Lesson learned:(:(:(:(:(
MySn...@webtv.net
build a rocket with 5 engines because it "could"
be unstable...........I would add to that.... NEVER
build a rocket with 5 engines because it could boost to 30 ft. go
sideways and make everyone "Hit The Dirt" and then impale itself on your
girlfriends 280 ZX, And have her say, "I Told You So"!!!
What a day:(:(:(:(
James............................
Robert Iannucci
What did you use for igniters? What type of ignition system? Clustering
needs LOTS O' AMPS and very reliable igniter's. "I" would recommend Jim
Turners Tungsten "Fire in the hole Igniters" For Any clustering project up
to J motors. After that you need to be using Low current squibs with
thermalite and pyrogen. It is also VERY important to have a Launch system
that will deliver A LOT of Amps FAST! Gel cells with a relay system are very
effective for doing this. Good luck and don't give up! This can be done and
is quite often!
--
Robert Iannucci
NAR 75375 L2
Charter President
Eastern Arizona Rocket Society
<MySn...@webtv.net> wrote in message
news:17300-3A...@storefull-104.iap.bryant.webtv.net...
TÿrannyØfGøvt
launched on 80 "C" motors. Cluster success is only as good as the ignition
system.
<MySn...@webtv.net> wrote in message
news:17300-3A...@storefull-104.iap.bryant.webtv.net...
Neil Tarasoff
My suggestion is LOSE THE GIRLFRIEND, her attitude is toooooo negative.
BTW, get a real ISP. 8-)
Dancing Baby
J M
pretty good life.BTW I was using a Estes "Command"
launch controller, But this was my fault for not double checking the
leads. I was using Estes ignitors.
Robert Iannucci
AMPS!!!!! is the key! Pratt Hobbies has a nice system if need more power but
don't want to build your own. I use a Project box from Radio Shack with a
Ford Solenoid and a Motorized Wheel chair Battery. It is 12ga wire from the
Battery to the Solenoid and 14ga from the Solenoid to the igniter. I could
light the SRB's on the Shuttle!
--
Robert Iannucci
NAR 75375 L2
Charter President
Eastern Arizona Rocket Society
"J M" <night...@webtv.net> wrote in message
news:28943-3A...@storefull-102.iap.bryant.webtv.net...
Mark Recktenwald
news:JJdn6.168$BW1....@news-west.eli.net...
> <snip>
> I could light the SRB's on the Shuttle!
And just how long is your remote cable?
--
Mark Recktenwald
Stow, Ohio
Moderator of ABMR on Yahoo! Groups: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ABMR
NAR #77432 L1, NAR Section #606 Advisor
MTMA web page: http://web.raex.com/~markndeb/rockets/mtma/
Jim Z in VT
very well be that the CG's too far back. Those 5 motors put a lot of weight
at the wrong end of the rocket and may need some nose weight to compensate.
You could get 'em all lit and still have it go sideways at 30' if the
stability margin's bad.
I've had no problems flying my 5-motor Big Daddy :-)
--
Jim Z in Vermont
JimZ...@adelphia.NoThanks.net
(to reply by e-mail, remove the polite decline from my address)
J M <night...@webtv.net> wrote in message
news:28943-3A...@storefull-102.iap.bryant.webtv.net...
Robert Iannucci
manuever because of stability?
Robert
PS Neil's right Ditch the girlfriend!
"Jim Z in VT" <jimz...@adelphia.NoThanks.net> wrote in message
news:AFfn6.753$sp3....@news1.news.adelphia.net...
J M
So I guess I didn't use enough nose weight.
James
Art Fuldodger
<scratching head>
Huh?
Dave Ward
> Battery to the Solenoid and 14ga from the Solenoid to the igniter. I could
> light the SRB's on the Shuttle!
Don't they use a rocket motor to light the SRB's?
J M
too. I was using the standard Estes igniters with an
Estes "Command" launch control. Its never failed me and it didn't fail
me this time, It was my fault.
By the way, Everything people have said about this particular launch
controller,(Estes "Command" launch control") is true, Its a very
reliable launch control and I've never had any problems with it. Out of
about a dozen or so people I've asked only 1 person had anything
negative to say about it.
James........................
J M
combination of nose weight,(or the lack thereof) and engines not
igniting. Is that
better?!?
Art Fuldodger
O.k., I understand...
But if only 3 out of 5 lit, you wouldn't have a stable flight anyway,
regardless of whether your CG was forward enough. You would
have asymmetric thrust, and the flight would be, well, "subnominal".
The possible exception to this _might_ be if you had a 5-motor
arrangement like the "5" on a die, and the two that didn't light were
diagonally opposite outboards. Then you'd just be underpowered.
Just curious, did your GF ditch you over this? ;-)
Robert Iannucci
Robert
"Dave Ward" <Tac...@geocities.com> wrote in message
news:97keeb$p3c85$1...@ID-31200.news.dfncis.de...
David Weinshenker
> Don't they use a rocket motor to light the SRB's?
And a smaller one to light that one.
Somewhere further up the line is a substantial
mass of boron/KNO3 pellets. At the head of the
chain is a pair of "NASA standard initiators".
-dave w
J M
future. Man, One little dent!!!
James.......................:(
Dave Ward
> NO! They use squibs.
To quote NASA:
The solid rocket motor ignition commands are sent by the orbiter computers
through the MECs to the safe and arm device NSDs in each SRB. A PIC
single-channel capacitor discharge device controls the firing of each
pyrotechnic device. Three signals must be present simultaneously for the PIC
to generate the pyro firing output. These signals- arm, fire 1 and fire
2-originate in the orbiter general- purpose computers and are transmitted to
the MECs. The MECs reformat them to 28-volt dc signals for the PICs. The arm
signal charges the PIC capacitor to 40 volts dc (minimum of 20 volts dc).
The fire 2 commands cause the redundant NSDs to fire through a thin barrier
seal down a flame tunnel. This ignites a pyro booster charge, which is
retained in the safe and arm device behind a perforated plate. The booster
charge ignites the propellant in the igniter initiator; and combustion
products of this propellant ignite the solid rocket motor initiator, which
fires down the length of the solid rocket motor igniting the solid rocket
motor propellant.
dem squibs are NSDs igniting propellant igniting propellant to ignite the
propellant.
Jim Z in VT
Robert Iannucci wrote:
> NO! They use squibs.
mmmm.....calamari!
--
Jim Z in Vermont
"I've got plenty of common sense....I just choose to ignore it" - Calvin
Gordon S. Hlavenka
> > NO! They use squibs.
Jim Z in VT wrote:
> mmmm.....calamari!
Never eat the calamari at a bris.
--
Gordon S. Hlavenka O- nos...@crashelex.com
Vote Straight-ticket Procrastination Party on December 6th!
Fred Shecter
-Shread Vector NRA #1 Paramount Leader
Gordon S. Hlavenka <nos...@crashelex.com> wrote in message
news:3A9DE6BF...@crashelex.com...
David Wallis
If I remember correctly, the squibs ignite what are essentially large
composite rocket motors who's exhaust/flame ignites the SRB. What blew
my mind is that "large compisite rocket motors" equated to about 750
pounds of APCP!
--
David Wallis
Mark Simpson
guys, I've become a Battlebots addict. I even taped last week's 8 hour
Battlebot Marathon. 8-)
Mark Simpson
NAR 71503 Level II
J M
I thought about buying a couple of radio controlled cars(on different
frequencies) and using them, Not to try to mortally wound the other car
but just to incapacitate it by flipping it over or something.
Love those battlebots!!!!!!
Chris
Better then those nuts who try to send their lovingly crafted RC boats to
the briny deep through the use of tiny, ship mounted, pellet guns... :)
Chris
Remove .nospam to reply.
Chris Taylor Jr.
I also like battle bots and have some IDEAS of my own ! :-) hehehe
Just not enough CASH right now
"Chris" <xtch...@yahoo.com.nospam> wrote in message
news:986ct5$p59$1...@horsefly.nf.net...
P Flanagan
opposing bot? :-)
"Chris Taylor Jr." <nos...@nerys.com> wrote in message
news:668q6.208$xe7....@newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net...
Chris Taylor Jr.
have an air cannon to though them and flip them over (yeah right :-)
PS I could always have it fire Acid Filled Nano Rockets to slowly disolve
the enemy with each salvo.
"P Flanagan" <set...@flanaganweb.com> wrote in message
news:tajhd5j...@corp.supernews.com...
David Weinshenker
> PS I could always have it fire Acid Filled
> Nano Rockets to slowly disolve
> the enemy with each salvo.
I don't think the rules permit
propellants or corrosives.
-dave w
Chris
"David Weinshenker" <daz...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:3AAB096D...@earthlink.net...
If I recall correctly, no propellant driven weapons, but I don't remember
anything about corrosives. Perhaps instead a tethered rail gun rocket?
Jim Yanik
<3AAB096D...@earthlink.net>:
Shoot out some fine metal particles,short out the microprocessor.
--
Jim Yanik,NRA member
remove X to contact me
-----= Posted via Newsfeeds.Com, Uncensored Usenet News =-----
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Chris
"Jim Yanik" <jya...@kua.net> wrote in message
news:90617835Fj...@209.25.157.130...
> daz...@earthlink.net (David Weinshenker) wrote in
> <3AAB096D...@earthlink.net>:
>
> >Chris Taylor Jr. wrote:
> >> PS I could always have it fire Acid Filled
> >> Nano Rockets to slowly disolve
> >> the enemy with each salvo.
> >
> >I don't think the rules permit
> >propellants or corrosives.
> >
> >-dave w
> >
>
> Shoot out some fine metal particles,short out the microprocessor.
> --
> Jim Yanik,NRA member
> remove X to contact me
Maybe an electromagentic pulse... nothing in the rules about Nuclear
Fission...
Janine and Mike
Chris wrote in message <98h897$ok4$1...@horsefly.nf.net>...
Sorry to say, but the rules prohibit EMP.
A friend of mine suggests mounting a can of pepper spray on the 'bot and
going after the driver. :)
mike
P Flanagan
called Razor that had a nasty hydrolic crusher spike on the front. It
scooped up a robot on its low front forks and then slowly dropped the
crusher on it, that came down with like 5 tons of unstoppable pressure. It
only got ahold of one robot this way and crushed its rear.
"Janine and Mike" <j9an...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:XtXq6.2806$6p5.2...@newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net...
Chris
news:XtXq6.2806$6p5.2...@newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net...
>
>
> A friend of mine suggests mounting a can of pepper spray on the 'bot and
> going after the driver. :)
>
> mike
But how do they expect you generate an EMP without a nice nuclear blast?
For that matter... do they ban an EMP as a SIDE EFFECT of a nuclear
explosion???
Janine and Mike
Chris wrote in message <98j8lf$h9o$1...@horsefly.nf.net>...
:)
mike
Mark Simpson
back. IIRC, the builder told the host that he wanted to use the "jaws of
life" for his clamping mechanism, but it was too heavy.
I'm a Battlebots addict. I even watch the reruns of reruns from last season.
;-) " Long live Vlad the Impaler!"
Mark Simpson
NAR 71503 Level II
Jim Yanik
You can generate an EMP pulse with conventional explosives.But it would
destroy your own battlebot.Make a mess out of the arena,too,along with the
spectators.Thus,not a good idea.
--
Jim Yanik,NRA member
remove X to contact me
Art Fuldodger
> You can generate an EMP pulse with conventional explosives.But it would
> destroy your own battlebot.Make a mess out of the arena,too,along with the
> spectators.Thus,not a good idea.
JOOC, HTH do you create an EMP w/o a ND?
RayDunakin
destroy your own battlebot.Make a mess out of the arena,too,along with the
spectators.Thus,not a good idea. >>
Surely an EMP could be produced electronically, without the use of explosives?
I seem to recall reading something about attempting to use an EMP to stop cars
being pursued by police. The main problem was that there was no way to direct
it -- it would fry every car in the vicinity, including the cop's.
Chris Taylor Jr.
I probably can not afford it (actually the tough part would be the airfare
nand hotel ALL else I have or can scratch)
"RayDunakin" <raydu...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20010312220133...@ng-cd1.aol.com...
Janine and Mike
Chris Taylor Jr. wrote in message
<0ngr6.5965$6p5.5...@newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net>...
>where do you get the rules regs etc.. for battlebots.
mike
Dave Lyle
Depends on what you mean by EMP. EMP is ElectroMagnetic Pulse. An ND
would put out a very strong EMP. Radar systems put out a constant
string of EMP's. When you push the button on your electric garage door
opener (assuming you have one), the transmitter puts out an EMP - quite
weak by ND standards, but an EMP none the less.
It's very possible the an EMP of the stength generated by a small
aircraft weather radar might be enough to scramble the electronics of
one of the 'robots'. It all depends on how well shielded they are.
Jim Yanik
<3aadac40$0$14453$272e...@news.execpc.com>:
EMP is measured in KV's/meter.From what I've read,the US uses fields of
50KV/m and up to test their aircraft and electronics.A long time ago ,I saw
an article in Aviation Week with a picture of an EMP device,it used copper
discs and explosives.They were not more detailed than that.
Ryan McDaniell
Laboratory in Albuquerque. Neal Singer pronounced it an interesting urban
legend. Sandia, of course, is one of the national laboratories responsible
for weaponization of the U.S. nuclear arsenal. The lab has also done
extensive research into shielding against and generation of
electromagnetic pulse effects.
Awareness of electromagnetic pulse effects happened in 1962 when a 1.4
megaton nuclear weapon was detonated in Test Shot Starfish. The Starfish
shot was conducted 400 kilometers high above the mid-Pacific and the
electromagnetic pulse from it destroyed satellite equipment and blocked
high frequency radio communications across the Pacific for 30
minutes. "Strings of street lights in Oahu went out and hundreds of
burglar alarms set off when the pulses overloaded their circuits," wrote
William Arkin in "S.I.O.P.: The Strategic U.S. Plan for Nuclear War." A
scientist at Lawrence Livermore, Nicholas Christofilos, had predicted this
effect earlier in the rear, calculating that high energy particles from a
nuclear burst high in the atmosphere would become trapped in the Earth's
magnetic field, producing a series of lightning-like pulses.
Since then, the idea of using electromagnetic effects as a death ray, of
sorts, produced without a messy 1.4 megaton nuclear explosion, has become
increasingly interesting to fans of the weird quack-science of
non-lethality and, for some reason, computer security experts and teenage
hackers. For example, Crypt Newsletter frequently receives poorly spelled
advertisements put together by teenagers advertising schematics for
electromagnetic computer death rays for about $5.00 cash U.S. These, along
with instructions for turning the telephone handset into an electric
chair, software for melting the circuitry in a PC, and recipes for
poisoning enemies with arsenicals -- come dirt cheap on pink photocopying
paper or cheesy-looking pamphlets sold at "Survival Books" in north
Hollywood.
Interestingly, Winn Schwartau did much to embed the myth of the emp weapon
in the mainstream imagination with his 1994 book "Information Warfare." In
it, Schwartau wrote of secret U.S. missiles used against Iraq in the Gulf
War to short circuit communications through bursts of microwaves. It was
an interesting mistake based on a more prosaic reality having nothing to
do with emp weapons. In the Gulf War, the Navy used a few Tomahawks
containing spools of carbon filament. The filament was deployed across
Iraq's power lines and stations by the Tomahawks, causing black-outs by
short circuit around Baghdad.
Since 1992 the tale of the emp gun has been seized upon by hackers rather
too eager to sell gullible journalists on a pseudo-reality of imposing
feats of technical legerdemain. (For example, mention of it as a hacker
tool contaminates Alvin and Heidi Toffler's "War and Anti-War," published
in 1993. The EMP gun appearances are also cyclical, many times attached
every year to Winn Schwartau, Inc.'s information warfare conventions in
Washington, DC. Journalists attend these types of things and report that
the EMP gun has just been invented. Almost like clockwork -- appearances
in the media, be it 1997, 1998, 1999, even mere months apart, such
reporters have almost no memory on subject -- and the EMP gun is
"invented" anew, rising from its own ashes, another phoenix of mystifying
electronic danger that puts us all at risk. However, what is usually
"invented" is little more than a glorified stun baton that can make a
television screen blink or a radio speaker emit static at about ten
paces.)
In another such story, "Hack Attack," published as a cover feature in a
1996 issue of Forbes ASAP magazine, a number of "dangerous
ex-hackers" played the game, "Let's lie to the journalist." The
emp-weapon-used-against-Iraq myth was deployed:
Forbes writer: Have you ever heard of a device that directs magnetic
signals at hard disks and can scramble the data?
Dangerous ex-hackers, in unison: Yes! A HERF [high energy radio frequency]
gun.
Dangerous ex-hacker A: This is my nightmare. $300: a rucksack full of car
batteries, a microcapacitor and a directional antenna and I could point it
at Oracle . . .
Dangerous ex-hacker B: We could cook the fourth floor.
Dangerous ex-hacker A: . . . You could park it in a car and walk
away. It's a $300 poor man's nuke . . .
Dangerous ex-hacker A, on a roll: They were talking about giving these
guns to border patrol guards so they can zap Mexican cars as they drive
across the border and fry their fuel injection . . .
Dangerous ex-hacker A, really piling it on: There are only three or four
people who know how to build them, and they're really tight lipped
. . . We used these in the Persian Gulf. We cooked the radar installation.
In other parts of the article the "dangerous ex-hackers" discuss the ease
of building what purports to be a $300 death ray out of Radio Shack parts
and car batteries. In a rare moment of intellectual honesty and
self-scrutiny the "dangerous ex-hackers" admit there are a lot of "snake
oil salesmen" in the computer security business.
The sticking point of the legend, according to Sandia's Singer and others
Crypt News interviewed, is the generation of militarily interesting
amounts of electromagnetic pulse. To generate the effects ascribed to the
notional weapon requires power fluxes that would kill everyone triggering
the device and everyone in the vicinity of the detonation and target. Far
easier to use Tim McVeigh's fuel oil-soaked fertilizer truck bomb.
John Pike, director of the Federation of American Scientists' Space Policy
Project puckishly commented, "[This] is sorta like Dr. Strangelove saying
that a Doomsday Machine 'would not be dificult'! It is easily within the
reach of even the smallest . . . nuclear power."
Nevertheless, the myth of electromagnetic pulse weapons remains powerful,
gaining lodgment in the damndest places. Indeed, in Crypt Newsletter 42
one article discussed how a U.S. Army course on information warfare in
Carlisle, Pennsylvania, was instructing about them in its sub-lecture
devoted to weaponry.
Now, Crypt News provides a thumbnail list of the myth's characteristic
hearsay.
1. The EMP gun is always seen in remote places, as in "Boris Badenov, a
computer security consultant, said criminal hooligans had destroyed a bank
network in Dvinsk with an emp gun and escaped with 8 millions rubles in
blackmail money."
2. The EMP gun is always developed by adjunct professors, fringe military
reservists, or hackers. For example: "Glip Popple, an adjunct professor of
information warfare at the Technical University of Gobble-Wallah in
Australia, said he had built a working emp gun for $2,000," or
"Uber-Fiend, a hacker for a group calling itself Karn Evil 9, told Reuters
correspondents he had built a 12 gigaJoule electromagnetic pulse
projector."
3. EMP guns are always secret, protected by classification, as in,
"W. E. van Azathoth, a computer scientist genius working for the northern
Virginia company Nefari US Electronics, had written a working paper on
constructing emp weapons from four bags of sour cream and onion potato
chips, a roll of aluminum foil and a positronic hammer -- it was
immediately seized and classified by the National Security Agency.
4. Sometimes only unnamed "experts" talk about EMP guns, as in: "Experts
have revealed to Associated Press reporters that U.S. banks lost $90
billion due to electromagnetic pulse attacks in 1996 -- the assaults
untraceable, the perpetrators -- unknown."
5. Illicit EMP gun blueprints are on the Internet. Usage: "This reporter
was told by a very highly placed Pentagon consultant that plans for EMP
guns were on the Internet and that teen hooligans and criminal gangsters
had obtained them."
6. Infrequently, an "EMP gun" -- more accurately, anything that can
emulate the electromagnetic emissions of a large, unshielded electric
motor -- will be demonstrated on assorted pieces of electronic equipment
at conversational range. Results will be trivial or unremarkable and the
demonstrator, often someone with a cargo cult-like devotion to the memory
and work of Nikola Tesla, will dress them up as quite the
opposite. Invariably, the demonstrations are conducted by people or
agencies who just "coincidentally" happen to offer consulting services to
defend against EMP guns.
Indeed, it must be considered that in a country where a googly-eyed eunuch
can persuade a large group of educated adults to poison themselves in
preparation for hitching a ride on a flying saucer and a significant
portion of the citizenry cannot be convinced that aliens didn't land at
Roswell, the EMP gun must be a lead pipe cinch to sell.
Postscript: Interestingly, an EMP gun inventor, David Schriner, showed up
on ABC's 20/20 in mid-February 1999 to demonstrate the effects of it for
an overawed Diane Sawyer. After donning fancy protective suits and
unusual-looking copper mesh headgear, Schriner tested his weapon on
Sawyer's corvette and a white limousine. At a range of about 5-10 feet and
with the weapon pointed directly into the automobiles' open engine
compartment, Schriner's electromagnetic pulse gun made Sawyer's idling
corvette . . . run roughly. [Crypt News notes it can make any car's engine
stop permanently, not just hesitate, at a range of five feet with a
sledgehammer aimed directly into an open engine compartment.] Once, said
Sawyer, the electric locks in her car's doors went up and down, too. While
Sawyer stood well away from her car, farther away from it than Schriner's
contraption, electronic videocameras inside the car continued to work
during the firing of the "weapon."
During the segment, Sawyer claimed "results" of testing of electromagnetic
pulse on a Cobra helicopter at Junction Ranch in China Lake were
"classified." Curiously, Crypt Newsletter covered the results of this test
which were published on the Web over a year ago by the government. [Found
in the attached links at the end of this story.] Crypt News must now
assume posting a paper on the World Wide Web constitutes "classification."
Besides David Schriner's demonstration of a short range microwave's
ability to occasionally stall an idling, parked car at extremely close
range, Sawyer's story -- like all Crypt News has seen on the subject,
relied a great deal upon hearsay.
Now, here comes the tricky part.
Sawyer also claimed on 20/20: "Russian criminals have used an RF weapon,
we're told, to disarm security and rob a bank."
Crypt Newsletter repeats from the top of the story:
"Pelham was amused when the overly gullible newspaper reporter published
his frank lies about Russian computer programmers knocking over
international banks with emp guns made from stolen Radio Shack equipment."
And:
"Boris Badenov, a computer security consultant, said criminal hooligans
had destroyed a bank network in Dvinsk with an emp gun and escaped with 8
millions rubles in blackmail money."
Read carefully: Crypt Newsletter made these statements up in 1997 as
humorous examples -- jokes -- to be used as material for this article. In
the context of this piece, they are amusing fictions.
Apparently, Crypt Newsletter's jokes about EMP guns have travelled
sufficiently far away from their original source to wind up gulling Diane
Sawyer on 20/20 in 1999.
Update: March 03, 1998: One of Diane Sawyer's sources for the 20/20
broadcast was Victor Sheymov, a KGB defector who advertised himself as a
communications expert. Sheymov told Sawyer the KGB has used a microwave
weapon to start a fire in the U.S. embassy in 1997 for the purposes of
annoyance and in hope that firemen would be summoned. Using the firemen as
cover, the idea was to plant listening devices in the embassy.
Sheymov said the same thing before the House Joint Economic in February
1999, describing what can only be characterized as trivial effects of
alleged Russian EMP gun use:
Sheymov: Another example of a [EMP] attack was the KGB's manipulation of
the United States Embassy security system in Moscow in the mid-80s. This
was done in the course of the KGB operation against the Embassy which
targeted the U.S. marines there. The security system alarm was repeatedly
falsely triggered by the KGB's induced [radio frequency] interference
several times during the night. This was an attempt to annoy and fatigue
the marines [sic] and to cause the turning of the "malfunctioning" system
off.
Woo - a ringing alarm and, next, an alleged minor fire -- pretty scary
stuff. Surely the cloth a national emergency is woven from.
Sheymov: Additional example of an [EMP] attack was when the KGB used it to
induce fire in one of the equipment rooms in the U.S. Embassy in Moscow in
1977. A malfunction was forced on a piece of equipment. It caught fire,
which spread over a sensitive area of the Embassy. The KGB tried to
infiltrate its bugging technicians into the sensitive area under the cover
of the firefighters who arrived immediately after the fire started.
Subsequent to his appearance on 20/20, Sheymov was placed on the payroll
of the National Security Agency where what was unclassified trivial
testimony for TV reporters is, apparently, now classified. [Crypt
Newsletter asks the question: How does one measure the incentive for
alleged KGB defectors to embroider their stories for American handlers in
hopes they will be put on a taxpayer-derived salary?]
Update -- March 23, 1999: Yellow Peril -- The EMP gun hallucination is now
intermingled with the hysteria over Chinese spying.
In a mid-March Newsweek story on alleged Chinese penetration of the
U.S. network of nuclear bomb-making national laboratories, magazine
reporters write:
"[The Chinese] may also have stolen secrets about U.S. efforts [emphasis
added] to devise a nuclear weapon tailored to create an electromagnetic
pulse; a man-made lightning bolt that would short out anything in an enemy
nation that uses electricity."
By the 19th, the Newsweek rumor had quickly mutated into a tale of stolen
electromagnetic pulse guns, courtesy of the New York Times.
Initially, during a White House press conference, President Clinton was
asked by a Fox News reporter:
"Mr. President, you said just a short while ago that no one has reported
to you they suspect Chinese espionage at U.S. nuclear labs during your
administration, sir. But sources tell Fox News, and we are reporting this
evening, that China stole the technology for electromagnetic pulse weapons
from several nuclear labs during your first term in office, sir, and that
the Chinese have successfully tested these weapons in China. And the
sources also say that the administration, at least, was aware of this.
"Can you tell us, sir, were you not personally aware? Are you concerned
about this? And what will be your administration's response to the
report?"
This raises an interesting question. How can the President determine if a
weapon is stolen if it is not known to exist?
Ambushed by phlogiston, the President nevertheless gamely tried to answer:
President Clinton: "Well, you didn't say what the source of what they sold
was. You say they 'stole, is that the word you used?"
Fox reporter: "Yes, sir, the technology for EMP weapons, from four of the
11 nuclear labs."
The President susbsequently said he knew nothing of the matter and that he
forgot little of what went on during national security briefings.
By Saturday, the New York Times had picked it up. This time, the
statements on EMP guns, not nuclear weapons tuned for EMP broadcast, was
attributed to the standard EMP red herring, the anonymous government
source.
The reader will notice the confusion and chronic abuse of anonymous
sourcing common to all of these stories.
From the New York Times, "When asked by a reporter from Fox News about
whether China stole information from the labs about a nuclear device
called an electromagnetic pulse warhead, during his tenure, the president
said he knew nothing about that."
"A U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Friday night
that intelligence reports show that China is satisfied that it has
obtained the technology to develop a so-called electromagnetic gun. That
gun, the official said, shoots an electromagnetic pulse."
"It is not a nuclear weapon, however," continued the New York Times, "and
is different from the electromagnetic pulse warhead in the U.S. nuclear
arsenal."
In June 1997, the House Joint Economic Committee entertained testimony
from a retired general, Robert Schweitzer, who claimed China was
attempting to obtain EMP gun technology from Russia. During the same
hearing, a great deal of effort was spent in bloviation about the Red
Chinese peril.
In early 1999, a KGB-defector named Victor Sheymov claimed on national
television that the KGB had used EMP guns to attack the U.S. embassy in
Moscow, causing an alarm system to ring and the instigation of a minor
fire. As a result, Sheymov was hired as a consultant to the National
Security Agency.
One month later, amidst more Yellow Peril hysteria, the Chinese are
accused of stealing not only the plans for a standard nuclear weapon, but
also electromagnetic pulse guns, which have not been demonstrated to
exist, and -- maybe -- plans for a nuclear weapon-tuned to create maximum
EMP. [Perhaps the NSA should be paying "the national labs" for
consultation?]
The reader may notice how none of these rumors, or news reports, appear to
be on the same page.
Update -- April 11, 1999: The war against Yugoslavia has spawned its own
EMP weapon chupacabras.
Rumors of new weaponry in use by the US Air Force floating around the
Usenet and in and out of mainstream news organizations which should know
better appear to stem from a brief article of extremely suspect
credibility originally published by the Moscow ITAR-TASS news service on
March 29.
In "US Uses [Federal Republic of Yugoslavia] as Test Site for New
Bomb," reporter Anatoly Yurkin writes:
"The USA is using Yugoslavia as a testing ground for its latest secret
offensive weapons. The ITAR-TASS correspondent was told today at the
Defence Ministry that, besides cluster bombs, which are extensively being
used during the air strikes, the American bomber crews are using
experimental samples of the latest aircraft bombs, the specifications of
which differ considerably from those of conventional offensive weapons.
"This aircraft bomb was developed in secret laboratories in Los Alamos,
where the first American nuclear bomb was created. The new weapon is
designed to disrupt the enemy's radio-electronic equipment. When it
explodes, it generates an electric impulse, similar to the electromagnetic
waves during a nuclear explosion. In its military specifications this bomb
is a cross between a conventional weapon and a nuclear one, which provides
grounds for regarding it as a weapon of mass destruction.
"It is reported that the US air force is using two strategic B-2 bombers,
developed with the 'Stealth' technology, to test the latest American
aircraft bomb."
Crypt Newsletter reminds its readers that "official Russian news
agencies" like ITAR-TASS have much in common with editorial practices at
tabloids like the Weekly World News and National Enquirer. Traditionally,
intelligence analysts have regarded it as a good source of fairy tales.
For example, on December 16, Komsomolskaya Pravda, like ITAR-TASS, one of
"Russia's largest circulation and most outspoken dailies," published a
feature entitled: "Electronic 'Hiroshima' Already Hidden in Moscow; 21st
Century Wars Will Be Like Computer Horror Games."
An interesting and rather amusing myth passed on by the Russian news
agency was framed around the appearance of Richard Pryce, one of two
British hackers who broke into the Department of Defense's Rome Labs
installation at Griffiss Air Force Base in 1994. Pryce and his
[accomplice], claimed the Russian article, launched a "[space]
shuttle" remotely and switched all of "New York's traffic lights to
green."
In the same piece, the EMP weapon chupacrabras is invoked. However,
instead of U.S. bombers using it over Yugoslavia, the situation is quite
the opposite: The Russian military will use EMP bombs, which it calls
"beer cans," to destroy U.S. "supercomputers."
One hallmark of the EMP weapon chupacabras is its extreme flexibility.
One month it can be your secret weapon; the next it can be your enemy's.
Updated -- September 9, 1999: Schwartau, Inc's. annual information warfare
convention in Washington, DC., rolled out the same electromagnetic pulse
gun demonstration David Schriner deployed for Diane Sawyer on 20/20 in
February 1999. The primary difference was if you had a television and
could tune to Sawyer in February, the demo was free, but if you went to
Schwartau, Inc. in September it cost you $1000 or so. (Oops, better hope
your boss who gave you use of the company credit card for it isn't reading
this.)
Schwartau, Inc's. blurb for its $1000-buck-a-seat infowar convention
read: "On Sept. 9 at InfowarCon-99, the first ever (Crypt News emphasis
added) public conference demonstrations of an 1870 technology developed by
Heindrich Hertz [sic] generates powerful electromagnetic effects on modern
technology.
First ever, Crypt Newsletter adds, only since an identical dog-and-pony
show in February 1999 on primetime network TV.
From the 20/20 transcript of Diane Sawyer's piece on David Schriner's
Tesla ray in February of this year:
DIANE SAWYER (voice over) But will it work? We take precautions with our
cables and computerized cameras by enclosing them in copper
shielding. [David] Schriner and his assistant use copper mesh masks to
protect their eyes and face.
DAVID SCHRINER: Ray one is ready for testing.
DIANE SAWYER: The first target, two computers. The objective -- to crash
them.
DAVID SCHRINER: Going hot!
DIANE SAWYER : Every short burst has the energy of 100 radio stations, a
million watts. Watch the computer on the left. In just three seconds, it
crashes. And a few seconds later, so does the other one.
Real pants-wetting stuff, this material: "first ever" crashing of a PC at
about ten paces and guys in funny-looking copper wire hats. Add this to
KGB officer Victor Sheymov's claims (made in the same Diane Sawyer 20/20
broadcast in February) about the same "first ever" technology being used
to set off a burglar alarm and start a small fire at the US embassy in
Moscow a couple decades ago -- still surely the whole cloth national
security emergencies are woven from.
Virus Myth's Rob Rosenberger puckishly comments:
"It takes a 20 MegaWatt focused radio pulse just to crash Win9x? Bah! I'd
write off the demo as a complete flop. The FAA believes a suicidal maniac
can bring down a 747 with nothing more than a Rio. You can attack the
cockpit from the rear of the plane, I might add. 'Listen up! I downloaded
the final 43 seconds of the Sgt. Pepper's CD and I'm prepared to use it!'
Seaman Tesla needs remedial DeVry training if you ask me."
Mark Simpson
arm that I'd see to date, but was vulnerable to being flipped itself. I also
loved Ziggo. It's builder had his act together with the gyro-stabilization and
when it struck something, pieces flew. I hope that the new Buddy Lee isn't
like the old one. It had zero weapons and poor drivers. Any new mods to
Ramstein? Any other Team Loki entries to watch? Someone needs to build an
anti-low-wedge weapon that drives a spike down into something like Biohazard
when it gets under them. >;-)
As for getting out to SF to see BB, my wife's glad that I'm over 2000 miles
away. She know's that if I lived closer, I'd be planning to build one myself.
;-)
Good luck in 3.0,
Mark Simpson
NAR 71503 Level II
K2 UNIT wrote:
> Mark,
> The robot to watch for BBSF3.0 will be SHW TORO!!!
> For more "Robocarnage" keep an eye on HW "Surgeon General" & MW "Buddy
> Lee...Play Nice"
> For the record...Diesector's Jaws arn't half as bad as the HAMMERS! OUCH!
> Hope You can make it to BB San Fransisco.
>
> K2
J M
arrogant
person I've ever seen. These youger drivers are way too cocky, IMHO.
K2 UNIT
K2 UNIT
arrogant person I've ever seen. <
General Morgan is COOL!! He's the poster child for Battlebots. "You don't have
to be crazy to drive a battlebot, but it helps!"
Keep in mind that it's "JUST TV"!!!
K2