Comments on: Elon Musk at MIT’s AeroAstro Centennial Symposium

By: Roger

Roger — Wed, 29 Oct 2014 04:40:00 +0000

Always gimballed is incorrect. Look at Goddard’s first design and most of the early VfR designs.

I’m surprised the commenters haven’t yet mentioned the Harrier in the TVC world…

By: Scipio Americanus

Scipio Americanus — Tue, 28 Oct 2014 12:39:12 +0000

Luckylucky beat me to it, but a lot of high-performance modern combat aircraft have thrust vectoring. I think what Musk is referring to, though, is engine gimbaling and vectored thrust as a total replacement for conventional control surfaces.

By: Lucklucky

Lucklucky — Tue, 28 Oct 2014 10:09:42 +0000

I think some Su-27 had gimbals. There is also thrust vectoring in the F-22, if I am not mistaken.

By: Isegoria

Isegoria — Mon, 27 Oct 2014 14:30:26 +0000

Yes, rocket engines need to be gimbaled, because control surfaces don't work in a vacuum, and airplane engines don't need to be gimbaled, because control surfaces do work in atmosphere, but can we replace airplane control surfaces with gimbals? That's an interesting question, and Musk suggests that we could, at least with electric engines.

By: Bob Sykes

Bob Sykes — Mon, 27 Oct 2014 11:05:24 +0000

Rocket engines are gimbaled because directional control by airlerons and other surfaces is impossible in space. Aircraft engines aren’t because it is in air. Also, leaving out the gimbals saves weight. Rotary engines are still used in some small aircraft to save the weight of the cooling system.

By: Mike

Mike — Sun, 26 Oct 2014 19:55:06 +0000

I remember talking to a engineer or some such who said sci fi was a major source of inspiration for him and his friends. IIRC, Peter Thiel and/or his coauthor in “Zero to One” writes about how ‘Cryptonomicon’ by Neal Stephenson was mandatory reading at PayPal, where I guess Elon Musk also was. I’m sure sci fi authors love to hear that. :)