NASA's NEXT Ion Thruster Runs Five and a Half Years Nonstop To Set New Record

cylonlover writes "Last December, NASA's Evolutionary Xenon Thruster (NEXT) passed 43,000 hours of operation. But the advanced ion propulsion engine wasn't finished. On Monday, NASA announced that it has now operated for 48,000 hours, or five and a half years, setting a record for the longest test duration of any type of space propulsion system that will be hard to beat."

Comments

Re:Perfect analogy for NASA

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Would it be insufferably pedantic to mention Pioneer 10/11, Explorer 49, Mariner 10, Helios A/B(with Germany), Viking 1 and 2, Voyager 1 and 2, Pioneer Venus 1 and 2, ISEE-3(with EU), Magellan, Galileo, Hubble(with EU), Ulysses(with EU), Mars Observer, Clementine, WIND, NEAR Shoemaker, Mars Global Surveyor, Mars Pathfinder, ACE, Cassini-Huygens(with EU), Lunar Prospector, DS1, Stardust, Mars Odyssey, Genesis, Mars Exploration Rovers, MESSENGER, Deep Impact, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, New Horizons(in transit), STEREO, Pheonix, Dawn, Lunar Reconnaisance Orbiter, Solar Dynamics Observatory, Juno, GRAIL, Mars Science Laboratory, and Radiation Belt Storm Probes?

Sure, our man-in-a-can cred isn't what it used to be; but I, for one, welcome our robotic overlords.

1G of thust - you're gonna need a bigger boat

[Overzeetop]

1G of thrust would require, as you mentioned, almost 10m/s2 of acceleration, or your mass x 10 in Newtons.

NEXT produces 236 mN of thrust at 7kW of power

A typical terrestrial nuclear power plant will produce about 1 GW of power, or enough to power 143,000 of these engines. That would result in 33,700 Newtons of thrust, able to accelerate a spacecraft at 1G weighing 3433kg.

To put that into perspective, those (143,000) engines would burn 2860kg/hr in fuel alone.