23 Universities advance to next round of Hyperloop competition - Polidicks

[QUOTE=Morgen;49644473]You don't need access roads.[/quote] uh, yes you do. otherwise you're not going to be able to move the massive amounts of steel and concrete required lol [quote]The tube can be connected to the pylon through adjustable dampeners that can compensate for thermal expansion. Redundant systems on the tube itself? It's a steel tube.. with ports on it that can open in the event of an emergency. You have an induction motor every 70 miles and that's it. Not exactly complicated. Low power systems to check between the powered parts wouldn't be that hard to implement either. You can run things along the outsides of the tube. You can use slip joints near the station to allow for thermal contractions while keeping the main part welded to allow for it to be smooth and high speed. Since it isn't actually a vacuum any leakage can be overcome with pumps easily enough, and near the stations you aren't going at high speed anyway.[/quote] the kind of thermal expansion we're talking about isn't something that dampeners can handle - its like 180 metres of contraction and expansion over the whole route. you need expansion joints. you still haven't mentioned the communications systems, need for a real time map, the fact you still need to build things like bridges, the concrete pillars construction, the foundations for each pylon, etc? [quote]But trying to tack on crap that old technology uses and saying it won't work because old system X required Y so this must require Y too is poor form at best.[/quote] you do realize that the first railway engineers had experience building canals and roads right? claiming that a lot of the problems which afflict normal civil engineering don't apply to the hyperloop is ignorant of civil engineering [quote]Who even suggested they start surveying the route? I mean really come on now.[/QUOTE] because this is a basic requirement for any kind of civil engineering project? [QUOTE=paindoc;49644538]Hey Sobotnik did you know that it's really popular for universities to hold design contests sp that students can learn about engineering and have fun? No? I guess we better tell concrete canoe to stop - fuck learning, it's impractical. Same with steel bridge. And Formula SAE. They're not things we can make money off of, so fuck em Jesus Christ get over yourself[/QUOTE] i'm not even talking about that stuff, no need to be rude about it.

[QUOTE=HumanAbyss;49644601]Maglev uses super cooled helium to cool the magnets, and it has to do that the whole track length. That seems like quite a headache for farm land, as much as the hyper loop no?[/QUOTE] Some of the newer maglev designs don't need super cooling but they make the trains quite heavy iirc.

[QUOTE=paindoc;49644538]Hey Sobotnik did you know that it's really popular for universities to hold design contests sp that students can learn about engineering and have fun? No? I guess we better tell concrete canoe to stop - fuck learning, it's impractical. Same with steel bridge. And Formula SAE. They're not things we can make money off of, so fuck em Jesus Christ get over yourself[/QUOTE] My Uni has a cardboard boat competition. [editline]31st January 2016[/editline] They don't last very long.

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;49644626]uh, yes you do. otherwise you're not going to be able to move the massive amounts of steel and concrete required lol the kind of thermal expansion we're talking about isn't something that dampeners can handle - its like 180 metres of contraction and expansion over the whole route. you need expansion joints. you still haven't mentioned the communications systems, need for a real time map, the fact you still need to build things like bridges, the concrete pillars construction, the foundations for each pylon, etc? you do realize that the first railway engineers had experience building canals and roads right? claiming that a lot of the problems which afflict normal civil engineering don't apply to the hyperloop is ignorant of civil engineering because this is a basic requirement for any kind of civil engineering project? i'm not even talking about that stuff, no need to be rude about it.[/QUOTE] Oh well, if Sobotnik says they can't handle thermal contraction in the way they stated then I guess Musk and the engineers at SpaceX and Tesla must be wrong. Communications aren't even an issue? It's a pretty basic principle with no new technology required for it. The technology is still being investigated, there's no point to trying to build a massive track like LA to SF until it has been investigated more thoroughly. You should really read the whitepaper, it covers just about everything. But I guess arguing against a new technology that you got all your knowledge from some clickbait blog about is good enough.

[QUOTE=Atlascore;49644692]I never said we can't investigate alternatives, all I'm asking is why are you so hellbent on eradicating trains?[/QUOTE] I'm not against trains at all. Trains are great for moving mass cargo or building a cheapish route with regular speed trains. I even advocated the use of trains earlier in this thread. But the Hyperloop has it's niche if the technology works out, being able to commute to another city. That isn't possible in the scenario we are talking about even with a high speed railway.

[QUOTE=Morgen;49644688]Oh well, if Sobotnik says they can't handle thermal contraction in the way they stated then I guess Musk and the engineers at SpaceX and Tesla must be wrong. Communications aren't even an issue? It's a pretty basic principle with no new technology required for it. The technology is still being investigated, there's no point to trying to build a massive track like LA to SF until it has been investigated more thoroughly. You should really read the whitepaper, it covers just about everything. But I guess arguing against a new technology that you got all your knowledge from some clickbait blog about is good enough.[/QUOTE] it's really arrogant to assume that basic principles of civil engineering and economics can be overcome in this manner. it's a blatant disregard of just how complex a mass transit system really is, and the work, time, and resources that goes into building and maintaining it. civil engineers, economists, and the like all cast doubt on the project i mean what about the point with surveying? did you know that civil engineers have to actually survey the route in its entirety before they begin? as for the economics: [url]http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2013/8/14/economists-don-tbelievethehyperloop.html[/url] [url]http://www.businessinsider.com/musk-flawed-plan-for-hyperloop-construction-2013-8?IR=T[/url] [QUOTE=Morgen;49644724]That isn't possible in the scenario we are talking about even with a high speed railway.[/QUOTE] Japan, France, China, and an increasing number of places in the world seem to be reporting success with HSR and are expanding or upgrading infrastructure to HSR. Why can't America do the same? It's been exceptionally successful in Japan and the same engineering utilized in Japan would match well to California since both are seismically active zones.

[QUOTE=Atlascore;49644273]Why can't we keep using trains? They're efficient, the technology behind them is improving, the infrastructure is already in place to continue using them, and it's relatively cheap to build more trains and railroads especially in comparison to these over-engineered sci-fi concepts people regularly come up with.[/QUOTE] Fair point, I guess I'm being a bit too futurist. Either way, I still think we should encourage unconventional engineering and see where it takes us.

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;49644752]it's really arrogant to assume that basic principles of civil engineering and economics can be overcome in this manner. it's a blatant disregard of just how complex a mass transit system really is, and the work, time, and resources that goes into building and maintaining it. civil engineers, economists, and the like all cast doubt on the project i mean what about the point with surveying? did you know that civil engineers have to actually survey the route in its entirety before they begin? as for the economics: [url]http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2013/8/14/economists-don-tbelievethehyperloop.html[/url] [url]http://www.businessinsider.com/musk-flawed-plan-for-hyperloop-construction-2013-8?IR=T[/url] Japan, France, China, and an increasing number of places in the world seem to be reporting success with HSR and are expanding or upgrading infrastructure to HSR. Why can't America do the same? It's been exceptionally successful in Japan and the same engineering utilized in Japan would match well to California since both are seismically active zones.[/QUOTE] The US has unique challenges because it's so big. LA to San Francisco is like Edinburgh to London, Toulouse to Paris or Hachinohe to Tokyo. Other parts of the world are much more densely populated. There's no point surveying the route since they aren't going to actually build it anytime soon. The technology needs to be investigated and developed on a smaller scale first.

[QUOTE=Aide;49642559]Surprised to see UW-M on the list for an award.[/QUOTE] It's funny, I probably wouldn't have heard of UW-M if it wasn't for the fact that googling UW "topic" also gives me UW-M results. It's still a pretty good school though!

[QUOTE=Morgen;49644831]The US has unique challenges because it's so big. LA to San Francisco is like Edinburgh to London, Toulouse to Paris or Hachinohe to Tokyo. Other parts of the world are much more densely populated.[/quote] China and Russia use HSR, and both are massive countries. I don't see why the USA can't do likewise. [quote]There's no point surveying the route since they aren't going to actually build it anytime soon. The technology needs to be investigated and developed on a smaller scale first.[/QUOTE] Well that bodes well if it's going to compete with HSR. Sounds like by the time the first commercial line is completed, the USA will be already halfway through upgrading their infrastructure to HSR and the competition is going to be much tougher because HSR technology will have improved too.

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;49643668]But those are individual capsules which are shot out. Each capsule can only hold about 30 people, and you need clearance times inbetween them. The more you add, the more it impacts on safety. How much more can the clearance time be reduced? If you sent one out every 30 seconds (which is very generous), that's two per minute, 120 an hour. That means you can only manage about 3600 passengers an hour if we assume 30 per capsule. That's only just managing to compete with the roads.[/QUOTE] Highways are used for considerably short travel, like from northern New Jersey to New York City, a pretty typical morning commute. With Hyperloop, people could live in Boston and work in New York. The number of people doing this commute will be drastically smaller than the number of people commuting from nearby, and then there's the handful of tourists going through every day. It's not like the demand for this service will ever rival the highway system because they serve two different needs.

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;49644853]China and Russia use HSR, and both are massive countries. I don't see why the USA can't do likewise. Well that bodes well if it's going to compete with HSR. Sounds like by the time the first commercial line is completed, the USA will be already halfway through upgrading their infrastructure to HSR and the competition is going to be much tougher because HSR technology will have improved too.[/QUOTE] The majority of China's population is on the east coast. Russia only has three lines, and they are all based around the west of the country around Moscow. Still takes 4 hours to get from Moscow to St Petersburg, not exactly something you can commute on everyday.

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;49643731]Again there's mentioning the fact that they won't be building hyperloop stations in the middle of cities, unlike HSR which can take advantage of existing infrastructure.[/QUOTE] Not [I]yet.[/I] *Automerge*

[QUOTE=Morgen;49644950]The majority of China's population is on the east coast. Russia only has three lines, and they are all based around the west of the country around Moscow. Still takes 4 hours to get from Moscow to St Petersburg, not exactly something you can commute on everyday.[/QUOTE] Except you're ignoring that Chinas HSR network is extremely extensive and it's still growing rapidly. Japan likewise. I don't get why we can't just upgrade to HSR infrastructure across the board? It's got discernible and obvious benefits which have been well proven for years. Everybody is jumping on the HSR train now. [QUOTE=BigJoeyLemons;49644944]Highways are used for considerably short travel, like from northern New Jersey to New York City, a pretty typical morning commute. With Hyperloop, people could live in Boston and work in New York. The number of people doing this commute will be drastically smaller than the number of people commuting from nearby, and then there's the handful of tourists going through every day. It's not like the demand for this service will ever rival the highway system because they serve two different needs.[/QUOTE] sounds like something only the wealthy and rich will use then, especially considering ticket prices

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;49644626]uh, yes you do. otherwise you're not going to be able to move the massive amounts of steel and concrete required lol the kind of thermal expansion we're talking about isn't something that dampeners can handle - its like 180 metres of contraction and expansion over the whole route. you need expansion joints. you still haven't mentioned the communications systems, need for a real time map, the fact you still need to build things like bridges, the concrete pillars construction, the foundations for each pylon, etc? you do realize that the first railway engineers had experience building canals and roads right? claiming that a lot of the problems which afflict normal civil engineering don't apply to the hyperloop is ignorant of civil engineering because this is a basic requirement for any kind of civil engineering project? i'm not even talking about that stuff, no need to be rude about it.[/QUOTE] I agree in many respects about the (im)practicality of hyperloop for mass transit, but right now its still privately funded and being used mostly for this competition. The design of the pods themselves is fascinating and provides quite a challenge for students, along with the chance to work near industry and get to go to cool events like this. I fail to see the problem with what this thread specifically referred to- the university competition and the winners announced. It seems silly to kick up this much of a shitstorm over it in a thread that was hardly even about the practicality of the project itself. If they get government funding, or subsidies, to build a hyperloop route question all you like. Hell, I know how you feel about Musk. So when they try to scale it up, why not stand back and laugh as Musk (plus whatever company trys this) eats shit (as you believe he will)?

[QUOTE=BigJoeyLemons;49644944]Highways are used for considerably short travel, like from northern New Jersey to New York City, a pretty typical morning commute. With Hyperloop, people could live in Boston and work in New York. The number of people doing this commute will be drastically smaller than the number of people commuting from nearby, and then there's the handful of tourists going through every day. It's not like the demand for this service will ever rival the highway system because they serve two different needs.[/QUOTE] Heck you could potentially even connect Detroit to New York (rip New York) but it would allow people struggling in Detroit to work in New York. Could do Denver to Las Vegas but that might be stretching it a bit. [editline]31st January 2016[/editline] [QUOTE=Sobotnik;49644971]Except you're ignoring that Chinas HSR network is extremely extensive and it's still growing rapidly. Japan likewise. I don't get why we can't just upgrade to HSR infrastructure across the board? It's got discernible and obvious benefits which have been well proven for years. Everybody is jumping on the HSR train now. sounds like something only the wealthy and rich will use then, especially considering ticket prices[/QUOTE] It's not physically possible to get HSR to match the Hyperloop. You can't get a regular train to do 700+ MPH.

[QUOTE=Morgen;49644990]It's not physically possible to get HSR to match the Hyperloop. You can't get a regular train to do 700+ MPH.[/QUOTE] you ignored my point about how china and japan both already have extensive HSR networks that they are continually improving upon and seem to serve commuters pretty well why can't america build an extensive HSR network?

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;49645043]you ignored my point about how china and japan both already have extensive HSR networks that they are continually improving upon and seem to serve commuters pretty well why can't america build an extensive HSR network?[/QUOTE] If your commute takes more than 2 hours one way it's going to get tedious real fast and would be better to just move. China's east coast is much more densely populated than the US. Japan is tiny and it's still not realistic to commute from the north of the main island to Tokyo. The US is extremely spread out compared to China. [thumb]http://www.china-food-security.org/images/maps/pop/pop_1_h.jpg[/thumb] [thumb]https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/21/US_population_map.png[/thumb]

[QUOTE=Morgen;49644077]Well that's what the proposed track is supposed to do. Follow the interstate and only divert from it when it makes a sharp turn. It doesn't need to be built on pillars either, it's only on pillars to reduce the amount of land you need to buy since the pillars would be pretty much on par with a tree in dimensions. You gain the advantage of earthquake protection from the pillars though.[/QUOTE]Uh, yeah that isn't how zoning and property works. A lot of places require a minimum amount of land to be sold, for example in my area you need to sell or transfer [I]no less[/I] than ten acres and they need to be full square acres. So you can't go "haha well w/e" and get rid of a tiny little penis of land that adds up to ten acres total. That's not the only problem with your post: [QUOTE=Morgen;49644077]A ground based high speed rail system by comparison needs up to a 100 ft wide swath of dedicated land to build up foundations for both directions, forcing people to travel for several miles just to get to the other side of their property. It is also noisy, with nothing to contain the sound, and needs unsightly protective fencing to prevent animals, people or vehicles from getting on to the track. The Hyperloop just has a bunch of tree sized pillars going along.[/QUOTE]See, the land used for a hyperloop tube is going to be completely fucking useless aside from being able to go under the tube. So any buildings in the way are gone, agricultural land is just limited to ranches or pastures, and holy fuck don't even get me started if it wants to compete with a electrical pylon. [QUOTE=Morgen;49644473]You don't need access roads. You don't see access roads built for every mobile phone mast on farm land.[/QUOTE]lmao yes you do and if you don't it's on pasture. Any pylon in fields or orchards is not going to be very big anyway, having all those wires to keep it from tipping over interferes with things like combines and threshers. That said yes you will need access to the tube because those shock absorbers [I]need[/I] to be serviced. All of it needs to be serviced actually, you can't have a vacuum tube that's under constant abuse and out in the elements without fixing it up now and again. Plus any of the electrical components would need service [I]at least[/I] every couple of months. Subways in NYC are down all the time for maintenance because shit breaks down, when you're moving that much juice from point A to point B you're going to have issues and these issues have to be fixed. Then there's the issue of construction, building the thing is going to mean lots of trucks smashing the shit out of the land (horrible, horrible thing to do for farm fields) and assuming the construction goes fine (which it never does) that still doesn't deal with the issue of this big fucking tube looming over land casting a shadow. Or worse: it's transparent and it magnifies the light and bakes the soil. Look, I have read that fucking paper and while it is a nifty idea and it does need to be explored I'm not really seeing anything that useful just from what's jumping out at me. At least it doesn't seem to be any more useful than laying down some high-speed rail or ripping up old rails and replacing them. I'm sure with a lot of headaches and a lot of pain, sweat, and tears there could be a feasible system but as Sobotnik said it's going to be far, far more expensive than the engineers say. Mind you they are not [B]civil[/B] engineers, they don't have anywhere near the experience necessary to adequately say how much it will actually cost because shop and lab engineering is way the fuck different than field engineering. There's all sorts of other factors at play in the big wide world that aren't readily apparent when you propose a system like this. Civil engineering projects constantly run into cost overruns because of these issues, somebody doesn't want to sell their land? Well buckle the fuck up for an eminent domain rollercoaster ride which might actually end in a court saying, "no you crazy assholes you can't take this guy's land and stop trying to rip him off." What if the survey didn't catch some sort of geographical issue? That's real fucking easy to miss, there could be a whole chunk of the proposed track that's sitting on an unstable mess that nobody knew about. Civil engineers are used to dealing with this and they expect this, their field of work is very, very different than the authors of the hyperloop proposal. [editline]31st January 2016[/editline] [QUOTE=Morgen;49645109]If your commute takes more than 2 hours one way it's going to get tedious real fast and would be better to just move. China's east coast is much more densely populated than the US. Japan is tiny and it's still not realistic to commute from the north of the main island to Tokyo. The US is extremely spread out compared to China.[/QUOTE]We are going to have to build a high-speed network sooner or later though. As our cities get denser and denser we're going to need something to move high volumes quickly and HSR is the way to do it. There's already freight trains running on HSR networks elsewhere in the world so it is a viable system and would really be perfect for the United States precisely because we're so spread out.

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;49645043]you ignored my point about how china and japan both already have extensive HSR networks that they are continually improving upon and seem to serve commuters pretty well why can't america build an extensive HSR network?[/QUOTE] i'm a really, really big fan of hsr but it's not feasible for the united states. not because it wouldn't work, because as long as you constrained the individual networks to certain sites (e.g. california hsr, new england hsr, south east coast hsr) it would be fine, but you simply can't have a cross-country rail system because the united states is too big, at that point planes are simply the superior option for travel. the reason it's not feasible for the other, more concentrated areas is simply because of the up-front cost of the solution, the fact that it cannot use existing rail infrastructure besides stations (hsr carriages need special reinforced tracks and gauges that require extensive maintenance). the only existing 'high speed' rail in the US is the 125mph track between DC and boston. so to build hsr you would either have to rip up and replace existing track, which would slow down hsr rolling stock because they have to maneuver around slower stock, or build entirely new lines, which is even harder due to the constraints of building rail inside cities that weren't designed for it. also, the average person simply won't support hsr development when current methods of transportation work 'just as well' in their eyes, and the cost is so high. i think it could work really well in certain areas of the us but i doubt it will ever really happen. also i'm not sure exactly about the profitability of hsr in japan, iirc the only profitable branches are jr east and central, and the other 5 are in the red, but plan to become profitable as their new lines attain break even with ridership. this is also ignoring the fact that when the japan rail network became privatized in the late 80s, it had over 27 trillion JPY in debt

The whole land thing is actually a really bad argument IMO. Are you all forgetting that any train will have to take up new space, and replace buildings that are in it's way unless, as Sobotonik uses as a counter argument to the Hyperloop, those trains stop on the outskirts of town, making it pointless. Any train, any railway, transportation method like this, is going to take land. Hyper loop, HSR, Maglev, it's all the same in that sense. It all needs land. It all needs service roads, access ways, it needs a relatively cleared path to get into the heart of a city. How is the space/land argument not one that cuts against both designs in modern densely packed american cities?

[QUOTE=Morgen;49645109]If your commute takes more than 2 hours one way it's going to get tedious real fast and would be better to just move. China's east coast is much more densely populated than the US. Japan is tiny and it's still not realistic to commute from the north of the main island to Tokyo. The US is extremely spread out compared to China. [thumb]http://www.china-food-security.org/images/maps/pop/pop_1_h.jpg[/thumb] [thumb]https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/21/US_population_map.png[/thumb][/QUOTE] I don't get your point. The Northeast would obviously benefit from it. A HSR connection from New York to Boston would make commuting very feasible. New York to Washington could be very feasible for commuting too. Travelling from Boston to Washington itself could probably only take about three hours. The Northeast coast looks very promising for HSR in general. There's also mentioning the Texas Triangle, and also Tampa-Orlando-Miami. Chicago (having already been a rail hub for some time) could have commuting to Springfield, Milwaukee, Indianapolis, and Kalamazoo. America has a lot of places where there are clusters of urban centers - many of them well within reach of HSR.

Whatever comes out of this, we HAVE to do something about making transportation faster and less expensive. This perpetual separation due to geographical distance is in my mind one of the biggest roadblocks to humanity coming together as a species. It's killing us.

[QUOTE=HumanAbyss;49645216]The whole land thing is actually a really bad argument IMO. Are you all forgetting that any train will have to take up new space, and replace buildings that are in it's way unless, as Sobotonik uses as a counter argument to the Hyperloop, those trains stop on the outskirts of town, making it pointless. Any train, any railway, transportation method like this, is going to take land. Hyper loop, HSR, Maglev, it's all the same in that sense. It all needs land. It all needs service roads, access ways, it needs a relatively cleared path to get into the heart of a city. How is the space/land argument not one that cuts against both designs in modern densely packed american cities?[/QUOTE] The difference is that while HSR already takes these costs into account, the hyperloop attempts to avoid them with daft proposals. Ultimately both methods consume vast amounts of land and money, although promoters of the hyperloop heavily downplay the land and financial requirements.

[QUOTE=Atlascore;49644273]Why can't we keep using trains? They're efficient, the technology behind them is improving, the infrastructure is already in place to continue using them, and it's relatively cheap to build more trains and railroads especially in comparison to these over-engineered sci-fi concepts people regularly come up with.[/QUOTE] because trains are not [i]cool[/i], and people want [i]cool[/i] stuff. fuck yeah science!!!

I don't see why it can't start out as a a super high speed transport service for goods, food and specialist items and then make its way to human transport. I imagine there's a few companies that would pay absurd amounts of money to have something delivered across half a continent in 30 minutes.

[QUOTE=Headhumpy;49645277]because trains are not [i]cool[/i], and people want [i]cool[/i] stuff. fuck yeah science!!![/QUOTE] I can't exactly state this, but this is a ridiculous fallacy that a person can easily imagine having been said before automobiles, planes, and every other advancement we enjoy now. You have to try new things to get new things. You really want us to just not build new things?

[QUOTE=Zombii;49645208]i'm a really, really big fan of hsr but it's not feasible for the united states. not because it wouldn't work, because as long as you constrained the individual networks to certain sites (e.g. california hsr, new england hsr, south east coast hsr) it would be fine, but you simply can't have a cross-country rail system because the united states is too big, at that point planes are simply the superior option for travel.[/QUOTE]I really, really disagree because the cost of HSR systems (and the rolling stock) has drastically fallen and the price of a train ticket is and always will be a fraction of a plane ticket. It's just cheaper to move stuff by train, the fuel's cheaper, the vehicles are cheaper, the only downside is the massive investment cost and this was true even in the early days of railroads. Our rail network wouldn't have been built without the government going "yeah we need to do this." What is an incentive, and a fast-growing one, is the development of freight capability on these networks. We [I]definitely[/I] need that because the current method is absolutely pulverizing our highways. So a HSR network that spans coast to coast would mitigate both pollution and wear on other transportation systems. HSR isn't exactly a cheap solution in the USA but it [I]is[/I] viable. [QUOTE=HumanAbyss;49645216]Any train, any railway, transportation method like this, is going to take land. Hyper loop, HSR, Maglev, it's all the same in that sense. It all needs land. It all needs service roads, access ways, it needs a relatively cleared path to get into the heart of a city. How is the space/land argument not one that cuts against both designs in modern densely packed american cities?[/QUOTE]It does, absolutely, but Sobotnik and I are arguing against the idea that the hyperloop will somehow use less land when it clearly won't.

[QUOTE=HumanAbyss;49645294]I can't exactly state this, but this is a ridiculous fallacy that a person can easily imagine having been said before automobiles, planes, and every other advancement we enjoy now. You have to try new things to get new things. You really want us to just not build new things?[/QUOTE] I'm all for trying out new things, but treating every crazy idea with hopeless optimism and acting like it is the second coming is silly and gives the public a wrong perception of what science or engineering really entails.

[QUOTE=Headhumpy;49645349]I'm all for trying out new things, but treating every crazy idea with hopeless optimism and acting like it is the second coming is silly and gives the public a wrong perception of what science or engineering really entails.[/QUOTE] Blimps somehow got made, so... y'know.