[Moontanman]

CraigD, on 08 August 2011 - 08:45 PM, said:

Quote

Moontanman, on 05 August 2011 - 03:59 PM, said:
One type of mag sail would increase in size as it ventered further from the sun thus keeping it's acceleration potential more constant.

Mini-magnetospheric plasma propulsion

Pretty cool, even the math-pun acronym M2P2, but by the ionized gas sprayed into space to make the “mini magnetosphere” that allows a larger magnetic field to be generated is predicted to “leak” from the confinement of the magnetic field induced by the current through it, escaping into space, so like a rocket, it’d eventually runs out of stored mass. Its “effective specific impulse”, however, is predicted to be high – about 200000 m/s, about 6.5 times that of Dawn’s xenon ion thrusters’s actual specific impulse of 30400 m/s, but still, when it runs out of plasma, it’ll stop working.

Yes it would stop working but if it was used to travel around inside the solar system it could be refueled, such a system could be used to move a toriodal type space craft around the solar system or slowly move a colony type craft around as it visits various bodies to harvest resources for it's own use. If you wanted to use it for interstellar flight it would have to be a long term generational ship but no one says you would have to use all your propellant to accelerate, hold some back to decelerate at your destination. We are not talking about a large fraction of c here or a gigantic amount of propellant.

[sigurdV]

SextonBlake, on 08 August 2011 - 02:36 AM, said:

Solar cells would get the high initial speed. When they were of little use (somewhere past Mars), they could be discarded and another form of propulsion used.

Can we focus and export Concentrated Sun Light into the Asteroid belt,Kuiper Belt and Oort Cloud?
Starting with parabolic mirrors as close to the sun as possible, sending rays further out via Relay Mirrors?

Can Sun Light be exported all the way to the next solar system,
making "cheap high speed interstellar travel" possible? If so we might also have a good Defensive Weapon...

[sigurdV]

Moontanman, on 16 August 2011 - 03:13 PM, said:

Yes it would stop working but if it was used to travel around inside the solar system it could be refueled, such a system could be used to move a toriodal type space craft around the solar system or slowly move a colony type craft around as it visits various bodies to harvest resources for it's own use. If you wanted to use it for interstellar flight it would have to be a long term generational ship but no one says you would have to use all your propellant to accelerate, hold some back to decelerate at your destination. We are not talking about a large fraction of c here or a gigantic amount of propellant.

The words we use can limit our thinking...
I stopped using the term "Space Ship" i think "Space City" instead