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Just an interesting blog about the great airships,  the Hindenburg, Graf Zeppelin,  US Navy zeppelins, lead zeppelins (not really) etc.

http://www.airships.net/blog (http://www.airships.net/blog)

Quote from: AllPurposeAtheist on May 13, 2014, 07:32:38 AM
Just an interesting blog about the great airships,  the Hindenburg, Graf Zeppelin,  US Navy zeppelins, lead zeppelins (not really) etc.

http://www.airships.net/blog (http://www.airships.net/blog)

What's the difference between Zeppelins and airships, if there is one?

Quote from: Mandingo on May 13, 2014, 08:45:08 AM
What's the difference between Zeppelins and airships, if there is one?

Zeppelins are rigid airships (most of them, at least). There's also non-rigid and semi-rigid ones. That said, nowadays the two terms are generally used interchangeably, at least in the common language.

Quote from: DunkleSeele on May 13, 2014, 08:48:18 AM
Zeppelins are rigid airships (most of them, at least). There's also non-rigid and semi-rigid ones. That said, nowadays the two terms are generally used interchangeably, at least in the common language.

So all Zeppelins are airships, but not all airships are Zeppelins?

Like all cows are mammals, but not all mammals are cows?

Quote from: Mandingo on May 13, 2014, 08:55:58 AM
So all Zeppelins are airships, but not all airships are Zeppelins?

Like all cows are mammals, but not all mammals are cows?

Yep, in a nutshell.

Zeppelin was a brand (I guess you knew it, but maybe someone else didn't). They were the first ones to manufacture wery big airships with a rigid structure; since then the brand has become synonimous with this kind of airship.

Goodyear, another famous manufacturer, were mostly manufacturing blimps, that is, airships with a non-rigid structure.

"R-101", most obscure, to me, reference the Python made.

Blimps are famous for plaguing U-boats. Imagine a dive bomber that could do 10 knots coming up silently behind you.

There was actually a guy called Count Zeppelin. He also starred in the Twilight series.

Quote from: AllPurposeAtheist on May 13, 2014, 03:00:13 PM
There was actually a guy called Count Zeppelin. He also starred in the Twilight series.

There were quite a few counts in the Zeppelin line. It was just the more recent on that made history.

Yeah I guess if you're a count you're obligated to keep the family blood line going especially in money. Nothing like a count on food stamps, eh?

Quote from: AllPurposeAtheist on May 13, 2014, 03:11:15 PM
Yeah I guess if you're a count you're obligated to keep the family blood line going especially in money. Nothing like a count on food stamps, eh?

They actually adopted likely young men if there were no male heirs. Admiral Yamamoto Isoruku was an adoptive. It was a kind of a "wink, wink" thing when the male of the line was definitely not going to be producing any offspring.

Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on May 13, 2014, 03:15:34 PM
They actually adopted likely young men if there were no male heirs. Admiral Yamamoto Isoruku was an adoptive. It was a kind of a "wink, wink" thing when the male of the line was definitely not going to be producing any offspring.

(Bold mine)

Consider the designation 'male' as a place holder (in more ways than one).

Irony: 10 or 20 years ago there was a lot of hoopla about 'they' were planning to build a few MEGA big airships, 3 times the size of the Hindenburg, to haul extremely big and massive gear to otherwise inaccessible and dirt poor regions in the middle of nowhere of East Uzturkistan, and similar places around the world, whence roads and bridges could never accomodate such loads. Think pre-assembled electricity power plants* to provide light and power to the subsistence farmers, herders, elementary schools, and mothercare clinics in the arid rocky foothills. That would be a solid boost for those remote regions' development.

Airships would be perfect for getting that stuff there. Such outsized loads don't need high speed. Under airships they are independent of available road infrastructure (as in: absent). They don't need roads. They cross rivers, canals, lakes, and other waterways and obstacles effortlessly. They are 'all-terrain' and can get anywhere under 3.000 meters altitude. They don't need a lot of gound clearance either. A couple hundred meters is enough.

Of course these airships needed to be built first. For that purpose they built an even bigger hangar. And then something must have gone terribly wrong. Because this is what's happened to that MEGA big airship hangar:




*or operational ballistic missile launch platforms to strategic locations anywhere on the globe's landmasses...

I recently read "The Airmen Who Would Not Die."  It mostly deals with attempts at afterlife communication.  However, the main topic is the R-101.  Its construction and problems are discussed.

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