It is not the speed it is the sudden stop at the end that’s a killer...
It still needs a HECKUVALOTTA testing before it can be shown to do any of these things.
In my opinion, this may turn out to be a turning point moment in science when old theory fall to new ideas. When the impossible and unexplained break our collective understanding and force us to reevaluate the “laws” of science.
But where will we get the dilythium crystals to run the thing?
At 62,500 miles per hour I bet it does a mean quarter mile!
Stopping and starting gonna hurt.
Better double those estimates. Arriving at Mars at several million miles an hour would hurt. You’d have to turn 180 degrees mid-way and decelerate.
I want a photon rocket... if it could get to Qom....
“It produces thrust by using solar power to generate multiple microwaves that move back and forth in an enclosed chamber.”
Wait! My house has solar panels AND I have multiple microwaves! If I hook them together and move them around, my little stucco palace can SOAR!
Sounds to me like the writer took the top theoretical speed of this engine and presumed that constant speed to the moon.
You would have to accelerate at a constant 3.7G (think that math is right) to reach the moon in 4 hours from a dead stop on Earth.
“It produces thrust by using solar power”
Doesn`t work at night at all.
Good luck, and thanks for all the fish.
The other ‘new’ approach is to use the solar wind. It produces a very little acceleration, but that acceleration continues to build up the velocity with time, to very high values, because there is no friction and air drag in space.
I’ve read about this before. I was unaware that they’d managed to get it to produce any large effects. If so, that’s bloody awesome. I doubt something like this can be used to escape the earth’s gravity well, but once out there, it opens up some interesting possibilities. Inter-solar exploration would be greatly enhanced if we had propulsive systems in our probes as well.
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I find this a little hard to believe.
But then, I ain’t no Rocket Surgeon, so I guess it could be.
Is this a spindizzy? I’m not going with Scranton PA.