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Future of Maglev in the US Military
The Hippy of Death writes "An article at The Weekly Standard discusses the current maglev research being funded by the US military. From the article: 'But what if you could drastically reduce the amount of noise a ship makes directly at the source? ...Vibration & Sound Solutions Limited suggested placing mag-lev sensors at the source of the electromagnetic fields, such as motors. The idea was to actually levitate the machinery with an array of electromagnets while using a small amount of power.'"
I'm no mechanical engineer (rather obviously) but wouldn't this be useful in reducing friction and alleviating part of the need for complex bearings and lube mechanisms?
What happens when the power dies and all of those sitting in seats fall on their asses?
As an engineer and scientist I oftentimes find myself excited about whatever technologies the military is funding. No, I'm not a proponent of destructive technologies -- even though military advancements oftentimes contribute to destruction (a topic for another conversation). But, what really excites me is the benefit to humanity that stems from such research.
While applying magnetic levitation technologies to engines is a rather roundabout solution, the research will improve humanities knowledge of such technologies in general, potentially expediting the timeframe in which you and I can reap the benefits. Who knows what the future will be? Perhaps we will see MagLev public transportation soon? Or perhaps air travel will be much quieter (now that would be enjoyable)... nevertheless research into the field is necessary.
One interesting note is that MagLev technologies are NOT that difficult to implement. It's really just a control system of an electromagnetic field. OK, so it is difficult, but its nothing new. What advancements we really NEED have to do with:
1.) Efficiency. Superconductivity will reduce the overall power / energy demands of the system.
2.) Reliability. What happens when the power goes out? Does the train / engine / whatever just fall to the ground? This is a BIG consideration.
3.) Safety. Does exposure to such large EM fields cause cancer?
4.) etc.
Despite all of the these concerns I am REALLY excited that this type of research is getting funding... at the very least it is a very practical application!
Well, thats enough for now.
Matthew Wong
http://www.themindofmatthew.com
The submitter didn't even get to the second page.
This technology was originally designed to dampen mechanical vibration in ships like the submitter said, but the Navy wasn't interested (probably because while that would be useful in a cold war, it's not too helpful in the war on terror).
What they're doing now, is using to cushion seats. The article claims some of the speedier boats they use to put marines ashore can pull 8Gs hopping over waves. So they use this technology along with wave height sensors and a fast processor to reduce it to 2-3Gs. Although this sounds new, it's basically the same technique as those active noise cancellation headphones only for lower frequencies and higher amplitudes.
Then the company is trying to expand by putting this into other vehicles like humvees and helicopters. (why in a helicopter?)
The problem of using Maglev on the motors is that the torque that is generated. It isn't as simple as lifting the weight of several tonnes but also apply the rotational torque as well (normally this is less that the wieght of the motor for conventional drives but high power units with hydrogen gas cooling [best thermal conductivity] could increase this force to multiples of the static wieght).
In the ocean there are two types of vessels. Submarines and targets.
Too lazy to create a sig...
Ever hear of a place called China?
There's a reason they've been working on extending the range of their nukes, and it's not so they can hit farther into Canada. . . .
When things get complex, multiply by the complex conjugate.
No need. There was no need to spend a jillion dollars on star wars either. The military is the last bastion of spending money like it's going of style. The sheeple are easy to scare and become compliant when you present a boogieman for them. Ruskies, chinks, gooks, a-fucking-rabs, they are all out to get us donchaknow. They hate us because we are free and good and nice and rich. Please don't ask about that black budget or the military budget, or all the private contractors that we hire out to kill the bastards.
evil is as evil does
How about hand to hand combat .. tried it lately.. or just calling your self brave by killing people who have nothing to do with anything with missile (who is the terrorist).
Launching a cruise missile instead of challenging people to hand to hand combat isn't brave. It is smart.
As far as the size of the US military goes, the US military is what stood between the USSR and the rest of the world for half a centaury. The sacrifices that the American people made to keep the USSR where it was and hold the line against such a juggernaut seems to have been quickly forgotten. The US put itself directly in the way of the USSR. As the Cuban missile crises showed, the US was more then willing to risk complete annihilation in a fight to keep the USSR at bay.
Now, I am not claiming that US isn't a big ugly leviathan that makes nations fall apart when it sneezes wrong. I am not arguing that in its pursuit to keep the USSR at bay that innocent people were not hurt, nor that the US has not committed its share of evils in the name of a greater good. Anyone who tries to paint the actions of the largest economy and military in the world in terms of pure right and wrong is deluding themselves. The US is and always has been run by humans, flawed creatures as they are. I have no doubt that if it could all be done over again there are things that we would never do again because the turned out to cause so much human suffering.
My point is that despite its mistakes, the US was there for the rest of the world with its big ugly and unwieldy military. That big ugly military that slaughtered innocent people in Vietnam also bought millions of people time to escape Vietnam (many of them to the US) before it descended into the hell hole that it became. The US military was there to repulse North Korea from South Korea and held the line even after a million Chinese came pouring over the border. South Korea is happy little fairytale land that it is today and not the seventh level of hell that North Korea is because the US military was there. The threat of the US military is what kept the USSR from making West Germany and France look like East Germany and Poland.
My point? Yeah yeah, the US military is big and deadly. Where ever it goes and whatever it does people die. That said, it stood as a shield for half a centaury against far more malevolent forces and saved the lives of countless hundreds of millions. Maybe in this new centaury it has worn out its usefulness. Maybe all of the challengers have been beaten and the US can set down the shield and sword and get on with more productive things.
Then again, I bet at the very least the people of Taiwan sleep a little bit better at night knowing that US military leviathan is still lumbering around.
I know fools like you typically fail at math and logic and also rarely have a firm grasp on reality. Analyzing the actual dollars spent is worthless. What's important is $ per capita and as a percentage of a countries total GDP.
i g_percap
o rder/2034rank.html
Measured as $ per capita the US is #3 (behind Israel and Singapore):
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/mil_exp_dol_f
Measured as a percentage of GDP the US is #36:
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/rank
Random countries that spend more (as a % of the GDP): Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey, Singapore, China, Greece, Chile, Egypt
US Defense spending as percent of GDP from 1940-2000.
But I'm sure whatever you've learned in school (in whatever country you're from) doesn't cover these sort of things. Your ignorant leftist teachers just point out the the US is evil because it spends more money than other countries, as if that has a thread of logic to it.
You're a fool.
War has solved some of the greatest problems in history. War is the biggest motivational force in innovation.
War is a tragic thing, but don't you dare let me hear you say it isn't useful.
"The blood of the people is the grease of the system." The more grease the system has, the more it produces; as long as the greasing is limited (limited warfare). War has solved some of the greatest problems ever conceived. As long as the relatively poor & uneducated continue to be at the front lines, the educated will have funding (biggest motivator) and purpose to overcome extremely difficult problems. War won't ever be right, but we wouldn't be where we are today without it.
It's time we started working towards peace rather than war.
Nice idea, but someone's gotta play with all that shiny new machinery from Lockheed Martin.
When I was in school, I had an aerodynamics prof that was trying to make a point about the serious mechanical and material issues that helicopters have because of vibration. It's a real problem, and this system would help a lot, even if a crash landing isn't involved (as TFA mentions).
However, since his exact words were "Helicopters are flying vibrators", the point was largely lost on us at the time, and it took several minutes for the lecture hall to calm down enough for him to continue...
We can believe in you for 3 minutes, but beyond that, even the King of All Cosmos can't be expected to wait.
They're useful in situations where lubrication is difficult or the lubricant has to be sealed away from the environment. Clean rooms, vacuum systems, food and drug processing, cyrogenics, and pressurized gases qualify. They're also useful for large diameter bearings.
These things look and work much like an electric motor. They're not that exotic.