Goro Majima
Kitty Genovese Member
70 day trip to Mars? That's exploration age lengths of travel so that makes manned missions far more practical. Amazing!
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New Test suggests NASA's EM Drive will work in space
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My understanding is that it is basically troll physics that is actually working. Imagine standing on a boat blowing into the sail and causing the boat to move. This is what is happening but with microwaves.
EDIT: Apparently myth busters tested the blowing your own sail and got movement. The air bounces off the sail and around it causing there to be a propellant. Bad comparison to the EM drive.
Probably an incredibly, incredibly dumb question... but why don't we just build something small and dumb, attach it to this thing, launch it into space with a rocket, and see what happens? Is it basically just because that would cost too much given how unknown this technology is?
Badlucktroll
Gold Member
My dream would be to see a probe outfitted with an EMdrive on a "grand tour" of the closest star systems, much how the voyager probes went on a grand tour of the solar system. It will happen one day, people. Imagine being able to pop back and forth to mars very quickly while bringing lots of equipment and terraforming gear. What if we caused climate change on mars, and it caused hostile wildlife (Microbial or bigger), that existed in Mars's wet period, to "wake up"?
FantasticMrFoxdie
Mumber
Whoa this sounds too good to be true.
Hope this pans out.
Hope this pans out.
BobTheFork
Member
I can't hear EM drive without thinking it means 'Electro-Mechanical'
The crazy thing is NASA doubted the original creator. So he sold it to China and now NASA bit his idea and is presenting it as their own.
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-02/06/emdrive-and-cold-fusion
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-02/06/emdrive-and-cold-fusion
Mengy
wishes it were bannable to say mean things about Marvel
I'm guessing that very thing will be happening "soon".
That's the first warp enabled ship. Gotta be patient.
No, that's gotta be the Phoenix
First ship should be the SS Botany Bay, what could go wrong
Too many variables.
Launching shit into space costs a ton money, especially considering the "not knowing why it works" thing.
Same here. Pinball blood.
I would just be excited by the possibility to easily travel to and survey the Oort Cloud. It's not out of reach with these speeds. That's an amazing concept.
Fragamemnon
Member
Honestly though that has to be one of the less expensive curses of the pinball enthusiast.
( I think the same where i hear EM).
frankie_baby
Member
Maybe not a good idea, the last spaceship called enterprise crashed during testing and killed someone
Delta Assault
Member
That worked out really well for the space shuttle...
No, the thrust is too low for operating on Earth. Also, it's not needed since we are bathed in propellant (air).
Sir_Crocodile
Member
hype
now hurry up and try this outside of earth's magnetic field so we know for sure
now hurry up and try this outside of earth's magnetic field so we know for sure
Bubba_Sparks
Member
To make this thing ready for showtime is going to take years of development and billions of dollars. Probably an investment on the level of the Apollo program to get it work.
Hari Seldon
Member
Forget space, this thing would mean vastly more efficient electric cars probably.
TAJ
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
No way. All the real awards go to Shaywer. Yang gets a pat on the back and a Little League trophy. NASA gets an 'I Participated' ribbon.
Smart people..
Whats the difference between this, and Vasimr..?
http://www.adastrarocket.com/aarc/VASIMR
Ad Astra is making headway with their systems. Minus GOV restrictions.
This too is going to get us to mars in the shorter time window. 60-70days
Whats the difference between this, and Vasimr..?
http://www.adastrarocket.com/aarc/VASIMR
Ad Astra is making headway with their systems. Minus GOV restrictions.
This too is going to get us to mars in the shorter time window. 60-70days
Hari Seldon
Member
Smart people..
Whats the difference between this, and Vasimr..?
http://www.adastrarocket.com/aarc/VASIMR
Ad Astra is making headway with their systems. Minus GOV restrictions.
This too is going to get us to mars in the shorter time window. 60-70days
There is no propellant at all with this. Basically you are strapping a cone onto a solar cell and magically getting thrust.
Orbis Tabula
Member
I do hope this works, just because of how splendid it would be to live in a world where we're using some technology to get around but no one has any idea how it works.
Smart people..
Whats the difference between this, and Vasimr..?
http://www.adastrarocket.com/aarc/VASIMR
Ad Astra is making headway with their systems. Minus GOV restrictions.
This too is going to get us to mars in the shorter time window. 60-70days
^ This engine up has a propellant. EM Drive has no propellant. It uses electricity to produce microwaves, which bounce inside totally closed container and stir up quantum vacuum into movement. This produces thrust. Supposedly.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EmDrive
CitizenVectron
Member
What about the British guy who actually invented it and nobody believed for over a decade?
Yeah. Roger Shawyer deserves the praise.
Hari Seldon
Member
This is the best summary I have found on this entire issue.
http://www.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/34cq1b/the_facts_as_we_currently_know_them_about_the/
http://www.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/34cq1b/the_facts_as_we_currently_know_them_about_the/
Yeah, space doesn't work like that.
Being in the "same place" means having the same position AND velocity.
That's 400 years in half-accel (peak at half-distance at 4.6% lightspeed)
^ This engine up has a propellant. EM Drive has no propellant. It uses electricity to produce microwaves, which bounce inside totally closed container and stir up quantum vacuum into movement. This produces thrust. Supposedly.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EmDrive
Thanks smart people
I wonder. The Astra thing seems pretty plausible in the immediate future. Either way, im happy to see alternative methods of thrust coming out.Isn't this going to have to scale by many orders of magnitude to even be feasible for space travel? The effect is just barely detectable as a little bit of signal outside a bunch of noise, so to speak, and just because you can do it on a really tiny scale in a lab doesn't mean you can scale it to ship propulsion levels.
That said, if the effect is confirmed real by others reproducing it, and can be scaled accordingly over the next 50-100 years, shit will get REAL. Sadly I doubt I'll be around to see the fruits of this labor.
That said, if the effect is confirmed real by others reproducing it, and can be scaled accordingly over the next 50-100 years, shit will get REAL. Sadly I doubt I'll be around to see the fruits of this labor.
Yes, it's not like you see in the movies. The chances of hitting an asteroid in an real asteroid field for example are astronomically low AFAIK.
The thrust has been incredibly small because the amount of power they've used in the tests at Eagleworks is very small. The leading theories believe efficiency could be as much as .5-1N/W. It won't scale linearly, but yes it would absolutely be feasible for LEO, LEO-GEO transition, and long duration space travel.
It's also be theorized by Shawyer that a superconducting cavity could increase efficiency exponentially to something like 30N/W, which would be feasible for terrestrial travel.
Really crazy stuff.
Hopefully this tech will scale and works everywhere - it would suck to get outside the solar system and find it craps out.
If it does then there is no need to stop at 1 milli-G. Wack in a couple of fusion drives and ramp up that acceleration to 0.5-0.8g. More comfortable for humans to live and work in and at the halfway point just swing the ship around and decelerate at 0.5-0.8g.
If it does then there is no need to stop at 1 milli-G. Wack in a couple of fusion drives and ramp up that acceleration to 0.5-0.8g. More comfortable for humans to live and work in and at the halfway point just swing the ship around and decelerate at 0.5-0.8g.
DonasaurusRex
Online Ho Champ
wow we could start linking up the solar system in the very least with robotics and unmanned missions first bwahahah the Imperium begins.
Yeah the movies make it look like you're flying through Saturn's rings or something. The asteroids outside the solar system are extremely far apart from one another.
Probably because they got bit in the ass by the last physics defying engine they made a big deal out of testing.
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