The Microship Status Reports

Microship Status 3/29/94 by Steven K. Roberts

Just a quickie tonight -- I wanted to let you know that things are getting back to normal (whatever that is). The project went on hold for a week or so there as finals week passed, I did a trip to LA, and then entertained my 81-year-old dad, who flew from Louisville for a Spring Break visit. Operations in the Microship lab were reduced to basic maintenance and email-answering only.

A few updates:

Spring Quarter is now in session, and we had our first meeting of the new project group this afternoon. We'll be having intensive one-on-one meetings over the next couple of days, and then forming project teams -- most likely centered around solar and battery management, fuzzy-logic bilge pump control and general data collection, thruster control, and autopilot/navigation system. One interesting spinoff expected from all this is a FORTH fuzzy-logic toolset that will certainly be publishable, and perhaps marketable. From last quarter, we have reasonably stable working systems for audio, video, and serial crossbar networks (with some repackaging necessary on the latter), as well a reliable network infrastructure and forward progress in various other areas. The ship downsizing is having the desirable side effect of reducing the number of processors and increasing integration, so even this aspect of the project is becoming sleeker. Stay tuned.

I have received four 30-watt photovoltaic modules from Solarex (with normal SX-series packaging on .090" aluminum substrate) as well as the first sample of the 24 units that will actually be used (a very thin, lightweight Tedlar sandwich). The four will be the test array for the solar-management project coming up, and we'll start looking into adhesives, honeycomb substrate thickness, cabling, and thermal issues using this sample.

Interest is developing in the Ames (mechanical engineering) department -- I'll know in a few days if we'll have projects this quarter involving pedal/thruster design, folding crossbeam assemblies, trailering/suspension hardware, and bay pressurization system. If all goes well, we should see significant cross-pollination between ME and ECE groups working on different but interlocking aspects of the overall system...

As I reported in the last issue, downsizing is now a major priority, and I'm toying with some rather radical ideas. I hope to give you a clear picture of the new design within the next week or so!

Finally, the Los Angeles (Pomona) trip went well. I was accompanied by TJ Tyler and Annette Loudon, and we did three days of booth duty, answering a barrage of questions about the bike from the relentless crowd. We sold about 60 of the new "From BEHEMOTH to Microship" monographs, as well as half that number of books. There seems to be interest in the new publication series, so we're proceeding with plans to issue technical reports in hardcopy.

These reports should start coming a bit more frequently again -- breaktime is over, and we're back at it!

Cheers, Steve