I used to go on motorcycle rides and would go to the one closer to Shilshole/Golden Gates. One of the places I miss since moving to the East Coast the year this article was written. Great burgers.
Feeling vindicated in having gotten rid of my windows comps and gmail. I used to have a dedicated linux box but lately have been preferring the ease of macs. Maybe one day I'll get another linux desktop up, or just run it on the m2.
The AC75 class is now going very fast as well with foils, over 50kts.
Just recently the 40kt barrier was broken by hydrofoil windsurfers. Fins still have a higher top end but the gap has been closing. I'm not sure what design change will enable foils to be just as fast or if they hit a wall.
I've personally done about 24kts on foil and similar on fin and in some cases it's a bit terrifying in more chop. Others are much faster than that.
In my brief stint working on spacecraft in the private sector I worked with guys like you that did beautiful things with wiring that I loved to see.
I hear you on scheduling too. I've given best estimates and they then get chopped up and halved (or worse) by management types, then things start to slip and we end up being closer to what was originally estimated, but somehow everyone then gets surprised.
Nowhere near as extreme but I broke my leg and there was a weird sensation if I touched my leg near the break, my toes would tingle even though they were quite a ways away. Years later, it no longer does that and feels normal in that area.
I was hoping there would be something here about using Stirling engines that use decay heat, but looks like they are just using the decay heat itself and not generating electricity. The space stirling engines that NASA has worked on in a few iterations made a lot more electrical power than the older RTGs, with the tradeoff of moving components and associated issues.
It really seems like the ancients knew quite a bit. Their system for counting and for angles seems to have been really handy. And the measurement system of feet and inches was really close to what everyone had readily available.
I remember falling off of a tall monkey bar thing like that and getting the wind knocked out of me the first time. And a lot of other equipment that I haven't seen in decades.
It would be interesting to see a cross section and what kind of variable geometry they are using to max out in the different flight regimes. I poked around and didn't see that, and I wonder if they could even publish that at this stage.