...100 MW of Space Solar Power ...per single launch!
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From: Greg D. Moore (Strider) on 16 Dec 2009 17:11 <jimp(a)specsol.spam.sux.com> wrote in message news:fqrnv6-6so.ln1(a)mail.specsol.com... > > For existing things there is the concept of minimum enroute altitude > which ensures you are above all the obstacles for a significant distance. > > There is no getting above an energy beam from space. > And yet people still fly into the ground or buildings. Again, it's the pilot's fault. Not the build, ground or beam. -- Greg Moore Ask me about lily, an RPI based CMC.
From: jimp on 16 Dec 2009 17:21 In sci.physics Rick Jones <rick.jones(a)hp.com> wrote: > In sci.space.history jimp(a)specsol.spam.sux.com wrote: >> In sci.physics Rick Jones <rick.jones(a)hp.com> wrote: >> > Sure, the pilot might be thinking he is high enough to clear the >> > "buildings" but he is supposed to have checked-out his flight path >> > and have up-to-date charts and all that correct? > >> For existing things there is the concept of minimum enroute altitude >> which ensures you are above all the obstacles for a significant >> distance. > >> There is no getting above an energy beam from space. > > In which case, one presumes a flight path that went withing some > chosen distance of these beams would have a minimum enroute altitude > of GEO expressed in whatever the customary units would be right? Yeah, sure... -- Jim Pennino Remove .spam.sux to reply.
From: jimp on 16 Dec 2009 17:25 In sci.physics "Greg D. Moore \(Strider\)" <mooregr_delet3th1s(a)greenms.com> wrote: > <jimp(a)specsol.spam.sux.com> wrote in message > news:fqrnv6-6so.ln1(a)mail.specsol.com... >> >> For existing things there is the concept of minimum enroute altitude >> which ensures you are above all the obstacles for a significant distance. >> >> There is no getting above an energy beam from space. >> > > And yet people still fly into the ground or buildings. Again, it's the > pilot's fault. Not the build, ground or beam. Apples and oranges. How do you avoid something that is invisible to all existing aviation sensors? While flying VFR, obstacles are avoided by eyesight and altitude, neither of which will work with an energy beam from space. -- Jim Pennino Remove .spam.sux to reply.
From: Pat Flannery on 16 Dec 2009 19:42 Peter Fairbrother wrote: > > > There is another, not obvious, advantage in building such a > high-capacity launch system (almost certainly it would be a TSTO with a > winged reusable first stage) - the lower the cost per pound of launch, > the cheaper the hardware gets. When these systems were first proposed in the 1970s-80s the favored launch system was a massive single or two-stage-to-orbit vehicle that did a vertical takeoff and landing. One design used no less than twenty F-1 engines, all firing during ascent, and six firing for landing. Building a horizontal takeoff and landing or vertical take-off/horizontal landing first stage for the size payload required to make it economical would be daunting, as it would probably dwarf a C-5B Galaxy as far as size and weight went. Also, since most booster designs that use this design philosophy try to get up to around Mach 6-7 before they release the orbital stage, you are going to have a huge square-foot area of thermal protection materials that will need going over after every flight to check them for damage, and that's a real pain in the rear with even the far smaller Shuttle as far as man-hours go. The fewer flights you need to get all of the materials for the SPS into LEO (it can be moved slowly out to GEO via ion engines once assembled, and building it in LEO really cuts back on assembly crew launch costs, as well as removing the radiation threat to the assembly crew from solar storms) the better from a economic viewpoint, and if you want to go that route, you may want to consider building huge low-cost expendable boosters around the size of the Sea Dragon concept, and get everything up there with just a few launches: http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/searagon.htm Although clunky as hell from a engineering viewpoint, this might end up costing less in the long run than a reusable system if the Shuttle is anything to go by. Also, maybe the expendable upper stage can be used for something once it's in orbit, like the proposals to use the Shuttle ET as a cheap space station module. Pat
From: Pat Flannery on 16 Dec 2009 19:54
jimp(a)specsol.spam.sux.com wrote: > > Buildings are visible and don't extend from the surface all the way through > the atmosphere. That's what you have GPS collision avoidance systems for. When the GPS display panel in the aircraft catches fire, it means you have accidentally wandered into the microwave beam. ;-) Pat |