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High Power RocketCam Videos 264

Posted by timothy from the if-you-got-the-money-honey dept.
HaveNoMouth writes "What happens when the founder of Xircom and his brother bolt a DV Camcorder to the side of a 200 lb. model rocket and press the red button? The incredible movies (with sound!) at Gates Bros. Rocketry tell the tale. The quality of these movies is by far the best I've seen from the "strap a camera to a flying toy" community. They have a nice gallery of still photos too. If only everyone named Gates did stuff this cool."
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High Power RocketCam Videos

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  • What happens (Score:5, Funny)

    by jki ( 624756 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @05:53AM (#4714092) Homepage
    What happens when the founder of Xircom and his brother bolt a DV Camcorder to the side of a 200 lb. model rocket and press the red button

    Tens of thousands of USD is blown up in the air and converted into a couple of movies which can be shown on Slashdot so that we can make insightful comments like this?

    • The quality of these movies is by far the best I've seen from the "strap a camera to a flying toy" community. They have a nice gallery of still photos too.


      I was totally impressed by the quality of the movies and photos! but for some reason they all look the same to me. The movie is on repeat and keeps playing "503 Service Unavailable
      The requested URL Bandwidth is temporarily unavailable." Gets kind of boring after watching it for 30 minutes.

    • Re:What happens (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Shanep ( 68243 )
      Tens of thousands of USD is blown up in the air and converted into a couple of movies

      ; )

      In the late 80's I was working in electronic weapons. Homing anti aircraft missiles had their internal electronics placed carefully and then covered in resin, due to the fact that when these incredible machines launched, large'ish unprotected components (electrolytic caps for eg) would generally rip right off the PCB's or otherwise be damaged. Sending the missle anywhere but where it was supposed to go.

      Even cables would be tied into bundles, bolted down and resin'ed into place.

      Ship mounted missles, like the "standard anti aircraft", would strip the on deck "grip paint" back to bare aluminium after just one launch, from the rocket blast.

      I can't get to the site, it's /.'ed for me. Did the DV even last one ride?

  • if only... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Animaether ( 411575 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @05:54AM (#4714095) Journal
    if only they could strap a DVcam to the desk pointing at the blinkenlights on their server as the poor thing gets slashdotted to hell and back

  • That's Interesting! (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Zech Harvey ( 604609 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @05:54AM (#4714096)

    You know, since Carmack shares a love of the same hobby as these gentlemen, I wonder if this would interest him? I would say it might. And being that it might, I wonder if he would code a mini-cam for the Rocket Launcher in Doom III? Bullet-time eat your heart out!

    • Re:That's Interesting! (Score:5, Informative)

      by JanusFury ( 452699 ) <kevin...gadd@@@gmail...com> on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:08AM (#4714134) Homepage Journal
      There's already been a camera for rocket launchers in FPSes before - Unreal Tournament (and Unreal Tournament 2003, I think) allows you to steer the Redeemer missle in first person.

      • You're right! Silly me, thank you for reminding me. I had forgotten about that! I rarely played UT, but when I did, I prefered the Strangelove mod. =)
      • Killer Quake Patch had it first I bellieve, with very agile guided rockets... it was grouse, i loved that patch, you could chase somebody with your rocket till they walked into the room in which the floating gibbed head was waiting :)

      • SiN had this, as did Tribes (Score:3, Informative)

        by Wee ( 17189 )
        In the Wages of SiN expansion pack (came out in 99) for the game SiN there was an "alternate fire" mode for the rocket launcher that put you in the nose cam, flying the missle. It was deadly (especially if someone caught you up on the roof, staring off into space). Sound was done very well, too. You could just sort of hear distorted sounds from the missle's travel, but could also hear things happening around your "body". The effect of wearing googles to steer the missle was very well done.

        There was also a Tribes 1 mod that allowed you to deploy a base station which you could load with various missle types (my favorite was the one that exploded in poison gas) and then fly them around the map. You had to put them on the ground or on a structure, and you could only carry one missle ata time, so they had to be near an inventory station. My brother and I found a bug which allowed you to delpoy them on these floating, mid-air platforms with inventory stations. He'd fly a bomber waaaay up into the sky, I'd jump out, deploy the platform, fall to my death. He'd fly above the platform, jump out onto it, then set up a transporter. I'd respawn in the base, set up the other transporter, and wind up on the base in the sky. Then we'd set up missle stations and fly around destroying things. The best was when you had a missle in the air and you saw a scout car (really fast one-man vehicles). They were the same speed as the missles (except for one type) and catching them was a challenge. Occasionally, we'd get three people flying missles around. It took about 4 minutes to gain air superiority over most of the map. It took about 8 minutes for the other team to find our base in the sky and blow it up (or try, we'd defend it pretty well).

        Anyway, flying missles around is great in CTF-type FPS games, especially when they have ultra-large, indoor/outdoor maps like in Tribes -- it gives the game a "Gulf War" flavor.

        -B

    • It's already been done in Max Payne... when you shoot the sniper rifle... and it's bullet time :)

      • Thank you for the correction! I've not the system yet to run that game, so I've not been exposed to its coolness yet. Hopefully I'll get to see people die up close and personal after the Holidays. ;)

  • Well... (Score:4, Funny)

    by acehole ( 174372 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @05:58AM (#4714100) Homepage
    I guess it'd be an improvement over strapping someone to a rocket then hoping they survived the landing so they could tell you about it.

    • Re:Well... (Score:3, Funny)

      by MacAndrew ( 463832 )
      They tried that. Notice they don't mention their "other" brother, Wayne, who would've been fine if he hadn't struggled so much on the way up.
    • Why no just strap a camera to this guys router? I'm sure it had more interesting pyrotechnics...

      Not that I can tell you what's in the footage of the rocket.....

  • Isn't that just the way... (Score:4, Funny)

    by djupedal ( 584558 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:00AM (#4714103)
    So I build this nice, trim little single stage rocket (solid fuel), and my brother talks me into strapping another zero delay motor onto the bottom....it went fine until the tagged on motor lit the main motor....the rocket tumbled just for an instant, and when the main motor fired, the rocket was horizontal...it quickly made it to a nearby freeway and took out an aged Mustang. We figured since lunch was almost over we'd just as soon head back to the lab and quietly call it a day. A camera on that one would have shown one ticked off Mustang owner, I'm sure.

    Don't know if I have the nerve to sacrifice a DV camera...but maybe someone else's camera would be ok :)

    • Re:Isn't that just the way... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by tanveer1979 ( 530624 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:56AM (#4714247) Homepage Journal
      The tumbling is due to the fact that the full thrust us taking too much time to come. By the time full thurst came, the initial thrust had already lifted of the rocket and naturally due to that newton guy this thing would start tumbling, and when thrust was enough to pull it with speed it was horizontal.

      The solution would be to have a pipe around the rocket, by the time the rocket exits the pipe full thrust would be generated, and before that the pipe would keep it more or less straigt. Or if you can have such a motor design which can go to full thurst in minimal time it would be great, but that is expensive.

      If you want a safer demo of this you can try this. Take the ordinary fireworks rocket, the small one with the long stick which you put in a bottle and then ignote the fuse. You will see that the rocket goes quite save. Next take a smaller bottle and place the rocket so that the bottom of the stick is very near to top of botle. you will see that the initial thrust will have the rocket out of the bottle, but since the thrust is not enough yet the rocket will begin to fall sideways and by the time it falls power is max and you have a SSM!
      • The second motor was the same thrust as the main, and thus too weak for the initial load. All it did was get the thing off the ground a few meters and then ignite the main...ooopps...time to duck. I figured it would just sit on the stand. All in all, not a good decision by any means...oh well. The solution would have been to not listen to my brother :) I put significant time into shaping the fins, etc. This thing would have flown perfectly, but since this was the first shot, I'll never know for sure.

        This is the same poor logic as when he told me to load a small firecracker into a plastic pill bottle, and then light it and cap it and toss it into a bucket of water. I was sure it wouldn't explode...I still have the scar in my left eyeball from the debris. I was bleeding, naturally, and by the time our Mom saw me she thought he'd stuck it in my mouth....oops.

    • Re:Isn't that just the way... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Graff ( 532189 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @08:32AM (#4714437)
      it went fine until the tagged on motor lit the main motor....the rocket tumbled just for an instant, and when the main motor fired, the rocket was horizontal

      What you need to do is to read this web page on how to design a stable rocket [nasa.gov] before you build one. Basically it all comes down to the last paragraph on the web page, which tells you to make sure you have the center of gravity closer to the nose than the center of pressure.

      What you probably needed was to have more weight in the nose of the rocket and/or to use larger fins on the rocket. More weight in the nose would move the center of gravity toward the nose, larger fins would move the center of pressure toward the motor. If you had done this then the drag on the rocket from the air passing over it would have kept it straight up until it lost all upward velocity. Thus it would have not wobbled during the small delay between the first motor ending and the second motor getting up to speed.
      • :)

        The errant rocket was properly designed and assembled up until just before launch...errr, I mean just before the second primary motor was added.

        I've built and sucessfully flown many, many rockets, including single and multi-stage. This particular launch was the single most entertaining off pad failure I can recall, and it's retold here just to share the stupidity of the last minute 'modification', suggested by a known troublemaker and implemented by yours truly with the excuse of just being curious :)

        What was needed was a deft ear to the launch crew...oh well. That reminds me...I owe him one.
        • Yep, the last-minute addition must have lowered the center of gravity below the center of pressure. It goes to show, never make last-minute changes to a design! The last time I did that I was working on a chemistry project and I ended up with a mixture of hot sulphuric acid, sodium hydroxide, butyl alcohol, and a few other chemicals fountaining out of a flask onto my hands. Luckily for me I was wearing thick gloves and there was a chemical shower 3 feet away. Nasty nasty stuff, those gloves were melting in seconds.

          My worst rocketry accident occurred when I built a model SR-71 Blackbird. It was a beautiful model rocket and it took me a long time to get just right. I put it on the launch pad and everything was going ok until I hit the ignition button. The rocket got about 1/2 way up the launch rod and then it stuck. The force of the engine caused the rocket to tip over the pad and then it freed itself and went shooting off at about 2 feet off the ground. The damn rocket slammed into the ground nose first, jammed on, and then the ejection charge fired and lit the rocket on fire.

          Many hours of work down the drain in 10 seconds. Amazing. It turned out that the 2 sections of the launch rod had gotten turned and, since they are designed to only line up a certain way, they were off center from each other. The rocket jammed on this and well...

  • Cool! (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Goldberg's Pants ( 139800 )
    While the on rocket cams are good, I think the tower ones are most impressive. I'm amazed the cameras still worked afterwards! Wow!

  • What happens? (Score:5, Funny)

    by JanusFury ( 452699 ) <kevin...gadd@@@gmail...com> on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:05AM (#4714119) Homepage Journal
    What happens when the founder of Xircom and his brother bolt a DV Camcorder to the side of a 200 lb. model rocket and press the red button?
    It gets posted on the slashdot front page and somebody makes a joke about {Bill Gates/Microsoft/Windows/RIAA/MPAA, chooose one}? Oh, that and you scare some wildlife. You can't launch a 200 pound rocket without scaring the shit out of SOMETHING.

  • Shock certified camcorders! (Score:3, Interesting)

    by krazyninja ( 447747 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:05AM (#4714120)
    "What happens when...."

    For one, JVC and Canon camcorder models mentioned in the site get shock certified at 0.6 Mach speed, with forces exceeding 1G. Wow!

  • Cheap shots... again. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Mitreya ( 579078 ) <<moc.liamg> <ta> <ayertim>> on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:05AM (#4714122)
    ...If only everyone named Gates did stuff this cool."

    Is it really really neccessary to have a cheap shot at MS no matter how little the post might be related? Why don't we just have a default sig "Windoze sucks, Linux rulez."?

    Just in case the posters read the comments: Please lash out at MS and other scapegoats ONLY when it is justified. (not too optimistic, since not all posters proofread the submissions or even read the articles, it seems... sigh...)

  • "by far the best I've seen" (Score:5, Funny)

    by nakaduct ( 43954 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:06AM (#4714127)
    The quality of these movies is by far the best I've seen from the "strap a camera to a flying toy" community.
    And yet, still vastly inferior to the output of the "strap a camera to a showerhead" community.

    • strap a camera to a flying toy and fly it into the showers at a local school
      Get the best of both, people freaking out hilariously and lots of h4w7 n3kk1d gur1z 8-). You could even have it blow up afterward, but that would ruin the whole video thing.

  • On the subject of 'Gates' (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:07AM (#4714128)
    It's pretty offtopic, I know, but does anyone else here really wonder about Bill Gates? I mean, he is a geek, right? Would it be possible to hang out with the guy and have a good time chatting about different clever ways to approximate solutions to the travelling salesman problem?

    Does the guy code?

    Does he have other geek hobbies?

    I mean, seriously. I think this is fascinating stuff. Whether we like it or not, HE'S ONE OF US (but maybe with a different economic perspective). Wouldn't it be interesting to get to know the other Bill Gates?

    • Re:On the subject of 'Gates' (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Hmmm... I like the thought...
      Perhaps a slashdot interview -- with the restriction that nothing can be about anything MS related (ie: "Do you think DRM in windows... etc" is a no-no, but "How often do you blow shit up in your microwave? Do you have a warehouse full of microwave ovens?" yes-yes") would be a good idea.
      Perhaps we could even get him to admit that he's been contributing to the apach project under a psuedonym for the past three years... ;)

      -your mother

    • Re:On the subject of 'Gates' (Score:5, Interesting)

      by dtmos ( 447842 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @08:50AM (#4714478)
      I realize having Bill even reply to a Slashdot missive is far, far out into fantasyland, but here's what I've always been interested in.

      Bill went from being a (perhaps upper-) middle-class Harvard student to the richest person on the planet in the space of fifteen years or so. That *had* to involve a large lifestyle change. While I'm not at all interested in his present personal affairs, I am interested in how he handled the transition from college drop-out to industry icon. I'd like to ask:

      -How did you handle the transition from handling your own personal affairs (going down to the dealer to by a car, buying your own Pepsi and Fritos at the grocery, etc.) to having assistants and minions perform all these functions for you? When did this transition occur? At the time, did you view the transition positively or negatively (i.e., as one of the benefits of success, or one of the banes)?

      -When was the last time you drove yourself to work on public roads, or flew on a commercial airline flight? When the transition to limousines and personal aircraft occurred, what was the rationalization (e.g., more time available for work, increased prestige, etc.) for their use?

      -When did you first feel the need for 24x7 personal security? How did having people around you constantly affect your lifestyle? (Personally, I'd find it pretty creepy to have people monitoring me all the time--but even more creepy to realize that they were needed.)

      -You were single a relatively long time, then married a woman who worked at your office. As the richest bachelor on the continent, I can imagine that the competition among the single women at MS for your attentions must have made Machiavelli look like a Sunday-school teacher. Were you aware of this? If so, how did you address the resulting problems with office politics? Did you suffer from the insecurity, so common among the wealthy and powerful, that everyone that meets you is more interested in your money and power than in you?

      Just post the above in the "unavailable for comment" file....

      • See here [greenspun.com] for a concise biography of Gates, in particular the history of the wealth of the Gates family of Washington State. Summarizing he's always been upper class, he was already from one of the wealthiest families in Washington State at birth. As an aside many "entrepreneurs" came from upper class backgrounds: the Walton family (yeah Sam started off running a mom and pop grocery but it's been growing exponentially since the early 70's, by the time Wal-Marts started popping up like dandelions Walton was already among the wealthiest people in Arkansas) and Donald Trump (second generation scion of a New York real estate millionaire) and Ted Turner (he bet the already considerable family fortune on cable television in the early 70's).

        Really there are two kinds of "entrepreneur" those who entered the world without access to significant capital (Larry Ellison, don't know about Jobs, Mark Cuban) and those who risked significant personal wealth (Turner, Gates et al.) to move from being merely very wealthy (as in top1 or 2% of the population) to extremely wealthy (as in the number of individuals with similar wealth on the entire planet numbers less than 1000). Given that the very wealthy can afford to make great sacrifices (gamble) because often they will still be very wealthy even if they fail it's really not that remarkable that sometimes they succeed. For example Gates sacrificed a Harvard degree (and the concommitant access it provides) to move to New Mexico where all he had to fall back on was a $1 million trust fund ($1 million in 1979 remember, invested conservatively at 6% that's $3.8 million today a far cry from $1 billion but I'm sure Bill would find a way to survive on it).

      • I think that for a long time he flew coach.

        It's only in the last few years that he finally bit the bullet and got a private jet.

        So my guess is that he didn't think much of some of the changes, and was probably forced into them strictly for reasons of privacy.

        D

      • like some pie? (Score:2, Insightful)

        by nucal ( 561664 )
        When did you first feel the need for 24x7 personal security?

        I think that we all know when [com.com] that happened.

    • ... he's one of us and everyone else is jealous of the fact that not only did he have the skills but the business sense to cash in on it all?

      Oh, thats right, the whole struggling 'artist' concept applies- it's good to suffer the injustices of the majority for your craft....

  • Amazing! (Score:3, Funny)

    by joebp ( 528430 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:07AM (#4714129) Homepage
    This is the most amazing thing I've seen in all my life! The way it goes up, gets put through such a lot of strain and still lives! And it's still flying! I wonder what hardware they're using.

    Oh, the videos of the rockets are OK too.

    *rimshot*

  • What happens? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:08AM (#4714137)
    What happens when the founder of Xircom and his brother bolt a DV Camcorder to the side of a 200 lb. model rocket and press the red button?

    You prove to NASA that it can be done cheaply? [slashdot.org] :)
    -mo
  • ...I could finally yell, "Fly lunchbox, fly!"

  • Beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by toybuilder ( 161045 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:27AM (#4714176)
    I'd rather see these on prime-time TV than glorified remote-controlled chainsaws destroying each other... The views of the horizon gliding into place is absolutely breathtaking!
    • I agree. but you can imagine the networks getting hold of it and making the rockets hit each other "for the 12-18 male demographic."

      Sigh. It's true. In the TV business the product is not the show that is sold to the viewers; the product is the viewers who are sold to the advertisers.

  • How did they keep that thing balanced? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by nounderscores ( 246517 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:41AM (#4714211)
    With the camera sticking out of the side? Many, many rockets have been totally destroyed from just losing one fin. This series of rockets had a whole fairing bigger than a grapefruit protruding from it and it never tumbled. (except the one which had a parachute failure.)

    • Re:How did they keep that thing balanced? (Score:5, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @08:39AM (#4714451)
      You counterweight inside the rocket and streamline the bulge to minimize drag. At 200 lb weight, a 10 oz camera sticking 2" out isn't going to cause enough thrust to overcome the resultant stabilization forces from the fins. Also, these motors are producing upwards of 1000 lb (not precise number) of thrust distributed across the cross sectional area of the rocket. Once again, 10 oz vs 1000 lb, it's not much.
    • It's really not that difficult. Provided that the center of pressure (the summation of drag forces on the rocket) is behind the center of gravity, small differences like that aren't going to make much of a difference at all.

      The problem with losing a fin is not the resultant asymmetry of the rocket, it's that it shifts the center of pressure very far forward - almost always ahead of the center of mass, which then results in, to put it mildly, a "suboptimal" flight pattern. : )

      You'd be amazed at some of the amazingly odd designs people come up with that still fly perfectly fine. Take a browse through here [aeroconsystems.com].

      steve

  • Question... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by sifi ( 170630 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:44AM (#4714220)
    I'm curious to know: Do you have to get permission to launch these things? or is it a free-for-all
    Is there some sort of height limit?
    What about the UK (where I live)?

    • Re:Question... (Score:5, Informative)

      by gregwbrooks ( 512319 ) <gregb AT west-third DOT net> on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @07:25AM (#4714322)
      I don't know if the Gates Bros. went this route or not, but High Powered Rocketry is a big hobby and has some pretty strict self-policing standards. For example, you can't go buy engine x until you're qualified by your peers on its smaller predecessors. The group also works with various federal and local agencies to make sure John Law doesn't get too itchy about rockets going up in the desert.

      More info? The leading organization is www.tripoli.org.

      • The group also works with various federal and local agencies to make sure John Law doesn't get too itchy about rockets going up in the desert.

        The problem isn't really the US agencies, its the launch detection systems of other countries. You don't want the Russians to think there's an ICBM heading their way when John Carmack sends up his first test rocket, do you?

    • Re:Question... (Score:3, Informative)

      by GothChip ( 123005 )
      You do need permission in the UK but I don't know where from :-(

      A few years ago my friend bought a model Rocket from Beatties (a toy shop). We went down to a local park which was deserted. Just as we were about to set it up for the third launch we were approached by a local Bobby who told us to stop immediately.

      Just found [a href="http://www.gbnet.net/orgs/staar/legal.html"> this. It says there are no laws in the UK fro mpreventing this (except not doing it within 5 miles of an airport), but there may be many byelaws preventing it.

  • I wish we could have taped this... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Malorian ( 520615 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:58AM (#4714248)
    A few years ago, a friend had a nasty split with his g/f not to long before Guy Fawkes night and she'd been foolish enough to leave her beloved 'Piglet' cuddly toy...

    Piglet was firmly taped to a display firework rocket (one of those damn huge ones), head facing the sky before being fired into the sky. Can you say "Pigs in Spaaaaaaace!" ;)
    I wish we could have had a Piglets eye view of it, we kept finding bits of piglet in nearby streets for days :)

    • Oh, in case someone tries something similar - don't! At least not anywhere populated!
      That thing starting to come back down way too early - we started to get a bit worried as it started to curve back down, luckily it exploded just high enough so that only a few sparks bounced off our roof!
      Shout's of 'Pigs in Space' soon turned to 'Shit, INCOMING!!' ;)

  • Anyone Thinking of "FoxTrot" (Score:4, Funny)

    by Ronin Jonin ( 582090 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @06:58AM (#4714251)
    I'm sorry, but I'm thinking of those FoxTrot comics where Marcus and Jason attach the video camera to the rocket which upsets the balance and it flies straight at them. Something along those lines happaned to me once.

  • G-forces on the DV camera (Score:3, Insightful)

    by psychofox ( 92356 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @07:08AM (#4714274)
    What amazes me is that the video camera can still record footage succesfully given the enormous g-forces sustained at takeoff. The clarity of video appears unaffected.

    I would have at least expected a bit of flicker as the tape strains, or the motor backtracks a little or something...

    Very cool.

    • Some time ago, I downloaded all of their movies. in the higher-thrust liftoffs, yet, the G-forces do causes temporary glitches in the video, but they're very minor. However, when the deployment charge goes off and separates the sections, there is a more noticeable dropout in video.

      steve

  • Anybody get a mirror? slashdot should offer! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by fantomas ( 94850 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @07:39AM (#4714338)

    What happens when?... it gets slashdotted! Help them out, slashdot!


    Anybody get a mirror? Maybe slashdot should think about providing mirrors of small time operators' sites when an article like this is posted. We all *know* the poor little guy is going to get slashdotted. At best, he can't show his girlfriend/ dad/ best friends what he is up to. At worst, he gets a hefty bandwidth bill from his ISP. Linking to IBM etc is another thing, but surely slashdot could show a bit of community spirit and responsibility and offer a mirror before posting up articles with links to little guys?

  • I know! I know! Oooh, pick me! *waving hand* (Score:3, Funny)

    by CrystalFalcon ( 233559 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @08:41AM (#4714458) Homepage
    What happens when the founder of Xircom and his brother bolt a DV Camcorder to the side of a 200 lb. model rocket and press the red button?

    They have to get a new web hosting provider because the old one gets slashdotted, blames them for the outage, and kicks them out?

  • You guys should ask permission before hosing them (Score:3, Interesting)

    by gelfling ( 6534 ) on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @08:53AM (#4714490) Homepage Journal
    Really this is like the 10th time in the past two weeks you guys have hosed someone's site. You should start asking permission before you post someone's site here.
    • If I were them I'd start worrying about over-zealous lawyers coming after them for damages. The worrying thing is, the lawyer might have a case. I mean if hundreds of US are repeatedly pointing out to slashdot how irresponsible/lazy it is of them to not at least give warning, knowing that a slashdotting is imminent...

      I'm serious! The lawyer might have a leg to stand on. And I'm sure slashdot doesn't really want to end up spending what meagre money it has on lawyers of it's own.

      Not that I or you think that they'd be justified. Put your stuff up in public, no fault of anyone else if an interested crowd shows up. Bah, I'm just trying to scare them into it.

      Giving a warning WOULD be a courteous thing to do.
    • You have an ID in the thousands and just noticed that sites linked to from Slashdot have a tendency to be "hosed"? Are you often told that you are very perceptive? ;-)
    • If you don't want people to look at your website, don't make it public.

      If you DO make it public, and a lot of people suddenly look at it, and as a result you exceed your bandwidth/transfer-limit/server-specs limitations, this means one of two things:

      (1) Your site has become, at least temporarily, far more popular than you anticipated! Hooray!! Now to call the ISP...

      (2) You can't afford to be popular, so you probably shouldn't have made it so public. You, the server administrator, made a mistake. Perhaps you should have required a password to access the resources.

      If someone runs their own web page, like /., they don't have to ask anyone's permission before linking to your site. A similar situation is, if someone finds a cool web site, they don't have to ask permission before forwarding the URL to their friends (even though that might cause it to be forwarded on to thousands more people)

      If someone makes your server so popular that you can't handle it, that's really not their problem.

      -=Ivan
  • I've been seeing these films on Roadrunner vs Coyote, though they look a little chalky.

  • Gates (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 20, 2002 @09:29AM (#4714665)
    <i>"If only everyone named Gates did stuff this cool."</i>

    What? Windows for Warheads? :)
  • By definition [nar.org], if it weights over 1500 grams, it is NOT a model rocket. Their web server is /.'d, so I can't read their details. Assuming their rocket really has a lift off weight of 200 lbs., it is going to require a substantial motor of that would clearly put it into the high power class.
  • If only everyone named Gates did stuff this cool.

    Yeah..... sadly, all Bill Gates does is donate hundreds of millions of dollars to finance vaccinations [bbc.co.uk] for children in third-world countries who otherwise wouldn't receive them. But then again, not everybody named Gates can put their fortunes to such practical use......

    </sarcasm>
  • Here's another site with videos from both low and high power rockets:
    www.videorocketry.com [videorocketry.com]
    (videos available Here [dph.com])

    One prime candidate for a low power camera is the discontinued Intel Play Digital Movie Creator [intel.com]. You record video onto a chip and upload to your PC via USB. I believe I saw this camera resurface at Toys R Us under the manufacturer name "Digital Blue". Anyone?

    Here is an example of the Intel camera at work in an off-the-shelf Estes rocket with a payload bay added [dph.com]

    And here is a rocket with Gumby as the pilot [dph.com].

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