 1913, he was an associate in the firm of Wallis & Goodwillie, and then practiced alone until joining Shreve and Lamb. His works from that period include battle monuments at Tours, Cantigny and Somme-Py in France, a YMCA in Jerusalem, and the award-winning Shelton Hotel in New York.
Design and Construction of the 500 Fifth Avenue Building
With his acquisition of the properties at nos. 3, 5, 7, and 9 West 42nd Street in 1915, Walter J. Salmon had assembled a parcel of 20,900 square feet at 500 Fifth Avenue, about the minimum size necessary for profitable redevelopment. In 1922, Gerry Estates, Inc. entered into an agreement with Salmon to redevelop the site. With other projects in the works, including the adjacent Salmon Tower at 11-27 West 42nd Street, Salmon delayed beginning work on the corner site until the summer of 1929. At that time he announced plans for a fifty-eight story building with frontage of 100 feet on Fifth Avenue and 208 feet on 42nd Street to be built to the design of Shreve, Lamb & Harmon. Given its status as the second most valuable piece of real estate in Manhattan, redevelopment of this site was greatly anticipated among the real estate community and by the public at large. An article in the Real Estate Record & Guide described the high-profile nature of the project:
For years residents of the city and out-of-town visitors alike have speculated as to the future of this corner, wondering that so prominent a location—at “the crossroads of the world”—should have been neglected in the modern development of Fifth Avenue as the leading shopping street of the world and of the Grand Central area as the midtown financial and business district…With the fashionable shopping district definitely extending its limits above Forty-second Street; with the north and south flow of automobile and pedestrian traffic and the cross flow between Grand Central Station and Times Square making the intersection one of the busiest in the world, and with other building under way, the time appeared ripe for an improvement on this corner.
The construction of the office building at 500 Fifth Avenue had a significant impact on the eventual development of the adjacent parcels, because its planning affected the zoning of the entire Fifth Avenue block front. The zoning code permitted a taller building on 42nd Street than on Fifth Avenue, so Salmon acquired a long-term lease on the adjacent four-story converted dwelling at 508 Fifth Avenue in 1927; by merging the zoning lots of this 25 by 102-foot building and that of 500 Fifth Avenue, he was able to build a higher tower than would have otherwise been possible.
The program for 500 Fifth Avenue called for street-level stores, banking facilities on the second and third floors, and office units on the floors above, totaling approximately 450,000 square feet of rentable area. Plans were submitted to the Buildings Department in October 1929, and excavation began in February of 1930; the estimated cost of the project was $4,000,000. Charles T. Wills, Inc. was the general contractor, and McClintic-Marshall Co. the steel contractor. Erection of the skyscraper’s steel skeleton began at the end of March, and was completed in a mere four months owing to a highly efficient system whereby the steel arrived on site and was hoisted by derricks to the 36th floor, where it was assembled and continuously distributed by a relay derrick to other floors. The exterior brickwork was completed in early September 1930, and the general contract for the building was completed in January 1931. At the height of the building project nearly 2,200 workers were employed.
The construction of 500 Fifth Avenue and its sister skyscraper the Empire State Building set a new standard for speed and efficiency in building construction. Each component of 500 Fifth Avenue’s structure was planned, mapped, and measured in advance, in what historian Christopher Gray called a “tight ballet of scheduling.” This strategic approach to construction planning and oversight was successfully realized at 500 Fifth Avenue through the close collaboration of the architect, building owner, real estate advisers, operating managers, and builder throughout the entire process of planning and construction. Architect Richmond Shreve was a great proponent of rationalized building construction, and expounded on his ideas in an essay titled “The Economic Design of Office Buildings”:
To set up properly an income-producing building the control of its design and construction should be in the hands of a Board on which sit Owner, Banker, Builder, Architect, Engineers, and Real Estate Men. The record of their decisions finds place in plans, specifications and contracts, financial transactions and leases, and the outcome of their work, if it is to be successful, must have been foreseen far in advance of its realization.
500 Fifth Avenue was completed in just over a year without accident or serious injury, and opened in March 1931 in time for the traditional renewal date for business leases of May 1. William F. Lamb called 500 Fifth Avenue “a thoroughly frank expression of the requirements of an up-to-date office building.” These requirements included modern, well lit and properly ventilated office units near elevators and bathrooms; fast and efficient elevator service; and maximum rentable floor space. Despite its relatively small lot and constricted building envelope, 500 Fifth Avenue offered all of these things; moreover, its unusually advantageous corner location across from the New York Public Library and Bryant Park afforded ample natural light, cross-ventilation, and unobstructed views for two blocks to the south.
Effectively, Shreve, Lamb & Harmon designed 500 Fifth Avenue from the top down, determining the placement of the building’s service core within the tower and then the base, and from the inside out, determining the ideal office unit as a basis for formulating the overall plan and circulation. The building’s set-back configuration, which allowed for an unusually high window-to-wall ratio, as well as a 25-foot wide light court on the west side of the building beginning at the sixth floor, ensured that no office unit would be more than 30 feet from natural light; a distance of 28 feet or less was considered optimal for modern office buildings before the development of air-conditioning. Floor areas ranged from 2,150 to 18,000 square feet, with office units as small as 9 feet in width and as large as an entire floor. The typical floor plan for the building’s base had 21 office units, while the typical floor plan for the tower had nine office units.
The main entrance to the building was placed on the Fifth Avenue facade, about 70 feet from 42nd Street and on center with the sheer tower rising above the setbacks, and the remainder of the ground floor on both the east and south facades was dominated by an unbroken line of bronze-framed, plate-glass storefronts. The main entrance was framed dramatically by pylons and crowned with the highly stylized bas-relief figure of a Grecian woman holding a staff with a winged sun disc and kneeling beside a model of the building itself, an allegorical representation of the “genius of the modern skyscraper,” sculpted from a single block of limestone by Edward Amateis.
The dramatically massed exterior of 500 Fifth Avenue expressed the constraints of the zoning code, which allowed more bulk on the 42nd Street side than on the Fifth Avenue side and thus determined the positioning of the tower on the base. The building’s tight footprint, which limited the size of the base, and the imperative of maximizing profits with top-quality office and retail space in a relatively small building envelope, resulted in the complex geometry of setbacks stepping up asymmetrically to the slender tower. With regards to the height of office buildings in a competitive real estate market, “…there is a point where the balance begins to swing back and the rate of return on capital investment begins to diminish as the building goes higher.” At 500 Fifth Avenue, the projected height of 58 stories , or 697 feet, was considered the limit of economic feasibility for a 100- by 208-foot lot. In his essay on tall office buildings, Shreve summed up the design problem inherent in the 1916 zoning ordinance, describing the modern tall office building as
“a geometrical form consisting of a base enclosed by vertical walls, an intermediate section defined by sloping limits, and a tower…[and]…practical usable office floor area, supported and enclosed by structural forms, served by mechanical equipment, and reached through public spaces which are not directly sources of revenue.”
Shreve, Lamb & Harmon’s completed building was noted in the press for its height, its zoning conditions, and its real estate value; it was among the city’s notable tall buildings of the time and remains a distinguished example of Art Deco skyscraper design. Stylized geometrical ornament, a restrained color palette, and the “vertical accent” created by spandrels and channeling all contributed to the building’s “modern architectural treatment”, in the words of partner William Lamb. On the second, third, and fourth stories, limestone piers decorated with channeling and abstracted frond and scroll motifs and light-green metal spandrels decorated with folds and chevrons reflect Art Deco’s affinity for stylized geometric forms. Around the main entrance the carved limestone pylons and allegorical bas-relief are picked out in gilding, and on the 42nd Street facade a pair of eagles carved in profile enhance the figural quality of the ornamental scheme. Rising above the base is 500 Fifth Avenue’s flat-roofed, slab-form tower.
The tower’s vertical buff-brick stripes are likely inspired by Hood’s Daily News Building, which bridged Art Deco and the emerging International Style when it opened in 1930. As with the Daily News Building—where Hood sought to conceal the windows to avoid the effect of a wall “shot full of holes”—these stripes alternate with dark window bands. In the center bays on 42nd Street and in the two window bays over the main entry, 500 Fifth Avenue’s terra-cotta spandrel panels are dark gray in color and angle forward. Seen from a distance the dark color of the spandrels merges with the dark color of the window frames to create a series of vertical stripes that rise unbroken to the roofline. This striped effect is continued on the north elevation, where the large expanse of brick wall enclosing the elevators and utilities is articulated with three uninterrupted channels filled with strips of dark gray terra cotta.
Above its base, 500 Fifth Avenue is virtually free of ornament, except at the tower, where a series of angled brick and terra-cotta panels decorated with chevrons read as pleated cresting against the skyline.
Subsequent History
A year after the stock market crash and three months before the opening of 500 Fifth Avenue, Walter J. Salmon was quoted in the papers on the subject of his prospects for an immediate return on his investment: “We feel that it will take some time to absorb the approximately 500,000 square feet of office space in the building, but the enterprise was undertaken with the greatest faith in the future of midtown expansion and development.” By May 1931, three months after its opening, the 15th, 16th and 20th floors of the building had been fully rented ; by the end of the year, several prestigious tenants had signed leases, including the Electrolux Corporation, no less than ten railroad corporations, and the Western Universities Club, which used the penthouse and the three floors below for its club facilities. An article in the New York Times from January 1932 reported a consistent demand for business space in the midtown area, calling business renting “brisk.”
Later tenants of 500 Fifth Avenue included the Austrian and Japanese consulates, and in the mid-1930s the building became the target of Communist protests directed at the Japanese consulate, which had offices on the 40th floor.
In 1944, when the Manufacturers Trust Company—then located at 513 Fifth Avenue–and the Mutual Insurance Company entered into a lease in which Mutual Life agreed to construct a new bank building on the property at nos. 508 and 510-514 Fifth Avenue, a corollary agreement with Walter Salmon permitted Manufacturers Trust Company to sublease, and ultimately redevelop, 508 Fifth Avenue. An important stipulation in this agreement was that during the time Salmon’s lease remained in effect , any building erected on the portion of the lot at No. 508 would not exceed the height of the then-existing building or otherwise interfere with 500 Fifth Avenue. Thus, the height of the new bank building was effectively limited to four or five stories, and light and ventilation levels on the north wall of 500 Fifth Avenue were preserved.
In 1955, the land under 500 Fifth Avenue was sold by Gerry Brothers & Co., whose principals were descendants of the original ownership, to the Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. 500 Fifth Avenue was again the site of political disturbance in 1980, when Croatian nationalists bombed a Yugoslavian bank located on the 30th floor of the building; there were no injuries, and only minor damage to the interior spaces. In the mid-1990s, the facade of 500 Fifth Avenue was repaired, ornament was restored or selectively refabricated, and replacement windows were installed. The building continues to be used as an office building with street-level stores.
Description
500 Fifth Avenue is an asymmetrically massed skyscraper with setbacks at the 18th, 22nd, and 25th stories on the Fifth Avenue facade and a recessed light court beginning at the eighth story and setbacks at the 23rd, 28th, and 34th stories on the 42nd Street facade; the side facade is partially visible from street; sheathed in limestone, terra cotta, and buff brick, the facades are enriched with carefully scaled Art Deco motifs, which accentuate the building’s sculptural massing and emphasize its verticality; on the Fifth Avenue facade the limestone and black granite main entrance is treated as a pylon framed by stylized gilded palmettos and capped by an allegorical bas-relief; the metal-and-glass main entrance door is deeply recessed and has returns of polished stone or metal; possibly historic pendant and wall-mounted light fixtures within recess of main entrance; possibly historic light fixtures and flag poles flank the main entrance; freight entrance in seventh bay of ground floor on 42nd Street facade; ground-floor storefronts on the Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street facades retain the original patinated metal cornice with chevron motifs; the three commercial stories above the storefronts have large show-window openings set between limestone piers decorated with channeling and abstracted frond and scroll motifs and patinated metal spandrels decorated with stylized folds and chevrons; the majority of the show windows on the 2nd Street facade are historic multi-pane metal sash; on the Fifth Avenue facade only a few of these historic show windows remain; on the buff-brick mid-section and tower the windows are arranged into paired and triple groups separated by projecting piers, with the major piers enhanced by vertical channeling; in the center bays on 42nd Street and in the two window bays over the main entry, the terra-cotta spandrel panels are dark gray in color and angle forward; seen from a distance the dark color of the spandrels merges with the dark color of the window frames to create a series of vertical stripes that rise unbroken to the roofline; this striped effect is continued on the back elevation where the large expanse of brick wall enclosing the elevators and utilities is articulated with three uninterrupted channels filled with strips of dark gray terra cotta; crowning the setbacks and tower are a series of angled brick and terra-cotta panels decorated with chevrons that read as pleated cresting against the skyline.
Alterations: non-historic metal-and-glass storefront infill on ground story; several non-historic plate-glass windows with metal frames on second through fourth stories of Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street facades; metal plaques and security lights at main entrance on Fifth Avenue facade; four utility boxes affixed to southeast corner of building above fifth story; double-hung metal replacement windows in all openings above the fourth story; louvers or vents in several window openings or as replacement window panes on Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street facades; brick replaced at corners of building; dunnage/cooling tower and antennas visible on roof.
- From the 2010 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report
70 Ton Payload, Single Stage to Orbit Fixed Wing Aircraft - Hypersonic Plane - Space Plane
Earlier, pre Iteration 1, Just felt like posting this online, working out the physics/geometries/energy requirements and contruction.
Mach 8-10 in amtmosphere, 195ft long, Heavy Lift Single Stage To Orbit Fixed Wing Aircraft. 70 TONS, ie 140,000 LBS, 60 ft X 15ft X 15ft payload bay. Up in the Falcon Heavy and Delta IV class, except not $400 million to launch giant payloads into orbit, but below $250 per lbs, or about $28 million to launch giant payloads, and normalized orbital flight, as normal as a 737 commercial flight. Load up, refuel, take off in an afternoon. I estimate this aircraft would cost about $750 million each for space capable. In atmosphere commercial, roughly $300 million each for a 200 passenger M8-10 (not designed yet)
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www.ioaircraft.com/hypersonic/ranger.php
Drew Blair
www.linkedin.com/in/drew-b-25485312/
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Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle. Current technologies and what Lockheed is trying to force on the Dept of Defense, for that low speed Mach 5 plane DOD gave them $1 billion to build and would disintegrate above Mach 5, is TBCC. 2 separate propulsion systems in the same airframe, which requires TWICE the airframe space to use.
Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle is 1 propulsion system cutting that airframe deficit in half, and also able to operate above Mach 10 up to Mach 15 in atmosphere, and a simple nozzle modification allows for outside atmosphere rocket mode, ie orbital capable.
Additionally, Reaction Engines maximum air breather mode is Mach 4.5, above that it will explode in flight from internal pressures are too high to operate. Thus, must switch to non air breather rocket mode to operate in atmosphere in hypersonic velocities. Which as a result, makes it not feasible for anything practical. It also takes an immense amount of fuel to function.
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Advanced Additive Manufacturing for Hypersonic Aircraft
Utilizing new methods of fabrication and construction, make it possible to use additive manufacturing, dramatically reducing the time and costs of producing hypersonic platforms from missiles, aircraft, and space capable craft. Instead of aircraft being produced in piece, then bolted together; small platforms can be produced as a single unit and large platforms can be produces in large section and mated without bolting. These techniques include using exotic materials and advanced assembly processes, with an end result of streamlining the production costs and time for hypersonic aircraft; reducing months of assembly to weeks. Overall, this process greatly reduced the cost for producing hypersonic platforms. Even to such an extent that a Hellfire missile costs apx $100,000 but by utilizing our technologies, replacing it with a Mach 8-10 hypersonic missile of our physics/engineering and that missile would cost roughly $75,000 each delivered.
Materials used for these manufacturing processes are not disclosed, but overall, provides a foundation for extremely high stresses and thermodynamics, ideal for hypersonic platforms. This specific methodology and materials applications is many decades ahead of all known programs. Even to the extend of normalized space flight and re-entry, without concern of thermodynamic failure.
*Note, most entities that are experimenting with additive manufacturing for hypersonic aircraft, this makes it mainstream and standardized processes, which also applies for mass production.
What would normally be measured in years and perhaps a decade to go from drawing board to test flights, is reduced to singular months and ready for production within a year maximum.
Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle (U-TBCC)
To date, the closest that NASA and industry have achieved for turbine based aircraft to fly at hypersonic velocities is by mounting a turbine into an aircraft and sharing the inlet with a scramjet or rocket based motor. Reaction Engines Sabre is not able to achieve hypersonic velocities and can only transition into a non air breathing rocket for beyond Mach 4.5
However, utilizing Unified Turbine Based Combine Cycle also known as U-TBCC, the two separate platforms are able to share a common inlet and the dual mode ramjet/scramjet is contained within the engine itself, which allows for a much smaller airframe footprint, thus engingeers are able to then design much higher performance aerial platforms for hypersonic flight, including the ability for constructing true single stage to orbit aircraft by utilizing a modification/version that allows for transition to outside atmosphere propulsion without any other propulsion platforms within the aircraft. By transitioning and developing aircraft to use Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle, this propulsion system opens up new options to replace that airframe deficit for increased fuel capacity and/or payload.
Enhanced Dynamic Cavitation
Dramatically Increasing the efficiency of fuel air mixture for combustion processes at hypersonic velocities within scramjet propulsion platforms. The aspects of these processes are non disclosable.
Dynamic Scramjet Ignition Processes
For optimal scramjet ignition, a process known as Self Start is sought after, but in many cases if the platform becomes out of attitude, the scramjet will ignite. We have already solved this problem which as a result, a scramjet propulsion system can ignite at lower velocities, high velocities, at optimal attitude or not optimal attitude. It doesn't matter, it will ignite anyways at the proper point for maximum thrust capabilities at hypersonic velocities.
Hydrogen vs Kerosene Fuel Sources
Kerosene is an easy fuel to work with, and most western nations developing scramjet platforms use Kerosene for that fact. However, while kerosene has better thermal properties then Hydrogen, Hydrogen is a far superior fuel source in scramjet propulsion flight, do it having a much higher efficiency capability. Because of this aspect, in conjunction with our developments, it allows for a MUCH increased fuel to air mixture, combustion, thrust; and ability for higher speeds; instead of very low hypersonic velocities in the Mach 5-6 range. Instead, Mach 8-10 range, while we have begun developing hypersonic capabilities to exceed 15 in atmosphere within less then 5 years.
Conforming High Pressure Tank Technology for CNG and H2.
As most know in hypersonics, Hydrogen is a superior fuel source, but due to the storage abilities, can only be stored in cylinders thus much less fuel supply. Not anymore, we developed conforming high pressure storage technology for use in aerospace, automotive sectors, maritime, etc; which means any overall shape required for 8,000+ PSI CNG or Hydrogen. For hypersonic platforms, this means the ability to store a much larger volume of hydrogen vs cylinders.
As an example, X-43 flown by Nasa which flew at Mach 9.97. The fuel source was Hydrogen, which is extremely more volatile and combustible then kerosene (JP-7), via a cylinder in the main body. If it had used our technology, that entire section of the airframe would had been an 8,000 PSI H2 tank, which would had yielded 5-6 times the capacity. While the X-43 flew 11 seconds under power at Mach 9.97, at 6 times the fuel capacity would had yielded apx 66 seconds of fuel under power at Mach 9.97. If it had flew slower, around Mach 6, same principles applied would had yielded apx 500 seconds of fuel supply under power (slower speeds required less energy to maintain).
Enhanced Fuel Mixture During Shock Train Interaction
Normally, fuel injection is conducted at the correct insertion point within the shock train for maximum burn/combustion. Our methodologies differ, since almost half the fuel injection is conducted PRE shock train within the isolator, so at the point of isolator injection the fuel enhances the combustion process, which then requires less fuel injection to reach the same level of thrust capabilities.
Improved Bow Shock Interaction
Smoother interaction at hypersonic velocities and mitigating heat/stresses for beyond Mach 6 thermodynamics, which extraordinarily improves Type 3, 4, and 5 shock interaction.
6,000+ Fahrenheit Thermal Resistance
To date, the maximum thermal resistance was tested at AFRL in the spring of 2018, which resulted in a 3,200F thermal resistance for a short duration. This technology, allows for normalized hypersonic thermal resistance of 3,000-3,500F sustained, and up to 6,500F resistance for short endurance, ie 90 seconds or less. 10-20 minute resistance estimate approximately 4,500F +/- 200F.
*** This technology advancement also applies to Aerospike rocket engines, in which it is common for Aerospike's to exceed 4,500-5,000F temperatures, which results in the melting of the reversed bell housing. That melting no longer ocurrs, providing for stable combustion to ocurr for the entire flight envelope
Scramjet Propulsion Side Wall Cooling
With old technologies, side wall cooling is required for hypersonic flight and scramjet propulsion systems, otherwise the isolator and combustion regions of a scramjet would melt, even using advanced ablatives and ceramics, due to their inability to cope with very high temperatures. Using technology we have developed for very high thermodynamics and high stresses, side wall cooling is no longer required, thus removing that variable from the design process and focusing on improved ignition processes and increasing net thrust values.
Lower Threshold for Hypersonic Ignition
Active and adaptive flight dynamics, resulting in the ability for scramjet ignition at a much lower velocity, ie within ramjet envelope, between Mach 2-4, and seamless transition from supersonic to hypersonic flight, ie supersonic ramjet (scramjet). This active and dynamic aspect, has a wide variety of parameters for many flight dynamics, velocities, and altitudes; which means platforms no longer need to be engineered for specific altitude ranges or preset velocities, but those parameters can then be selected during launch configuration and are able to adapt actively in flight.
Dramatically Improved Maneuvering Capabilities at Hypersonic Velocities
Hypersonic vehicles, like their less technologically advanced brethren, use large actuator and the developers hope those controls surfaces do not disintegrate in flight. In reality, it is like rolling the dice, they may or may not survive, hence another reason why the attempt to keep velocities to Mach 6 or below. We have shrunken down control actuators while almost doubling torque and response capabilities specifically for hypersonic dynamics and extreme stresses involved, which makes it possible for maximum input authority for Mach 10 and beyond.
Paradigm Shift in Control Surface Methodologies, Increasing Control Authority (Internal Mechanical Applications)
To date, most control surfaces for hypersonic missile platforms still use fins, similar to lower speed conventional missiles, and some using ducted fins. This is mostly due to lack of comprehension of hypersonic velocities in their own favor. Instead, the body itself incorporates those control surfaces, greatly enhancing the airframe strength, opening up more space for hardware and fuel capacity; while simultaneously enhancing the platforms maneuvering capabilities.
A scramjet missile can then fly like conventional missile platforms, and not straight and level at high altitudes, losing velocity on it's decent trajectory to target. Another added benefit to this aspect, is the ability to extend range greatly, so if anyone elses hypersonic missile platform were developed for 400 mile range, falling out of the sky due to lack of glide capabilities; our platforms can easily reach 600+ miles, with minimal glide deceleration.
It is chilly and rainy in Arizona for Super Bowl 48 but BMW turned up the heat with their all-electric i3 and hybrid i8 sports car. To add additional flavor to the recipe New England Patriots’ starting corner Kyle Arrington and wife VaShonda Arrington joined the experience for the energetic weekend festivities.
Kyle spent a few days in both vehicles during his activities, which included stops at the Nike Football Super Bowl Hospitality Gifting Suite at the immaculate Scottsdale Resort & Conference Center, the NFL Experience, family outings and dinner with his spouse. Vashonda’s centerpiece moment was raising funds for the Off the Field Player’s Wives Association’s “14th Annual Super Bowl Fashion Show” held at the upscale Scottsdale Fashion Mall. The wives, kids and a handful of former NFL players walked the runway with grace and style. Guests included Holly Robinson Peete, Antonio Cromardie, Steve Young, Kevin Hart and many more. She enjoyed the earthly interior of the i3 and spoke passionately about the need regarding increased sustainability in the world.
The mind is driven by thoughts and fueled by inventive answers. The i3 is 100% pure electric and the i8 is a plug-in hybrid sports car, which means its power is sourced from both gasoline and electricity. The i8 is comprised of a Life module and a Drive module. The 3-liter gasoline motor is placed in the rear and the smaller electric engine is housed up front. In addition, the i8 is essentially an AWD vehicle channeling traction from both axles simultaneously but doesn’t utilize the company’s hallmark xDrive system. A few common i8 performance specs include:
•0 to 60 mph = 4.2 seconds
•Top speed = 155 mph (electronically limited)
•Electric only top speed = 75 mph
•Pure electric range = 22 miles
Born electric, the i3 is engineered with BMW’s LifeDrive architecture, which is also structured into two categories, the Life Module and the Drive Module. Comprised of high-strength carbon, the Life Module protects and provides comfort for the driver and passengers. The second platform, the Drive Module, encompasses the electric drive system, the suspension and the HVAC. Since the car is lighter, the liquid-cooled lithium-ion battery (developed in-house by BMW) is smaller and only needs three hours for a full stage-2 (240-volt) charge. Additionally, BMW attempts to use as much renewable energy as possible for the manufacturing process of the carbon fiber i3.
The journey continues towards educating the world on the benefits of going green. BMW is both an innovator and leader in this technology category and has already spearheaded a positive movement. Expect more BMW i products down the line since they have only just begun.
The impressive three-storeyed Ynys-y-pandy slate processing works, which served the Gorseddau Quarry, was built in 1856-7 by Evan Jones of Garndolbenmaen and probably designed by James Brunlees. It is ingeniously planned so that the natural fall of the site assisted the manufacturing process. A deep trench inside accommodated a large overshot water wheel (26 ft, 8m in diameter), and on the south side a long curving ramp brought branches of the tramway from Gorseddau Quarry into the mill at two different levels, serving the middle and upper floors. The grand, round-headed openings are closely spaced like a Roman aqueduct. The eastern gable is surmounted by a decorative feature incorporating a false shimney stack, and the west gable windows have at some time had window frames or shutters. Otherwise the construction is bold and plain but none the less impressive.
The mill specialised in the production of slate slabs for floors, dairies, troughs, urinals, etc. In its heyday, in 1860, it was producing over 2,000 tons per annum, but seven years later production was down to 25 tons per annum (due to poor quality of the quarried slate) and the business went into liquidation in 1871. The building provided a venue for eisteddfodau until the roof was removed around 1906.
Image copyright www.kevinobrian.co.uk/
Selective Laser Melting (SLM) is an additive manufacturing process that can be used for many different applications.
The SLM process starts by numerically slicing a 3D CAD model into a number of finite layers. For each sliced layer a laser scan path is calculated which defines both the boundary contour and some form of fill sequence, often a raster pattern. Each layer is then sequentially recreated by depositing powder layers, one on top of the other, and melting their surface by scanning a laser beam.
The powder is spread uniformly by a wiper. A high power-density fibre laser with a 40µm beam spot size fully melts the pre-deposited powder layer. The melted particles fuse and solidify to form a layer of the component.
For more information please visit www.twi-global.com/technologies/welding-surface-engineeri...
If you wish to use this image each use should be accompanied by the credit line and notice, "Courtesy of TWI Ltd".
The two fuzzy pictures on the left are huge open tanks of rum fermenting, seen from atop a dim catwalk -- the sweet smell there was by itself intoxicating. The two sharper pictures on the right show later stages in the rum manufacturing process. We were told that the rum was bottled off island, in Florida I think the guide said. We were surprised, though, that the barrels are emptied into metal tanks that are shipped out, instead of shipping out the barrels.
After the 15 minute $5 tour the guide, a woman who didn't drink, served much too big cups (at least 4 ounces of rum on ice) of our choice from the different kinds of Cruzan brand rum. My favorite was Cruzan Rum Cream, because of it smoothness and lower alcohol (17%), but the stronger tasting Cruzan Blackstrap Rum also tasted good (however it's 40% alcohol was too much for me). I drank only half of my mixture of Blackstrap and Cream and still felt walloped.
Cruzan Rum is very cheap in St. Croix, either at the factory or in the grocery stores. Black Strap Rum is only $8 for a 750 ml. bottle. Cruzan Rum Cream is $14 a bottle. There's no sales tax in St. Croix and we could have brought back up to 6 bottles duty free with us (but we didn't -- it could have been a security hassle on the airplane and, more to the point, wanting more of its good taste didn't seem like a habit we wanted to get into).
Here's some customer's reviews of Cruzan Rum. I was surprised by the latest review that said the factory or distillery has a new owner and that the quality has since dropped quite a bit. www.igougo.com/attractions-reviews-b21372-St._Croix-Cruza...
You've probably heard of tropical lethargy, which we happened to read about again there in several historical novels by local author, Patricia Gill. While our home state of Florida (Tallahassee) was shivering with record lows (down to 14 degrees) we were feeling the constant high humidity in the St. Croix rain forest, with lows not much under 70 in the mornings and highs usually at least in the mid 80s. But after tasting the Cruzan factory's good rum and seeing its cheap prices we suspected that climate isn't the only reason for tropical lethargy.
Perhaps one kind of tropical lethargy is "island time," or as its called in St. Croix, Crucian time. An example of it was on one of the 12 days Christmas Festival the starting time of the Adult Parade was always scheduled to start at 10 a.m. but we were told it never actually began until about 1 p.m. We also ran into Cruzan time when we occasionally found stores closed in the middle of the afternoon, though sometimes that was probably more a result of the Great Recession. One of the great things about Polly's at the Pier (besides its coffee and brownies) was that it was usually open. One of its co-owners, a man from Iowa, said he made it a point of being dependably open. He said people there told him he could not make a go of it, but Polly's seemed to have plenty of regular customers and not only from the cruise ships.
Mach 10 Hypersonic Plane - Turbine Based Combined Cycle - IO Aircraft
Drew Blair
www.linkedin.com/in/drew-b-25485312/
20 Passengers plus 3 crew
10,000 mile range
Mach 10 Cruise
io aircraft, phantom express, phantom works, boeing phantom works, lockheed skunk works, hypersonic weapon, hypersonic missile, scramjet missile, scramjet engineering, scramjet physics, boost glide, tactical glide vehicle, Boeing XS-1, htv, Air-Launched Rapid Response Weapon, (ARRW), hypersonic tactical vehicle, hypersonic plane, hypersonic aircraft, space plane, scramjet, turbine based combined cycle, ramjet, dual mode ramjet, darpa, onr, navair, afrl, air force research lab, defense science, missile defense agency, aerospike,
Advanced Additive Manufacturing for Hypersonic Aircraft
Utilizing new methods of fabrication and construction, make it possible to use additive manufacturing, dramatically reducing the time and costs of producing hypersonic platforms from missiles, aircraft, and space capable craft. Instead of aircraft being produced in piece, then bolted together; small platforms can be produced as a single unit and large platforms can be produces in large section and mated without bolting. These techniques include using exotic materials and advanced assembly processes, with an end result of streamlining the production costs and time for hypersonic aircraft; reducing months of assembly to weeks. Overall, this process greatly reduced the cost for producing hypersonic platforms. Even to such an extent that a Hellfire missile costs apx $100,000 but by utilizing our technologies, replacing it with a Mach 8-10 hypersonic missile of our physics/engineering and that missile would cost roughly $75,000 each delivered.
Materials used for these manufacturing processes are not disclosed, but overall, provides a foundation for extremely high stresses and thermodynamics, ideal for hypersonic platforms. This specific methodology and materials applications is many decades ahead of all known programs. Even to the extend of normalized space flight and re-entry, without concern of thermodynamic failure.
*Note, most entities that are experimenting with additive manufacturing for hypersonic aircraft, this makes it mainstream and standardized processes, which also applies for mass production.
What would normally be measured in years and perhaps a decade to go from drawing board to test flights, is reduced to singular months and ready for production within a year maximum.
Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle (U-TBCC)
To date, the closest that NASA and industry have achieved for turbine based aircraft to fly at hypersonic velocities is by mounting a turbine into an aircraft and sharing the inlet with a scramjet or rocket based motor. Reaction Engines Sabre is not able to achieve hypersonic velocities and can only transition into a non air breathing rocket for beyond Mach 4.5
However, utilizing Unified Turbine Based Combine Cycle also known as U-TBCC, the two separate platforms are able to share a common inlet and the dual mode ramjet/scramjet is contained within the engine itself, which allows for a much smaller airframe footprint, thus engingeers are able to then design much higher performance aerial platforms for hypersonic flight, including the ability for constructing true single stage to orbit aircraft by utilizing a modification/version that allows for transition to outside atmosphere propulsion without any other propulsion platforms within the aircraft. By transitioning and developing aircraft to use Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle, this propulsion system opens up new options to replace that airframe deficit for increased fuel capacity and/or payload.
Enhanced Dynamic Cavitation
Dramatically Increasing the efficiency of fuel air mixture for combustion processes at hypersonic velocities within scramjet propulsion platforms. The aspects of these processes are non disclosable.
Dynamic Scramjet Ignition Processes
For optimal scramjet ignition, a process known as Self Start is sought after, but in many cases if the platform becomes out of attitude, the scramjet will ignite. We have already solved this problem which as a result, a scramjet propulsion system can ignite at lower velocities, high velocities, at optimal attitude or not optimal attitude. It doesn't matter, it will ignite anyways at the proper point for maximum thrust capabilities at hypersonic velocities.
Hydrogen vs Kerosene Fuel Sources
Kerosene is an easy fuel to work with, and most western nations developing scramjet platforms use Kerosene for that fact. However, while kerosene has better thermal properties then Hydrogen, Hydrogen is a far superior fuel source in scramjet propulsion flight, do it having a much higher efficiency capability. Because of this aspect, in conjunction with our developments, it allows for a MUCH increased fuel to air mixture, combustion, thrust; and ability for higher speeds; instead of very low hypersonic velocities in the Mach 5-6 range. Instead, Mach 8-10 range, while we have begun developing hypersonic capabilities to exceed 15 in atmosphere within less then 5 years.
Conforming High Pressure Tank Technology for CNG and H2.
As most know in hypersonics, Hydrogen is a superior fuel source, but due to the storage abilities, can only be stored in cylinders thus much less fuel supply. Not anymore, we developed conforming high pressure storage technology for use in aerospace, automotive sectors, maritime, etc; which means any overall shape required for 8,000+ PSI CNG or Hydrogen. For hypersonic platforms, this means the ability to store a much larger volume of hydrogen vs cylinders.
As an example, X-43 flown by Nasa which flew at Mach 9.97. The fuel source was Hydrogen, which is extremely more volatile and combustible then kerosene (JP-7), via a cylinder in the main body. If it had used our technology, that entire section of the airframe would had been an 8,000 PSI H2 tank, which would had yielded 5-6 times the capacity. While the X-43 flew 11 seconds under power at Mach 9.97, at 6 times the fuel capacity would had yielded apx 66 seconds of fuel under power at Mach 9.97. If it had flew slower, around Mach 6, same principles applied would had yielded apx 500 seconds of fuel supply under power (slower speeds required less energy to maintain).
Enhanced Fuel Mixture During Shock Train Interaction
Normally, fuel injection is conducted at the correct insertion point within the shock train for maximum burn/combustion. Our methodologies differ, since almost half the fuel injection is conducted PRE shock train within the isolator, so at the point of isolator injection the fuel enhances the combustion process, which then requires less fuel injection to reach the same level of thrust capabilities.
Improved Bow Shock Interaction
Smoother interaction at hypersonic velocities and mitigating heat/stresses for beyond Mach 6 thermodynamics, which extraordinarily improves Type 3, 4, and 5 shock interaction.
6,000+ Fahrenheit Thermal Resistance
To date, the maximum thermal resistance was tested at AFRL in the spring of 2018, which resulted in a 3,200F thermal resistance for a short duration. This technology, allows for normalized hypersonic thermal resistance of 3,000-3,500F sustained, and up to 6,500F resistance for short endurance, ie 90 seconds or less. 10-20 minute resistance estimate approximately 4,500F +/- 200F.
*** This technology advancement also applies to Aerospike rocket engines, in which it is common for Aerospike's to exceed 4,500-5,000F temperatures, which results in the melting of the reversed bell housing. That melting no longer ocurrs, providing for stable combustion to ocurr for the entire flight envelope
Scramjet Propulsion Side Wall Cooling
With old technologies, side wall cooling is required for hypersonic flight and scramjet propulsion systems, otherwise the isolator and combustion regions of a scramjet would melt, even using advanced ablatives and ceramics, due to their inability to cope with very high temperatures. Using technology we have developed for very high thermodynamics and high stresses, side wall cooling is no longer required, thus removing that variable from the design process and focusing on improved ignition processes and increasing net thrust values.
Lower Threshold for Hypersonic Ignition
Active and adaptive flight dynamics, resulting in the ability for scramjet ignition at a much lower velocity, ie within ramjet envelope, between Mach 2-4, and seamless transition from supersonic to hypersonic flight, ie supersonic ramjet (scramjet). This active and dynamic aspect, has a wide variety of parameters for many flight dynamics, velocities, and altitudes; which means platforms no longer need to be engineered for specific altitude ranges or preset velocities, but those parameters can then be selected during launch configuration and are able to adapt actively in flight.
Dramatically Improved Maneuvering Capabilities at Hypersonic Velocities
Hypersonic vehicles, like their less technologically advanced brethren, use large actuator and the developers hope those controls surfaces do not disintegrate in flight. In reality, it is like rolling the dice, they may or may not survive, hence another reason why the attempt to keep velocities to Mach 6 or below. We have shrunken down control actuators while almost doubling torque and response capabilities specifically for hypersonic dynamics and extreme stresses involved, which makes it possible for maximum input authority for Mach 10 and beyond.
Paradigm Shift in Control Surface Methodologies, Increasing Control Authority (Internal Mechanical Applications)
To date, most control surfaces for hypersonic missile platforms still use fins, similar to lower speed conventional missiles, and some using ducted fins. This is mostly due to lack of comprehension of hypersonic velocities in their own favor. Instead, the body itself incorporates those control surfaces, greatly enhancing the airframe strength, opening up more space for hardware and fuel capacity; while simultaneously enhancing the platforms maneuvering capabilities.
A scramjet missile can then fly like conventional missile platforms, and not straight and level at high altitudes, losing velocity on it's decent trajectory to target. Another added benefit to this aspect, is the ability to extend range greatly, so if anyone elses hypersonic missile platform were developed for 400 mile range, falling out of the sky due to lack of glide capabilities; our platforms can easily reach 600+ miles, with minimal glide deceleration.
ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md. (Dec. 19, 2014) -- The U.S. Army is seeking to implement a new mortar manufacturing process to provide improved weapons at a lower cost, officials said.
The Army introduced a nickel super-alloy called Inconcel to produce mortars in 2008, but its properties make it challenging to manufacture. Researchers have been working on an alternative method to overcome the difficulties, said Chris Humiston, a mechanical engineer with the Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center at Watervliet Arsenal, New York.
Read more:
Museu del Disseny / Design Museum Barcelona, Spain
The Museu del Disseny de Barcelona brings together, under one roof, the collections of the Museu de les Arts Decoratives, the Museu de Ceràmica, the Museu Tèxtil i d'Indumentària and the Gabinet de les Arts Gràfiques, to showcase its vast heritage of more than 70,000 objects.
The Museu del Disseny is based on a common theme «From the decorative arts to design», and is dedicated to the culture of the object, focusing on pieces that are often from the everyday sphere, their design, manufacturing process, use and distribution, aesthetic and functional obsolescence, all from a 21st-century perspective.
The Disseny Hub Barcelona building was designed by MBM architects. The building comprises two parts: an underground section made possible by the change in level caused by the redevelopment of the square; and a block at street level, which cantilevers out towards the Plaça de les Glòries, 14.5 metres above the ground. This block houses the venues for long- and short-term temporary exhibitions, as well as a hall for events and a large auditorium. Most of the building's floor space is located below this level and houses key areas such as the main exhibition gallery, the documentation centre, research rooms, the bar and restaurant and the shop. The entire project complies with high environmental quality and sustainability standards which are achieved through a large-scale, self-sufficient energy system.
Raven - Model B Mach 8-10 - Supersonic / Hypersonic Business Jet - Iteration 6
Seating: 22 | Crew 2+1
Length: 100ft | Span: 45ft 8in
Engines: 2 U-TBCC (Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle)
Fuel: H2 (Compressed Hydrogen)
Cruising Altitude: 100,000-125,000 ft @ Mach 8-10
Air frame: 75% Proprietary Composites
Operating Costs, Similar to the hourly operating costs of a Gulfstream G650 or Bombardier Global Express 7000 Series
IO Aircraft www.ioaircraft.com
Drew Blair www.linkedin.com/in/drew-b-25485312/
-----------------------------
supersonic business jet, hypersonic business jet, hypersonic plane, hypersonic aircraft, hypersonic commercial plane, hypersonic commercial aircraft, hypersonic airline, Aerion, Aerion Supersonic, tbcc, glide breaker, fighter plane, hyperonic fighter, boeing phantom express, phantom works, boeing phantom works, lockheed skunk works, hypersonic weapon, hypersonic missile, scramjet missile, scramjet engineering, scramjet physics, boost glide, tactical glide vehicle, Boeing XS-1, htv, Air Launched Rapid Response Weapon, (ARRW), hypersonic tactical vehicle, space plane, scramjet, turbine based combined cycle, ramjet, dual mode ramjet, darpa, onr, navair, afrl, air force research lab, office of naval research, defense advanced research project agency, defense science, missile defense agency, aerospike, hydrogen, hydrogen storage, hydrogen fueled, hydrogen aircraft, virgin airlines, united airlines, sas, finnair ,emirates airlines, ANA, JAL, airlines, military, physics, airline, british airways, air france
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Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle. Current technologies and what Lockheed is trying to force on the Dept of Defense, for that low speed Mach 5 plane DOD gave them $1 billion to build and would disintegrate above Mach 5, is TBCC. 2 separate propulsion systems in the same airframe, which requires TWICE the airframe space to use.
Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle is 1 propulsion system cutting that airframe deficit in half, and also able to operate above Mach 10 up to Mach 15 in atmosphere, and a simple nozzle modification allows for outside atmosphere rocket mode, ie orbital capable.
Additionally, Reaction Engines maximum air breather mode is Mach 4.5, above that it will explode in flight from internal pressures are too high to operate. Thus, must switch to non air breather rocket mode to operate in atmosphere in hypersonic velocities. Which as a result, makes it not feasible for anything practical. It also takes an immense amount of fuel to function.
-------------
Advanced Additive Manufacturing for Hypersonic Aircraft
Utilizing new methods of fabrication and construction, make it possible to use additive manufacturing, dramatically reducing the time and costs of producing hypersonic platforms from missiles, aircraft, and space capable craft. Instead of aircraft being produced in piece, then bolted together; small platforms can be produced as a single unit and large platforms can be produces in large section and mated without bolting. These techniques include using exotic materials and advanced assembly processes, with an end result of streamlining the production costs and time for hypersonic aircraft; reducing months of assembly to weeks. Overall, this process greatly reduced the cost for producing hypersonic platforms. Even to such an extent that a Hellfire missile costs apx $100,000 but by utilizing our technologies, replacing it with a Mach 8-10 hypersonic missile of our physics/engineering and that missile would cost roughly $75,000 each delivered.
Materials used for these manufacturing processes are not disclosed, but overall, provides a foundation for extremely high stresses and thermodynamics, ideal for hypersonic platforms. This specific methodology and materials applications is many decades ahead of all known programs. Even to the extend of normalized space flight and re-entry, without concern of thermodynamic failure.
*Note, most entities that are experimenting with additive manufacturing for hypersonic aircraft, this makes it mainstream and standardized processes, which also applies for mass production.
What would normally be measured in years and perhaps a decade to go from drawing board to test flights, is reduced to singular months and ready for production within a year maximum.
Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle (U-TBCC)
To date, the closest that NASA and industry have achieved for turbine based aircraft to fly at hypersonic velocities is by mounting a turbine into an aircraft and sharing the inlet with a scramjet or rocket based motor. Reaction Engines Sabre is not able to achieve hypersonic velocities and can only transition into a non air breathing rocket for beyond Mach 4.5
However, utilizing Unified Turbine Based Combine Cycle also known as U-TBCC, the two separate platforms are able to share a common inlet and the dual mode ramjet/scramjet is contained within the engine itself, which allows for a much smaller airframe footprint, thus engingeers are able to then design much higher performance aerial platforms for hypersonic flight, including the ability for constructing true single stage to orbit aircraft by utilizing a modification/version that allows for transition to outside atmosphere propulsion without any other propulsion platforms within the aircraft. By transitioning and developing aircraft to use Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle, this propulsion system opens up new options to replace that airframe deficit for increased fuel capacity and/or payload.
Enhanced Dynamic Cavitation
Dramatically Increasing the efficiency of fuel air mixture for combustion processes at hypersonic velocities within scramjet propulsion platforms. The aspects of these processes are non disclosable.
Dynamic Scramjet Ignition Processes
For optimal scramjet ignition, a process known as Self Start is sought after, but in many cases if the platform becomes out of attitude, the scramjet will ignite. We have already solved this problem which as a result, a scramjet propulsion system can ignite at lower velocities, high velocities, at optimal attitude or not optimal attitude. It doesn't matter, it will ignite anyways at the proper point for maximum thrust capabilities at hypersonic velocities.
Hydrogen vs Kerosene Fuel Sources
Kerosene is an easy fuel to work with, and most western nations developing scramjet platforms use Kerosene for that fact. However, while kerosene has better thermal properties then Hydrogen, Hydrogen is a far superior fuel source in scramjet propulsion flight, do it having a much higher efficiency capability. Because of this aspect, in conjunction with our developments, it allows for a MUCH increased fuel to air mixture, combustion, thrust; and ability for higher speeds; instead of very low hypersonic velocities in the Mach 5-6 range. Instead, Mach 8-10 range, while we have begun developing hypersonic capabilities to exceed 15 in atmosphere within less then 5 years.
Conforming High Pressure Tank Technology for CNG and H2.
As most know in hypersonics, Hydrogen is a superior fuel source, but due to the storage abilities, can only be stored in cylinders thus much less fuel supply. Not anymore, we developed conforming high pressure storage technology for use in aerospace, automotive sectors, maritime, etc; which means any overall shape required for 8,000+ PSI CNG or Hydrogen. For hypersonic platforms, this means the ability to store a much larger volume of hydrogen vs cylinders.
As an example, X-43 flown by Nasa which flew at Mach 9.97. The fuel source was Hydrogen, which is extremely more volatile and combustible then kerosene (JP-7), via a cylinder in the main body. If it had used our technology, that entire section of the airframe would had been an 8,000 PSI H2 tank, which would had yielded 5-6 times the capacity. While the X-43 flew 11 seconds under power at Mach 9.97, at 6 times the fuel capacity would had yielded apx 66 seconds of fuel under power at Mach 9.97. If it had flew slower, around Mach 6, same principles applied would had yielded apx 500 seconds of fuel supply under power (slower speeds required less energy to maintain).
Enhanced Fuel Mixture During Shock Train Interaction
Normally, fuel injection is conducted at the correct insertion point within the shock train for maximum burn/combustion. Our methodologies differ, since almost half the fuel injection is conducted PRE shock train within the isolator, so at the point of isolator injection the fuel enhances the combustion process, which then requires less fuel injection to reach the same level of thrust capabilities.
Improved Bow Shock Interaction
Smoother interaction at hypersonic velocities and mitigating heat/stresses for beyond Mach 6 thermodynamics, which extraordinarily improves Type 3, 4, and 5 shock interaction.
6,000+ Fahrenheit Thermal Resistance
To date, the maximum thermal resistance was tested at AFRL in the spring of 2018, which resulted in a 3,200F thermal resistance for a short duration. This technology, allows for normalized hypersonic thermal resistance of 3,000-3,500F sustained, and up to 6,500F resistance for short endurance, ie 90 seconds or less. 10-20 minute resistance estimate approximately 4,500F +/- 200F.
*** This technology advancement also applies to Aerospike rocket engines, in which it is common for Aerospike's to exceed 4,500-5,000F temperatures, which results in the melting of the reversed bell housing. That melting no longer ocurrs, providing for stable combustion to ocurr for the entire flight envelope
Scramjet Propulsion Side Wall Cooling
With old technologies, side wall cooling is required for hypersonic flight and scramjet propulsion systems, otherwise the isolator and combustion regions of a scramjet would melt, even using advanced ablatives and ceramics, due to their inability to cope with very high temperatures. Using technology we have developed for very high thermodynamics and high stresses, side wall cooling is no longer required, thus removing that variable from the design process and focusing on improved ignition processes and increasing net thrust values.
Lower Threshold for Hypersonic Ignition
Active and adaptive flight dynamics, resulting in the ability for scramjet ignition at a much lower velocity, ie within ramjet envelope, between Mach 2-4, and seamless transition from supersonic to hypersonic flight, ie supersonic ramjet (scramjet). This active and dynamic aspect, has a wide variety of parameters for many flight dynamics, velocities, and altitudes; which means platforms no longer need to be engineered for specific altitude ranges or preset velocities, but those parameters can then be selected during launch configuration and are able to adapt actively in flight.
Dramatically Improved Maneuvering Capabilities at Hypersonic Velocities
Hypersonic vehicles, like their less technologically advanced brethren, use large actuator and the developers hope those controls surfaces do not disintegrate in flight. In reality, it is like rolling the dice, they may or may not survive, hence another reason why the attempt to keep velocities to Mach 6 or below. We have shrunken down control actuators while almost doubling torque and response capabilities specifically for hypersonic dynamics and extreme stresses involved, which makes it possible for maximum input authority for Mach 10 and beyond.
Paradigm Shift in Control Surface Methodologies, Increasing Control Authority (Internal Mechanical Applications)
To date, most control surfaces for hypersonic missile platforms still use fins, similar to lower speed conventional missiles, and some using ducted fins. This is mostly due to lack of comprehension of hypersonic velocities in their own favor. Instead, the body itself incorporates those control surfaces, greatly enhancing the airframe strength, opening up more space for hardware and fuel capacity; while simultaneously enhancing the platforms maneuvering capabilities.
A scramjet missile can then fly like conventional missile platforms, and not straight and level at high altitudes, losing velocity on it's decent trajectory to target. Another added benefit to this aspect, is the ability to extend range greatly, so if anyone elses hypersonic missile platform were developed for 400 mile range, falling out of the sky due to lack of glide capabilities; our platforms can easily reach 600+ miles, with minimal glide deceleration.
The United States Astronaut Hall of Fame, located inside the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex Heroes & Legends building on Merritt Island, Florida, honors American astronauts and features the world's largest collection of their personal memorabilia, focusing on those astronauts who have been inducted into the Hall. Exhibits include Wally Schirra's Sigma 7 space capsule from the fifth crewed Mercury mission and the Gemini IX spacecraft flown by Gene Cernan and Thomas P. Stafford in 1966.
In the 1980s, the six then-surviving Mercury Seven astronauts conceived of establishing a place where US space travelers could be remembered and honored, along the lines of halls of fame for other fields. The Mercury Seven Foundation and Astronaut Scholarship Foundation were formed, and have a role in the ongoing operations of the Hall of Fame. The foundation's first executive director was former Associated Press space reporter Howard Benedict.
The Astronaut Hall of Fame was opened on October 29, 1990, by the U.S. Space Camp Foundation, which was the first owner of the facility. It was located next to the Florida branch of Space Camp.
The Hall of Fame closed for several months in 2002 when U.S. Space Camp Foundation's creditors foreclosed on the property due to low attendance and mounting debt. That September, an auction was held and the property was purchased by Delaware North Park Services on behalf of NASA and the property was added to the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex. The Hall of Fame re-opened December 14, 2002.
The Hall of Fame, which was originally located just west of the NASA Causeway, closed to the public on November 2, 2015, in preparation for its relocation to the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex 6 miles (9.7 km) to the east on Merritt Island. Outside of the original building was a full-scale replica of a Space Shuttle orbiter named Inspiration (originally named "Shuttle To Tomorrow" where visitors could enter and view a program). Inspiration served only as an outdoor, full scale, static display which visitors could not enter. After the Hall of Fame was transferred to the KSC Visitor Complex, Inspiration was acquired by LVX System and was placed in storage at the Shuttle Landing Facility at the Kennedy Space Center; in 2016, the shuttle was loaded on to a barge to be taken for refurbishment before going on an educational tour.
The building was purchased at auction by visitor complex operator Delaware North and renamed the ATX Center, and for a time housed educational programs including Camp Kennedy Space Center and the Astronaut Training Experience. Those programs have since been moved to the KSC Visitor Complex, and as of December 2019, the structure was being offered for lease. In July 2020, Lockheed Martin announced it would lease the building to support work on the NASA Orion crew capsule.
Inductees into the Hall of Fame are selected by a blue ribbon committee of former NASA officials and flight controllers, historians, journalists, and other space authorities (including former astronauts) based on their accomplishments in space or their contributions to the advancement of space exploration. Except for 2002, inductions have been held every year since 2001.
As its inaugural class in 1990, the Hall of Fame inducted the United States' original group of astronauts: the Mercury Seven. In addition to being the first American astronauts, they set several firsts in American spaceflight, both auspicious and tragic. Alan Shepard was the first American in space and later became one of the twelve people to walk on the Moon. John Glenn was the first American to orbit the Earth and after his induction went on, in 1998, to become the oldest man to fly in space, aged 77. Gus Grissom was the first American to fly in space twice and was the commander of the ill-fated Apollo 1, which resulted in the first astronaut deaths directly related to preparation for spaceflight.
Thirteen astronauts from the Gemini and Apollo programs were inducted in the second class of 1993. This class included the first and last humans to walk on the Moon, Neil Armstrong and Eugene Cernan; Ed White, the first American to walk in space (also killed in the Apollo 1 accident); Jim Lovell, commander of the famously near-tragic Apollo 13; and John Young, whose six flights included a moonwalk and command of the first Space Shuttle mission.
The third class was inducted in 1997 and consisted of the 24 additional Apollo, Skylab, and ASTP astronauts. Notable members of the class were Roger Chaffee, the third astronaut killed in the Apollo 1 fire and the only unflown astronaut in the Hall; Harrison Schmitt, the first scientist and next-to-last person to walk on the Moon; and Jack Swigert and Fred Haise, the Apollo 13 crewmembers not previously inducted.
The philosophy regarding the first three groups of inductees was that all astronauts who flew in NASA's "pioneering" programs (which would include Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, Apollo Applications Program (Skylab), and Apollo-Soyuz Test Project) would be included simply by virtue of their participation in a spaceflight in these early programs. The first group (the inaugural class of 1990) would only include the original Mercury astronauts (most of whom would go on to fly in later programs). The second group of inductees would include those astronauts who began their spaceflight careers during Gemini (all of whom would go on to fly in later programs). The third group of inductees would include those astronauts who began their spaceflight careers during Apollo, Skylab, and ASTP (some of whom would go on to fly in the Space Shuttle program). Since it would not be practical (or meaningful) to induct all astronauts who ever flew in space, all subsequent inductees (Space Shuttle program and beyond) are considered based on their accomplishments and contributions to the human spaceflight endeavor which would set them apart from their peers.
Over four dozen astronauts from the Space Shuttle program have been inducted since 2001. Among these are Sally Ride, the first American woman in space; Story Musgrave, who flew six missions in the 1980s and 90s; and Francis Scobee, commander of the ill-fated final Challenger mission.
The 2010 class consisted of Guion Bluford Jr., Kenneth Bowersox, Frank Culbertson and Kathryn Thornton. The 2011 inductees were Karol Bobko and Susan Helms. The 2012 inductees were Franklin Chang-Diaz, Kevin Chilton and Charles Precourt. Bonnie Dunbar, Curt Brown and Eileen Collins were inducted in 2013, and Shannon Lucid and Jerry Ross comprised the 2014 class.
Those inducted in 2015 were John Grunsfeld, Steven Lindsey, Kent Rominger, and Rhea Seddon. In 2016, inductees included Brian Duffy and Scott E. Parazynski. Ellen Ochoa and Michael Foale were announced as the 2017 class of the United States Astronaut Hall of Fame. Scott Altman and Thomas Jones followed in 2018. The 2019 inductees were James Buchli and Janet L. Kavandi.
Michael López-Alegría, Scott Kelly and Pamela Melroy were the 2020 inductees, inducted in a November 2021 ceremony. The 2022 inductees were Christopher Ferguson, David Leestma, and Sandra Magnus. Roy Bridges Jr. and Mark Kelly were the 2023 inductees.
The Hall of Heroes is composed of tributes to the inductees. Among the Hall of Fame's displays is Sigma 7, the Mercury spacecraft piloted by Wally Schirra which orbited the Earth six times in 1962, and the Gemini 9A capsule flown by Gene Cernan and Thomas P. Stafford in 1966. An Astronaut Adventure room includes simulators for use by children.
The spacesuit worn by Gus Grissom during his 1961 Liberty Bell 7 Mercury flight is on display and has been the subject of a dispute between NASA and Grissom's heirs and supporters since 2002. The spacesuit, along with other Grissom artifacts, were loaned to the original owners of the Hall of Fame by the Grissom family when it opened. After the Hall of Fame went into bankruptcy and was taken over by a NASA contractor in 2002, the family requested that all their items be returned. All of the items were returned to Grissom's family except the spacesuit, because both NASA and the Grissoms claim ownership of it. NASA claims Grissom checked out the spacesuit for a show and tell at his son's school, and then never returned it, while the Grissoms claim Gus rescued the spacesuit from a scrap heap.
The John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC, originally known as the NASA Launch Operations Center), located on Merritt Island, Florida, is one of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) ten field centers. Since December 1968, KSC has been NASA's primary launch center of human spaceflight. Launch operations for the Apollo, Skylab and Space Shuttle programs were carried out from Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39 and managed by KSC.[4] Located on the east coast of Florida, KSC is adjacent to Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS). The management of the two entities work very closely together, share resources and operate facilities on each other's property.
Though the first Apollo flights and all Project Mercury and Project Gemini flights took off from the then-Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, the launches were managed by KSC and its previous organization, the Launch Operations Directorate. Starting with the fourth Gemini mission, the NASA launch control center in Florida (Mercury Control Center, later the Launch Control Center) began handing off control of the vehicle to the Mission Control Center in Houston, shortly after liftoff; in prior missions it held control throughout the entire mission.
Additionally, the center manages launch of robotic and commercial crew missions and researches food production and In-Situ Resource Utilization for off-Earth exploration. Since 2010, the center has worked to become a multi-user spaceport through industry partnerships, even adding a new launch pad (LC-39C) in 2015.
There are about 700 facilities and buildings grouped across the center's 144,000 acres (580 km2). Among the unique facilities at KSC are the 525-foot (160 m) tall Vehicle Assembly Building for stacking NASA's largest rockets, the Launch Control Center, which conducts space launches at KSC, the Operations and Checkout Building, which houses the astronauts dormitories and suit-up area, a Space Station factory, and a 3-mile (4.8 km) long Shuttle Landing Facility. There is also a Visitor Complex open to the public on site.
Since 1949, the military had been performing launch operations at what would become Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. In December 1959, the Department of Defense transferred 5,000 personnel and the Missile Firing Laboratory to NASA to become the Launch Operations Directorate under NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center.
President John F. Kennedy's 1961 goal of a crewed lunar landing by 1970 required an expansion of launch operations. On July 1, 1962, the Launch Operations Directorate was separated from MSFC to become the Launch Operations Center (LOC). Also, Cape Canaveral was inadequate to host the new launch facility design required for the mammoth 363-foot (111 m) tall, 7,500,000-pound-force (33,000 kN) thrust Saturn V rocket, which would be assembled vertically in a large hangar and transported on a mobile platform to one of several launch pads. Therefore, the decision was made to build a new LOC site located adjacent to Cape Canaveral on Merritt Island.
NASA began land acquisition in 1962, buying title to 131 square miles (340 km2) and negotiating with the state of Florida for an additional 87 square miles (230 km2). The major buildings in KSC's Industrial Area were designed by architect Charles Luckman. Construction began in November 1962, and Kennedy visited the site twice in 1962, and again just a week before his assassination on November 22, 1963.
On November 29, 1963, the facility was given its current name by President Lyndon B. Johnson under Executive Order 11129. Johnson's order joined both the civilian LOC and the military Cape Canaveral station ("the facilities of Station No. 1 of the Atlantic Missile Range") under the designation "John F. Kennedy Space Center", spawning some confusion joining the two in the public mind. NASA Administrator James E. Webb clarified this by issuing a directive stating the Kennedy Space Center name applied only to the LOC, while the Air Force issued a general order renaming the military launch site Cape Kennedy Air Force Station.
Located on Merritt Island, Florida, the center is north-northwest of Cape Canaveral on the Atlantic Ocean, midway between Miami and Jacksonville on Florida's Space Coast, due east of Orlando. It is 34 miles (55 km) long and roughly six miles (9.7 km) wide, covering 219 square miles (570 km2). KSC is a major central Florida tourist destination and is approximately one hour's drive from the Orlando area. The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex offers public tours of the center and Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
The KSC Industrial Area, where many of the center's support facilities are located, is 5 miles (8 km) south of LC-39. It includes the Headquarters Building, the Operations and Checkout Building and the Central Instrumentation Facility. The astronaut crew quarters are in the O&C; before it was completed, the astronaut crew quarters were located in Hangar S[39] at the Cape Canaveral Missile Test Annex (now Cape Canaveral Space Force Station). Located at KSC was the Merritt Island Spaceflight Tracking and Data Network station (MILA), a key radio communications and spacecraft tracking complex.
Facilities at the Kennedy Space Center are directly related to its mission to launch and recover missions. Facilities are available to prepare and maintain spacecraft and payloads for flight. The Headquarters (HQ) Building houses offices for the Center Director, library, film and photo archives, a print shop and security. When the KSC Library first opened, it was part of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency. However, in 1965, the library moved into three separate sections in the newly opened NASA headquarters before eventually becoming a single unit in 1970. The library contains over four million items related to the history and the work at Kennedy. As one of ten NASA center libraries in the country, their collection focuses on engineering, science, and technology. The archives contain planning documents, film reels, and original photographs covering the history of KSC. The library is not open to the public but is available for KSC, Space Force, and Navy employees who work on site. Many of the media items from the collection are digitized and available through NASA's KSC Media Gallery or through their more up-to-date Flickr gallery.
A new Headquarters Building was completed in 2019 as part of the Central Campus consolidation. Groundbreaking began in 2014.
The center operated its own 17-mile (27 km) short-line railroad. This operation was discontinued in 2015, with the sale of its final two locomotives. A third had already been donated to a museum. The line was costing $1.3 million annually to maintain.
The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, operated by Delaware North since 1995, has a variety of exhibits, artifacts, displays and attractions on the history and future of human and robotic spaceflight. Bus tours of KSC originate from here. The complex also includes the separate Apollo/Saturn V Center, north of the VAB and the United States Astronaut Hall of Fame, six miles west near Titusville. There were 1.5 million visitors in 2009. It had some 700 employees.
It was announced on May 29, 2015, that the Astronaut Hall of Fame exhibit would be moved from its current location to another location within the Visitor Complex to make room for an upcoming high-tech attraction entitled "Heroes and Legends". The attraction, designed by Orlando-based design firm Falcon's Treehouse, opened November 11, 2016.
In March 2016, the visitor center unveiled the new location of the iconic countdown clock at the complex's entrance; previously, the clock was located with a flagpole at the press site. The clock was originally built and installed in 1969 and listed with the flagpole in the National Register of Historic Places in January 2000. In 2019, NASA celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Apollo program, and the launch of Apollo 10 on May 18. In summer of 2019, Lunar Module 9 (LM-9) was relocated to the Apollo/Saturn V Center as part of an initiative to rededicate the center and celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Apollo Program.
The John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC, originally known as the NASA Launch Operations Center), located on Merritt Island, Florida, is one of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) ten field centers. Since December 1968, KSC has been NASA's primary launch center of American spaceflight, research, and technology. Launch operations for the Apollo, Skylab and Space Shuttle programs were carried out from Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39 and managed by KSC. Located on the east coast of Florida, KSC is adjacent to Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS). The management of the two entities work very closely together, share resources and operate facilities on each other's property.
Though the first Apollo flights and all Project Mercury and Project Gemini flights took off from the then-Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, the launches were managed by KSC and its previous organization, the Launch Operations Directorate. Starting with the fourth Gemini mission, the NASA launch control center in Florida (Mercury Control Center, later the Launch Control Center) began handing off control of the vehicle to the Mission Control Center in Houston, shortly after liftoff; in prior missions it held control throughout the entire mission.
Additionally, the center manages launch of robotic and commercial crew missions and researches food production and in-situ resource utilization for off-Earth exploration. Since 2010, the center has worked to become a multi-user spaceport through industry partnerships, even adding a new launch pad (LC-39C) in 2015.
There are about 700 facilities and buildings grouped throughout the center's 144,000 acres (580 km2). Among the unique facilities at KSC are the 525-foot (160 m) tall Vehicle Assembly Building for stacking NASA's largest rockets, the Launch Control Center, which conducts space launches at KSC, the Operations and Checkout Building, which houses the astronauts dormitories and suit-up area, a Space Station factory, and a 3-mile (4.8 km) long Shuttle Landing Facility. There is also a Visitor Complex on site that is open to the public.
Since 1949, the military had been performing launch operations at what would become Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. In December 1959, the Department of Defense transferred 5,000 personnel and the Missile Firing Laboratory to NASA to become the Launch Operations Directorate under NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center.
President John F. Kennedy's 1961 goal of a crewed lunar landing by 1970 required an expansion of launch operations. On July 1, 1962, the Launch Operations Directorate was separated from MSFC to become the Launch Operations Center (LOC). Also, Cape Canaveral was inadequate to host the new launch facility design required for the mammoth 363-foot (111 m) tall, 7,500,000-pound-force (33,000 kN) thrust Saturn V rocket, which would be assembled vertically in a large hangar and transported on a mobile platform to one of several launch pads. Therefore, the decision was made to build a new LOC site located adjacent to Cape Canaveral on Merritt Island.
NASA began land acquisition in 1962, buying title to 131 square miles (340 km2) and negotiating with the state of Florida for an additional 87 square miles (230 km2). The major buildings in KSC's Industrial Area were designed by architect Charles Luckman. Construction began in November 1962, and Kennedy visited the site twice in 1962, and again just a week before his assassination on November 22, 1963.
On November 29, 1963, the facility was named by President Lyndon B. Johnson under Executive Order 11129. Johnson's order joined both the civilian LOC and the military Cape Canaveral station ("the facilities of Station No. 1 of the Atlantic Missile Range") under the designation "John F. Kennedy Space Center", spawning some confusion joining the two in the public mind. NASA Administrator James E. Webb clarified this by issuing a directive stating the Kennedy Space Center name applied only to the LOC, while the Air Force issued a general order renaming the military launch site Cape Kennedy Air Force Station.
Located on Merritt Island, Florida, the center is north-northwest of Cape Canaveral on the Atlantic Ocean, midway between Miami and Jacksonville on Florida's Space Coast, due east of Orlando. It is 34 miles (55 km) long and roughly six miles (9.7 km) wide, covering 219 square miles (570 km2). KSC is a major central Florida tourist destination and is approximately one hour's drive from the Orlando area. The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex offers public tours of the center and Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
From 1967 through 1973, there were 13 Saturn V launches, including the ten remaining Apollo missions after Apollo 7. The first of two uncrewed flights, Apollo 4 (Apollo-Saturn 501) on November 9, 1967, was also the first rocket launch from KSC. The Saturn V's first crewed launch on December 21, 1968, was Apollo 8's lunar orbiting mission. The next two missions tested the Lunar Module: Apollo 9 (Earth orbit) and Apollo 10 (lunar orbit). Apollo 11, launched from Pad A on July 16, 1969, made the first Moon landing on July 20. The Apollo 11 launch included crewmembers Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins, and Buzz Aldrin, and attracted a record-breaking 650 million television viewers. Apollo 12 followed four months later. From 1970 to 1972, the Apollo program concluded at KSC with the launches of missions 13 through 17.
On May 14, 1973, the last Saturn V launch put the Skylab space station in orbit from Pad 39A. By this time, the Cape Kennedy pads 34 and 37 used for the Saturn IB were decommissioned, so Pad 39B was modified to accommodate the Saturn IB, and used to launch three crewed missions to Skylab that year, as well as the final Apollo spacecraft for the Apollo–Soyuz Test Project in 1975.
As the Space Shuttle was being designed, NASA received proposals for building alternative launch-and-landing sites at locations other than KSC, which demanded study. KSC had important advantages, including its existing facilities; location on the Intracoastal Waterway; and its southern latitude, which gives a velocity advantage to missions launched in easterly near-equatorial orbits. Disadvantages included: its inability to safely launch military missions into polar orbit, since spent boosters would be likely to fall on the Carolinas or Cuba; corrosion from the salt air; and frequent cloudy or stormy weather. Although building a new site at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico was seriously considered, NASA announced its decision in April 1972 to use KSC for the shuttle. Since the Shuttle could not be landed automatically or by remote control, the launch of Columbia on April 12, 1981 for its first orbital mission STS-1, was NASA's first crewed launch of a vehicle that had not been tested in prior uncrewed launches.
In 1976, the VAB's south parking area was the site of Third Century America, a science and technology display commemorating the U.S. Bicentennial. Concurrent with this event, the U.S. flag was painted on the south side of the VAB. During the late 1970s, LC-39 was reconfigured to support the Space Shuttle. Two Orbiter Processing Facilities were built near the VAB as hangars with a third added in the 1980s.
KSC's 2.9-mile (4.7 km) Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF) was the orbiters' primary end-of-mission landing site, although the first KSC landing did not take place until the tenth flight, when Challenger completed STS-41-B on February 11, 1984; the primary landing site until then was Edwards Air Force Base in California, subsequently used as a backup landing site. The SLF also provided a return-to-launch-site (RTLS) abort option, which was not utilized. The SLF is among the longest runways in the world.
On October 28, 2009, the Ares I-X launch from Pad 39B was the first uncrewed launch from KSC since the Skylab workshop in 1973.
Beginning in 1958, NASA and military worked side by side on robotic mission launches (previously referred to as unmanned), cooperating as they broke ground in the field. In the early 1960s, NASA had as many as two robotic mission launches a month. The frequent number of flights allowed for quick evolution of the vehicles, as engineers gathered data, learned from anomalies and implemented upgrades. In 1963, with the intent of KSC ELV work focusing on the ground support equipment and facilities, a separate Atlas/Centaur organization was formed under NASA's Lewis Center (now Glenn Research Center (GRC)), taking that responsibility from the Launch Operations Center (aka KSC).
Though almost all robotics missions launched from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS), KSC "oversaw the final assembly and testing of rockets as they arrived at the Cape." In 1965, KSC's Unmanned Launch Operations directorate became responsible for all NASA uncrewed launch operations, including those at Vandenberg Space Force Base. From the 1950s to 1978, KSC chose the rocket and payload processing facilities for all robotic missions launching in the U.S., overseeing their near launch processing and checkout. In addition to government missions, KSC performed this service for commercial and foreign missions also, though non-U.S. government entities provided reimbursement. NASA also funded Cape Canaveral Space Force Station launch pad maintenance and launch vehicle improvements.
All this changed with the Commercial Space Launch Act of 1984, after which NASA only coordinated its own and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) ELV launches. Companies were able to "operate their own launch vehicles" and utilize NASA's launch facilities. Payload processing handled by private firms also started to occur outside of KSC. Reagan's 1988 space policy furthered the movement of this work from KSC to commercial companies. That same year, launch complexes on Cape Canaveral Air Force Force Station started transferring from NASA to Air Force Space Command management.
In the 1990s, though KSC was not performing the hands-on ELV work, engineers still maintained an understanding of ELVs and had contracts allowing them insight into the vehicles so they could provide knowledgeable oversight. KSC also worked on ELV research and analysis and the contractors were able to utilize KSC personnel as a resource for technical issues. KSC, with the payload and launch vehicle industries, developed advances in automation of the ELV launch and ground operations to enable competitiveness of U.S. rockets against the global market.
In 1998, the Launch Services Program (LSP) formed at KSC, pulling together programs (and personnel) that already existed at KSC, GRC, Goddard Space Flight Center, and more to manage the launch of NASA and NOAA robotic missions. Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and VAFB are the primary launch sites for LSP missions, though other sites are occasionally used. LSP payloads such as the Mars Science Laboratory have been processed at KSC before being transferred to a launch pad on Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
On 16 November 2022, at 06:47:44 UTC the Space Launch System (SLS) was launched from Complex 39B as part of the Artemis 1 mission.
As the International Space Station modules design began in the early 1990s, KSC began to work with other NASA centers and international partners to prepare for processing before launch onboard the Space Shuttles. KSC utilized its hands-on experience processing the 22 Spacelab missions in the Operations and Checkout Building to gather expectations of ISS processing. These experiences were incorporated into the design of the Space Station Processing Facility (SSPF), which began construction in 1991. The Space Station Directorate formed in 1996. KSC personnel were embedded at station module factories for insight into their processes.
From 1997 to 2007, KSC planned and performed on the ground integration tests and checkouts of station modules: three Multi-Element Integration Testing (MEIT) sessions and the Integration Systems Test (IST). Numerous issues were found and corrected that would have been difficult to nearly impossible to do on-orbit.
Today KSC continues to process ISS payloads from across the world before launch along with developing its experiments for on orbit. The proposed Lunar Gateway would be manufactured and processed at the Space Station Processing Facility.
The following are current programs and initiatives at Kennedy Space Center:
Commercial Crew Program
Exploration Ground Systems Program
NASA is currently designing the next heavy launch vehicle known as the Space Launch System (SLS) for continuation of human spaceflight.
On December 5, 2014, NASA launched the first uncrewed flight test of the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV), currently under development to facilitate human exploration of the Moon and Mars.
Launch Services Program
Educational Launch of Nanosatellites (ELaNa)
Research and Technology
Artemis program
Lunar Gateway
International Space Station Payloads
Camp KSC: educational camps for schoolchildren in spring and summer, with a focus on space, aviation and robotics.
The KSC Industrial Area, where many of the center's support facilities are located, is 5 miles (8 km) south of LC-39. It includes the Headquarters Building, the Operations and Checkout Building and the Central Instrumentation Facility. The astronaut crew quarters are in the O&C; before it was completed, the astronaut crew quarters were located in Hangar S at the Cape Canaveral Missile Test Annex (now Cape Canaveral Space Force Station). Located at KSC was the Merritt Island Spaceflight Tracking and Data Network station (MILA), a key radio communications and spacecraft tracking complex.
Facilities at the Kennedy Space Center are directly related to its mission to launch and recover missions. Facilities are available to prepare and maintain spacecraft and payloads for flight. The Headquarters (HQ) Building houses offices for the Center Director, library, film and photo archives, a print shop and security. When the KSC Library first opened, it was part of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency. However, in 1965, the library moved into three separate sections in the newly opened NASA headquarters before eventually becoming a single unit in 1970. The library contains over four million items related to the history and the work at Kennedy. As one of ten NASA center libraries in the country, their collection focuses on engineering, science, and technology. The archives contain planning documents, film reels, and original photographs covering the history of KSC. The library is not open to the public but is available for KSC, Space Force, and Navy employees who work on site. Many of the media items from the collection are digitized and available through NASA's KSC Media Gallery Archived December 6, 2020, at the Wayback Machine or through their more up-to-date Flickr gallery.
A new Headquarters Building was completed in 2019 as part of the Central Campus consolidation. Groundbreaking began in 2014.
The center operated its own 17-mile (27 km) short-line railroad. This operation was discontinued in 2015, with the sale of its final two locomotives. A third had already been donated to a museum. The line was costing $1.3 million annually to maintain.
The Neil Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building (O&C) (previously known as the Manned Spacecraft Operations Building) is a historic site on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places dating back to the 1960s and was used to receive, process, and integrate payloads for the Gemini and Apollo programs, the Skylab program in the 1970s, and for initial segments of the International Space Station through the 1990s. The Apollo and Space Shuttle astronauts would board the astronaut transfer van to launch complex 39 from the O&C building.
The three-story, 457,000-square-foot (42,500 m2) Space Station Processing Facility (SSPF) consists of two enormous processing bays, an airlock, operational control rooms, laboratories, logistics areas and office space for support of non-hazardous Space Station and Shuttle payloads to ISO 14644-1 class 5 standards. Opened in 1994, it is the largest factory building in the KSC industrial area.
The Vertical Processing Facility (VPF) features a 71-by-38-foot (22 by 12 m) door where payloads that are processed in the vertical position are brought in and manipulated with two overhead cranes and a hoist capable of lifting up to 35 short tons (32 t).
The Hypergolic Maintenance and Checkout Area (HMCA) comprises three buildings that are isolated from the rest of the industrial area because of the hazardous materials handled there. Hypergolic-fueled modules that made up the Space Shuttle Orbiter's reaction control system, orbital maneuvering system and auxiliary power units were stored and serviced in the HMCF.
The Multi-Payload Processing Facility is a 19,647 square feet (1,825.3 m2) building used for Orion spacecraft and payload processing.
The Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility (PHSF) contains a 70-by-110-foot (21 by 34 m) service bay, with a 100,000-pound (45,000 kg), 85-foot (26 m) hook height. It also contains a 58-by-80-foot (18 by 24 m) payload airlock. Its temperature is maintained at 70 °F (21 °C).[55]
The Blue Origin rocket manufacturing facility is located immediately south of the KSC visitor complex. Completed in 2019, it serves as the company's factory for the manufacture of New Glenn orbital rockets.
Launch Complex 39 (LC-39) was originally built for the Saturn V, the largest and most powerful operational launch vehicle until the Space Launch System, for the Apollo crewed Moon landing program. Since the end of the Apollo program in 1972, LC-39 has been used to launch every NASA human space flight, including Skylab (1973), the Apollo–Soyuz Test Project (1975), and the Space Shuttle program (1981–2011).
Since December 1968, all launch operations have been conducted from launch pads A and B at LC-39. Both pads are on the ocean, 3 miles (4.8 km) east of the VAB. From 1969 to 1972, LC-39 was the "Moonport" for all six Apollo crewed Moon landing missions using the Saturn V, and was used from 1981 to 2011 for all Space Shuttle launches.
Human missions to the Moon required the large three-stage Saturn V rocket, which was 363 feet (111 meters) tall and 33 feet (10 meters) in diameter. At KSC, Launch Complex 39 was built on Merritt Island to accommodate the new rocket. Construction of the $800 million project began in November 1962. LC-39 pads A and B were completed by October 1965 (planned Pads C, D and E were canceled), the VAB was completed in June 1965, and the infrastructure by late 1966.
The complex includes: the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB), a 130,000,000 cubic feet (3,700,000 m3) hangar capable of holding four Saturn Vs. The VAB was the largest structure in the world by volume when completed in 1965.
a transporter capable of carrying 5,440 tons along a crawlerway to either of two launch pads;
a 446-foot (136 m) mobile service structure, with three Mobile Launcher Platforms, each containing a fixed launch umbilical tower;
the Launch Control Center; and
a news media facility.
Launch Complex 48 (LC-48) is a multi-user launch site under construction for small launchers and spacecraft. It will be located between Launch Complex 39A and Space Launch Complex 41, with LC-39A to the north and SLC-41 to the south. LC-48 will be constructed as a "clean pad" to support multiple launch systems with differing propellant needs. While initially only planned to have a single pad, the complex is capable of being expanded to two at a later date.
As a part of promoting commercial space industry growth in the area and the overall center as a multi-user spaceport, KSC leases some of its properties. Here are some major examples:
Exploration Park to multiple users (partnership with Space Florida)
Shuttle Landing Facility to Space Florida (who contracts use to private companies)
Orbiter Processing Facility (OPF)-3 to Boeing (for CST-100 Starliner)
Launch Complex 39A, Launch Control Center Firing Room 4 and land for SpaceX's Roberts Road facility (Hanger X) to SpaceX
O&C High Bay to Lockheed Martin (for Orion processing)
Land for FPL's Space Coast Next Generation Solar Energy Center to Florida Power and Light (FPL)
Hypergolic Maintenance Facility (HMF) to United Paradyne Corporation (UPC)
The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, operated by Delaware North since 1995, has a variety of exhibits, artifacts, displays and attractions on the history and future of human and robotic spaceflight. Bus tours of KSC originate from here. The complex also includes the separate Apollo/Saturn V Center, north of the VAB and the United States Astronaut Hall of Fame, six miles west near Titusville. There were 1.5 million visitors in 2009. It had some 700 employees.
It was announced on May 29, 2015, that the Astronaut Hall of Fame exhibit would be moved from its current location to another location within the Visitor Complex to make room for an upcoming high-tech attraction entitled "Heroes and Legends". The attraction, designed by Orlando-based design firm Falcon's Treehouse, opened November 11, 2016.
In March 2016, the visitor center unveiled the new location of the iconic countdown clock at the complex's entrance; previously, the clock was located with a flagpole at the press site. The clock was originally built and installed in 1969 and listed with the flagpole in the National Register of Historic Places in January 2000. In 2019, NASA celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Apollo program, and the launch of Apollo 10 on May 18. In summer of 2019, Lunar Module 9 (LM-9) was relocated to the Apollo/Saturn V Center as part of an initiative to rededicate the center and celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Apollo Program.
Historic locations
NASA lists the following Historic Districts at KSC; each district has multiple associated facilities:
Launch Complex 39: Pad A Historic District
Launch Complex 39: Pad B Historic District
Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF) Area Historic District
Orbiter Processing Historic District
Solid Rocket Booster (SRB) Disassembly and Refurbishment Complex Historic District
NASA KSC Railroad System Historic District
NASA-owned Cape Canaveral Space Force Station Industrial Area Historic District
There are 24 historic properties outside of these historic districts, including the Space Shuttle Atlantis, Vehicle Assembly Building, Crawlerway, and Operations and Checkout Building.[71] KSC has one National Historic Landmark, 78 National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) listed or eligible sites, and 100 Archaeological Sites.
Further information: John F. Kennedy Space Center MPS
Other facilities
The Rotation, Processing and Surge Facility (RPSF) is responsible for the preparation of solid rocket booster segments for transportation to the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB). The RPSF was built in 1984 to perform SRB operations that had previously been conducted in high bays 2 and 4 of the VAB at the beginning of the Space Shuttle program. It was used until the Space Shuttle's retirement, and will be used in the future by the Space Launch System[75] (SLS) and OmegA rockets.
Selective Laser Melting (SLM) is an additive manufacturing process that can be used for many different applications.
The SLM process starts by numerically slicing a 3D CAD model into a number of finite layers. For each sliced layer a laser scan path is calculated which defines both the boundary contour and some form of fill sequence, often a raster pattern. Each layer is then sequentially recreated by depositing powder layers, one on top of the other, and melting their surface by scanning a laser beam.
The powder is spread uniformly by a wiper. A high power-density fibre laser with a 40µm beam spot size fully melts the pre-deposited powder layer. The melted particles fuse and solidify to form a layer of the component.
For more information please visit www.twi-global.com/technologies/welding-surface-engineeri...
If you wish to use this image each use should be accompanied by the credit line and notice, "Courtesy of TWI Ltd".
Raven - Model B Mach 8-10 - Supersonic / Hypersonic Business Jet - Iteration 6
Seating: 22 | Crew 2+1
Length: 100ft | Span: 45ft 8in
Engines: 2 U-TBCC (Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle)
Fuel: H2 (Compressed Hydrogen)
Cruising Altitude: 100,000-125,000 ft @ Mach 8-10
Air frame: 75% Proprietary Composites
Operating Costs, Similar to the hourly operating costs of a Gulfstream G650 or Bombardier Global Express 7000 Series
IO Aircraft www.ioaircraft.com
Drew Blair www.linkedin.com/in/drew-b-25485312/
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supersonic business jet, hypersonic business jet, hypersonic plane, hypersonic aircraft, hypersonic commercial plane, hypersonic commercial aircraft, hypersonic airline, Aerion, Aerion Supersonic, tbcc, glide breaker, fighter plane, hyperonic fighter, boeing phantom express, phantom works, boeing phantom works, lockheed skunk works, hypersonic weapon, hypersonic missile, scramjet missile, scramjet engineering, scramjet physics, boost glide, tactical glide vehicle, Boeing XS-1, htv, Air Launched Rapid Response Weapon, (ARRW), hypersonic tactical vehicle, space plane, scramjet, turbine based combined cycle, ramjet, dual mode ramjet, darpa, onr, navair, afrl, air force research lab, office of naval research, defense advanced research project agency, defense science, missile defense agency, aerospike, hydrogen, hydrogen storage, hydrogen fueled, hydrogen aircraft, virgin airlines, united airlines, sas, finnair ,emirates airlines, ANA, JAL, airlines, military, physics, airline, british airways, air france
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Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle. Current technologies and what Lockheed is trying to force on the Dept of Defense, for that low speed Mach 5 plane DOD gave them $1 billion to build and would disintegrate above Mach 5, is TBCC. 2 separate propulsion systems in the same airframe, which requires TWICE the airframe space to use.
Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle is 1 propulsion system cutting that airframe deficit in half, and also able to operate above Mach 10 up to Mach 15 in atmosphere, and a simple nozzle modification allows for outside atmosphere rocket mode, ie orbital capable.
Additionally, Reaction Engines maximum air breather mode is Mach 4.5, above that it will explode in flight from internal pressures are too high to operate. Thus, must switch to non air breather rocket mode to operate in atmosphere in hypersonic velocities. Which as a result, makes it not feasible for anything practical. It also takes an immense amount of fuel to function.
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Advanced Additive Manufacturing for Hypersonic Aircraft
Utilizing new methods of fabrication and construction, make it possible to use additive manufacturing, dramatically reducing the time and costs of producing hypersonic platforms from missiles, aircraft, and space capable craft. Instead of aircraft being produced in piece, then bolted together; small platforms can be produced as a single unit and large platforms can be produces in large section and mated without bolting. These techniques include using exotic materials and advanced assembly processes, with an end result of streamlining the production costs and time for hypersonic aircraft; reducing months of assembly to weeks. Overall, this process greatly reduced the cost for producing hypersonic platforms. Even to such an extent that a Hellfire missile costs apx $100,000 but by utilizing our technologies, replacing it with a Mach 8-10 hypersonic missile of our physics/engineering and that missile would cost roughly $75,000 each delivered.
Materials used for these manufacturing processes are not disclosed, but overall, provides a foundation for extremely high stresses and thermodynamics, ideal for hypersonic platforms. This specific methodology and materials applications is many decades ahead of all known programs. Even to the extend of normalized space flight and re-entry, without concern of thermodynamic failure.
*Note, most entities that are experimenting with additive manufacturing for hypersonic aircraft, this makes it mainstream and standardized processes, which also applies for mass production.
What would normally be measured in years and perhaps a decade to go from drawing board to test flights, is reduced to singular months and ready for production within a year maximum.
Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle (U-TBCC)
To date, the closest that NASA and industry have achieved for turbine based aircraft to fly at hypersonic velocities is by mounting a turbine into an aircraft and sharing the inlet with a scramjet or rocket based motor. Reaction Engines Sabre is not able to achieve hypersonic velocities and can only transition into a non air breathing rocket for beyond Mach 4.5
However, utilizing Unified Turbine Based Combine Cycle also known as U-TBCC, the two separate platforms are able to share a common inlet and the dual mode ramjet/scramjet is contained within the engine itself, which allows for a much smaller airframe footprint, thus engingeers are able to then design much higher performance aerial platforms for hypersonic flight, including the ability for constructing true single stage to orbit aircraft by utilizing a modification/version that allows for transition to outside atmosphere propulsion without any other propulsion platforms within the aircraft. By transitioning and developing aircraft to use Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle, this propulsion system opens up new options to replace that airframe deficit for increased fuel capacity and/or payload.
Enhanced Dynamic Cavitation
Dramatically Increasing the efficiency of fuel air mixture for combustion processes at hypersonic velocities within scramjet propulsion platforms. The aspects of these processes are non disclosable.
Dynamic Scramjet Ignition Processes
For optimal scramjet ignition, a process known as Self Start is sought after, but in many cases if the platform becomes out of attitude, the scramjet will ignite. We have already solved this problem which as a result, a scramjet propulsion system can ignite at lower velocities, high velocities, at optimal attitude or not optimal attitude. It doesn't matter, it will ignite anyways at the proper point for maximum thrust capabilities at hypersonic velocities.
Hydrogen vs Kerosene Fuel Sources
Kerosene is an easy fuel to work with, and most western nations developing scramjet platforms use Kerosene for that fact. However, while kerosene has better thermal properties then Hydrogen, Hydrogen is a far superior fuel source in scramjet propulsion flight, do it having a much higher efficiency capability. Because of this aspect, in conjunction with our developments, it allows for a MUCH increased fuel to air mixture, combustion, thrust; and ability for higher speeds; instead of very low hypersonic velocities in the Mach 5-6 range. Instead, Mach 8-10 range, while we have begun developing hypersonic capabilities to exceed 15 in atmosphere within less then 5 years.
Conforming High Pressure Tank Technology for CNG and H2.
As most know in hypersonics, Hydrogen is a superior fuel source, but due to the storage abilities, can only be stored in cylinders thus much less fuel supply. Not anymore, we developed conforming high pressure storage technology for use in aerospace, automotive sectors, maritime, etc; which means any overall shape required for 8,000+ PSI CNG or Hydrogen. For hypersonic platforms, this means the ability to store a much larger volume of hydrogen vs cylinders.
As an example, X-43 flown by Nasa which flew at Mach 9.97. The fuel source was Hydrogen, which is extremely more volatile and combustible then kerosene (JP-7), via a cylinder in the main body. If it had used our technology, that entire section of the airframe would had been an 8,000 PSI H2 tank, which would had yielded 5-6 times the capacity. While the X-43 flew 11 seconds under power at Mach 9.97, at 6 times the fuel capacity would had yielded apx 66 seconds of fuel under power at Mach 9.97. If it had flew slower, around Mach 6, same principles applied would had yielded apx 500 seconds of fuel supply under power (slower speeds required less energy to maintain).
Enhanced Fuel Mixture During Shock Train Interaction
Normally, fuel injection is conducted at the correct insertion point within the shock train for maximum burn/combustion. Our methodologies differ, since almost half the fuel injection is conducted PRE shock train within the isolator, so at the point of isolator injection the fuel enhances the combustion process, which then requires less fuel injection to reach the same level of thrust capabilities.
Improved Bow Shock Interaction
Smoother interaction at hypersonic velocities and mitigating heat/stresses for beyond Mach 6 thermodynamics, which extraordinarily improves Type 3, 4, and 5 shock interaction.
6,000+ Fahrenheit Thermal Resistance
To date, the maximum thermal resistance was tested at AFRL in the spring of 2018, which resulted in a 3,200F thermal resistance for a short duration. This technology, allows for normalized hypersonic thermal resistance of 3,000-3,500F sustained, and up to 6,500F resistance for short endurance, ie 90 seconds or less. 10-20 minute resistance estimate approximately 4,500F +/- 200F.
*** This technology advancement also applies to Aerospike rocket engines, in which it is common for Aerospike's to exceed 4,500-5,000F temperatures, which results in the melting of the reversed bell housing. That melting no longer ocurrs, providing for stable combustion to ocurr for the entire flight envelope
Scramjet Propulsion Side Wall Cooling
With old technologies, side wall cooling is required for hypersonic flight and scramjet propulsion systems, otherwise the isolator and combustion regions of a scramjet would melt, even using advanced ablatives and ceramics, due to their inability to cope with very high temperatures. Using technology we have developed for very high thermodynamics and high stresses, side wall cooling is no longer required, thus removing that variable from the design process and focusing on improved ignition processes and increasing net thrust values.
Lower Threshold for Hypersonic Ignition
Active and adaptive flight dynamics, resulting in the ability for scramjet ignition at a much lower velocity, ie within ramjet envelope, between Mach 2-4, and seamless transition from supersonic to hypersonic flight, ie supersonic ramjet (scramjet). This active and dynamic aspect, has a wide variety of parameters for many flight dynamics, velocities, and altitudes; which means platforms no longer need to be engineered for specific altitude ranges or preset velocities, but those parameters can then be selected during launch configuration and are able to adapt actively in flight.
Dramatically Improved Maneuvering Capabilities at Hypersonic Velocities
Hypersonic vehicles, like their less technologically advanced brethren, use large actuator and the developers hope those controls surfaces do not disintegrate in flight. In reality, it is like rolling the dice, they may or may not survive, hence another reason why the attempt to keep velocities to Mach 6 or below. We have shrunken down control actuators while almost doubling torque and response capabilities specifically for hypersonic dynamics and extreme stresses involved, which makes it possible for maximum input authority for Mach 10 and beyond.
Paradigm Shift in Control Surface Methodologies, Increasing Control Authority (Internal Mechanical Applications)
To date, most control surfaces for hypersonic missile platforms still use fins, similar to lower speed conventional missiles, and some using ducted fins. This is mostly due to lack of comprehension of hypersonic velocities in their own favor. Instead, the body itself incorporates those control surfaces, greatly enhancing the airframe strength, opening up more space for hardware and fuel capacity; while simultaneously enhancing the platforms maneuvering capabilities.
A scramjet missile can then fly like conventional missile platforms, and not straight and level at high altitudes, losing velocity on it's decent trajectory to target. Another added benefit to this aspect, is the ability to extend range greatly, so if anyone elses hypersonic missile platform were developed for 400 mile range, falling out of the sky due to lack of glide capabilities; our platforms can easily reach 600+ miles, with minimal glide deceleration.
This is my first time trying the Taiwan-based brand Pintoo, which makes puzzles out of plastic. This puzzle was a limited-edition that I only saw available at Planet Puzzles about a year ago (they also had Monet's "Nympheas" in the same size).
I'm finding it an interesting change of pace but I'm not sure that I like this material all that much. The pieces fit very tightly: you really need to force them to snap into place, and I wonder how easy these puzzles would be to take apart. Maybe Pintoo assumes that everyone will want to display their finished puzzle as art after completion.
And this is what the white border is all about: the border pieces are all identical and fit anywhere (well, two types which alternate every other place). If you wanted to you could link this puzzle with another 2000 piece puzzle, or two horizontal 1000s, I suppose. Pintoo makes calendar puzzles where all 12 months could be combined. This feature doesn't really interest me at all.
The flaw I'm finding in the material is that although it's quite rigid, it's still thin enough that the pieces can be bent quite easily. They do seem to bend back, but I'd imagine that disassembling this puzzle would leave many pieces not sitting flat.
The image is printed directly onto the plastic, there is no paper face. The quality of the image is very good, and the pieces have a slight texture to them that helps deflect light. The sheen level of the pieces is low to moderate.
The puzzle size is similar to Epoch's small size 2016 piece series, so the pieces are smaller than average. But the cut is not nearly as neat as Epoch's, so the puzzle cut is only of average difficulty, I'd say (although this Monet is a pretty tough image).
I noticed when doing the inner edge (the partially white pieces) that the puzzle has a repeating pattern with two identical 1000 piece sections. This was also a little disappointing since I'm not sure their manufacturing process has the same limitations as cardboard puzzles. I can't figure out if they are using a press or a mold to form the pieces. I opened the box a while ago but I'm pretty sure there were two separate bags and then another small bag with the white pieces.
It's also worth mentioning that the all-white border pieces are in addition to a total of 2000 inner pieces, which run 40 x 50.
Pintoo is now making plastic puzzles in the 4000 piece size, and even offers custom puzzles on its web site up to 9000 pieces (which run about $400 apiece). Indeed, their puzzles are at least twice as expensive as a cardboard of similar size (the 2000 series retail at $55), another reason I won't be going out of my way to collect this brand.
This is at the 5 hr. mark, with no box reference.
MISSION:
Provide the warfighter with 5.56 mm (Ball/Tracer) ammo that improves hard and soft target performance while eliminating more than 2,000 metric tons of lead annually from training ranges.
DESCRIPTION:
The M855A1 Ball Enhanced Performance Round contains an environmentally friendly projectile that eliminates up to 2,000 tons of lead from the manufacturing process each year in direct support of Army commitment to environmental stewardship. The M855A1 is tailored for use in the M-4 weapon system (Colt M4 Carbine and Colt M4A1 Carbine Short Barreled Rifle platforms) but also improves the performance of the M-16 assault rifle and M-249 (FN M249 SAW/LMG) families of weapons. The M855A1 steel penetrator is effective against light armored targets while its three-piece construction maintains operational capabilities against unprotected personnel targets. The M855A1 enhances performance on hard targets or barriers. It contains an improved propellant which reduces flash.
Read more at: asc.army.mil/web/portfolio-item/peo-ammo-5-56-mm-ball-m85...
VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE, Calif.--Officials cut the ribbon Feb. 27 ceremonially opening a brand new education center that will help Airmen stationed at this central coast base achieve their personal and professional education goals.
The $14.2 million center replaced a 60-year-old elementary school campus, which had been used as the education center for more than 40 years.
"We hear the dollar value, and I just can't stress how precious those dollars are in today's fiscal environment," said Col. Keith Balts, 30th Space Wing commander. "The fact that we get to do military construction at all, especially something for the quality of our Airmen and their families, says a lot about the importance we place on education."
One of the center's first customers was Senior Airman Antoine Marshall, 30th Force Support Squadron, who joined the Air Force four years ago with an associate degree in criminal justice.
"I just took the analyzing and interpreting literature CLEP (College Level Examination Program) exam," said Marshall, who's pursuing a bachelor's degree in organizational management. "It was my first one--I passed it. I'm extremely happy!"
The 38,384-square-foot facility includes 20 classrooms, computer lab, testing center, and 75-seat auditorium, as well as offices for various colleges and universities serving the Vandenberg community.
"I think the facility is great," said Marshall. "Overall, it provides a better environment to work and study, and it's just comfortable."
The design-build project was constructed by Corps contractor Teehee-Straub, a joint-venture team from Oceanside, Calif.
"The design was quite extensive, just due to the detail and the location," said Keith Hamilton, project executive for Teehee-Straub. "The site work was very challenging, and I think that was something that brought a lot of character to this building."
Teehee-Straub's 21st century design included sustainable development and energy efficiencies, such as light pollution reduction and water use reduction.
"This is a sustainable building," said Col. Kim Colloton, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Los Angeles District commander. "We can build our buildings smartly, so they can do more; it's more [money] that can go back into the base."
During construction, 75 percent of the construction and demolition debris was diverted from landfills and redirected back to the manufacturing process as reusable and recyclable material. Walk-off mats, exhaust systems and filtered heating and cooling improves indoor air quality. Low-flow fixtures and faucets, high-efficiency drip irrigation and drought-tolerant landscaping reduce potable water use by more than 40 percent. All are efficiencies the contractor believes will achive a LEED Silver rating (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design, a Green Building Council rating system).
"We're just proud to be part of this," said Teehee-Straub managing partner Richard Straub. "The Corps of Engineers is one of our favorite customers, and we love supporting the Air Force in doing a job that will educate a lot of servicemen."
EXHIBITION
100 Best Posters 14
GERMANY, AUSTRIA, SWITZERLAND
MI, MO 11/11/2015, 03/28/2016
MAK Art Print Hall
Already for the tenth time, the MAK in the exhibition 100 Best Posters 14. Germany Austria Switzerland shows the hundred most compelling design concepts in the probably hottest medium of visual everyday culture: the poster. The current winning projects of the popular graphic design competition are characterized by an enigmatic pictural humor, explosive colors as well as precise designs and demonstrate impressively that a poster can be more than just an banal advertising space. Many of the award-winning works furthermore also rely on a subtle play with typography. Innovative ideas can also be found in the manufacturing process: This year's competition shows that you can readily knit posters in high-tech process or use a thermo-insulating space blanket as carrier material for screen printing.
Hardly any medium is such clocked on the consumption and nevertheless sets trends at the cutting edge. "[...] The poster designer challenges himself repeatedly and enjoys himself at gained symbols." Says Götz Gramlich, President of the association 100 Best Posters eV, and he postulats. "A good poster unfolds in the mind of the beholder."
From over 1 800 submitted individual posters, composed of contract work, self-initiated posters/self-promotion as well as student project orders from Germany, Austria and Switzerland, awarded the international jury, consisting of Richard van der Laken (Amsterdam, Chairman), Christof Nardin (Wien), Jiri Oplatek (Basel), Nicolaus Ott (Berlin) and Ariane Spanier (Berlin), the 100 winning posters of the year 2014.
In the competition participated 575 submitters (men and women), of which 48 are from Austria, 128 from Switzerland and 399 from Germany. The leader among the winning 100 best is Switzerland with 51 winning projects, followed by 44 German and 5 Austrian contributions.
The by sensomatic design (Christine Zmölnig and Florian Koch, Vienna) designed catalog offers in addition to the illustrations of all the winning posters and the contacts with the designers also this year a captivating essay by Thomas Friedrich: On the dialectics of image and text in the poster today. In a concise way, he looks at the contextuality of posters and explains the theme facetiously and pictorially based on a poster for a bullfight. Read more in the catalog!
For the corporate design of this year's competition and the new Web Visuals also sensomatic design, Vienna, is responsible. Since June 2014, the new online archive on the homepage of the 100 Best Posters Registered Association offers a comprehensive overview of all award-winning works from the years 2001-2014.
The exhibition takes place in cooperation with 100 Best Posters e. V.
100-beste-plakate.de
Curator Peter Klinger, Deputy Head of the MAK Library and Works on Paper Collection
AUSSTELLUNG
100 Beste Plakate 14
DEUTSCHLAND ÖSTERREICH SCHWEIZ
MI, 11.11.2015–MO, 28.03.2016
MAK-KUNSTBLÄTTERSAAL
Bereits zum zehnten Mal zeigt das MAK in der Ausstellung 100 BESTE PLAKATE 14. Deutschland Österreich Schweiz die einhundert überzeugendsten Gestaltungskonzepte im wohl heißesten Medium der visuellen Alltagskultur: dem Plakat. Die aktuellen Siegerprojekte des beliebten Grafikdesignwettbewerbs bestechen mit hintergründigem Bildwitz, explosiver Farbgebung sowie exakten Ausführungen und demonstrieren eindrücklich, dass ein Plakat mehr als nur banale Werbefläche sein kann. Viele der prämierten Arbeiten setzen außerdem auf ein subtiles Spiel mit Typografie. Innovative Ideen finden sich auch im Herstellungsprozess: Der diesjährige Wettbewerb zeigt, dass man Plakate ohne Weiteres im Hightech-Verfahren stricken oder eine thermo-isolierende Rettungsdecke als Trägermaterial für einen Siebdruck verwenden kann.
Kaum ein Medium ist derart auf den Verbrauch hin getaktet und setzt dennoch Trends am Puls der Zeit. „[…] der Plakatgestalter fordert sich immer wieder selbst heraus und erfreut sich an gewonnenen Sinnbildern.“ so Götz Gramlich, Präsident des Vereins 100 Beste Plakate e. V., und er postuliert: „Ein gutes Plakat entfaltet sich im Kopf des Betrachters.“
Aus über 1 800 eingereichten Einzelplakaten, zusammengesetzt aus Auftragsarbeiten, selbst initiierten Plakaten/Eigenwerbungen sowie studentischen Projektaufträgen aus Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz, prämierte die international besetzte Fachjury, bestehend aus Richard van der Laken (Amsterdam, Vorsitz), Christof Nardin (Wien), Jiri Oplatek (Basel), Nicolaus Ott (Berlin) und Ariane Spanier (Berlin), die 100 Siegerplakate des Jahres 2014.
Am Wettbewerb hatten sich 575 EinreicherInnen beteiligt, davon 48 aus Österreich, 128 aus der Schweiz und 399 aus Deutschland. Spitzenreiter unter den prämierten 100 Besten ist die Schweiz mit 51 Siegerprojekten, gefolgt von 44 deutschen und 5 österreichischen Beiträgen.
Der von sensomatic design (Christine Zmölnig und Florian Koch, Wien) gestaltete Katalog bietet neben den Abbildungen aller Siegerplakate und den Kontakten zu den GestalterInnen auch dieses Jahr einen bestechenden Aufsatz von Thomas Friedrich: Zur Dialektik von Bild und Text im Plakat heute. In pointierter Form geht er auf die Kontextualität von Plakaten ein und erklärt das Thema witzig und bildhaft anhand eines Plakats für einen Stierkampf. Mehr dazu im Katalog!
Für das Corporate Design des diesjährigen Wettbewerbs und die neuen Web-Visuals zeichnet ebenfalls sensomatic design, Wien, verantwortlich. Seit Juni 2014 bietet das neue Online-Archiv auf der Homepage der 100 Beste Plakate e. V. einen umfassenden Überblick aller prämierten Arbeiten aus den Jahren 2001 bis 2014.
Die Ausstellung findet in Kooperation mit 100 Beste Plakate e. V. statt.
100-beste-plakate.de
Kurator: Peter Klinger, Stellvertretende Leitung MAK-Bibliothek und Kunstblättersammlung
VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE, Calif.--Officials cut the ribbon Feb. 27 ceremonially opening a brand new education center that will help Airmen stationed at this central coast base achieve their personal and professional education goals.
The $14.2 million center replaced a 60-year-old elementary school campus, which had been used as the education center for more than 40 years.
"We hear the dollar value, and I just can't stress how precious those dollars are in today's fiscal environment," said Col. Keith Balts, 30th Space Wing commander. "The fact that we get to do military construction at all, especially something for the quality of our Airmen and their families, says a lot about the importance we place on education."
One of the center's first customers was Senior Airman Antoine Marshall, 30th Force Support Squadron, who joined the Air Force four years ago with an associate degree in criminal justice.
"I just took the analyzing and interpreting literature CLEP (College Level Examination Program) exam," said Marshall, who's pursuing a bachelor's degree in organizational management. "It was my first one--I passed it. I'm extremely happy!"
The 38,384-square-foot facility includes 20 classrooms, computer lab, testing center, and 75-seat auditorium, as well as offices for various colleges and universities serving the Vandenberg community.
"I think the facility is great," said Marshall. "Overall, it provides a better environment to work and study, and it's just comfortable."
The design-build project was constructed by Corps contractor Teehee-Straub, a joint-venture team from Oceanside, Calif.
"The design was quite extensive, just due to the detail and the location," said Keith Hamilton, project executive for Teehee-Straub. "The site work was very challenging, and I think that was something that brought a lot of character to this building."
Teehee-Straub's 21st century design included sustainable development and energy efficiencies, such as light pollution reduction and water use reduction.
"This is a sustainable building," said Col. Kim Colloton, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Los Angeles District commander. "We can build our buildings smartly, so they can do more; it's more [money] that can go back into the base."
During construction, 75 percent of the construction and demolition debris was diverted from landfills and redirected back to the manufacturing process as reusable and recyclable material. Walk-off mats, exhaust systems and filtered heating and cooling improves indoor air quality. Low-flow fixtures and faucets, high-efficiency drip irrigation and drought-tolerant landscaping reduce potable water use by more than 40 percent. All are efficiencies the contractor believes will achive a LEED Silver rating (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design, a Green Building Council rating system).
"We're just proud to be part of this," said Teehee-Straub managing partner Richard Straub. "The Corps of Engineers is one of our favorite customers, and we love supporting the Air Force in doing a job that will educate a lot of servicemen."
Graham Harwood (UK), Matsuko Yokokoji (JP).
A coal-fired boiler powers a network of computers exploring the relationships between power and media. Coal Fired Computers explores the ecologies that have created and maintained power, and the subsequent health residues and crisis of fuelling that power. The work responds to the displacement of coal production to distant India, China or Vietnam and our industrial heritage, in particular the work of Charles Parsons whose steam turbine is used to produce 40% of today’s electricity. In many countries this rate is much higher (more than 70% in India and China).
According to the World Health Organization, 318.000 deaths occur annually from chronic bronchitis and emphysema caused by exposure to coal dust. The common perception is that wealthy countries have put this all behind them, displacing coal dust into the lungs of unrecorded, unknown miners in distant lands, coal returning in our lives in the form of cheap and apparently clean goods we consume.
Coal fired energy not only powers our computers here in Europe, but is integral to the production of the 300.000.000 computers made each year. 81% of the energy used in a computer’s life cycle is expended in the manufacturing process, now taking place in countries with high levels of coal consumption.
Graham Harwood (UK), Matsuko Yokokoji (JP).
A coal-fired boiler powers a network of computers exploring the relationships between power and media. Coal Fired Computers explores the ecologies that have created and maintained power, and the subsequent health residues and crisis of fuelling that power. The work responds to the displacement of coal production to distant India, China or Vietnam and our industrial heritage, in particular the work of Charles Parsons whose steam turbine is used to produce 40% of today’s electricity. In many countries this rate is much higher (more than 70% in India and China).
According to the World Health Organization, 318.000 deaths occur annually from chronic bronchitis and emphysema caused by exposure to coal dust. The common perception is that wealthy countries have put this all behind them, displacing coal dust into the lungs of unrecorded, unknown miners in distant lands, coal returning in our lives in the form of cheap and apparently clean goods we consume.
Coal fired energy not only powers our computers here in Europe, but is integral to the production of the 300.000.000 computers made each year. 81% of the energy used in a computer’s life cycle is expended in the manufacturing process, now taking place in countries with high levels of coal consumption.
It is chilly and rainy in Arizona for Super Bowl 48 but BMW turned up the heat with their all-electric i3 and hybrid i8 sports car. To add additional flavor to the recipe New England Patriots’ starting corner Kyle Arrington and wife VaShonda Arrington joined the experience for the energetic weekend festivities.
Kyle spent a few days in both vehicles during his activities, which included stops at the Nike Football Super Bowl Hospitality Gifting Suite at the immaculate Scottsdale Resort & Conference Center, the NFL Experience, family outings and dinner with his spouse. Vashonda’s centerpiece moment was raising funds for the Off the Field Player’s Wives Association’s “14th Annual Super Bowl Fashion Show” held at the upscale Scottsdale Fashion Mall. The wives, kids and a handful of former NFL players walked the runway with grace and style. Guests included Holly Robinson Peete, Antonio Cromardie, Steve Young, Kevin Hart and many more. She enjoyed the earthly interior of the i3 and spoke passionately about the need regarding increased sustainability in the world.
The mind is driven by thoughts and fueled by inventive answers. The i3 is 100% pure electric and the i8 is a plug-in hybrid sports car, which means its power is sourced from both gasoline and electricity. The i8 is comprised of a Life module and a Drive module. The 3-liter gasoline motor is placed in the rear and the smaller electric engine is housed up front. In addition, the i8 is essentially an AWD vehicle channeling traction from both axles simultaneously but doesn’t utilize the company’s hallmark xDrive system. A few common i8 performance specs include:
•0 to 60 mph = 4.2 seconds
•Top speed = 155 mph (electronically limited)
•Electric only top speed = 75 mph
•Pure electric range = 22 miles
Born electric, the i3 is engineered with BMW’s LifeDrive architecture, which is also structured into two categories, the Life Module and the Drive Module. Comprised of high-strength carbon, the Life Module protects and provides comfort for the driver and passengers. The second platform, the Drive Module, encompasses the electric drive system, the suspension and the HVAC. Since the car is lighter, the liquid-cooled lithium-ion battery (developed in-house by BMW) is smaller and only needs three hours for a full stage-2 (240-volt) charge. Additionally, BMW attempts to use as much renewable energy as possible for the manufacturing process of the carbon fiber i3.
The journey continues towards educating the world on the benefits of going green. BMW is both an innovator and leader in this technology category and has already spearheaded a positive movement. Expect more BMW i products down the line since they have only just begun.
VTOL - Hypersonic Plane - High Supersonic - Scramjet - IO Aircraft - Iteration 4
Early preview (Iteration 4) of an entirely new type of aircraft, no info is on the net yet and won't be for a while. RANGER - 2 Passenger VTOL Hypersonic Plane
www.ioaircraft.com/hypersonic/ranger.php
Drew Blair
www.linkedin.com/in/drew-b-25485312/
Vertical take off and landing - High Supersonic into Hypersonic Realm. Economy cruise above Mach 4, and can accelerate to beyond Mach 8. Non VTOL, could reach LEO. With a range of 5,000+ nm (8,000-10,000nm non vtol). Fuel H2, reducing fuel weight 95%.
Length, 35ft (10.67m), span 18ft (6m).
Propulsion, 2 Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle. 2 Unified thrust producing gas turbine generators that provide the power for the central lifting fan (electric, not shaft driven) and the rear VTOL.
Estimated market price, $25-$30 million in production. New York to Dubai in an hour.
All based on my own technology advances in Hypersonics which make Lockheed and Boeing look ancient.
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Advanced Additive Manufacturing for Hypersonic Aircraft
Utilizing new methods of fabrication and construction, make it possible to use additive manufacturing, dramatically reducing the time and costs of producing hypersonic platforms from missiles, aircraft, and space capable craft. Instead of aircraft being produced in piece, then bolted together; small platforms can be produced as a single unit and large platforms can be produces in large section and mated without bolting. These techniques include using exotic materials and advanced assembly processes, with an end result of streamlining the production costs and time for hypersonic aircraft; reducing months of assembly to weeks. Overall, this process greatly reduced the cost for producing hypersonic platforms. Even to such an extent that a Hellfire missile costs apx $100,000 but by utilizing our technologies, replacing it with a Mach 8-10 hypersonic missile of our physics/engineering and that missile would cost roughly $75,000 each delivered.
Materials used for these manufacturing processes are not disclosed, but overall, provides a foundation for extremely high stresses and thermodynamics, ideal for hypersonic platforms. This specific methodology and materials applications is many decades ahead of all known programs. Even to the extend of normalized space flight and re-entry, without concern of thermodynamic failure.
*Note, most entities that are experimenting with additive manufacturing for hypersonic aircraft, this makes it mainstream and standardized processes, which also applies for mass production.
What would normally be measured in years and perhaps a decade to go from drawing board to test flights, is reduced to singular months and ready for production within a year maximum.
Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle (U-TBCC)
To date, the closest that NASA and industry have achieved for turbine based aircraft to fly at hypersonic velocities is by mounting a turbine into an aircraft and sharing the inlet with a scramjet or rocket based motor. Reaction Engines Sabre is not able to achieve hypersonic velocities and can only transition into a non air breathing rocket for beyond Mach 4.5
However, utilizing Unified Turbine Based Combine Cycle also known as U-TBCC, the two separate platforms are able to share a common inlet and the dual mode ramjet/scramjet is contained within the engine itself, which allows for a much smaller airframe footprint, thus engingeers are able to then design much higher performance aerial platforms for hypersonic flight, including the ability for constructing true single stage to orbit aircraft by utilizing a modification/version that allows for transition to outside atmosphere propulsion without any other propulsion platforms within the aircraft. By transitioning and developing aircraft to use Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle, this propulsion system opens up new options to replace that airframe deficit for increased fuel capacity and/or payload.
Enhanced Dynamic Cavitation
Dramatically Increasing the efficiency of fuel air mixture for combustion processes at hypersonic velocities within scramjet propulsion platforms. The aspects of these processes are non disclosable.
Dynamic Scramjet Ignition Processes
For optimal scramjet ignition, a process known as Self Start is sought after, but in many cases if the platform becomes out of attitude, the scramjet will ignite. We have already solved this problem which as a result, a scramjet propulsion system can ignite at lower velocities, high velocities, at optimal attitude or not optimal attitude. It doesn't matter, it will ignite anyways at the proper point for maximum thrust capabilities at hypersonic velocities.
Hydrogen vs Kerosene Fuel Sources
Kerosene is an easy fuel to work with, and most western nations developing scramjet platforms use Kerosene for that fact. However, while kerosene has better thermal properties then Hydrogen, Hydrogen is a far superior fuel source in scramjet propulsion flight, do it having a much higher efficiency capability. Because of this aspect, in conjunction with our developments, it allows for a MUCH increased fuel to air mixture, combustion, thrust; and ability for higher speeds; instead of very low hypersonic velocities in the Mach 5-6 range. Instead, Mach 8-10 range, while we have begun developing hypersonic capabilities to exceed 15 in atmosphere within less then 5 years.
Conforming High Pressure Tank Technology for CNG and H2.
As most know in hypersonics, Hydrogen is a superior fuel source, but due to the storage abilities, can only be stored in cylinders thus much less fuel supply. Not anymore, we developed conforming high pressure storage technology for use in aerospace, automotive sectors, maritime, etc; which means any overall shape required for 8,000+ PSI CNG or Hydrogen. For hypersonic platforms, this means the ability to store a much larger volume of hydrogen vs cylinders.
As an example, X-43 flown by Nasa which flew at Mach 9.97. The fuel source was Hydrogen, which is extremely more volatile and combustible then kerosene (JP-7), via a cylinder in the main body. If it had used our technology, that entire section of the airframe would had been an 8,000 PSI H2 tank, which would had yielded 5-6 times the capacity. While the X-43 flew 11 seconds under power at Mach 9.97, at 6 times the fuel capacity would had yielded apx 66 seconds of fuel under power at Mach 9.97. If it had flew slower, around Mach 6, same principles applied would had yielded apx 500 seconds of fuel supply under power (slower speeds required less energy to maintain).
Enhanced Fuel Mixture During Shock Train Interaction
Normally, fuel injection is conducted at the correct insertion point within the shock train for maximum burn/combustion. Our methodologies differ, since almost half the fuel injection is conducted PRE shock train within the isolator, so at the point of isolator injection the fuel enhances the combustion process, which then requires less fuel injection to reach the same level of thrust capabilities.
Improved Bow Shock Interaction
Smoother interaction at hypersonic velocities and mitigating heat/stresses for beyond Mach 6 thermodynamics, which extraordinarily improves Type 3, 4, and 5 shock interaction.
6,000+ Fahrenheit Thermal Resistance
To date, the maximum thermal resistance was tested at AFRL in the spring of 2018, which resulted in a 3,200F thermal resistance for a short duration. This technology, allows for normalized hypersonic thermal resistance of 3,000-3,500F sustained, and up to 6,500F resistance for short endurance, ie 90 seconds or less. 10-20 minute resistance estimate approximately 4,500F +/- 200F.
*** This technology advancement also applies to Aerospike rocket engines, in which it is common for Aerospike's to exceed 4,500-5,000F temperatures, which results in the melting of the reversed bell housing. That melting no longer ocurrs, providing for stable combustion to ocurr for the entire flight envelope
Scramjet Propulsion Side Wall Cooling
With old technologies, side wall cooling is required for hypersonic flight and scramjet propulsion systems, otherwise the isolator and combustion regions of a scramjet would melt, even using advanced ablatives and ceramics, due to their inability to cope with very high temperatures. Using technology we have developed for very high thermodynamics and high stresses, side wall cooling is no longer required, thus removing that variable from the design process and focusing on improved ignition processes and increasing net thrust values.
Lower Threshold for Hypersonic Ignition
Active and adaptive flight dynamics, resulting in the ability for scramjet ignition at a much lower velocity, ie within ramjet envelope, between Mach 2-4, and seamless transition from supersonic to hypersonic flight, ie supersonic ramjet (scramjet). This active and dynamic aspect, has a wide variety of parameters for many flight dynamics, velocities, and altitudes; which means platforms no longer need to be engineered for specific altitude ranges or preset velocities, but those parameters can then be selected during launch configuration and are able to adapt actively in flight.
Dramatically Improved Maneuvering Capabilities at Hypersonic Velocities
Hypersonic vehicles, like their less technologically advanced brethren, use large actuator and the developers hope those controls surfaces do not disintegrate in flight. In reality, it is like rolling the dice, they may or may not survive, hence another reason why the attempt to keep velocities to Mach 6 or below. We have shrunken down control actuators while almost doubling torque and response capabilities specifically for hypersonic dynamics and extreme stresses involved, which makes it possible for maximum input authority for Mach 10 and beyond.
Paradigm Shift in Control Surface Methodologies, Increasing Control Authority (Internal Mechanical Applications)
To date, most control surfaces for hypersonic missile platforms still use fins, similar to lower speed conventional missiles, and some using ducted fins. This is mostly due to lack of comprehension of hypersonic velocities in their own favor. Instead, the body itself incorporates those control surfaces, greatly enhancing the airframe strength, opening up more space for hardware and fuel capacity; while simultaneously enhancing the platforms maneuvering capabilities.
A scramjet missile can then fly like conventional missile platforms, and not straight and level at high altitudes, losing velocity on it's decent trajectory to target. Another added benefit to this aspect, is the ability to extend range greatly, so if anyone elses hypersonic missile platform were developed for 400 mile range, falling out of the sky due to lack of glide capabilities; our platforms can easily reach 600+ miles, with minimal glide deceleration.
Shimano has released only 1000 of these sets to North America. If you are a collector or someone that just likes the best, than this is for you. This group is almost too beautiful to put on your bike.
The Dura-Ace name speaks for itself. You can feel the quality and see the attention to detail when you hold the parts. It is quality that has made Dura-Ace successful for 25 years.
The shifts are very fast and accurate with a smooth action. The refined dual pivot brakes stop on a dime even in wet conditions. The bearings of the bottom bracket and hubs are smooth. The new SPDR pedal locks your foot to the pedal better than anything we have tried.
The components are based on the 1999 Dura-Ace 7700 series components, but there are significant differences. Component surfaces have been hand polished to a mirror like finish and more titanium hardware is used throughout the group. Each components is also identified with a special 25th Anniversary emblem. Detailed specifications are provided with the group.
The components are packaged in ready-to-display condition in a handsome aluminum presentation case which also provides ample protection for long term storage. The package also includes a book which details the history of the group, briefly explains the manufacturing process, and provides comments from the people who have been closely involved with Dura-Ace over the years.
When Dura-Ace first appeared in Europe, cycling enthusiasts thought there was little chance a Japanese component maker could make inroads into the conservative and tradition-bound sport of professional bicycle racing. Much to everyone’s surprise, Shimano’s commitment to quality, innovative engineering, and attention to the needs of racing cyclists resulted in Dura-Ace becoming a very popular and well respected component group. It is estimated that more than 60 percent of high-end road racers are now riding Dura-Ace.
The dependability and functionality of the components are integral to the performance of the racing bicycle and the athlete riding it. Dura-Ace is designed to create a highly efficient link between the racer and the bicycle. It’s an interface that allows racing cyclists to concentrate more on the race, and less on controlling the bicycle. As a result, Dura-Ace is now recognized by road racers and cycling enthusiasts around the world as the performance standard for racing components.
INB2202-220x200cm-1000g-C-AAA
Mulberry Silk filled comforters, Queen size silk comforter with 300TC cotton cover. Comforter with loops that coordinate with a large selection inboo duvet covers.
The hand-stretched silk fibers is AAA Mulberry Silk,Oeko-Tex rating. Natural silk has anti-allergic, anti-mite,anti-bacterial, skin-friendly and the silk fleece sheds surplus heat by wicking away moisture from your body - keeping you cool and comfortable. the use of natural silk duvet can really do improve human health. Further more by being combined with a silk fleece blanket on the top, the silk comforter will be very flexible to adjust the temperature.
Features:
Significant benefits of silk comforters:
Silk is a natural insulator:Depending on the temperature, silk duvets either draw heat away from the body, or traps in the warmth. In the winter, the large fibres in silk duvets, reduce heat loss from the body, but in summer, the silk fleece sheds surplus heat by wicking away moisture from your body - keeping you cool and comfortable.
This also means that one silk duvet/quilt will satisfy two sleepers with different warmth needs.
Silk is naturally hypoallergenic: Silk duvets/quilts are resistant to dust and house mites, mildew, mould, and rot that attacks other fibres. Sufferers of asthma, blocked sinuses or other hay fever symptoms, can find relief in silk duvet bedding, as well as those with allergies to down or other synthetic material.
Silk is composed of 18 amino acids: The same amino acids that are found in our own bodies. Medical studies have show that this can help blood circulation and your digestion system during sleep. It also helps to reduce the discomfort of itchy skin and aids in preventing vascular sclerosis.
Silk duvets are also suited to children: Their lightweight nature and breathable qualities ensure a regulated, even, sleep temperature with no added chemicals for a healthier sleeping environment.
Silk duvets provide the same warmth as down duvets. They are comfortable all year round due to their insulating properties.
Specification:
1. The Silk comforters Silk duvets Silk blanket cover options:
100% cotton cover: (conventional)
233TC twill, 300TC,400TC Sateen and Jacquard cotton,
100% silk cover: (Luxury)
8mm, 15mm100% silk habotai, 16mm, 19mm, 23mm 100% silk/cotton Jacquard, 15mm silk, 16mm Pure silk Charmeuse.
Eco friendly Recyclable fiber fabrics: (low cost solution)
bamboo fiber Viscose, 100% Tancel,
Polyester fabrics: (lowest cost solution)
Polyester pongee
2. Filling material: 100% mulberry silk / 100% tussash silk or mixed depends on customers' requirement.
3. Filling Weight
Available in lightweight (summer), medium (all season) Summer and winter.
Summer-weight silk duvet (250gsm) is perfect for warm summer nights. ( equivalent of a 4 tog)
All Year round (winter)-weight (400gsm ) is ideal all year round for most people in a centrally heated environment.
Medium to winter duvet (aprrox 550-600gsm) is ideal for cold winter ( equivalent of a 9 tog)
Combining either two summer weights or a summer and winter silk duvet will allow maximum use of the quilts when you need more or less warmth.
Conventional size:
150x210cm, 180x210cm, 200x230cm, 220x240cm
Full sizes available:
1.2m single bed:
150x180cm
150x200cm
150x210cm
160x210cm
1.5m twin bed:
180x210cm
180x220cm
180x230cm
200x230cm
1.8m Queen bed:
220x240cm
Child bed:
100x150cm
USA size:
Baby 30" x 36"
Twin 68" x 86"
Full 78" x 86"
Queen 90" x 86"
King 104" x 94"
Cal king 108" x 98"
4. Manufacturing process:
The long-fiber mulberry silk is hand stretched and then hundred layered in a grid pattern until the desired tog rating and weight is achieved. Then the silk is hand stitched or box stitched, hand tacked. Hand Tufted on the the duvet case(shell) to prevent the silk filling moving.
5. Machine box stitch quilting pattern selection
diamond stitch(30x30cm or custom),
Ring stitch
Light weight box stitched silk duvet is ideal as a Summer quilt, bedspread, coverlet and throw.
Easy for machine wash.
6. Silk Quilt Edges Trimming options and decorative designs:
Piping edge with different color, matchingh or contrast
decorative logo by scalding hot drilling plans
5cm -10cm 100% pure charmeuse silk border binding, matchingh or contrast
5cm -10cm polyster satin silk border binding, matchingh or contrast
7. Inspecting opening & loops:
Depending on requirment recommend using a duvet (comforter) cover to protect and prolong the use of this beautiful silk comforter.
8. Cover Color: white, light pink, custom.
9. Packing : each with a plastic bag, match with exterior retail pacing: non-woven bag, cotton bag, gift packing
10. Washing:
Machine-washable, dry wash, hand wash
11. Minimun order quantity: 100pcs per color
12.Inquiry Number: INB2201-220x200 cm-1000g-C-Subsidiary details A
Nomenclature:
INB2201-150x210cm-700g-C-Subsidiary details
INB: INBOO products
-2201: product code for Mulberry Silk filled comforters, Silk duvets
-150x210cm: Silk duvets Size
-700g: filling weight
-C : Cotton cover
-S : Silk cover
-- Subsidiary details: For more details
Application:
Bedroom health sleeping
Midtown Manhattan, Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States
Built in 1929-31, Shreve, Lamb & Harmon’s 500 Fifth Avenue Building is a soaring 59-story Art Deco skyscraper, located at the northwest corner of 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue. The building was constructed concurrently with the Empire State Building. Because the site was so valuable and so small, measuring only 100 feet by 208 feet, the building was designed to the maximum height and floor area allowable under the 1916 zoning code. Located in two zoning districts with differing setback requirements, it is asymmetrically massed with setbacks at the 18th, 22nd, and 25th stories on Fifth Avenue and a recessed light court beginning at the eighth story and setbacks at the 23rd, 28th, and 34th stories on West 42nd Street. Sheathed in limestone, terra cotta, and buff brick, the facades are enriched with carefully scaled Art Deco motifs, which accentuate the building’s sculptural massing and emphasize its verticality.
On Fifth Avenue the limestone and black granite main entrance is treated as a pylon framed by stylized gilded palmettos and capped by an allegorical relief by sculptor Edmond Amateis “symbolizing the genius of the modern skyscraper.” Capping the setbacks and tower are a series of angled brick and terra-cotta panels decorated with chevrons that read as pleated cresting against the skyline. When it opened in March 1931, 500 Fifth Avenue was the crowning achievement of real estate developer Walter J. Salmon, who was responsible for rebuilding the north side of West 42nd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues in the first decades of the 20th century. Shreve, Lamb & Harmon was one of the leading architectural firms in the country specializing in skyscraper design. In addition to 500 Fifth Avenue, Shreve Lamb & Harmon designed the Empire State Building . 500 Fifth Avenue continues to be used as an office building with street-level stores.
DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS
History and Development of Midtown and the 500 Fifth Avenue Site
The area surrounding Fifth Avenue between 42nd Street and the southern end of Central Park remained rural in character until the second half of the nineteenth century, when speculative residences and mansions began to be constructed on lots newly mapped by the city. By 1900, the character of the neighborhood on the blocks north of 42nd Street began to change with the construction of, or the conversion of private residences to, exclusive retail shops, restaurants, and office buildings. By 1923, so many banks and trust companies had established uptown branches near the intersection of Park Avenue and 42nd Street and on the blocks of Fifth Avenue north of 42nd Street, that Rider’s New York City guide reported the area was popularly known as “Little Wall Street.” 42nd Street, which linked this business district to Times Square, became one of the busiest thoroughfares in New York while Fifth Avenue remained the most fashionable shopping street in the city, leading Real Estate Record & Guide to declare the parcel at 500 Fifth Avenue, at the northwest corner of 42nd Street, as “the most valuable building site on Manhattan Island north of Wall Street.”
In 1903 a young and ambitious real estate entrepreneur named Walter J. Salomon , who later changed his surname to Salmon, leased the corner lot and the adjacent L-shaped lot, which fronted on Fifth Avenue and West 42nd Street. Salmon then converted the existing building, the eight-story Hotel Bristol, into a commercial and office building and renamed it the Bristol Building. This property was to form the core of Salmon’s redevelopment plan for 500 Fifth Avenue, his crowning achievement as a real estate man and the final puzzle piece in the transformation of the entire block front into an imposing wall of modern commercial structures.
New York’s Art Deco Skyscrapers
America’s involvement in World War I, followed by a recession in the early 1920s, caused a construction lull in New York City, as in other parts of the country. By the mid 1920s, the economy had bounced back, and demand for new and larger commercial buildings was booming. Fifteen new office skyscrapers were erected in New York in 1925, and 1926 saw the construction of 30 more. This building frenzy lasted through the 1929 stock market crash, as construction went forward in the early 1930s on buildings that had already been planned and financed; although largely finished by 1932, the boom left behind a “rich array of towers,” many of them executed in what is known today as the Art Deco style. Indeed, several of New York’s most spectacular skyscrapers from this period—including the Chanin Building , the Chrysler Building , the Empire State Building and the General Electric Building , all designated New York City Landmarks, are among the country’s most significant examples of Art Deco design.
Into the 1910s, no limits on building height or bulk existed in New York City. In 1916, New York implemented the nation’s first zoning regulations, which permitted unrestricted height on one quarter of a building site, but required skyscrapers to taper as they rose to allow light and air to reach the street. Six years later, architect and critic Harvey Wiley Corbett and architectural delineator Hugh Ferriss published a group of influential renderings that explored zoning’s impact on the shape of tall buildings. Presented as a series of illustrations progressing from the abstract, pyramidal shape of the zoning envelope to a stepped-back practicable building form, these drawings catalyzed a trend in which “buildings endeavored to take on the feeling of sculpted mountains, their shape suddenly more important than their historical detail or even their style.” So pervasive were the new stepped-back skyscrapers that by the mid-1920s, architects and critics spoke of an emerging “setback style”.
Another important influence on 1920s skyscraper design was Eliel Saarinen’s 1922 competition entry for the Chicago Tribune’s new tower. With its straightforward shape, vertical emphasis, and limited ornament, Saarinen’s ahistorical design was “taken to be style-less and was thought in the twenties to have freed architects from what seemed the inevitable alternatives in skyscraper design, Gothic solutions on the one hand and vertically stretched Classicism on the other.”
The issue of what constituted “modern” design was expounded upon in the press and occupied many architects, who sought an appropriate means of expressing the societal changes brought about by new technology and manufacturing processes. A dichotomy existed, according to Ada Louise Huxtable, between the “modern” architecture of Europe and the “modernistic” new skyscrapers of New York:
‘Modern’ was radical, reductive, and reformist; ‘modernistic’ was richly decorative and attached to conservative and hedonistic values. ‘Modern’ was the austere, abstract, elite, avant-garde work of … [Walter] Gropius, Mies [van der Rohe], and Le Corbusier, united in its early days under the rubric of the International Style. ‘Modernistic’ was neither pure nor revolutionary; it fused the ornamental and the exotic for what was really the last great decorative style.
Only a handful of International Style skyscrapers were constructed in the United States before World War II. Far more popular was the “modernistic” style, which was later termed “Art Deco” based on its debt to the 1925 Paris Exposition Internationale des Arts Decoratifs et Industriels Modernes. Flamboyant, dynamic, and dazzling to the eye, Art Deco’s primary characteristic was its “sumptuous ornament, and the lush textures and colors achieved by combining several materials, such as stone, brick, terra cotta, and metal.” Gilding and shiny materials were frequently used, and favorite decorative motifs, drawn from the natural world and geometric forms, included “spirals, sunflowers, steps, zigzags, triangles, double triangles, hexagons, fragmented circles, and seashells.” Frequently, facades were given a woven fabric treatment, in buildings including One Wall Street and the 21 West Street Building . Wall surfaces read as thin decorative veneers, as “stage sets” to a public infatuated with movies and the theater.
As Art Deco was conquering New York, a new skyscraper form, the slab, emerged. Into the 1920s, the city’s tallest skyscrapers were typically constructed on enormous lots. These sites were big enough, as with the Chrysler Building, to allow for “geometrically pure” square, needle-like towers that broke free of their bases and pierced the sky. But as large lots became rarer and developers sought to construct tall office buildings on narrow lots, this approach became unfeasible; the square tower, if made too small, lost too much of its internal space to elevators. As a result, new skyscrapers on narrower lots took on a slab-like form, their long and rectangular upper stories seemingly extruded from their bases. The pioneering slab skyscraper was H. Douglas Ives’ and Sloan & Robertson’s 38-story Fred F. French Building at Fifth Avenue and 45th Street, which was constructed on a relatively small lot.
But the master of the slab at the end of the 1920s was Raymond Hood, whose Daily News Building marked the most radical departure of any tall building from previous skyscraper form. Despite the rich Art Deco bas-relief over its main entrance, Hood’s building, with its artfully planned setbacks and flat, unornamented roofline, came closer to abstract sculpture than any skyscraper before; falling, in style, “between modern and modernistic,” it forsook the decorated crown of the Art Deco skyscraper and approached the purity of the International Style. Hood built upon his experience with the Daily News Building in designing another of the city’s great slab skyscrapers, the RCA Building at Rockefeller Center , which was completed in 1933.
Located just three blocks from the French Building, and similar in design and materials to the Daily News Building, 500 Fifth Avenue’s slender, slab-form tower situated the building within this group of transitional skyscrapers, precursors to the postwar office building. But with the Depression remaining entrenched and money for office buildings drying up, few Art Deco skyscrapers were completed in New York after Rockefeller Center, and the style, increasingly employed for government and institutional buildings, became considerably more restrained.
Shreve, Lamb & Harmon Richmond Harold Shreve William Frederick Lamb
The architectural firm of Shreve, Lamb & Harmon, formed in 1929, was one of New York City’s premier design teams, known primarily for their modern office buildings and especially the Empire State Building . The three principal designers had traditional architectural educations and experience with important New York firms before they joined together and created buildings specifically adapted to the design requirements and technological advances of the modern era.
Richmond Harold Shreve was born in Cornwallis, Nova Scotia. He studied architecture at Cornell University, graduating in 1902, and spent the next four years on the faculty of the School of Architecture there. While at Cornell, he supervised the construction of Goldwin Smith Hall, designed by the New York firm of Carrère & Hastings, and at the conclusion of the project he joined the firm. William Frederick Lamb, son of New York builder William Lamb, was born in Brooklyn. Graduating from Williams College in 1904, Shreve subsequently studied at the Columbia University School of Architecture, and then went to Paris to study at the Atelier Deglane. After receiving his diploma from the École des Beaux Arts in 1911, Lamb returned to New York and joined the firm of Carrère & Hastings where he met Shreve. In 1920, Shreve and Lamb became partners in the new firm of Carrère & Hastings, Shreve & Lamb.
By 1924, they decided to establish their own partnership, and five years later they were joined by Arthur Loomis Harmon to form Shreve, Lamb & Harmon. Harmon, who had been born in Chicago, studied at the Art Institute there and graduated from Columbia University School of Architecture in 1901. He worked as a designer in the firm of McKim, Mead & White between 1902 and 1911. From 1912 to 1913, he was an associate in the firm of Wallis & Goodwillie, and then practiced alone until joining Shreve and Lamb. His works from that period include battle monuments at Tours, Cantigny and Somme-Py in France, a YMCA in Jerusalem, and the award-winning Shelton Hotel in New York.
Design and Construction of the 500 Fifth Avenue Building
With his acquisition of the properties at nos. 3, 5, 7, and 9 West 42nd Street in 1915, Walter J. Salmon had assembled a parcel of 20,900 square feet at 500 Fifth Avenue, about the minimum size necessary for profitable redevelopment. In 1922, Gerry Estates, Inc. entered into an agreement with Salmon to redevelop the site. With other projects in the works, including the adjacent Salmon Tower at 11-27 West 42nd Street, Salmon delayed beginning work on the corner site until the summer of 1929. At that time he announced plans for a fifty-eight story building with frontage of 100 feet on Fifth Avenue and 208 feet on 42nd Street to be built to the design of Shreve, Lamb & Harmon. Given its status as the second most valuable piece of real estate in Manhattan, redevelopment of this site was greatly anticipated among the real estate community and by the public at large. An article in the Real Estate Record & Guide described the high-profile nature of the project:
For years residents of the city and out-of-town visitors alike have speculated as to the future of this corner, wondering that so prominent a location—at “the crossroads of the world”—should have been neglected in the modern development of Fifth Avenue as the leading shopping street of the world and of the Grand Central area as the midtown financial and business district…With the fashionable shopping district definitely extending its limits above Forty-second Street; with the north and south flow of automobile and pedestrian traffic and the cross flow between Grand Central Station and Times Square making the intersection one of the busiest in the world, and with other building under way, the time appeared ripe for an improvement on this corner.
The construction of the office building at 500 Fifth Avenue had a significant impact on the eventual development of the adjacent parcels, because its planning affected the zoning of the entire Fifth Avenue block front. The zoning code permitted a taller building on 42nd Street than on Fifth Avenue, so Salmon acquired a long-term lease on the adjacent four-story converted dwelling at 508 Fifth Avenue in 1927; by merging the zoning lots of this 25 by 102-foot building and that of 500 Fifth Avenue, he was able to build a higher tower than would have otherwise been possible.
The program for 500 Fifth Avenue called for street-level stores, banking facilities on the second and third floors, and office units on the floors above, totaling approximately 450,000 square feet of rentable area. Plans were submitted to the Buildings Department in October 1929, and excavation began in February of 1930; the estimated cost of the project was $4,000,000. Charles T. Wills, Inc. was the general contractor, and McClintic-Marshall Co. the steel contractor. Erection of the skyscraper’s steel skeleton began at the end of March, and was completed in a mere four months owing to a highly efficient system whereby the steel arrived on site and was hoisted by derricks to the 36th floor, where it was assembled and continuously distributed by a relay derrick to other floors. The exterior brickwork was completed in early September 1930, and the general contract for the building was completed in January 1931. At the height of the building project nearly 2,200 workers were employed.
The construction of 500 Fifth Avenue and its sister skyscraper the Empire State Building set a new standard for speed and efficiency in building construction. Each component of 500 Fifth Avenue’s structure was planned, mapped, and measured in advance, in what historian Christopher Gray called a “tight ballet of scheduling.” This strategic approach to construction planning and oversight was successfully realized at 500 Fifth Avenue through the close collaboration of the architect, building owner, real estate advisers, operating managers, and builder throughout the entire process of planning and construction. Architect Richmond Shreve was a great proponent of rationalized building construction, and expounded on his ideas in an essay titled “The Economic Design of Office Buildings”:
To set up properly an income-producing building the control of its design and construction should be in the hands of a Board on which sit Owner, Banker, Builder, Architect, Engineers, and Real Estate Men. The record of their decisions finds place in plans, specifications and contracts, financial transactions and leases, and the outcome of their work, if it is to be successful, must have been foreseen far in advance of its realization.
500 Fifth Avenue was completed in just over a year without accident or serious injury, and opened in March 1931 in time for the traditional renewal date for business leases of May 1. William F. Lamb called 500 Fifth Avenue “a thoroughly frank expression of the requirements of an up-to-date office building.” These requirements included modern, well lit and properly ventilated office units near elevators and bathrooms; fast and efficient elevator service; and maximum rentable floor space. Despite its relatively small lot and constricted building envelope, 500 Fifth Avenue offered all of these things; moreover, its unusually advantageous corner location across from the New York Public Library and Bryant Park afforded ample natural light, cross-ventilation, and unobstructed views for two blocks to the south.
Effectively, Shreve, Lamb & Harmon designed 500 Fifth Avenue from the top down, determining the placement of the building’s service core within the tower and then the base, and from the inside out, determining the ideal office unit as a basis for formulating the overall plan and circulation. The building’s set-back configuration, which allowed for an unusually high window-to-wall ratio, as well as a 25-foot wide light court on the west side of the building beginning at the sixth floor, ensured that no office unit would be more than 30 feet from natural light; a distance of 28 feet or less was considered optimal for modern office buildings before the development of air-conditioning. Floor areas ranged from 2,150 to 18,000 square feet, with office units as small as 9 feet in width and as large as an entire floor. The typical floor plan for the building’s base had 21 office units, while the typical floor plan for the tower had nine office units.
The main entrance to the building was placed on the Fifth Avenue facade, about 70 feet from 42nd Street and on center with the sheer tower rising above the setbacks, and the remainder of the ground floor on both the east and south facades was dominated by an unbroken line of bronze-framed, plate-glass storefronts. The main entrance was framed dramatically by pylons and crowned with the highly stylized bas-relief figure of a Grecian woman holding a staff with a winged sun disc and kneeling beside a model of the building itself, an allegorical representation of the “genius of the modern skyscraper,” sculpted from a single block of limestone by Edward Amateis.
The dramatically massed exterior of 500 Fifth Avenue expressed the constraints of the zoning code, which allowed more bulk on the 42nd Street side than on the Fifth Avenue side and thus determined the positioning of the tower on the base. The building’s tight footprint, which limited the size of the base, and the imperative of maximizing profits with top-quality office and retail space in a relatively small building envelope, resulted in the complex geometry of setbacks stepping up asymmetrically to the slender tower. With regards to the height of office buildings in a competitive real estate market, “…there is a point where the balance begins to swing back and the rate of return on capital investment begins to diminish as the building goes higher.” At 500 Fifth Avenue, the projected height of 58 stories , or 697 feet, was considered the limit of economic feasibility for a 100- by 208-foot lot. In his essay on tall office buildings, Shreve summed up the design problem inherent in the 1916 zoning ordinance, describing the modern tall office building as
“a geometrical form consisting of a base enclosed by vertical walls, an intermediate section defined by sloping limits, and a tower…[and]…practical usable office floor area, supported and enclosed by structural forms, served by mechanical equipment, and reached through public spaces which are not directly sources of revenue.”
Shreve, Lamb & Harmon’s completed building was noted in the press for its height, its zoning conditions, and its real estate value; it was among the city’s notable tall buildings of the time and remains a distinguished example of Art Deco skyscraper design. Stylized geometrical ornament, a restrained color palette, and the “vertical accent” created by spandrels and channeling all contributed to the building’s “modern architectural treatment”, in the words of partner William Lamb. On the second, third, and fourth stories, limestone piers decorated with channeling and abstracted frond and scroll motifs and light-green metal spandrels decorated with folds and chevrons reflect Art Deco’s affinity for stylized geometric forms. Around the main entrance the carved limestone pylons and allegorical bas-relief are picked out in gilding, and on the 42nd Street facade a pair of eagles carved in profile enhance the figural quality of the ornamental scheme. Rising above the base is 500 Fifth Avenue’s flat-roofed, slab-form tower.
The tower’s vertical buff-brick stripes are likely inspired by Hood’s Daily News Building, which bridged Art Deco and the emerging International Style when it opened in 1930. As with the Daily News Building—where Hood sought to conceal the windows to avoid the effect of a wall “shot full of holes”—these stripes alternate with dark window bands. In the center bays on 42nd Street and in the two window bays over the main entry, 500 Fifth Avenue’s terra-cotta spandrel panels are dark gray in color and angle forward. Seen from a distance the dark color of the spandrels merges with the dark color of the window frames to create a series of vertical stripes that rise unbroken to the roofline. This striped effect is continued on the north elevation, where the large expanse of brick wall enclosing the elevators and utilities is articulated with three uninterrupted channels filled with strips of dark gray terra cotta.
Above its base, 500 Fifth Avenue is virtually free of ornament, except at the tower, where a series of angled brick and terra-cotta panels decorated with chevrons read as pleated cresting against the skyline.
Subsequent History
A year after the stock market crash and three months before the opening of 500 Fifth Avenue, Walter J. Salmon was quoted in the papers on the subject of his prospects for an immediate return on his investment: “We feel that it will take some time to absorb the approximately 500,000 square feet of office space in the building, but the enterprise was undertaken with the greatest faith in the future of midtown expansion and development.” By May 1931, three months after its opening, the 15th, 16th and 20th floors of the building had been fully rented ; by the end of the year, several prestigious tenants had signed leases, including the Electrolux Corporation, no less than ten railroad corporations, and the Western Universities Club, which used the penthouse and the three floors below for its club facilities. An article in the New York Times from January 1932 reported a consistent demand for business space in the midtown area, calling business renting “brisk.”
Later tenants of 500 Fifth Avenue included the Austrian and Japanese consulates, and in the mid-1930s the building became the target of Communist protests directed at the Japanese consulate, which had offices on the 40th floor.
In 1944, when the Manufacturers Trust Company—then located at 513 Fifth Avenue–and the Mutual Insurance Company entered into a lease in which Mutual Life agreed to construct a new bank building on the property at nos. 508 and 510-514 Fifth Avenue, a corollary agreement with Walter Salmon permitted Manufacturers Trust Company to sublease, and ultimately redevelop, 508 Fifth Avenue. An important stipulation in this agreement was that during the time Salmon’s lease remained in effect , any building erected on the portion of the lot at No. 508 would not exceed the height of the then-existing building or otherwise interfere with 500 Fifth Avenue. Thus, the height of the new bank building was effectively limited to four or five stories, and light and ventilation levels on the north wall of 500 Fifth Avenue were preserved.
In 1955, the land under 500 Fifth Avenue was sold by Gerry Brothers & Co., whose principals were descendants of the original ownership, to the Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. 500 Fifth Avenue was again the site of political disturbance in 1980, when Croatian nationalists bombed a Yugoslavian bank located on the 30th floor of the building; there were no injuries, and only minor damage to the interior spaces. In the mid-1990s, the facade of 500 Fifth Avenue was repaired, ornament was restored or selectively refabricated, and replacement windows were installed. The building continues to be used as an office building with street-level stores.
Description
500 Fifth Avenue is an asymmetrically massed skyscraper with setbacks at the 18th, 22nd, and 25th stories on the Fifth Avenue facade and a recessed light court beginning at the eighth story and setbacks at the 23rd, 28th, and 34th stories on the 42nd Street facade; the side facade is partially visible from street; sheathed in limestone, terra cotta, and buff brick, the facades are enriched with carefully scaled Art Deco motifs, which accentuate the building’s sculptural massing and emphasize its verticality; on the Fifth Avenue facade the limestone and black granite main entrance is treated as a pylon framed by stylized gilded palmettos and capped by an allegorical bas-relief; the metal-and-glass main entrance door is deeply recessed and has returns of polished stone or metal; possibly historic pendant and wall-mounted light fixtures within recess of main entrance; possibly historic light fixtures and flag poles flank the main entrance; freight entrance in seventh bay of ground floor on 42nd Street facade; ground-floor storefronts on the Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street facades retain the original patinated metal cornice with chevron motifs; the three commercial stories above the storefronts have large show-window openings set between limestone piers decorated with channeling and abstracted frond and scroll motifs and patinated metal spandrels decorated with stylized folds and chevrons; the majority of the show windows on the 2nd Street facade are historic multi-pane metal sash; on the Fifth Avenue facade only a few of these historic show windows remain; on the buff-brick mid-section and tower the windows are arranged into paired and triple groups separated by projecting piers, with the major piers enhanced by vertical channeling; in the center bays on 42nd Street and in the two window bays over the main entry, the terra-cotta spandrel panels are dark gray in color and angle forward; seen from a distance the dark color of the spandrels merges with the dark color of the window frames to create a series of vertical stripes that rise unbroken to the roofline; this striped effect is continued on the back elevation where the large expanse of brick wall enclosing the elevators and utilities is articulated with three uninterrupted channels filled with strips of dark gray terra cotta; crowning the setbacks and tower are a series of angled brick and terra-cotta panels decorated with chevrons that read as pleated cresting against the skyline.
Alterations: non-historic metal-and-glass storefront infill on ground story; several non-historic plate-glass windows with metal frames on second through fourth stories of Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street facades; metal plaques and security lights at main entrance on Fifth Avenue facade; four utility boxes affixed to southeast corner of building above fifth story; double-hung metal replacement windows in all openings above the fourth story; louvers or vents in several window openings or as replacement window panes on Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street facades; brick replaced at corners of building; dunnage/cooling tower and antennas visible on roof.
- From the 2010 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report
Crown Equipment uses a virtual welding machine as part of its welder training and qualification program. In addition to improving employee skills, Crown’s virtual welding program has significantly decreased the amount of scrap metal produced through traditional welder training. This initiative is just one element of Crown’s commitment to improving the sustainability of raw materials and its manufacturing processes, as shared in Crown’s recent ecologic™ report. Learn more at news.crown.com/.
They may be better but ceramic brakes look scruffy compared to steel ones.
Carbon ceramic braking systems are set to make the leap from supercars to sports and luxury models as Italian brake manufacturer Brembo and German carbon specialist SGL kick-off a new partnership aimed at automating production.
Although carbon brake discs offer significant advantages over steel, the manufacturing process is currently labour-intensive using several manual and semi-automated process steps, says the new joint-venture company Brembo SGL. As a result, although carbon ceramic brakes were first offered in 2001 on a commercial basis, they have remained expensive. Today, Brembo and SGL carbon ceramic discs appear mainly on models from the likes of Aston Martin, Bentley, Bugatti, Daimler, Ferrari, Lamborghini and Porsche
When FDA approves a drug, we review the manufacturing processes to ensure that the drugs are of consistent quality and purity. That’s not the case with unapproved prescription ear drops. What’s especially worrisome is that some of these products are prescribed for young children and infants, the population most susceptible to ear infections. It’s very basic—drugs that are used in children should be tested in children. But these products haven’t been shown to be effective in anyone, and there’s no proof that they work. To learn more, read this FDA Consumer Update.
This graphic is free of all copyright restrictions and available for use and redistribution without permission. Credit to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is appreciated but not required. For more privacy and use information visit: www.flickr.com/people/fdaphotos/
FDA graphic by Michael J. Ermarth
Brian Temple, the Europe District Public Affairs chief, delivered his “Science behind the Magic” presentation to several classes May 9 at Aukamm Elementary School in Wiesbaden, Germany. He performed for about 200 students overall. It’s part of the district’s educational outreach program, under which Corps officials share instructional opportunities related to science, technology, engineering and math. The presentation focused on chemistry, mixtures and compounds, along with various manufacturing processes for coins, rope and flash paper. Temple showed slides and videos highlighting each scientific element, then followed it up with a magic trick demonstrating the science and technological aspects of his art. He lit the flash paper on fire and turned it into a $100 bill, drawing gasps and looks of amazement from the students. As an organization, USACE is working to engage students early and be a constant resource throughout their academic development in an effort to promote STEM careers and pursuits. “You have the coolest presentation we see all year,” third-grader Sara Uharriet, 9, told Temple. “It’s just very interesting, and we get to learn a lot of cool things.” (U.S. Army Corps of Engineers photo by Vince Little)
Starting in January 2012 the Department for Transport is conducting a trial of longer semi-trailers. The trial involves 900 semi-trailers of 14.6m in length (i.e. 1 metre longer than the current maximum), and a further 900 semi-trailers of 15.65m in length (i.e. 2.05 metres longer). This will result in the total maximum length of the semi-trailer truck being 17.5 metres (for trailers of 14.6 metre in length) and 18.55 metres (for trailers of 15.65 metres in length). The increase in length will not result in the 44,000 kg (97,000 lb) weight limit being exceeded, and will allow some operators to approach the weight limit which may not have been previously possible due to the previous length of trailers. The trial will run for a maximum of 10 years.
www.dft.gov.uk/topics/freight/road-freight/longer-semi-tr...
United Biscuits, the company famous for well known UK brands KP, Jacobs, McVities, McCoys, Go Ahead and Jaffa Cakes to name just a few, has recently taken delivery of 20 longer semi trailers built by South Manchester based Cartwright.
The Curtainside Longer Semi Trailers, which operate from United Biscuit’s distribution centre at Ashby de la Zouche are 15650mm in length, Tri-axle in design with a rear command steering axle. The Clearspan body design has insulated and security curtains and conforms to the EN12642XL standard. They are painted in six different liveries promoting the distinctive United Biscuits brands and include an impactive liveried environmental vehicle which runs on waste vegetable oil, a by product of UB’s manufacturing process.
CARTWRIGHT GROUP says its longer semitrailers (LSTs) will use the “command rearsteer” technology because it is more versatile than current self-tracking rear-steer solutions.
The Altrincham-based body and trailer manufacturer is in the process of building its irst LST, says director Steven Cartwright, which is expected to be unveiled in January 2012. “We are inalising the design but we will initially use command [positive] rear-steer technology, which in this case is Tridec, as it is more versatile and reduces the tyre wear.
“With self-tracking rear-steer trailers, which are cheaper and lighter, you have to straightenup to slot the pin into place before reversing with three ixed axles – and there will be a lot of yards where this might not be possible,” he says.
Manufacturers developing maximum length longer trailers with a single rear-steer axle are yet to achieve a true 44-tonne GVW because they are unable to put the axle in the right position to achieve the required turning circle without compromising weight distribution.
Cartwright admits its company’s design is currently at 42-tonnes GVW. However, a reduced GVW could beneit operators that regularly cube-out and those involved with the pallet networks, as there is no height restriction with longer trailers.
DUMBO, Brooklyn
Features: Nineteen bays on Bridge Street, nine bays on Water Street, and nine bays on Front Street; large segmental-arch openings separated by brick piers; end bays on Bridge Street narrower than other bays; building reflects slight slope of site, with the basement only partially above sidewalk level on Front Street rising to a full story on Water Street; multi-pane metal windows with operable awnings; iron tie rods; corbelled cornice; pedestrian entrance in westernmost bays on Front Street and Water Street; bluestone stairs at pedestrian entrance on Water Street; three fire escapes on Bridge Street.
Significant alterations: Two corner bays on Front Street partially filled in and converted into loading docks on first floor; eighth bay on Water Street partially filled in and converted into vehicular entrance.
History: The western portion of this block was home to the Union White Lead Works (later the National Lead Company) which began purchasing property on the block as early as 1837. The lead company’s property was sold to James and John H. Hanan in 1893. Although already occupied by a factory, James Hanan and his son John chose to demolish the existing buildings and replace it with a new factory for the manufacturing of shoes. Hanan initially announced construction of a seven-story structure; he actually built a five-story factory. Even before purchasing the DUMBO property, James Hanan was a resident of Brooklyn, living in a large mansion at 45 Eighth Avenue (demolished) in Park Slope. James Hanan (1819-1897) was born in Ireland and learned the shoe trade from his father. In 1849 he moved to America and in 1854 established a small shoemaking business in New York City. In about 1865, his son, John Henry Hanan (1849-1920), entered his father’s firm, and in 1882 the company became Hanan & Son.
The Hanan Company was among the first to stamp the firm’s name on every shoe, a daring idea at a time when most people still sought shoes handmade by the dealer. The firm was successful and in 1888 Hanan began opening retail stores to sell the factory’s product directly to consumers.
In 1894, the company had stores in New York, Brooklyn, Boston, Philadelphia, Cleveland, Milwaukee, New Haven, Buffalo, Chicago, and St. Paul. By 1914 the firm had thirteen retail stores in the United States and Europe (apparently in London and Paris).
Shoe manufacturing was a major industry in Brooklyn in the late nineteenth century, with 65 factories doing a combined business of $2,300,000 in 1894; one-third of that business was done at the Hanan factory. The manufacture of a pair of shoes began on the upper floor of the factory where thin leather uppers were cut from patterns; women then stitched the uppers together on sewing machines; boys then took the uppers and smoothed the seams. The uppers were then moved to the third floor where lasters worked. The uppers were tacked to lasts and leather attached to the last mold to create the form of the bottom of the shoe. The bottom and upper were sewn together and then the shoes proceed to men who inserted the insoles, largely by machine. Then glue was placed on the insole and another employee added the heavy sole, again by machine. The shoes now moved sown to the next floor where heels were nailed on by machine and where soles and heels were trimmed. Finally the shoes moved to the lower floor where they were washed, cleaned, and boxed. On this lower floor, machines also stamped out the soles. The company’s offices were on the first floor facing Front Street.
In 1894, when the description of the manufacturing process was written, there were between three and four hundred employees in the factory, although the article notes that there was capacity for 600 people. In 1913 the company employed 1,131 people in its Brooklyn factory (871 men,210 women, and 50 office workers). John Hanan also owned shoe companies in other cities and served as president of the National Boot and Shoe Manufacturers’ Association. He was also the founder of the United Shoe Machinery Corporation, which manufactured machines for use in show factories. After John Hanan’s death, the firm was taken over by his sons Herbert Wilmer Hanan (1872-1933) and Addison Garthwaite Hanan (1876-1923) and grandson Robert Wilmer Hanan (1903-1933). The company went bankrupt in 1935. Old signs extant on the building in 2000 recorded some of the complex’s later occupants: Starlite Lamp Shade Company, Fashion Decor Lamp Shade Company, Washington Garter Corporation, National Leather Manufacturing Company, Gotham Furniture Frame Company, Modern Box Company, Star Fastener Company, Embassy Archives Center, Melcon Design Company, Shaw Television Corporation, Deluxe Novelty Company (DLX Industries), and Latex Specialties.
The simple brick facade, articulated by large segmental openings, simple brick piers, and corbelled cornice, marks 54 Bridge Street as a significant example of transition from the American Round Arch style to the daylight factory. This, together with its slow-burning mill construction, makes it representative of American factory architecture of this period and contributes to the architectural and historical character of the DUMBO Historic District. Built in 1893, during a major period of development when manufacturers such as Hanan & Son were making DUMBO into one of the city’s most important industrial neighborhoods, the structure contributes to the district through its architecture, structure, and the fact that its owners played a significant role in the area’s history.
- From the 2007 NYCLPC Historic District Designation Report
Lego is a line of plastic construction toys manufactured by the Lego Group, a privately held company based in Billund, Denmark. Lego consists of variously colored interlocking plastic bricks made of acrylonitrile butadiene styrene that accompany an array of gears, figurines called minifigures, and various other parts. Its pieces can be assembled and connected in many ways to construct objects, including vehicles, buildings, and working robots. Anything constructed can be taken apart again, and the pieces reused to make new things.
The Lego Group began manufacturing the interlocking toy bricks in 1949. Moulding is done in Denmark, Hungary, Mexico, and China. Brick decorations and packaging are done at plants in the former three countries and in the Czech Republic. Annual production of the bricks averages approximately 36 billion, or about 1140 elements per second.
Films, games competitions, and eight Legoland amusement parks have been developed under the brand. One of Europe's biggest companies, Lego is the largest toy manufacturer in the world by sales. As of July 2015, 600 billion Lego parts had been produced.
History
The Lego Group began in the workshop of Ole Kirk Christiansen (1891–1958), a carpenter from Billund, Denmark, who began making wooden toys in 1932. In 1934, his company came to be called "Lego", derived from the Danish phrase leg godt which means "play well". In 1947, Lego expanded to begin producing plastic toys. In 1949 the business began producing, among other new products, an early version of the now familiar interlocking bricks, calling them "Automatic Binding Bricks". These bricks were based on the Kiddicraft Self-Locking Bricks, invented by Hilary Page in 1939 and patented in the United Kingdom in 1940 before being displayed at the 1947 Earl's Court Toy Fair. Lego had received a sample of the Kiddicraft bricks from the supplier of an injection-molding machine that it purchased. The bricks, originally manufactured from cellulose acetate, were a development of the traditional stackable wooden blocks of the time.
The Lego Group's motto, "only the best is good enough" (Danish: det bedste er ikke for godt, literally "the best isn't excessively good") was created in 1936. Christiansen created the motto, still used today, to encourage his employees never to skimp on quality, a value he believed in strongly. By 1951, plastic toys accounted for half of the company's output, even though the Danish trade magazine Legetøjs-Tidende ("Toy Times"), visiting the Lego factory in Billund in the early 1950s, wrote that plastic would never be able to replace traditional wooden toys. Although a common sentiment, Lego toys seem to have become a significant exception to the dislike of plastic in children's toys, due in part to the high standards set by Ole Kirk.
By 1954, Christiansen's son, Godtfred, had become the junior managing director of the Lego Group. It was his conversation with an overseas buyer that led to the idea of a toy system. Godtfred saw the immense potential in Lego bricks to become a system for creative play, but the bricks still had some problems from a technical standpoint: Their locking ability was still limited, and they were not yet versatile. In 1958, the modern brick design was developed; it took five years to find the right material for it, ABS (acrylonitrile butadiene styrene) polymer. A patent application for the modern Lego brick design was filed in Denmark on 28 January 1958 and in various other countries in the subsequent few years.
The Lego Group's Duplo product line was introduced in 1969 and is a range of blocks whose lengths measure twice the width, height, and depth of standard Lego blocks and are aimed towards younger children. In 1978, Lego produced the first minifigures, which have since become a staple in most sets.
In May 2011, Space Shuttle Endeavour mission STS-134 brought 13 Lego kits to the International Space Station, where astronauts built models to see how they would react in microgravity, as a part of the Lego Bricks in Space program. In May 2013, the largest model ever created, made of over 5 million bricks, was displayed in New York City; a one-to-one scale model of a Star Wars X-wing fighter. Other record breakers include a 34-metre (112 ft) tower and a 4 km (2.5 mi) railway.
In February 2015, marketing consulting company Brand Finance ranked Lego as the "world's most powerful brand", overtaking Ferrari.
Lego bricks have acquired a reputation for causing extreme pain when stepped on.
Design
Lego pieces of all varieties constitute a universal system. Despite variations in the design and the purposes of individual pieces over the years, each remains compatible in some way with existing pieces. Lego bricks from 1958 still interlock with those made presently, and Lego sets for young children are compatible with those made for teenagers. Six bricks of 2 × 4 studs can be combined in 915,103,765 ways.
Each piece must be manufactured to an exacting degree of precision. When two pieces are engaged, they must fit firmly, yet be easily disassembled. The machines that manufacture Lego bricks have tolerances as small as 10 micrometres.
Primary concept and development work for the toy takes place at the Billund headquarters, where the company employs approximately 120 designers. The company also has smaller design offices in the UK, Spain, Germany, and Japan which are tasked with developing products aimed specifically at their respective national markets. The average development period for a new product is around twelve months, split into three stages. The first is to identify market trends and developments, including contact by the designers directly with the market; some are stationed in toy shops close to holidays, while others interview children. The second stage is the design and development of the product based on the results of the first stage. As of September 2008 the design teams use 3D modelling software to generate CAD drawings from initial design sketches. The designs are then prototyped using an in-house stereolithography machine. These prototypes are presented to the entire project team for comment and testing by parents and children during the "validation" process. Designs may then be altered in accordance with the results from the focus groups. Virtual models of completed Lego products are built concurrently with the writing of the user instructions. Completed CAD models are also used in the wider organisation for marketing and packaging.
Lego Digital Designer is an official piece of Lego software for Mac OS X and Windows which allows users to create their own digital Lego designs. The program once allowed customers to order custom designs with a service to ship physical models from Digital Designer to consumers; the service ended in 2012.
Manufacturing
Since 1963, Lego pieces have been manufactured from acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS). As of September 2008, Lego engineers use the NX CAD/CAM/CAE PLM software suite to model the elements. The software allows the parts to be optimised by way of mould flow and stress analysis. Prototype moulds are sometimes built before the design is committed to mass production. The ABS plastic is heated to 232 °C (450 °F) until it reaches a dough-like consistency. It is then injected into the moulds using forces of between 25 and 150 tonnes and takes approximately 15 seconds to cool. The moulds are permitted a tolerance of up to twenty micrometres to ensure the bricks remain connected. Human inspectors check the output of the moulds to eliminate significant variations in colour or thickness. According to the Lego Group, about eighteen bricks out of every million fail to meet the standard required.
Lego factories recycle all but about 1 percent of their plastic waste from the manufacturing process. If the plastic cannot be re-used in Lego bricks, it is processed and sold on to industries that can make use of it. Lego, in 2018, set a self-imposed 2030 deadline to find a more eco-friendly alternative to the ABS plastic.
Manufacturing of Lego bricks occurs at several locations around the world. Moulding is done in Billund, Denmark; Nyíregyháza, Hungary; Monterrey, Mexico; and most recently in Jiaxing, China. Brick decorations and packaging are done at plants in the former three countries and in Kladno in the Czech Republic. The Lego Group estimates that in five decades it has produced 400 billion Lego blocks. Annual production of the bricks averages approximately 36 billion, or about 1140 elements per second. According to an article in BusinessWeek in 2006, Lego could also be considered the world's number-one tyre manufacturer; the factory produces about 306 million small rubber tyres a year. The claim was reiterated in 2012.
In December 2012, the BBC's More or Less radio program asked the Open University's engineering department to determine "how many Lego bricks, stacked one on top of the other, it would take for the weight to destroy the bottom brick?" Using a hydraulic testing machine, members of the department determined the average maximum force a 2×2 Lego brick can stand is 4,240 newtons. Since an average 2×2 Lego brick has a mass of 1.152 grams (0.0406 oz), according to their calculations it would take a stack of 375,000 bricks to cause the bottom brick to collapse, which represents a stack 3,591 metres (11,781 ft) in height.
Private tests have shown several thousand assembly-disassembly cycles before the bricks begin to wear out, although Lego tests show fewer cycles.
In 2018, Lego announced that it will be using bio-derived polyethylene to make its botanical elements (parts such as leaves, bushes and trees). The New York Times reported the company's footprint that year was "about a million tons of carbon dioxide each year" and that it was investing about 1 billion kroner and hiring 100 people to work on changes. The paper reported that Lego's researchers "have already experimented with around 200 alternatives." In 2020, Lego announced that it would cease packaging its products in single-use plastic bags and would instead be using recyclable paper bags. In 2021, the company said it would aim to produce its bricks without using crude oil, by using recycled polyethylene terephthalate bottles, but in 2023 it reversed this decision, having found that this did not reduce its carbon dioxide emissions.
Set themes
Since the 1950s, the Lego Group has released thousands of sets with a variety of themes, including space, pirates, trains, (European) castle, dinosaurs, undersea exploration, and wild west, as well as wholly original themes like Bionicle and Hero Factory. Some of the classic themes that continue to the present day include Lego City (a line of sets depicting city life introduced in 1973) and Lego Technic (a line aimed at emulating complex machinery, introduced in 1977).
Over the years, the company has licensed themes from numerous cartoon and film franchises and some from video games. These include Batman, Indiana Jones, Pirates of the Caribbean, Harry Potter, Star Wars, Marvel, and Minecraft. Although some of these themes, Lego Star Wars and Lego Indiana Jones, had highly successful sales, the company expressed in 2015 a desire to rely more upon their own characters and classic themes and less upon such licensed themes. Some sets include references to other themes such as a Bionicle mask in one of the Harry Potter sets. Discontinued sets may become a collectable and command value on the black market.
For the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, Lego released a special Team GB Minifigures series exclusively in the United Kingdom to mark the opening of the games. For the 2016 Summer Olympics and 2016 Summer Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro, Lego released a kit with the Olympic and Paralympic mascots Vinicius and Tom.
One of the largest commercially produced Lego sets was a minifig-scaled edition of the Star Wars Millennium Falcon. Designed by Jens Kronvold Fredericksen, it was released in 2007 and contained 5,195 pieces. It was surpassed by a 5,922-piece Taj Mahal. A redesigned Millennium Falcon retook the top spot in 2017 with 7,541 pieces. Since then, the Millennium Falcon has been superseded by the Lego Art World Map at 11,695 pieces, the Lego Titanic at 9,090 pieces, and the Lego Architect Colosseum at 9,036 pieces.
In 2022, Lego introduced its Eiffel Tower. The set consists of 10,000 parts and reaches a height of 149 cm, which makes it the tallest set and tower but the second in number of parts after the World Map.
Robotics themes
Main articles: Lego Mindstorms, Lego Mindstorms NXT, Lego Mindstorms NXT 2.0, and Lego Mindstorms EV3
The company also initiated a robotics line of toys called 'Mindstorms' in 1999, and has continued to expand and update this range ever since. The roots of the product originate from a programmable brick developed at the MIT Media Lab, and the name is taken from a paper by Seymour Papert, a computer scientist and educator who developed the educational theory of constructionism, and whose research was at times funded by the Lego Group.
The programmable Lego brick which is at the heart of these robotics sets has undergone several updates and redesigns, with the latest being called the 'EV3' brick, being sold under the name of Lego Mindstorms EV3. The set includes sensors that detect touch, light, sound and ultrasonic waves, with several others being sold separately, including an RFID reader.
The intelligent brick can be programmed using official software available for Windows and Mac computers, and is downloaded onto the brick via Bluetooth or a USB cable. There are also several unofficial programs and compatible programming languages that have been made to work with the brick, and many books have been written to support this community.
There are several robotics competitions which use the Lego robotics sets. The earliest is Botball, a national U.S. middle- and high-school competition stemming from the MIT 6.270 Lego robotics tournament. Other Lego robotics competitions include FIRST LEGO League Discover for children ages 4–6, FIRST LEGO League Explore for students ages 6–9 and FIRST Lego League Challenge for students ages 9–16 (age 9–14 in the United States, Canada, and Mexico). These programs offer real-world engineering challenges to participants. FIRST LEGO League Challenge uses LEGO-based robots to complete tasks, FIRST LEGO League Explore participants build models out of Lego elements, and FIRST LEGO League Discover participants use Duplo. In its 2019–2020 season, there were 38,609 FIRST LEGO League Challenge teams and 21,703 FIRST LEGO League Explore teams around the world. The international RoboCup Junior football competition involves extensive use of Lego Mindstorms equipment which is often pushed to its extreme limits.
The capabilities of the Mindstorms range have now been harnessed for use in Iko Creative Prosthetic System, a prosthetic limbs system designed for children. Designs for these Lego prosthetics allow everything from mechanical diggers to laser-firing spaceships to be screwed on to the end of a child's limb. Iko is the work of the Chicago-based Colombian designer Carlos Arturo Torres, and is a modular system that allows children to customise their own prosthetics with the ease of clicking together plastic bricks. Designed with Lego's Future Lab, the Danish toy company's experimental research department, and Cirec, a Colombian foundation for physical rehabilitation, the modular prosthetic incorporates myoelectric sensors that register the activity of the muscle in the stump and send a signal to control movement in the attachment. A processing unit in the body of the prosthetic contains an engine compatible with Lego Mindstorms, the company's robotics line, which lets the wearer build an extensive range of customised, programmable limbs.
In popular culture
Lego's popularity is demonstrated by its wide representation and usage in many cultural works, including books, films, and art. It has even been used in the classroom as a teaching tool. In the US, Lego Education North America is a joint venture between Pitsco, Inc. and the educational division of the Lego Group.
In 1998, Lego bricks were one of the original inductees into the National Toy Hall of Fame at The Strong in Rochester, New York.
"Lego" is commonly used as a mass noun ("some Lego") or, in American English, as a countable noun with plural "Legos", to refer to the bricks themselves, but as is common for trademarks, Lego group insists on the name being used as an adjective when referring to a product (as in "LEGO bricks").
As part of the required course knowledge pupils need to be able to outline the process involved in taking a square wooden blank and preparing it for turning between centres. These pictures depict that process chronologically.
Stage 1 * Preparation of wooden blank. Cut to size. Sand square. Mark across diagonals. Centre punch the centre point. Use spring dividers to mark circumference. Repeat on other end.
Stage 2 * Plane off corners down to circumference line. This takes cross section from square to octagon. This reduces force on cutting toll in initial prep of blank. Mount between fork [driven] centre and dead [or live ] centre at tailstock end. Apply grease a dead centre end. apply force from tailstock end to force fork into material at driven end. Adjust toolstock height to suit. Check for clearance.
Stage 3 * Roughout using scraper to diameter. Use combination of gouges and skew chisels to add beads and other decorative detailing as required. Ensure spindle speed is appropriate for material and cross section under consideration. Obey all safety instructions.
View from the Empire State Building Main Observation Deck, Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States
Built in 1929-31, Shreve, Lamb & Harmon’s 500 Fifth Avenue Building is a soaring 59-story Art Deco skyscraper, located at the northwest corner of 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue. The building was constructed concurrently with the Empire State Building. Because the site was so valuable and so small, measuring only 100 feet by 208 feet, the building was designed to the maximum height and floor area allowable under the 1916 zoning code. Located in two zoning districts with differing setback requirements, it is asymmetrically massed with setbacks at the 18th, 22nd, and 25th stories on Fifth Avenue and a recessed light court beginning at the eighth story and setbacks at the 23rd, 28th, and 34th stories on West 42nd Street. Sheathed in limestone, terra cotta, and buff brick, the facades are enriched with carefully scaled Art Deco motifs, which accentuate the building’s sculptural massing and emphasize its verticality.
On Fifth Avenue the limestone and black granite main entrance is treated as a pylon framed by stylized gilded palmettos and capped by an allegorical relief by sculptor Edmond Amateis “symbolizing the genius of the modern skyscraper.” Capping the setbacks and tower are a series of angled brick and terra-cotta panels decorated with chevrons that read as pleated cresting against the skyline. When it opened in March 1931, 500 Fifth Avenue was the crowning achievement of real estate developer Walter J. Salmon, who was responsible for rebuilding the north side of West 42nd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues in the first decades of the 20th century. Shreve, Lamb & Harmon was one of the leading architectural firms in the country specializing in skyscraper design. In addition to 500 Fifth Avenue, Shreve Lamb & Harmon designed the Empire State Building . 500 Fifth Avenue continues to be used as an office building with street-level stores.
DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS
History and Development of Midtown and the 500 Fifth Avenue Site
The area surrounding Fifth Avenue between 42nd Street and the southern end of Central Park remained rural in character until the second half of the nineteenth century, when speculative residences and mansions began to be constructed on lots newly mapped by the city. By 1900, the character of the neighborhood on the blocks north of 42nd Street began to change with the construction of, or the conversion of private residences to, exclusive retail shops, restaurants, and office buildings. By 1923, so many banks and trust companies had established uptown branches near the intersection of Park Avenue and 42nd Street and on the blocks of Fifth Avenue north of 42nd Street, that Rider’s New York City guide reported the area was popularly known as “Little Wall Street.” 42nd Street, which linked this business district to Times Square, became one of the busiest thoroughfares in New York while Fifth Avenue remained the most fashionable shopping street in the city, leading Real Estate Record & Guide to declare the parcel at 500 Fifth Avenue, at the northwest corner of 42nd Street, as “the most valuable building site on Manhattan Island north of Wall Street.”
In 1903 a young and ambitious real estate entrepreneur named Walter J. Salomon , who later changed his surname to Salmon, leased the corner lot and the adjacent L-shaped lot, which fronted on Fifth Avenue and West 42nd Street. Salmon then converted the existing building, the eight-story Hotel Bristol, into a commercial and office building and renamed it the Bristol Building. This property was to form the core of Salmon’s redevelopment plan for 500 Fifth Avenue, his crowning achievement as a real estate man and the final puzzle piece in the transformation of the entire block front into an imposing wall of modern commercial structures.
New York’s Art Deco Skyscrapers
America’s involvement in World War I, followed by a recession in the early 1920s, caused a construction lull in New York City, as in other parts of the country. By the mid 1920s, the economy had bounced back, and demand for new and larger commercial buildings was booming. Fifteen new office skyscrapers were erected in New York in 1925, and 1926 saw the construction of 30 more. This building frenzy lasted through the 1929 stock market crash, as construction went forward in the early 1930s on buildings that had already been planned and financed; although largely finished by 1932, the boom left behind a “rich array of towers,” many of them executed in what is known today as the Art Deco style. Indeed, several of New York’s most spectacular skyscrapers from this period—including the Chanin Building , the Chrysler Building , the Empire State Building and the General Electric Building , all designated New York City Landmarks, are among the country’s most significant examples of Art Deco design.
Into the 1910s, no limits on building height or bulk existed in New York City. In 1916, New York implemented the nation’s first zoning regulations, which permitted unrestricted height on one quarter of a building site, but required skyscrapers to taper as they rose to allow light and air to reach the street. Six years later, architect and critic Harvey Wiley Corbett and architectural delineator Hugh Ferriss published a group of influential renderings that explored zoning’s impact on the shape of tall buildings. Presented as a series of illustrations progressing from the abstract, pyramidal shape of the zoning envelope to a stepped-back practicable building form, these drawings catalyzed a trend in which “buildings endeavored to take on the feeling of sculpted mountains, their shape suddenly more important than their historical detail or even their style.” So pervasive were the new stepped-back skyscrapers that by the mid-1920s, architects and critics spoke of an emerging “setback style”.
Another important influence on 1920s skyscraper design was Eliel Saarinen’s 1922 competition entry for the Chicago Tribune’s new tower. With its straightforward shape, vertical emphasis, and limited ornament, Saarinen’s ahistorical design was “taken to be style-less and was thought in the twenties to have freed architects from what seemed the inevitable alternatives in skyscraper design, Gothic solutions on the one hand and vertically stretched Classicism on the other.”
The issue of what constituted “modern” design was expounded upon in the press and occupied many architects, who sought an appropriate means of expressing the societal changes brought about by new technology and manufacturing processes. A dichotomy existed, according to Ada Louise Huxtable, between the “modern” architecture of Europe and the “modernistic” new skyscrapers of New York:
‘Modern’ was radical, reductive, and reformist; ‘modernistic’ was richly decorative and attached to conservative and hedonistic values. ‘Modern’ was the austere, abstract, elite, avant-garde work of … [Walter] Gropius, Mies [van der Rohe], and Le Corbusier, united in its early days under the rubric of the International Style. ‘Modernistic’ was neither pure nor revolutionary; it fused the ornamental and the exotic for what was really the last great decorative style.
Only a handful of International Style skyscrapers were constructed in the United States before World War II. Far more popular was the “modernistic” style, which was later termed “Art Deco” based on its debt to the 1925 Paris Exposition Internationale des Arts Decoratifs et Industriels Modernes. Flamboyant, dynamic, and dazzling to the eye, Art Deco’s primary characteristic was its “sumptuous ornament, and the lush textures and colors achieved by combining several materials, such as stone, brick, terra cotta, and metal.” Gilding and shiny materials were frequently used, and favorite decorative motifs, drawn from the natural world and geometric forms, included “spirals, sunflowers, steps, zigzags, triangles, double triangles, hexagons, fragmented circles, and seashells.” Frequently, facades were given a woven fabric treatment, in buildings including One Wall Street and the 21 West Street Building . Wall surfaces read as thin decorative veneers, as “stage sets” to a public infatuated with movies and the theater.
As Art Deco was conquering New York, a new skyscraper form, the slab, emerged. Into the 1920s, the city’s tallest skyscrapers were typically constructed on enormous lots. These sites were big enough, as with the Chrysler Building, to allow for “geometrically pure” square, needle-like towers that broke free of their bases and pierced the sky. But as large lots became rarer and developers sought to construct tall office buildings on narrow lots, this approach became unfeasible; the square tower, if made too small, lost too much of its internal space to elevators. As a result, new skyscrapers on narrower lots took on a slab-like form, their long and rectangular upper stories seemingly extruded from their bases. The pioneering slab skyscraper was H. Douglas Ives’ and Sloan & Robertson’s 38-story Fred F. French Building at Fifth Avenue and 45th Street, which was constructed on a relatively small lot.
But the master of the slab at the end of the 1920s was Raymond Hood, whose Daily News Building marked the most radical departure of any tall building from previous skyscraper form. Despite the rich Art Deco bas-relief over its main entrance, Hood’s building, with its artfully planned setbacks and flat, unornamented roofline, came closer to abstract sculpture than any skyscraper before; falling, in style, “between modern and modernistic,” it forsook the decorated crown of the Art Deco skyscraper and approached the purity of the International Style. Hood built upon his experience with the Daily News Building in designing another of the city’s great slab skyscrapers, the RCA Building at Rockefeller Center , which was completed in 1933.
Located just three blocks from the French Building, and similar in design and materials to the Daily News Building, 500 Fifth Avenue’s slender, slab-form tower situated the building within this group of transitional skyscrapers, precursors to the postwar office building. But with the Depression remaining entrenched and money for office buildings drying up, few Art Deco skyscrapers were completed in New York after Rockefeller Center, and the style, increasingly employed for government and institutional buildings, became considerably more restrained.
Shreve, Lamb & Harmon
Richmond Harold Shreve
William Frederick Lamb
The architectural firm of Shreve, Lamb & Harmon, formed in 1929, was one of New York City’s premier design teams, known primarily for their modern office buildings and especially the Empire State Building . The three principal designers had traditional architectural educations and experience with important New York firms before they joined together and created buildings specifically adapted to the design requirements and technological advances of the modern era.
Richmond Harold Shreve was born in Cornwallis, Nova Scotia. He studied architecture at Cornell University, graduating in 1902, and spent the next four years on the faculty of the School of Architecture there. While at Cornell, he supervised the construction of Goldwin Smith Hall, designed by the New York firm of Carrère & Hastings, and at the conclusion of the project he joined the firm. William Frederick Lamb, son of New York builder William Lamb, was born in Brooklyn. Graduating from Williams College in 1904, Shreve subsequently studied at the Columbia University School of Architecture, and then went to Paris to study at the Atelier Deglane. After receiving his diploma from the École des Beaux Arts in 1911, Lamb returned to New York and joined the firm of Carrère & Hastings where he met Shreve. In 1920, Shreve and Lamb became partners in the new firm of Carrère & Hastings, Shreve & Lamb.
By 1924, they decided to establish their own partnership, and five years later they were joined by Arthur Loomis Harmon to form Shreve, Lamb & Harmon. Harmon, who had been born in Chicago, studied at the Art Institute there and graduated from Columbia University School of Architecture in 1901. He worked as a designer in the firm of McKim, Mead & White between 1902 and 1911. From 1912 to 1913, he was an associate in the firm of Wallis & Goodwillie, and then practiced alone until joining Shreve and Lamb. His works from that period include battle monuments at Tours, Cantigny and Somme-Py in France, a YMCA in Jerusalem, and the award-winning Shelton Hotel in New York.
Of the three architects in the firm, Lamb was generally acknowledged to be the designer, and Shreve the administrator. For the Empire State Building, the firm’s most famous work, Lamb was the designer, but Shreve’s organizational skills were generally credited with enabling the building to be constructed in just one year. Shreve was also active as a planner beyond the firm’s work; he was the director of the Slum Clearance Committee of New York after its formation in 1933, and chief architect of the group preparing plans for the Williamsburg Housing Project, as well as chief architect of the Vladeck Houses on the Lower East Side and also of Parkchester in the Bronx.
Shreve, Lamb & Harmon worked principally on commercial office buildings, although they also designed a number of estates and residences in the New York suburbs, and a few apartment houses in Manhattan . Their residential work was largely in the neo-Tudor and other popular historical styles of the 1920s, while their commercial work tended to be spare and functional, reflecting little of the Beaux Arts ornament for which Carrère & Hastings had been famous. Their other buildings in New York included the L.P. Hollander & Company Building at 3 East 57th Street , a 1931-33 addition to 14 Wall Street , the Best & Company store at Fifth Avenue and 51st Street , an addition to the New York Times Annex on West 43rd Street, the Lefcourt National Building, and the Mutual of New York Building. Outside of New York City, their work includes the Standard Oil Building in Albany, the Reynolds Tobacco Company building in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and the Chimes Building in Syracuse, NY. These tend to be similar to their New York City work, with unadorned limestone cladding, metal-framed windows and simple, set-back massing, occasionally with Art Deco or Streamlined ornamental motifs.
Edmond R. Amateis
Edmond R. Amateis was an American sculptor born in Rome and trained at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design in New York. Working in the U.S. and Europe, Amateis created monumental public sculpture of a heroic-classical nature. Early in his career he won recognition with his award of the Prix de Rome , the Avery Prize of the Architectural League of New York , and the McCleese Prize of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts . For the New York World’s Fair of 1939, Amateis sculpted a monumental allegorical group based on American folklore, with figures depicting Johnny Appleseed as Benevolence, Paul Bunyan as Efficiency, and Strap Buckner as Humility. Amateis’s other major commissions included a sculptural frieze for the Liberty Memorial in Kansas City, Missouri, completed in 1938, and a memorial to American soldiers who died in France during World War II, located in Draguignan, France.
Design and Construction of the 500 Fifth Avenue Building
With his acquisition of the properties at nos. 3, 5, 7, and 9 West 42nd Street in 1915, Walter J. Salmon had assembled a parcel of 20,900 square feet at 500 Fifth Avenue, about the minimum size necessary for profitable redevelopment. In 1922, Gerry Estates, Inc. entered into an agreement with Salmon to redevelop the site. With other projects in the works, including the adjacent Salmon Tower at 11-27 West 42nd Street, Salmon delayed beginning work on the corner site until the summer of 1929. At that time he announced plans for a fifty-eight story building with frontage of 100 feet on Fifth Avenue and 208 feet on 42nd Street to be built to the design of Shreve, Lamb & Harmon. Given its status as the second most valuable piece of real estate in Manhattan, redevelopment of this site was greatly anticipated among the real estate community and by the public at large. An article in the Real Estate Record & Guide described the high-profile nature of the project:
For years residents of the city and out-of-town visitors alike have speculated as to the future of this corner, wondering that so prominent a location—at “the crossroads of the world”—should have been neglected in the modern development of Fifth Avenue as the leading shopping street of the world and of the Grand Central area as the midtown financial and business district…With the fashionable shopping district definitely extending its limits above Forty-second Street; with the north and south flow of automobile and pedestrian traffic and the cross flow between Grand Central Station and Times Square making the intersection one of the busiest in the world, and with other building under way, the time appeared ripe for an improvement on this corner.
The construction of the office building at 500 Fifth Avenue had a significant impact on the eventual development of the adjacent parcels, because its planning affected the zoning of the entire Fifth Avenue block front. The zoning code permitted a taller building on 42nd Street than on Fifth Avenue, so Salmon acquired a long-term lease on the adjacent four-story converted dwelling at 508 Fifth Avenue in 1927; by merging the zoning lots of this 25 by 102-foot building and that of 500 Fifth Avenue, he was able to build a higher tower than would have otherwise been possible.
The program for 500 Fifth Avenue called for street-level stores, banking facilities on the second and third floors, and office units on the floors above, totaling approximately 450,000 square feet of rentable area. Plans were submitted to the Buildings Department in October 1929, and excavation began in February of 1930; the estimated cost of the project was $4,000,000. Charles T. Wills, Inc. was the general contractor, and McClintic-Marshall Co. the steel contractor. Erection of the skyscraper’s steel skeleton began at the end of March, and was completed in a mere four months owing to a highly efficient system whereby the steel arrived on site and was hoisted by derricks to the 36th floor, where it was assembled and continuously distributed by a relay derrick to other floors. The exterior brickwork was completed in early September 1930, and the general contract for the building was completed in January 1931. At the height of the building project nearly 2,200 workers were employed.
The construction of 500 Fifth Avenue and its sister skyscraper the Empire State Building set a new standard for speed and efficiency in building construction. Each component of 500 Fifth Avenue’s structure was planned, mapped, and measured in advance, in what historian Christopher Gray called a “tight ballet of scheduling.” This strategic approach to construction planning and oversight was successfully realized at 500 Fifth Avenue through the close collaboration of the architect, building owner, real estate advisers, operating managers, and builder throughout the entire process of planning and construction. Architect Richmond Shreve was a great proponent of rationalized building construction, and expounded on his ideas in an essay titled “The Economic Design of Office Buildings”:
To set up properly an income-producing building the control of its design and construction should be in the hands of a Board on which sit Owner, Banker, Builder, Architect, Engineers, and Real Estate Men. The record of their decisions finds place in plans, specifications and contracts, financial transactions and leases, and the outcome of their work, if it is to be successful, must have been foreseen far in advance of its realization.
500 Fifth Avenue was completed in just over a year without accident or serious injury, and opened in March 1931 in time for the traditional renewal date for business leases of May 1. William F. Lamb called 500 Fifth Avenue “a thoroughly frank expression of the requirements of an up-to-date office building.” These requirements included modern, well lit and properly ventilated office units near elevators and bathrooms; fast and efficient elevator service; and maximum rentable floor space. Despite its relatively small lot and constricted building envelope, 500 Fifth Avenue offered all of these things; moreover, its unusually advantageous corner location across from the New York Public Library and Bryant Park afforded ample natural light, cross-ventilation, and unobstructed views for two blocks to the south.
Effectively, Shreve, Lamb & Harmon designed 500 Fifth Avenue from the top down, determining the placement of the building’s service core within the tower and then the base, and from the inside out, determining the ideal office unit as a basis for formulating the overall plan and circulation. The building’s set-back configuration, which allowed for an unusually high window-to-wall ratio, as well as a 25-foot wide light court on the west side of the building beginning at the sixth floor, ensured that no office unit would be more than 30 feet from natural light; a distance of 28 feet or less was considered optimal for modern office buildings before the development of air-conditioning. Floor areas ranged from 2,150 to 18,000 square feet, with office units as small as 9 feet in width and as large as an entire floor. The typical floor plan for the building’s base had 21 office units, while the typical floor plan for the tower had nine office units.
The main entrance to the building was placed on the Fifth Avenue facade, about 70 feet from 42nd Street and on center with the sheer tower rising above the setbacks, and the remainder of the ground floor on both the east and south facades was dominated by an unbroken line of bronze-framed, plate-glass storefronts. The main entrance was framed dramatically by pylons and crowned with the highly stylized bas-relief figure of a Grecian woman holding a staff with a winged sun disc and kneeling beside a model of the building itself, an allegorical representation of the “genius of the modern skyscraper,” sculpted from a single block of limestone by Edward Amateis.
The dramatically massed exterior of 500 Fifth Avenue expressed the constraints of the zoning code, which allowed more bulk on the 42nd Street side than on the Fifth Avenue side and thus determined the positioning of the tower on the base. The building’s tight footprint, which limited the size of the base, and the imperative of maximizing profits with top-quality office and retail space in a relatively small building envelope, resulted in the complex geometry of setbacks stepping up asymmetrically to the slender tower. With regards to the height of office buildings in a competitive real estate market, “…there is a point where the balance begins to swing back and the rate of return on capital investment begins to diminish as the building goes higher.” At 500 Fifth Avenue, the projected height of 58 stories , or 697 feet, was considered the limit of economic feasibility for a 100- by 208-foot lot. In his essay on tall office buildings, Shreve summed up the design problem inherent in the 1916 zoning ordinance, describing the modern tall office building as
“a geometrical form consisting of a base enclosed by vertical walls, an intermediate section defined by sloping limits, and a tower…[and]…practical usable office floor area, supported and enclosed by structural forms, served by mechanical equipment, and reached through public spaces which are not directly sources of revenue.”
Shreve went on to offer this thought:
The demands of time, cost, and practicability need not be hostile to the aesthetic side of the work. Indeed, may it not be fairly said that character is improved and greater success of pure design assured if sound reasoning as to value, and honest recognition of function, accompany and guide our struggle to attain architectural beauty?
Shreve, Lamb & Harmon’s completed building was noted in the press for its height, its zoning conditions, and its real estate value; it was among the city’s notable tall buildings of the time and remains a distinguished example of Art Deco skyscraper design. Stylized geometrical ornament, a restrained color palette, and the “vertical accent” created by spandrels and channeling all contributed to the building’s “modern architectural treatment”, in the words of partner William Lamb. On the second, third, and fourth stories, limestone piers decorated with channeling and abstracted frond and scroll motifs and light-green metal spandrels decorated with folds and chevrons reflect Art Deco’s affinity for stylized geometric forms. Around the main entrance the carved limestone pylons and allegorical bas-relief are picked out in gilding, and on the 42nd Street facade a pair of eagles carved in profile enhance the figural quality of the ornamental scheme. Rising above the base is 500 Fifth Avenue’s flat-roofed, slab-form tower.
The tower’s vertical buff-brick stripes are likely inspired by Hood’s Daily News Building, which bridged Art Deco and the emerging International Style when it opened in 1930. As with the Daily News Building—where Hood sought to conceal the windows to avoid the effect of a wall “shot full of holes”—these stripes alternate with dark window bands. In the center bays on 42nd Street and in the two window bays over the main entry, 500 Fifth Avenue’s terra-cotta spandrel panels are dark gray in color and angle forward. Seen from a distance the dark color of the spandrels merges with the dark color of the window frames to create a series of vertical stripes that rise unbroken to the roofline. This striped effect is continued on the north elevation, where the large expanse of brick wall enclosing the elevators and utilities is articulated with three uninterrupted channels filled with strips of dark gray terra cotta.
Above its base, 500 Fifth Avenue is virtually free of ornament, except at the tower, where a series of angled brick and terra-cotta panels decorated with chevrons read as pleated cresting against the skyline.
Subsequent History
A year after the stock market crash and three months before the opening of 500 Fifth Avenue, Walter J. Salmon was quoted in the papers on the subject of his prospects for an immediate return on his investment: “We feel that it will take some time to absorb the approximately 500,000 square feet of office space in the building, but the enterprise was undertaken with the greatest faith in the future of midtown expansion and development.” By May 1931, three months after its opening, the 15th, 16th and 20th floors of the building had been fully rented ; by the end of the year, several prestigious tenants had signed leases, including the Electrolux Corporation, no less than ten railroad corporations, and the Western Universities Club, which used the penthouse and the three floors below for its club facilities. An article in the New York Times from January 1932 reported a consistent demand for business space in the midtown area, calling business renting “brisk.”
Later tenants of 500 Fifth Avenue included the Austrian and Japanese consulates, and in the mid-1930s the building became the target of Communist protests directed at the Japanese consulate, which had offices on the 40th floor.
In 1944, when the Manufacturers Trust Company—then located at 513 Fifth Avenue–and the Mutual Insurance Company entered into a lease in which Mutual Life agreed to construct a new bank building on the property at nos. 508 and 510-514 Fifth Avenue, a corollary agreement with Walter Salmon permitted Manufacturers Trust Company to sublease, and ultimately redevelop, 508 Fifth Avenue. An important stipulation in this agreement was that during the time Salmon’s lease remained in effect , any building erected on the portion of the lot at No. 508 would not exceed the height of the then-existing building or otherwise interfere with 500 Fifth Avenue. Thus, the height of the new bank building was effectively limited to four or five stories, and light and ventilation levels on the north wall of 500 Fifth Avenue were preserved.
In 1955, the land under 500 Fifth Avenue was sold by Gerry Brothers & Co., whose principals were descendents of the original ownership, to the Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. 500 Fifth Avenue was again the site of political disturbance in 1980, when Croatian nationalists bombed a Yugoslavian bank located on the 30th floor of the building; there were no injuries, and only minor damage to the interior spaces. In the mid-1990s, the facade of 500 Fifth Avenue was repaired, ornament was restored or selectively refabricated, and replacement windows were installed. The building continues to be used as an office building with street-level stores.
Description
500 Fifth Avenue is an asymmetrically massed skyscraper with setbacks at the 18th, 22nd, and 25th stories on the Fifth Avenue facade and a recessed light court beginning at the eighth story and setbacks at the 23rd, 28th, and 34th stories on the 42nd Street facade; the side facade is partially visible from street; sheathed in limestone, terra cotta, and buff brick, the facades are enriched with carefully scaled Art Deco motifs, which accentuate the building’s sculptural massing and emphasize its verticality; on the Fifth Avenue facade the limestone and black granite main entrance is treated as a pylon framed by stylized gilded palmettos and capped by an allegorical bas-relief.
AS17-162-24063 (7-19 Dec. 1972) --- A close-up view of the equipment used for the Heat Flow and Convection Experiment, an engineering and operational test and demonstration carried out aboard the Apollo 17 command module during the final lunar landing mission in NASA's Apollo program. Three test cells were used in the demonstration for measuring and observing fluid flow behavior in the absence of gravity in space flight. Data obtained from such demonstrations will be valuable in the design of future science experiments and for manufacturing processes in space.
The kit shows the steps in the insulin manufacturing process from animal pancreas to drug product.
americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_107...
This is Grimace in a Formula One style white car with the McDonalds "Golden Arches" logo in the front. You can pull it back on a surface and it will go!
This toy is in good vintage condition with some yellowing from age. Some plastics are prone to this due to the manufacturing process.
The bottom states: -GRIMACE-McDONALDS CORP. 1988-P.c.-CHINA-
The car is about 2.5" long and 1.5" tall.
www.etsy.com/listing/99653169/vintage-mcdonalds-grimace-r...
Selective Laser Melting (SLM) is an additive manufacturing process that can be used for many different applications.
The SLM process starts by numerically slicing a 3D CAD model into a number of finite layers. For each sliced layer a laser scan path is calculated which defines both the boundary contour and some form of fill sequence, often a raster pattern. Each layer is then sequentially recreated by depositing powder layers, one on top of the other, and melting their surface by scanning a laser beam.
The powder is spread uniformly by a wiper. A high power-density fibre laser with a 40µm beam spot size fully melts the pre-deposited powder layer. The melted particles fuse and solidify to form a layer of the component.
For more information please visit www.twi-global.com/technologies/welding-surface-engineeri...
If you wish to use this image each use should be accompanied by the credit line and notice, "Courtesy of TWI Ltd".
The sewers require continuous maintenance. Cooking fat needs to be regularly removed, and recycled paper products tend not to break down so quickly - perhaps because the shorter, more damaged fibres need to be more strongly bonded in the re-manufacturing process.
I used auto colour balance, and long exposures of several seconds but the fluorescence - under the UV fluorescent lighting - from waste detergent water - seems real.
See also the related Brighton Sewer Tour Gallery.
External links:
Sewer tour photo gallery [Southern Water]
Brighton's magnificent sewers [Southern Water tour details]
A little history of Brighton's magnificent sewers [Southern Water]
From Barfoot's series of coloured lithographs of 1840 depicting the cotton manufacturing process.
Original text written to accompany Lithograph No.9:
The Beam full of yarn, after being dressed with size to stiffen and strengthen the threads, is brought to the Drawing-in Frame, and hung up as you see in the picture, the Healds which are made of twisted worsted, or Cotton, are hung under the beam and weighted below. The ends of the warp are then drawn down, and the rods hung up to preserve the lease, or the warp could not be woven. There is a female at each side of the healds; one takes hold of the ends of the warp, and gives them separately to the other, who draws them through the healds. When all the ends are through, the Drawing-in is completed. Next comes the Reeding; a reed consists of a great number of short flat pieces of steel or brass called Dents, fixed at short and equal distances from each other, in long pieces of split cane, and tightly secured with a wax band. Through each space, between the dents, two ends are drawn by a small hook, called a Reed-hook. It is not always necessary to draw the warps in; they can also be twisted in, that is, when the warp is nearly all woven into cloth by the weaver, the yarn is cut off, and the fresh warp twisted to the old one. Drawing-in and Reeding is very tedious work and requires great care, there are not only a great number of threads to draw in and reed, but if they were to miss one dent or one heald, it is probable that the whole or a part of the work would have to be done over again. Since this is the case, the steady, careful look of the girls is not to be wondered at.
Escultura Splash Expo Zaragoza 2008
La escultura Splash es una escultura de 21 m de altura diseñada por Program Collective y desarrollada mediante fluidos y dinámicas por Pere Gifre para la Exposición Internacional de Zaragoza de 2008; a partir del concepto de diseñadores Program Collective formado por: Mona Kim, Todd Palmer, Olga Subirós y Simon Taylor, para la exposición diseñada por Program Collective “Agua para la vida” en el Edificio Torre del Agua.
El cálculo de las estructuras a cargo del ingeniero José Maria Velasco de AMATRIA y la construcción por PQC bajo la dirección de PROGRAM COLLECTIVE.
Características Técnicas
La escultura estaba formada por 135 piezas distintas que se sujetaban mediante cables a la parte superior del edificio Torre del Agua. Estas piezas fueron diseñadas íntegramente por ordenador por Pere Gifre representado una gota de agua impactando en una superficie.
Proceso de Desarrollo
Mediante la utilización de efectos visuales (efectos especiales) Pere Gifre generó un fluido y mediante procesos de Diseño asistido por computador se adaptaron para su fabricación.
El proceso de fabricación realizado por PQC en sus instalaciones en MADRID combina la Fabricación asistida por computadora con procesos artesanales para generar los volúmenes finales que posteriormente fueron transportados e instalados en la Torre del Agua dentro de la Exposición Internacional de Zaragoza de 2008 SPAIN.
Splash Sculpture Expo Zaragoza 2008
The Splash sculpture is a sculpture of 21 m in height and designed by Collective Program developed by fluid and dynamic by Pere Gifre for Expo Zaragoza 2008; from Program Collective designers concept formed by Mona Kim, Todd Palmer, Simon Taylor and Olga Subirós for the exhibition designed by Program Collective "Water for Life" in the Water Tower Building.
The calculation of the structures in charge of the engineer José Maria Velasco of Amatria and construction under the direction of PQC PROGRAM COLLECTIVE.
Technical Characteristics
The sculpture was made up of 135 different pieces that were attached by wires to the top of the Water Tower building. These pieces were designed entirely by computer by Pere Gifre represented a drop of water hitting a surface.
Development process
Using visual effects (special effects) Pere Gifre fluid generated by processes of computer aided design adapted for manufacturing.
The manufacturing process performed by PQC at facilities in MADRID combines computer aided manufacturing with traditional processes to generate the final volumes were subsequently transported and installed at the Water Tower in the International Expo Zaragoza 2008 SPAIN.
The research space at Sector 7 of the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne National Laboratory is the only X-ray beamline in the world dedicated to fuel injection studies. The auto and aerospace industries and military use the system to study ways to make engines more fuel efficient and stable as well as to test new types of alternative fuels.
The injection system also aids in studies of spray systems, such as those used in manufacturing processes and industrial paint and coating equipment. The black foam at the center of the picture covers a fuel injection system for the NASA rocket Morpheus that will be tested. November 2014.
Photograph Courtesy of Argonne National Laboratory
Introducing the Champlain Octagon Shaped On Ground Pools. This NEW product is exclusively offered by Propools! A semi-inground pool is perfect for yards which slope because the pool can be installed partially in the ground and partially out. It can be decked with redwood or pressure treated wood and complimented with either a concrete deck or pavers. Depths ranges available are from 40" to an 8' Deep End.
This pool wall, equipment and materials are like that of an inground pool but competitively priced like a higher end above ground pool. Features a 17-gauge no-weld wall, 9 bolt panel fastening system, Stake-Loktm Rivet-less/Weldless manufacturing process, Z-700 (G-235) galvanized coated panels and supports. Lifetime Transferable warranty.
Read More About: On Ground Pools
Proces produkcji chmur.
Cloud manufacturing process.
Quenching tower of modern no. 1 coke oven battery.
Wieża gaszenia koksu baterii nr 1 - bis.
BlueEdge - Mach 8-10 Hypersonic Commercial Aircraft, 210 Passenger Hypersonic Plane - Iteration 2
Seating: 210 | Crew 2+4
Length: 195ft | Span: 93ft
Engines: 4 U-TBCC (Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle) +1 Aerospike for sustained 2G acceleration to Mach 10.
Fuel: H2 (Compressed Hydrogen)
Cruising Altitude: 100,000-125,000ft
Airframe: 75% Proprietary Composites
Operating Costs, Similar to a 737. $7,000-$15,000hr, including averaged maintenence costs
Iteration 2
IO Aircraft www.ioaircraft.com
Drew Blair www.linkedin.com/in/drew-b-25485312/
-----------------------------
hypersonic plane, hypersonic aircraft, hypersonic commercial plane, hypersonic commercial aircraft, hypersonic airline, tbcc, glide breaker, fighter plane, hyperonic fighter, boeing phantom express, phantom works, boeing phantom works, lockheed skunk works, hypersonic weapon, hypersonic missile, scramjet missile, scramjet engineering, scramjet physics, boost glide, tactical glide vehicle, Boeing XS-1, htv, Air Launched Rapid Response Weapon, (ARRW), hypersonic tactical vehicle, space plane, scramjet, turbine based combined cycle, ramjet, dual mode ramjet, darpa, onr, navair, afrl, air force research lab, office of naval research, defense advanced research project agency, defense science, missile defense agency, aerospike, hydrogen, hydrogen storage, hydrogen fueled, hydrogen aircraft
-----------------------------
Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle. Current technologies and what Lockheed is trying to force on the Dept of Defense, for that low speed Mach 5 plane DOD gave them $1 billion to build and would disintegrate above Mach 5, is TBCC. 2 separate propulsion systems in the same airframe, which requires TWICE the airframe space to use.
Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle is 1 propulsion system cutting that airframe deficit in half, and also able to operate above Mach 10 up to Mach 15 in atmosphere, and a simple nozzle modification allows for outside atmosphere rocket mode, ie orbital capable.
Additionally, Reaction Engines maximum air breather mode is Mach 4.5, above that it will explode in flight from internal pressures are too high to operate. Thus, must switch to non air breather rocket mode to operate in atmosphere in hypersonic velocities. Which as a result, makes it not feasible for anything practical. It also takes an immense amount of fuel to function.
-------------
Advanced Additive Manufacturing for Hypersonic Aircraft
Utilizing new methods of fabrication and construction, make it possible to use additive manufacturing, dramatically reducing the time and costs of producing hypersonic platforms from missiles, aircraft, and space capable craft. Instead of aircraft being produced in piece, then bolted together; small platforms can be produced as a single unit and large platforms can be produces in large section and mated without bolting. These techniques include using exotic materials and advanced assembly processes, with an end result of streamlining the production costs and time for hypersonic aircraft; reducing months of assembly to weeks. Overall, this process greatly reduced the cost for producing hypersonic platforms. Even to such an extent that a Hellfire missile costs apx $100,000 but by utilizing our technologies, replacing it with a Mach 8-10 hypersonic missile of our physics/engineering and that missile would cost roughly $75,000 each delivered.
Materials used for these manufacturing processes are not disclosed, but overall, provides a foundation for extremely high stresses and thermodynamics, ideal for hypersonic platforms. This specific methodology and materials applications is many decades ahead of all known programs. Even to the extend of normalized space flight and re-entry, without concern of thermodynamic failure.
*Note, most entities that are experimenting with additive manufacturing for hypersonic aircraft, this makes it mainstream and standardized processes, which also applies for mass production.
What would normally be measured in years and perhaps a decade to go from drawing board to test flights, is reduced to singular months and ready for production within a year maximum.
Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle (U-TBCC)
To date, the closest that NASA and industry have achieved for turbine based aircraft to fly at hypersonic velocities is by mounting a turbine into an aircraft and sharing the inlet with a scramjet or rocket based motor. Reaction Engines Sabre is not able to achieve hypersonic velocities and can only transition into a non air breathing rocket for beyond Mach 4.5
However, utilizing Unified Turbine Based Combine Cycle also known as U-TBCC, the two separate platforms are able to share a common inlet and the dual mode ramjet/scramjet is contained within the engine itself, which allows for a much smaller airframe footprint, thus engingeers are able to then design much higher performance aerial platforms for hypersonic flight, including the ability for constructing true single stage to orbit aircraft by utilizing a modification/version that allows for transition to outside atmosphere propulsion without any other propulsion platforms within the aircraft. By transitioning and developing aircraft to use Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle, this propulsion system opens up new options to replace that airframe deficit for increased fuel capacity and/or payload.
Enhanced Dynamic Cavitation
Dramatically Increasing the efficiency of fuel air mixture for combustion processes at hypersonic velocities within scramjet propulsion platforms. The aspects of these processes are non disclosable.
Dynamic Scramjet Ignition Processes
For optimal scramjet ignition, a process known as Self Start is sought after, but in many cases if the platform becomes out of attitude, the scramjet will ignite. We have already solved this problem which as a result, a scramjet propulsion system can ignite at lower velocities, high velocities, at optimal attitude or not optimal attitude. It doesn't matter, it will ignite anyways at the proper point for maximum thrust capabilities at hypersonic velocities.
Hydrogen vs Kerosene Fuel Sources
Kerosene is an easy fuel to work with, and most western nations developing scramjet platforms use Kerosene for that fact. However, while kerosene has better thermal properties then Hydrogen, Hydrogen is a far superior fuel source in scramjet propulsion flight, do it having a much higher efficiency capability. Because of this aspect, in conjunction with our developments, it allows for a MUCH increased fuel to air mixture, combustion, thrust; and ability for higher speeds; instead of very low hypersonic velocities in the Mach 5-6 range. Instead, Mach 8-10 range, while we have begun developing hypersonic capabilities to exceed 15 in atmosphere within less then 5 years.
Conforming High Pressure Tank Technology for CNG and H2.
As most know in hypersonics, Hydrogen is a superior fuel source, but due to the storage abilities, can only be stored in cylinders thus much less fuel supply. Not anymore, we developed conforming high pressure storage technology for use in aerospace, automotive sectors, maritime, etc; which means any overall shape required for 8,000+ PSI CNG or Hydrogen. For hypersonic platforms, this means the ability to store a much larger volume of hydrogen vs cylinders.
As an example, X-43 flown by Nasa which flew at Mach 9.97. The fuel source was Hydrogen, which is extremely more volatile and combustible then kerosene (JP-7), via a cylinder in the main body. If it had used our technology, that entire section of the airframe would had been an 8,000 PSI H2 tank, which would had yielded 5-6 times the capacity. While the X-43 flew 11 seconds under power at Mach 9.97, at 6 times the fuel capacity would had yielded apx 66 seconds of fuel under power at Mach 9.97. If it had flew slower, around Mach 6, same principles applied would had yielded apx 500 seconds of fuel supply under power (slower speeds required less energy to maintain).
Enhanced Fuel Mixture During Shock Train Interaction
Normally, fuel injection is conducted at the correct insertion point within the shock train for maximum burn/combustion. Our methodologies differ, since almost half the fuel injection is conducted PRE shock train within the isolator, so at the point of isolator injection the fuel enhances the combustion process, which then requires less fuel injection to reach the same level of thrust capabilities.
Improved Bow Shock Interaction
Smoother interaction at hypersonic velocities and mitigating heat/stresses for beyond Mach 6 thermodynamics, which extraordinarily improves Type 3, 4, and 5 shock interaction.
6,000+ Fahrenheit Thermal Resistance
To date, the maximum thermal resistance was tested at AFRL in the spring of 2018, which resulted in a 3,200F thermal resistance for a short duration. This technology, allows for normalized hypersonic thermal resistance of 3,000-3,500F sustained, and up to 6,500F resistance for short endurance, ie 90 seconds or less. 10-20 minute resistance estimate approximately 4,500F +/- 200F.
*** This technology advancement also applies to Aerospike rocket engines, in which it is common for Aerospike's to exceed 4,500-5,000F temperatures, which results in the melting of the reversed bell housing. That melting no longer ocurrs, providing for stable combustion to ocurr for the entire flight envelope
Scramjet Propulsion Side Wall Cooling
With old technologies, side wall cooling is required for hypersonic flight and scramjet propulsion systems, otherwise the isolator and combustion regions of a scramjet would melt, even using advanced ablatives and ceramics, due to their inability to cope with very high temperatures. Using technology we have developed for very high thermodynamics and high stresses, side wall cooling is no longer required, thus removing that variable from the design process and focusing on improved ignition processes and increasing net thrust values.
Lower Threshold for Hypersonic Ignition
Active and adaptive flight dynamics, resulting in the ability for scramjet ignition at a much lower velocity, ie within ramjet envelope, between Mach 2-4, and seamless transition from supersonic to hypersonic flight, ie supersonic ramjet (scramjet). This active and dynamic aspect, has a wide variety of parameters for many flight dynamics, velocities, and altitudes; which means platforms no longer need to be engineered for specific altitude ranges or preset velocities, but those parameters can then be selected during launch configuration and are able to adapt actively in flight.
Dramatically Improved Maneuvering Capabilities at Hypersonic Velocities
Hypersonic vehicles, like their less technologically advanced brethren, use large actuator and the developers hope those controls surfaces do not disintegrate in flight. In reality, it is like rolling the dice, they may or may not survive, hence another reason why the attempt to keep velocities to Mach 6 or below. We have shrunken down control actuators while almost doubling torque and response capabilities specifically for hypersonic dynamics and extreme stresses involved, which makes it possible for maximum input authority for Mach 10 and beyond.
Paradigm Shift in Control Surface Methodologies, Increasing Control Authority (Internal Mechanical Applications)
To date, most control surfaces for hypersonic missile platforms still use fins, similar to lower speed conventional missiles, and some using ducted fins. This is mostly due to lack of comprehension of hypersonic velocities in their own favor. Instead, the body itself incorporates those control surfaces, greatly enhancing the airframe strength, opening up more space for hardware and fuel capacity; while simultaneously enhancing the platforms maneuvering capabilities.
A scramjet missile can then fly like conventional missile platforms, and not straight and level at high altitudes, losing velocity on it's decent trajectory to target. Another added benefit to this aspect, is the ability to extend range greatly, so if anyone elses hypersonic missile platform were developed for 400 mile range, falling out of the sky due to lack of glide capabilities; our platforms can easily reach 600+ miles, with minimal glide deceleration.
The Horrockses Cotton Fairies take you on a tour of the cotton manufacturing processes at three of their Preston Mills - Yard Works, Centenary / New Preston and Fishwick.
This was Horrockses - Crewdson's contribution to the 1920 trade publication Concerning Cotton - A brief account of the aims and achievements of the Amalgamated Cotton Mills Trust Limited and it's component companies.
TO ENLARGE - either:
1. Right-click the image then choose Original or...
2. Select View all sizes from the Actions tab then choose Original
Early preview (Iteration 3) of an entirely new type of aircraft, no info is on the net yet and won't be for a while. RANGER - 2 Passenger VTOL Hypersonic Plane
Drew Blair
www.linkedin.com/in/drew-b-25485312/
Vertical take off and landing - High Supersonic into Hypersonic Realm. Economy cruise above Mach 4, and can accelerate to beyond Mach 8. Non VTOL, could reach LEO. With a range of 5,000+ nm (8,000-10,000nm non vtol). Fuel H2, reducing fuel weight 95%.
Length, 35ft (10.67m), span 18ft (6m).
Propulsion, 2 Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle. 2 Unified thrust producing gas turbine generators that provide the power for the central lifting fan (electric, not shaft driven) and the rear VTOL.
Estimated market price, $25-$30 million in production. New York to Dubai in an hour.
All based on my own technology advances in Hypersonics which make Lockheed and Boeing look ancient.
-------------
io aircraft, phantom express, phantom works, boeing phantom works, lockheed skunk works, hypersonic weapon, hypersonic missile, scramjet missile, scramjet engineering, scramjet physics, boost glide, tactical glide vehicle, Boeing XS-1, htv, Air-Launched Rapid Response Weapon, (ARRW), hypersonic tactical vehicle, hypersonic plane, hypersonic aircraft, space plane, scramjet, turbine based combined cycle, ramjet, dual mode ramjet, darpa, onr, navair, afrl, air force research lab, defense science, missile defense agency, aerospike,
Advanced Additive Manufacturing for Hypersonic Aircraft
Utilizing new methods of fabrication and construction, make it possible to use additive manufacturing, dramatically reducing the time and costs of producing hypersonic platforms from missiles, aircraft, and space capable craft. Instead of aircraft being produced in piece, then bolted together; small platforms can be produced as a single unit and large platforms can be produces in large section and mated without bolting. These techniques include using exotic materials and advanced assembly processes, with an end result of streamlining the production costs and time for hypersonic aircraft; reducing months of assembly to weeks. Overall, this process greatly reduced the cost for producing hypersonic platforms. Even to such an extent that a Hellfire missile costs apx $100,000 but by utilizing our technologies, replacing it with a Mach 8-10 hypersonic missile of our physics/engineering and that missile would cost roughly $75,000 each delivered.
Materials used for these manufacturing processes are not disclosed, but overall, provides a foundation for extremely high stresses and thermodynamics, ideal for hypersonic platforms. This specific methodology and materials applications is many decades ahead of all known programs. Even to the extend of normalized space flight and re-entry, without concern of thermodynamic failure.
*Note, most entities that are experimenting with additive manufacturing for hypersonic aircraft, this makes it mainstream and standardized processes, which also applies for mass production.
What would normally be measured in years and perhaps a decade to go from drawing board to test flights, is reduced to singular months and ready for production within a year maximum.
Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle (U-TBCC)
To date, the closest that NASA and industry have achieved for turbine based aircraft to fly at hypersonic velocities is by mounting a turbine into an aircraft and sharing the inlet with a scramjet or rocket based motor. Reaction Engines Sabre is not able to achieve hypersonic velocities and can only transition into a non air breathing rocket for beyond Mach 4.5
However, utilizing Unified Turbine Based Combine Cycle also known as U-TBCC, the two separate platforms are able to share a common inlet and the dual mode ramjet/scramjet is contained within the engine itself, which allows for a much smaller airframe footprint, thus engingeers are able to then design much higher performance aerial platforms for hypersonic flight, including the ability for constructing true single stage to orbit aircraft by utilizing a modification/version that allows for transition to outside atmosphere propulsion without any other propulsion platforms within the aircraft. By transitioning and developing aircraft to use Unified Turbine Based Combined Cycle, this propulsion system opens up new options to replace that airframe deficit for increased fuel capacity and/or payload.
Enhanced Dynamic Cavitation
Dramatically Increasing the efficiency of fuel air mixture for combustion processes at hypersonic velocities within scramjet propulsion platforms. The aspects of these processes are non disclosable.
Dynamic Scramjet Ignition Processes
For optimal scramjet ignition, a process known as Self Start is sought after, but in many cases if the platform becomes out of attitude, the scramjet will ignite. We have already solved this problem which as a result, a scramjet propulsion system can ignite at lower velocities, high velocities, at optimal attitude or not optimal attitude. It doesn't matter, it will ignite anyways at the proper point for maximum thrust capabilities at hypersonic velocities.
Hydrogen vs Kerosene Fuel Sources
Kerosene is an easy fuel to work with, and most western nations developing scramjet platforms use Kerosene for that fact. However, while kerosene has better thermal properties then Hydrogen, Hydrogen is a far superior fuel source in scramjet propulsion flight, do it having a much higher efficiency capability. Because of this aspect, in conjunction with our developments, it allows for a MUCH increased fuel to air mixture, combustion, thrust; and ability for higher speeds; instead of very low hypersonic velocities in the Mach 5-6 range. Instead, Mach 8-10 range, while we have begun developing hypersonic capabilities to exceed 15 in atmosphere within less then 5 years.
Conforming High Pressure Tank Technology for CNG and H2.
As most know in hypersonics, Hydrogen is a superior fuel source, but due to the storage abilities, can only be stored in cylinders thus much less fuel supply. Not anymore, we developed conforming high pressure storage technology for use in aerospace, automotive sectors, maritime, etc; which means any overall shape required for 8,000+ PSI CNG or Hydrogen. For hypersonic platforms, this means the ability to store a much larger volume of hydrogen vs cylinders.
As an example, X-43 flown by Nasa which flew at Mach 9.97. The fuel source was Hydrogen, which is extremely more volatile and combustible then kerosene (JP-7), via a cylinder in the main body. If it had used our technology, that entire section of the airframe would had been an 8,000 PSI H2 tank, which would had yielded 5-6 times the capacity. While the X-43 flew 11 seconds under power at Mach 9.97, at 6 times the fuel capacity would had yielded apx 66 seconds of fuel under power at Mach 9.97. If it had flew slower, around Mach 6, same principles applied would had yielded apx 500 seconds of fuel supply under power (slower speeds required less energy to maintain).
Enhanced Fuel Mixture During Shock Train Interaction
Normally, fuel injection is conducted at the correct insertion point within the shock train for maximum burn/combustion. Our methodologies differ, since almost half the fuel injection is conducted PRE shock train within the isolator, so at the point of isolator injection the fuel enhances the combustion process, which then requires less fuel injection to reach the same level of thrust capabilities.
Improved Bow Shock Interaction
Smoother interaction at hypersonic velocities and mitigating heat/stresses for beyond Mach 6 thermodynamics, which extraordinarily improves Type 3, 4, and 5 shock interaction.
6,000+ Fahrenheit Thermal Resistance
To date, the maximum thermal resistance was tested at AFRL in the spring of 2018, which resulted in a 3,200F thermal resistance for a short duration. This technology, allows for normalized hypersonic thermal resistance of 3,000-3,500F sustained, and up to 6,500F resistance for short endurance, ie 90 seconds or less. 10-20 minute resistance estimate approximately 4,500F +/- 200F.
*** This technology advancement also applies to Aerospike rocket engines, in which it is common for Aerospike's to exceed 4,500-5,000F temperatures, which results in the melting of the reversed bell housing. That melting no longer ocurrs, providing for stable combustion to ocurr for the entire flight envelope
Scramjet Propulsion Side Wall Cooling
With old technologies, side wall cooling is required for hypersonic flight and scramjet propulsion systems, otherwise the isolator and combustion regions of a scramjet would melt, even using advanced ablatives and ceramics, due to their inability to cope with very high temperatures. Using technology we have developed for very high thermodynamics and high stresses, side wall cooling is no longer required, thus removing that variable from the design process and focusing on improved ignition processes and increasing net thrust values.
Lower Threshold for Hypersonic Ignition
Active and adaptive flight dynamics, resulting in the ability for scramjet ignition at a much lower velocity, ie within ramjet envelope, between Mach 2-4, and seamless transition from supersonic to hypersonic flight, ie supersonic ramjet (scramjet). This active and dynamic aspect, has a wide variety of parameters for many flight dynamics, velocities, and altitudes; which means platforms no longer need to be engineered for specific altitude ranges or preset velocities, but those parameters can then be selected during launch configuration and are able to adapt actively in flight.
Dramatically Improved Maneuvering Capabilities at Hypersonic Velocities
Hypersonic vehicles, like their less technologically advanced brethren, use large actuator and the developers hope those controls surfaces do not disintegrate in flight. In reality, it is like rolling the dice, they may or may not survive, hence another reason why the attempt to keep velocities to Mach 6 or below. We have shrunken down control actuators while almost doubling torque and response capabilities specifically for hypersonic dynamics and extreme stresses involved, which makes it possible for maximum input authority for Mach 10 and beyond.
Paradigm Shift in Control Surface Methodologies, Increasing Control Authority (Internal Mechanical Applications)
To date, most control surfaces for hypersonic missile platforms still use fins, similar to lower speed conventional missiles, and some using ducted fins. This is mostly due to lack of comprehension of hypersonic velocities in their own favor. Instead, the body itself incorporates those control surfaces, greatly enhancing the airframe strength, opening up more space for hardware and fuel capacity; while simultaneously enhancing the platforms maneuvering capabilities.
A scramjet missile can then fly like conventional missile platforms, and not straight and level at high altitudes, losing velocity on it's decent trajectory to target. Another added benefit to this aspect, is the ability to extend range greatly, so if anyone elses hypersonic missile platform were developed for 400 mile range, falling out of the sky due to lack of glide capabilities; our platforms can easily reach 600+ miles, with minimal glide deceleration.
www.pharmapackagingcn.com/products/infusion-rubber-stopper/
Infusion Stoppers are designed for infusion bottles and provide optimal protection and drug delivery. Our range of pharmaceutical rubber Infusion Stoppers is specifically designed to meet multi-piercing needs and facilitate manufacturing processes.
Details of Infusion Rubber Stopper
Product SpecificationDrawing NoCrown FeaturesCrown Diameter mmCrown Thickness mmPlug Diameter mmTotal Height mm
22-B21501Pit radiation22.33.814.27.8
28-C1512Pit single hole single circle273.81811.8
32-A111603Four hole three segment arc radiation30.9423.612.2
32-A31614Four hole three segment arc radiation30.8524.216