Zero G Pitstop...Red Bull Gives You Wings

[xcarguy]

....pass me a slick, please!

 

Edited November 21, 2019 by xcarguy

[panamericano]

I shutter (in gravity) to think what that PR blurb cost to make.

[Croc]

Yes, you can charter the Vodka Express Antonov heavy lift and then it does the parabolic flight path until the stomachs have emptied, they have cleaned up the plane and then they can start actually filming. Probably better service than my experience on Aeroflot. No idea of that price but....

 

If you wish to replicate it with just you and a few friends and no car or pitstops then you can hire the Vomit Comet/Weightless Wonder 727 out of Miami/Orlando for $170,000. 15 weightless periods of 25-30s each. So a little over 6 minutes being weightless, yodeling many technicolor yawns, and generally bouncing off walls, friends, ceiling, crew, floor, etc. They issue special waterproof jumpsuits for a reason. It uses the same flight ops place our corporate jets use in FL. I have seen many happy excited people hop on the plane. Once I even saw them deplane. Still many excited people but also some who were a little green and liberally covered in some evil looking substance with chunks. The good news is the jumpsuits contain/absorb the contents that issue from the other end of the body in a weightless environment... :ack:

 

Or the cheaper option is to fly with xcarguy in his private jet and he does that as part of his normal smooth flight operations. I hear his landings are particularly special! :jester:

 

Cost - $5-10M area. I suspect at the higher end of that range!

 

No thanks - not for me. I value my dignity.

Edited November 22, 2019 by Croc

[Certified Lotus]

They completed the exercise with the help of Russian space agency Roscosmos aboard an Ilyushin 11-76-MDK cosmonaut training craft.

Using a 2005 spec Red Bull RBI, the team filmed the pit stop over a week, doing seven flights and working around 80 parabolas where the aircraft climbed at 45 degrees before it fell in a ‘ballistic arc at 45 degrees.

The result was a time of artificial weightlessness.

 

Red Bull mechanic, Paul Knight, said the first parabola they did was quite strange.

There was no sensation of climbing or descending. He added that climbing at 2G, meaning they experienced twice their average weight, felt like being planted on the ground as one struggled to move. The sensation that followed reversed when they went over the top and into freefall.

According to the team, everyone was like Bambi on ice at first as they were struggling to get their bearings. However, they figured out to stabilize themselves and the best way to deal with the unearthly sensations.

Knight claimed it was an amazing experience and nothing that one could imagine.

The support team chief mechanic, Joe Robinson, said it pushed them harder than they could ever imagine.

Apparently, one realizes how much they rely on gravity when there is not any available.

He added that something as straightforward as the tightening of a wheel nut becomes extremely difficult when the vehicle is not tied down and floating.

The only control that a person has is through the stiffness of the ankles tucked into the floor straps.

He said it challenges one to think and operate in different ways. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity, and he wanted to stay and do it for a longer time.

The

is much smaller than the current generation of Red Bull Formula 1 cars. That makes it easier for them to maneuver and more predictable when it had to be strapped down when gravity retook effect though the team confirmed that the exercise was much harder than they thought.

 

To make things even more complicated, each filming session had to be reduced to just 15 seconds in order to ensure no one could get hurt.

"Car and equipment had to be carefully secured before and after each weightless period (no-one wants gravity returning when car, tyres and pit crew are a metre off the deck), reducing each filming session to around 15 seconds," Red Bull said on their website.

Edited November 22, 2019 by Certified Lotus

[xcarguy]

. . . the cheaper option is to fly with xcarguy in his private jet and he does that as part of his normal smooth flight operations. I hear his landings are particularly special! . . . not for me. I value my dignity.

 

I’m parabolic at the outer marker (that’s pilot talk..makes me look smart). And I’m the poster child for why full faced helmets are a double edged sword.:jester: