SpaceX purchace of old MILA tracking antennas

[bob the martian]

For those who don't know what object oriented design means, it's a style of programming. It's kinda complicated but the essence is that each piece of the program is it's own separate piece that can interact with other pieces of the program. These pieces are called objects.

The three main attributes of object-oriented programming and design are encapsulation (limiting expoure of data to only those parts of the program that really need it), polymorphism (applying the same operation to different types), and inheritance (extending types to add new attributes or behavior, while preserving the attributes and behaviors of the parent type). 

Probably the only OOP concept that applies cleanly to the Falcon family would be inheritance; FH "inherits" the cores and engines from the F9, while extending the "type" by adding duplicate cores.  The same concept kinda-sorta applies to EELVs like the Delta IV; you have a baseline stage (CBC) that can be extended by adding SRMs or additional CBCs to create different "types" of rockets. 

Okay, maybe not so cleanly. 

[nat.vincent]

I'm not sure what I'm looking at in the photo. Is most of the primary reflector missing on those antennas?

Looks like it... Here's a "before" shot:

[Nomadd]

If that's the hydraulic mechanism I'm familiar with from some old 80s antennas we used to have, I hope they didn't pay more than scrap metal prices. I was never happier to see something go in the crusher. Using domed antennas so the dishes can be perfectly balanced and driven by tiny motors has made life a whole lot easier.