SpaceX Is Building a Hyperloop Test Track

Jason Koebler reports that SpaceX is building a small-scale version of Elon Musk's hyperloop transport tube system, which can move cargo and people at speeds over 700 mph. The test track will be approximately one mile long, and its inner diameter will be between four and five feet. But while SpaceX is building the track, it's not going into full development mode. Instead, the company is turning it into a competition. Other organizations will be invited to build pods — the containers that move through the tubes — and test them inside the track. They say the competition will be geared toward university students and independent engineering teams. SpaceX expects the testing to happen next June, and they've published a document with details on the competition. They add, "The knowledge gained here will continue to be open-sourced."

Comments

Re:Reasons why I don't like Musk's hyper loop

[OzPeter]

The seats are actually quite roomy - check out the dimensions in the Hyperloop alpha document.

Claustrophobia has nothing to do with seat size. Imagine a failure mode where the power goes off, the screens die and all movement stops. And the only way to get out is someone on the outside with a power saw.

Yes, it does. Section 4.5.2. Same system as on an airplane.

And where do you think airplanes get their oxygen from? Its called the outside atmosphere. If a plane stops flying it descends to a lower height with a breathable atmosphere - something that the hyper loop can't do. And emergency oxygen in planes is predicated being able to descend to a safer level. So once the capsule stops the clock starts ticking until you run out of air. In this case the capsule is more comparable to a submarine than a plane.

It's two tubes, one for each direction. In the event of a long term outage, the one open tube can be periodically reversed to allow traffic in both directions, at a cost of throughput.

Still sucks to be stuck in the tube with the issues, and at 5 minute launch intervals, there will be a lot a of people in the same boat.

All capsules have mechanical braking systems and are spaced five minutes apart, automatically triggered in the event of an obstruction. They also all have powered wheels for low-speed travel. Section 3.5.2.

And the capsules are designed with a power budget that only covers the duration of the trip. They can't even accelerate to speed by themselves. Once they are stopped, the only way out is that worker with the power saw that I mentioned above.

It'd be nice if you'd read the document before complaining about the concept.

I did read the document several months ago when it was on here. I read it all in order to understand what it was about. And nowhere were any of these failure mechanisms addressed.

Re:Reasons why I don't like Musk's hyper loop

[OzPeter]

There's probably no way to do that safely.

To quote from the link you so kindly supplied:

oxygen production typically lasts at least 15 minutes

Do you want to speculate how long it will take to extract people from a hyper loop capsule?

Here, let me help you.
1. Time to locate the capsule
2. Time for the Hyperloop Emergency Extraction Team to respond.
3. Time transport man lifts to the location of the capsule at some arbitrary point between the start and finish location
4. Time to safely raise those man lifts to to the height of the pipe
5. Time to safely cut through the pipe and capsule.

I'd wager that it is a bit more than a standard aircraft emergency oxygen supply can hold out for - by at least an order of magnitude or two.

So you counter with "well make it bigger". And then I'll counter with "Here you are wanting to change the design so that the capsule carries more air than even needed for the transit of the trip itself. But the hyper loop capsule design was predicated on not having an internal air supply. If Musk couldn't make it work carrying its own air supply for the trip duration - how could he make it work when it needs to contain multiple times more air?" And so on.