Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!purdue!mentor.cc.purdue.edu!ajk
From: ajk@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Jeff Boerio)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: 104% on shuttle launch
Summary: correct this man's warped mind
Message-ID: <2516@mentor.cc.purdue.edu>
Date: 23 Apr 89 06:59:56 GMT
References: <883@sactoh0.UUCP> <9130002@hpwrce.HP.COM>
Organization: Tg Programming
Lines: 26

In article <9130002@hpwrce.HP.COM>, howeird@hpwrce.HP.COM (Howard Stateman) writes:
> So to carry this over to your engine running at 104%, it is running 
> harder than at 100%, but it is past its point of peak efficientcy, and
> may do something non-user-friendly, like blow everyone all to Hell.  

Something tells me that this is incorrect.  Why, in NASA's infinite wisdom
would they knowingly send up all these space shuttles whose engines run
inefficiently??  Why would they use an engine that would be prone to blow
up?  Sure, things may have gotten out of hand before the Challenger
accident, but that's not quite what I meant.  Getting something into space
is a delicate maneuver and needs all the precision there is.  Using something
that is inefficient and succeptable to blow up seems quite unreasonable.

My personal opinion, and something that I certainly don't know as fact, would
be that the engines used were originally expected to operate at a level X,
or 100%.  But, the production engines actually operate at X+4%, or 104%.

That's what seems a little better to me, but again, I could be absolutely
wrong.

     - Jeff Boerio


---
Jeff Boerio -- Tg Programming               FidoNet: 1:201/100         
Purdue University Computer Science Dept.    E-Mail:  mace.cc.purdue.edu!ajk