MARS and back in 2 days...

[Koen1]

I think there is more energy to be gotten from all the people
talking about crap like Lakovski coils and Leedskalin tests,
than there is in those "devices" themselves.

And I think it would be great to actually have a "warp" drive,
but to do so we must either create a very strong gravity field
ourselves which would probably royally mess up the mechanics of
our solar system, or we would have to wrap our ship in a
negative energy bubble, which so far is impossible.
Don't see many other ways of doing it without "transdimensional
shifting" into a "subspace" or "hyperspace" domain...

[utilitarian]

I think there is more energy to be gotten from all the people
talking about crap like Lakovski coils and Leedskalin tests,
than there is in those "devices" themselves.

And I think it would be great to actually have a "warp" drive,
but to do so we must either create a very strong gravity field
ourselves which would probably royally mess up the mechanics of
our solar system, or we would have to wrap our ship in a
negative energy bubble, which so far is impossible.
Don't see many other ways of doing it without "transdimensional
shifting" into a "subspace" or "hyperspace" domain...

Well the good news right now is that we do not really need faster than light travel to explore or colonize our own solar system, which is the next logical step for mankind.  Something faster than rockets would be great, and I think it's coming within this century.  But really, even the two months it takes to get to Mars is tolerable.  We just have to figure out a way to lower the costs of getting out of Earth's gravity.  Space elevator should help here, if we can get that going.  A similar space elevator on Mars, and then it's cake!

[hartiberlin]

Well,
why don?t they start the spaceshuttle without rockets first, but fly like a normal
plane so high, until the air is too thin, that they will not get higher ...

Then they finally could switch to rocket propulsion and lift the space shuttle the rest of the
few Kms into the space.

Would probably consume much lower fuel cost.
At least save the first stages of the rockets on the space shuttle...

[exxcomm0n]

Well,
why don?t they start the spaceshuttle without rockets first, but fly like a normal
plane so high, until the air is too thin, that they will not get higher ...

Then they finally could switch to rocket propulsion and lift the space shuttle the rest of the
few Kms into the space.

Would probably consume much lower fuel cost.
At least save the first stages of the rockets on the space shuttle...

Hi Stephan.

For the space shuttle to get into the atmosphere, it would have to use it's rear rocket nozzles for propulsion, even if it were flying like a plane instead of shooting like a rocket. Jet/rocket propulsion is all it's got.

It would still need a few big tanks to supply the rockets with hydrogen and oxygen for burn.

I do know that the shuttle HAS been piggy-backed (attached to the back of) to a 747 for testing and I always wondered why they just didn't launch that way, or using a Sikorsky crane helicopter  to get it into atmosphere.

All those big tanks you see attached to it on the rocket launch pad are fuel JUST TO GET IT OUT OF EARTHS GRAVITY!
I bet the big one could be done away with for a atmosphere launch

That's a lot of liquid hydrogen and oxygen.

Atmospheric launches just make sense vs. ground launches.

Good point.

[utilitarian]

Well,
why don?t they start the spaceshuttle without rockets first, but fly like a normal
plane so high, until the air is too thin, that they will not get higher ...

Then they finally could switch to rocket propulsion and lift the space shuttle the rest of the
few Kms into the space.

Would probably consume much lower fuel cost.
At least save the first stages of the rockets on the space shuttle...

Ah, now you are getting into rocket science!  I am no rocket scientist, but from what I remember, a combo jet/rocket booster module was actually on the drawing board.  I think it got scrapped because of the complexity and added weight of having to have two separate sets of engines and separate fuel sections.  Also, from what I understand, the added weight of oxygen (in liquid or solid form) does not add that much weight to the rocket, so having an all rocket booster module works out fairly well.

So, in a nutshell, rocket propulsion is still needed, and a pure rocket system worked out to be simpler and, I believe, more economical than a combo system.