Andy Kunz  wrote;
>>What a stupid world we live in.  When is the next bus for Mars leaving?
>
> Nigel wrote;
>You should know!, if it's going from anywhere I suspect it'll be your
>side of the Atlantic :-). (I bet it has PIC's on board as well!).
>--
The first operational (read actually worked) ballistic rocket (read leaves
the atmosphere and returns) was of course the German V2, which was built by
Von Braun and many others.  The guidance was a tube circuit that mixed (they
called it a mixing circuit) the gyro and vane position signals and generated
servo signals for positioning the vanes.  I bet that we can get that to work
with a PIC.  Possibly an 8 pin device.  Mars is a bit more complicated, that
might be a bit tougher.  But we certainly can loft a body to space with a
PIC.  I bet that would be great PR.

Chris Eddy