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May 28, 2021 at 18:56 comment added John Dvorak @Harabeck or at the very least, generate a viral video, a worthwhile history lesson, and at least one meme template.
May 25, 2021 at 20:29 comment added Harabeck I mean, there's a lot of debate over how practical it will end up being, but they're bound to learn something by trying.
May 25, 2021 at 20:18 history edited The Square-Cube Law CC BY-SA 4.0
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May 25, 2021 at 20:15 comment added The Square-Cube Law @Harabeck holy macaroni, I gotta send them my résumé!
May 25, 2021 at 20:10 comment added Harabeck SpinLaunch is a real company trying to do something close to this conceptually.
May 24, 2021 at 19:08 comment added TLW Alas, this requires Unobtainium for the spinner :-(
May 24, 2021 at 12:04 comment added John Dvorak One option would be for the launcher to have the accelerator loop enclosed except at one point. If you mistime the release, you'll grind some rails, but at least you'll launch in the correct direction. Now, dealing with the heat inevitably generated by two surfaces sliding against each other at 8 km/s is a job for the engineers.
May 24, 2021 at 11:32 history edited The Square-Cube Law CC BY-SA 4.0
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May 24, 2021 at 11:24 comment added Joe Bloggs @JohnDvorak: The release timing better be femtosecond perfect! Yet another job for the engineers though, amirite?
May 24, 2021 at 8:13 history edited The Square-Cube Law CC BY-SA 4.0
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May 24, 2021 at 8:07 comment added John Dvorak @JoeBloggs if you launch the payload at twice the orbital velocity, the launcher won't deorbit, only change inclination by 180 degrees. Making it function more than once is a problem for the engineers.
May 24, 2021 at 7:28 comment added Joe Bloggs Additional problems arise from the conservation of momentum (both linear and angular): Your vessel will be flung into the void with some spin they will have to correct (gets worse as the launcher gets smaller), and the launcher will also be flung backwards. Unless it either weighs significantly more than the payload or simultaneously releases an equal payload in the opposite direction you’ll end up flinging your launcher out of orbit too.
May 24, 2021 at 6:41 comment added jdunlop @TheSquare-CubeLaw - at eighteen million gees, it's less "liquefying" and more "compressed to a laminate only a few molecules thick".
May 24, 2021 at 3:52 history edited The Square-Cube Law CC BY-SA 4.0
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May 24, 2021 at 3:51 comment added The Square-Cube Law @bmf well, you can't make an omelet without liquefying a few astronauts.
May 24, 2021 at 3:48 comment added BMF A 100 meter radius cylinder spinning with an angular speed of 42 km/s experiences a centrifugal acceleration of almost 18 million gees. Wow!
May 24, 2021 at 3:43 comment added BMF This reminds me of a world building project I did a long time ago. A group needed to reach a certain star system before another--beat them to the punch. They instructed autonomous assemblers to garner and refine space resources to build a thousand-kilometer-long guass gun delivery system. A gun that shoots a backwards gun that shoots the payload. A series of telescoping coilguns that accelerate the next series onward into high fractions of light-speed, and then back down again to a relative stop at the destination.
May 24, 2021 at 3:37 history edited The Square-Cube Law CC BY-SA 4.0
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May 24, 2021 at 3:26 history answered The Square-Cube Law CC BY-SA 4.0