New answers tagged materials
2
votes
Is speed of a ship limited by its propellers or the engine
It sounds like you are going several different ways here.
The above (excellent) answers seem to be speaking to non-fiction
physics, which is what the first part of your questions seems to
ask.
The ...
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5
votes
Is speed of a ship limited by its propellers or the engine
I think this is an interesting question because the size of the ship would cause all sorts of issues logistically, how you would support it, crew it and support it. How deep the water would need to be,...
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32
votes
Is speed of a ship limited by its propellers or the engine
You should read up on a concept called "hull speed".
For a vessel with a displacement hull (that is, anything that doesn't use dynamic force of motion through water to lift part of the hull ...
- 36.3k
12
votes
Is speed of a ship limited by its propellers or the engine
Both. For best efficiency, the screw must be designed to fit the speed and power of the engine and the shape of the hull. Overly fast propeller rotation can lead to cavitation, which was a problem ...
- 97.3k
6
votes
Accepted
Impact of Cheap Synthetic Diamonds
The material you want is not actually diamond, which is hard but brittle. You want ALON (Aluminium oxynitride). ALON is 85% as hard as sapphire and can stop armor piercing bullets without shattering....
- 1,049
2
votes
Accepted
Ballistic properties of unobtainium
Here's a few alternative calculations:
You will have problems when the speed of sound is insufficient to carry the information of the impact far enough to dissipate said impact before the material is ...
- 532
0
votes
Aluminum in a renaissance era civilization
Aluminum did exist and was produced in small quantities before electricity. There is a small pyramid of Aluminum at the top of the Washington monument in DC. It was considered a more rare and valuable ...
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0
votes
Aluminum in a renaissance era civilization
Start with native aluminum.
Most solutions involve Renaissance with electricity, which isn't going to feel authentic. But native aluminum does exist, in small quantities in unusual places. The ...
- 18.8k
0
votes
Aluminum in a renaissance era civilization
Others have done a good job answering the electrical question, I will address the second: what uses would a civilization without electricity have for aluminum?
The answer is going to be along the same ...
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2
votes
Aluminum in a renaissance era civilization
Very difficult. Aluminium oxide is very stable and inert and it was extremely expensive until electrolysis.
Historically, it was produced using sodium metal...but that's normally produced using ...
- 2,718
6
votes
Aluminum in a renaissance era civilization
It is pretty well known that all the primary production methods for producing aluminum use electrolysis. It also an energy intensive process - so researchers periodically look around for other ways to ...
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8
votes
Accepted
Aluminum in a renaissance era civilization
How could a civilization that has not discovered electricity yet reliably mass produce aluminum and what uses would such a civilization have for it?
I will only address the first part of the question.
...
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1
vote
Ballistic properties of unobtainium
Okay, it seems to me we can reason roughly as follows.
Take the case of a 1 m object impacting at 100 km/s (around the high end of expected natural impact speeds, assuming an object coming from ...
- 4,398
2
votes
Ballistic properties of unobtainium
Boom.
The biggest problem I see with your paraneutronium is that it has no repulsive force. Neutron is stuck to neutron somehow, every femtometer. If a piece of matter hits it, the electrons sail ...
- 18.8k
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