7
votes
Accepted
How would a multipurpose railgun work
Sabot
In modern weapons, when you want to fire something that doesn’t perfectly match your barrel size, you can use a sabot.
It is a supportive device that lets you fire differently shaped items down ...
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4
votes
How would a multipurpose railgun work
You just need to encase the desired type of projectile into a sabot that fits the railgun "tube", so that the railgun can propel the sabot with its content.
Once it is flying outside of it, ...
- 263k
4
votes
Accepted
Why would a sublight Alcubierre drive be more useful for braking than for propulsion?
Like you noted in the question, deceleration is acceleration. The only difference is your preferred frame of reference. With that said, to get what you're wanting the only solution I can see is ...
- 4,999
3
votes
Why would a sublight Alcubierre drive be more useful for braking than for propulsion?
It's not that they couldn't be used for acceleration, it's just that they require a lot of fuel. So, if they were used for acceleration the ship would have to accelerate the entire mass of fuel ...
- 478
3
votes
Accepted
Interception of missiles in space combat
Edit: added a simulator for missile interception.
So.
Missile is moving towards you at speed $v_M$.
You have a weapon (laser or particle beam) that can shoot out an attack at speed $v_a$. $v_a$ is ...
- 4,341
3
votes
Accepted
How fast can a cylinder spin, with a human on its inner wall, to NOT experience motion sickness?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_gravity: It is generally believed that at 2 rotations per minute or less, no adverse effects from the Coriolis forces will occur, although humans have been ...
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2
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I have an unlimited supply of antimatter -- how do I actually make my spaceship go?
Antimatter Reactions
Mixing matter and antimatter gets you some energy, some charged particles, and some neutral particles. The energy is in the form of high-energy gamma rays which radiate with ...
- 4,999
2
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Interception of missiles in space combat
Frame Challenge
Based on my comments and discussion with BMF - I don't think that Lasers for long range point defence are a good option.
Now, I'm assuming for the moment that the type of Missile we ...
- 6,950
2
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Interception of missiles in space combat
You can add uncertainties like perpendicular vectors. If your thrown rock has a standard deviation of 3m, and your target position has a standard deviation of 4m, then the total accuracy from the two ...
- 1,560
1
vote
How fast can a cylinder spin, with a human on its inner wall, to NOT experience motion sickness?
As of 2007, NASA refers to anything under 3rpm (section 3.2) as "low rotation rates". The limit isn't a hard one, as our vestibular systems aren't standardized, so it's common to add in some ...
- 10.1k
1
vote
Why would a sublight Alcubierre drive be more useful for braking than for propulsion?
The ship doesn't actually carry everything needed to form the warp bubble. The equipment on the ship anchors one to the ship once formed, but forming one requires part of the structure to moving past ...
- 3,918
1
vote
I have an unlimited supply of antimatter -- how do I actually make my spaceship go?
Antimatter-annihilation gamma ray laser relativistic photon rocket. Or, the Winterblaster.
The 'Winterblaster', proposed by theoretical physicist F. Winterberg, is a type of photon rocket powered ...
- 1,650
1
vote
I have an unlimited supply of antimatter -- how do I actually make my spaceship go?
Hydrogen Funnel
also called a Bussard Ramjet. Larry Niven invented it. So you know it's good. Your spaceship travels by filling itself up with hydrogen and opening the back door.
Then someone with an ...
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1
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How would a multipurpose railgun work
A railgun doesn't needs a barrel like the gas driven guns.
You can attach a rail just outside the spaceship. As projectiles you can just put containers any size onto this rail. You just have to ...
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