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Old 21st August 2007, 09:46 PM   #21
Cynic
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Default Re: I'm new and learning. My WIP.

My weekend is coming up soon. I spent a bit of the past few days trying to conceptualize a sublight propulsion system for my game.

Chemical, aka solid fuel, is out because it's ineffecient. You have to burn tons of it just to get into sapce. However, from my physics studies, I remember them basing rockets on the concept of momentum, p = m*v, leading me to think, what would make an ideal momentum replacement for a solid fuel system...what produces a massive amount of force on a small amount of matter...rail guns.

The idea is that a projectile is propelled via an electrostatic system, rather than expanding gas, so you can get a mass moving at much higher velocities.

A bit of research turned up coil and gauss guns, so I now started looking at a solenoids, superconductors, the Meissner effect, etc.

Hmmm...If I can model gauss or coil drives, so cooool...
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Old 21st August 2007, 11:17 PM   #22
Wiggles
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Default Re: I'm new and learning. My WIP.

good luck, in order to make something like that to move that much mass, would require something huge. That's why we don't use them. At least last time I heard

One thing you can look into are scramjets.
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Old 22nd August 2007, 01:26 AM   #23
Cynic
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Default Re: I'm new and learning. My WIP.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Wiggles View Post
good luck, in order to make something like that to move that much mass, would require something huge. That's why we don't use them. At least last time I heard

One thing you can look into are scramjets.
Well, going by the basic math of physics (for now):

p=mv (momentum = mass * velocity)

It takes one Newton of force to accelerate one kg mass one meter/second^2.

Now, if we have a 97,000 metric ton ship, we want to produce 1g of acceleration, requires:

97000mt*1000kg/mt = 97,000,000kgs

97,000,000kg * 9.6m/s^2 = 931,200,000N

That's alot, granted. Assuming eight engines:

931,200,000N / 8 engines = 116,400,000N/engine.

Now, if each engine moved 10kg/second, that means:

116,400,000N = 10kg * a
116,400,000N/10kg = 11,640,000 m/s^2.

The speed of light in a vacumn is c or 299,792,458m/s.

Still alot, but keep in mind, it's no more silly than the impulse drive of Star Trek. By the law of conservation of momentum, each engine is moving 10kg mass at approx 4% of the speed of light to produce 1g of acceleration for a 97,000metric ton vessel.

Also, keep in mind, that the premise of the game is something futuristic. So, you can't compare current tech. I did readup on magnetic saturation and fall off, so I've got some work ahead of me, but I suspect I'm still going to have to fudge some realities (not nearly as bad as Star Wars or Star Trek though).

However, the one piece I don't have is a magnetic field. I'm not ready to start modeling this yet, but I'll need to before the end of this year.

Last edited by Cynic; 22nd August 2007 at 10:18 AM.
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