h a l f b a k e r yTrying to contain nuts.
add, search, annotate, link, view, overview, recent, by name, best, random
news, help, about, links, report a problem
browse anonymously,
or get an account
and write.
register,
|
|
|
Have they sent Mir crashing into the atmosphere yet? Well I wish they wouldn't. They should salvage it. Not for reuse, but for valuable space scrap metal. Same with all those dead satelites, booster rockets, and other space debris. Someone should collect it all and form an orbiting space scrap heap.
Or at least send it crashing down on the moon in a designated lunar dump area. There may be a time in the near future when we'll wish we had several thousand tons of scrap metal up in space.
Advanced Propulsion Concepts
http://sec353.jpl.nasa.gov/apc/
A veritable Halfbakery of wacky propulsion concepts. [egnor, Dec 15 2000]
[link]
|
| |
There's a difference between "space" and low earth orbit, where most "space trash" is. To boost trash free of Earth's gravitational influence, or even to the moon, is an expensive proposition. Most space junk consists of small bits like paint flakes and bolts, so it's not even practical. I agree it's a waste of potential energy, though. |
|
| |
Solar mirrors powering big electromagnets could collect at least some of the junk...and rather than just let it burn up, salvaging it for later use is a good idea. Wouldn't need to land it anywhere, just get it into a stable orbit. At least some of the dead satellites would have even a little fuel left, and it could be used to help... |
|
| |
And being able to reduce the possibility of damage to spacecraft would be a big help as well. The Shuttle windows have to be replaced fairly frequently becuase those paint flakes beat the hell out of them... |
|
| |
One of the problems with doing stuff in space is that accelerating requires both energy and mass. Things like solar cells can provide power essentially forever, but can't be used forever for providing accelleration power since the only way for a space craft to accellerate is to throw out mass. |
|
| |
I wonder if space junk could be useful as something to push against? |
|
| |
You can get away with throwing less mass for acceleration if you throw it faster. How big would your solar array need to be to power a cyclotron? (Yeah I know, ion drives are Baked. I'm just armchair engineering here.) How much matter could a decent-sized cyclotron throw out, and how fast would the particles be moving--say, with a c-tron 2 meters in diameter? |
|
| |
egnor: What I'm thinking is the precursor of the synchrotron--the particle spirals in the magnetic field until it reaches the outside of the cyclotron and exits. I don't any books with me, but as I recall this is simpler than a synchrotron and even possible without supercooling(?--not sure). |
|
| |
Am I keeping cyclotron/synchrotron straight here? |
|
| |
I'll see if (later) I can come up with some sort of ballpark figures for what might be a reasonable ejection speed for particles and the resulting kinetic energy given a fairly simple accelerator. |
|
| |
[Oh, wait: cheap dictionary. 1 to 10 MeV.] |
|
| |
A lot of the space junk is paint chips and other useless stuff. Powder that and charge it and use it to feed the electric jet. |
|
| |
Any way you can collect the potential energy of all that stuff up there? One ton of stuff comes down and a ton of working brand new satellite gets up. |
|
| |