• kens 9 months ago

    Author here for your mechanical computer questions...

    P.S. there are two more parts to the series, going into more details on the Globus, explaining the circuitry and the "algorithms": https://www.righto.com/2023/03/reverse-engineering-electroni... https://www.righto.com/2023/03/reverse-engineering-globus-in...

    • haunter 9 months ago
      • 4gotunameagain 9 months ago

        It's actually the same one I think !

           > Fortunately, CuriousMarc was able to get the globe back into position while ensuring that the gears had the right timing. (Putting the globe back arbitrarily would mess up the latitude and longitude.)
      • harywilke 9 months ago

        Read a very interesting book on the space race from the soviet side. One of the things that stood out was the lack of solid state transistor technology meant that they were using tube transistors in their space craft. This was one of the reasons they had problems doing spacewalks. They couldn't expose the interior of their capsules to space or the electronics would go pop. The Wrong Stuff How the Soviet Space Program Crashed and Burned by John strausbaugh https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/john-strausbaugh/th...

        • izacus 9 months ago

          The title itself should tell you that the book is there to sensationalize and grind an axe, not to actually provide any historical accuracy.

          And yep, the author didn't even bother to use primary sources: https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4851/1

          It's like recommending a book about Apollo program written by Russians without reading any US documentation.

          If there has to be a western author, James Harford's Korolev biography is a better put together look into Soviet space program and actually has some proper academic reviews.

          • kens 9 months ago

            I read "Beyond: The Astonishing Story of the First Human to Leave Our Planet and Journey into Space" and found it very interesting. It is a detailed history of the early Soviet space program and Yuri Gagarin's flight.

          • MrBuddyCasino 9 months ago

            Why would a vacuum tube „pop“ when exposed to vacuum?

            • analog31 9 months ago

              Possibly nowhere for the heat to go. Some tubes need a certain amount of ventilation depending on the application. It wouldn't pop, but might fail.

              • numpad0 9 months ago

                Some of Soviet spacecrafts were known to have been built around ~1atm pressure vessels as a brute force means to reduce unknown unknowns. I suspect it could be reverse reasoning from there.

                • dmix 9 months ago

                  probably because the vacuum of space is way more extreme than inside the tube which would cause pressure on the seals

                  • teraflop 9 months ago

                    Vacuum tubes typically have an internal pressure of less than 0.001 atm, sometimes much less.

                    Any seal that can withstand a pressure difference of 0.001 atm to 1 atm from the outside can almost certainly withstand a difference of 0.001 atm to 0 atm from the inside.

                • undefined 9 months ago
                  [deleted]
                  • bgnn 9 months ago

                    that's bullshit. vacuum tubes are used in spacecraft by NASA too. it's likely they are still used. they don't pop in vacuum. plus they're more radiation resistant thwn transistors.

                  • neuralRiot 9 months ago

                    I always found mechanical calculators fascinating, here’s an article with a video explanation about the MK1 navy fire control computer. https://hackaday.com/2014/10/28/retrotechtacular-fire-contro...

                    • 4gotunameagain 9 months ago

                      One was sold last year for the bargain price of 40 thousand euros !

                      https://meshok.net/en/item/275902733_%D0%93%D0%9B%D0%9E%D0%9...

                      • LetsGetTechnicl 9 months ago

                        Whether or not its technically inferior to American space technology at the time, you have to admire the ingenuity.

                      • richrichie 9 months ago

                        Mechanical computers are still used onboard Russian warships. These are meant to function under EMP attacks.

                        • dennis_jeeves2 9 months ago

                          Interesting, I never thought of that.

                        • thrownawaysz 9 months ago

                          Dumb question: How do you jam a device like this? Is it even possible? Example: you want them to land at an incorrect location or doing more orbits than planned

                          • Ugohcet 9 months ago

                            You don't. This is basically a clock display with extra knobs and dials. It doesn't have any sensors or inputs except 1sec pulse.

                          • philistine 9 months ago

                            Imagine going to space using gears moving a pin on a globe.

                          • rbanffy 9 months ago

                            Now we need one on the Apollo 8 ball.

                            • kens 9 months ago

                              As soon as someone loans us an FDAI...

                            • baybal2 9 months ago

                              [dead]

                              • hshdhhshe7 9 months ago

                                [flagged]

                                • hintymad 9 months ago

                                  Ha, the similar technology that Eridians used to launch Rocky's blip-A.