I was gone applying for college, now I'm in and back.

Well after two years procrastinating/deciding if I was sure I went ahead with it.

I have at least 6 years of GI Bill, but they have gone to 8 for Veterans after Dr.

Montana offers 6 more years ON TOP of the GI Bill after it runs out under the Veterans Education Benefit.

My local community college here on the Blackfoot Rez...

Offers up through a masters in cellular biology.

They do not offer an associates in maths... But they partner with the University in Missoula.

I already have trig, calc, graphing, and etc down solid, I had one of the math teachers from the U in Missoula for a Veterans Upward Bound course along with an English teacher, I was the only one enrolled had them to myself. My English is a bit above what she sees among students.

The U offers a bioengineering course with genetic option.

They also have a math program up through masters in maths, astrophysics, and theoretical physics, engineering degrees are handled by the U of M.

Currently the GI Bill pays 100% to all Purple Heart vets and offers more support for students in STEM studies under the new "Forever GI Bill going into effect this fall.

This amount is more than 4x the tuition cost at the SKC I'm enrolled at... I need to spend it wisely, why not a few college level STEM related hobbies and projects....


I have been playing with an HHO generator, exploding water balloons of HHO gas. I have been soldering electronics, forced my windows computer to host Kali Linux so Kali can turn off all the spy/report/diagnostic/bloatware on windows and run both win and linux programs at the same time on a graphic desktop.

Now I am looking at pulse jets, kero/lox rockets, ramjets and turbojets of the home built type on youtube and digging through parts I have lying around.



That brings us to today. I built an open air supersonic wind tunnel using my 2 Watt modified "Thor" handheld as the point light source.

(Not my vid, just one I learned how to build the "tunnel" from)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eGTuNfc_kk

I ran out of canned air playing with "shock cones" and different tiny items in the airstream before I thought to take pictures.

I have an idea, where I reverse engineer and scale back the SR-71s engine nacelles.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3ao5SCedIk

While working on that I will also be working on a "Toroidal Aerospike" (Doughnut with rocket thrusters on outside of rim) Rocket engine with the intent to fit it on sort of a ball joint cowling on the back of the scaled SR-71 engine.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBdkpLxLuSs

For now I'm getting ready to order a $200 tig welder so I can weld up a pulse jet prototype I'm going to try to run on HHO gas...

Followed by a 3 d printer so I can try some shapes for use in a turboram/scram jet engine design.

I can cut the radial channels of my design concepts, into a 2D flat plane (plexi, shape, plexi) and just push in air in with a compressor up to Mach 3, then measure the shock cones and wave features provided by the areo-oreo.

So I'm off to get some more canned air... I'll make a new thread when I have cool pictures to post.

It's good to be back.

man you are into some kewl stuff- until I read your post I was ready to give advice I wish I had gotten-- study anything/all things photonic- the fields are expanding- lasers become more important to our lives by the minute. Anyone here sould be getting Photonics spectra trade mag- tons of great info - and its free to get. I have gotten two HUGE 'books' on every company involved with photonics.. give me your city and I can give you contact info with ANY there involved w/ photonics.. anywhere in the world.
its a lasergeeks dream book-- laser stuff would die for!... lots of great articles even tho some are way over my head. Got swell wall chart that later you had to pay $20 for in paper (about 2' by 3' big) (sans the staples mine has) and IIRC $30 for a laminated one- every laser wavelength common today is there. far before and past the visible ones. inb the phone=book size yearly Directory there is also a big section on laser safety.. the thing is cross -referenced-- you can look up an area=or company name or the field they are connected with. been around IIRC 26 years. wish I had been getting it long ago..

sry OT ranting again

My freshman classes start Sep 20. Basically Math, English, Biology.

My declared Major is Cellular Biology, on the way to that I end up with an Associates in science in the next two years.

The SKC also offers EMS, Fire, and HASMAT certs that only take 2 semesters. I'm thinking HASMAT as one of my first electives...



After my OP, Social Security finally got around to giving me many months worth of back pay.

I have payed a year of school in advance, ordered all my books, supplies, printer/school dedicated computer, and payed up a years worth or propane.

I ordered the parts I need for a hydrogen/oxygen gen that captures each gas un-mixed and should allow me to generate/pipe off each as needed.

I got that cheap wire feed to re learn welding. Once I have it down I'll get a real TIG that handles up through aluminum... This cheep unit doesn't need shielding gas and works fine on mild steel/scrap.

I got a little 2 liter air compressor for airing up tires and running the "wind tunnel", it will pay for itself in the first 12 cans of air duster it saves me from buying.

Finally I ordered the parts to build a "liquid air" generator using a fridge compressor and the Joule–Thomson effect coupled with an ice bath and recycling the cold but decompressed gas back over the heat exchanging coil in the cooling tower to condense liquid nitrogen and O2 from the air. I'm also thinking about how I could use the cold water from my well to boost the thermal exchange.

Since O2 condenses at a higher temp than N2 a simple condenser, pop can filled with LQ-N2 in coat hanger holder, suspended over double wall vac bottle, will allow you to collect pure liquid 02 as it beads up and "sweats" of the condenser.



I have all this taken care of, no debt... Yet I'm still supposed to get the GI Bill and once I take in my 2016 tax records I'll be applying for adjusted Pell grants...



With the $$$ I'm looking at I may need to look into a first time home buyers loan, and find a house/lab site that qualifies under rural development just to keep that $$$ as a stable asset likely to earn value I could always convert into more ed...

I've also offered my entire fam a "free ride" to school, at least two plan to take my offer for "some courses, or cert, or trade".

I've dug out the tax papers for my 401c and now I'm looking into forming an LLC here pretty soon. I plan to unload a lot of my projects/artworks on ebay/etsy if that starts earning real amounts of money that will be my sign I need the LLC.




Of forum interest.

I ordered a portable 110v battery pack, power supply for 50w CO2 tube, and the 50W CO2 tube.

I think this portable laser device I make out of these components should be very effective at igniting HHO balloons at a safe distance.

So far I have been using speaker wire, steel wool threads and lithium batteries.

Welcome back... :wave:

Jerry