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#76 2004-03-02 17:22:05

GCNRevenger
Member
From: Earth
Registered: 2003-10-14
Posts: 6,056

Re: Carbon nano tube straw for fuel transfer to space

No, that is not quite accurate. Any addition of gas at the bottom will only cause a pressure rise at the bottom, it will not force any signifigant quantity of gas out of the top. Again, a gas does not behave like a true liquid because it is mostly empty space. It is not like a garden hose where you can push water in one end and it comes out the other, the gas molecules will simply be compressed tighter together.

Back to my last post, about how gas molecule velocity determines if it can reach end of the tube or not. This does not change with pressure, this only changes with temperature. Simply adding more slow-moving molecules at the bottom with a pump will not change the miniscule average fraction that leave the tube; the vast majority will collapse back down and occupy some of the excess empty space of the original gas, hence raising pressure - not altitude.


[i]"The power of accurate observation is often called cynicism by those that do not have it." - George Bernard Shaw[/i]

[i]The glass is at 50% of capacity[/i]

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#77 2004-03-02 19:09:32

ERRORIST
Member
From: OXFORD ALABAMA
Registered: 2004-01-28
Posts: 1,182

Re: Carbon nano tube straw for fuel transfer to space

I agree if it was an enclosed system. However, it has a place to escape out the other end.The more molecules you add to the system the more the system pressure will increase. Thus, since it is open at the end, and that end is near a perfect vacuum in space, it will flow.

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