The DYNAMICS Group
Mechanical Engineering

David McKenzie's Personal Home Page

The obligatory spiel about me:

I'm a second year postgraduate student researching the dynamics of orbital tethers, given a studentship by EPSRC. My supervisor is Matthew Cartmell, and I work with Chris Draper. Together, we are the Tether Group at Glasgow University.

My Work in the Tether Group

At the moment, I'm simulating the dynamics of the tethers on an inclined orbit using Mathematica

Tethers for beginners:

These are a great way to do things in space without propellant. Using the properties of gravity (the closer you are to a mass, the stronger the pull) and a bit of orbital mechanics (the nearer you are to a mass, the faster you orbit) and a high tensile tether, you can boost or decay the orbit of a satellite as you please. All at a cost of zero fuel!
The really interesting things start to happen if you force the tether to rotate - you can give the payload enough velocity to get to the moon (or at least Geostationary orbit), change its inclination, or deorbit the payload from further out in space.

CV

My CV (in PDF Format) for those that are interested.

Mathematica Programs

I'm a keen user of Mathematica, and a programmer at heart, so here are a few things that I've made that may make your life easier

Mathematica program to make a model of the Earth spin
Mathematica program to .....

Research Interests

These include:

Orbital Mechanics
Solar Sails

Personal Interests

These include:

GUNS - GU Network Gaming (a club I set up this year)
3D FPS computer games
Map editing for above
Io (science fiction club)

Goodmans Digital Camera Driver for Goodmans G-SHOT 2025 TFT

Please go here for instructions how to download and install the Goodmans G-SHOT 2025 digital camera driver.

If you want to get in contact with me, please use one of the following options:

Address:	Room 429, James Watt Building (South) University of Glasgow, University Avenue, Glasgow, G12 8QQ
Phone Number:	+44(0)141 330 2477
Fax Number:	+44(0)141 330 4563
Email:
PGP info:	My Public Key for my departmental account

My publications to date:

M.P. Cartmell and C.R. McInnes and D.J. McKenzie, Proposals for a continuous Earth-Moon cargo exchange mission using the Motorised Momentum Exchange Tether concept, Proc. XXXII International Summer School and Conference on Advanced Problems in Mechanics, APM2004, June 24 - July 1 2004
C.H. Draper and D.J. McKenzie and M.P. Cartmell, Increacing Launch Site Capability using a Motorised Momentum Exchange Tether (MMET), 40th AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE Join Propulsion Conference and Exhibit, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, USA, 11-14 July 2004
D.J. McKenzie and M.P. Cartmell, On The Performance Of A Motorized Tether Using A Ballistic Launch Method, 55th International Astronautical Congress, Vancouver, Canada, Oct. 4-8 2004

Last Updated:
25/11/2004