Launching Rockets With Electricity
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 20 มิ.ย. 2024
- What will it take to ditch chemical rockets and make space launches fully electric? What tech will it require and when will it be reasonable to use such a system? What technical challenges are associated with it? Answering all these questions with David Dillon, the founder of Electromagnetic Launch.
👉 Electromagnetic Launch
electromagneticlaunch.com/
🦄 Support us on Patreon:
/ universetoday
📚 Suggest books in the book club:
/ universe-today-book-club
00:00 Intro
01:38 The idea behind electromagnetic launch
07:40 Quech launcher
14:45 How the system will could like
24:03 Recent partnerships and applications
33:09 Space infrastructure
36:13 What's next
📰 EMAIL NEWSLETTER
Read by 60,000 people every Friday. Written by Fraser. No ads.
Subscribe Free: universetoday.com/newsletter
🎧 PODCASTS
Universe Today: universetoday.fireside.fm/
Astronomy Cast: www.astronomycast.com/
🤳 OTHER SOCIAL MEDIA
Twitter: / fcain
Twitter: / universetoday
Facebook: / universetoday
Instagram: / universetoday
📩 CONTACT FRASER
frasercain@gmail.com
⚖️ LICENSE
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
You are free to use my work for any purpose you like, just mention me as the source and link back to this video. - วิทยาศาสตร์และเทคโนโลยี
One benefit of this approach on the Moon is the lack of kick up of lunar regolith that you have with rockets.
There would still be dust kickup with the ionization of the regolith by the sun, however still much less so than a traditional rocket of course.
The lunar regolith actually gets flung out at faster than orbital velocities.
It would probably be worse unless it's self contained on the moon
@veilmont688 still would create orbital dust debris clouds. Although the lower velocties of the moon it isnt as dangerous still worsens maintence
@@gabrieldavis5794 oh yea absolutely. I know I was a bit vague with my comment.
This David Dillon guy sounds very legit. So many of these startups look like "pie in the sky" funds or outright scams. I'm happy at least some of them are solid and honest. Good luck to the Mass Driver project!
He was actually quite realistic about the challenges.
I like the fact that he addressed the radial stresses caused through extreme amperage used in these coils, and the longitudinal force caused by equal and opposite forces as the projectile is ejected, while noting the fragility of current high temp superconductors.
These problems are generally ignored or just given a hand wave.
This company, in my opinion is likely to succeed.
It's utter bollox. The projectile will vapourise in atmosphere.
@@dougaltolan3017, that was - as was stated in the interview - resolved 60 yrs ago.
Do you mean Rocket lab
It is amazing that there are still people in the country who can fluently and seriously converse without vulgarisms and without stupid lame joking . Bravo and asking for more!!!
before we build one that launches a projectile into space we should build one, that accelerate its payload to a speed where you can start a ramjet. That would be super useful for hypersonic research.
And it would also be a need way to get to space.
The minimum speed at which a scramjet(I assume you mean that and not a ramjet) can operate, is mach 5. For that you need to be at least ~20km high to prevent everything burning up.
@@paulmichaelfreedman8334 no, I meant ram-jet. there is enough overlap between the two to do that in stages. But your Idea of strait up going for scramjet speed is also interesting. I would however suggest building mine first. It is cheaper and there is still a lot you can do with it.
About "everything burning up" we are basically talking about a launch side here. So I would not worry to much about it. There are methodes to deal with that. also 20 km that is just a few seconds after leaving the mass driver at that kind of speed.
also also for a big part of the interesting aerodynamic experiments, we would not even do a burn.
@General_Cornelius what sounds sketchy? to build a massdriver to do high velocity aerodynamic research?
@@MusikCassette Actually, the idea of a mass driver to do hypersonic aerodynamic research is really a good thought.
@@freeprint thx
Interesting interview, thanks Fraser. David seems really humble despite ambitions for advancing a field that's still on the fringe of science, physics and engineering possibilities. Wish the EL crew the best of luck in their pursuit and hope to hear more from them soon! 👍
Absolutely great Fraiser! Super, super exciting conversation! Thank you very much! As always! 😊
Agreed, great vid 👍👍👍
I had a CFD course under Dr Graham Candler! The man is an awesome teacher and a great researcher from what I hear. So nice to see him get recognition
Candler is a national treasure. Pretty good on a bicycle too.
More interviews like these please. Would be cool to see some visuals of what you are speaking too.
Seconded
thanks Frazer I am 87 I wish I was 27 and could see all these ideas comming to fruition a great interview as allways
Great to get someone who is knowledgeable about mass drivers on the show! It was great that he could dispel some of the myths, such as the myth that the atmosphere is an insurmountable problem.
Great channel fraser. You and event horizon, some of the best content on all of youtube.
This channel is much better than Event Horizon.
@@daemeonation3018event horizon is first class.
@@Pacer... I have an m.s. in physics. In order to not say anything negative, I will just say that Frasier Cain asks much better questions.
@daemeonation3018 so what.. I don't care what qualifications you have. You are a nobody. Event horizon is top quality.
Some of Event Horizon's content is a bit too "wishful thinking," in my opinion. Some, not all.
I think he has great presentation and presence, and is a good story teller.
by nature this is more viable than spin launch.
Spin launchers are just a bad idea
@@slo3337 And a con as they know it can never get off the ground.
Using the comparison of a linear accelerator to a cyclotron doesn't exactly work here... But I think the advantage of spinlaunch is the slow input of energy without as much complexity. It seems like a better way to get small vehicles off the ground quicker (quicker in terms of building the launcher)
Still
I don't think it will ever be a practical direct to space system , not from earth anyway. On the moon I can see how it could me more practical as it would require less materials, less velocity, less complexity, and easy enough concept even an army guy could understand 😜.
Yep, spin launch puts a spin on the item launched.
No rail wear on spinlaunch. Easier to reuse.
Fireball XL5 electromagnetic sled launcher , yes please . Needs to be attached to an easily land able space plane thingy
The Fireball XL5 sled launcher was rocket propelled, and SpaceX have already solved the landing.
I don't know what that is, but sounds like something I should make in my backyard... 🤔
@@MCsCreations It was a kids TV series using puppets by Gerry Anderson in the 60s, he later did Stingray, Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet, Joe 90, UFO and Space 1999.
The late 1970's tv show 'Buck Rogers, In The 25th Century' used electro-magnetic propulsion to launch their spaceships.
I worked under Michael Schoenfeld as a nuclear propulsion intern in 2014. We worked on an NTP reactor design under the name of "SCCTE".
This is a VERY good interview!!!! I wish more (interviews in general) were like this..!!
Awesome interview Frasier!!!
Fireball XL5 was the first time I saw a science fiction electromagnetic rail launcher
Moving an electromagnetic launcher to the moon or even just to orbital space seems pretty expensive!
Thanks Fraser! A solenoid-style launch system on the moon is something I've wondered about for years now, really glad proper engineers have been looking at this.
If the technology were developed enough and the launch system long enough, might passenger launches become possible? I'd imagined a circum-lunar launcher with a long, gentle acceleration and shaped to carry a vehicle off at a tangent.. Great interview!
Fascinating stuff indeed! Fantastic interview, Fraser! Thanks!!! 😃
Stay safe there with your family! 🖖😊
BTW, I'm absolutely skeptical about the superconductor "breakthrough", but at the same time I'm kinda crossing my fingers... And I'm not superstitious either.
There was no breakthrough. The material turned out not to be a superconductor.
Seriously? Come on man you can do better than that.
Go back 30 years and read the book The millennial project. The author posits putting the accelerator on Kilimanjaro, already halfway out of the atmosphere requiring much lower launch speed and energy. I believe Martin Savage was the author. It's very very well thought out and I believe it was published around 1985. There used to be clubs around the US that would gather and discuss these ideas. The book goes way beyond that in terms of colonizing the galaxy but the mass driver on Kilimanjaro was the most striking idea in my mind. And as for spin launch, hahaha.
I remember that book. I think he proposed putting blocks of ice on the back of the EM-launched spacecraft and then zapping them with lasers.
Lol, great content. But still "Why call it a quench motor? it reminds meof a sword quenched in water"
"Well....its coomplex"
26 mins later
"well, they run as hot super condutors, then we cool them"
THANK YOU! lol
Fascinating, excellent interview 😊
This is my favorite interview so far. Clear, and focussed on the engineering. Awesome! Question, what would be the theoretical limit in speed for such a system,in a vaccum?
The theoretical maximum speed isn't known. We estimate four to six kilometers per second are achievable. The essential problem becomes one of how fast you can switch the quench motor. The good news is that the two magnetic fields, one from the carrier sleeve (the armature that is pulled) and one from the stator (that does the pulling) engage with each other at the speed of light. There isn't any good news after that. ; ) We aren't publicly sharing particular design details at this point.
@@freeprint Thank you for this answer. In true scientific manner it only strenghtens my curiosity.
600000 miles per second
Fraser, now do a segment on the hydrogen launcher. Interview John Hunter at Greenlaunch about past efforts. You can launch to 8 km/sec with no superconductors, with a device so simple and cost effective, just concrete and steel, that it is remarkable more effort into it hasn't been deeply researched. This was worked on at LLL (SHARP program) during SDI, but dropped when SDI fell away. They got a ten lb projectile up to mach 9 before the money was cut.
I wish I was in the ‘room’. And this was before the room temperature room pressure superconductor announcement. So much new stuff in this conversation. Thanks Fraser.
the "room temperature room pressure superconductor" turned out to be false.
I've been imagining this project in this exact design( Electromagnetic propulsion in a vacuum tube as a method of space launch) for the past 15 years. It's amazing to see someone actually bringing it to life. I only wish I could share some of my ideas with the design team.
Really love your channel Fraser - fascinating interview and conversation!
Just started the video, can't wait to finish it. I was recently thinking about a future system for orbital installations. Using scaled-up versions of similar technologies, by constructing a cascade of "boost" rings that function as force amplifiers/multipliers for the spacecraft, you can enhance the effect of an orbital gravity sling shot, resulting in increased local velocities and enabling extended exploration of deep space. Less fuel burn overall.
NOPE. doesn't work that way. adding deltaV that way causes a reverse delta
V in the opposite direction. And that deltaV can only be nutralized by rockets.
The engineering of the superconductors is going to be challenging. The mechanical forces on the ceramic superconductor during the quench are going to be extreme.
Super exciting stuff!! Thanks for covering innovative solutions like this!
very cool...so many different exciting technologies being explored for space commercialization.
Note that their code showed pull only was the best method for mass driver construction. The goal is lunar materials launched to catchers for materials for building L5 colonies.
The one prime place to put a EM rail system, would be at Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. It is on the Equator. It raises 4,900 metres and is the highest mountain in Africa. To the east is Indian Ocean (splash down area). When it comes to ramping up on a power rail, this is probably the best place on Earth to launch anything. Sadly one needs to avoid quakes and eruptions, for it is a volcano. In another idea. Get the thing up to 1.5 Speed of Sound, and then turn on our Ram-Jet or Rocket-Motors, and leave the power sled behind.
Sounds like it essentially changes from a super conductor to a resistor when it warms up.
Amazing to think that the whole of humanity could become focused on space colonization within the next few decades.
Really good and interesting interview. David Dillon is a wealth of functional knowledge.
I am curious about the rate of reusability and efficiency of the a quench gun. When quenching the coils, presumably the magnetic field energy is converted to heat. That heat needs to be pumped out of the coils to get them to superconduct again in preparation for the next launch. How is the energy allocated between powering refrigeration equipment and charging the coils? How much of the total energy input is converted to kinetic energy? How long does it take to cool down a coil?
I can see the benefits, but have you also considered, payloads going to space don't just go straight up, but have to enter orbit, what is going to make it change direction to enter orbit, vacuum tubes 10+ kilometres long, can't remain straight, how will this be achieved? Good idea, but I doubt this is feasible.
Thanks for this one, Fraser.. I hope you'll consider bringing David Dillon back for a later interview to share progress being made on this project at some future date.
Oh, if it actually works... you bet. :-) There's got to be something better than rockets.
Very informative and interesting.
Thanks Fraser for the answer for my question. I'm just a layman who now a little bit about quenching ❤❤
Hah, me too. You could see I had no idea about this topic either.
This is very intriguing.
Alternate title: "Rocket and powerful magnetic launcher inadvertently destroyed by a technician who stands too close while holding a tablet".
Solid!
Top KEK!
Peace be with you.
I really like the idea of a 3 phase AC launcher. it has a series of coils that are all driven by a AC signal. Capacitors make each coil resonant. The spacing between coils would get farther as the projectile speeds up. There are limits to the spacing range so there would be different frequencies. The only problem is that super conductors don't like AC currents so this would have to use chilled copper. This would be for a lunar launcher for lots of small packages.
With any non-zero resistance circuit, any current change will introduce additional losses beyond purely resistive, and AC, being constant change, is no exception, not to mention poower factor losses.
Keep in mind that the resonating circuit will change its frequency when the payload passes through.
They have found superconducting graphene that is controlled by a small angle from 2 sheets of 2 dimensional graphene. It's also one thousand times more energy density than copper. It's 200 times stronger than steel and 10 times lighter than aluminum. Check it out. A simple Google search is all you need.
I have to listen it again. Can we consider the armature M. Dillon is talking about (12:20) as a stage 0 making the movement with the ship until the end of the rail gun? If Fraser you can return on that subject that would be awesome. A stage 0 making stuffs like at the Starbase, along the railgun. Thanks all.
Great questions Fraser
With a spacecraft accelerated before leaving the ground I think we should find a way to beam energy to the craft as it goes up towards space. Possibly this could be done with stations on the ground using narrow coherent energy beams that stay aimed at a receiving dish on the craft - sending it energy that is used to provide thrust using an inert propellant or some other way, And as the craft rises to space, satellites using solar energy could send energy to it the same way.
High Temperature Superconductors are ceramics. For high stress environments use the low temperature superconductors like NbTi. Fermilab used them in Tevatron II and they are currently being used in the LHC. NbTi is cooled to 1.9K using liquid Helium and can achieve 9-10 Tesla fields.
Those ceramics are a thin film deposited on a high-strength Hastelloy substrate and are handling high stress. 400 MPa tensile stress is no exception as design stress. Operation at 1.9 K is fine for a DC magnet but the cooling costs and cool down time would be prohibitive in this application.
fascinating, thank you
Great video ! Arthur C. Clarke B. Sc. wrote an artical for the Journal of the BIS in November 1950 titled "Electromagnetic Launching as a Major Contribution to Spaceflight" for on the moon ! And T.A.Heppenheimer wrote a paper in in 1977/1978 for the AIAA from a known location since July 19, 1976 (just East of the Apollo 11 landing site) to L2 ! ! ! Talked to a person who had a patent issued 1989 for an electromagnetic launcher for him and his uncle. At an open house saw a demo of a small scale launcher for use on earth or the moon. The design for the lunar launcher would be about 200 m long at 2000 gees. and reach L2 in about 2.97 days. The solar powered machine would launch twice an hour to L2. The mass of the launcher could be equaled in about nine months. Virgin Glalaric is doing a bunney hop for September the 8th in New Mexico ! R. Lipinski
that is T. Lipinski musr proof read more...
ahh yeah -- midnight star -- some of cleveland's finest funk --
Electricity
I got the power to energize
I got the power to magnetize
I'll fill you up with my energy
You'll be my toy, I'll be your electricity
You've got my head all wired up
It seems I never can get enough
My gears are running mighty hot
It feels so good, don't you ever stop
You never let me touch your lovely body
You make me hot and I wanna party
So won't you come a little closer to me
You'll be my toy, I'll be your electricity
(Electricity) Let me charge your battery, baby
(Electricity) Energize me
(Electricity) Use me
(Electricity) I'm your utility, baby
Well, come on, energize me
Could this be made into an engine or combined with an engine to increase exhaust velocity?
Top channel… great interviews 👍👍👍☕️
I imagine this could be combined with the spin launch idea to straighten out there launch trajectory and give an additional boost in velocity and not need a 5km vacuum tube
How much of an advantage would it be to overcome gravity by launching at altitude, like Denver, or higher, than what they do now at sea level?
Nope. such a thing requires changes in deltaV - and that change has to be compensated for somehow - and currently only rockets work.
Actually what you want to launch needs to include electronics and they could be damaged be the strong electromagnetic fields in the - let's say - rail gun. So instead it's probably to use ordinary gas pressure like in a light gas cannon. Then we run into a scaling problem, are limited to small payloads etc. Btw you need to shield against the heavy air resistance which burns your "projectile" down if you don't.
Luv it. Been waiting a long time.
Thanks Frazier for the video. It was a very informative conversation. It has increased my understanding of electromagnets magnetism.
Crap, I need to go to sleep but I don't want to miss one second of this video. Back to your playlist, I guess...
Pace yourself, I've got a 1000 videos.
Extremely informative video through its entirety. This is very exciting stuff and I can't wait to see how it will progress throughout the years. We're only that much closer to a mass relay from Mass effect
nothing like Mass effect.
I wonder if a room temperature superconductor finding would be useful for this. I mean, actually ambient air temp. Maybe it would weigh less and get us closer to 8 km/s. Thanks, Fraser!
Absolutely, it would be a total gamechanger.
A room temperature superconductor would help with literally anything and everything technology
If it's magnetic or uses electricity, a room temperature superconductor would make it better.
@@frasercain That LK-99 room temp superconductor has maybe been confirmed by independent researchers.
I saw someone confirm it for 100 K, but that's well below room temperature.
The kind of acceleration that would take place inside a electromagnetic "railgun" type tube would probably not be safe for humans, only inanimate objects. Otherwise I would imagine the acceleration inside the tube would peel the skin off our faces.
Yes, they did mention this briefly. He said the best uses would be raw matterials- rolls of metal sheeting, fuel, water, etc. Basically the higher the mass, the higher the volume, and the less squishy it is, the more this approach makes the most sense.
I can see small payloads under high acceleration launched to something closr to low earth orbit. The biggest challenge is storing enough energy and delivering the intense amounts of power needed to accelerate a significantly meaningful ammount of mass over a short enough launch facility to reach a low earth orbit.
im wondering if the "quenching" really is fast enough to prevent the "projectile" from getting pulled back. it doesnt really sound like something that can be done in milliseconds.
excellent interview...this is so important.
he also eludes to the issue with thermal nuc that nasa is pursuing. electricity is much better...
Thanks a lot, I'm glad you enjoyed it.
The problem with evacuated maglev sled tubes replacing first stages is exiting the tube, not just a breakaway cap which is a source of all kinds of chaos, hitting the atmosphere is even worse. It's a complete loss of directional control and structural integrity, along with heat and turbulence.
well, it is the heat and turbulence that causes the loss of structural integrity.
Wow this is very exciting!
I would be interested to see how this compares to spin launch... also is would a rotating space tethers replace a second stage?
The rail gun is always a cool subject. Making contact is just a supid. You need a space to protect the projectile. A layer of aluminum solves the issue, and it acts like highspeed railroad rail. It creates a layer. They knew this in 1965.
Is it a static pick up motor there using for this.
on a side note, you could put a person in a tank of liquid ie a launch chamber the liquids may cushion Excelleration and deceleration ie liquids become like solids under shock or use Oblak or make Oblak with olive oil and make a fluid that hardens via electric current ie corn flour and olive oil becomes solid when electricity is added
I made a coil accelerator in high school (at home for science fair) that launched a magnetized sewing needle about a foot into a 3/4 plywood back board. It used a 12 volt battery, a high voltage transformer coil and 200 feet of very fine magnet wire wrapped arround a tiny glass tube for a smooth launch. It was wildly impractical and over heated after the 3rd launch but it was a fun learning experience.
What a fantastic project!
Did you mean half a inch into 3/4 ply ?
@@petertaylor4758 yes from about 12 inches from the 3/4 plywood. Didn't win because "it could be a weapon" but I saw it as a prooff of concept.
@@gooberclese oh ok, I wasn't sure what you meant
Read Dr O'Neill space settlement. Grad students built one and did the sim code for mass drivers in the 70's.
Sadly, those are the proof-of-concept prototypes that revealed all the problems Dillon explores in this video!
It turned out that mass drivers are much more difficult to manufacture than anticipated, especially if you want to use them more than once before you have to rebuild them. (The US Navy managed at least six or seven firings of their railgun before it needed major refurbishment-I believe the actual number of rounds is classified? So I'm just passing along a guess- but their mass-driver approach wasn't feasible either, long term.)
Let's hope that Dillon and his team have come up with a solution with this "quench" accelerator idea!
A mass driver is not a rail gun. It is a series of electtomagnetic hoops using pull only to accelerate the bucket. There is no physical contact.
I noticed he said "pull, pull, pull"- and this is the main reason why most electric motors waste current and produce excessive heating. If he was to design these linear motors to both pull and push, the pushing phases would "self-quench" (invert or repel) the current, while simultaneously amplifying (or at least doubling) the total B field flux density which is applied to the forward momentum of the payload (because there is virtually no inductive time delay on the quench). This method would greatly reduce the actual current consumed by the stator coils, as well as greatly reducing the heating of the coils (because the electrons in the stator are decelerated by polar opposition to the magnetized rotor or capsule. This method greatly reduces the initial "start-up" current drain, while it would also help to use starting motor (or an initial push from a chemical explosive) so as to initiate the applied current on the push or "quench phase" of operation. Of course, this would require a permanently magnetized (or electromagnetic) capsule that would still need to be recovered by some means (if not sent to orbit with the payload); but ordinary, copper coils could be used effectively and repeatedly, and affordable means of cooling, such as liquid nitrogen could be used.
it still generates heat.
So on the NIMBY issue, is it louder than regular rocket launches? Cuz those are pretty loud....
yup.
For the Moon it should be great. On Earth though it may well be able to replace a first stage. High temperature super conductors should be able to help. (You said "low temperature" in the intro'). Liquid nitrogen temperature super conductors are not so big a problem now I understand.
Ground based energy helps to over come the limits of the rocket equation. So yeah any velocity you can put in by an electromagnetic launcher before you light the engines is good.
You'd have to stiffen the launch vehicle considerably, maybe too considerably.
Building just under a meter underground would give thermal properties, so at a depth for decent foundations, it can be built with potential use atop of it..perhaps under a road, as an example regardless of the particular viability
100% the right approach for space or moon launches. Too many issues with the thermal and physical shock of hitting our atmosphere, suddenly at Mach 10, let alone Mach 20. Hypersonic flight is far from a 'done thing' Its still very experimental and not fully understood. Yes re-entry vehicles do it but they are hitting very thin atmosphere at Mach 20 and slowing down gradually. Even if the launch tube could somehow be a mile tall, the air is still very thick. I guess you could build it in the Atacama Desert! Maybe something launching with a scramjet on it might work. Get it to a more modest launch speed and then accelerate it with the scramjet. At least you only need to carry some fuel and no oxidizer.
This is one of my childhood ideas.
Reminds me of the atom bomb rocket (50's ?) .. set 1 bomb off, it hits the pusher plate coupled by springs/shock absorbers ta da. Replace the bomb with a quench tube and voila, high efficiency propulsion. Might be fun to engineer/analyze wrt present rockets.
Jan Troska was writing about this in 1940’s. He wrote books published in Czech called Zápas s nebem (Fight with the sky). I read it as a child and has been wondering why that never got implemented.
People have tried. The problem is that the enormous forces tear the gun itself apart.
Looking like this option just became much more viable. ^.^
Spinlaunch uses an electromagnetic motor to spin and slowly add energy to its hybrid rockets and a weight to ballance it on the other side. At the point of release, it releases tgr hybrin rocket in one direction and a mass with identical angular momentum in the other direction. I wonder if energy can be recovered from that and delivered to the hybrid rocket throug a comparably short electromagnetic accelerator.
Pretty cool.
What about spin launching it first and then speeding it up with a coil gun?
good show very interesting guest.
"Accidental quench event" -does that mean electricity arcing out of the MRI magnet? Or an exothermic explosion? Both?
(And if this is disastrous for an MRI, how did the "quench" launcher work without destroying itself as its payload launches?)
generally explosions as the coolant is wildly execeeded in its capacity which is the cause of the explosion.
If the launcher is stretched to about 50 to 100 km, the g forces can reduced to human-rated levels. Target 4 km/sec and 6000-7000 meter elevation, and the launch vehicle is basically a second stage. The atmospheric heat load and max Q are tolerable.
Build it in Ecuador going east up the Andes mountains.
Not really. hitting the atmosphere is still like hitting a brick wall.
Surprisingly enough, that isn't the case. This is an area of engineering research that is fairly well understood and tested in specialized wind tunnels and evaluated in simulation with good numerical models. @@jessepollard7132
Not a bad thought. There are a couple of problems with longer. The first is economics although that may not be critical. Even though a ten times longer system would have (roughly) ten times higher up front capital costs, it turns out the critical cost is in the operating costs. (Like the railroads.) The greater problem might be that the launch tube really wants to be straight. Even a very slight curve is tough for package centering of the carrier sleeve in a non contact system. Maybe longer is V 2 !
This technology would work well with buoyant mega towers built somewhat like airships. They could use conventional electric lifts to get to the launch section. After separation from the launcher the orbital stage would have some kind of conventional rockets optimized for vacuum.
when an object is launched into orbit at 8km/s, its direction must be correct and still at 8km/s, it is not enough that its initial speed is 8km/s.
Hmmm say the projectile was magnetized to one polarity then magnetize the rails to the same polarity, perhaps with microscopic clearances... worth a try?
Sir did you consider termoacustic cooking?
How clever are you to be so en point with the superconductor thing right now, I bet you wish you'd had this talk this week. I think there may have been different musings ;-)
I actually reached out to him about this. He said his team is looking at it, but they're skeptical. We'll see how it all plays out.
@frasercain if it gets any where near reality and the odds appear favourable. I'd love a ensemble cast episode with all your guests opining how it could help their projects. Just some spit balling for an optimistic future
I asked you about this several years ago.
Quenching also refers to dissipating the charge on a photoconductor by exposing it to controlled light.
I accidentally made an electric gun in electrical shop in Jr High. I coiled lots of wire around a hollow wood core. Dropped a screw with the head cut off in it when I plugged it in. It got sucked in, left a big dent in the wood base. It bounced out, luckily missed my head. We never found the bolt.
29:40 i had been thinking much the same for half the interview - imagine an interstellar voyage (generation ship?) where firing mined asteroid/s back to Earth is your reaction mass.
you still have to find or keep asteroids to slow down. you aren't changing the problem, just different means of gaining delta V.
In the future the boring company may be able to drill up through Mount Chimborazo in Ecuador.
Which is the Most Ideal place for this as the Highest point near the Equator by far ( actually about 12 miles further from Earth's center than Mount Everest due to the equatorial bulge)
This gives a 14 mile headstart on a LEOrbit journey of 1200 miles. The typical first stage of a rocket goes only 40 miles high so one might need to have an explosive charge shoot the rocket from a launch casing howitzer to reach the 40 mile equivalent of a first stage. Then a starship type rocket takes it the other 1160 miles. But I think one could eliminate the entire first stage with all that fuel burning.
With the possibility of higher temperature and cheaper superconductors and modular nuclear fission or possibly fusion plants in the future. This could really get a lot of mass to orbit very cheaply ( like water, fuel, food, and metals or structural building supplies )
The number two ideal site is Mount Killamanjero in Africa or a 3rd possibility is in Borneo.
I really hope that some Billionaires decide to fund more work on this effort.
Good thought. I would love to talk with folks at The Boring Company about this.
I remember spending several years in my school years trying to figure out where in the world you could place a roughly 10-mile-long rail launcher, the roughly best location I could find was launching up over the Western Sahara, low population density, nearish the equator, there is a mountain to build along and the climate is dry. Beyond that, maybe the island of new guinea? Could also be a few other small islands that have suitable mountain terrain and big enough. but regardless finding a good launch location that also has a suitable mountain side is pretty difficult.
I've heard Mt Kilimanjaro as a suggestion .
@@frasercain that could work though mt kilimanjaro is a popular destination as well as there are a few local population centers that would make it complicated
Hmmm. Normally when a superconductor quenches, there is a huge release of magnetic energy that will quickly turn into heat if it isn't used to do work...
You would have to time this so the magnetic energy would be absorbed by the projectile as it passes. If you don't, it goes boom.
That would be a very hard system to time correctly.
Cool thought problem.
try mixing the spin launch systems with a railgun finisher , this would also work with hand held guns
One word: "SPIN LAUNCH" Newton proved, You can not just "throw" an object into space no matter how much energy you have. The object has to be self propelled. You can only assist the launch to save on onboard fuel. Not on earth, Not on the moon