Richard Hoagland: Rockets, lies, and e-mail

        I don't subscribe to Richard Hoagland's new chat-show on digital radio. I don't mind listening to arrogant pseudoscientists in the wee hours of the morning, but that's on the pocket radio tucked up in bed, and for free. I draw the line at getting out of bed and paying for it, no matter how little. So I won't be reviewing The Other Side of Midnight unless somebody pirates it to Youchoob.

        Binaryspellbook, being in a very different time zone, evidently does listen, and on his blog yesterday he wrote this:

"Then Hoagland mentioned Explorer I and his explanation of it on his website. He then quickly admitted that there were some errors in the calculation, but there was still an over-performance of the rocket. He then went on to state that if anyone had emailed him regarding this error he would email them back with corrections."

        Here's the complete collection of my e-mails to the pseudoscientist on this topic. He never replied to any of them.

1 July 2013
Subj: Your mathematical errors in 'Von Braun's Secret'

I believe it has been nearly two years since you admitted, on Facebook, that you had made serious mathematical errors in your web page, Von Braun's Secret part 1.

At about the same time, also on Facebook, you wrote of your "decades-long, demonstrated scientific competence." I am writing to express my surprise that a man who seems proud of his scientific rigor would allow these catastrophic errors to go uncorrected for so long.

Just in case you need reminding of the nature of the errors, you misapplied the Tsiolkovsky equation by using it on all three solid upper stages of the Juno rocket at once. You also failed to evaluate a natural logarithm which forms a well-known part of the equation. When the equation is applied and evaluated correctly it does not support the ideas that you wish to communicate. That is because those ideas are wrong.

May I know why you have allowed this travesty to survive so long (and any answer along the lines of "I've been busy" or "I haven't had time" will be greeted with derision)?

13 August 2013
Subj: Von Braun's Secret FALSIFIED

Well, I see the mendacious web page is still uncorrected. Still delta-V = 3520 ft/sec.

You can't correct it, can you Richard, because if you did work the math correctly you'd arrive at delta-V  = 14,189 ft/sec. The 600 ft/sec excess velocity at orbit injection would be an error of, not 17%, but just over 4% -- easily within the tolerance of the military polysulphide aluminum/ammonium perchlorate fuel.

Are you not JUST A LITTLE BIT ASHAMED to have a theory which has been mathematically falsified published under your name?

28 September 2013
Subj: Another reason to withdraw Von Braun's Secret

Not only is your math unforgivably wrong, but your map of the tracking stations is totally at variance with the actual truth.

The Microlock network consisted of:
Antigua (doppler)
RED - Earthquake Valley
GOLD - AFMTC Florida
BLACK - Ibadan, Nigeria
SILVER - Singapore


The Spheredrop network had stations at:
China Lake, CA
Temple City, CA
White Sands, NM
Cedar Rapids, IA
Huntsville, AL


PLEASE WITHDRAW.

30 September 2013
Subj: Another reason to withdraw Von Braun's Secret



By the time the second stage fired off the vehicle was traveling horizontally, therefore any so-called anti-gravity boost would be irrelevant.

Do you understand that?

Source: Technical report on Juno.