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Even at 300:1, I bet it wouldn't be storable. If it is that wildly exothermic, then the rate of recombination must be so low that it doesn't boil the fuel rapidly... and if it did, and the radical hydrogen concentration increased...
"boom"
Unless the stuff is volitile, in which case you will have to figure out if the gasseous radical hydrogen will recombine at a dangerous rate, or find a way to ventilate the boiloff. And if it is more volitile then the regular liquid hydrogen, it may leave solution too quickly and be a threat, or at least be useless.
And is it supposed to be made in bulk?
I agree that it is interesting, it would be the "magic" fuel needed to make Buck Rodgers' world a reality, and is probobly the most practical of the "Metastable" fuels... but the obsticles are awfully steep, and barring some breakthrough, is a pretty far-future concept.
I don't think that a great deal of money should be poured into it, and air-breathing engines would be a better investment.
Edit: Oh yes, and if you imbed the stuff in ultracold liquid Neon, then that will take a big bite out of its Isp wouldn't it? Though it might give you higher thrust, if it yeilds far lower impulse then conventional chemical comes out ahead.
Edit edit: If memory serves, there is a such thing as the H3 trimer, albeit very unstable. I wonder if you mix Hydrogen radical with liquid hydrogen, would this be produced? Is it easier to make? More stable? Would that change the thermodynamics perhaps? Would H3 trimers react, or would they diassociate into H2 and H radicals when heated? Would this disassociation be rapid enough?
Hmmmm... just intellectually speaking, very interesting. Unfortunatly not any more practical as far as I know.
[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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You might as well be bombarding a rod of metallic hydrogen with neutrons... The future is big cryogenic systems that make the Shuttle look like a paper plane.
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What about positively charging the inner fuel tank surfaces to deflect the H+.
After all it can't completely recombine if there are not enough electrons around.
But it will be difficult to completely seal off the fuel, so this is only another theoretic suggestion.
Edit: On second thought, I guess the H+ would recombine to H2+ ions, taking the electrons from the uncharged H2 and producing heat.
In this case there really doesn't seem to be anything you can do to stop the fuel from degrading and boiling off, unless you store pure H+. That would need very high voltage fields to store and a structurally very strong fuel tank to counter the pushing by the electrical force of the H+.
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That isn't the problem Fledi, this is NOT H+ protons in solution like you may be familiar with from highschool chemistry, these are neuteral Hydrogen radicals with one electron and no charge. Electrons in atoms tend to pair off and couple their spins as you may know, so two atoms with unpair electrons meet they will spontainiously combine to form the bound molecule (like H2), and this can be a very exothermic process. In the case of monoatomic hydrogen radicals, it is vastly more exothermic then plain old combustion with Oxygen, and without the weight of the Oxygen it is the most efficent theoretical chemical fuel that I know of. In fact, just as or even more efficent then any concieved nuclear engine, like GCNR, NSWR, or Orion depending on the concentration you could safely carry (H in H2).
Just how to make those radicals and keep them seperate and under control until you want them to combine... thats the trick. A trick that might not be possible to overcome, and definatly wouldn't be easy, which is why its not going to be practical for a while barring a breakthrough. Slushed Hydrogen spiked with nanoscale aluminum powder or magnesium burned in a Scramjet would be a more practical and bennefical near-term goal.
[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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Dont]http://space.com/adastra/adastra_mars_050802.html]Don't ask "Why bother?" Ask "What can I do?"
"We go big, or we don't go." - GCNRevenger
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Oh, thanks for the information GCN, I thought this whole thing with recombination was meant to be with some form of hydrogen plasma, where the electrons are separate, too (as happens when reaction temperatures get very high or during reentry).
I'm surprised there is any way that neutral hydrogen radicals can exist in large numbers and not spontaniously recombine.
Some time ago I did some calculations about the required mechanical strength of an electrically charged fuel tank containing protons, but found it is too difficult to solve with present day materials, certainly not within the weight margin of the tank if you want to lift it.
So I agree we will have to rely on some form of chemical engine to get us into orbit for the near future.
C M, this Kennedy style thinking is exactly what we need more of if we ever want to seriously continue advancing outward in space. None of us can be an expert everywhere but we can learn from each other and some day probably figure out something that brings us all forward to space.
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So I agree we will have to rely on some form of chemical engine to get us into orbit for the near future.
So why cant we depend on chemical Engines to slow us at Mars. Aerobraking is suicidal at best, and requires technological improvements. Chemical engine deceleration can be done now with what we have.
I see http://www.Redcolony.com are pushing some nice Mars Habitat artwork!
I suppose they will get a project underway before we do.
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So I agree we will have to rely on some form of chemical engine to get us into orbit for the near future.
So why cant we depend on chemical Engines to slow us at Mars. Aerobraking is suicidal at best, and requires technological improvements. Chemical engine deceleration can be done now with what we have.
I see http://www.Redcolony.com are pushing some nice Mars Habitat artwork!
I suppose they will get a project underway before we do.
I'm think you mean aero capture and not aerobreaking. I am pretty sure most mars probes use a limited amount of aerobreaking. Improving the mass fraction is always good and aroebreaking/aerocaputre is just one of many technologies that can be investigated to do that.
Dig into the [url=http://child-civilization.blogspot.com/2006/12/political-grab-bag.html]political grab bag[/url] at [url=http://child-civilization.blogspot.com/]Child Civilization[/url]
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Thanks for that reference to Red Colony! I was going to start a new topic on this but it seems you have everything covered here so I'll jump in here. Having read your various thoughts on this subject I wanted to ask my own questions for you. How many space advocates do you think there are in the world today? From this base of people do you think it's possible that we can work up our own privately funded mission? Much work is being done to research all the various aspects of a mission from the suits, rovers to habs and launchers. Instead of hoping on a few billionaires or rich corporations to pay for it all(and I think that can still happen), wouldn't it be better to have a fund raising campaign that reaches out to as many people as possible, and while we are doing that no doubt the billionaire types will start to look in on us? We don't need to reach the whole world. There are already millions of people with a growing interest in space topics and who dream of what might be, and its that market we need to tap in raising funds. It could be done if only we stopped being so small minded about it. What issues do you see that would need to worked out before such a mission could be funded and built? I can see that we are working on things already but the reason we don't have more support is that the general public don't have our level of interest and don't take us seriously. I'm not saying we do this but imagine this scenario- United space advocate groups announce their own campaign to launch humans to Mars within 20 years. They form various task forces to deal with all the issues in fund raising, technological requirements, political legislative issues, etc Just like President Bush's "Vision" so space advocate groups would have their own "Vision", clearly defined. NASA have already done the ground work. If space advocate groups think that small payload missions like Cosmos 1 are what we need for people to take us seriously then they will be waiting probably several more decades to even come close to thinking about going to Mars. The fact is we don't have the resources of NASA and it is always going to be a struggle to raise funds for small projects. Look at the MER mission. The technical challenges are immense and the money required is huge.
We cannot hope to immitate that. Instead of trying to build every single component from the ground up why don't we concentrate on getting the funds needed to aquire technologies that are already on the market no matter what country they are from? It could be a true international mission reflecting the diversity that exists in all our groups and nations. I have a feeling that ego and bragging rights(with all their technology demonstrator projects) seem to be more important to many space advocate groups than actually concentrating on going to Mars. It seems logical to go step by step, small missions first, then finally human missions. NASA have already done that work for us. If we spend our money and decades of time on this "step by step" process which NASA and others have already done, we will not get to Mars for probably 3 to 5 decades from now. I'm not saying that smaller payload missions and projects should not be done, especially if we are trying to rival NASA but is that what we are doing? Trying to build our own private NASA one day? Trying to prove that we have what it takes to become our own space power? The general public will never flock to this step by step program we have in the numbers we hope for. Why? because we are not giving them a vision, only small parts of it with no definite timeline. I might give my $50 to the Mars Society so they can continue their research into habs, mars suits, etc but what I and most people want to know is when are we planning on going? You might say that at present we cannot give a time to people for when we will go to Mars and that is just what turns them off. You might also say that it's unrealistic to set a date or timeline with our current lack of everything to make it happen. But this is where true pioneering boldness is required. For example, have you read this plan?-
http://www.marscolony.net/docs/simplymars.html
A simple plan to set up a permanent base on Mars. Could you imagine what effect it would have on the whole space program if something like this was successful? We know what obstacles are in front of us, we just have to decide to overcome them and actually go to Mars. Tell me your thoughts on all this.
welcome to [url=http://www.marsdrive.net]www.marsdrive.net[/url]
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Reduce costs by trading off time. E.g. send a lot of cargo via one of the slower methods that give higher payload fractions - maybe electromagnetic tether to get from LEO to a highly elliptical orbit. Then an ion engine to get to Mars tramsfer orbit, finishing with rockets and aerobraking and parachutes.
Use similar methods to get the crew's transit hab escaping from Earth - have the crew launch separately and rendezvous shortly before rockets are used to enter Mars transfer orbit. Have a small fueled lander sent ahead to a highly elliptical Mars orbit and have it rendezvous with the crew to take them down to Mars, while the transit hab continues on back to pass Earth.
By getting 80% of LEO mass to Mars, instead of maybe 20%, you could slash mission launch costs to 1/4th.
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A New Space Academy in Colorado Will Train Private-Industry Astronauts
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Space sector reacts to collapse of Silicon Valley Bank
https://spacenews.com/space-sector-reac … lley-bank/
Astra Space, BlackSky, Planet, Redwire, Rocket Lab and Space Perspective are among the companies that attracted investment or borrowed money from SVB
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Some more news on Commercial Alt Space and Private Tourism
Here’s what went wrong with Virgin Orbit
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/03/31/virgin- … wrong.html
Now, Virgin Orbit is on the brink of bankruptcy.
A time ago there was only Branson and Bezos...then Musk started to succeed. Others have grown and gained ground RocketLab, FireflyAerospace, Relativity Space, Astra and private companies are popping up in China.
Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2023-04-01 09:16:36)
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Rocket Lab sees itself as leader of the small launch industry
https://spacenews.com/rocket-lab-sees-i … -industry/
As other companies suffer technical or financial setbacks, Rocket Lab says it believes it is the leader in the small launch market with little competition.
How Architecture and Design on Earth Helps to Plan For Life on Mars
https://www.archdaily.com/1000446/how-a … fe-on-mars
micro-spaces, glass domes and 3D-printed constructions
Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2023-05-10 03:52:04)
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'Everyday Astronaut'
After applying for the mission, in 2022, Dodd was selected to participate in a lunar spaceflight as part of the dearMoon project crew.
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Third NASA Enabled Private Flight to Space Station Completes Safely
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IM-1 Odysseus lunar lander
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UhldAqwnBM
NASA to go to Mars with private help
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