DMA General Membership Meeting - Hybrid (Online and In-Person)

The Dayton Microcomputer Association, Inc. (DMA) holds an online/in-person monthly general meeting each month (except in December) about a wide range of technology topics.

This Month's Meeting Topic: V2 and Apollo Guidance Systems
Presented by Stephen Frey, Assistant Curator, The DMA Computer Museum and Technology Showcase

October holds many firsts for rocketry. The Space Age began October 3rd 1942 with the first successful launch of the German A4 (aka V2) rocket. The V2 was the first man-made object to reach space. Stephen will talk about the guidance system and flight control computer used in the 1940s German V2 and how the concepts developed then evolved into the systems that got us to the moon in the 1960s.

Stephen will describe how gyroscopes are used in the inertial guidance system to sense attitude, how an Integrating Gyroscopic Accelerometer works and the information it provides. The mathematics of mixer functions and PID control were accomplished by the vacuum tube based
analog flight control computer using the technology of 1940. He will show his Estes V2 model, complete with an inertial guidance system, and show it "flying" in a wind tunnel. Stephen will also give an overview of the guidance systems and computers used on the Saturn V launch vehicle and the Apollo Spacecraft developed during the 1960s.
On October 4th 1957, the Soviets sent the first artificial satellite, Sputnik, into orbit. October Sky is the name of a book and movie about a real-life group of young men known as the Rocket Boys.

Homer Hickam and a group of his friends from a coal mining town in West Virginia, were Inspired by the launch of Sputnik. The boys began building their own model rockets and fought their way out of the mining town. All the boys went on to higher education and technical careers. Homer landed a position at NASA.

During these hybrid meetings, some of us will be at TJ Chumps, and some of us will be online. We will have a computer in the T.J. Chumps meeting room and the presentation will be streamed over Zoom. For those who cannot attend the meeting, it will be saved and posted on our new YouTube Channel about a week later.

The address for TJ Chumps Huber Heights is 7050 Executive Blvd., Huber Heights, OH 45424.

For more information about the DMA, please visit our website--http://www.dma1.org. Information about our Special Interest Group (SIG) meetings and events may also be found there.

All DMA meetings are free and open to the public.

Our General Meeting Agenda:
A short talk about our organization begins at 7:00 PM. Then, a presenter will be introduced and the guest speaker will talk about a computer-related topic.

Our General Meeting Timeline:
6:00 PM Social Hour for those attending In-Person.
7:00 PM Presentation: V2 and Apollo Guidance Systems.
8:00 PM Presentation Q&A.
8:15 PM DMA and Technology News.
8:30 PM Ask our ‘Brain Trust’ experts your tech questions.
8:45 PM Door Prize Drawing for Members.