LiftPort's scale model of a robot lifter successfully made its way up a tether at MIT's Cecil and Ida Green Building.
Credit: Tom Nugent/LiftPort
Posted on 11/17/2004 8:02:57 PM PST by Brett66
Space Elevator Climbs at MIT
It was one small climb for the space elevator last week at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge.
From high atop the roof of MIT’s Cecil and Ida Green Building, a tether was lowered to the ground as curious onlookers watched the display in suspended belief under snowy conditions.
A scale model of a robot lifter successfully made its way up the lengthy ribbon, under the watchful eye of Michael Laine, president and founder of LiftPort Incorporated. Based in Bremerton, Washington, LiftPort is a for-profit company devoted to the commercial development of an elevator to space. The lifter was designed by LiftPort's David Shoemaker.
LiftPort's scale model of a robot lifter successfully made its way up a tether at MIT's Cecil and Ida Green Building. Credit: Tom Nugent/LiftPort (Click to Enlarge)
A lifter is a robotic cargo and construction car, a key element of the space elevator mass transportation system that would stretch from an ocean platform up, up and way beyond geosynchronous orbit.
The event was part of SpaceVision 2004, hosted November 11-14 by the Students for the Exploration and Development of Space (SEDS) and the MIT Mars Society.
-- Leonard David
November 16
I think that's just amazing that I'll see such an advancement in my lifetime.
LiftPort's scale model of a robot lifter successfully made its way up a tether at MIT's Cecil and Ida Green Building.
Credit: Tom Nugent/LiftPort
Looks like a good start. Only 22,235 miles,4,280 feet more to go.
I think I read somewhere that they figured out how to make long strands of nanotubes a couple of months ago.
I know, it is just such an thinking outside the box idea. Who knows if it will work. Amazing to think about.
Wow, we made it 10 posts on a space elevator thread without some pants-wetter whining that it would be a terrorist target. Progress, I think.
I think it's commonly misunderstood to be a tower that stands under its own weight, rather than a tension wire that's pulled up into space. "Tower = target" is stuck in peoples' minds.
Where can I find more on these tests and where can I find these photos related to it?
It's not a tower. It's a ribbon under tension caused by outward centripetal force.
I only survived two years at MIT before I transferred out, so I don't know enough to know it won't work :-)
Thing about terrorism is that I can't think of anything easier to defend from terrorists than some platform out in the Pacific Ocean on the Equator.
Where does the idea fail?
And millions of bits of existing satelites to be removed from orbits below, that are statisticly certian to smack the tether at some time or other. Particularly since it doesn't just occupy a single point in an orbit, but is along a 22k+ mile line.
The question is more like, how many times will it be struck per hour.
It'll never be built, materials science improvements notwithstanding. This is just a science boondoggle, just like studying global warming. (come to think of it, I'd rather have them study this, because at least the raw science is constructive instead of destructive)
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