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The possibilities of solar sailing the Inner Solar System still haven't been checked out yet....
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Checking for solar sail as high-speed, high-efficiency, leave-any-time-you want technology: checked. And lacking.
[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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The possibilities of solar sailing the Inner Solar System still haven't been checked out yet....
Actually, I was thinking more along the lines of fission powered or fusion powered space craft. Fission power would get the amount of fuel you need down to an acceptable level to make a trip to Mars where it need to be, but we would still be stuck with having to sling shot from Earth orbit to a Mars orbit and have to wait for that window to launch so we can make the trip either way. But, at least we would be heading in the right direction for repeatability and afordability. That would still not quit get us where we want to go.
But, for that we going to launch any time kind of space craft, we would have to develop either fusion or possibly anti-matter or something like that and at this point, it doesn't look like that going to happen. With a fusion powered space ship, if fusion power is possible, you would be able to accelerate you space craft at "G" and decerate it at "G". If that were possible, then you would be able to accelerate your space craft half way to Mars and decerate the other half way to Mars. Such a space ship would take only about three days to make the trip to Mars. It wouldn't make any difference where the Earth was to where Mars would be, because it a powered craft vs the ones that are using the sling shot method to get between Earth and Mars. In theory, that how it would work, but we don't know if it even possible to even do fusion power at all right now.
So fission power, is probably our best bet for right now.
Larry,
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Checking for solar sail as high-speed, high-efficiency, leave-any-time-you want technology: checked. And lacking.
So what else is new? The point was made that "it [is] never going to be efficient to go to Mars, because you have to use too much fuel to get there and then back to Earth." I disagreed with "never" and went on to stir the pot by mentioning the (not yet checked-out in situ) principle of light sailing. I never reject anything out of hand except religion, death, and taxes. By the way, did we ever resolve Gold's contention that light sailing using a perfect reflector can't possibly work? Is there still a thread where this could be taken up again?
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Checking for solar sail as high-speed, high-efficiency, leave-any-time-you want technology: checked. And lacking.
So what else is new? The point was made that "it [is] never going to be efficient to go to Mars, because you have to use too much fuel to get there and then back to Earth." I disagreed with "never" and went on to stir the pot by mentioning the (not yet checked-out in situ) principle of light sailing. I never reject anything out of hand except religion, death, and taxes. By the way, did we ever resolve Gold's contention that light sailing using a perfect reflector can't possibly work? Is there still a thread where this could be taken up again?
Unfortunately, GCNRevenger is absolutely correct about all known technologies that we now know that we could develop to power a Mars Space Ship. I said all known power system that we could build with present technologies that is. Baring the development of either fusion or anti-matter or some other exotic or new technology that currently doesn't exist or that we know about, then GCNRevenger is absolutely correct whether you like it or don't like it. It has absolutely nothing to do with your opinion or my opinion or even GCNRevenger, it a matter of physical principles that we are bound by use of present technologies at our disposal.
That why I personally support developing new technologies for going to Mars instead of using any current technology for traveling to Mars. Instead of fiddling around with any current technology for going to Mars, we should just bit the bullet and roll up our sleeve and get at developing new technologies for going to Mars. Yes, it would be a whole lot more expensive to get to Mars, but we would have the technologies for colonizing Mars once that technology has been developed.
We aren't going to be colonizing Mars with present technologies, because we are too technologically deficient to colonize Mars right now and we don't have the infrastructure in place to do the job.
Larry,
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Checking for solar sail as high-speed, high-efficiency, leave-any-time-you want technology: checked. And lacking.
So what else is new? The point was made that "it [is] never going to be efficient to go to Mars, because you have to use too much fuel to get there and then back to Earth." I disagreed with "never" and went on to stir the pot by mentioning the (not yet checked-out in situ) principle of light sailing. I never reject anything out of hand except religion, death, and taxes. By the way, did we ever resolve Gold's contention that light sailing using a perfect reflector can't possibly work? Is there still a thread where this could be taken up again?
If you never reject any idea regardless of its merits, then that pretty much makes you an irrational "feeelings not facts!!!!111!11!" sort of person. There are such things as truly bad ideas, which do not deserve unearned merit nor their author respect, much less insulation from ridicule for trying to get us to believe in such a bad idea to begin with. I seem to recall some crack about "open minds, empty heads" going together. But I digress...
The current technology for solar sailing is not good enough, and even hypothetical future technology would be firmly relegated to the "slow" category of technologies. Therefore it is entirely reasonable to reject this technology right now today this minute.
[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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The current technology for solar sailing is not good enough, and even hypothetical future technology would be firmly relegated to the "slow" category of technologies. Therefore it is entirely reasonable to reject this technology right now today this minute.
I agree there, and coupled with that I still can't help but think of solar sails as giant tissue paper in the face of meteors; heck the solar wind (and yes I'm aware solar sails have nothing to do with it) or radiation might have an effect on the plastic material.
I don't think it'd hurt to test the idea, after all we did that with ion engines, but like its xeon-powered counterpart I imagine even at best solar sails will only have a use for lightweight probes.
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No, there is no point in testing the technology, you miss the point entirely: we already know that it is not good enough for fast manned/heavy payload travel even within the inner solar system.
The numbers do not lie.
Now if all you want to do is push a sub-tonne probe with it, thats a whole different matter. If thats all it will be used for, fine, but talk of putting people on a sail to get to Mars quick is right out.
[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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