New Plasma Rocket Can Shorten Mars Trip To 39 Days
75 replies, posted
[quote]Last Wednesday, the Ad Astra Rocket Company tested what is currently the most powerful plasma rocket in the world. As the Webster, Texas, company announced, the VASIMR VX-200 engine ran at 201 kilowatts in a vacuum chamber, passing the 200-kilowatt mark for the first time. The test also marks the first time that a small-scale prototype of the company's VASIMR (Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket) rocket engine has been demonstrated at full power.
"It's the most powerful plasma rocket in the world right now," says Franklin Chang-Diaz, former NASA astronaut and CEO of Ad Astra. The company has signed an agreement with NASA to test a 200-kilowatt VASIMR engine on the International Space Station (ISS) in 2013. The engine could provide periodic boosts to the ISS, which gradually drops in altitude due to atmospheric drag. ISS boosts are currently provided by spacecraft with conventional thrusters, which consume about 7.5 tonnes of propellant per year. By cutting this amount down to 0.3 tonnes, Chang-Diaz estimates that VASIMR could save NASA millions of dollars per year.
But Ad Astra has bigger plans for VASIMR, such as high-speed missions to Mars. A 10- to 20-megawatt VASIMR engine could propel human missions to Mars in just 39 days, whereas conventional rockets would take six months or more. The shorter the trip, the less time astronauts would be exposed to space radiation, which is a significant hurdle for Mars missions. VASIMR could also be adapted to handle the high payloads of robotic missions, though at slower speeds than lighter human missions.
Chang-Diaz has been working on the development of the VASIMR concept since 1979, before founding Ad Astra in 2005 to further develop the project. The technology uses radio waves to heat gases such as hydrogen, argon, and neon, creating hot plasma. Magnetic fields force the charged plasma out the back of the engine, producing thrust in the opposite direction. Due to the high velocity that this method achieves, less fuel is required than in conventional engines. In addition, VASIMR has no physical electrodes in contact with the plasma, prolonging the engine's lifetime and enabling a higher power density than in other designs.[/quote]
Source [url]http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=5a7_1255323536[/url]
This is a big step forward considering that it takes at least 6 months witht the older rockets.
More effective and cost efficient?
Things are looking brighter for both the private aerospace industry and space travel.
It takes 6 months with our current rockets... it even says in the fucking article...
Also even if rocket technology was able to accelerate us to light speed in a instant, the main issue is doing so safely. If you accelerate to fast you're going to become a human soup against whatever you're sitting against.
Hurray for USA
"Plasma rocket" sounds like something out of Star Trek.
This is old news.. Kinda.
[QUOTE=darkrei9n;24012696]It takes 6 months with our current rockets... it even says in the fucking article...[/QUOTE]
woops pressed the wrong button
:science:
[QUOTE=darkrei9n;24012696]It takes 6 months with our current rockets... it even says in the fucking article...[/QUOTE]
Oh you were replying to something he said
nvm
As engines get faster and faster we will eventualy reach light speed.
And that means hawkins will be happy (if he will be still alive)
[editline]05:22PM[/editline]
[QUOTE=BaconDioxide;24012805]And?
That's our conventional rockets we're using right now. This is the new type of rocket that will go faster. What's your point?[/QUOTE]
yeah i pressed the wrong button and commented that it takes 9 months
he was pointing out my mystake.
Oh yeah, also six months or more, so six months is the minimum.
I'll be happy when they dabble in nuclear fission fragment rockets
[QUOTE=Evald;24012818]yeah i pressed the wrong button and commented that it takes 9 months
he was pointing out my mystake.
Oh yeah, also six months or more, so six months is the minimum.[/QUOTE]
Oh yeah, missed that. derp
I'm waiting for reactionless space drives.
..didn't we see this last year..?
Cool. Now I want my Plasma rifles please.
Sounds like VASIMR's kicked it up a notch. But like darkrei9n said, the main issue is the rate of acceleration transforming the human occupants into minestrone. The occupants would require something like a grav-tank that lessens the effects of the acceleration on living tissues, most likely filled with water or something thicker than air, since there's more drag in water than in air. But would this have either a positive or negative effect?
[QUOTE=Evald;24012604]Source [url]http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=5a7_1255323536[/url]
This is a big step forward considering that it takes at least 6 months witht the older rockets.[/QUOTE]
The VASIMR is over a decade old...
[QUOTE=bravehat;24013042]The VASIMR is over a decade old...[/QUOTE]
You missed the fact were this is a new model, it has been created and fully researched.
Also, somethign interesting from wikipedia
[quote]VASIMR
VASIMR, or Variable specific impulse magnetoplasma rocket, works by using radio waves to ionize a propellant into a plasma and then a magnetic field to accelerate the plasma out of the back of the rocket engine to generate thrust. The VASIMIR is currently being developed by the private company Ad Astra Rocket, headquartered in Houston, TX with some help from a NS Canada based company Nautel, producing the 200Kw RF generators for ionizing propellant. Some of the components and "Plasma Shoots" experiments are tested in a laboratory settled in Liberia, Costa Rica. This project is led by former NASA astronaut Dr. Franklin Chang-Díaz (CRC-USA). [b]Recently[/b] the Costa Rican Aerospace Alliance announced the cooperation to this project by developing an exterior support device for the VASIMIR to be fitted in the exterior of the ISS (International Space Station), as part of the plan to test the VASIMIR in space, this test phase is expected to be conducted in 2012. [b]The engine VF-200 could reduce the duration of flight from earth to e.g. Jupiter or Saturn from six years to fourteen months.[/b][/quote]
Sign me up
[QUOTE=ironman17;24013037]Sounds like VASIMR's kicked it up a notch. But like darkrei9n said, the main issue is the rate of acceleration transforming the human occupants into minestrone. The occupants would require something like a grav-tank that lessens the effects of the acceleration on living tissues, most likely filled with water or something thicker than air, since there's more drag in water than in air. But would this have either a positive or negative effect?[/QUOTE]
Like a giant Damper behind the crew compartment, not sure if that would work, might just delay the acceleration, unless you controlled it correctly so that might work.
Also the VASIMR has the added bonus of enveloping the crew compartment with a magnetic field so less harmful cosmic radiation :science:
[QUOTE]The engine VF-200 could reduce the duration of flight from earth to e.g. Jupiter or Saturn from six years to fourteen months.[/QUOTE]
...someone use the new figures to work out how long it would take to get to Gliese 581 D
And the Cost Ricans have a space agency? cool didn't know that :v:
I don't even think NASA is going for new rocket engines, I think they're focusing on preventing G forces, if you do that then you could do whatever the hell you wanted in space. If we did not have that as a issue space travel would become so much quicker because we would not have to spend so much time accelerating and decelerating so slowly.
Just one question: how cool will it look from Earth on a cloudless night? I *basically* get how it works, but how will it look/sound?
And yeah; it's not the fall/crash that kills you, it's the sudden deceleration.
[QUOTE=bravehat;24013185]...someone use the new figures to work out how long it would take to get to Gliese 581 D[/QUOTE]
Probably still a long fucking time.
[editline]06:42PM[/editline]
It all depends on how long you can acclerate for though.
[QUOTE=ironman17;24013037]Sounds like VASIMR's kicked it up a notch. But like darkrei9n said, the main issue is the rate of acceleration transforming the human occupants into minestrone. The occupants would require something like a grav-tank that lessens the effects of the acceleration on living tissues, most likely filled with water or something thicker than air, since there's more drag in water than in air. But would this have either a positive or negative effect?[/QUOTE]
I thought the power of plasma rockets was that it slowly accelerates to super high speeds.
[QUOTE=Maxaxle;24013220]Just one question: how cool will it look from Earth on a cloudless night? I *basically* get how it works, but how will it look/sound?[/QUOTE]
you might see a very very very faint light in the sky where the ship is and that's it
and you wont be able to hear it because it's in space, and it can't be used for space launches from earth because VASIMR rockets don't work in the atmosphere of a planet, they're strictly for taking a craft from one celestial object to another
[editline]11:52AM[/editline]
[QUOTE=bravehat;24013185]...someone use the new figures to work out how long it would take to get to Gliese 581 D[/QUOTE]
well, i think VASIMR travels at about 21 km/s (light travels at around 297,000 km/s) so let's try this out in wolfram alpha:
[url]http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=earth+to+Gliese+581+D+at+21+km%2Fs&asynchronous=false&equal=Submit[/url]
291745 years!!
[QUOTE=Maxaxle;24013220]Just one question: how cool will it look from Earth on a cloudless night? I *basically* get how it works, but how will it look/sound?
And yeah; it's not the fall/crash that kills you, it's the sudden deceleration.[/QUOTE]
It will look like a ball of plasma stretching out from an engine.
And it won't sound like anything cause there's no medium in space for sound to vibrate/propogate through.
[QUOTE=sami-pso;24013283]I thought the power of plasma rockets was that it slowly accelerates to super high speeds.[/QUOTE]
This is what I heard too, plasma rockets require nothing but one reactant gas and electricity to burn, so it can burn for a much longer time while carrying a much smaller mass of fuel. This allows it to reach much higher speeds.
For the people that wonder what it looks like. Check out the video in the source.
Cool.
If it wasn't because anyone sitting in it will [B]die[/B] a somewhat painful death.
This is awesome.
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