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A supply rocket carrying cargo and experiments to the ISS exploded shortly after liftoff. NASA and Orbital Sciences (the company operating the rocket) have not released any information about what may have caused the incident, pending further investigation.
The mission was unmanned, and all personnel are safe and accounted for. The extent of the damage to the launch facility has not yet been determined.
Phil Plait, author of the Bad Astronomy blog speculates that the 60s-70s era refurbished Russian engines the vehicle used will come under heavy scrutiny.
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ISS Resupply Rocket Explodes Shortly after Launch
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ANN JILLIAN'S HAIR makes LONI ANDERSON'S HAIR look like RICARDO
MONTALBAN'S HAIR!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by LoRdTAW on Wednesday October 29 2014, @01:10PM
You would be surprised how far back machining automation goes. In the 1800's they used mechanical automation using cams, gers, chains and belts. Here is a chain making machine: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q18V5oq5b-g [youtube.com]. That design is easily a hundred years old, perhaps even older. I remember seeing one on how its made and it is awesome to see nothing but a spinning shaft will all sorts of cams gears and chains all timed together to orchestrate the simple operation of making chain. This was done for many other operations including turning(lathe) and milling. I grew up in a machine shop and my grandfather was a master tool and die maker who did a lot of press work and my father ran a machine shop with 5 CNC centers (3 turning, 2 vertical mill). Both businesses under the same roof. My grandfather always disliked CNC as it was his belief that the precision and repeatability was less than that of a proper mechanical cam programmed machining center. He came from a time when machine programs were a bunch of cams and gears hung on the wall in groups according to the job.
CNC started back in the 40's/50's too: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_numerical_control#Earlier_forms_of_automation [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 1) by WillAdams on Wednesday October 29 2014, @03:14PM
I began a timeline for CNC when researching a presentation at the local library:
http://www.shapeoko.com/wiki/index.php/CNC_History [shapeoko.com]
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Wednesday October 29 2014, @05:14PM
You know I forgot that the loom was one of the first truly automated machines. Funny how the punch card lasted as long as it did in terms of a storage medium for programs.
I remember the old CNC machines we had had punch tape readers. My father would hand write the programs and send them out to be punched onto tape. We used to have a carousel in the main office with dozens of square plastic tubes each with a program tape inside. The tubes had a job name, number and manufacturer. Then by the late 80's he moved to all serial lines for DNC. He had a switch box in his office next to his PC that he could select one of four machines, two sharing a serial line since they were right next to eachother. Long serial cables ran to the shop floor from his desk and he could upload a program right from his desk. During that phase he moved to CAD/CAM.