The Perfect Spacecraft

[the_big_m_in_ok]

triffid said:

So maybe someone can figure out how to use some of that several thousand tons of sunlight pressure to shoot payloads into space?

A circular solar sail 8,000 miles in diameter wouldn't have the mass of the Earth, but it would be massive enough.
(I could figure the acceleration by paper and pencil for you, but there's not enough time on this computer.)

I'll assume, say, 1/100,000,000 of a 'G' at the Earth orbital radius.  Even if the specific area of the sail was 10,000 ft^2/ton in mass, just the sail should weigh quadrillions of tons.

--Lee

[TechStuf]

A simple Crooke's Radiometer adequately demonstrates that a high probability exists that the 'solar sail' can be dramatically improved upon....

TS

[triffid]

If a magnetic field or electric field could be generated from a small vessel(spaceship) that was hundreds of times larger than the craft.We would not need so much mass.Let the electric field or magnetic field interact with the sunlight.Consider this as an example:    .            the craft itself
                       ------------field
                             sun
So the first period is the spaceship itself.The dotted line represents the field and of course the word sun represents the sun.So the sunlight pushes on the magnetic or electric field.The field in turn is generated by the spaceship itself.I am assuming
there is an interaction of the photons with the field.I know of the interaction between particles from the sun and the earth's magnetic field.Its how we have the northen lights.Triffid

[triffid]

I will try again.
       .
------------
    sun





triffid

[the_big_m_in_ok]

triffid said:

If a magnetic field or electric field could be generated from a small vessel(spaceship) that was hundreds of times larger than the craft.

I think that's how a Bussard ramjet works.  It just scoops up hydrogen protons, electrons or ion to fuse together, thus powering the ship with excess energy.

We would not need so much mass.Let the electric field or magnetic field interact with the sunlight.Consider this as an example:             the craft itself                  .
                                           ------------field
                                                  sun
So the first period is the spaceship itself.The dotted line represents the field and of course the word sun represents the sun.So the sunlight pushes on the magnetic or electric field.The field in turn is generated by the spaceship itself.I am assuming there is an interaction of the photons with the field.I know of the interaction between particles from the sun and the earth's magnetic field.Its how we have the northen lights.Triffid

@all:
NOTE:
This post was edited slightly for visual clarity only, compared to the immediately following post.  None of triffid's words were changed, only punctuation.

@triffid:
I see what you're getting at.
Think of this:
I read in a scientific paper or magazine awhile ago that two magnetic stars or a giant planet with a large satellite having a dense magnet core will have there magnet fields interact to such an extent, they collide sooner that if they weren't so magnetic.
Have you heard of this?

Re-edit:
Sorry for the typos above(see the correctly editted post immediately above by triffid.)
I accidentally hit 'remove formatting' before I posted this, and you it's difficult to undo that, by my experience.


--Lee