Project Orion. Worthy of a second look? - New Article at Spacedaily.

Adrian · 2003-03-18 04:34:31

Looking over the previous posts in this thread, I can't see that archie has done anything particularly objectionable. He could take a bit more of a diplomatic stance though. Indeed, according to Soph, he isn't that aggressive on other sites.

I looked at the IPs of Nuclearspace and SciAuthor, and they appear to be pretty different. Sure, there are ways to do this, but I have no reason to believe that they're the same person.

For the moment, I'm going to tell the two of you (Nuclearspace and Archie) to calm down and stop arguing. If I see a flamewar emerging, then people will be warned and then banned. It is trivially easy to ban people on this forum; older New Mars members will attest to this. While I don't like banning people, I'm more than prepared to do it if thing get out of hand.

So in other words, quit it. I don't want to hear *any* ad hominems, or *any* unfounded accusations. You guys can argue to your heart's content on Project Orion, but if it starts getting personal, then people will be banned. I'll be keeping a close watch on this thread and others, and I would like other New Mars members to message me if they see anything that I should take note of.

archiebald · 2003-03-18 06:07:53

Adrian,
Point taken. I will restrict my remarks to the political, technical, ecological and economic reasons why orion is an impossiblity.

BTW, Adrian just for your reference only first page 13th post Wayne did in fact admit that he is Sciauthor and NuclearSpace.

In fact I noted that there is already another thread running in "Interplanetary Transportation" also started by Wayne so I see no further need to post in this one.

Archie

Shaun Barrett · 2003-03-18 06:43:24

Going back about 4 days to Tim_Perdue's post (By the way, Tim is the fella who, upon learning of my Australian nationality, expressed his intention to try not to hold it against me. So far, he has shown admirable restraint but I don't know how much longer he can control his natural impulses! ).
:;):

Somewhere in New Mars, about 6 or 12 months ago, I posted about a very entertaining documentary I'd seen on TV. (I wish I knew now where that post is - I can't find the damned thing.)
Anyway, the point is that a craft driven by explosions can and does work. A research team in the late 50s / early 60s produced a working model (using conventional explosives of course! ) and filmed it flying to a very respectable height.
I think, from memory, that there were about a half dozen explosions and the miniature craft looked perfectly stable to me!
Werner von Braun saw the same film and, although he was extremely skeptical beforehand, became an instant convert to this mode of rocketry.

Putting aside the politics of nuclear power, I'm quite convinced that Orion is a perfectly feasible launch system. Naturally I'm wary of any system which utilises nuclear explosions in the atmosphere, for obvious reasons. But with the march of technology, I'm prepared to believe that sufficiently 'clean' nuclear devices can probably be developed. In any event, I'm prepared to look at the facts before making up my mind.

dicktice · 2003-03-18 08:38:02

Shaun: You're referring, I think, to Freeman Dyson's U.S. Navy experiments off Point Loma, San Diego, California, not long before I moved there to work for Convair (now General Dynamics) in 1951.... His book includes this launch scheme, what led up to it, and why it was discontinued. (I'll have to look it up for you.) Ii's fascinating, and he no slouch as a scientist/engineer (my favourite kind of person of either gender). Back with the title, if I succeed in Google-ing it.

[Later] Here is one book:

The True Story of the Atomic Spaceship, August 7, 2002
Reviewer: A reader from Atlanta, GA United States
Dyson, son of the distinguished British-born physicist Freeman Dyson, unveils a wealth of formerly classified information covering the attempt of a group of US scientists, beginning in 1957, to develop and launch a space vehicle powered solely by serial explosions of nuclear devices. The elder Dyson, who lends extensive personal perspectives here, was involved with the effort (sponsored by the Defense Department's hush-hush Advanced Research Projects Agency) from its inception; the list of its proponents reads like a roster of Nobel candidates, including one winner-the world-renowned atomic scientist Edward Teller. So it's made immediately clear that, as hard as it may be to accept, detonating nuclear bombs right behind a huge, bullet-shaped spaceship was, and still is, by some, considered not only a practical avenue of technical pursuit but one offering far more promise for extending man's horizon into the Solar System than those wimpy "chemical" rockets-the Atlases, Titans, etc.-that Wernher von Braun was simultaneously developing. (Briefed on Orion several years into the project, in fact, von Braun readily endorsed the concept.) Dyson's myriad interviews nicely capture the sweep of a grandiose technical scheme, but also the rapturous initial state of Orion scientists whose coup, as they see it, has them turning nuclear weapons into plowshares under the auspices-not to mention watchful eyes-of the same generals who want to back down the Soviet Union at any cost. However, political obstacles would become even more daunting than the considerable technical challenges, as small, fission-based devices (like those intended to boost Orion) came to be viewed in some circles as even more dangerous than megaton-yielding H-bombs (since military commanders might actually be tempted to use one). Ultimately, creeping realization that the potential effects of radioactive fallout had been dangerously understated for years undermined what support remained, and so Orion's budget was axed in 1964. An intimate look at an amazing concept some still believe offers the best hope for fending off-literally-an errant asteroid or comet that could wipe humankind from Earth.

Dyson's autobiographical book (my favourite to re-read over and over) is: "Disturbing the Universe."

Shaun Barrett · 2003-03-18 18:42:50

Yes indeedy, Dicktice!
Freeman Dyson was part of it, all right.

Thanks for looking that up for us!

I still think we should be looking seriously at how we might be able to utilise such a propulsion system to advance our space program. Imagine establishing a major Moon base in one launch?!! (And cheaply, too.)

Dingo1 · 2003-03-19 22:42:40

Archie, I will try and answer the questions you asked.

Anyhow, the questions.

1) Is this thing supposed to be a ground launch or orbital assembly?
This will be difficult. First off, there is no safe location to launch this from the ground. There is no country willing to be the launch site, as it would be eccological suicide. Even with very clean nuclear devices, fallout would be generated.
An orbital assembled Orion driven spacecraft would violate several international laws in regards to placing a nuclear weapon in space. Doing so, even for peaceful purposes, would be concidered by several countries as an act of war, and could trigger a surface based nuclear war.

2) If a ground launch, where do you propose to launch it from.
See the responce from answer one.

3) Give or take a few hundred tons, what is the expected mass of the Orion vehicle at take-off.
Ok, lets say someone accually built this thing. Due to the nessisary shielding to protect the crew from the nuclear explosions, we are looking at approx 10,000 tons minimal. for the ship itself, not including fuel. As this would be using fission devices, each device would need to be shielded from other devices due to the nature of uranium and plutonium. That will rase the mass by approx 1/2 ton per device. Using fusion devices is not possible with current technology. Due to the heat generated (15 million degree's at the heart of the explosion), it would easily melt the ship

4) If a ground launch, how many thermonuclear detonations will be required in the atmosphere.
Ground launch has already been ruled out due to eccological reasons

5) If a ground launch, what happens to all the communication satellites once this thing gets to high altitude as a result of EMP. See previous in regards to ground launches. Even an orbital launch, we would need to place the ship significantly away from the Earth. Even though most satilites are shielded for radiation. Several nearby ECM pulses will overload that shielding.

6) If an orbital launch, please state a reasonable time frame for development, design and construction based on experiences with the ISS.
Based on our experience with the ISS. We are talking at least 20 years of design and developement, as well as at least 10 years of construction time.

7) If an orbital launch, please give an approximate number of conventional chemical launches required to complete assembly based on current and near future launch vehicles.
The projected number of launches to build the ISS, is approximately 56. The ISS, as initially planned was to have a finished weight of 2000 tons. Based on those numbers we are looking at, at least 250 chemical launches. At those numbers, we could have sent several manned missions to Mars at a much cheaper cost.

Based on all of this information, for solar exploration, Orion is not a cost effective platform. Now there is a good reason to build one, and that would be for an Intersteller Colony ship. Due to the size of such a vehical, an Orion drive would be nessisary to provide enough thrust to activate a Barnard drive outside the solar system.

If we can build a lightweight/high radiation shielding module, the use of solar sails would be an excellent means of exploration within the solar system, as well as a reusable transport to Mars and back

Josh Cryer · 2003-03-20 02:35:55

Wayne, it's a bit late here, but I was wondering. What do you personally think of an Orion-type ground launch? I recall reading something on the nuclear space site about such a thing (I don't think it was written by you), but I found the EMP figures there to be, well, prohibitive.

BTW, I think you'd be better off just ignoring your stalkers, but if you disagree with their statements, or you think they're non-factual or whatever, it might be better to correct them with your own information, rather than tiresomely saying that they're stalking you, etc.

soph · 2003-03-20 19:20:27

But I don't see Orion offering us all that much more than a NTR for the buck, which has been built, tested, and much easier to make clean, without the infrastructure. You also aren't exploding anything, and have a reactor for powering your ship.

soph · 2003-03-20 19:33:01

NERVA, designed in the 60s, had a thrust of 250,000 lbs. If that's what they could get without designing it as a launch vehicle, I wonder what they could get to design it as a launch vehicle.

It would only take three of those to get 200 tonnes of cargo/mass to orbit.

Dingo1 · 2003-03-20 20:21:48

Ok, basicly if we could develope a super clean nuclear rocket engine, which from my understanding is what the Orion drive would need to be for a ground launch system, you are talking about sending something the size of a nuclear aircraft carrier into space.

Currently we have developed a possible vessal that would quallift at 15,000 tons. A modified nuclear submarine would fit the bill.

Some questions I have, deal with fuel storage, and substained nuclear pulse bursts..and most important cost. Uranium is a rare item, and very expensive to process into weapons grade. It is also very unstable substance.

Now personnelly I do not have a problem with nuclear powerplants in spaceships to provide heat, and energy for onboard systems.

What would the safety factors be. All rocket scientists will tell you that launching a vehical, is basicly having your payload on top of a barely controlled explosion. What would the results be if the Orion drive suffered a catastopic failure during a launch???

soph · 2003-03-20 20:23:51

This is what I like about NTRs, dingo.

NTRs are reactors that heat propellant and shoot it out. The exhaust could be made perfectly clean, and the reactor could be designed to be much, much less vulnerable to a catastrophic failure.

Dingo1 · 2003-03-20 21:25:23

I am interested in it. In order to develope something like the Orion drive, one must identify possible problems...so one can design it to overcome those problems.

In some ways it is difficult to create a nuclear explosion...That is because most weapons grade uranium contains contaminates that have to be overcome for it to reach critical mass. The less contaminiants, the clearner it is, but unfortunately the cleaner it is, the more dangerous of it going critical. What I am worried about is that these will have to be timed pulses, but the ECM pulse could create a situation that will cause the next device in line to premature detonation.

Now you notice I am concentrating on Uranium, and not Plutonium. That is due to plutonium being one of the most poisionous elements to work with, and it would be a huge mistake to use such a material in the event of a catastrophy.

Here is a question, how are we going to stabilize the launch?? Will we need to utitlize chemical rockets so that in the case of the payload shifting off-balance during launch, the main thrust will be directed downward??

Dingo1 · 2003-03-21 05:39:48

I did mean EMP, not ECM, that was a typo on my part.

One thing that has not been tested, is the effects of a multiple detonation (one right after the other in the same spot) so they are not sure if the second one would detonate inside the explosion of the first, which from my reading of Orion is required. Testing of that had been planned, but was cancelled when the nuclear testing was suspended.

I understand the basics of how to create the explosion, basicly use conventional explosives to compress the pieces of uranium past the critical mass limit, resulting in the explosion. Nuclear weapons designs is something that I do not know much about, because it is very complex to build devices so that they do not spontaniously explode, or achive "fizzle" status.

You have said that we would use hardened electronics and computers. What is the effects of the EMP on electronics very close to a nuclear explosion. My experience in the nuclear energy generation field, most of the maintenece done in a nuclear power plant is replacing electronic equipment due to long term exposure to radiation and EMP's that are constatly present, and this is hardened equipment.

I ask these questions because safety is a big concern of mine when dealing with nuclear devices

archiebald · 2003-03-21 19:57:34

More paranoia Wayne?,
Why not just answer the questions or provide a reasonable explanation dealing with the problems that Dingo has identified?

Phobos · 2003-03-21 20:43:33

It appears Adrian's warning against these pointless flamewars has gone unheeded. If you guys have a personal thing going on between you please feel free to take it elsewhere.

Palomar · 2003-03-21 21:07:00

It appears Adrian's warning against these pointless flamewars has gone unheeded. If you guys have a personal thing going on between you please feel free to take it elsewhere.

*I second Phobos.

--Cindy

soph · 2003-03-22 05:52:03

Nuclear bombs must have a certain critical mass. So, they can't be tiny, first of all. And explosions, and the resulting shockwaves, last more than "a milisecond."

A misfired bomb, too close to the ship, may generate enough force to detonate the other bombs. Bombs do go off by shock, which atomic weapons are not impervious to.

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#26 2003-03-18 04:34:31

Re: Project Orion. Worthy of a second look? - New Article at Spacedaily.

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Re: Project Orion. Worthy of a second look? - New Article at Spacedaily.

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Re: Project Orion. Worthy of a second look? - New Article at Spacedaily.

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