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I think I suck...; Based on empirical evidence!
Topic Started: Mar 6 2011, 07:02 PM (602 Views)
T.Neo
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A hard mathematical figure provides a sort of enlightenment to one's understanding of an idea that is never matched by mere guesswork.
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colddigger
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Joke's over! Love, Parasky
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For the radiation problem just flush the engine with hydrogen gas to make tritium, burn it, then sell the heavy water as snake oil.
Oh Fine.

Oh hi you! Why don't you go check out the finery that is SGP??

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T.Neo
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It... doesn't work that way. I wish it did.


Or... nuclear power without radiation. How wonderful that would be. :(

It would starve Greenpeace about stuff to complain about though. :P
A hard mathematical figure provides a sort of enlightenment to one's understanding of an idea that is never matched by mere guesswork.
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Holben
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Rumbo a la Victoria

How about chemical rockets? :P

If you want to get there quickly, and accelerate at rates strong enough to feel, they won't cut it though.

As for heat management, how about an engine that doesn't get hot?

Time flows like a river. Which is to say, downhill. We can tell this because everything is going downhill rapidly. It would seem prudent to be somewhere else when we reach the sea.

"It is the old wound my king. It has never healed."
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Ànraich
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L'évolution Spéculative est moi

Reroute power to the forward deflector array through the EPS conduits. That always makes a difference.
We should all aspire to die surrounded by our dearest friends. Just like Julius Caesar.

"The Lord Universe said: 'The same fate I have given to all things from stones to stars, that one day they shall become naught but memories aloft upon the winds of time. From dust all was born, and to dust all shall return.' He then looked upon His greatest creation, life, and pitied them, for unlike stars and stones they would soon learn of this fate and despair in the futility of their own existence. And so the Lord Universe decided to give life two gifts to save them from this despair. The first of these gifts was the soul, that life might more readily accept their fate, and the second was fear, that they might in time learn to avoid it altogether." - Excerpt from a Chanagwan creation myth, Legends and Folklore of the Planet Ghar, collected and published by Yieju Bai'an, explorer from the Celestial Commonwealth of Qonming

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Kamidio
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Sometimes I think you guys are all bullshiting this and you make up the lingo. Force Deflector? Really?
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seascorpion
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Why Can't I Hold All These Mongols?

I agree with Fakey.
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FallingWhale
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The irony: force deflectors are being prototyped; deflector shield is the more common name.
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Kamidio
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WAT?
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FallingWhale
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http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn11623
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6567709.stm
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Holben
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Rumbo a la Victoria

I'd much rather call those electromagnetic shields, to avoid sci-fi associations and sounding silly.

And Star Trek is not good with the science.
Time flows like a river. Which is to say, downhill. We can tell this because everything is going downhill rapidly. It would seem prudent to be somewhere else when we reach the sea.

"It is the old wound my king. It has never healed."
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FallingWhale
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The scientists were using the comparison, it makes them sound silly but it still stands(even though I don't think Star Trek shields worked like this).

I was just saying that the name did apply to a real thing.
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T.Neo
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You know, I really don't know if we should call the science in Star Trek atrocious. Maybe we just need to settle into the fact that Star Trek lacks science altogether. :rolleyes:

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How about chemical rockets?


Chemical rockets for what? Interplanetary travel or LEO-only spaceplanes?

You can have interplanetary travel using chemical rockets, but... it will be slow. Essentially you put yourself on an orbit that intersects the orbit of whatever you want to get to. Problem is: it is painfully slow. Something like 8 months to Mars, many years to the outer planets... it becomes an impractical timeframe for manned flights.

For surface-to-orbit on Earth, it is possible, but... it becomes troublesome. This is why rockets have many 'stages' that are cast off and disposed into the ocean... of course, if you want a reusable vehicle, you either have to return those stages safely to Earth and refurbish them for flight as well, or eliminate stages altogether. The former makes costs go up, the latter is difficult.

I have however considered drop-tanks (almost like the big orange external tank the shuttle is mounted to)- if you can mass-produce them, they become cheap enough to be a viable option (and incidentally cheaper than maintaining a reusable booster stage).

Using chemical propulsion, my spaceplane can already make over 50% of the needed velocity change by itself... so things aren't that bad.

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If you want to get there quickly, and accelerate at rates strong enough to feel, they won't cut it though.


Acceleration doesn't matter with chemical rockets; thrust is generally independant of specific impulse (the rocket equivalent of "gas mileage", and it relates directly to the velocity of the exhaust), except in some electric rocket designs... I can make a chemical rocket with a very low thrust and it will take forever to speed up, but will not have a higher performance than its more powerful cousins.

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As for heat management, how about an engine that doesn't get hot?


And how do you propose to do that? :rolleyes:
A hard mathematical figure provides a sort of enlightenment to one's understanding of an idea that is never matched by mere guesswork.
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