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JB0

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Everything posted by JB0

  1. JB0
    I think Gubaba was politely requesting I stop derailing this thread with walls o' text. Which is a justifiable complaint. ... I still wanna see an upgraded Stampede Valk.
  2. JB0
    Doh! Yeah, I dunno where I got 17 from.
  3. JB0
    The WHAT? That's just... oh my god, what were they thinking?
  4. JB0
    Sorry. My inner scientist got the better of me. Just be glad it wasn't my inner mad scientist, I suppose. Glad some folks appreciated it, though.
  5. JB0
    Aside from the lack of moving parts, yeah. Fusion is a lot simpler than fission, startup costs aside. I don't think ionization is a goal, but yes. And releasing directly from the reactor isn't a goal, because it would leech energy you need to sustain your fusion reaction. I believe Valks use the heat from the reactor to superheat liquid hydrogen. It actually IS more efficient in atmosphere. Which is why they go to the trouble of heating air instead of just using space mode all the time. Welllllllllll... the thing is that while hydrogen and helium both fuse VERY easily, helium is a very difficult atom to split. It'd be a net energy loss. Now, on the other hand, you COULD have a multi-stage fusion reaction. If you start with hydrogen, you fuse that to get helium, then you fuse helium to get something heavier. You could continue this until you reach iron, but you get successively smaller amounts of energy out(and when you fuse iron, you get less out than you put in). Stars are purely fusion. They start with hydrogen, as they age and "burn up" the hydrogen, they start fusing the helium byproducts of their hydrogen fusion. In the sun, this is our end game. Sol isn't large enough to fuse anything bigger. But in larger stars, that cycle of "burning" byproducts continues on through carbon, oxygen, neon, silicon, and magnesium, ballooning to ridiculous sizes as they do so. And then they try to fuse iron. Iron doesn't release enough energy to support the giant ball of gas they have become, and they collapse under their own weight very rapidly. The shockwave hits hard enough to ignite a round of fusion like you won't see anywhere else. And this sudden burst of energy makes the star explode in a supernova that releases a cloud of literally everything on the periodic table(all fusion byproducts), leaving a superdense neutron star or black hole behind as a mark of the unfathomably large cataclysm. Sustained fission reactions are (almost) all the results of human engineering, because the setup is fairly complex. Outside of one REALLY WEIRD geological formation in Ohio, all known deposits of fission isotopes in the wild undergo nothing more than natural decay. I am a total science nerd. I make no apologies.
  6. JB0
    As far as a hostage rescue Valk goes... just make sure it moves fast in battroid and GERWALK modes and carry the rescuee out in a trash can in your robohand. If you're feeling ambitious, a padded trash can like the zentradi used to install spies aboard enemy vessels. See, we don't need a second seat at all! No worries. Just doing my part to raise awareness of the differences between fission and fusion. Also, fusion doesn't really have chain reactions, controlled or otherwise. It's a lot harder to make a large atom split into two smaller atoms than it is two make two small atoms combine into a larger one. Fusion reactions take a lot of energy to start(enough so that every real-world fusion bomb ever made uses a fission bomb as the detonator), and don't want to continue. It's the biggest problem facing real-world attempts to build a fusion power generator. On the upside, it also makes fusion reactors much safer. The stars keep burning because they're utterly massive. With enough weight, anything will fuse. No fancy chain reactions required. A fusion reactor is far different than a fission one, even though they're both "nuclear power." Think of a fusion reactor as a jar full of REALLY HOT fire(and now all atomic physicists in the area are sobbing quietly). If you stop feeding fuel into the fire, it uses up all the available fuel and burns out fast.
  7. JB0
    Critical mass is a concept of great importance in fission reactions, but not one with meaning in the realm of fusion where Macross operates.
  8. JB0
    Who the hey is Gumpy, anyway?
  9. JB0
    I'm just surprised no one's favorite is Gubaba. Not even Gubaba's.
  10. JB0
    But SPOILER is still correct! Oh, we all wanted to punch Sentinel in his massive chin. We were supposed to, of course. But on the other hand, Sentinel never ordered a team of autobots be buried alive because they were stupid. So... eh, the jerk scale is a little variable.
  11. JB0
    He also survived the pineapple curse!
  12. JB0
    Indeed it has. And ANN failed to actually link the campaign, near as I can tell. So I will.
  13. JB0
    Hey, I'm excited to see this finished. But... wrestling meltrans is a pretty hard act to top!
  14. JB0
    Oh, and let's not forget Sari is the least annoying human sidekick of all time.
  15. JB0
    What everyone else said. Initial trepidation gave way to "great show, shoulda been longer."
  16. JB0
    I think it just means I strike close to the truth of the matter.
  17. JB0
    How is that a tossup? The coke machine is hands down the better character.
  18. JB0
    Honestly, it made sense for Operation Stargazer. And I imagine after they got back, Millia just harangued him about it endlessly. "You got your own VF-22? " "Well, it was a necessity for the miss-" "You know they're based on MY Quedluun!" "I'm aware some of the technol-" "And one of YOUR so-called 'ace pilots' stole and destroyed MY VF-1!" "I assure you Gamlin had the best of inten-" "I'm not blaming anyone. But the VF-22 is a really nice plane." "*sigh* I can get the factory satellite to build a second one if you'd like." "Oh, if it's not too much trouble! MAKE SURE THEY PAINT IT THE RIGHT SHADE OF RED!"
  19. JB0
    Man, I'd love that last one. Especially with that cape. I wish the too-small swimsuit wasn't a too-small swimsuit because it's an awesome style, but the, shall we say, clinginess of the outfit is just a TINY bit ridiculous. And it's TOTALLY out of character!(he said as if anyone in this thread cares about in-characterness)
  20. JB0
    They built a -19 for a homeless rock star before the special forces got a shot at them. <noncanon musings> Which I guess means it's possible the special forces guys only got it because Basara had already demonstrated the thing had a significant real-world advantage over their current rides. I kind of like the idea of Basara getting a -19 to "beta-test" it for the rest of the fleet. Making sure the Sound Force project is useful even if Dr. Chiba's sound energy theory had turned out to be just the ravings of a mad man. </noncanon musings> And then they built a pair of -22s for their fleet commander and mayor because why not? Clearly the military and civilian leaders of your entire gig should be on the front lines where they can more effectively oversee operations. (And it was awesome and I love them for it.)
  21. JB0
    Kakizaki. Someone's gotta root for the underdog.
  22. JB0
    That's not true! That's impossible! Everyone knows the UPS guy doesn't talk to anyone. Just throws the box on the porch and runs.
  23. JB0
    I knew I should've doublechecked which mold Bumblejumper was instead of just shooting from the hip.
  24. JB0
    Bumblejumper, isn't it?
  25. JB0
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