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Still More on Space Elevators
parseexception writes "The NYTimes is reporting
Not Science Fiction: An Elevator to Space. Not a whole lot of technical detail but good read. It is interesting to see alternatives to current space technologies being explored."
Not Science Fiction: An Elevator to Space
meh.
Clarke's Fountains of Paradise is a wonderful book. It presents the basic physical problems of a space elevator and some ways to solve them (and it has a great plot too).
Right now, as Clarke envisioned, carbon nanotubes are the only engineering material that could be used to make this elevator. The basic technological question is whether we will ever be able to make cheap and long nanotubes. Despite the enthusiasm for a space elevator in the NYT article, we really have no idea how to do that. And any cost estimates like "$6 billion" are very immature without that kind of detail.
Once we have a number of people going into space, and it builds a travel industry around it, suddenly we will see lots of innovations like the space elevator, etc. become not only practical but quite cheap. If only the government used computers, computers would cost a fortune, but since there is such competition, we have computers that sell for $300 or less now. If that same concept is applied to space travel, there WILL be competition, and there WILL be new better, cheaper ways to get up there, which may or may not involve the space elevator.
My theory has always been that once we have a hotel on the moon, due to it's gravity, people will not have as much of a hard time adapting to it for their vacation, more hotels will open up in competition. Initially, a lot of money would be spent setting up, but the costs of everything would continue to go down. Before we knew it, we would have faster propulsion technologies, better gravity-like technology, and we would be off to Mars for our next resort, resulting in even better competition for innovation.
space elevator
Hasn't the confectionery industry already done this? I hope these NASA folks know to watch out for Vermicious Knids.
I've put in a request... hopefully our headlines will be added as a slashbox here soon.
Not one thing.
the most mysterious thing you'll see today
"If the elevator gets stuck, do not become alarmed. There is little danger of the elevator running out of air. Then again...."
In addition to the other MAJOR engineering challenges that this project would require, how will the satellite at the other end of the elevator stay in place? I understand that if it has the proper mass and is at the proper altitude it will orbit directly above the base station - but what happens when you deliver a 13-ton payload there? Won't all that additional weight cause the satellite to swing forward?
every stain tells a story
to be the first to stand in that elevator...and press all the buttons so that the next guy will have to stop at every port before the 60,000 mile trip is over. hehehe cb
Remember, licking doorknobs is illegal on other planets.
So how does escape velocity play into this? If we can leave the earth without reaching an escape velocity then (on a very theoretical level) could we ride a space elevator out of the event horizon of a black hole? I realize there's a million other reasons why we couldn't get near a black hole, hawking radiation, strong gravity would rip us apart, etc. But you could also apply this argument to other things, like going into Jupiters' upper atmosphere which has bucko gravity. I was taught escape velocity was unavoidable to get out of a gravity hole.
-Steve
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