I offer a few unverified post-mortem personal speculations:
STEORN's problem might actually be due to the ORBO components used in its construction. The prototype is likely made out of various materials known to the general public as "Plexiglas" and/or "acrylic", "nylon" – blocks of the stuff. There are many reasons for using these materials. (1) The material is non-magnetic (2) You can see-thru a lot of the material, particularly the clear "acrylics". (3) The material is relatively cheap to order, (4) It's easy to machine or mill to the required dimensions. (5) The material is reasonably strong if not put under too much stress or heat. The material will however denature, bend, crack, do bad things if heated beyond their recommended tolerance levels. It might not have been a fault of the bearings but rather the support structures surrounding the bearings that were cracking and bending ever so slightly due to excess heat. Sean also states that the Kinetica prototype was definitely NOT a robust version of their "ORBO" technology, that it was fussy and finicky to get operational for prime time. Bottom line, as we all know STEORN apparently didn't test the ORBO critter under the intense heat of the camera lights like they should have back in the safety of their lab. Alas, not all engineers appear to have the inherited ability to engineer the best public demonstrations particularly when nobody had ever put together a public demo of this complexity before. It is probably the reason behind one of my personal rationalizations as to why I'm still willing to cut STEORN some slack here. It's my understanding that initially the engineers didn't believe the excess energy readings they were getting either. As such, I see no reason not to assume that these smart nerdy, possibly even socially dysfunctional engineers don't know how to record energy readings accurately. I gather they've been at it for years. It may be naive of me to say so, but I continue to suspect it's only a matter of time before companies like STEORN & MPI get their historic 12 second flight. But we shall see. In the meantime, watch your thermostats. Regards, Steven Vincent Johnson www.OrionWorks.com
