Solar Plane Completes 24-Hour Flight

asukasoryu writes "An experimental solar-powered plane landed safely Thursday after completing its first 24-hour test flight, proving that the aircraft can collect enough energy from the sun during the day to stay aloft all night. The record feat completes seven years of planning and brings the Swiss-led project one step closer to its goal of circling the globe using only energy from the sun. The team will now set its sights on an Atlantic crossing, before attempting a round-the-world flight in 2013." We ran a story about the flight's departure yesterday.

Comments

Re:How about winter flight

[Molochi]

Semi-related to this (the power density bit). There was a design for small arms ammunition in the '90s that used an electrical heating element. The propellant was water flashed into superheated steam. I don't know what the momentum impulse energy would be for superheated steam, but the escaping vapor would at least be supersonic, making it an interesting idea for a renewable propellant.

Just find a source for more water (clouds) than you are using and you could stay up indefinitely. Heh, an "atmospheric bussard ramjet". OK probably not.

BTW, the ammo melted and expended its aluminum heating element to get the effect. So you'd need something that heated up to those temperatures without expending itself per pulse,like a ceramic casing around a molten core. I guess.

PS a quick search revealed the inventor to be Rusi Taleyarkhan (of Bubblegate infamy). Lol